How to contact Google?

What's the best way to reach Google about website?

[Nova]

How do I contact Google about issues with my website? Is email help @ google com the best way? I remember it was dicussed somewhere here but cannot find it.

Thank you!

[tedster]

The best way to contact Google is through a Webmaster Tools account. Those communications get higher priority and weight because you have authenticated yourself as responsible for the domain.

[Nova]

Thanks! I am in my webmaster tools account and only see the "Discussion Groups for Webmasters" link. Is this the only way to contact? through the forum? I'd rather not.

[jetteroheller]

Some people would say, go in the church and pray.

Ah, sorry, I thought You asked how to contact god, but I feel since June 27th no difference.

[tedster]

I'd say try the reinclusion form -- even though you have to check off boxes that may not seem to represent your real situation. Then at least you can put your message into the form's textarea and send it.

Otherwise, yes, you can try the public email, but I seldom hear of that taking much of a priority at Google these days.

[night707]

My experience with Google support is so poor, that I have given up writing to them.

I have received only a bunch of fairly non-relevant pre-formated phrases that tell me not to waste any time writing to them.

[tiori]

night707 ..... You're right on. All they have is a bunch of canned emails that they send to everyone. I have never been able to get a real response from them. Seems they have chosen to go the route of so many big businesses. They call it customer service; but it reality it's NO customer service.

[Adam_Lasnik]

Hi Nova,

We've examined lots of options and are genuinely doing our best to connect Webmasters with Googlers-in-the-know... both to answer questions AND get feedback and identify trouble spots.

We decided that interactions would be most productive by having folks like myself and Vanessa and search quality engineers set up and participate in our Webmaster Help Google Group... answering a (most typically frequently-asked) question once and having it viewed and helpful for thousands or tens of thousands of Webmasters.

Via the forum, Webmasters can get feedback and questions seen by the Googlers who are directly part of the Search Quality and Webmaster Tools teams... basically connecting with the source :). For instance, when I see issues that need to be addressed, I'm able to just walk a few feet to debug stuff with one of our crawl guys or someone on the spam team and so on.

Also, we are regularly hitting the road to speak on panels and chat with Webmasters around the world. At the most recent WebmasterWorld PubCon in Las Vegas, for instance, 25 of us Googlers were there. I'm posting this from Search Engine Strategies in Chicago -- again, along with more than a dozen Googlers. In just the last half a year, I've also chatted in person with Webmasters in London, Boston, Washington D.C., San Jose, and informally at arts events and other festivals and events in other cities.

We've also hugely updated expanded our help documentation in the last half-year... not to mention translated it into 18 languages.

Lastly, our Webmaster tools can help troubleshoot the vast majority of common questions.

There's more to come. Our team is growing (we just added a Webmaster Trends Analyst in Kirkland), we're committed to communicating in other venues and in greater amounts, and also supported by more powerful Webmaster tools.

And no, despite Barry's teasing in an external post linking to this thread, the best way to get a Googler response on our Webmaster Help Google Group is NOT to put my name in the subject. It's always best to use descriptive subject lines :)

[hvacdirect]

We decided that interactions would be most productive by having folks like myself and Vanessa and search quality engineers set up and participate in our Webmaster Help Google Group... answering a (most typically frequently-asked) question once and having it viewed and helpful for thousands or tens of thousands of Webmasters.

This is key to getting information on the public forum. It has to relate to as many people as possible. They are not going to answer, "why doesn't my site rank for monkeys?" as I'm sure they get that question a million times a day. On the other hand, other members of the forum likely will answer such a question, as posting of the URL in question is not discourage but actully almost required.

[night707]

Hi Adam,

some time ago i still had the patience to send detailed bug reports to support when searches for even popular and elementary kws had resulted in utterly outdated and junky Google suggestions whilst some real quality content had been dropped completely.

Sadly enough, there had been no real response and good sites go in and out with the various refreshes since 1,5 years despite no changes in structure except for more and more valuable content.

Forums might often help, but why not being able to provide dedicated and efficient support for established publishers to find a solution to match Google`s target to present the "best content and results".

At the moment many publishers have given up on communicating with Google.

[netmeg]

I've had pretty response from Google support in almost every area (AdWords, AdSense, Reinclusion, Webmaster Tools) except for Analytics; they need some work there.

[rustybrick]

And no, despite Barry's teasing in an external post linking to this thread, the best way to get a Googler response on our Webmaster Help Google Group is NOT to put my name in the subject. It's always best to use descriptive subject lines :)

LOL - I had to do that, sorry. But I did add clarification on that.