What do you tend to write when appealing a submission?
Reiterate what you have already said in your nomination?
Point out why the initial rejection was incorrect?
Use horrible buzz words like hyper local business and emphasize the word great a lot?
2 Likes
Hi @26thDoctor
I appealed 1 time. My experience on that:
I told them why I think that this is a good wayspot and the community was incorrect.
From your possibilities I choose the second.
P.S. 100% success rate
Edit: I felt inspired by this to appeal my edit, which was sadly while challenge around the world denied and instead was taken a description which ends of a half sentence. Yeah my appeal was rejected. The half description wins. My succes rate is now by 50:50.
2 Likes
I quote the rejection reasons and give a statement why they are not correct. I do point out again how it meets criteria. I offer more evidence if I can find more links. If applicable, I quote clarifications from the forum, in case the Niantic reviewers are not aware.
Here is one I recently did for a cooking school that had been rejected by Niantic in house reviewers:
Appeal Statement: This was rejected as a generic business, but it is not. This is a unique educational facility, one of a kind and not a chain as you can see from their website: https://www.wyntonsworld.com/ They offer certification courses for professionals, as well as classes that are just for fun: Programs - Wyntons World Cooking School This school has been top rated in the area: THE BEST Cary Cooking Classes (Updated 2024) - Tripadvisor or https://www.yelp.com/biz/wyntons-world-cooking-school-cary From a great place to learn a new skill or technique (exploration) to a great way to make friends, have a party, or take a date (social), this place meets criteria and would make a great Wayspot. Please reconsider this nomination.
original nom text:
Description: Offers culinary arts education through classes, camps, date nights, and parties, with programs ranging from recreational to professional.
Supplemental Information: Educational place of exploration, and meets social criteria, too. https://www.wyntonsworld.com/ Main photo shows overhead sign on curved brick and supporting photo can be zoomed in to read the store information. Visible in Street View from dated June 2021.
edit: i guess i should add that this was accepted
4 Likes
I tend to do my best to address and counter the reasons for the rejection if I can make some sense of them, perhaps provide further links or information to reinforce what I have already said.
Always emphasise that submissions are great!
As your nominations are typically well-researched and well-reasoned, your appeal is an attempt to get into the appeal-reviewer’s head and persuade them to come to their senses.
How did they go astray? Did they ignore your links? Remind them of what you had previously provided.
Perhaps you nominated a footbridge that provides an experience in an historical and cultural setting, but the reviewer saw only sticks of wood. Wake them up! Use either attack or defense as appropriate.
If you cannot summon an impassioned re-statement of your original position, try at least to hammer home the best connection you can find to the core criteria.
If they cannot recognize a great nomination when they see it, they might still worry about how their boss will judge them for their misapprehension.
If I cannot find a hook, I usually don’t appeal the rejection, but re-craft the nomination instead.
1 Like
My last 2 appeals were for war memorial stones at an outdoor plaza there were rejected by ML as dupes. There are 4 there, 1 each for WWI, WWII, Korean War, and Vietnam War. They all have the same shape and size, but the wording is different, and they are all in different corners of the plaza.
I was able to find a good 360 view of the plaza on Street View, so I took screenshots and edited them to point out where each stone is and other identifiable areas, such as the nearby street on the east side, and the local courthouse on the west side. I uploaded the images to Imgur, and also provided the link to the 360 view of the plaza from Google Maps, and both were approved.
I always try to provide more information than what was originally provided, and the 360 view is easy to miss in these cases. A lax appeal without much context seems to be frowned upon, so the more info, the better the chances of getting approved on appeal.
2 Likes
I think I tend to just repeat my submission with more concise text.
I’ll try harder after reading these 
I think this is a good topic.
appeals were introduced with no guidance as to what would happen or the best way to help staff decide.
I do have a critical rethink and posting something in nomination support can suddenly show an issue that hadn’t been considered.
You need to interpret the reject reasons.
And then address each. And include links.
I try not to make it too long if I get a big wall of text to read I switch off. So I try and keep it sharply focussed and definitely wait a few days after getting the reject so youcan write in a calm manner.
6 Likes
In a community group in my country, many people are recommending coffee shops. I think coffee shops are a good place to socialize, and there are many coffee shops with unique and interesting architecture that are worth exploring. But in that group there are a lot of people who are toxic to the people who nominated the coffee shop, and they are forced to use appeal to be accepted. So should a coffee shop really become a wayspot?
I also think this is a good topic for people who need to appeal and for Niantic employees to consider and make a reasonable decision. Because many nominations, when rejected or accepted in an invalid form through appeal, will cause the forum to have many controversial reports.
My locality has a lot of meaningless and invalid nominations, many people rely on tricks like Easy Access, or Interesting to manipulate Niantic staff and get the appeal accepted even though the nomination is not at all worthy.
1 Like
It will be helpful if this topic could remain focussed on how you make a good appeal of a rejected submission rather than more general issues.
1 Like
This is from ages ago but after this I only really have edits and I’m not appealing those.
Rejected for not being visually unique.
Information on the 15 the century jousting, Tudor Royal games, cricket and fairs that have taken place here
In retrospect I could have taken a better support pic.
There’s not much more to say for the appeal without basically repeating my text?
I write down why the rejection reasons are wrong, then reiterate why it shouldnpass
I wish our appeal text was saved somewhere visible then Id know what I said 
5 Likes
There’s a tool for that 
2 Likes
In my opinion an appeal is something like “who’s the boss here? I want to talk to him!”
Convincing someone who has absolutly no clue (cultural details, local knowledge…), sits somewhere on the globe, with less words (time is money) → management summary
4 Likes
I’ve tried to counter the rejection reasons given with evidence to the contrary. For example, I’ve had two murals rejected as temporary/seasonal and I sent photos from Google Street View showing that the murals were long established.
I had one that was marked as location inaccurate, and upon researching it I found that Google had the addresses wrong for an entire city block (if you typed in the address your pin would end up on a different street entirely). But if you looked it up on Bing maps, the address is correct. Many links and screenshots later (plus a report filed with Google) and the appeal was granted.
I now preemptively check all of my nominations on satellite and using Google Street View and I explain in my nominations if the Street Views is outdated or if the pinned location and the maps location vary widely. I think that often saves the need to appeal. Live and learn.
2 Likes
The thing with countering rejection reasons, is, you don’t always understand what they mean.
For example, when reviewers give thumbs down to a park bench for “permanent and distinct”, because one bench is just like the other, and anyone can buy them at any generic the home and garden store. The message that goes to the nominator is that it’s temporary. So then they use lots of words in the appeal, to prove it’s permanent. When maybe they should have emphasized how that bench is a destination - for the view it has.
Or a thumbs down for being factually incorrect, or religiously insulting, or mentioning the game they play. If the nominator knew, presumably they wouldn’t have done it.
IOW: Rejection reasons can be unclear, incomplete, or misleading. You don’t know what you don’t know.
BUT it’s all we have to go on. So we go with that.
(Just needed to whine about it a bit.)
I’m more likely to re-research the nomination, and use different words on why it’s a good Wayspot. Maybe ask another gamer how they’d word it.
3 Likes