We are watching a paradigm shift in the market and I'm not so sure Google is ready for it.

My favorite new home gadget is Amazon's Alexa. I don't have to push any buttons. I just ask and Alexa is always listening.

Alexa has just added local search to her knowledge base! This is huge and it's not Google.

I just say: "Alexa, I need a plumber"

Alexa respond immediately, "Here are a few nearby popular ones..." and then proceeds to name them. She goes on to tell you to open your Alexa app to get more detail.

With the app already open, the results are immediate although not always appropriate. But if you're asking for a niche that Yelp is particularly good at (restaurants for example), the results are awesome. It's very interesting to me that when a device says the name of the business, it's more believable then when you read it (that's a gut feel - I'm sure someone will spend 100k to see if I'm right.)

While I'm not ready to jump on the Yelp bandwagon just yet, you should know that this is where Alexa is getting her data.

With this technology and others, you can see that it's not going to be such a Google-centric world. Now, all of a sudden, those citations you should have been filling out are becoming more important. Each of them is it's own search engine. At the end of the day,, the search you believe to be the most accurate will depend on reviews by other people who have already been though the experience of what it is you're requesting.

So? Still think you should be focused on Google exclusively? Alexa doesn't think so.