Google has come along with another great product called “Boost.”
Boost is tailored to local (I interpret this as “small”) businesses. Boost is only in its beta (testing) stage right now, but you can bet they’ll be expanding before too long. Right now, Google Boost is available in San Francisco, Houston and Chicago.
Boost advertisements are created right inside a business’ Google Places account, which is free. (Boost isn’t free–but businesses can set their own budget.)
One of the great benefits of Google Boost is that, like cable television advertising, it’s extremely well targeted with regards to location. And because the advertising reach is smaller, the ads should be much cheaper than advertising that is not as well targeted.
Small businesses will see much greater benefit from locally targeted advertising than if they tried to place a commercial on a broadcast network–ABC, for example–because local customers are more likely to visit a local business. (A person shopping for a particular book probably won’t drive out of state to get it–they’ll go to a store close to them.)
At Mashable.com, they believe Google Boost is a preemptive strike against Facebook Places advertising. According to Mashable, Facebook has only just announced their cursory guidelines for their own locally-targeted advertising product.
Of course, Google Places and Boost won’t do much to help online businesses, because these kinds of companies don’t WANT customers showing up on their figurative doorsteps. Not to mention, online businesses–regardless of their size–can draw their customers from anywhere in the world.