Alliance Blog Reviews » local/mobile

Google Tells What is “Near You Now”

cgseo — Fri, 08 Jan 2010 14:50:16 +0000

What’s with Google and their constant upgrades and innovations? What is it with these guys? You would think that they are trying to improve and stuff. The latest, and personally I think one of the coolest, service introductions is the “Near You Now” feature on Google.com for mobile. It’s pretty simple. Your location is known by Google (if you allow it of course) so it simply tells you what is “near you now” with regard to restaurants, local services (i.e. animal hospitals, dentists, drugstores, gyms, parking lots etc), coffee shops, lodging, shopping and a lot more. Google’s blog tells us a bit more : “Near me now” was designed to address two user problems. First, we wanted to make it fast and easy to find out more about a place in your immediate vicinity, whether you’re standing right in front of a business or if it’s just a short walk away. Second, we wanted to make searching for popular categories of nearby places really simple. Imagine that you emerge from the subway station and you want to grab a coffee, but you don’t see a coffee shop around you. You can simply search for all nearby coffee shops by using “Near me now”. To search other categories of places not shown, “Browse more categories” provides access to our local search product with more category choices. Pretty slick. Watch out other local apps like Yelp. This one really works although I can’t figure out why my location keeps coming up with Chinese characters but I’ll survive (neither me or my iPod have been to China unless that’s where it was “born”?). Anyway, “Near me now” is currently available in the US for iPhone (OS 3.x) or Android-powered devices with version 2.0.1 or later. While this video demo is one of the cheesiest ever, it does show how the service works. Try to ignore the music, I dare you.

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Google Tells What is “Near You Now”

For Google Maps It’s Not the Problem but How You Handle It

admin — Thu, 07 Jan 2010 20:48:25 +0000

How many times have you heard it said in business (or anywhere for that matter) that how you respond to a problem is more important than the problem itself? It’s said over and over again because it’s simply good advice. Well, Google had a chance to practice that principle last night when it began sending out e-mails to those with listings in the Local Business Center. Search Engine Land’s Barry Schwartz reports of the issues that occurred . Starting last night, Google began sending out the monthly (or so) Google Local Business Center updates. The updates go out via email and contain analytical information about how many times a listing was viewed, clicked on, and other miscellaneous analytics. The analytics are a summary of what they would see in their Google LBC analytics dashboard. But instead of these emails going to their actual business owners, they went to the wrong business owners. Schwartz received information for a business that was 1,500 mile from his location and he was not the only one having the experience. To Google’s credit they recognized the error and set things straight as quickly as one might expect. The following was sent to Barry so he could help the rest of us get some clarity on the issue. Of course, it doesn’t hurt your ability to get these kinds of responses when you are the News Editor of Search Engine Land. In other words, not everyone received the following explanation right away. As you’re aware, we send a monthly newsletter to our Local Business Center users, featuring product news and a glimpse at the Dashboard statistics which show the traffic Google properties drive to their listing. Shortly after sending the newsletter to a small portion of our users last night, we discovered that some emails included incorrect business listing information. We promptly stopped sending any further emails and investigated the cause, which we found to be a human error while pulling together the newsletter content. We’d like to sincerely apologize to all the business owners impacted and assure all our users that we’re working hard to ensure that nothing similar will happen again. Oh no! It appears that there may be a Googler who is, gulp, human and made a mistake. Of course it would never be one of the thousands of faithful servers around the world, it had to be one of those pesky human thingys. All kidding aside, as Schwartz points out, the data is pretty innocuous. It could even be looked at as a sideways form of advertising to a very small market because now people know about a business somewhere else that they never heard of before. Google later sent an automated reply to all those impacted by this glitch and it appears that all is well in the world again. While I would rather not have something like this happen I have to give Google credit for calling themselves on the error and working to make it right. Hopefully, any of the business owners who got the wrong data would treat one of their mistakes with the same approach. Pilgrim’s Partners: SponsoredReviews.com – Bloggers earn cash, Advertisers build buzz!

Android Taking over AT&T

cgseo — Thu, 07 Jan 2010 19:50:36 +0000

The last domino has fallen: AT&T has announced that they will offer Android handsets on their network. The last of the major US carriers to sign on with the open-source Google OS devices, AT&T plans five Android-based handsets built by Motorola and HTC this year. Of course, AT&T is the home of the iPhone. Along with the Android, AT&T announced at CES that they’ll also be offering a couple Palm OS devices as well as adding support for the Palm, Android, Windows Mobile and Nokia app stores. Perhaps wisely, AT&T didn’t bring up the iPhone, though they continue to enjoy an exclusive sale agreement—which apparently wasn’t reciprocal. (Will it be renewed?) This move by AT&T may be a precursor to signing on with the agreement to sell plans for Google’s new Nexus One . Like most other smartphones, the Nexus One is pretty cool, and Google selling an unlocked version is pretty cool, too—but the price tag (without carrier subsidies and rebates) will effectively keep all but the most tech-covetous shoppers from the Nexus (with the iPhone running as little as $200 vs. the Nexus’s $530). AT&T will also be adding more cell sites and connections to improve their network, which has been facing a lot of complaints of dropped calls and texts and sluggish download times. (Not to mention the 3G map comparison Verizon’s latest ad campaign harps on.) What do you think? Will this help AT&T or Google more in the long run?

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Android Taking over AT&T

Hyperlocal Being Targeted by M&A and VC Crowd

admin — Wed, 06 Jan 2010 15:50:51 +0000

Search marketers are always interested in local marketing and search. It’s where the rubber meets the road for many businesses including the enterprise (i.e. big box stores) whose real representation of their brand is the local store that someone goes into to buy products. If the local experience is bad then the brand is bad in many consumers’ eyes. So getting down to the local level is critical for marketers especially in the age of continuing social media adoption and influence. Now there is local and there is hyperlocal. Hyperlocal is just as it implies it is getting down to the street level for reporting of local news and events. Noted hyperlocal blogger Matt McGee of hyperlocalblogger.com says this Hyperlocal blogging is writing about the streets where you live. It’s blogging about local news, local events, local businesses — anything that’s happening in your hometown, city, street, or neighborhood. Hyperlocal blogs often talk about things that traditional media ignores, the stuff that’s too small or not important enough to a wide range of people. Well, it appears that what traditional media ignores the VC and M & A crowd are finding interesting. According to theDeal.com While newspapers have been decimated by the economics transforming today’s media industry, Web sites that report news and deliver other content at the neighborhood, or “hyperlocal,” level, are bursting with life, with many of them becoming sought-after targets by big media and big tech companies. It is getting harder to ignore the concentration on the local level that is becoming one of the most important elements for B2C and some B2B online business success. The sound and fury around the mobile market with Google and Apple squaring off is just as much about local search as it is a device. The mobile device and its growth is perfectly suited for the hyperlocal crowd for both creating content and consuming it as well. Chris Brogan talks today about how interesting it would be to be able to geotarget outbound tweets to make sure the local interest of a tweet is not shared across a larger group that don’t have any access or real concern for the data. If you want to judge how big this is by the money it attracts thedeal.com tells us …hyperlocal startups continued to get funded. In December, Outside.in Inc., which pulls together neighborhood blogs and other local content, announced it had closed a $7 million Series B round of funding, led by existing investor Union Square Ventures, with participation from new investor Turner Broadcasting System Inc. As part of Turner’s investment, CNN.com will use Outside.in’s aggregation and curation tools to power hyperlocal news across all of its sites. The new round brings Outside.in’s total raised to $12 million. And let’s not forget FourSquare’s growing success Over the summer, one of the most competitive early-stage fundings the VC industry saw all last year was that of FourSquare Labs Inc., which encourages people to share their whereabouts from local restaurants and businesses via their mobile phones. Union Square and O’Reilly AlphaTech Ventureswon the honor of funding FourSquare’s $1.35 million Series A, announced in September, with Jack Dorsey, a co-founder of Twitter Inc. and the mobile payments startup Square, serving as an angel investor in Foursquare. How are you and your business addressing the hyperlocal craze? If you aren’t is your competition getting involved? It could be that in the very near future the first to find a hyperlocal hook into a market will be the winner.

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Hyperlocal Being Targeted by M&A and VC Crowd

Google Premieres Nexus (Big Surprise)

cgseo — Tue, 05 Jan 2010 19:32:09 +0000

Google declined to go for the fake out as they unveiled the expected Nexus One today at their Android event . First spotted after employees received free phones last month , the Nexus has already created a media frenzy as the “real” Google phone—one that will be sold by Google through their web store (though manufactured, like so many other Android headsets, by HTC). So today is the formal announcement of the phone, along with the full rundown of the technical specs (available below). Search Engine Land , Read Write Web and many others are liveblogging the event, which features Google, Android and HTC engineers presenting not only the phone but an update on the progress and history of the OS. But we’ve been following Android for over two years now , so we’ll just stick to the Nexus news. Google has decided that their phone is so smart, it can’t even qualify as a “smartphone”—they call it a “superphone.” (Buzzwords FTW!) And for the low, low price of $529, one can be yours today. (Free engraving!) As per the rumor, the phone is available unlocked with no data plan included; T-mobile is the premiere partner for $80/month, but they’re not available just yet. Verizon and Vodafone are slated to join in spring. In the store you can have two lines of custom engraving added to the back of the phone (for free), and naturally checkout is through Google Checkout. The phone itself is pretty slick—with a fast enough processor and enough memory to run the “live wallpaper” and other apps in the background, multiple apps simultaneously and get some pretty good-looking graphics (if you’ve seen the Engadget video ). However, it’s not the game changer that the iPhone was. Processor: 1GHz Qualcomm Snapdragon processor 3.7″ AMOLED display Trackball at bottom which pulses and uses multicolor lights to notify of new calls and messages Light and proximity sensors (automatically dim backlight, etc.) 11.5mm (

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Google Premieres Nexus (Big Surprise)

2010: The Year of Google v. Apple?

admin — Tue, 05 Jan 2010 15:40:47 +0000

It appears that not just the Year of Mobile is being christened this January but new competitive lines are being drawn as well between Internet giants Google and Apple. Yes, it’s time to officially deem Apple an Internet company in my opinion but you are always free to disagree. According to All Things Digital Apple is preparing to announce a purchase that virtually mirrors the acquisition made of AdMob by Google. Apple is ready to buy Quattro Wireless for $275 million. Apple had been in the mix for the AdMob deal but Google won that one. So as a result Apple and Quattro’s ad platform will be getting geared up to fight out the looming iPhone v. Droid device conflagration (great ‘over-the-top’ word, huh?) that could shape the future of how many people acquire information from the Internet. Quattro was already ID’d as a potential win as evidenced by investment and there are more players out there says All Things D: Waltham, Mass.-based Quattro has raised close to $30 million from two main venture investors–Highland Capital Partners and Globespan Capital Partners. Founded several years ago, its clients include Ford (F), Disney (DIS) and the National Football League. Competitors in the space are many still, despite these big acquisitions, including Millenial Media and Jumptap, both of which are now clearly in play to other players from telcoms to other device makers to big Internet companies. So get ready for the battle that lies ahead. Who are you putting your money on?

Revving up for the Nexus

admin — Mon, 04 Jan 2010 19:43:31 +0000

Tomorrow is the big day: the invite-only Google Android event . While we’ve all pretty much assumed they’re going to tout Android and reveal the Google-sold Nexus One phone, there’s always the possibility that Google will surprise us all. Google’s Nexus phone was first “leaked” in December after they distributed them at a Google party (no gag order in effect). Naturally, the phone created a free social- and mainstream media frenzy in pretty much no time flat. But employees were the only ones with sneak previews—until recently. Saturday, Engadget posted a video tour of the Nexus UI and a preliminary review —and the Nexus is not the iPhone killer: [I]s this the be-all-end-all Android phone / iPhone eviscerator? In two words: not really. The thing that’s struck us most (so far) about the Nexus One thus far is the fact that it’s really not very different than the Droid in any substantial way. Yes, we’d say the design and feel of the phone is better (much better, in fact), and it’s definitely noticeably faster than Motorola’s offering, but it’s not so much faster that we felt like the doors were being blown off. It is very smooth, though we still noticed a little stuttery behavior (very slight, mind you) when moving between home pages. Still, opening applications and moving between them was super speedy, as was Google maps, and any area of the phone where you’ve got to get through long lists. Don’t get us wrong, the phone cooks — but it’s not some paradigmatic shift for Android. So while it’s slick and cool, the Nexus isn’t a huge technological change—and it’s not changing the game the way the iPhone did. It’s a viable smartphone option, and probably typical of the second generation of Android devices. And then there’s the possibility Google will surprise us all. At Search Engine Land, where Danny Sullivan will be liveblogging the event tomorrow, Greg Sterling points out that if Google really wants to surprise us, they could introduce an Android tablet computer —effectively upstaging Apple’s event scheduled for January 26, where they’re anticipated to unveil their own tablet. Boringly, Google will probably just formally premiere the Nexus. Maybe they’ll be ready to sell it immediately, even. What do you think? Will Google go for the obvious or the surprise factor?

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Revving up for the Nexus

Google to Host Android Announcement Event

cgseo — Wed, 30 Dec 2009 19:32:37 +0000

Google is stirring up buzz to rival Apple’s yearly expectations with an invitation for reporters to an event January 5—yep, just days before the CES show. Apple has made a tradition of big (or not so big) announcements scheduled conveniently upstaging the popular Consumer Electronics Show. So Google will definitely be cutting into the speculation market between now and then—especially since they told reporters the announcement, hosted at the Mountain View facility—will have something to do with their mobile OS, Android. First launched on the G1 over a year ago, “this is just the beginning of what’s possible,” Google said in the email invitation. The announcement comes less than a month after Google sent its employees home with an unlocked Android phone called the Nexus One , sparking a viral media frenzy when the employees hit social media. With free buzz already in the air and more to come, it seems entirely possible that Google will officially unveil the Nexus at the event. Apple, on the other hand, appears to be keeping any major announcements under its hat for now, with a major product announcement scheduled for January 26, according to Reuters . The anticipated Apple tablet computer would definitely rival a Google phone for buzz, but it looks like they won’t be in direct competition for consumers’ presales attention. So far, not a whole lot is certain about the Nexus One. Search Engine Journal takes a look at the definites and rumors from technical specs to carriers. On the other hand, there’s been a lot of buzz (which seems mostly misguided) around the Chrome OS being used on netbooks. Recently Google premiered a netbook with a Google OS—Android. What do you think? Will Google formally unveil the Nexus One? Or do they have something else up their sleeve?

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Google to Host Android Announcement Event

Google Edging into Travel Again

cgseo — Tue, 29 Dec 2009 18:16:21 +0000

Six months ago, Google launched Google City Tours. A Labs product for Google Maps, City Tours was based around pedestrian sight-seeing, with maps, walking times and sight suggestions. Now Google is continuing to edge into travel (at least pedestrian travel) with enhancements to City Tours . They’ve added more detailed directions and travel times as well as integrated better with My Maps and tweaked the UI. Interestingly, some of these were already in place in Google Maps but just recently added to City Tours: Today, we start providing complete pedestrian routing information for every step of your tour, taking road types, bridges and bodies of water into account just like a regular Google Maps walking directions search . We still try to minimise the time you spend walking and we still won’t recommend a visit to an attraction when we think it’s closed but, now, the suggested tours are a whole lot closer to reality. You can also now import your own My Maps or other public My Maps to create walking tours: create or find a My Map with the sights you want to see and City Tours will customize a walking tour with detailed directions for you. So City Tours is not bad and getting better—but is this really Google making the first steps toward Google Travel?

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Google Edging into Travel Again

Consumer Groups Lobby FTC to Block GoogleMob

cgseo — Mon, 28 Dec 2009 18:50:32 +0000

Early last month, Google announced it was acquiring AdMob for $750M. The deal is still in the works, of course—in part, at least, because the FTC is taking a first and, as of last week, second look at the deal. As the FTC continues to scrutinize the search giant buying the mobile ad giant, consumer groups are taking their opportunity to have their say —and it’s not in favor of the deal. The biggest concerns of the Center for Digital Democracy and Consumer Watchdog include decreasing competition in the mobile ad market and consumer privacy. The groups say that together, Google and AdMob would control most of the mobile ad market. AdMob is already the leader in the market, thought there’s lots of competition in that area. However, with backing from the search engine, it’s possible that AdMob could come to dominate their arena just as Google pwns theirs. The second argument is based on the fact that Google and AdMob both collect considerable information about their users. Together, that information may be a threat to consumers’ privacy, with the two entities sharing everything from searching habits to location data. The groups’ full filing with the FTC is embedded below. It’s easy to understand the appeal for Google, though—with AdMob “approaching a $100M business in the next three years,” as TC puts it, this could be the way for Google to stake their claim in the emerging mobile market. CW and the CDD often make this type of filing on Google’s acquisitions, and it doesn’t always seem to have an effect. But with the FTC already taking a harder look, their word may have that much more sway with the regulators this time around. LtrFTCfinal – What do you think? How much influence will CW & the CDD have this time? Will the FTC ultimately okay the deal?

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Consumer Groups Lobby FTC to Block GoogleMob