Suggested improvements to the Questions & Answers notification process

[#1]

Idea 1: Questions within the notification

About two months ago, Google Maps implemented a change where if someone had a question it would show the introductory part of that question in the notification screen, for example below:

Instead of:
Someone has a question
about Elizabeth Jonsson Reserve. Can you help?

It was temporarily (along the lines of):

Someone has a question about
Elizabeth Jonsson Reserve: What activities are available at... (fully expandable)

This was one of the most useful updates of Google Maps to include the question in the notifications. This gave me the opportunity to see in a glance what the question was and determine whether or not I can answer that question or dismiss the notification entirely. No longer did I have to navigate through the app, wait for the question to load or even come up empty-handed saying that "This question was removed." even though I just got the notification.

However it looks like the recent update of Google Maps have back-flipped on this implementation, now going back to the generic notification probably as part of a test. I'm sure some people don't really want to see forsaken or obvious questions, but those were easily dismissed. Those who wanted to see what question it was conveniently understood it from their notifications and made a judgement whether to answer or not.

I would like to see the latter re-implemented to make these questions more accessible and a lot more quicker to distinguish whether the question should be answered or not. Or at least, allow an option in its notification settings to display the question in its entirety as the notification.

Idea 2: Improving the email when a business replies to your review

Right now, the email gives a generic response "Thank you for posting a review on Google." We've already been thanked enough at the instant we posted the review in the first place, and thanking us again when the owner responds to the review doesn't seem to make sense. Instead, the email should either show it within its contents, or if it's long enough the link should say "See full reply" beneath. 

Caption: The current email when an owner replies to your review. Right: A hypothetical email that also shows the owner's response."

Essentially the same basis as the first idea, it allows for a convenient glance of the email instead of having the user navigate within the app. I hope this makes sense.

Idea 3: "Your report to Google"

Not much of an idea, but this email is an oddity. Implemented in June I believe, every single time I have to report a photo because it has someone's as the subject of the photo or that it's not a photo of a place, this mandatory email has to be sent to me and starts to clog up my inbox. Why was this implemented anyway? Sure, I do like confirmation that the report has gone through and I would see it actioned through, but this feels unnecessary and the email really doesn't tell much either. Maybe you could tell me the type of report I sent (e.g. photo violation, question violation, abusive edit, etc.) and also a link to the Google Maps listing the report is referring to, but it doesn't have to be too detailed. I just don't want the same generic email over and over again.

Those are three of my ideas. There might be some issues or reasons why people might not want to see a question in full or instantly see the owner's response (especially if they posted a bad review and the owner's reaction was negative) but for anyone's sake notifications for any of these in particular can be toggled within Google Maps' settings.

[Osaka78forTRUMP]

Good thinking Briggs 👍

[Osaka78forTRUMP]

Small time saving features add up to massive speed gain when multiplied by every Q+A on Maps globally👍👍

[sonnyNg]

Hi @Briggs,

Thanks for sharing with us.

As a side note, regarding each ideas, it would be a better practice to have them separated in individual posts on Idea Exchange.

Otherwise, it is much appreciated for your detailed explanation for every proposed suggestions.

[sonnyNg]

Hi @Briggs,

In case there would be any additional details for the ideas, please, feel free to share them in separate posts as previously mentioned.

For the moment, the status of the post has been changed.

[ThaRoost]

I agree with everything you've said here. I'd also like to add that although I get the "someone has a question" alert on my Pixel 3 XL, half of the time when I click on it, maps opens, but then nothing happens...the question never loads & then I can't find the question. I don't mean that the question isn't real. What I mean is that if someone asks a question, for example, at Walmart, one of the largest store chains in the WORLD. How is a local guide supposed to find the question when there are thousands of questions asked for each location. The town I live in has 2 Walmarts and if I didn't get a chance to see which location the question was for, or even if I did, there isn't an option to sort the questions by date or any other filter. It's just a jumbled mess of randomly asked questions in a chaotic unsorted manner as far as I can tell. Am I missing something? Is there another way to find recent questions or even recent local guide notifications sent to my phone? Thanks for the help!