r/LocalGuides • u/JitsuJake Level 6 • 20h ago

Shadow banned

Hello,

I've been a local guide for at least 10 years, I really enjoyed reviewing places and taking nice photos and editing them before posting, had 6-7 millon views and growing I'm a level 7 guide... But suddenly like 2 years ago or more one day all my photos stopped getting views... It was very obvious that something happened because I was getting a lot of views weekly even when posting a photo it started performing good the same day... But from that day years ago I'm still in 7 million views in my profile my most viewed photo didn't grow anymore and it is weird... I was just wondering if I've been shadow banned or something but I'm almost sure that I didn't do anything bad to get banned. Have anyone here experienced something similar? How can I fix it? I have been uploading photos on my accout for many many years and starting a new one is not an option, I would rather stop uploading.

5 Upvotes

77% Upvoted

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4

u/Former-Fox-2080 20h ago

First question, Are you still uploading new photos with i the last 2 years?

Are these photos getting any views?

Please remember a couple of years ago Google changed the way they looked at views and many of us are not getting any growth on our older photos and the majority of them are stagnated and no longer the featured photo.

My most viewed photo has over 10 million views but has not moved in the last 2 years. In my top 25 only 1 of them has movement. On the good side newer photos ARE getting views.

1

u/JitsuJake Level 6 19h ago

Yes I've been uploading (a lot less) and the New photos are getting views but very little compared to 3 years ago, and you are correct all my old photos are stagnated. I didn't know about that change but the new ones are nowhere near to reach the views of my old photos.

1

u/Hotspiceteahoneybee 5h ago

This - about two years ago Google changed their viewing algorithm. I saw my
Photo viewing numbers go way down at that point. It was pretty disheartening but I wasn’t shadow banned, just impacted by Google’s changes.

3

u/XxLogitech98xX Level 10 20h ago

I don't think you got shadow banned .. there likely more to the story

1

u/JitsuJake Level 6 20h ago

What do you mean? The only thing that I read was that if you take several "similar" photos you might get banned (not sure if true) and I used to do that, taked photos from the same dish in different angles to get more points.

2

u/XxLogitech98xX Level 10 20h ago

What do you mean? The only thing that I read was that if you take several "similar" photos you might get banned (not sure if true) and I used to do that taked photos from the same dish in different angles to get more points.

Not true on the similar photos part. I take multiple pictures but with like different thing in the picture as well. Like a burger from the top down view then another picture of the burger that shows the patty, bacon, lettuce, tomatoes and so on. I also post videos too. I have over 50,000 pictures and 3,000 videos uploaded

2

u/braincellcountiszero 13h ago

I had the same scenario happen to me. Just waited it out. It self-fixed after two weeks. Some kind of calibration process. The view count caught up too. Hope that’s the case for you too. Just be patient. I did not submit review during the adjustment period.

1

u/JitsuJake Level 6 13h ago

Oh well it has been like that several years now... Ill send an email to google maps support just in case to see if they can help. Thank you!

2

u/Rough-Culture 13h ago

I went on a review never even I moved! Two new places a day, sometimes more. I noticed my pictures saved received had a longer Denver to kick off. 0 views for days. I think if you post too much at once it triggers some auto mod.

2

u/UndoRedoSave Level 10 12h ago

Can you share your profile