How to Earn Links with Google’s New Business Photos

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If you’ve ever used Google’s Street View technology and been surprised by the alien relaxing by the side of the road or the two-legged white cat casually strolling down the avenue, you know what kind of fun you might have now that the same technology is available for business use. And we decided that’s exactly what we were going to do.

First of all we had to hire a trusted Google photographer or agency. Then when we knew what date they were coming we staged our offices to provide puzzle’s, objects, images and other creative gimmicks. By carefully planning our virtual tour, we created something that feels more like a virtual reality game, than a boring photo shoot, and that will also add excitement to our social media campaigns.

Read more at searchenginejournal.com

How Google Map Hackers Can Destroy a Business at Will

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He was alerted to that possibility when one of his regulars phoned the restaurant. “A customer called me and said, ‘Why are you closed on Saturday, Sunday and Monday? What’s going on?’” Bertagna says.

It turned out that Google Places, the search giant’s vast business directory, was misreporting the Serbian Crown’s hours. Anyone Googling Serbian Crown, or plugging it into Google Maps, was told incorrectly that the restaurant was closed on the weekends, Bertagna says. For a destination restaurant with no walk-in traffic, that was a fatal problem.

Read more at wired.com

Inside Google’s Big Plan to Race Amazon to Your Door

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Though Google over the years had experimented with letting consumers buy goods with the help of services such as Google Wallet and Google Checkout, it accelerated this strategy in 2013 with Shopping Express. The service lets shoppers buy things from local retail stores through Google, which then delivers them to consumers from the physical retail store on the same or next day.

“You can very much expect that we are putting a lot of money into this and we’re excited and willing to sustain that investment over time as this gets going,” said Tom Fallows, head of Google Shopping Express.

Read more at recode.net