Mike Blumenthal

There has been much written about Google now showing 4 ads at the top of search.  Mostly about its impact on bidding and ad costs. Given that Google tests these things and likely has a good handle on the income implications, we can rest assured that they have not made any changes that would reduce …

Ryan Schilling of Lead Hub, noted (h/t Barry Schwartz) on Twitter having spotted click to call phone numbers in mobile organic results. The snippets are appearing in both organic and YouTube universal results on the iPhone. To see these results you need to click through to page 2 of the search results on mobile only (let me …

Our Local U Advanced is rapidly approaching. We still have seats left if you are a last minute type. To sign up visit our Eventbrite page. With David Mihm, Mary Bowling, myself as well as Andrew Shotland, Google, Joy Hawkins and the rest of the Local U gang it promises to be a great event. …

A very brief history: Rich Snippet review stars have had a tough week. Starting last Wednesday I noticed they were missing on a few searches I was using in a demo. By Friday, the reports of their disappearance were widespread. Interestingly not all instances of the review stars disappeared, even during the “darkest” hour. Many …

Opinion polls are an ever present part of our society. All too often, in the absence of real democracy, they seem to take on the role of the “people’s voice” in public debates. I was fascinated by the recent headline from the Verge declaring More than half of Americans think Apple should comply with FBI, finds …

With the release of V2 of the Google My Business API, Google simultaneously released categories for each of the 135 countries currently supported by the GMB. I noted it at the time but it was lost in the article but I wanted to be sure that folks so these categories and downloaded them if they needed …

Our spring Local U Advanced in Williamsburg is one of my favorite conferences… its laser focused on Local search, the group is intimate and collegial, the content is state of the art…. And this year, David Mihm claims that the IPAs will be to die for (you won’t be able to tell by me). All …

Today, NY attorney General  Schneiderman announced a  settlement with four companies in regards posting fraudulent content in the form of reviews and pay for play testimonials. Penalties ranged from $20,000 to $50,000 and included both NY and Californian companies. Schneiderman has led the states in enforcement in this area having previously settled similar review abuse cases in the …

My wife is redoing our living room and recently ordered replacement curtains from JC Penny.  As you know I also helped create GetFiveStars (although I am not helping with the living room) but anything in regards to reviews gets my attention. So I was surprised last week when JC Penny asked me to write a …