Imagine this: You’re driving across town to catch a concert by a new artist that friends have been talking about for weeks. Only you’re not really driving. The car is driving itself. And you’re actually paying as much attention to the video screen on your car’s dashboard as anything. You’ve already bought the singer’s latest […]
Adding to its growing portfolio of mobile search ads exploiting location, Google is introducing a “hyper-local” ad capability that shows users the precise distance to the advertiser’s business or location — right now. The ad units are denoted by a blue pushpin and feature click-to-call and an expandable map. This new announcement comes on the […]
There’s a funny and satirical 1989 British film called “How to Get Ahead in Advertising.” The movie focuses on an ad executive, played by actor Richard E. Grant, who experiences an ethical and mid-life crisis. He develops a boil on his neck, which grows into a literal head (a kind of evil twin) and eventually […]
In a lawsuit that will be closely watched Boston’s Skyhook Wireless has sued Google for patent infringement and interfering in its business relationship with Motorola. Skyhook’s principal business is providing location to third parties through the use of cell tower and WiFi location databases often referred to as “triangulation.” Skyhook’s system and technology is widely […]
Earlier this summer Google rolled out Expandable Map Ads for mobile devices. These ads appear on the mobile web and in apps. To participate advertisers must enable location extensions and be opted in to the content network for mobile. They begin as a banner that expands when clicked into a map with the option to […]
We’re delighted to announce that Yelp Chief Operating Officer Geoff Donaker will be in the spotlight for SMX East’s second day keynote on Tuesday, October 5th. Combining local search with customer reviews, special offers and a healthy dose of social interaction, Yelp is an indispensable resource for local businesses and those who enjoy “getting out […]
One of the questions that came up after the formal launch of Facebook Places last night was: how will this affect Google Places (among others)? As an aside, I have to say it’s really strange that these products have nearly the identical name. It’s almost like Honda offering a car with a particular name and […]
You actually don’t have to be a mobile expert to do mobile marketing. Believe it or not, you actually don’t even need mobile-specific technology to do mobile marketing. You just need to be creative and use existing mobile platforms—especially social networks—to distribute your mobile marketing message. One of the coolest things about mobile social networking […]
Location Services: The New Local Search? Presentations from SMX Advanced Seattle, June 2010 Is checking in on Foursquare search? Yes, indeed! That’s because by checking in, people are also often also looking around, checking for tips, advice and information. How are location services like Foursquare, Google Latitude, Gowalla or mobile apps from established local search […]
Google previously announced (at its I/O developer conference) the creation of a Places API as part of the Google Maps API. That Places API is now open for business and being made available to third party developers. Booyah’s MyTown “check-in” app is one that has already been using it. In short all the information and […]
At Google I/O Google VP Vic Gundotra and his co-presenters showcased a dizzying array of announcements and products to come. Included among them was Google’s iTunes competitor, soon to come to market, and well as a range of new richer mobile ad formats. Those new mobile ad formats have been gradually rolling out. This morning […]
If you’re using Foursquare to search for local offers and deals, you may soon find a lot more of them — especially if you live outside of major cities. Foursquare announced yesterday that it’s going to expand the reach of deals/offers in rural areas: The current location range for offers “nearby” is approximately 200 yards, […]
After a protracted set of M&A discussions with Yahoo and Facebook (and perhaps others), Foursquare announced that it had secured $20 million in funding from several VCs: Union Square Ventures, O’Reilly AlphaTech Ventures and Andreessen Horowitz. CEO Dennis Crowley discussed the funding and how it would be used in his blog post: With this new […]
On Monday when Apple released its iOS 4 software update it changed its terms and privacy policy. One of the provisions of the new privacy terms — though few typically read them — concerns location monitoring and sharing in the background. Here’s what it now says about location: To provide location-based services on Apple products, […]
One of the big, unanswered questions in the local search space is, Who’s going to do the best job of marrying location with real-time context. Twitter is hardly the first to try, but it may have the best chance to succeed. On Monday, the company announced Twitter Places, a new feature that’s being rolled out […]
Below is what happened in search today, as reported on Search Engine Land and from other places across the web. From Search Engine Land: Live Blog: Google’s Dylan Casey On How Real Time Is Changing Search Next up at TWTRCON, where I’m at today, an honest-to-goodness search panel! Moderator David Berkowitz of 360i will be […]
Responding to Apple CEO Steve Jobs’ declaration that on mobile devices “search hasn’t happened,” we’ve now written several times about how mobile apps of various sorts are essentially search by another name. Just to refresh your memory, here’s Jobs making that statement in April of this year: [youtube]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YuQWPGTBVE4&feature=player_embedded[/youtube] The specific app he references (in case […]
Google recently announced a Location History dashboard that allows users to see where they’ve been, based on their Latitude activity: Today we’re launching an experimental new view in Beta for Google Location History to visualize your location history in a different — and hopefully more interesting — way than just a string of locations. If […]
Yahoo announced that it has acquired an Indonesian site called Koprol. Think of it as a kind of cross between Twitter and Foursquare, with more emphasis on the latter. (Yahoo had been rumored to be in talks to buy Foursquare. This move may reflect its inability to close that deal.) It touches local, mobile and […]
Yahoo and Nokia made their anticipated partnership announcement this morning in New York. The public elements of the deal include the following: Nokia will be the exclusive, global provider of Yahoo!’s maps and navigation services, integrating Ovi Maps across Yahoo! properties, branded as “powered by Ovi.” Yahoo! will become the exclusive, global provider of Nokia’s […]
Google Buzz has been available on Maps for mobile devices, but now Google has made it possible to access Buzz on Maps for the PC. In addition Google is rolling out localized Search Suggest for Maps in more places around the world. You access the “Buzz layer” on Maps by selecting more, which reveals the […]
I’m attending South By Southwest for the first time, later this week. I have to say, already I find SXSW to be overwhelming — and I’m not even there yet! To get myself organized as to how to attack this monster, I starting making a list of search-related sessions. I thought it would be useful […]
Google has announced a new product called Google Buzz, which represents the company’s latest attempt to hitch its wagon to the popularity of social networking and, more specifically, the growth of social sharing and status updates. Many will call this a Twitter killer or a threat to Facebook. Certainly the company is targeting the audiences […]
Google is set to announce a new social tool at a 10:00 am event on its Mountain View campus. Due to the last-minute notice, we’re not on the scene, but Google is providing a webcast via YouTube that we’ll be using. Stay tuned for the liveblogging to start at 10 am or shortly thereafter…. Okay, […]
We’re just weeks into 2010, and already a host of major tech, online, and mobile companies have made some exciting announcements about their latest plans for local search. In mid-January, Google’s Mobile division announced that it is upgrading its search engine on Android-powered devices and the iPhone to present results reflective of the current or […]
Just a couple weeks after failing to consummate a rumored deal to buy Yelp, Google has launched a mobile search tool that could take away the mobile market share of Yelp and similar sites/apps like Urbanspoon, MapQuest, and some of the yellow pages apps. It’s called “Near Me Now,” and Google previewed it last month […]
The Google Search Evolution event today featured a fair amount of discussion of the impact of mobile on the future direction of search and the user experience. There was a flurry of announcements about mobile products and feature upgrades, summarized on the Google Mobile Blog. Danny live-blogged the event. Vic Gundotra, Vice President of Engineering, […]
Google announced they have purchased Teracent, a company that uses machine learning to show the different display ad creatives based on dozens of factors. Google bought them to improve and better automate the display ad side of their ad serving technology. Google said: We think that this technology has great potential to improve display advertising […]
Seeking to make Latitude, Google’s location-aware friend finder, more engaging and useful the company has added location history and alerts to the service. Location Alerts, which require Location History to be enabled, tell you when friends are in the area. The system is smart enough to recognize routine places like home and work so it […]
Google’s new social search experiment is kind of a big deal for a lot of reasons, not the least of which is it will open up lots of opportunity for smart local search marketers.
Lots of companies make a good living from hardware and software GPS navigation systems. In the US carriers such as Verizon and Sprint and personal navigation device (PND) makers such as TomTom, Garmin, Magellan, among others, earn device and subscription revenues from turn-by-turn routing and directions and points of interest directories. There are a number […]
There seems to be an explosion of “real-time” search engines on the PC. The space is very new, still fairly open and in my opinion the tools and sites are not yet all that useful. Almost exactly the same can be said of “augmented reality” (AR) in mobile. From almost nothing about six months ago, […]
We’re really just at the beginning of the era of “mobile search.” Even what we think of as “search” will be dramatically altered by innovations in mobile. In this first phase the transfer of what might be called the “query box” (and related links) into mobile is complete. In time, however, we many even come […]
We’ve known for some time, based on a number of studies from Microsoft, Yahoo, SEM firms and ad networks, that an online ad campaign that includes both display and search performs better than one that features only display or search. In another version of that same theme, Yahoo recently said that it was using search […]
Google is now expanding its map-based, location-aware service Latitude beyond the the Latitude destination in new ways with a public location sharing badge for third party sites and other apps that incorporate location. The first of those other apps is Google Talk. In the first example, Google has enabled those already signed up for Latitude […]
Microsoft is launching Vine today as a limited beta in Seattle only. It’s an interesting local/social communications and information tool that plays in the same sandbox as both Twitter and Facebook, and also competes to a degree with online news sites. Vine is Windows-only software that’s intended to sit open on your desktop so that […]
MapQuest has beefed up its business locator tool. A scrolling vertical bar now appears on the upper right of every map allowing users to populate any map quickly and simply with different categories of businesses or, in the case of advertisers, with specific brand locations. Here’s what happens when you click the logo for Holiday […]
The Yahoo Search Blog announced that Yahoo oneSearch shortcut has been improved and expanded. A new auto-locate feature will detect your location on some mobile devices Enhanced Search Assist that incorporates the user’s recent search history was added and Expanded availability on Windows Mobile client including the latest latest Nokia and BlackBerry This service also […]
Google Latitude is now live, a new service from Google that allows you to send your location to Google Maps and share it with friends via many mobile phones (not the iPhone yet, but that’s coming). Some might call the just-launched Google Latitude (part of a new version of Google Maps for Mobile) “son of […]
In some ways the “future of search” is a tired topic that has already seen hundreds (maybe thousands) of speculative articles. But it’s also a topic of critical importance for search leader Google, whose entire franchise is built upon doing it better than anyone else. Just as Microsoft didn’t anticipate the rise of search and […]