Search this term and you get setup walkthroughs, lead-cost estimates and badge explainers, a good number of them written before Google changed the badge. The application walkthrough is Google's own job and its help pages do it properly. What the results skip is the review side: what the ad quotes off your profile, which reviews it reads, and what the badge above your name now certifies.
That last one moved recently, so start there.
The badge consolidated, and the guarantee went with it
Google's announcement page describes "simplifying our advertiser badging by launching a single badge for all advertisers". Advertisers who had already completed verification "will automatically earn the new Google Verified badge", and the same page says "Local Services Ads ranking won't be affected by this change".
The sentence worth reading twice is the other one. Google "will be discontinuing the Money Back Guarantee associated with the Google Guarantee badge". Consumers can still request reimbursement for services booked through Local Services Ads "before December 7, 2025", and the request has to arrive "within 30 days of the initial service completion date". Past that, there is nothing left to claim against.
So the check mark is a screening signal, not a warranty. Google's getting-started page puts it as a badge that "signals to consumers that your business has passed Google's proprietary screening process", with verified profiles also showing "the specific verification checks they have completed". Passed a check, not insured.
If you sold against that badge in a quote, or built a landing page around the guarantee, both need an edit.
What the ad actually quotes off your profile
Google states the ranking input without hedging: "Star ratings and number of reviews affect how your business is ranked within Local Services Ads." The overview page adds that "All ads will show an average star rating", with the count of reviews sometimes shown in brackets beside it.
Where those reviews come from matters more than people assume. Google's help says the reviews come from your Google Business Profile, and that they are managed in Google Business Profile Manager rather than inside the Local Services Ads account. There is no separate stack of ad reviews to go and build. The profile you already ask customers to review is the profile the ad is reading, which means the work is the same work, and so is the thing that can go wrong with it: reviews here follow the Maps user contributed content policies and ones that violate those policies are removed. What Google's review policy forbids goes through which of those rules catch honest businesses by accident.
Reviews are an entry requirement, not only a ranking input
This is the part that catches new advertisers. Google's getting-started page lists what a provider needs to run ads before the badge is granted, and the list includes a licence or a business registration, an acknowledgment that you hold the appropriate business licences, billing and a budget set up, and "Reviews, subject to category requirements". The per-category thresholds are not published on that page. Pre-badge listings do show in results, ranked below providers who have finished onboarding and carry the badge.
Read that in order. A thin review profile is not just a low position in the auction, it can be the reason you are not in the auction yet. Which puts review collection before the ad spend rather than alongside it.
Check your category before you plan the budget
Two limits worth confirming first. The format charges per lead, on Google's wording you "only pay when a customer gets in touch from your ad", so the cost follows contacts rather than clicks. And it is not offered everywhere: the badge is unavailable for businesses in auto, beauty and dining verticals, and pre-badge ads are not available for garage door services, health care verticals or locksmiths.
The unglamorous input
The ad reads a star average and a review count. Those come from customers who were asked, and nothing about that half is clever.
Two things are worth saying about how the asking is done here, because they bear on the profile the ad reads. The request goes to every customer on the job list, with no sentiment step in front of it, because filtering by predicted happiness is review gating and Google's policies forbid it. And the link in the request is the profile's own review link, built from your place ID, which the review link generator will produce for you at no charge.
Google's own review guidance points the same way: it notes that customers are more likely to leave a review when the request comes from you directly, and describes a business-specific review URL that advertisers working directly with Google can find under "Business Verifications" on the "Google Business Profile" tab.
The ad is one surface on that profile. Google Business Profile optimization covers the rest of it, and how to get more Google reviews covers the request itself. Worth noting the shape of the two costs: an ad budget renews whether the leads were good or not, which is a different commitment from month-to-month software you can cancel in one click.
The short version
The badges became one Google Verified check and the money-back guarantee behind the old one is being retired, with a closing window for bookings made before December 7, 2025. Star rating and review count affect where you rank in the ads. Those reviews are your Business Profile reviews, managed in Business Profile Manager, not a separate ad asset. Reviews are also on the pre-badge requirement list, so an empty profile can keep you out rather than merely place you low. And the screening check says you passed screening, which is worth having and is not the same as a promise to the customer.