14 DAY TRIAL // The work Google put into the OneBox results on the left is starting to pay off? NOT! Well, perhaps they are doing the right thing in their opinion, or at least they have the best intentions, but the result isn't by far what they would have expected it to be. Turning the three most relevant and rated returns into the first "ten commandments" in alphabetical order does not sit in well with those who rely on natural traffic from local search queries, in order to generate revenue.
As Daniel Bower noted on Search Engine Land, the geographical terms queries that trigger the OneBox are too arbitrary chosen by Google and if your business chances to be near it, you're certain to receive a lot more traffic than bigger and better alternatives further away. Google's counterargument could be that it looks at other variables as well, like the name of the operation you run (whatever it might be), but traditional SEOs will tell you that having a company name with a common word in it will boost your chances of being found and turns your geographical advantage into a double advantage because of it. Take "coffee," for example, add it to the firm's name and you've just ruled out most of the places further away that have higher user rating. The list could go on.
The dev team or those in charge with the concept must have been on a pretty bad day when they managed to come up with this, although in all fairness, it is a laudable attempt to give small businesses a chance to compete. Doing that by sacrificing the bigger and most popular does, though, have some downfall in policy about it. I'm sure there will be a lot of talking about this and I'm quite interested if Google will roll back to its former self, or will stick with the new attitude.