“Google is a monopolist.” Those were the words written by U.S. District Judge Amit Mehta earlier this month in his landmark ruling against the search giant in the antitrust case brought to the court by the U.S. Justice Department.
While that case against Google pertained to its $20 billion deal with Apple regarding Google Search maintaining its default dominance on the iPhone, it seems that the DOJ lawsuit may have just opened the floodgates.
On Wednesday, local business review platform Yelp filed an antitrust lawsuit against Google regarding the company’s dominance over local search and local search advertising.
Yelp takes on Google’s local search dominance
Yelp’s case against Google is all about the search giant giving priority to its own local search product.
“Our case is about Google, the largest information gatekeeper in existence, putting its heavy thumb on the scale to stifle competition and keep consumers within its own walled garden,” writes Yelp CEO Jeremy Stoppelman in a public post addressing the lawsuit. “Google has illegally abused its monopoly in general search to dominate the local search and local search advertising markets — engaging in anticompetitive conduct that has degraded the quality of search results and demoted rivals to grow its market power.”
Type in any local business whether it be a nearby restaurant or plumbing service and Google local search information is unavoidable. Google reviews and star ratings for an establishment, left via Google Maps, as well as contact information, business hours, and more are all readily available right the on Google Search results page. On the web, this information is usually located on the sidebar and doesn’t distract from Google’s competitors on the search page as much. However, perform a local search on a mobile device and Google’s local search information is oftentimes the first – and only – thing you see on the page until you scroll down.
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“When a consumer conducts a Google search with local intent, Google manipulates its results to promote its own local search offerings above those of its rivals, regardless of the comparative poorer quality of its own properties, exempting itself from the qualitative ranking system it uses for other sites,” Stoppelman says.
According to the Yelp CEO, Google’s anticompetitive practices have impacted the company so much that Yelp has noticed that an increase in the number of Google searches for a term has often resulted in zero additional clicks to links recommended on the page. The reason, according to Yelp, is that Google’s local search product just provides all the information on the search page which gives users no reason to click through to a competitor.
Yelp’s public push explaining its lawsuit against Google cites numerous cases against Google over the years as well as fines the company has received for anticompetitive practices. It also includes crucial quotes from Google executives over the years such as one from Google’s former VP of search products Marissa Mayer where she claims Google would put their own products first in Google search results because it “seems only fair.” Mayer’s statement also acknowledges that search ranking results would only be ranked by popularity after Google’s own product link at the top of the page.
Yelp, a regular Google critic, clearly sees an opening after the recent ruling from Judge Mehta. Yelp’s General Counsel Aaron Schur said so himself in a statement provided to Mashable.
“Judge Amit Mehta’s recent ruling in the government’s antitrust case against Google, finding Google illegally maintained its monopoly in general search, is a watershed moment in antitrust law, and provides a strong foundation for Yelp’s case against Google,” Schur said. “In addition to injunctive relief, Yelp seeks a remedy that ensures Google can no longer self-preference in local search.”
“The harms caused by Google’s self-preferencing are not unique to Yelp, and we look forward to telling our story in court,” he continued.
Mashable has reached out to Google for comment and will update if we hear back.