With the launch of Google Collections – which is Google’s answer to Pinterest – it has affected another feature within Google+.  Local SEOs noticed today that when the Collections link was added to the Google+ menu, they dropped the Local link from the menu.

Linda Buquet from the Local Search Forum asked Google whether this change was permanent, and they sent her a statement.

We’ve been making some changes to Google+ to streamline the user experience. Recently, we’ve removed the Local element from the left-hand navigation ribbon and the local search box on Google+ Local pages. Users will see a Profile element and the standard Google+ search box moving forward and may still search for local (and other) pages using this search box.

Here is how the menu with Local included.

And here is how it appears now that Collections has been added.

It probably was one of the least used links on the Google+ menu, and I can’t imagine Google removing it without knowing the CTR of each of those links on the menu. From a user perspective, most people aren’t on Google+ to do a local search… unless they are an SEO.

One reason why this local search was popular for local SEOs is because it was an easy way for people to find spam entries and duplicate local listings, so they can be removed or corrected.

There is a forum discussion on the Local Search Forum.