• For businesses and agencies, this goes against the grain of internet advertising, where we're all used to paying more for competitive terms and less for those not many other people are interested in. There is definitely a disconnect between the way we usually think of internet advertising and the way Tags worked.


• For Google, Tags have a severely limited profit potential. The most Google can realize from a business advertising with a Tag is $25 per location per month. AdWords, and its little cousin Boost, and Product Search have much, much more profit potential for Google.

Tags are an add-on, rather than a stand-alone, product. They simply highlight a feature in the business' search result and do not give advertisers any other type of advantage in the SERPs.

• For businesses and agencies, this means that unless you are already ranking well, not many prospects will see your Tag because they aren't even seeing your listing.


• For Google, businesses don't want to pay for advertising that isn't being seen. So the pool of potential advertisers is pretty much limited to the top 7-10 businesses ranking well in Places search and in the local results in Web search.

What was learned:

• Google gained revenue from Tags, as it was building better advertising products aimed at SMBs. Along the way, it learned that flat rate advertising was a dead end road for them. Hopefully, Google also learned that people get angry when you sell them something and do not provide decent customer support after the sale.


• Most small businesses and agencies probably didn't learn anything new from Tags, although a few did use the opportunity to test their offers against those of their competitors.  But the experiment reinforces what we already know - we have to remain nimble so we can roll with the punches and make the best of whatever Google throws at us - or whatever it takes away.