Google Acquires Zagat

Google has been buying out a lot of different companies lately. As always, they are wanting to create the best user experience for their users.  They are at it again with the acquisition of Zagat. Zagat gives the famous “Zagat ratings” to the best places to eat all over the world!

Here is the announcement from Zagat.com:

This is going to be huge in building reviews and ratings for restaurants on local Google Places listings.  Recently there were complaints from 3rd party companies having their reviews on Google Places listings, so this was removed. There is still a way for you to access these reviews, but they are not located on the actual places page.  Google puts much more emphasis and value to user reviews that are written by Google users. Now Zagat is on board to add their reviews, too. Now restaurants will more than likely have their Zagat score and review posted on their places listing, along with user reviews and experiences.

If you are a local restaurant owner and are wanting to get your Google Places listing optimized and ranking well, now is a great time to get started. With this new addition, Google is going to have a lot more validity and authority with their listings. In turn, they are going to attract a lot more visitors to their Google Places pages, and that is going to convert into more customers for your business.

As always we are here to help you get your local listing set up properly. Let us know what we can do for you. Also what do you think of this new acquisition? Do you feel Google is taking too much control over everything? Or do you feel differently about it? Post your comments below.