Google Maps could be chocked full-O-ads
I was glancing at Google Maps of Tokyo when I noticed just how many ads they have running in them! I can see icons for all sorts of chain restaurants for instance, including: McDonald’s, Baskin-Robbins, 7-Eleven, Royal Host, Mini Stop, Taco John’s, Denny’s, KFC, ampm, etc.
Now, we’ve already seen ads in Google Maps here in America, but in a much more limited deployment:
The Tokyo map ads are not clickable like the ads in the states.
What’s really different with the Tokyo map is the density of ads within the maps is much greater, and there seems to be much more variety of companies advertising. I can only see this as the likely future for Google Maps here in the US, too — more ads, from more companies.
UPDATE 3/18/2010: Mike Blumenthal reports on how icon ads have been added to Google Maps in Australia.
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Posted by Chris of Silvery on 06/20/2007
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Filed under: Google, Local Search, Maps Google-Maps, Google-Maps-Tokyo, Map-Ads, Map-Advertising
Cool Yellow Pages Billboard Ads from Israel
Ad agency Young & Rubicam’s Israeli office came up with this great billboard and tv campaign to promote the Golden Pages — Isreal’s primary yellow pages company. This is one of the more effective yellow pages billboard campaigns I’ve seen — they’re funny, engaging, and simple enough to read when driving:
Acupuncture – billboard for Israeli Yellow Pages, the Golden Pages
Here’s their funny pinnocchio-inspired video ad.
The Y&R Israel blog shows some of these in Hebrew – I’m assuming they mocked up the ads in English primarily for promotional release distribution in America — I bet these English versions of the ads are not actually being used on billboards anywhere, but I couldn’t get confirmation from Y&R before posting this.
Click through to see some more cool billboards from the sequence…
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Posted by Chris of Silvery on 06/13/2007
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Filed under: Advertising, Local Search, Yellow Pages Ads, Advertising, Billboards, Golden-Pages, iyp, Online-Yellow-Pages, Yellow Pages, Young-&-Rubicam, YP
Plea for a New Open Format: Open Local Profile Format
My most-recent Locals Only column just pubbed at SearchEngineLand.com, titled “A Call To Standardize Local Search Listings“.
Open Local Profile Format
In it, I’m calling for the companies operating in the local search space to come together and agree upon a common data format protocol that would allow businesses and organizations to more easily submit their directory profile information to the great plethora of local info sites where users go to get information. The local search engines, online yellow pages, and various vertical directories should come together to reduce costs/complexity for businesses, and to facilitate improved information for consumers, similar to how the major search engines last year came together to agree on one common submission protocol – Sitemaps – for submitting sites’ page links to them. Read on for more details.
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Posted by Chris of Silvery on 06/04/2007
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Filed under: Local Search, Yellow Pages Business-Listings-Data, Google-Maps, hCard, microformats, Open-Formats, Open-Local-Profile, Open-Local-Profile-Format, Sitemaps, Yahoo-Local, Yellow Pages
Google Map API to Now Include Ads
InfoWorld reports that at a conference yesterday, Google Maps engineer Andrew Eland announced that Google has integrated its AdSense program with Google Maps so that those using their Maps API and developer tools would be able to derive money off the clickthroughs to the map ads when displayed on their site pages.
Detail – Google Map Ads
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Posted by Chris of Silvery on 06/01/2007
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Filed under: Advertising, Google, Local Search, Maps AdSense, Affiliate Marketing, Google, Google-Maps, Map-APIs, Mapping
Experiment with Google Voice Local Search
Google recently released their new Voice Local Search in beta, also known as “GOOG-411”, and I thought I’d kick the tires a bit. They also mentioned it on their new Google Lat Long Blog.
I used to work for a major telco (Verizon), and we had a number of researchers working on various voice recognition systems. I’ve also tinkered a bit with applications using text-to-speech voice synthesis software such as the AT&T Labs Text-to-Speech software, so I’m familiar with some of the issues that are commonly associated with these types of systems.
I was curious about whether Google’s clever engineers had perhaps improved upon some of the issues involved with having software recognize spoken words, and I also wondered how the quality was of their voice-synthesis.
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Posted by Chris of Silvery on 05/23/2007
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Filed under: Google, Local Search Goog-411, Google, Google-Voice-Local-Search, Voice-Recognition, Voice-Synthesis
Google Confirms New Local OneBox Placement in SERPs
I earlier reported that Google SERPs were now showing the “OneBox” containing Google Maps listings embedded throughout the listings in the results pages, not just at the very top any more. Days later, Google has now confirmed this new layout on the new Google LatLong Blog:
You’ve probably heard Google’s big announcement about Universal search. As part of this, when you search for local businesses on Google.com, listings from Google Maps are now blended into the results page. These listings may appear at the top, middle, or bottom of the page based on their relevance compared to the other web results.
Previously we only showed local listings at the top of the results page, and since this was prime real estate, we would not display the listings if we were not certain that you were looking for a local business. Within the Universal search framework, we are now able to more smartly handle ambiguous queries. For example, for the query [san francisco bar] we can now satisfy users who are looking for the website of the Bar Association of San Francisco as well as those looking for a local place to get a drink.
Well, you heard it here, first! 😉
I’ll probably circle back around and comment about Google’s new “Universal Search” later on.
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Posted by Chris of Silvery on 05/20/2007
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Filed under: Google, Local Search, Maps Google-LatLong, Google-Maps, Local Search, Universal-Search
Superpages Launches LocalServe Affiliate Program
I see that my former company, Idearc Media, finally launched the Superpages LocalServeSM Affiliate Program.
LocalServe was developed by one of the development teams reporting to me during the past year before I left, and it was quietly in beta release up until now.
This is a great way for local info sites and vertical industry-related sites to make money, and the content is perfectly compatible for those niche markets. Superpages has a very rich set of general listings and local search advertisers which can enhance the content of local and vertical sites, while also providing a good revenue stream.
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Posted by Chris of Silvery on 05/18/2007
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Filed under: Local Search, Yellow Pages Affiliate Marketing, Affiliate-Programs, Local-Serve, LocalServe, superpages
Local Guides Beta Launch
Local Matters yesterday announced the launch of their new site, LocalGuides.com, which mashes up Local + Social + Vertical content and utilities. The site is really strong with some compelling features, so I’ve kicked the tires and have a few technical comments.
The press release they sent me contains the following quote from their CEO, Perry Evans:
“Consumers want more involvement with local information. While some progress has been made in a few entertainment categories, the search industry has failed to give consumers useful tools for personalized local information and opinions. LocalGuides.com fills this void by creating a relevant and engaging shared-consumer experience, while also helping local merchants find new ways to connect with their local audience. This is a big part of what has been missing in Local Search.�
The UI is beautifully clean and quite attractive. I can easily imagine that the simplicity and carefully local-oriented design would be readily adopted by users.
The conceptual format, which allows users to build out their personal local guides, is very, very strong. Just clicking into their “Explore Guides” link allows one to view custom local directories created by other users. One for Oxford, Mississippi immediately caught my eye, because it’s located very near where my grandmother used to live, and I’m quite familiar with the small town.
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Posted by Chris of Silvery on 05/17/2007
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Filed under: Local Search, Yellow Pages Local Search, Local-Guides, Local-Matters
Bill Gates Predicts Demise of Yellow Pages
Last week at the Microsoft Strategic Account Summit 2007, Bill Gates interacted with Microsoft’s Corporate VP and Chief Media Officer, Joanne Bradford in an interview/Q&A session, and he predicted that among those under 50, yellow pages usage would drop down to zero within five years!
Now, he was apparently speaking solely about the print yellow pages, but the statement still seemed a tad bit bearish, considering that Microsoft is partnered closely with my former company, Idearc Superpages.com, one of the largest yellow pages companies (print or otherwise) in the world, to license the yellow pages data and service for use in Microsoft’s Live Local Search, and for the MSN Yellow Pages.
Now, Gates isn’t alone in predicting the demise of printed directories, since many others have also foreseen their eventual extinction, including me. But I think that other analysts out there have stated terms more in the ten-year range. Even if the numbers of some directories are declining, I still note that usage and sales are still very strong, so I’d be inclined to expect that print YP will likely go on for longer than five years.
It could be even longer, if there’s some more revolutionary tech introduced, such as I earlier suggested in “Could Nanotechnology Save Print Yellow Pages?”
UPDATE: Don Dodge, Director of Business Development for Microsoft’s Emerging Business Team, also posted on his blog about the Summit, and he quoted a Seattle Times report which gave a further quote from Bill Gates about the yellow pages:
The traditional Yellow Pages are doomed as voice-activated Internet searches combined with on-screen interfaces on smart mobile devices get better and proliferate, Gates said. The company’s recent acquisition of voice-technology provider TellMe is accelerating the trend.
Dodge further states:
Microsoft’s recent acquisitions of MotionBridge and Screentonic, coupled with the acquisition of TellMe will support Gates vision of search and advertising on smart phones.
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Posted by Chris of Silvery on 05/16/2007
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Filed under: Local Search, MSN Search, Yellow Pages Bill-Gates, Live-Search, MicroSoft, msn, superpages, Yellow Pages
New Layout for Google Local Search Onebox Results
Chris Sherman earlier reported that Google was to begin displaying their OneBox content for news anywhere within the search results page, not just at the top of the organic results as they have been for some time. I’ve just in the last few days run across instances where the OneBox for local keyword searches has been appearing lower down in the page. Check it out:
This was a search for “San Antonio Sea World”. Read on for another example and comments.
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Posted by Chris of Silvery on 05/14/2007
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Filed under: Google, Local Search, Maps Google-Maps, Local Search, SERP-Layout, User-Interface
