Blog - Local Splash

At the Google I/O keynote a new Google Maps interface was rolled out in beta form. This new user interface is the first major overhaul of the Maps product in almost 10 years. Besides the UI overhaul, it fundamentally alters the way that users interface with Google Maps. What does that mean?

Big changes!

This new interface is absolutely visually stunning, if not a little difficult to navigate. The most important new change? You guessed it!

No more Peg Man!

The list is dead! Long live the list!

In all seriousness, probably the most important change as far as local discover and local SEO is that searches for businesses or locations are no longer displayed in a list. Instead, they are displayed in a more organic fashion on the map itself:

Not only does this have the potential to impact the discovery of local businesses, but for those of us in the local search marketing space, it will most likely break your rank tracking tools. Especially since Places was removed as an option from Google Search. Fear not! There still is a way to get to a hierarchical list of places. Simply click the “Go to list of top results” after you perform a search in the new Google Maps interface:

Once you click on this you are taken to the same list of Places results that Mike Blumenthal recently showed on his blog. There is lots of speculation on whether or not this will replace Places in Google after the previous version was eliminated, however, only time will tell. At least right now, you will have to get your rankings report and conduct deeper dives into local rankings data through the new Maps interface. It’s not perfect, but it is doable.

Integrating with Google Plus and other Google products

Before the Google I/O keynote there was lots of speculation that the new Maps UI was going to more fully integrate with Google Plus/Plus Local and that is definitely the case. It is possible to sort Maps results through both your Google Plus circles, as well as the top reviews.

To access the Maps beta I have to be signed into my Google account, so I assume that filtering through your Google Plus circles goes away if you aren’t signed in, but cannot verify. Regardless, it adds a new social layer and level of personalization to Google Maps that some will appreciate and some won’t. This new integration also further fuels speculation that Google is not so much redesigning their local search products as much as they are integrating them into Google Maps and Google Plus. Given some of the other changes to Maps, that likely seems their strategy. Speaking of which…

Another change in the new Google Maps interface is a deeper integration with other Google products like Google Ads and Offers. Specifically, Google Ads campaigns with local extensions now show up on the map with a purple pin and are clearly labeled as ads.

In addition to the new ad display, when you click on a business location that has a Google Offer, it shows the offer in the UI; if you click on it you are taken directly to that company’s offer page.

Hopefully this will provide more value for local businesses that attempt to fully integrate with the Google idon’tknowwhattheyarecallinglocal experience.

A look at the new business listings

The classic business listing also got a much needed visual and information overhaul:

The new business listing has several components, and are much more robust then they used to be. The features include:

The business name and address
Today’s hours (which when clicked on brings up an overlay of the complete business hours)
Directions (because it wouldn’t be Google Maps without directions)
The ability to save a location
The website associated with the listing (and if there isn’t one it references the Google Plus Local Page)
Phone Number
Street View
Photos associated with the business listing
A 360 degree panoramic view of the inside of the business (if the specific business has one)
A star rating and average if the business has more than 5 reviews
A menu, that as far as I can tell comes from menupages.com or viewmenu.com
Pricing displayed as dollar signs
Google categories, which if clicked produces a new search with the category as the query
A description taken from the associated Google Plus Local page, if there is one

Like I said previously, I really like the new interface, although it is harder to manage. Unfortunately, what that means is another complication for local business owners to navigate when dealing with Google’s convoluted and oft changing local ecosystem. Did anybody notice anything else? If so, I would love to hear about it.

“Press one to reach our customer service department. Press two for our sales department…For all other inquiries, press star. Press the pound key to return to the previous menu.”

Surely you’ve heard this one too many times: calling to complain about a T-Mobile phone bill after being charged with hidden fees, scheduling a doctor’s appointment, or getting in touch with Yahoo! in regard to your local listing. Whichever the case may be, it’s a headache, a vicious cycle, and you end up not resolving anything!

There is hope. As opposed to Yahoo! and Google, Bing offers a live chat to ease your worries. It’s no automated machine, nor is it a person ready to direct you to the wrong department. It is a real person, real conversation and chatting with you – real time.

No more dealing with phone calls you dread making, as you try to get past the automated machine. Bing Business Portal Support offers a virtual chat session and will assist you with any Bing related issues. The chats are personalized and tailored to your immediate request and they are super friendly, too! Bing’s support chat is dedicated to their Microsoft and Bing users. Their reps provide answers and discover solutions to Bing business listing issues you may be experiencing. A few problems may include:

Previously claimed listings
Removing duplicate, competing listings
PIN numbers not registering when verifying your listings
General questions
Log in issues
Any other issues you’re struggling with

Get What’s Yours

So you’ve claimed, prepared, and optimized the listing you wish, but arrive at a verification screen that displays this message: “This listing has been claimed and verified by another user.” Hey, it happens. But there is an easy fix.

Bing’s support chat will help release the claim on the listing you want. To expedite this, the Bing representative will request a verification email from the email associated with your business. For example, if your business is Panera Bread, Bing will request an email from *****@panerabread.com, verifying that you are connected to the business. This is so not just anyone can claim your business listing.

Once Bing receives an email from your business’ email address, the listing will be approved under your ownership. Bing representatives also will verify your listing after releasing the claim from the previous owner. No need to endure the long days of having your listing screened as you wait impatiently, unaware of what is going on behind the scenes. The listing is now yours and it is verified.

Duplicates: Say Bye-Bye to PIN-Verify

With Bing, there are several ways to remove duplicate listings. One of the most common ways is to claim, PIN verify, and then hide them on Bing Maps. This tactic works and may take 2-6 weeks for Bing to remove the duplicate off Bing Maps; in some instances it may take longer. Google offered the same strategy for removing dupes before they released Map Maker.

Another way to deal with duplicates – although it may not be the ideal practice – is running a community edit on the listing itself by clicking “Report a Problem.” There is an option to mark the business as closed. This may or may not remove the business from Bing Maps.

Using Bing’s support chat is a viable process for removing your duplicates. It’s simple. Once you’ve gathered all your duplicate listings, save the URLs until you meet a Bing rep on chat and instant message them those URLs. A Bing rep will take it from there, verifying and ensuring the URLs you’ve sent are legitimate duplicates – and that you are not some pretentious, first page-invested business owner who wants to wipe out all competing listings conflicting with yours. To verify true competing listings, Bing reps require an email from your business verifying that the business is active and located at the address provided. Other times, Bing reps call the phone number on the duplicate listing you want removed. The help is flexible. If you prefer one method over the other, discuss with them and determine which process is better for you.

Bing Support chat may not make up for its search engines’ struggling popularity – proven by the majority of internet users, consumers, entrepreneurs and the remaining Google-elitists – but they aren’t the least favored either.

According to a recent statistic by eBiz (April 2013), Bing trails Google by over 700 million users, with an Alexa rank of 22 versus Google’s Alexa rank of one. (Alexa is a well-known ranking system that audits and retrieves a website’s rank depending on its page visits. Webmasters and advertisers may use Alexa to measure their website’s efforts and that of their competitors). Bing does exceed Yahoo by 5 million users compared to past years, when Yahoo held the lead.

No machine-operated calls, unattended forum posts and headaches over your questions and concerns! Bing Live Chat is committed to taking the initiative in providing solutions that best fit your situation. It’s free. It’s easy! All you need is a contact email and name to start the conversation. No more waiting. Help is a keyboard and mouse click away!

*Bing Business Portal has recently migrated to Bing Places for Business. Updates and changes (due to the new interface) has taken effect and few things mentioned in this article are subject to change.

For about a month now, I have been getting an odd message when I try to access the “Edit Details” Mapmaker page directly from the Google Places listing of a SAB. A sad face tells me that the page won’t load and that they’ve tried everything.

It appears that Google has removed all SAB’s from Mapmaker. Any listing that hides its address cannot be found via the Mapmaker interface in Places or in Mapmaker itself. This may be a new effort by Google to separate the process of searching for SABs and storefront businesses, and it may provide a solution to the slew of problems we’ve recently faced with SABs. First we had the problem of SAB addresses showing in Mapmaker despite being hidden in the dashboard, and after that we experienced many businesses showing their addresses on Maps even though they had checked “Hide My Address” in the dashboard.

This possible ‘solution,’ however, may create just as many problems. With the community edit page transformed into Mapmaker earlier this year, there is now no way to edit your business details other than using the Places dashboard, which is unreliable and slow at best. A recommended practice for now would be to submit a Google troubleshooting form to deal with any problems you may have. You can complete this form, writing out any problems you have in detail, and you even have the option of calling Google phone support. Phone support may be a much faster method of getting your listing information fixed if you are the business owner. If you are managing someone else’s listing though, Google will need to contact the business owner to confirm the changes that you want to make.

The important thing is to remain adaptable to whatever Google rolls out in the near future. Legacy Places accounts have not yet been transferred to the new Dashboard, and this may be just the first of many changes that will screw with our workflow. My advice is to stay on top of what Google is doing and do your work the way that Google would want it to be done, or risk being left behind.

A Stroll Through the New Google Maps Interface

The list is dead! Long live the list!

Integrating with Google Plus and other Google products

A look at the new business listings

Because It’s Not Google: Bing’s Support Chat

Get What’s Yours

Duplicates: Say Bye-Bye to PIN-Verify

It’s Official… Google Has Tried Everything