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Apple Maps & Local Opportunities:
Apple Maps is ACTUALLY used for local discovery and it appears to be sending more traffic than either Yelp or Bing. According to Apple insights at least 28% of clicks came from category searches. While Apple Maps generates ~5% of the web visits and perhaps 10% of the phone calls of GBP, that is enough to put Apple Maps in second place as a source of local leads.
Interestingly having access to both Apple and Google Maps driving direction clicks we can estimate Apple Maps market share at about 40% of all iPhone users

Learnings from going undercover as a quality rater for Google:
Cyrus Shepard signed up to be a Google Quality Rater and doing so allowed him to provide additional insights into what Google thinks is important. The details of content, user intent, and web page quality understanding clearly inform the algo and provide a basis for Google’s results particularly in “your money and your life” categories.

Is Google’s AI based SGE a dead end or the future of search?
Initial excitement around Google’s AI response to bing chat raised hopes of a better user experience with search. The product, being slow and often not informative, has not really done that. And, at least according to this limited Twitter poll, users are using it less. Is it all just theater?

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.
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Mindful Monday: Finding Stillness in Chaos