Tag Archives: local seo service

According to an article on Mashable, only hours after the Google Maps app for iPhone was released, it became the most popular free app in the Apple App Store. For many iPhone users, this app is long awaited after Apple’s disappointing attempt at a Maps application (see Apple’s apology to its customers regarding Apple Maps).

Check out some screen shots of the new iPhone Google Maps app:

Easily search for local businesses and view their Google local listing. Click to call, save and share the listing, read the reviews and see how far the business is from your current location.

Choose different routes and view the entire route or use turn-by-turn navigation to get to your destination.

So far, our first impression of Google Maps is great – it’s easy to use, has a beautiful interface and integrates nicely with Google+ Local, all with the legendary power of Google Maps.

What are your first impressions of the new Google Maps app for iPhone?

If your engagement on Twitter seems down, it’s time to wake up those followers and get them interested and re-tweeting again. Here are three great ways to interact with your Twitter audience so they will go from followers to customers before you can say “hash tag.”

  • Ask a question.  People love to express themselves on social media. So asking them a question that allows them to express their opinion will get them talking to you. Tweet a question and have them attach a hash tag to their answer. Who knows, you may be able to get a trending topic going.
  • Tweet a series. If you tweet that over the next few days you will be tweeting a series of “how-to’s” or sharing an exclusive peek at new products, people will keep checking back to see the next exciting tweet. People always say, leave them wanting more; tweeting a series will do just that.
  • Answer a common question. If yours is like most businesses, you probably get a lot of the same questions to your customer service representatives. Why not do a Twitter FAQ? Tweet out the answers to some of your more common questions and the people who follow you will not only appreciate it, they’re likely to get excited about their newfound knowledge and share the wealth with others by re-tweeting.

Try these three great Twitter engagement techniques and you’ll not only engage your existing followers but attract new ones.

Google recently made changes to its review interface to put less of a focus on the Zagat review system. The new interface allows review authors to choose words or phrases like “Excellent,” “Very Good,” “Good,” and “Poor-Fair” rather than Zagat’s 0-3 number system.

Zagat’s 0-3 numbering system may have been too confusing to users because it is a unique, unusual system compared to what many people are used to. Many ratings are based on a 1-5 scale, with 3 being the rating for an “okay” or “so-so” experience. However, on Zagat’s rating scale, 3 is the highest score you can give. Google has done away with this Zagat scale. The reviews interface now looks like this:

Google is still displaying the overall Zagat score on each business’s Google+ Local page. This score is a number between 0-30. However, the fact that Google has done away with the initial 0-3 Zagat scoring scale may show that it’s taking steps towards completely eliminating the Zagat scoring system. What do you think? Do you like Google’s Zagat scoring system or should Google do away with it?