Mike Blumenthal

Should every place & business that exists in our everyday life be used to sell against? Should that specific, very real entity with its history of sentiment and purpose be leveraged to shill for something without their knowledge? And if so what is appropriate to sell against that place? I asked myself those questions as I …

As the jokes were flying about how distasteful Google’s new Map’s info ad venue was, I became curious as to exactly how unseemly it really was. So I looked. As Glen Gabe pointed out it may very well be necessary for SMB’s to take out ads defensively. Greg Sterling suggested that Google think about a …

As Facebook pushes the boundaries of privacy, Google is pushing the boundaries of ad placement. Like all corporations, Google needs to respond to the demands of a market that requires ever increasing income growth. One way to do that in the absence of significant page view growth is to monetize every remaining square inch of …

Many small shop owners think of themselves as being in more than one business. They have (perhaps loosely and imprecisely) marketed themselves under two or more brands into their local market and the allure of doing so on Google Places is strong. Should they continue to do so? Scott of BreakTheSeal in the UK asked …

With the rollout of the new grey pin local search results, Google has continued to increase the amount of information from your Places page that is visible in the main search results. This is particularly true with the new Branded One Box result. Google is prepared to turn over to your company the better part …

I was struck by the obvious similarity between the visual aspects of the new Local OneBox and the Google test of the Sources display first spotted by Cyrus Shepard. Google has been on a tear of late in local to gather photos and display them on your Place page. One assumes that this effort is …

Two weeks ago there were numerous reports of new pop-ups on the Places page to ascertain from visitors the accuracy of a business location, the website associated with the listing, and the quality of included photos. Shortly there after it became obvious that Google was starting to once again actively allowing users to edit every …

I was surprised to learn that Dependable Locksmith, raided in late 2009 by the Feds and sued by the attorney general in Missouri earlier that year , was still in business and still using their “standard” business model of bait and switch. It does not speak well of our regulatory or legal environment that known crooks and charlatans with …

Updated: 10:30 pm Update: 3:00 am Update: 11/2 11:00 am Minor Update: 11/3 8:00am Google has upgraded their local search results and the Grey pinned results are now live. Note in the screen shot that the branded One Box search now shows up to 4 5 images or a streetview and 2 images, although it …