If you’ve ever searched for businesses like a shop or a restaurant on Google, more often than not you will be presented with “local panels” which basically shows you information about the place, such as its opening hours, type of establishment, location, phone number, website, and sometimes even a rating/review.
However it looks like Google could be adding a new feature to the local panels, according to a post by Sergey Alakov (via 9to5Google). In his post, Alakov discovered that Google’s local panels are now showing a question and answer section, as you can see in the screenshot to the right. It seems to be a feature that is undergoing testing at the moment since apparently functionality breaks when you tap on it.
Basically the idea seems to be similar to what you might find on platforms like eBay or Amazon, where users can pose questions to the establishment and have them answer it. For example questions could be posted to ask about opening hours during a particular holiday, or if the a restaurant serves gluten-free meals, and so on.
Like we said it seems to be a feature in testing at the moment and we’re not sure if there are plans to eventually make it fully functional to all users, but it is a good idea so here’s hoping that Google will take it mainstream in the near future.
Image credit – Sergey Alakov
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