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 SMB more successful with content, typical looks at SMBS often undercounts total 

Google spent much of their I/O talking about their grand vision for integrating software and hardware as well as Local developments. Most of the hardware is about a future where they hope to compete while Local is moving clearly to a focus on a visual approach to local search. Many of these announcements are likely to not be universally adopted. 

 Wil local visual search near me drive the future of local commerce? Or is visual search just a subset of what folks really need?

The Near Memo is a weekly conversation about Search, Social, and Commerce: What happened, why it matters, and the implications for local businesses and national brands.
Near Memo Ep 64

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In three consumer surveys it became clear that a significant minority (~25%)  of the buying public thinks ill of companies that use Earth Day to sell things. But almost 33% noted that when Amazon engaged in Earth Day marketing to sell more products that they were less likely to do business with them. 

Whether it’s a review rating or an NPS score, all too often businesses focus too intently on the number and not on what's behind the number. Businesses should listen to all feedback wherever it is from and then make the changes so that it improves going forward. And STOP asking for answers to 30 question surveys. 

With In store shopping up & e-commerce down and ever increasing consumer expectations, for SMBs to survive they need an integrated digital approach. Between supply chain issues, inflations and on-line competition it has been a struggle for SMBs but those that have survived and those that will thrive have done so by doubling down on technology to drive point of sale, the web and their marketing. 

The Near Memo is a weekly conversation about Search, Social, and Commerce: What happened, why it matters, and the implications for local businesses and national brands.
Near Memo Ep 63

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It is generally assumed that the ratings aspect of reviews is what drives conversions and thus they are typically emphasized. However it would appear that in many cases that the content of the “top 3” most visible reviews actually influence purchase decisions more than the star ratings. In a clever study design these researchers were able to disentangle the relative importance of ratings versus the text in the top 3 reviews. 

Google announced upgrades to their Performance Max product and that it will provide a one-click upgrade (and replacement) path for both previous Smart Campaigns and Local Campaigns. Google Ads have long been moving towards an automated model to maximize effectiveness and away from the need for curated ad management. This is another step on that path and seems to make product ads almost as easy as their hands-off LSA ads. There is a need for rigorous A/B testing by enterprises to determine the value of each approach.

Even though Twitter is making user gains, it is likely that advertising on Twitter will be negatively affected by the types of changes that Elon Musk is suggesting. Obviously depending on specific product changes that Musk might make, it is an open question whether data licensing or advertising will be the primary path to profits. 

The Near Memo is a weekly conversation about Search, Social, and Commerce: What happened, why it matters, and the implications for local businesses and national brands.
Near Memo Ep 62

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Amazon’s bold play to push Prime benefits across all of e-commerce is not only a direct threat to Shopify but UPS and FedEx as well. While it will bring trust and convenience to small and local websites,  which types of businesses will actually benefit from Buy Prime on their site?

Google’s has stated that AI generated content is against their guidelines. But their guidelines are not so clear as they seem to imply that human edited content will be ok. What is the future of on-line content? Will Google be able to moderate the coming tsunami of AI generated content?

Very small businesses want to do their own research when buying SAAS products but which sorts of content do they use to do that? There isn’t really a single content source that drives uptake. Perhaps AI driven content might be able to allow content to be more easily repurposed across content types. 

The Near Memo is a weekly conversation about Search, Social, and Commerce: What happened, why it matters, and the implications for local businesses and national brands.
Near Memo Ep 61

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According to the 2021 IAB Internet Advertising Revenue Report, online ad revenue grew at the fastest pace since 2006, 35% year over year. In real dollar terms that translated into a $50 billion revenue increase from last year. Mobile revenues comprised roughly 71% of the $189 billion total, while the desktop contributed 28%. Paid search was the largest digital ad revenue category (41%, $78.3 billion), followed by display (30%, $56.7 billion) and digital video (21%, $39.5 billion). 

 Google has been updating business data for year, not due to AI but because of their massive access to data. This trend is increasing which is both annoying and reflective of their failure to engage SMBs to keep the data updated themselves. 

Over the past 5 years images have moved from virtually 0% oif the mobile search results to almost 40%. Google is using AI to understand the content of these images and changing them based on the user query. This points towards a new aspect of technical SEO, image optimization, to improve rank, visibility and conversions for local businesses.

The Near Memo is a weekly conversation about Search, Social, and Commerce: What happened, why it matters, and the implications for local businesses and national brands.
Near Memo Ep 60

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Google’s Local help files have been updated to note that providing real time inventory via Merchant Center will result in increased rank. Anecdotally, we are seeing the 3- Pack populated with more real time inventory over the past several weeks. Google, often accused of self-preferencing, did so again by highlighting their own Point POS product as the only solution. 

At LocalU’s last virtual event, Joy Hawkins shared insights spam prevalence by vertical and whether agencies should continue to fight it, as a service. Curtis Boyd described the results of a 1000 review case study of takedown and what worked and what didn’t. And there was a discussion of a new update to the Vicinity update which allowed many businesses to gain more visibility. 

GApocalypse will soon be upon us and Google Universal Analytics will soon be sunset and replaced with GA4. Since GA4 is so bad and agencies seem to have developed reporting chops with Google Data Studio, is it time to look at other base analytics programs and build your own reporting dashboard?

The Near Memo is a weekly conversation about Search, Social, and Commerce: What happened, why it matters, and the implications for local businesses and national brands.
EP 59 Near Memo

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Last week the European Parliament completed work on its Digital Markets Act. The legislation targets major US tech "gatekeepers" and prohibits app bundling, app store monopolies and so-called "self-preferencing," among other things. In the US, the American Competition and Innovation Act (ACIA) is similar and also seeks to prevent self-preferencing – think: Google Shopping or Maps at the top of search results. Google et all have ramped up the astroturf. 

Google has announced the ability to schedule an appointment to book with a doctor directly from a Google business profile. Initially as a pilot with CVS Minute Clinics, it is likely to expand. Google has once again picked winners and losers as opposed to making the feature generally available although due to the complexities of the medical arena, this project may face tough sledding. 

Trust in reviews has been declining since 2017, but consumers still rely on them to make decisions. Businesses must adapt review strategies and embrace the negative review.

The Near Memo is a weekly conversation about Search, Social, and Commerce: What happened, why it matters, and the implications for local businesses and national brands.
EP 58 Near Memo

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Most featured snippets come from what would have been organic results 1 through 3. However 20% of featured snippets come from results 6-10 and while featured snippets do not offer the click through rate of a #1 organic result, if you can answer a question query well and jump from a position down the page, it can be a huge SEO win and a quick way to the top of the rankings. 

Consumers had much higher expectations of chat response than SMS. With live chat, users expect responses within minutes and with SMS there is a much greater latitude. What does this mean for business responses to customers when the number of messages coming from different sources? By switching to asynchronous messaging businesses can gain an advantage in responding to customers that customers might prefer. 

A hallmark of Google’s competition with Amazon strategy is their integration of local product search with local business search. This development, of showing products and product availability in the 3 pack, is a tell of both Google’s product search ambitions and of the direction of their local search results. The ability to integrate real time product availability directly into local search results indicates Google's aggressive move into a local search result that is both more visual AND more transactional.

The Near Memo is a weekly conversation about Search, Social, and Commerce: What happened, why it matters, and the implications for local businesses and national brands.
Near Memo Ep 57

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Google, in competing with Amazon product search, has taken a local approach with their Shopping tool. While the approach makes sense strategically it isn’t clear whether it is enough to gain the traction in real time local inventory that Google needs to compete with Amazon. 

In a 3 count complaint, the FTC has accused HomeAdvisor of charging more than promised, delivering crappy leads and making it difficult to get refunds. HomeAdvisor says that they “will fight it vigorously” but the FTC is looking to make an example 

A recent Breeden survey was asking how businesses prefer to deal with sales people or whether they preferred to do research on their own. Over 70% prefer to start the exploration for software on their own. This attitude is leading to a product led sales model. 

The Near Memo is a weekly conversation about Search, Social, and Commerce: What happened, why it matters, and the implications for local businesses and national brands.
Near Memo Ep 56

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 Restaurants sue Google for adding  Order buttons through 3rd  parties to their Business Profile.
In 2019, Google automatically added DoorDash/GrubHub order buttons to the Google Business Profile for thousands of US based restaurants. Now the company is being sued over "order online" in federal court, in a potential class action. The plaintiff, Lime Fresh Mexican Grill, accuses Google of creating an "illicit storefront," unauthorized use of restaurant names and IP and deceiving consumers.

 Publishers argue ad providers are scraping too much content to deliver contextual ads
Newspapers are suing the companies that are providing them with contextual advertising, claiming that these very same companies are scraping more content than authorized and selling ads to national clients that the newspapers want. 

Yelp’s 2021 showed solid financials but user declines and review acquisition headwinds. 
Yelp, after layoffs, changing sales models and rolling out new products, Yelp had a bang up 2021. But Yelp user traffic peaked in 2017, was flat or down pre-pandemic and plummeted during the past 2 years. Where user growth will come from is not clear  Meanwhile their review growth has slowed and their review corpus has become stale making user growth even harder.  

The Near Memo is a weekly conversation about Search, Social, and Commerce: What happened, why it matters, and the implications for local businesses and national brands.
Near Memo Ep 55

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