On July 11, 2025, Google sent out an extremely confusing email titled “Local Services Customer Reviews are now fully managed by Google Business Profile”.
The email says “Local Services Customer Reviews are now managed by Google Business Profile, rating and review counts may change.”
What Does This Mean?
Local Services Ads (LSA) used to display reviews left to business’s Google Business Profile (GBP) and reviews left to the LSA profile.
Moving forward, Google is doing away with LSA reviews. LSA profiles will simply display the associated GBP reviews.
Why Did Google Change This?
Very few business owners were aware you could obtain LSA reviews, and even fewer users left LSA reviews.
Then in competitive niches, such as Personal Injury Attorneys, some law firms were purchasing massive amounts of LSA reviews because review count and review recency is a factor in LSA ad rankings.
I have had many interactions and published several articles calling for Google to end LSA reviews, dating back nearly 4 years. It is a good move, and long, long overdue.
Finally, aside from the idea being terrible, and the spam problems, some businesses, such as law firms, aren’t able to as for a review for many years after the first interaction. LSA was originally build for home service providers, and LSA reviews sort of made a little bit of sense for that, otherwise, they were just a dumpster fire.
