A Bootstrapped Tool for Google+ Local and Store Coordinates - An Ode To Our Developers

Dear Developer Core,

We are thankful for you and your infinite API knowledge.
You have saved us from another location change in places.google.com/manage/.
Although Google’s Maps Engine Pro allows for some data layering…
The platform and process just couldn’t handle 900 locations.  We were stuck in coordinate redundancy.
Our marketing abilities, although innovative… left us stuck in custom macros and complex index.
This mindshare created a manual path through a jungle of 1,800 individual latitude and longitude.
Slowly.  Slower.  Hitting… Head…on the desk.
But you said, “to heck with that“.  In one fell swoop you saved us.
Thank you for the innovative coordinates overlay and validation tool.
In less than 2 hours, you took a 40 hour project and turned it into an 8 hour project.

Our sincere thanks development team,
PG and All

P.S. Over the last year, our team has invested heavily in the local market place.  Whether that be social in local, structured data for enterprise level clients, syndication through the Yext Marketing Cloud, innovative local approaches, Google+ Local optimization patterns, local content development and general organization strategy.  Although channel partners like Google and Yelp are constantly evolving the way they consolidate and validate listings – there are still large gaps in data accuracy.   For businesses with 500+ store locations, the coordinates to NAP information may be off by 220 yards or 200 miles (based on an error in lat/long).  There are a number of tools that allow you to match NAP to the “suggested” lat/long however in many cases this is either a mismatch or OOS (out of site).  The latest challenge was a retailer with > 900 store locations and a feed that needed coordinate mapping for each store.  Our NAP match got us to 60% however the other group provided Google street view issues such as back alleys, malls, loading docks, P.O. Box, et cetera.

P.S.S. We sent the matching challenge out to the office at 2 pm and our developers had come up with a validator tool by 2:45pm.  It allowed our team to see the 900 listings in one view, check street level, validate coordinates and check NAP-coordinate relevancy.

There is always someone that could do it bigger and better.  Today… those guys are Matt, Chris D, Chris A, Thales and Travis.