The Near Memo

Send us a textRumors have surfaced that Apple will roll out a general purpose search engine at WWDC this week. Will it be browser based? Available on the desktop? Apple has historically favored “search as a feature” over the years as they have slowly built out Siri, Spotlight and Safari search. The UI/UX could use a refresh and it could become more obvious but will it be a Google replacement? Probably not. The disappearance of the Product feature from the Google Business Profile caused lots of speculation.Whether it was a bug or a very small test that was not meant to be seen, the removal of the Product feature from the Google Business Profile (and to be replaced by Merchant Center) last week lead many to soul search about the role of real time inventory in Google’s push for ever more granular data. Google has been taking a holistic commerce strategy (online and in-store inventory) to create a more complete consumer offering than Amazon. Walmart announced that they will offer last mile same day delivery to 3rd parties from their storesWalmart continues to push the boundaries of on-line/offline commerce and publicly shared that they will be using their many locations as a warehouse and point of delivery for 3rd party resellers. Can their retail stores efficiently function in this capacity? Can they compete with both Google AND Amazon with this strategy?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 67Subscribe to our newsletters and other content at https://www.nearmedia.co/subscribe/

Send us a textWalmart announced that they were rolling out drone delivery in 6 states this week, offering upto 100,000 picked in the local store. Meanwhile Gorrila (Europe’s largest food delivery company announced massive layoffs and UberEats continued to struggle to find a profitable path forward. Walmart’s many rural & suburban stores gives them a unique advantage in driving their own, same day delivery service. Interestingly Amazon’s drone work seems to have stalled.   Google is moving full steam ahead on a vision of search and advertising that includes an ever increasing amount of AI driven automation and an ever increasing amount of images and other visuals in the search results. They noted at the GML event that “​​we're transforming the SERPS into an endless stream of visual ideas”.  Google sees automated retail ads and local as their path to compet with AmazonGoogle testing new Local inventory ad unit that looks like the 3-packThe 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 66Subscribe to our newsletters and other content at https://www.nearmedia.co/subscribe/

Send us a textBill was instrumental in helping me understand Local search. Over the years he shared his knowledge willingly and unsparingly and he will be missed.My Ad Center - will people use it or is it just another data harvesting tool? Shotland showed a radical increase in rankings for a particular page on a client's website that was talking about baby formula. Over the last X number of weeks, he said the page was on page two plus, and it's now skyrocketed up to the top. His theory? That top ranking national retailers were out of formula and when users left those sites and found the lower ranked ones that did have formula, they stuck around leading to a ranking increase. Shotland made some astute suggestions on how to quickly cope with shortages.  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 65Subscribe to our newsletters and other content at https://www.nearmedia.co/subscribe/

Send us a text 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 64Subscribe to our newsletters and other content at https://www.nearmedia.co/subscribe/

Send us a textIn 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 63Subscribe to our newsletters and other content at https://www.nearmedia.co/subscribe/

Send us a textIt 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 62Subscribe to our newsletters and other content at https://www.nearmedia.co/subscribe/

Send us a textAmazon’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 61Subscribe to our newsletters and other content at https://www.nearmedia.co/subscribe/

Send us a textAccording 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 60Subscribe to our newsletters and other content at https://www.nearmedia.co/subscribe/

Send us a textGoogle’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 MemoSubscribe to our newsletters and other content at https://www.nearmedia.co/subscribe/

Send us a textLast 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 MemoSubscribe to our newsletters and other content at https://www.nearmedia.co/subscribe/