When businesses wanted to know how COVID-19 has affected the performance of my Google My Business (GMB) listing, Reputation.com compiled an analysis of COVID-19’s impact on Google My Business listings across several industries and examined metrics ranging from views to clicks for driving directions.

The analysis found that COVID-19 caused businesses to experience a sharp drop in GMB performance throughout March, but GMB performance also appears to have bottomed out. Now data suggests GMB performance will begin to improve.

“The drop has bottomed out or flattened,” said Adam Dorfman, director of product at Reputation.com. “While the drop in performance is unfortunate but expected, the silver lining is that the worst appears to be over and recovery should be forthcoming.”

For this study, Reputation.com examined more than 81,000 GMB listings across multiple industries and U.S. regions to look at metrics such as GMB impressions and actions such as clicks for driving directions, websites, and to call a business. Restaurant GMB impressions are down 57%.

GMB impressions fell 59%, compared with March 5 numbers, on average across all verticals. Every industry took a hit, but at the end of March declines began to flatten.

Clicks related to actions like driving directions, visits to websites and clicks to call a business fell 37%. The steep drop in clicks to driving directions results from people responding to shelter-in-place orders, but Reputation.com’s data suggest clicks are bottoming out, probably as people have learned more about which businesses are essential and remain open and which are closed. But even though clicks are down overall, clicks to phone have not been hit nearly as dramatically.

Are local automotive stores open is a query being asked of search engines. Did you know car dealerships are open? I had no idea until one of my friends bought a car in Wyoming. Automotive and retail are showing signs of performance recovery, which means people have begun searching for information in these market segments. It turns out most automotive dealers and service departments have stayed open.