The newest version of he Google My Business API, version 3.0 has been released by Google. Despite its release, Google has yet to be announced by Google. You can see that version 3.0 has been marked in the changelog and on the new features page.
With the release of the original Google My Business API back in December of last year, users and businesses were given the ability to automate managing their business listings.
Google said that version 3.0 “adds new functionality for people who manage locations at scale,” and that the “key new features include the ability to read and respond to customer reviews and provide additional attributes for locations, such as whether a restaurant accepts reservations, serves brunch, or has outdoor seating.”
The changelog version 3.0 includes the following:
- Attributes Provide additional, category-specific information about locations.
- Find Matching Location Find and manually associate existing maps locations with your business location.
- Transfer Location New action on Location :transfer. Allows transferring a location from one account (business or personal) to another.
- Preferred Photo Indicate which photo you’d prefer to show up first in Google Maps and Search.
- New Search Filters New search filters include any_google_updates, is_suspended, and is_duplicate.
- New Location States Location states now also include is_verified and needs_reverification.
- Photo URL Improvements The API now accepts photo URLs without an image format suffix.
- Backwards incompatible changes Photos can now only be updated for locations with a Google+ page (These were accepted and silently dropped before). The location_name and category_name fields are now output only. Only use category IDs when setting categories. Field masks no longer require the location. prefix for included fields. Create/update operations now take the location as the body payload, other parameters are moved to the query string.