Froogle Goes Local
Froogle now has the ability to search stores in your area, complete with Google Maps.
Just as I was ready to give up on Froogle altogether, they finally fix the damn thing. As far as I was concerned, Froogle’s results were so spammed up as to be useless. Froogle’s regular results still suck (like this product, where the cheapest result listed is for the wrong product), but the local results are beautiful, showing my local CompUSA, Circuit City, Staples, BestBuy, Office Depot and others. These are stores I can trust, that I can visit in person, and that have online components I can trust.
There are far too many crappy onlinestores plugged into Froogle right now, and Froogle Local is useful if only because it cuts them out. If you don’t live in New York City or a major metropolis, just enter 10001 as your zip code and you’ll still get better results than you would from Froogle’s regular search. I would love it if Google gave me the option to cut out certain stores (like the “delete this result” link in Google Personalized Search), but until then, this fixes Froogle very well.
Danny Sullivan points out that this is even more useful than Google Local:
How is this different from just doing a search on Google Local? Well, you can compare. Here’s cameras 92663 on Google Local. You’ll see that camera stores are listed in Google Local, while Froogle lists individual cameras for sale in various locations.
Another example is a search for ipod video 92663. In that case, Froogle shows you that several CompUSA stores have it in stock. A quick drive, and it would be in your hands if you needed it fast. In contrast, the same search on Google Local does poorly, bringing back two Apple Stores that probably have the item in stock but mostly a lot of places that won’t, such as The Friends Of The Newport Beach Library.
Greg Linden points out that this puts Google one step away from really challenging local merchants.
However, looking forward, this brings Google much closer to the disintermediation threat that has struck fear into retailing giants. Improve the coverage, hook this up to Google SMS, and you’ve got a service that might “be able to tell Wal-Mart shoppers if better bargains are available nearby.”
Oh, and here’s the search of the day.
