SmallBusinessNewz

There's been a lot of new coming out of the Google camp over the last day or two, but a few things stick out as important things that small business owners may really want to pay attention to.

For one, Google Checkout is raising its fees. The service is definitely not as popular as PayPal yet, but there are probably a great many of you using it anyhow. If so, you've probably already gotten an email about the rate hikes, but if not, it goes something like this:

Hello,

We're writing to let you know that on May 5, 2009, Google
Checkout's transaction processing fees will be changing. We'll be
transitioning from our 2.0% + $0.20 per transaction rate to a new
tiered fee structure, where the rates will vary depending on the
dollar amount of your monthly sales processed through Checkout.
The rate you'll be charged beginning on May 5, 2009 will be based
on your sales processed through Checkout during the month of April
2009. Each month thereafter, we'll continue to use the prior
month's sales volume to determine your transaction processing
rate. For more details about the new rates, please visit
http://checkout.google.com/seller/fees.html

We'll also be discontinuing the AdWords free transaction
processing promotion on May 5, 2009. Any AdWords transaction
processing credits accrued during April 2009 will be applied
towards transactions that occur on May 1-4, 2009.

Fees are the same for all payment types (Visa, MasterCard,
American Express, and Discover) and there are still no monthly,
setup, or gateway fees. For cross-border transactions, there will
be an additional 1% fee assessed per transaction. To learn more
about Google Checkout fees, please visit
http://checkout.google.com/seller/fees.html

Google is committed to the continued growth and development of
Checkout and to helping merchants increase sales by driving more
leads and higher conversions. Advertisers who use Checkout have
the opportunity to display the Checkout badge on their ads, which
has proven to be an effective way to differentiate ads and attract
user interest. Checkout users click on ads 10% more when the ad
displays the Checkout badge and convert 40% more than shoppers who
have not used Checkout in the past.

For more information about this change and how it affects the
product, please read our post on The Official Google Checkout
Blog: http://googlecheckout.blogspot.com/2009/03/google-checkout-fees-in-2009.html

If you have any questions, please visit our Help Center at
http://checkout.google.com/support/sell/bin/answer.py?answer=134473
Thank you for using Google Checkout.

Sincerely,
The Google Checkout Team

Probably the biggest piece of news is that Google is beginning to offer "interest-based" advertising as they call it. This is basically behavioral targeting based upon sites that users have visited in the past. Here's a video on that:

Google has also provided an informative video about getting more out of Google Image Search that business owners may find helpful:

On a related note, the search engine has also made changes to its Image Search results pages for Android, iPhone, and iPod Touch devices.

The latest news from Google is that it has opened up the Google Friend Connect API and is encouaging developers to create more plug-ins based on it. This means a lot more sites are going to be getting more social, and data portability is going to get a boost as well.