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Google Maps Rank Tracker | Track Competitors Tutorial

Stay ahead of the competition by monitoring changes in your competitors’ Google Business Profiles.

With the Track Competitors feature, you can keep an eye on what your top local rivals are doing - without manually checking their profiles.

Get 🔔 notified instantly when a competitor:

• Changes of business name
• Gains a spike in reviews
• Post new content or promotions
• Uploads new photos
• Changes their business categories
• Or even update their Main Category, which could affect their local search visibility

All alerts are tracked in one place so you can analyze trends, understand their strategy, and adjust your own accordingly.

💡 Use these insights to spot marketing pushes, uncover SEO moves, and identify new local competitors.

Step 1: Add a Competitor to Track

1. From your left-hand dashboard menu, click on Track Competitors.
2. Click the + Add Business button in the top right.
3. Search for your business by typing your Business name and selecting it from the results. (Service Area Businesses (SABs) are also supported. GTrack can find businesses that don’t display a public address on Google Maps.)
4. Once selected, you’ll see:

• Business details (address and place ID)
• Tracking options under What To Track

✅ What You Can Track:

Check the boxes next to the data points you want to track for each competitor:

• Business Name Changes
• Review Count Changes
• Category Changes
• Photo Count
• Post Count

🛠️ These options help you monitor updates that competitors make to improve visibility - like adding new photos, shifting categories, or gaining more reviews.

📊 Once added, each competitor will appear as a card showing what you're tracking - if you add more businesses, they will all be listed here.

Step 2: Set Review Threshold & Alert Frequency

1. In "Alert When Reviews Change By", enter a number (e.g., 5) to be alerted when the number of reviews increases or decreases by that amount.
2. In the Alert Frequency dropdown, choose how often you want to receive notifications:

• No Email Alerts
• Daily
• Weekly
• Monthly

📩 You will receive email alerts for:

• Category changes - when a category is added, removed, or updated on the competitor’s Google Business Profile.
• Main Category changes - this triggers a separate email notification, sent when the primary category of the Google Business is changed to a different one.

3. Click Add Business to start tracking.

Step 3: Manage Tracked Businesses

Once added, your competitors appear in the Tracked Businesses panel.

Each card displays:

• What you’re tracking (Name, Reviews, Categories, Photos, Posts)
• Email alert frequency
• Review alert threshold (e.g., 5 reviews)
• Last checked timestamp

🔧 Available Actions

• 📈 Analytics - Click the graph icon to view historical trends for each metric.
• ⏸️ Pause - Temporarily stop tracking this business.
• ▶️ Resume - Restart tracking after a pause.
• ✏️ Edit - Adjust tracking preferences at any time:
• 🗑️ Delete - Remove this business from tracking permanently.

📝 Field Explanations

What To Track

• Business Name Changes - Get alerts when the business changes its name.
• Review Count Changes - Alerts when the number of Google reviews goes up or down.
• Category Changes - Alerts if the business changes its listed categories.
• Photo Count - Alerts when new photos are added to the profile.
• Post Count - Alerts when new Google posts are published.

Alert When Reviews Change By

• Enter the number of reviews that must change before an alert is triggered.

Example: If set to 5, you’ll only get notified once reviews increase or decrease by at least 5.

Alert Frequency

• Choose how often the system checks for changes.
• Options: Hourly, Daily, Weekly (depending on your setup).

Alert Email (optional)

• Add an alternate email to receive alerts.
• Leave blank to use your account’s default email address.

Save Changes / Cancel

• Save Changes - Apply your new tracking preferences.
• Cancel - Discard edits and return without changes.

Step 4: Track Alerts in Real Time

🔔 Any detected change will show up in the Recent Alerts panel on the right.

Types of alerts include:

• Review count increased or decreased
• New photos added
• New posts published
• Category changes

You can click on an alert to view more, or mark it as read to keep your dashboard clean.

Step 5: Monitor Activity Over Time

Click the Analytics icon 📈 on a competitor card to open their activity charts.

This section lets you monitor how your competitors evolve over time. Use the metric dropdown (top-left) to switch between views and the time range filter (top-right) to zoom into a specific timeframe (e.g., All Time, Last 7 days, Last 30 days, Last 90 days).

📊 Review Count

This graph tracks the total number of Google reviews a business has received over time.

Here’s what each metric means:

• Current Review Count: The number of reviews the business has today.
• Total Change: The total increase or decrease in reviews during the selected time range.
• Average Daily Change: How many reviews are added (or removed) per day, on average.
• Data Points: Number of daily snapshots recorded during the selected period.

Use this to spot review growth trends - whether a competitor is gaining momentum or slowing down.

⭐️ Rating

• Current Rating: The latest star rating based on all their Google reviews.
• Total Change: How much the rating increased or decreased over the selected time.
• Average Daily Change: Rarely changes fast, but useful to track gradual improvement or decline.
• Data Points: How many days of rating data were collected.

Ideal for spotting if a competitor is struggling with negative feedback or working hard to boost reputation.

🖼️ Photo Count

Shows how many photos are publicly visible on the competitor's Google Business Profile.

• Current Photo Count: How many photos are live on their listing today.
• Total Change: Photos added or removed during the selected period.
• Average Daily Change: Helps identify consistent uploads vs. one-time updates.
• Data Points: Daily photo count records tracked.

Frequent uploads often mean the business is trying to stand out with visual content or highlight new services/products.

📮 Post Count

Tracks how many Google Posts (offers, updates, events) the business has published.

• Current Post Count: The total number of live posts on their profile.
• Total Change: Number of new posts added in the selected time period.
• Average Daily Change: Helps assess how actively they’re posting.
• Data Points: Days the post count was recorded.

Great for understanding if your competitor is running a consistent promo strategy or doing seasonal pushes.

This gives you a full timeline of your competitor’s marketing behavior - helping you benchmark, react, or adjust your own local strategy accordingly.

Step 6: Review History Log

At the bottom of the competitor detail view, you’ll find a History Log, which includes:

• Date of each check
• Business name
• Rating
• Review count
• Photo count
• Post count
• Business categories

🧾 This provides a full audit trail of your competitor’s evolution over time.

Summary

With Track Competitors, you can:

• Stay alert to your competition’s actions
• Monitor improvements and trends
• React faster with strategic decisions for your own business

Use this feature to gain a competitive edge in your local Google Maps rankings.

Updated on: 23/09/2025