I thought this was worth remarking on for a couple of reasons:

1. The novelty of getting a letter from Google telling you you’re one of their favorite places makes for a neat moment and a nice picture.
2. Google has been pretty explicit about their favorite places being those that achieved a certain level of activity in Google Local Business Center.

Will McLemore, proprietor, is an enterprising fellow and had signed up for Google Local Business Center well before Get Found Friday (and well before he was a customer, in fact). His business is constantly selling things, but it’s not a store. It’s not the kind of place that gets a lot of retail foot traffic. In short, it doesn’t fit the profile of a lot of other local businesses, some of which I’ve worked with, that seem like more natural results of a Google Maps search or even just universal search results that include maps.

So we’re both interested in what put him over the top. It’s possible that having a maturing business that has been pretty smart about the Web and search for its duration meant that just being an early adopter of Google Local Business Center has given him more exposure. It certainly makes for an interesting Google Analytics challenge, as I look to see whether queries like [nashville auction] can be correlated meaningfully with the numbers mentioned in the letter for people who “found” McLemore Auction and then people who requested more information. Unfortunately, both seem like statistics that Google keeps to themselves.

Now Will has a barcode on his door. It’ll be interesting to see whether anyone scans it. And even more interesting to see what Google does with the results.