Last October, Google rolled out Google Place Search, a new user interface for local search that organizes information around location. These changes merged the Google Map listings and organic results in a new way that makes it critical to pay attention to your online presence. Gone are the pack of 7 or 3 results at the top with a map, replaced by blended results that incorporate pieces of your website, your Google places listing, citations about your business from other sources and reviews from sites such as CitySearch, Yelp, Yahoo, Merchant Circle, InsiderPages and other Internet Yellow Pages sites and directories.

I got a call from a small business owner yesterday that reminds me why I focus on helping small business owners market their businesses. It disheartens me when someone spends a substantial amount of money with a company for pay-per-click or SEO services that do not get them any results. These companies charge $500 – $3000 per month for these services of which only a percentage of it is applied to your actual campaign.