While initial versions of Hotpot were released in mid-November, Google’s successor to Places is only now starting to gain popularity. This trend is not surprising, given that users have had the opportunity to experience and explore Hotpot’s features, and Google has launched additional marketing campaigns. But what exactly sets Hotpot apart from Google Places?
As covered by various news sources during the early release stage of Hotpot, the primary updates focus on how information is presented, how reviews are collected, the new “recommendation” feature, and the social aspect of the site.
The site’s interface is much more visually-oriented, with the location map playing only a minor role, and business details taking a back seat to images of local businesses.
While Google Places and Maps both allowed users to rate and review local businesses, much of the information was sourced from major review websites such as Yelp, TripAdvisor, and PriceLine. Google has not indicated that it will stop importing reviews, but it is clearly pushing to make Hotpot a more popular destination for writing reviews. The site encourages users to write reviews using the recommendation feature and social aspects, and it tracks the number of reviews directly in the interface.
Hotpot’s “recommendation” feature improves user feedback based on businesses that have already been well (or poorly) rated. According to Google, the more businesses you review, the better the recommendations you will receive. Additionally, since Hotpot is linked to your Google ID, these enhanced recommendations are expected to appear in Maps, standard search, and mobile searches as well.
Lastly, the social features of the site allow you to send recommendations to friends, see their reviews, and compete on Hotpot leaderboards to see who can review the most local businesses.
