Google has their tentacles outstretched into so many diverse areas. Occasionally the different teams seem to sit down together and say “hey what if we did x together?”
Regardless of the genesis of the new feature, the Google Apps and Google Maps teams have got together to integrate Google Map data right into Google Contacts on the web.
If you’re using the Google Contact Preview then this new feature is available to you. If you add a businesses phone number into your contacts, Google will search for a match on Google Maps and if one is found it will populate the contact card with all of the relevant details from the maps database.
If you click on the edit button you will see where contacts have sourced each entry from. If the details you have entered conflict with what Google has stored it will NOT override your entries. The update is available for both Apps and Gmail accounts starting from today and rolling out over the next 3 days.
There is a lot of extra information added to my contacts from a lot of sources, not just maps. And that is awesome! 🙂
I am not the kind of person who sits with my contacts and adds information to each one diligently so the more that Google can do for me – the better.