Very quietly Google has changed Google Places to remove the ability to manipulate a listing for organic performance and rebranded this property now as Google My Business. This action has very quietly slipped under the radar, but the changes are big for businesses.
First, Google sent out notices to all Google+ Local businesses that duplicate listings of the same business would not be allowed. Google immediately disabled access to all Google+ Local pages (also known as Google Maps pages and Google Places accounts) to email addresses that were not recognized by Google as clearly being the account owner by email, or having the business phone number or carrying the registered address. This effectively locked out all third party account managers.
Google then advised all account access users that the main account owner – not even the originator of the account, would have to allow access to any users from the parent account. Additionally that any approved users would then have to manage the account for two full weeks before transfer of the account could be done.
By making the linking and transfer process so complicated Google has effectively locked our all parties except the one account owner. Of additional important note is that Google has been removing one by one the items a business owner could actually change on their account. Over time, Google has removed the ability to add keywords and to craft a message that helped the business place locally.
Google even removed the ability for a monthly promotion as well as comments from the page owner. With this most recent update Google has now forced all Places pages now into the format of a Google My Business Page. No longer is the look and feel different of a Places page from a postable Google+ Business page but identical and one that you can now post to with a third party app like HootSuite.
If you already had a Google+ Business page Google has now made things even more difficult by creating a new page you’ll have to update called a Google My Business page.