Google Launching a “Store View”?

Posted 02/04/2010 at 12:21pm | by Bart Salisbury

3

Comments

Print

Word are wonderful for conveying information, but sometimes not so hot for communicating. Pictures, by comparison, are transcendent. Not only are they capable of passing along a lot more information (the old “thousand words” adage), they don’t suffer from the human filter requisite of language. Google figured this out with Street View and Images: communication is picture-based, not word-based.

Limits on the use of pictures or images are both technological and arbitrary. Google’s got the technology, now its chipping away at the arbitrary. What started with Street View, which shows us the outsides of things, may be moving to “Store View”, which will show us the inside of things. Barry Schwartz of Search Engine Land is passing along a tip from a New York retailer that Google might be in the process of taking pictures inside of retail establishments, with the plan of linking them to Street View.

There are definite advantages for Google and retailers in this. Google will drive more traffic to its sites, in particular Google Maps, while retailers can show off who they are and what they have to offer. It can aid consumers as well, as they’ll get a general feel for a store before venturing a foot inside.

Google hasn’t commented on its new endeavor, so right now “Store View” is entirely speculative. But, logically, it does fit into an overall market behavior for Google.

Image Credit: rustybrick/Flickr