Google is getting into the vacation rental space by adding specific vacation rentals to their popular hotel search. Now, when you do a hotel search for some locations, Google will add a prompt asking if you’d rather search for vacation rentals instead. This is a huge change and could have a huge impact on the […]
Google Encouraging Local Ratings & Reviews With Call to Action Test
Google is encouraging searchers to leave ratings and reviews for local businesses with a new call to action test in the mobile search results. It adds a new “Tell everyone about your experience” above the usual five empty stars. Sergey Alakov spotted the test. Here is what it looks like: The interesting part of “tell […]
Google Flags User Submitted Store Hours in Local Knowledge Panel
Google has received some criticism when hours listed in a local knowledge panel don’t match a location’s actual hours. Google is now showing when a user submits hours that don’t match the hours either Google has added or that the business has submitted, and flags them clearly as being different hours that someone has submitted. […]
Google Adds Other Locations to Local Knowledge Panel
Google has made yet another change to how they display local businesses in the knowledge panel. Google is now showing additional locations when it displays the knowledge panel, in a carousel at the bottom of the knowledge panel. Here is what it looks like: It has an additional “view all” link that can be clicked, […]
Bing Local Pack Shows Live Traffic Conditions in Search Results
Bing has added a new feature to their local packs in the Bing search results – the ability to toggle live traffic conditions on and off to help searchers choose a business when traffic is a concern. Here is how it looks normally – there is a new icon on the top right that acts […]
Google Maps Soliciting Location Information in Organic Search Results
Google is testing an interesting way to get data for Google Maps. When doing a search query – and a query that seemingly has nothing to do with local or location – Google will display a map with a pin and ask the searcher if they know what is located at the location marker. Here […]
Google Adds Festival Locations to Local Google Maps
Google has added a new feature to their local maps – Google will now show an area that a festival is in a map. Emily M. Yetzer shared this screenshot showing a local festival showing on Google Maps when nearby Ribfest in Chicago. It appears it shows it not when someone is searching specifically for […]
Google Adds Upcoming Hotel Deals to Hotel Knowledge Panel
Google is testing a new type of sponsored alert in their hotel knowledge panels, this time as an alert that there is a great deal at that particular hotel during particular dates, alerting searchers that the hotel they are looking at may have better deals if they chose alternative dates. Here is what it looks […]
Google Soliciting Feedback for Local Pack Results
Google is testing a new feedback feature in their local packs, allowing searchers to give feedback about the specific results that are being shown – or not shown – in the local pack. For local SEOs, the feedback form includes the usual expected feedback options, but with an very interesting addition – an option for […]
Google Adds Local Restaurant Search Suggestion to Top of Search Results
Google has added a new alert to their search results, suggesting that people use Google search to find local restaurants, going so far as suggesting a search query to do so. And most mysteriously, it shows up for completely unrelated – and non-local – queries. Here is what it looks like: As you can see, […]