Flickr, which previously offered users the ability to search for photos by location or see photos clustered and arrayed on a map, is going further down this path. The company is revamping Flickr’s map explorer and introducing a new service called “Places.” Places are pages dedicated to, well, specific places featuring maps and other information […]
Andy Baio has posted on his blog that he is leaving Yahoo and Upcoming, the social events site he started in roughly 2003. The co-founder of Upcoming says many friendly and favorable things about Yahoo and says that he’s taking some time off and next year will be “focusing exclusively on Waxy.org and related coding […]
ValleyWag speculates that a local search startup called “What’s Open” has written the first Android application. The site has some screenshots, which suggest a fairly familiar local search tool, with a map and some social networking features. The differentiator is likely — as the name suggests — data about what local stores and businesses are […]
Three dimensional mapping company Everyscape has been busy building its product out for the last several months. This morning it finally launched, with four US cities to show for its effort: Aspen, CO, New York, Miami, FL, and Boston. And while Google and Microsoft have been battling it out in public and the press with […]
Not long ago I had an appliance repair person to my house in the San Francisco Bay Area to fix my clothes dryer and, while he was at it, my dishwasher, which was stopping in the middle of cycles. I had used the Internet to find his company; however, he didn’t once ask me how […]
Below is what happened in search today, as reported on Search Engine Land and from other places across the web.
Below is what happened in search today, as reported on Search Engine Land and from other places across the web.
If spam isn’t an indication of the arrival of an advertising medium (e.g. email spam, search spam) I don’t know what is. Mike Blumenthal, who identified instances of Google mapspam has now investigated non-local businesses trying to fool the local algorithms on Yahoo into thinking they are local. Blumenthal cites detailed examples of gaming with […]
Below is what happened in search today, as reported on Search Engine Land and from other places across the web.
Google CEO Eric Schmidt said at one point that one of the reasons Google wanted to get into radio advertising was that the company couldn’t reach users during the morning or afternoon commutes. That’s all changing very quickly. Both Google and Yahoo have almost simultaneously announced in-car mapping and local search functionality.
Below is what happened in search today, as reported on Search Engine Land and from other places across the web.
New local search engine Grayboxx has spent over a year developing a methodology and collecting information that offers “implicit” recommendations or endorsements of local businesses. These are represented as scores, called “neighbor recommendations,” and offer an alternative to more familiar review sites such as Citysearch, Yahoo Local and Yelp. Grayboxx founder Bob Chandra says this […]
Yahoo is arguably the leader in local search, but others including Google, Microsoft and Yelp have been rapidly gaining. The search engine’s venerable Local site was in need of a refresh, which it has now received. With a redesign partly inspired by the Yahoo OurCity sites in India, the new Yahoo Local features a bolder […]
As part of our Google Free Mondays series this month, today is the day to try Yahoo. What are Google Free Mondays all about? My past post explains the intent of the series more. The short scoop is NOT to be anti-Google but rather stress that trying alternatives is good, because there might be something […]
Below is what happened in search today, as reported on Search Engine Land and from other places across the web.
Paul Levine, GM of Yahoo Local, is leaving (his decision) after almost five years and being replaced by Jennifer Dulski, who is now going to be Group Vice President & General Manager, Marketplace. Her title reflects a strategy shift and will combine Local with Shopping, Travel, Autos and Real Estate and represents a more integrated […]
Several years ago I was having lunch in a restaurant in New York with a couple of Yahoo executives, discussing the challenge of motivating people to rate local businesses. Yahoo was way ahead of the online curve back then, although now ratings and reviews of local businesses are seemingly everywhere online. Indeed, that conversation seems […]
Local search is coming to a neighborhood near you – literally. Google is the latest and highest profile site to introduce what might be called “colloquial” neighborhood level search into Google Maps. What it means is that people can now use popular terms and even geo-slang in some cases to identify businesses and points of […]
Although Microsoft might disagree, Yahoo was really the company that kicked off the dynamic mapping arms race back in March of 2004 with the introduction of a feature called “SmartView” ( a version of it still exists on Yahoo Maps “dial-up” presentation). SmartView enabled users of Yahoo Maps to conduct map-based searches using category buttons […]
When Google launched its personalized mapping tool, My Maps, the company said it would soon be integrating user-generated content. It appears that is now happening on many Google Maps searches (hat tip to NLC Marketing Blog).
Events are an important but historically neglected area of local search, previously the almost exclusive province of newspapers and printed weeklies. Now there are a range of startups and more established sites providing local events information. They include Socializr, Attendio, Eventful, Zvents, Citysearch, AOL Cityguide, Heyletsgo, Jambase, the various ticket sites and Yahoo’s Upcoming, among […]
Is local search a microcosm of general search or is it the ultimate vertical? I’ve had this debate with a number of people over the past couple of years. Ask’s CEO Jim Lanzone once told me that he felt local was part of almost every vertical, and therefore not a vertical. I agree with him […]
In the online world, we’ve seen the emergence of social networking sites that allow for the discovery and sharing of websites, of bookmarks, of common interests, and the meeting of friends and friends of friends. In the business world offline, small businesses have the opportunity to be socially active in a number of ways, from […]
Yahoo Quick Links are little links found beneath some of the search results at Yahoo Search. As an example, a search on barry schwartz at Yahoo Search brings up a Wikipedia entry for the other Barry Schwartz with Quick Links; it looks like this: I have been covering Yahoo Quick Links for a while and […]
Guide On HowTo Get Your Business Listed On Major Local Search Engines, Yellow Pages Sites and Social Local Networks from LocalType.com is a very comprehensive rundown to almost 50 places where you can submit your business for local inclusion. It is broken into three categories: local search engines such as Yahoo Local, Google Maps and […]
Below is what happened in search today, as reported on Search Engine Land and from other places across the web:
Below is what happened in search today, as reported on Search Engine Land and from other places across the web:
Below is what happened in search today, as reported on Search Engine Land and from other places across the web:
Om Malik writes about Yahoo testing new local mashups (called “OurCity”) in India, involving content from Flickr, Del.icio.us, Upcoming and news. As Om points out, what’s missing is maps (and maybe video). But this is an interesting further push into community/social media in the local space for Yahoo. The interface is fresher and more visual […]
ResourceShelf and O’Reilly Radar discuss a new offering from Yahoo Research Berkeley, in California: TagMaps. TagMaps are something like the word “tag clouds” meeting maps and Flickr. There are currently three offered, as described from the TagMaps site: World Explorer: “Explorer is based on photos users upload to the Flickr website. The World Explorer engine […]
Below is what happened in search today, as reported on Search Engine Land and from other places across the web:
Last year at the Consumer Electronics Show (CES), Yahoo Chairman Terry Semel introduced Yahoo Go, an initiative seeking to push and integrate Yahoo content beyond the desktop on mobile devices and TV. According to the Wall Street Journal (subscription required) the company is going to introduce an upgraded version of Go for mobile today at […]
The Yahoo Local Blog announced that they have added the ability to quickly add and edit a business listing. For example, if you wanted a business added within about 24 hours, you can go to this form and fill out the details, about 24 hours later, the listing should be live in Yahoo Local. To […]
One of the most challenging aspects of local search is small business (SMB) advertiser acquisition. Everyone is aware, especially Google, Yahoo and Microsoft, that the US SMB market is where the advertiser volume is: almost 99% of US businesses qualify as small businesses (here defined as < 100 employees). According to the US Small Business […]
Below is what happened in search today, as reported on Search Engine Land and from other places across the web:
Below is what happened in search today, as reported on Search Engine Land and from other places across the web:
Joining Yahoo Local, Windows Live Local, Google Maps, and IAC-owned Citysearch and AskCity, YellowPages.com announced a new “send to mobile” feature. The listing and contact details are sent via text to the user’s mobile phone. Here’s a result for the search “Plumbers, New York.” (Send to mobile is on the upper right of each ad.)
Below is what happened in search today, as reported on Search Engine Land and from other places across the web:
Below is what happened in search today, as reported on Search Engine Land and from other places across the web: