San Francisco: Google has rolled out support links for businesses to post directly to their Business Profiles on Google.
The new feature has been rolled out in the US, Canada, the UK, Ireland, Australia and New Zealand.
“Local businesses are core to our communities, but the impact of COVID-19 has been tough on business owners,” Google said in a statement late Monday.
“With this new feature, merchants will be able to add a donation link, gift card link or both to their profile,” the search engine giant added.
They can also share a personal message in their post to inform customers how funds will be put to use. These support links will be visible to consumers later this month.
“At launch, we’ve partnered with PayPal and GoFundMe for donations. For gift cards, merchants can link directly to the relevant page on their website or to their gift card offerings with one of our eligible partners, which includes Square, Toast, Clover and Vagaro,” informed Google.
While Google is not charging merchants or consumers any fees, there may be partner processing fees associated with campaigns.
According to the company, the initial launch will begin with a subset of businesses to protect against misuse, with plans to expand to more countries, merchants, and partners in a safe and responsible way over the coming weeks.
Over the past few months, the company has added tools and features to make it easier for businesses to keep customers informed, including the ability to add dining options and updated hours to Business Profiles.
