Google Phone Number
I got a call last week:
Me: Hello, Richard Hearne
Other Guy: Is that Google?
Me: Em, er, no
Other Guy: Right…well this is the number
Me: (laughing) No I’m sorry, this isn’t Google
Me: Can I ask you where you found the number?
Other Guy: It says it on the Internet
Me: Where?
Other Guy: Well I looked it up on Google and this was the number
Me: Right, I see…. (laughing more now as I look at the results)
We had a chat anyhow about Adwords and the like. Funny isn’t it how people have so much faith in Google results?
Hehe. that’s funny. Do you get many phone calls from the site? I get the occasional person who emails and wants my phone number to get free MU consulting by phone but no fan calls, Mr Google
Comment by Donncha O Caoimh — April 6, 2007 @ 4:25 pm
I get quite a few calls all right. But they normally know who they’re calling. I talked to this particular guy for a while because he was looking to use Adwords and really didn’t have a clue about the Internet.
I saw you gave me a nice mention on your photo blog – cheers for that! Meant to leave a comment but then got enthralled by the duck photo and had to read all about that. One of the best snaps I’ve seen in ages.
Comment by Richard Hearne — April 6, 2007 @ 4:40 pm
I’ve received a couple of phone calls, and a couple of emails from people who want their problems with Yahoo mail solved, and solved now, and they weren’t going to take no as an answer from me.
I’m not sure why they thought I was Yahoo’s email helpdesk. They weren’t too forthcoming with how they found my phone number and address. Though I did have a pleasant enough conversation with both callers once they realized that I wasn’t Yahoo.
Comment by Bill — April 6, 2007 @ 4:42 pm
At some levels it’s very funny. I don’t know if it applies in your case as well Bill, but it just amazes me that people search for something and then take the first result as being the truth.
Well at least now if I get any calls looking for Y!mail support I know where to send them
Rgds
Richard
Comment by Richard Hearne — April 6, 2007 @ 6:03 pm
I got a very funny call from someone about getting a listing on entertainment.ie :
Side Effect of SEO Blogging
I had to add the disclaimer!
Comment by Michele — April 6, 2007 @ 9:06 pm
Michele – I changed the link to point at the post I think you were referring to
Comment by Richard Hearne — April 7, 2007 @ 2:13 pm
Hahaha, brilliant Richard. Might be a nice way to get some clients or even do a little bit of reasearch.
Seems funny that the user did not actually look at the display URL or even click through to your site to find he was incorrect.
You are right, people put too much trust in organic results. In fact, I only found Google Irelands number (Public line) at SMW when I asked for it off one of the googlers.
Comment by Dave Davis — April 7, 2007 @ 3:17 pm
Ha nice one. Amazing what the results can pull up these days.
Dave I found myself many of times skimming phone numbers of the description snippet and not actually checking before calling. Cant say that I have got it wrong so far.
Comment by Gavin — April 7, 2007 @ 10:27 pm
Hi Richard,
we got a similar call from a concerned mother who wanted to ban Bebo from her son’s home PC.
Lar
Comment by Laurence Veale — April 9, 2007 @ 11:51 am
Just wait until we get a plus box with a ‘Call Now’ button to call the number over Google’s VOIP network….
Comment by Richard Hearne — April 9, 2007 @ 1:27 pm
*If* we ever get a plus box.
Comment by Dave Davis — April 9, 2007 @ 1:31 pm
I’m now getting irate Skymovies users posting comments on my “rant” about the new look skymovies.com ….
*sigh*
Comment by Michele — April 10, 2007 @ 9:04 pm
In previous version of Google Earth , if i wished i could look at the relief of Andes Mountains by dragging top cursr button .
i cannot use this facility with the lastest version of Google Earth .
Could we have it back plaes
Comment by jp harrington — September 10, 2008 @ 12:59 pm
This comedy does bring up an excellent (SEO selfish) idea for Google, though.
Create a paid call-in number for webmasters.
Not sure what the pricing would be, but I know there are several instances where I would have paid upwards of $200 for a straight answer from Google.
Comment by Jeff Gregory — February 23, 2009 @ 5:21 pm