Hot Spots for Good Restaurants = Google Places With Hotpot

Longer search terms are becoming more prevalent than ever as searchers continue to narrow their focus on what they are looking to find on the internet. In fact, more than 20% of all Google searches are made in conjunction with local keywords. As we have seen, location-based innovations have been all the rage this year with the outstanding popularity of geo-local social networks like Foursquare and SCVNGR. 

Of course, never one to be shown up, Google has introduced its latest contribution to the local, narrow search trend, Hotpots, in conjunction with the search engine's Google Places tool. With Hotpots, you can rate local restaurants from the comfort of your beloved google browser. The design of Hotpots, along with the cute (but potentially confusing) name, allows you to rate restaurants using a star system as well as smiley and frowning faces-- giving the site a social network-like appeal. After you rate a place you are also given the option to leave a tip or review for others (including friends, followers and whoever else you want to add from your other social platforms)-- sound like FourSquare anyone?

The coolest function of Hotpots is that the more you rate your favorite and not so favorite local spots, the almighty Google picks up on what kind of places you love to go and gives you recommendations for new places it thinks you should try. 

Seems like Hotpot is pretty much your Foursquare, Yelp, Citysearch, and Campusfood all in one-- I'd recommend giving it a try.