Advertising or promoting competitors

Reviews that exist primarily to promote a competing business, link to alternatives, or advertise services violate Google's content policy.

What Google says

“Maps user-contributed content is not meant for advertising, promotional, or commercial purposes. We don't allow content that contains: solicitation, contact information that diverts users away from the business reviewed, or promotional links.”

See Google's full content policy hub

Qualifies for removal

→Review says 'go to [competitor].com instead'
→Review contains a phone number for a different business
→Review primarily exists to drive traffic elsewhere

Does NOT qualify

→Customer mentioning they switched to a different provider (just a fact)

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The other policy categories

Reviews from people who were never customers Harassment and hate speech Conflict of interest Off-topic content Personal information in a review Impersonation and misrepresented identity Factually false claims Restricted and illegal content

Full breakdown: Google review policy violations explained · remove fake Google reviews · straight answers · by industry