Big Time Advertising founder and CEO Terry MacCauley recently issued a warning and follow-up recommendations that might help dealerships stay out of trouble with Google and federal regulators.

“Your review program may have just become a liability,” MacCauley said.

Why? MacCauley explained how the situation changed on July 24.

“Google updated the review snippet structured data documentation with a new guideline: do not include fake or undisclosed incentivized reviews on your page or in your structured data markup,” MacCauley said. “Google’s own examples of what that covers are reviews that are not based on a real experience with the product or service, and reviews written in exchange for a benefit such as money, a discount, a voucher, or a free product, where the incentive is not clearly and prominently disclosed.”

Then MacCauley offered multiple examples of how some dealers push for reviews.

“Gift cards for five stars. A free oil change in exchange for a Google review. Sales contests are scored on review count. BDC scripts that request the review before the customer has taken delivery. Employee and family reviews used to bury a bad month. Reputation vendors that push an aggregate rating into your schema without anyone at the store knowing which reviews sit behind the number,” he said.

MacCauley emphasized that the plan by dealerships asking every customer for a review always has been legitimate.

“Paying for a review changes the nature of the review, requires clear and prominent disclosure, and disqualifies that review from review snippet markup,” he said. “Paying specifically for a positive review is a different and considerably larger problem.”

And according to MacCauley, dealerships might not just land in trouble with Google. He reminded the industry about the Federal Trade Commission’s rule on consumer reviews and testimonials that’s been in effect since late 2024.

MacCauley indicated the FTC’s directives prohibit fake reviews, reviews bought on the condition that they be positive, and undisclosed insider reviews. He added there is civil penalty exposure per violation.

“This is not legal advice, and any dealer running an incentive program should have counsel review it rather than taking a marketing newsletter’s word for it,” MacCauley said.

So, what can a dealership do? MacCauley offered these suggestions.

“List every incentive currently attached to a review, formally or informally, at the store level and at the individual employee level,” MacCauley said. “Rewrite the ask so it is unconditional, requesting feedback rather than a rating, and never tie the benefit to sentiment.

“Pull the review markup on your site to see what the vendor is actually marking up and where those reviews came from,” he continued. “Remove non-genuine, undisclosed, incentivized reviews from the page and the structured data. Then document the process, train sales and service on it, and put it in the employee handbook.

“If this ever comes into question, the documentation is the defense,” he went on to say.

For more ideas to keep your store in the black and other dealership strategies, visit Big Time Advertising online at https://www.gowithbigtime.com.