Has Potential.

First, let me start by saying that I emailed the developer and received a fast response for a couple pre-sales questions from Paolo. If they answer after purchase support questions just as fast then they get a high 5 for that! Especially considering this was on a saturday night!

At my first reading of the feature listing at their website I was pretty impressed. And I can see the really great potential for this fine plugin.

However, after spending a some time with the demo site on their server, I resigned to the fact that I believe this plugin has a ways to go before I could give it a high number of Stars.

Here is the list of things that made me take away stars from my review:

1… On my Android phone the login/register screen had major display problems. It bunched both blocks (Login and register) into a skinny unreadable display. (About 1/2 inch wide with the input fields so tiny I could not even tell what they were. Not sure what is going on here but also tried with my wifes Larger LG android phone and got the same result.

2… The map on my mobile device did not allow to scroll below the map. Instead, it simply just moved the map around. Since the map took up the entire screen, there was no way to scroll the thing below the map. A little irritating to say the least.

3… I expected to see an easy search feature where a user could do a proximity search from the users current location to find nearest locations right on the main search page. For example: Search from my current location within 5,10,20,30,40,50 miles. I found an extended search area that appears to offer this. However, I am not sure if this is actually from the users CURRENT position (Say while driving in a car) or if it using a default position last stored from the user. I really would like to see the proximity options in a pull down along with the main search (i.e. “All, 10 miles, 20 miles… etc) rather than placed in another section.

4… After doing a search, the listings do not show number of miles from my current position. This has become a pretty standard thing on many other google map sites that give listings and something I really expected. The ability to change the current sort on the displayed listings to miles away from my current location is something that I expected to find.

5… A Possible Problem? : After trying the proximity search, the listing showed nothing listed. I expected this since I am in Colorado and there was nothing in their demo database within 10 miles. However, I was unable to search any longer without the proximity and everything I tried kept showing nothing found. The main screen map showed nothing found without the map showing. I could not find anywhere a reset button to get back the main map with search results without the last proximity settings. The only way I could get rid of the problem was to delete my cookies. On my mobile phone was the same result!

6… Another Possible Problem? Not sure if I just don’t have enough step-by-step docs to figure this out (could not find any good documentation available) but when I tried to add my first Place I kept receiving errors using the Place Information section. I typed in my address, entered my zip code and received an error popup that said “Please choose any address of the () city only”. Then it would insert text into the address field of “Cannot determine address at this location.” – So I tried other addresses with the same exact problem. Just to double check, I tried a free WP geo plugin and it accepted my addresses just fine. Not sure what is wrong here!

7… I was unable to find a “Get Directions” button anywhere on a detail listing. Something that most map sites using google API have and hard to believe that this was forgotten. Or perhaps it is just turned off in the demo for some reason?

My wish list for this plugin:

… A “Follow” feature. Allowing users to follow a business listing with the listings having the ability to send out notifications to their followers. Special announcements, etc… Ideally, having this feature would allow users to opt into receiving notifications via email OR just viewing on a following list of notifications when on the site.

… A “Deals” feature. These “Deals” would announce to those following their listings that they are offering a deal (at their establishment). Example: “Announcing 10% off everything on Tuesday from 1:00PM to 5:00PM.” Those who are followers of the business would receive this “Deal” announcement via email (If they elected to allow).

The “Deals” that I am talking about here could be pretty easy to implement using the Events plugin they already have with a little tweeking. However, as mentioned above, without the ability to tie in sending notifications to followers then this is only something to dream about without doing your own coding. To me, a Deal is an Event!

… The “Events” plugin should in my opinion also have the ability to auto notify followers of the newly announced event. This also shows the importance of a “Follow” feature.

… Would really like to see easy ways to build the detail pages with customization such as using blocks. (Dragable for the main detail page and sidebar) Having an easy way to add html along with custom php would be perfect for these blocks and being able to add shortcodes from other plugins would be awesome for great customization.

I hope that someday soon I will see this evolve into a something I can actually give more stars to. It sounds like the developers are pretty serious about going forward with this so I am sure that I will return someday with more positive comments!

FINAL COMMENTS: By NO means does the current state of the plugin or my comments above mean that it would not meet your needs. Like any plugins, they are never going to be perfect for every use case and will usually require more development to get the functionality each person actually needs.