Search Engine Journal

Google Maps in Gmail

I have both Yahoo! email and Gmail accounts and a Comcast personal email account—all of which I use for slightly different purposes. But I’ve started to notice that in Gmails where addresses appear, “Map This” links are showing up in the right column above the sponsored links.

It’s a useful integration if, for example, someone provides an address as part of a party invitation (as happened several times over the holidays). It also makes users more aware of the ads to the right. And it probably also makes them thus somewhat more inclined to (over time) start clicking on those links—making that inventory more valuable, although it’s contextual rather than search.

But it’s more than just addresses; here’s what Google has to say about it.

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Greg Sterling is managing editor of The Kelsey Group. He also leads The Kelsey Group’s the Interactive Local Media program, focusing on local search. Greg came to The Kelsey Group from TechTV’s “Working the Web,” the first national television show dedicated to e-business and the Internet.