I’ve heard my local search colleagues mention a number of times that no one is quite sure what percentage of Google’s local business listings are sitting unclaimed – but everyone seems to agree that the number must be huge. I know this to be true, because nearly any time I go to pull an example […]

I’ve been enjoying speaking with Peg Corwin of SCORE Chicago over the past couple of weeks about all manner of Local matters. Recently, Peg sent me 5 questions about Local Search and published my answers in this mini-interview style

Last year, after having an abysmal experiencing using Google Local during a medical emergency, I received a personal response from Google Maps Guide, Jen Chin, detailing Google’s special provisions for correcting emergency services data. At that time, going to this page in Google and clicking on the heading I see incorrect business information for emergency […]

Taken from the Google Maps Help Forum: How can I contact Google for support with My Maps? Is there an e-mail or phone number for google help to get this problem resolved? How in the world can one get in touch with google How can I contact google to correct an error with its local […]

Tonight, I spent a little time on Microsoft’s new search engine (or as they call it, decision engine), Bing. For the past couple of weeks, industry news has been spangled with discussions about whether Bing has the power to give Google a run for their money and Greg Sterling has even pointed out some compelling reasons why big Google might not mind little Bing having a bit of success. I’ve read a handful of the articles that have been making the rounds, but my own interest is more geared to how Bing is handling local-type queries. Here are a few things I’ve noticed.

If you are doing business in almost any California town or city and any or all of your business is dependent upon tourists or healthy-minded locals, the proposed closure of 80% of California’s State Parks is major news to you. In what I can only call an anti-human gesture on the part of California’s state […]

I was pleased to be invited by Peg Corwin of the SCORE Chicago Blog to contribute to a piece she has written on the potential benefits of Chicago business owners publishing content on the Chicago Trib Local site. Mr. Blumenthal also participated in this article and I think you’ll enjoy giving it a read. There’s […]

Eric Peacock is the General Manager of InsiderPages and I was very grateful to Andrew Shotland for introducing us to one another while I was researching my recent piece on the Edit, Remove and Owner Review capabilities of the top 8 user review entities. Eric was good enough to respond with what I think is […]