Thursday, February 24, 2011

Finding the right place when you need it

Over the past few months, we have launched several new mobile search features for iPhone and Android-powered devices that make it easier to find local businesses. In the US, we launched an “open now” feature which lets you filter local search results to show only businesses that are open right now, based on their listed hours. When you’re hankering for pizza at 1 o’clock in the morning, this can be really handy:

Other local search options available globally include filtering by star ratings (find a highly-rated restaurant for your first date) and by distance (especially handy when you’re on foot).

You may have noticed other improvements as well, like the addition of images, reviews from around the web and bigger buttons for viewing a map or calling a business directly. Each business’s open hours are also shown in the result snippets.

If you haven’t used local search recently, now is a great time to try it out. Just go to www.google.com in your browser, tap on the “Places” link at the top of the page, and do a search. You can also access these features when searching for businesses on Google Maps for mobile on Android devices.

Posted by Yoshi Matsumoto and Keiji Maekawa, Software Engineers
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14 comments:

  1. absbFebruary 24, 2011 at 3:21 PM

    Thanks again Google for all your hard work!

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  2. DanFebruary 24, 2011 at 5:29 PM

    An issue that has cropped up with certain (some, possibly many) Places pages is that you can't add hours to those places, even after editing the page and getting the changes approved. The Places pages won't update to reflect the new information, and as a consequence, you're unable to search for businesses that are 'Open Now' because the Places page doesn't contain any hours information.

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  3. ...February 24, 2011 at 6:35 PM

    Can you also search for poorly-ranked restaurants for your last date?

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  4. lizbonlineFebruary 25, 2011 at 5:33 AM

    Great!! What is the roll-out plan for the rest of the world? UK particularly please!

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  5. UnknownFebruary 25, 2011 at 7:25 AM

    Thats great, development

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  6. BobFebruary 25, 2011 at 8:52 AM

    What is a 'hanker'?

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  7. halpwrFebruary 25, 2011 at 8:38 PM

    Take that yelp!

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  8. JanaFebruary 26, 2011 at 8:14 AM

    hankering=craving

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  9. UnknownFebruary 27, 2011 at 5:37 AM

    Good. Maybe Google will continue following the other suggestions at the http://www.goodfaithclause.com website. The "do now" or "low hanging fruit" section or something like that. Ironic that it has been out there for a long time and supposedly because Google created a need based on their poor performance and now here it is. Yawnnn. Google is described in the 3 blue lines.

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  10. mayankMarch 1, 2011 at 1:39 AM

    AWESOME!!!!!!!
    WHAT A GREAT DEVELOPMENT BY GOOGLE..
    THANX FOR THIS.
    Price India

    ReplyDelete
  11. The Invite BunnyMarch 1, 2011 at 8:37 AM

    You spelled Albuquerque incorrectly on your banner ad. Was that intentional or merely insulting?

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  12. UnknownMarch 4, 2011 at 9:58 AM

    This is pretty nifty

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  13. UnknownMarch 5, 2011 at 3:14 AM

    This feature was stolen from another company. It is shameful that it is being presented here as innovative therefore deceiving those reading this blog or using the feature. Do no evil?

    ReplyDelete
  14. DawnMarch 8, 2011 at 2:45 AM

    I could access places on my android phone when I got it last week,now for days nothing. Any ideas what the problem is. It works ok on the pc.
    Cheers Dawn

    ReplyDelete

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