If you run a business, this one is worth a few minutes of your time.
Someone can write a negative post about your business on Reddit, and Google may show that thread right on your Google Business Profile.
I noticed it on a profile recently. In the Web results, directly under the business’s own website, there was a Reddit thread encouraging people to avoid them. It’s the kind of thing that can catch an owner completely off guard.
What’s happening
Marketers began noticing this in May 2026, when Reddit threads started appearing inside business listings. Whitespark, a well-known local SEO company, shared that Google is now pulling Reddit threads into Google Business Profiles. They had seen Reddit show up all over search results for a while, but this was the first time they’d seen such a direct connection to a business profile.
I couldn’t find an official statement from Google about it yet, so it’s worth checking your own profile to see whether it’s showing up for you.
Why this is tricky
There are a couple of things that make this tough to deal with.
- You can’t remove these Reddit threads from Google yourself.
- You can’t reply to them through your Google Business Profile the way you can with a Google review.
There’s a second layer too. An analysis of 30 million sources by Peec found that Reddit is the most-cited domain in AI search across tools like ChatGPT, Google AI Mode, Gemini, and Perplexity. So the same threads can shape what people hear when they ask an AI tool about your business. That varies by industry and by tool, and how much ChatGPT leans on Reddit has shifted over time, so I’d think of it as a possibility to keep an eye on rather than a certainty.
It’s also more common than you might expect. A survey of roughly 150 marketing teams found that 73% had Reddit threads ranking in Google for their brand name, and 63% of those threads were negative. It’s a small survey, so I’d treat it as a rough picture.
What you can do
The good news is that the steps are practical, and none of them are complicated.
- Check your own profile. Search your business name plus your city, then look at the Web results on your Google Business Profile.
- Search Reddit. Look for any mentions of your business so you know what’s already out there.
- Set up an alert. F5Bot is free and emails you when your business is mentioned on Reddit. Alerts on the free plan can arrive with a delay, and the paid plans are faster, but it’s a solid way to avoid finding out months later.
- Respond as the owner. When it’s relevant, join the thread. Be honest, be transparent, and focus on being helpful. It helps to read the whole thread before replying, since a calm and genuine response can say a lot about how you run things.
- Fix the underlying problem. If people are raising real issues, the best reply is to improve things. It also gives you something true to share in the thread.
One thing to avoid
Please don’t create fake accounts to defend your business. Reddit communities are good at spotting this, and it tends to make a small problem much bigger.
The bigger picture
Reputation management used to mean watching a handful of review sites. These days it covers the whole internet, and the places where people talk about your business keep expanding. A little regular attention goes a long way, and you don’t need to be everywhere at once. Knowing what’s being said, and showing up honestly when it makes sense, puts you in a good spot.