Google Starting to Convert Existing Dashboards to the New Places for Business Dashboard
Google just announced in the forums that they were starting the process of converting existing Dashboard users to the new Placed for Business Dashboard. Here is the post: As of May 21, some existing Places users will begin to see the new Google Places for Business dashboard. The transition will happen automatically, and all existing […]
Google Glass: Metaphor for the Future of Local or a Turkey?
At the Philadelphia Local U last week I had a chance to touch Matt McGee’s Glass. It was exhilarating, disturbing, interesting, disorienting and a number of other adjectives. Everyone at the table was anxious to try it and see what it did and how it works. I was struck by its awkwardness and obtrusiveness as […]
Google Local Adds New Troubleshooter to Move Reviews When a Business Relocates
Google has announced in the forums their ability and willingness to now move reviews when a business has moved locations and to remove reviews with significant brand changes for a given location. The request by the business to do so is done via a new troubleshooter. The guidelines that will apply to requests to move […]
How Many Reviews Are Needed to Show Stars in the New Map List View?
Peter Troast of EnergyCircle.com asked a great question in the comments to my post about the new visuals for the (now named) Maps List View -aka Places Search- result: Also seems like the # of reviews threshold is shifting for display. For zero reviews, “Be the first to review” appears right under company name. From […]
Some Tidbits from Google’s Rollouts Yesterday
The weird stuff from yesterday has come into clearer focus. New Maps, Back to the Future on Review Rating Stars (although red this time), New G+ (argh)….but here are some tidbits that might make all of the once and future changes a tad more understandable: The new Google Maps is currently available by invite only. […]
Access Your Local G+ Page with the New 5 Star Treatment
The new local result list display that was discovered today makes more sense when viewed in context of the newly updated Maps. Select the “Go to list of top results” link from the refinement pane and you will arrive at the new page. For those of you that don’t have access to the new Maps view […]
Google Rolling Out New Places Results Page? Or is it a Test? Visible World Wide
Updated: Linda points out that review STARS seemed to have returned in this interface. And they are red. I was first alerted to this change by Radina Sisheva of 411Locals.com. Google appears to be rolling out a new Places (whatever it will be called) search result page that is visually much more attractive. Apparently this display […]
What do these numbers have in common?
fWhat do these numbers have in common? 217-351-2072 618-344-2288 618-708-4055 800-388-9326 866-215-8062 866-216-8068 866-627-6475 866-627-6478 866-726-3116 866-938-2374 877-336-2150 888-399-4067 888-719-5954 I have looked at a lot of strange things in local. None more so than the listing for Thrasher Basement Systems in Omaha that was “having trouble” with their Google listing. As reported by Yext, each […]
A Guide to Call Tracking and Local Search
The question of call tracking keeps coming up in local search. Should it be used? Why or why not? The answer is often posed in stark terms of either you should or you shouldn’t use call tracking. The reality is, as is usual, more nuanced and subtle than that. It is a technology that has […]
Google Local SAB: How to Move Closer to the City
I frequently get the question of how a business in the burbs can compete in the adjoining major metro area. Obviously, one tactic is to do really, really well organically and appear above the local search results. As a tactic that is roughly akin to drawing to an inside straight in poker… not impossible but […]
Google Local Tidbits- Dashboard Going World Wide/New Hotel Restaurant Carousel Being Seen
Several items of note. 1- Firstly Google has announced in the forums that the new Places for Business Dashboard is now available for NEW users in UK, Ireland. It is nice to see this staring to roll out internationally. That being said the rate of conversions of existing dashboards is not at all clear. None of mine […]
Google Local Results Drops “More Results Near…” To “Improve” Local Search Experience
Google has quietly dropped yet another search feature, this one is related to local search results within a search on Google. Google has removed the “more results near…” link on local search results for queries with local intent. For example, if you search for [pizza] on…
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Whither Places Search? Is Plus Search Next?
Update 1:00 pm EST: Googler Jade has just confirmed that some changes of some sort are on the way. Here is their statement: We’ve seen some questions about the small update to local search user interface on Google (removal of “More results near…” link) – Thanks for your feedback about the small update to the […]
Linux/Cdorked: A Nasty New Apache Hack
A couple of days ago I received this email from Miriam at SolasDesign and my first thought was: what rich Google irony: Hey Mike, I was doing a search in Google today for ‘google+ local error 500′ and one of the results Google returned was this page of your site: Google + Page ’500 error […]
Google Closes European Places Support Forums
Today, Google announce the closing of foreign language forums for Google Places as of May 13th. It is not clear if language specific support will be available via email. The announcements can be seen in these various forums: Spanish: https://productforums.google.com/forum/#!forum/places-es Portugese: https://productforums.google.com/forum/#!forum/places-pt Russian: https://productforums.google.com/forum/#!forum/places-ru German: https://productforums.google.com/forum/#!category-topic/places-de/AEah3vEAUlk Here is the Google translation of the Spanish language announcment: Important Announcement: We […]
Google Showing Sitelinks to Nearest Locations on Brand Searches
Last week Bill Slawski wrote about Google’s categorization of web pages for use in local search. The patent he writes about is one in a long line of related works that discuss this sort of web page categorization. That or something very similar to it appears to be occurring that allows Google to include multiple […]
The Mysterious Case of @DannySullivan, Dana Point Jet Ski & Google+ Local
Danny Sullivan just tweeted that Google is screwing up royally when it comes to searches for “dana point jet ski”: Good job, Google. You ignore HTML title tag, make up your own title instead. Result: misname a harbor as business twitter.com/dannysullivan/… — Danny Sullivan (@dannysullivan) April 30, 2013 I thought it would be interesting to […]
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Places Link Removed From Google More Menu
Update from Darren Shaw of Whitespark: You can still access Places through a URL parameter: “tbm=plcs”. Not sure how long that will last though. For example: https://www.google.com/search?q=chicago%20pizza&tbm=plcs&near=chicago This came to me from Andy Kuiper of Calgary and Vancouver: the Places search menu option has been removed from Google. Google has been cleaning up and removing links […]
Google Local Bug: Review/Plus Pages Not Loading For SAB Pages
Laura Behny of Attaboy Plumbing and at least one poster in the forums have noted what appears to be a new bug when clicking on the the “Google reviews” link in the pack results. Either a blank page is delivered or these very weird results are shown instead of the local G+ Page. It is […]
ebay On the Wrong (and self serving side) of the Sales Tax Issue
I received this email from ebay this morning. I think that ebay is on the wrong side of this issue. I was in retail for many years and struggled with sales tax issues at every turn. “Struggle” is putting it mildly as at one point the NY State government came after me with guns a […]