Google Maps Business Intelligence Genie

Extracts and analyzes business data from Google Maps for market research, competitor analysis, and lead generation using the Google Places API.

Overview

This actor crawls Google Maps based on search terms or URLs to collect detailed business listings. It can enrich this core data with business intelligence scoring, sentiment analysis of reviews, and competitor analysis. The output is structured JSON suitable for data pipelines, sales intelligence, or market research.

Key Features

• Core Data Extraction: Fetches business names, addresses, phone numbers, websites, ratings, and review counts.
• Business Intelligence Analysis: Calculates market position, competitive metrics (average ratings, market share), and business health scores.
• Sentiment Analysis: Processes customer reviews to determine positive, negative, and neutral sentiment percentages and an overall score.
• Competitor Analysis: Identifies top competitors in the area and highlights market gaps and competitive advantages.
• Structured Output: Returns data in a consistent JSON schema, with nested sections for BI, sentiment, and competitor data.

How to Use

Configure the actor via input parameters. You must provide either searchTerms or googleMapsUrls. For advanced analytics, a googleApiKey is recommended.

Basic Configuration Parameters

• searchTerms (array): Keywords or phrases to search on Google Maps (e.g., ["pizza new york", "italian restaurant manhattan"]).
• googleMapsUrls (array, optional): Direct URLs to Google Maps pages or lists.
• location (string, optional): A geographic location to focus the search (e.g., "London, UK").
• maxCrawledPlaces (integer): Limit the total number of businesses extracted (default: 200).
• minRating (number): Filter results to show only businesses with this rating or higher (0-5).
• maxReviewsPerPlace (integer): Number of reviews to fetch per business (1-5, default: 5).

Advanced Analytics Parameters

• includeBusinessIntelligence (boolean): Enable BI scoring and market analysis (default: true).
• includeSentimentAnalysis (boolean): Enable review sentiment processing (default: true).
• includeCompetitorAnalysis (boolean): Enable competitor identification (default: true).
• googleApiKey (string, optional): Your Google Cloud Places API key. Using this improves reliability and data freshness.

Input / Output

Input Example

A typical run requires a minimum configuration like this:

{
  "searchTerms": ["coffee shops berlin"],
  "location": "Berlin, Germany",
  "maxCrawledPlaces": 100
}

Output Structure

The actor outputs a dataset where each item represents a business. The structure includes:

Basic Business Information:

{
  "businessName": "Example Cafe",
  "address": "123 Main St, Berlin",
  "phone": "+49123456789",
  "website": "https://example.com",
  "rating": 4.5,
  "userRatingsTotal": 342,
  "placeId": "ChIJ...",
  "businessStatus": "OPERATIONAL"
}

Analytical Data (if enabled):
* businessIntelligence: Contains marketPosition, competitiveAnalysis, and businessHealth metrics.
* sentimentAnalysis: Contains positive, negative, neutral percentages and a sentimentScore.
* competitorAnalysis: Lists topCompetitors and identifies competitiveAdvantage and marketGap.

Use Cases

• Sales & Lead Generation: Build contact lists for businesses in specific categories and locations.
• Market Research: Analyze competitor density, average ratings, and review trends in a target area.
• Business Strategy: Use BI metrics for market positioning, performance benchmarking, and identifying growth opportunities.
• Reputation Management: Monitor customer sentiment and review patterns for a brand or its competitors.