by Tom Krazit
It might have been just a trial balloon, but last year Google floated
the idea of putting ads in Street View.
(Credit: Google)
Could virtual billboards one day show up in Google Street View?
A few months ago, Google gave a presentation to marketing and ad
agency types in Europe as part of an event called "Above and Beyond
2009," an educational seminar/infomercial on how Google can help get
their clients' messages out to the public. One of the presentations
was on the exploding opportunities in mobile advertising, something
with which Google is clearly obsessed these days.
In the presentation, Google tossed out the notion that ads may one day
appear in Street View, the feature in Google Maps that lets searchers
navigate down an ever-increasing number of city and town streets
around the world. Those ads would be tied into the listings in the
Google Local Business Center and the Google Favorite Places program,
which lets participating merchants put signs in their windows with bar
codes leading to additional information or special offers.
A Google representative said the company had no current plans to put
ads in Street View but noted that Google has already added a link to
Street View in the Local Business Center listings that pop up in
Google Maps. The convergence of local search, mobile computing, and
navigation is one of Google's larger priorities for the upcoming year.