Google pushes maps into search

Google has announced that it’s featuring the use of Google Maps more prominently in many local searches on the search engine.

The result is that when searching for services located in major urban areas, a section from Google Maps will be displayed, showing key locations.

The results had already been spotted by some keen-eyed searchers.

The key locations appear to be drawn from results from Yell, the company behind Yellow Pages, but there are already complaints that some Yell customers are heavily involved in spamming Yell’s results.

However, despite the objections, it shows that Google is keen to further push on integrating existing Google services into Google Search.

It’s also worth pointing out that Local Search is a major market place that search engines are keen to push into - and that the continuing use of mobile internet access means this could become a much more important feature to be considered for all businesses.