If you have ever been on the receiving end of one of Local Lighthouse robocalls claiming to be Google, you will be happy to know that Google has filed a lawsuit against the company for their business practices and particularly their marketing technique of referring to themselves as Google.
Google posted about the problem on the Google Public Policy blog, detailing the tactics these companies use.
You’re eating dinner with your family when the phone rings, and you see a phone number that you don’t recognize. You answer and hear a recording: “It’s extremely urgent that we speak to the business owner! We’ve tried to reach you numerous times. Our records indicate that your Google Business Listing has not been claimed…”
Google also revealed they were filing a lawsuit against an SEO company for using these tactics.
It’s difficult for Google to take action against callers because they often use untraceable phone numbers, fake company names, and massive global networks of intermediaries. However, today we’re filing an action in California against one search engine optimization company for making these robocalls and confusing our users. It’s unfortunate when a problem must be addressed in a court of law, but we believe this course of action will protect our users and discourage this practice more broadly.
Even Googlers had been on the receiving end of these type of robocalls, coming to their work phone:
If you robocall a Googler's work # with a scam about "urgently claiming your business listing," you're gonna have a bad time.
— Adam Lasnik (@thatadamguy) July 31, 2015
It didn’t take long for local SEO experts to uncover the lawsuit and discover Local Lighthouse is the company being sued and their scare tactics appear to be working – they boast about having 25,000 clients. If you want an idea of their current clients, their Twitter feed is littered with their Pinterest spam for various local clients... as you could probably suspect, their SEO techniques are less than stellar.
@HesDave @bbb_us All complaints have been resolved with the client. Local Lighthouse has over 25k+ clients I would say thats pretty good.
— Local Lighthouse (@LocalLighthouse) August 20, 2015
Mike Blumenthal details the finer points of the lawsuit here, but it is obvious that Local Lighthouse has been subject to repeated warnings from Google about their business practices and impersonating Google in their sales script but refused to change their tactics.
For example, Google is informed and believes, and based thereon alleges, that Defendant’s sales agents have made statements such as: “We’re a Google subcontractor,” “we’re working for Google,” “the $100 fee [to initiate Defendant’s services] goes to Google,” and Defendant’s customers’ webpages “will show up multiple times on the front page and get what’s called ‘Front Page Domination.’”
There are many reviews about the business online that criticizes their misleading marketing through robocalls and the inability for recipients of the phone calls to get off their phone list. They also recently added a “Local Lighthouse is Not Google” page within the last month or so.
Google also posted advice for those who receive robocalls. And they added a new way for business owners to report these types of robocalls that state they are Google. You can fill out this form to report a business impersonating Google.
This is good news that Google is taking action against companies implying in cold calls that they are Google, especially against a company that is so prolific in their robocalls. It will be very interesting to watch and see how this plays out.
Local Lighthouse has yet to comment publicly about the lawsuit.
Jennifer Slegg
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Peter says
Hello!
Just wanted to thank you for sharing your view and opinion of this lawsuit. I’m actually a past employee of this company. It’s an amazing company to work for and in all of the training we received as well as the “scripts” used when offering services, we were never once told to use the words Google, or anything mentioned in this lawsuit. I actually feel bad for Local Lighthouse and that they now have to defend themselves in this case. The websites, and services offered by this company are top notch. I believe in the end, it will be determined that there was a handful of inexperienced marketing reps who came from other shady companies, that used Google’s name in their pitch. This company has 150+ reps that take phone calls daily. Some are experienced professionals truly wanting to help businesses with their visibility and websites, and then there are some younger reps who will say and do anything to get a deal. I have no comments on the robo dialing aspect of the business but have heard the messages. Nowhere do they say they are Google Calling. Ethically speaking, I don’t feel that they, as a company, gave the impression to clients or their staff, that using any affiliated words to Google was ok. When customers wanted nationwide campaigns, we would refer people back to Google.com and offer to help set up an Adword campaign. I know it looks all bad, and I know of at least 3 other large SEO companies that specifically train their reps to say they are Google, but I don’t believe Google will win this lawsuit. I believe they had to file it because of the multiple complaints they were getting. If they didn’t, they may of been liable and been sued by someone. There are 100s of companies that use these dealers with pre-recorded messages. I just think Local Lighthouse is getting a bad rep for some of these other businesses practices. If anything, they are at fault for not catching bad representatives in time that were using Google terms on their own. Innocent until proven guilty, and I don’t think there is enough evidence to convict them of anything malicious. That’s my 2 cents. I guess we will follow along and see how this unfolds.
Keith says
I have them on a recording stating that they are official Google Partners. Funny, they ended the conversation when I looked them up and they weren’t listed. While I only recorded 1 phone call, this wasn’t even the 5th one that they claimed that they were official Google Partners.
Based on all the false 4 star reviews left on google, yelp, etc. I am assuming that the comment left isn’t really an ex employee, but a current one just peddling more B.S.
Peter says
Keith,
Sounds like you had a bad experience, as I mentioned earlier, saying we were Google was not part of company training. Also, as I mentioned before, I’m an ex employee. I was only there for 5 months. Not sure anything I said was in peddling BS fashion. I left a comment, my opinion. At least you can now sleep at night knowing you shouldn’t have anymore deceptive fake Google Partners calling you to offer you a web service! Sweewww!! I know I will.
J says
they were a google partner… for 1 whole day only. then that status was revoked by google. they worked for an entire year to get there & lost it in 24hrs. 1/2 the staff didnt even know they lost that status the next morning.