Tag Archives: google maps

Google Maps Search Suggest Available in More Languages

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Recently Google put up an experimental search suggest feature for Google Maps to make it faster and more accurate to find places, businesses and points of interest as you type your search.  But this was only available for Google Maps in Germany, China, Hong Kong and  most recently Taiwan. But now, Google has just made this search suggest feature on Google Maps to 10 more domains and 8 additional languages, including on maps.google.com. Suggest for Google Maps was built on locally relevant stock of knowledge to get the most useful suggestions depending on where you are zoomed into Google Map. In addition, Suggest for Google Maps also give you additional information including business addresses to help you find and select the best and most exact business or location that you may be looking for. If you’re anywhere in these regions -  China, Brazil, Canada, Czech Republic, France, Germany, Hong Kong, Italy, Netherlands, Russia, Spain, Taiwan, United States, United Kingdom, you can now use the said feature. Check out the SEO Tools guide at Search Engine Journal . Google Maps Search Suggest Available in More

Google Tests Hotel Price Listings on Google Maps

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Google Maps is a pretty useful tool for conducting local search on business establishments, directions and yes route maps.  It’s been getting wide usage and yet Google seem to have not capitalize on its monetization potential especially from local search advertising. But this perhaps might change soon, as Google has started testing out a new Maps feature that shows hotel prices for selected local hotel listings. The new feature will let you enter the dates of your planned stay in a hotel in your search phrase. Google Maps search engine will then display real prices on selected listings and as you click on  a specific price, you’ll see a list of  advertisers who have provided pricing information for specific hotels. To avoid issue on search results relevance, the pricing information will be labeled “Sponsored.”  Of course you can click through to reserve a room from the advertiser’s site. Hence, a faster, more convenient way of planning your next trip, thanks to Google Maps. Now for those who are concerned that this might affect the ranking of hotels in Google Maps, Google was quick to explain that  this would not be the case. Business listings are still ranked based on their relevance to search terms and other factors. Google is currently testing this feature with selected advertisers only and is visible to selected users as well.  It’s availability to all Google Maps users will be determined by how the testing will push through. Check out the SEO Tools guide at Search Engine Journal . Google Tests Hotel Price Listings on Google

Gesture Search, Swipe N’ Search for Google Android Phones

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Google continues to shower mobile phones running its Android OS including its own Nexus One phone with great features one after another. Previously it just made the cool Gesture Search available for all phones running Android OS version 1.5+.  And now,   Google Maps for Mobile has just been updated to version 4.1. The first new feature that has been added to the latest version of Google Maps for Mobile is search n’ swipe. First, the Maps for Mobile search results pages now displays all the information related to your search. This was previously displayed as tabs. There are also new buttons that you can tap on and will show you places on the map, directions in getting to those places and even option to see those places in Street View. The new mobile search results page also now makes it easier for you to navigate through various information about particular business establishment that you see on the map. You can swipe of the results page to the left or right  to navigate between pages that will yield more reviews, ratings, buzz and all. Another new feature is the Latitude Widget and Live Wallpapers for Nexus One and Android 2.1 devices. You can add live Maps widget to your phone’s home screen to make it easier for you to access Google Maps for Mobile. And for Nexus one and Android 2.1 phone users, you can now also use those live, real-time updating maps as your phone’s wallpaper. The last of the new features of Google Maps for Mobile 4.1 is support for multiple Google accounts. You can now switch between Google accounts that you want synced from your computer to your Android device. Check out the SEO Tools guide at Search Engine Journal . Gesture Search, Swipe N’ Search for Google Android

Google Adds Biking Directions to Maps

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While you are pondering on the points made by Todd about online retirement , here’s a worthwile albeit healthy activity that you may want to consider – biking. And to help you navigate your way through U.S. cities on your bike, Google has just added useful biking directions and bike trail data to Google Maps. Google has been gathering these bike trail data for quite some time now and now that they’ve gathered as much data as possible, these biking directions are now part of the Google Maps interface. These biking directions provide efficient routes and allow you to customize your trip, make use of designated bike lanes, calculate rider-friendly routes as well as customize the look of the Google Maps to suit  cycling activities. Google has also added information about bike trails, lanes, and recommended roads directly onto Google Maps.  This will help you  get better sense of route and trails worth traversing if you’re into recreational ride.  You can check out the bicyling layer on the “more” button at the top of  a Google Map. This layer has three types of lines – dark green for dedicated bike-only trail, light green for a dedicated bike lane along a road and dashed green for roads recommended for biking but has not bike trail. Google Maps currently has more than 12,000 miles of bike trails, and bike lane data for 150 U.S. cities. You may check out Google Maps biking directions here . Check out the SEO Tools guide at Search Engine Journal . Google Adds Biking Directions to