Google has been allowing local business to add business information, and then has been using a mailing system to verify addresses. This has caused a lot of problems with businesses not receiving the mailing, or the proper person at the business not receiving the pin verification. Google has changed all this with a new business feed system.

Unlike most of it’s products, Google quietly unveiled this one through it’s Froogle program. When I first saw this, I couldn’t believe it was through Froogle, which is Google’s comparison shopping engine. When asked, Google informed me that Froogle is the most sophisticated with feed based information, so it was the best fit for the Google products. It’s still unclear why it’s not even listed on the Google Local page, or why Google is trying to keep it such a secret.

Google claims that once a feed is accepted (and there are a lot of formatting issues some local business will have problems with) that it’ll take approximate 6 weeks for the information to be updated in Google local. It seems Google is much more efficient that it claims, my first feed was integrated with in 3 days.

This is yet another move in the local search wars to have user generated data. It’s a good move, but the quietness of the program is still astounding.

Related Links:
Froogle homepage
Google Local homepage
Froogle information for businesses page

• The long tail of Feeds
• AdWords to RSS Feeds
• Google Local - Create Your Own Listings
• Subscribe to eWhisper.net
• Froogle Integrates Maps