Latest / Orthodontic Products Podcast / How Google’s AI Is Changing Online Visibility for Orthodontic Practices

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How Google’s AI Is Changing Online Visibility for Orthodontic Practices · Orthodontic Products Podcast

• Alison Werner (00:05) Hello and welcome to the orthodontic products podcast. I'm your host, Alison Warner. On today's episode, we're going to talk about how Google's AI algorithm updates and security measures are reshaping the digital landscape for local businesses. With AI now playing a bigger role in organic search, Google business profiles and Google ads, it's crucial for orthodontic practices to understand how these changes impact visibility, authenticity and patient engagement. With us to break this down, break down this issue and discuss the pros and cons of the new Google AI landscape Mary Kay Miller (00:05) So, thank Alison Werner (00:32) Mary Kay Miller. With over 40 years of experience in orthodontic marketing, Mary Kay is the CEO and owner of Kaleidoscope, a digital marketing agency specializing in the orthodontic industry. Before founding Orthopreneur Internet Marketing in 2006, she spent 25 years as a business and marketing coordinator in private practice. Orthopreneur merged with Kaleidoscope in 2021, which expanded its services to help practices maximize online visibility. Mary Kay is a sought after speaker and she has lectured at major industry events, including the AAO, and has contributed articles to many publications, including our own. And we are very happy to have with her with us today with her deep industry knowledge and expertise in the field of orthodontic marketing. I know she can really bring something to this conversation and have us better understand the Google AI landscape. So Mary Kay, thank you for joining me today. Mary Kay Miller (01:19) Thank you for having me, Alison. I really appreciate it because I feel that with all the changes that have been going on in the past year, many doctors, their practices and the marketing teams don't fully understand the scope of what's going on. And, you know, it's amazing to me, you know, what's going on, you know, in the landscape today. So again, I appreciate you inviting me on to do this. So what I want to start out with is exactly what's going on with Google and AI. And approximately a year ago, Google, in its infinite wisdom, and a lot of us are aware of the fact that they started mass layoffs. And one of the reasons for all these layoffs was AI was taking over the algorithm and aspects of their online services, which includes the algorithm. Alison Werner (01:53) Mm-hmm. Yeah. Mary Kay Miller (02:17) the ads algorithm and especially the Google business profile which is now the Gold Coast where people go today when searching out the services of an orthodontist. It's like your orthodontic Amazon. And in the past people used to look more for the websites in organic search down below which is where they had confidence in those areas. Alison Werner (02:27) Mm-hmm. Okay. Mary Kay Miller (02:45) where they felt was a good representation of a practice, but now they're up in that map area. And a lot of this has to do with the reviews where they can actually go on, figure out what's going on and research practices. Now, a lot of this occurred because of COVID. While everyone was quarantined home and looking for services, they realized that they could search for professional Alison Werner (03:03) Okay. Mary Kay Miller (03:13) health care providers, which normally they didn't do in the past. They used to depend upon word of mouth, general dental referrals, what's going on in the community, but more so than ever today, they have shifted, especially the millennials in Gen Z to these different areas getting more information. What this podcast is going to target today is what's going on with Google and AI. Alison Werner (03:19) Hmm. Yeah. Mary Kay Miller (03:42) This, you know, it's a completely different topic when we get into all the different online digital pieces that, you know, consumers today are looking at when searching for an orthodontist. But what happened with Google is when AI took over, and remember, AI is a computer. And when all these layoffs occurred, one of the biggest issues we had as a web agency is we no longer could call in. and explain to a rep, this is an error. Take a snapshot and go, okay, this is what it is. This is over here. There's no reason why this couldn't be corrected. And they would agree. And then they would manually make these changes because web agencies had different accesses than the general consumer. Well, that's no longer true today because AI is managing it. It's a computer and you can't call AI. Alison Werner (04:31) Right. Mary Kay Miller (04:39) So when we're seeing these issues, and some of them are major, two weeks ago I had a practice on the East Coast. A patient came in and said, why can't, why don't you have a map for your business? I wanted to call into the office and I couldn't find a map. And he goes, what are you talking about? And you know, most practices, they don't go in and research whether or not everything is showing correct on the internet. They're busy, they're seeing patients, and it's not high on their radar. Alison Werner (04:57) Mm-hmm. Yeah. Mary Kay Miller (05:10) You know, it's something that I'm always asking them to do if they don't have monthly monitoring SEO services. But you know, many doctors just don't feel it's necessary. So what happened was is he went in and he looked and his map and over 200 reviews was gone, completely nowhere to be found. So he contacted me and he said, you know, what happened? And I'm going, when was the last time you checked? Alison Werner (05:30) Okay. Mary Kay Miller (05:39) And he says, I don't know. Alison Werner (05:42) Yeah. Mary Kay Miller (05:43) You know, was a client, loved him dearly. I've had him as a client for over 10 years, but all he was interested in was a website. didn't want peripheral services. He just wanted, you know, us to take care of, you know, bare bones internet marketing. But what happened was, is, you know, we went in on the back end and everything had disappeared. Alison Werner (05:58) Yeah. Okay. Mary Kay Miller (06:06) And I said to him, did you receive any notification from Google that they were questioning your validity as a practice? And he's going, I don't know. He didn't even know how to log into the back end. So what's happening now is based on the 2016 elections years ago, if we go back, you'll remember that everyone was up in the arms about fake news. Alison Werner (06:20) okay. Yeah. Mary Kay Miller (06:35) Google and Facebook were pulled in front of Congress because there was no security. Anyone, whether they had a business or not, could set up a local business map setup, even if they didn't have a storefront, because they weren't verifying any of this. Well, now Google has taken it very seriously and they are verifying all of the information across the country for any small business. Alison Werner (06:49) Okay. Okay. Mary Kay Miller (07:03) And what's happened is if the information that is on the front of your maps listing does not 100 % match what's on the internet and also including state corporate records matching the general dental, MPC dental network. the, if there's any confusion in this, Google sending out an email through that Google business profile area and saying, you know, we want to verify your business. Alison Werner (07:23) Mm-hmm. Okay. Mary Kay Miller (07:33) And this isn't just for young doctors, startups, and someone that's transitioned their practice to a new name. The first time we encountered this was almost a year ago where we had a practice. For example, her legal name was Smith Orthodontic Associates, but on the map she had Smith Orthodontics, which did not match her legal business name. Alison Werner (07:53) Mm-hmm. Okay, because I was going to ask how in the weeds are they getting with the discrepancies? Because I've seen practices where on one version, I'll see the name like Smith orthodontics and another I'll see orthodontic smiles or something like there's a difference. Okay. Mary Kay Miller (08:16) Exactly. And what's happening now is Google is dropping the ranking in the maps area. If your brand does not match, you're losing your map. And in some instances, you're losing your map altogether. Now, this one particular practice that I'm talking about that happened a couple of weeks ago, his legal business name was his doctor professional name. But years ago, we switched the map to have Smith Orthodontics because for SEO purposes it brought him up into the number one spot. And I had mentioned to him, please make sure you get a DBA in the state of Massachusetts that goes with your corporation. And he never did it. He said, you know, he didn't want to go through the hassle. Alison Werner (09:10) Yeah, yeah. Mary Kay Miller (09:11) So what happened was, is AI, who is a computer, and it's learning quickly, it didn't used to go through all these as fast as it is now, it's law discrepancy. And it's asking, if Google, and Google never calls an office, it never text messages, anyone calling the office or text messaging is a third party vendor looking for a sales call. Alison Werner (09:21) Mm-hmm. Right. Mary Kay Miller (09:37) but it will send an email through the email address tied to your Google Business Profile login. And it will say, want to verify your business. And it will ask for articles of incorporation. It will ask for a DBA and a driver's license of the doctor. Now, on the first instance that I mentioned, which was Smith Orthodontic Associates, she got her back up and said this was none of Google's business. And I can understand who wants to give out legal paperwork to Google. But when she did not send the correct paperwork and she did not meet the paperwork within the guidelines that they set for her, because they don't give you a lot of time to give this information, because they don't want to give you enough time to go apply for it. Alison Werner (10:07) Mm-hmm. Yeah. Yeah. Mary Kay Miller (10:27) yeah, it's, you know, yeah, they got it all timed. And Google, if you don't meet that timeline, you're done. You know, you can't go back and say, well, I was busy or I just didn't get to it. First of all, you can't call anyone and you were given a timeline and it also has to be set in the format requested because AI reads a PDF. AI doesn't read a JPEG. Alison Werner (10:31) Okay. Huh? Right? Mary Kay Miller (10:53) You know, so if they ask it for a PDF format, you better send it in the format that they want. So what happened was she sent, you know, a legal document, but was not the legal documents that they requested that was not as sensitive and go. She lost her entire map and over 200 reviews. And we, you know, and this was the first time we had seen this. So she contacted us. Alison Werner (11:01) Okay. Mary Kay Miller (11:22) You know, she was a client of ours and she said, I got this notification and this is what I've done. And I said, well, why didn't you give them what they wanted? And she said, because it's none of their business. And so what happened was, is we got out, we found a forum for web agencies and we went on there and we found somebody that said, you know, this doesn't seem right. You know, it's really, they shouldn't have asked this to begin with. He's saying, okay, the associate wasn't on there, but it was pretty close. Alison Werner (11:44) Yeah. Right? Mary Kay Miller (11:53) He got back to us in about three weeks and he said, they won't budge. You've lost your map. So fortunately, she had a doctor listing that came up in an algorithm update where we took it and we changed the personal one to her business name and we had to reactivate her map. But she lost all of her reviews and she started from scratch. So these are the types of things that if you're caught up in this and you know, Alison Werner (12:19) Okay. Mary Kay Miller (12:22) I want to make it clear that the vast majority of practices are not having an issue with this. But if you are one of these and you're not checking that email and you're not paying attention to what's going on, your most important piece of online marketing is that map area in those reviews. And if you lose that, you know, there's no way to track loss production because people didn't find you. You can't. Alison Werner (12:28) Mm-hmm. Yeah. Yeah. Mary Kay Miller (12:51) determined, you know, okay, I lost this hundreds of thousands of dollars because my map is gone. And when all is said and done, Google doesn't care. You know, Google is very pro consumer, in my opinion, anti small business. And, you know, you follow their rules. And if you don't follow their rules, there are penalties and more so today than ever before, because AI is now managing this. Alison Werner (12:57) Mm-hmm. Right. Mary Kay Miller (13:21) Now there's many positive issues to this AI with Google, but today's conversation is about what if you get caught up in this and what are you going to do? And as far as Google ads, Google announced over two years ago that if you want to run an ad on Google, you have to be verified and you better be prepared with your articles of incorporation, the correct DBA and your driver's license. Alison Werner (13:25) Okay. Right. Okay. Okay. Mary Kay Miller (13:50) Now we've had instances with startups where they didn't update their address to the new business address because they did their corporation when they were still in school. Alison Werner (14:04) Okay. Mary Kay Miller (14:05) And then Google, we had one client, Google looked at the address and, know, at the time, you know, we're talking an orthodontic resident that was living in kind of like a slum area. You know, they can't afford anything and it just immediately denied. And of course, the clients up and are, what do mean they denied me? And then when, you know, well, you submitted paperwork that didn't match. Alison Werner (14:16) You Yeah. Mary Kay Miller (14:32) You know, and this was early on when we were figuring all this out. So one of the first things I do, even before these startups, or if you bought a practice and you're changing a business name, the first thing we go through is please, articles of incorporation, make sure your addresses are updated. Make sure all your addresses on the dental databases are updated, because we can't do that. These are things that they need to do. Because again, Google's a computer. It just runs through real quickly. Think of the internet as a great big huge spreadsheet and your online brand in the eyes of Google and Bing is your name, your address, your phone number. That's it. That's all they care about. Your name, your address, phone number. And if there's any deviation from that in all your different pieces of online marketing, it causes confusion to a computer and then it just takes you out of those areas. Alison Werner (15:06) Mm-hmm. to To what degree of a difference between, like, we talking like spelling out boulevard to abbreviating it? Or how in the weeds are we getting here? Mary Kay Miller (15:43) It doesn't quite get that much in the weeds with the boulevard. It will ask you, do you want this? But I haven't found that that's so much of an issue. It can be an issue with the suite number because there's many professional buildings that have suite numbers. They want to see these suite numbers. But say, for example, your Google Business profile has a suite number. Alison Werner (15:46) Okay. Okay. Okay. Mm-hmm. Mary Kay Miller (16:10) And Bing doesn't have a suite number, it's not that critical, but what many business owners don't understand is Google and Bing are search engines. They are not local databases that Google and Bing reference for accurate information. They're not top aggregators that supply the information to the search engines. And if that information on these aggregators and databases does not match what's on the Google Business Profile, you're penalized. Okay, so this oftentimes is you'll have someone that will, know, a doctor's retiring, they went in and they bought the practice and they go in and they change the name on the Google Business Profile, but they didn't notify the internet of the new name or that it's under a new owner. So... Alison Werner (16:40) Mm-hmm. and they didn't submit the new paperwork either. Mary Kay Miller (17:02) Oh yeah, it's, you know, this is not something easy, easily done. And it takes anywhere from three to four months to get it all updated. I mean, it's not something, okay, I went in and I did this and it's instantaneous across the internet. takes time. And then you risk losing. So you buy a practice and you're going great. You know, it looks great on the internet and here it is. And I'm just going to change the name. And then all of a sudden, bang, it's gone. But nine times out of 10, when a Alison Werner (17:12) Yeah. Right. Mary Kay Miller (17:32) practice, you know, you know, kaleidoscope specializes in this, a practice will come to us and say, why did I disappear in the maps? And we do an audit. And the first thing that comes up, did you ever move? Did you change your address? Did you change your name? Did you buy a location and add it in? They go, yeah. And I said, Alison Werner (17:52) Okay, because I was gonna ask what happens if you added a location. Mary Kay Miller (17:56) you've got to notify the internet you added the location. Now, one of the things that we noticed recently, and I'm sure many of you are aware of the fact that, you know, three to four weeks ago, there was an update in the maps and doctors and small businesses all over the country were up in arms because reviews were lost. And these reviews are hard earned. And there was a bug, a major bug in the algorithm. and businesses were just up in arms. You got to fix this. You you took our reviews away. But there was a two piece problem with all this. One of the Google guidelines for reviews, and I've been telling practices this for long as I can remember, and some apply and some don't. You cannot run a contest for reviews. It's against Google guidelines. Alison Werner (18:29) Mm-hmm. Okay. Mary Kay Miller (18:53) So the way Google can see this is they will see a spike in reviews, meaning, OK, you run a contest for eight weeks and all of a sudden you get 50 to 100 reviews. And then it goes back down again where you're getting maybe one or two reviews a month. When Google sees this and the spike in reviews with this last algorithm update, they just went through and wiped out hundreds of reviews depending where they saw the spikes. Alison Werner (19:02) Okay. Okay, yeah. And this is because the AI can now track this stuff better. Mary Kay Miller (19:22) They're gone. Permanently gone. than they could ever before. AI just goes in there and it sees it boom boom gone. Now on top of that because there was a bug in this update, legitimate reviews were also lost and you know again because everyone was up in arms they acknowledged online that there was a bug in the software and that they were addressing it. They could see the reviews on the back end of the Google Business Profiles. They just weren't showing up front and they were attempting to correct this to get them on the front. Now, some got some of the reviews back. A lot of them didn't get all of them back. If you did get them back, you're lucky. I also, we're having, because our clients are all over the country, there's certain areas of the country that weren't as hard as others. Which, you know, doesn't make sense, but you have to understand that when Google rolls out an update, it just doesn't do everything all at once. It does it by area. Okay, so, you know, there's a lot of nuances that, you know, go with all this. But what concerned me even more... Alison Werner (20:29) Okay. Mary Kay Miller (20:38) is we offer monthly SEO monitoring service where we actually manually go in the back end of the Google business profiles because we're always seeing playing games on the back end. And we actually go in and look versus relying on a piece of software that if that software wasn't updated for recent algorithm update, you don't always see what you need to do. So the best way to do is just put eyes on it. Alison Werner (20:52) Mm-hmm. Yeah. Right. Yeah. Mary Kay Miller (21:06) And what we found with all our clients, 30 % of them, which is a very high percent, had other issues that occurred besides these loss of reviews. Because of this update and what we did was we went through, we knew what we had done on these back ends because we monitor it and we have built it. What surprised me the most Alison Werner (21:17) because of this update. Mary Kay Miller (21:33) And on the SEO forums that we're always on, learning the different things that keep us up to date on what's going on, we never thought that the website was as tied directly to the Google Business Profile as it is now because of AI. So what happened was, if a client went in and changed the hours on their Google Business Profile area, but didn't notify us as a web vendor to update the hours on the website, Google stripped the hours off the website and updated the Google business profile to match the website. So doctors were calling in, know, our hours aren't right. What happened? Plus many doctors that didn't call in, our team went in and looked and we saw because Google on the back end told us exactly what they changed. And we saw all these hours that were being changed. And then we had to contact them. What's correct? Alison Werner (22:15) Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Okay. Mary Kay Miller (22:33) the map or the website. Because we don't know, you know, if the doctors aren't communicating with us. Now they can change the hours themselves. You know, we use WordPress and everyone is trained on how to edit if they choose and they just let us know. But a lot of them going, who cares about the website? Let's just take the map. The other thing that was missing is Google moved the pins, you know, the little pins that people click in the map for directions. Alison Werner (22:34) Yeah. Right. Mm-hmm. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Mary Kay Miller (23:02) some of them they moved the pins and the pins were no longer accurate. So, you know, we're in there looking at the pins and we had to know a pin moved and we're going, you know, we're notifying the doctor, is this accurate? Isn't it? You know, we don't know, we're assuming, but you know, many practices weren't checking this and it, what we're thinking happened was, is these pins probably weren't Alison Werner (23:04) Okay. okay. Yay. Mary Kay Miller (23:31) as accurate as they should have been in the past and then they moved to where they thought it is more accurate because you know this was part of the update. But one of the issues that we're running into is if you with this most recent update if you change your business name, your address, your phone number or your category you know orthodontist Alison Werner (23:34) Mm-hmm. Okay. Mm-hmm. Yeah. Mary Kay Miller (23:58) you re-trigger a re-verification process that never happened before, which means, okay, here we go. You know, we don't trust what you're doing because you changed it. Now you got to prove to us that this new information is accurate. This has never happened before. And in order to re-verify, they want streaming video where you show the front of your door or the outdoor sign. You got to go through the office, show your reception area. Alison Werner (24:05) Okay. Okay. Okay. Really? Mary Kay Miller (24:28) You know, go up, you know, into the operatory and you have to do it according to their guidelines. Now they're saying we want a 30 second to two minute video showing all this information and then you got to upload it. Now, if you submit a 29 second video, they will deny it. You know, you know, of we're laughing, you know, really. Alison Werner (24:50) God. Mary Kay Miller (24:54) with all of this and what's also changed is new startup practices that are just opening their doors. It used to be you could start up a Google business profile. You know, we could put a temporary landing page on there and get everything activated. They will not allow you to verify your business. So it will show on search until you are ready to open your doors and it's mandatory that you do this video. Alison Werner (25:00) Yeah. Mary Kay Miller (25:19) And I had one practice, all of his friends were telling him, that's just, forget that. That's not true. It is true now. So listening to your peers or friends that opened a business six months to two years ago, the rules have changed. It's all completely different. And they don't always believe a vendor saying, no, you can't do this. And I had a client in Dallas. He just wanted that. Alison Werner (25:35) Yeah. Yeah. Mary Kay Miller (25:47) back. wanted to start, he wanted people to start writing reviews about him, all this before his doors open. You used to be able to do that. You can't do that now. So when he uploaded the video with only partial information that they requested, because he did have his outdoor sign up, but you know, he didn't have the office work ready to open, Google went dark. And he's no matter, even after he had submitted the correct Alison Werner (25:52) Mm-hmm. Yeah. Okay, yeah, yeah. Mary Kay Miller (26:16) video, they would not answer him. So we had to cancel everything that we had done and then start over from scratch and, you know, mark the original one permanently closed because AI said, Nope, you're done. And it doesn't communicate. wouldn't communicate with them that this was unacceptable. It just, went dark and Alison Werner (26:39) So the business had online saying it was per the Google side saying it was permanently closed. you did. Okay, but okay. Jesus. Mary Kay Miller (26:45) No, we did that so we could start a new one. Okay, so I mean, was just, I kept, numerous times I said to him, please wait, you hired us for a reason. You are not ready to open your doors. my friend said I can do it and he did it. again, now his doors were open and his Google business profile was delayed because we couldn't get it set up correctly. you know, these are the types of things that, you know, Alison Werner (26:56) Yeah. Yeah. Right. Mary Kay Miller (27:17) I'm concerned that business owners don't understand the importance of paying attention to the back end of your Google business profile. Number one, you need to know how to log into it. Many doctors don't know the username to get in. And all doctors should be the owner admin, not the marketing staff, not the business manager. In the event, you know, I'm a big believer in hit by the bus rule. Alison Werner (27:26) Mm-hmm. Okay, all right, start there. Okay. Okay. Mary Kay Miller (27:45) Something happens to an employee and you can't get in there, Google's not going to give you access if you're not listed as the business owner, even though you are. Now, you know, we can get that change, but it could take months. So, you know, these are the different things that they need to understand. Someone should be monitoring that Google business profile email on a regular basis. Alison Werner (27:51) Mm-hmm. Okay. Yeah, okay. Okay, because I was gonna ask where would these notifications go if they're not necessarily looking at the back end like every day or every week? Mary Kay Miller (28:17) You know, each Google Business profile has an email that's attached to it. Now, if it's not an email that they regularly open, they will miss this. Now, they do have an area on the back end where you can set up additional users, because I understand a lot of times the doctors don't want to go into these emails, but you can set up somebody, your marketing. Alison Werner (28:28) Yeah, that's what I gonna say. Yeah. Okay. Mm-hmm. Mary Kay Miller (28:43) coordinator on there is an additional email and she will get those emails and then if something comes in she can let the doctor know we got a problem here we got to do this but someone needs to be monitoring it. Plus that Google Business Profile provides one of the best monthly reports regarding your online statistics once a month and it's free. Alison Werner (28:45) Yeah. Okay. Okay. Mm-hmm. Mary Kay Miller (29:07) And many doctors aren't even looking at these reports because this will let you know is your traffic going up, is your traffic going down, what are the major keywords that people are using to find you in your area, and it's different for every practice. Establish practices, it's the doctor's name and the practice name. They're Googling you. They already know who you are. That's not an internet referral. That's an internal marketing referral. Alison Werner (29:11) Okay. Yeah. Okay. Mary Kay Miller (29:36) because it's word of mouth. So when you're looking at a report and you see that 80 % of your referrals are coming in from the doctor name or the practice name, that's not from internet marketing. And I, as a web agency, and because of all the different many years I had in private practice, usually with an established practice, less than 20 % of new patient referrals come off someone Alison Werner (29:49) Okay. Mm-hmm. Mary Kay Miller (30:05) orthodontist near me or orthodontist city, the majority of are coming in because of word of mouth. And that has not changed over the years. It's just that the internet is the umbrella under which you get all of this information. So just because they're coming in, you know, they say they found you on the internet and you know, a lot of them, if you have a lot of good reviews, they'll say, well, Google, you know, they saw the reviews, but they already knew who you were when they Googled you. Alison Werner (30:10) Yeah. Okay. Mm-hmm. Right. Yeah. Mary Kay Miller (30:36) And AAO is now reporting on average consumers today are researching 2.5 orthodontists before making a buying decision. So they may have been referred to someone else, but they saw you in the map and you had more reviews, so they'll pick up the phone and call. So there's a whole completely different dynamic that's going on. But if you lose that map, you can't compete against those practices. Alison Werner (30:44) Mm-hmm. Yeah. Right. Yeah. Yeah. Okay. So checking their Google profile, make sure they have their email up to date and have access to it. And then what documentation you mentioned before, what documentation should they have on hand that they might need? Let's reiterate this. If they need to verify something, they need to have a driver's license and right. Mary Kay Miller (31:19) Right. Right. Articles of incorporation with the correct address. And the DBA, doing business as, if your business name is different than your corporate name. Also, for the different locations. right, because the address on the DBA. Alison Werner (31:37) Mm-hmm, okay. That's what I was gonna ask. Yes. Mm-hmm. Mary Kay Miller (31:47) Now I've had some doctors argue with me about this. I've got a DBA, but it's for the main location. But they've got three locations. I go, should have a DBA for each one of the locations separately. You know, it's like McDonald's. McDonald's has got the name and it's a franchise. But there's a DBA for each different McDonald's address. So in the event that Alison Werner (31:57) Okay, okay. Mm-hmm. Yeah. Mary Kay Miller (32:10) You know, Google says, OK, I want the articles of the corporation and DBA for this location. They may not ask for all locations. They may just ask for one location. You need the correct paperwork. And the reason we kind of fell into that one is we had a practice that had three separate websites because it was in a rural area and they were pretty far apart and decided, you know, they had been with me for a number of years and they go, I don't want to keep Alison Werner (32:16) Mm-hmm. Yeah. Yeah. Okay. Mm-hmm. Yeah. Mary Kay Miller (32:39) dealing with three websites, put it all under one. And I said, OK, but we've got to rename all of them to one name and you need MBAs for each. And he said, OK. Now, he got notified by Google because Google saw the discrepancy. They saw all the old information on one of the locations. And he emailed me and he says, is this a scam? And I said, no. I said, you. Alison Werner (32:47) right. Mm-hmm. Okay. Mary Kay Miller (33:06) you have all your paperwork right?" And he says, yep, I got it right here. He sent it and this was unusual because with this one it took the map down before it notified him and he knew it. So he sent all that information out that day and they put his map up, back up within 24 hours. But he lost his number one rank because he changed the name so he had to go at the bottom of the list. Alison Werner (33:17) Okay. Okay. Okay. Mm. Okay, okay. Mary Kay Miller (33:36) Okay, so, you know, it's, don't know what it's going to do. And I said to him, you know, just get a good reviews program going and it'll get you back up and in there. And he was back where he needed to be in about three months, but he was paying attention. And he asked, you know, the other first example I gave you was paying attention, but didn't ask and just did what she wanted to do. And it didn't meet guidelines and she was penalized. Alison Werner (33:50) Okay. Okay. Okay. Yeah. Right. Yeah. Okay. Mary Kay Miller (34:07) Third example, wasn't watching. Patient came in, said, where is it? We were able to get it on the back end, but from what we could see from his reports, it had been down for at least six months. And he didn't even know it. So these are different scenarios of what's going on. And Alison Werner (34:18) wow, okay. Okay. Okay. Yeah. Okay. Mary Kay Miller (34:27) one of the things that please be careful of, You know, the days, if you go in and look at your back end, it would say, OK, Smith, orthodontics, colon, and then a city. You know, a lot of them would do for SEO. We're seeing that Google taking it out and see a scratch off the back. We're seeing quite a bit of that going on. you keyword load, for example, Smith, orthodontics, colon, Invisalign, embraces, that's not part of your legal name. The only thing that's supposed to be in that area is the legal business name. If you start keyword loading, they'll take it out and they will drop you down. Now, there are millions of small businesses in the US and AI is making its way around. And if you're not paying attention to this and you get hit, it could be disastrous for a practice. Alison Werner (35:18) Mm-hmm Right. Yeah. Yeah, absolutely. Mary Kay Miller (35:32) Now, from what we're seeing, what I didn't like was the fact that with this last update and the mistakes with this bug, 30 % were hit. Normally, Google figures a 10 % error rate is acceptable. It's a free service. It's not like you're paying for the internet and you want everything exactly perfect. That's not the way Google works. Alison Werner (35:41) Yeah. Mm. Okay. Yeah. Right. Mary Kay Miller (36:01) You know, so this is why very important that today, especially today, you start paying attention to this. And if you go up and in and you see that there's a problem, you know, a lot of these ad vendors that are out there, you know, they're using call tracking numbers and they're changing the phone numbers, you know, with the ads. Alison Werner (36:16) Mm-hmm. Yeah. Yeah. Mary Kay Miller (36:23) and they aren't cloaked properly and Google sees a different phone number online than what's in the website and what's on the Google business profile. If it doesn't match, you lose your map. And many orthodontists, and I would assume if I was hiring a vendor or going to use best practices, Alison Werner (36:32) Okay. Mm-hmm. Mary Kay Miller (36:47) but they're not even aware what the best practices are. So it's very important to understand you never go in and put a call tracking number on your Google Business Profile area. Number one, does it skew reports because now all your organic traffic coming in from word of mouth, those vendors are going, see, I'm bringing in all this new business. And they're not. It's not a bad lead. Alison Werner (36:58) Okay. okay. Okay. Right. Mary Kay Miller (37:12) So this also is skewing things up. I've seen practices, especially with multiple locations, that had map ranking now has lost their map ranking because the phone numbers on the Google Business Profile do not match the website because of call tracking numbers or they've taken the phone numbers out altogether because they're trying to drive everything with ads. And it's raising havoc because it's destroying their organic range. Alison Werner (37:27) Mm-hmm. Mary Kay Miller (37:40) And then you got to clean all this up and this is not an easy process. Alison Werner (37:45) Yeah. Well, OK, so I think the key takeaway here is the fact that this isn't just hitting startups. It's not just hitting practices that are doing some kind of transition, whether that's adding an office. This could be a practice who thinks they're doing changing nothing. But they added maybe some kind of call tracker for a digital ad and it could skew everything. Mary Kay Miller (37:58) Exactly. it could just be it got hit in the algorithm and Google says prove it. So it could be anybody. And I've seen all scenarios and I don't want everyone to think that I'm an alarmist. All I am suggesting is that you pay attention. And many of the established practice over the years that still believe that the internet is not, you know, something that they need to be concerned about. Alison Werner (38:09) right. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Mary Kay Miller (38:34) Those are the practices that are getting hit the hardest because they have no clue what's going on and they don't even know they were hit like this one practice. mean, this was that, you know, the patient came in. I mean, this is what a well established practice and, know, it was, what do mean my math is gone? You know, fix it, fix it now instantly. Alison Werner (38:37) Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Right. Yeah. Yeah. Well, yeah, no, this definitely does not sound like something you can you did have that one case where it was 24 hours, but it does sound like this could be months. Mary Kay Miller (39:03) this one? yeah, it's, it's, we were. Alison Werner (39:06) Well, especially if you have to go get those DBAs done. Mary Kay Miller (39:10) Well, that's one of the issues was he has to get in the DBA that a DBA takes at least six to eight weeks. The other issue with this is we were able to get the map back, but all the reviews are gone. All the information that we had put on there, you know, regarding products and everything is gone and it lost its rank. Alison Werner (39:25) Yeah. Yeah, Well, Mary Kay, thank you so much for Actually, one more question, because, you know, you did mention that a lot of people think that this is a scam when they get the email. What should be in that subject line or the the from person? Mary Kay Miller (39:42) You you can imagine the amount of Alison Werner (39:51) Who should it be from? Do you know? OK. Mary Kay Miller (39:53) It should be from Google. And it'll say on their Google. And it should come from the email that is tied to the login address for your Google Business Profile area. It does not go to any other email. So you'll get people calling in or shooting in the emails saying, I'm a Google affiliate. That's a salesperson. Alison Werner (39:57) Okay. Okay. Okay. Right? Yeah. Okay. Yeah. Mary Kay Miller (40:23) Google never texts. It's just like your banks and all of that. They're very, very security conscious. if you have a question, ask. Ask your web vendor, I got this. Is this legitimate? Alison Werner (40:25) Okay, okay. Yeah, okay. Yeah, okay. Yeah. Mm-hmm. Okay. Mary Kay Miller (40:44) and your web vendor, they can't answer the question, then you shouldn't be with that web vendor. Alison Werner (40:48) Right. Yeah. Okay. Well, thank you so much. I really appreciate you going into the weeds on this one because even I'm learning about this stuff. So thank you so much, Mary Kay. Mary Kay Miller (41:00) And it's changing all the time. And I never know from one day to the next what Google's gonna do when I wake up in the morning and total havoc. When that bug hit, our entire team went into full emergency mode because we had lot of, we had hundreds of profiles we had to review. And it was, okay, what this here, there. Alison Werner (41:02) Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Mm-hmm. Right. Yeah. Yeah. Mm hmm. Yeah. Mary Kay Miller (41:24) You know, we were able to get through it all in about three, four days and get everything fixed and back up to speed. But, you know, there's a lot of vendors out there that don't put eyes on the problem. You know, they just, it's all automated. That's why. Alison Werner (41:31) Yeah. Mm-hmm. Yeah, yeah, absolutely. Well, I know that even for us having this conversation, we had to wait until literally the last 24 hours to nail down what we were going to talk about because you had told me I can't guarantee what we're going to be talking about. Mary Kay Miller (41:49) Exactly. Because when you and I last talked, this bug hadn't occurred. Alison Werner (41:58) Right, I was actually thinking about that. was like, if we had done this, we were originally supposed to record earlier. yeah. Mary Kay Miller (42:03) Yeah, no, it is something new and I don't know and you know with Meta and everything that's going on, know, Facebook is making all kinds of changes. You know, it's. You know this is considered part of offsite SEO. This isn't the organic SEO of a website. It's offsite. It has to do with your reviews and your social media and your Google Business profile and blogging and others. Many different types of SEO, which is a conversation for another time. Alison Werner (42:10) Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Mary Kay Miller (42:33) plus SEM, which is search engine marketing, your ads. This is where Google AI is really targeting, not so much the website build and what's on the website, except they don't like slow websites with mobile. But other than that, most of it is offsite SEO and many doctors don't know the difference. Alison Werner (42:35) Right. Yeah. Yeah, yeah. Well, I hope to have you back so we can continue to talk about this as things arise. But again, thank you so much Mary Kay. It's been a pleasure. And if anybody wants to get in contact with you or come to you for services. Mary Kay Miller (43:08) feel free to go to the Kaleidoscope website which is TheKaleidoscope.com or feel free to email me directly at mk.miller at the kaleidoscope.com Alison Werner (43:22) All right, thank you so much again, Mary Kay, I really appreciate it. Mary Kay Miller (43:25) My pleasure. Thank you for having me. Alison Werner (43:27) Hey.