Google has been testing its new promoted pin ads, which is now being called Promoted Plaes (officially), in Google Maps with a small group of retailers.  The pilot is currently running in the Google Maps app on Android devices. Promoted Places ads, which was announced publicly in March, can appear in the Google Maps app when users are […]

The design of the Google Maps interface has been updated to make it easier for their maps users to navigate and discover places.  The update spans all versions, including desktop, Android and iOS, which specifically impacts the maps interface. Google’s idea behind the new update was to declutter the interface by removing elements that “aren’t absolutely required,” […]

It’s been recently uncovered by the folks at Android Police that the new version of Google Maps for Android is now letting users set Google Maps to only work in WiFi mode.  When a user’s Google Maps is set to this mode, you won’t have to use your cellular data while using Google Maps.  This is, assuming […]

In this episode of Google Developers‘ Coffee with a Googler, we meet with Ken Hoetmer, one of the first ever users of Google’s Maps API, and now a product manager for the Google Maps Services. We talk about how Maps development has matured, and how intelligence in geo data is key. We discuss APIs such as […]

Are you tired of that weird “navigation arrow” found in Street View?  Well, Google is replacing that with a smoother “blue link” that will allow users to swipe and scroll through images more quickly. Here’s an example of what we would normally see (on mobile): Although I wasn’t able to get the new look myself, […]

Last November, UK-based Streetmap sued Google in court under an “abuse of competition” theory.  Even after the work Streetmap went into trying to win against Google, the High Court of Justice in the UK as ruled against the company. It was argued by Streetmap that their traffic and revenue was effectively destroyed by Google in 2008 due […]

It seems that there is quite a number of professionals in the Local SEO community that have little to no knowledge of how Google Map Maker works, let alone how it impacts the small businesses they work with.  There are a lot of people who hate Map Maker, and will just ignore it completely. But for […]

If you’re planning on going somewhere using Google Maps, but you think you may not have full access to the internet the entire way there, Google has a solution for you.  You can now download maps in advance, and use them regardless of if you have a connection or not. When downloading a section of the world […]