Google Goes Cold on Hotpot, Shutters the Standalone App - Click here http://bit.ly/euP5aN for full article

Click here http://bit.ly/euP5aN for full article

With the popularity of social, and location-based applications, like Yelp, FourSquare and GoWalla, it is not surprise that larger tech companies would hop on the bandwagon. Enter Google's social recommendations platform called, HotPot. But after a very short time of testing the waters with the HotPot website and dedicated mobile app, both the site and app began to be phased out.

For those unfamiliar with the project, HotPot was a social recommendations program intended on competing with Facebook and Yelp. In a nutshell, you could go to the HotPot web page, select local businesses or landmarks, write mini-reviews and post them on a variety of social media sites. For a short while, there was also a stand-alone application that was available on both iPhone and Android-based mobile devices. The application was similar to the web version of HotPot, but with a few minor differences.

To be fair, the HotPot website and application didn't completely peter out. In fact, many of HotPot's functions can still be found on the Google Places website, and in the Android Places application. Still, the company is constantly negotiating its place in order to stay competitive in the social recommendations space, which has been catapulted by the likes of Yelp and FourSquare. Incidentally, the multi-million search engine company unsuccessfully attempted to buy Yelp in early 2010.

Though many may be confused by the disappearance of HotPot in the social networking space, Google has pitched the move as a measure to consolidate their social offerings. They are actually calling the restructuring of HotPot into Places a "graduation" of sorts, which actually isn't very far off. Consolidating the many features of HotPot into the Places application is a step in the right direction. The good news is that the recommendations platform is alive and well for small business marketing. More and more small to mid-sized companies are using the Places platform as a means to garner attention from potential customers, and it's actually working.