Every time Optiscrape sends a request for information to the Google Servers it has to include four things:

API Key + Search Coordinates + Search Term + List of Desired Attributes for each result

Optiscrape gives you full control over which attributes you want to find out during your search. Google makes certain attributes slightly more costly to access than others so it’s worth understanding how to make sure you’re only getting the ones you need. On the other hand, some information is always free! Balancing searches using free information to then optimally seach paid information without waste is one of the key strengths of the Optiscrape system.

The four tiers of information are set out below, and Optiscrape will allow you to choose whichever will be useful to you as part of your search. It is worth reiterating that if you choose ANY piece of information from a higher tier, your entire call is charged at that higher level. That is worth understanding due to the allowances you get for free every month from Google, and the difference in cost once those allowances are used.

As you can see, that’s quite a lot of searches so long as your search areas aren’t vast. The fields below show the information available and the tiers they sit in. Note that geographical and type information is within Pro, but contact type information (such as phone, website and hours) is within Enterprise.

This looks like a daunting list to start, but you’ll quickly learn what is useful to you. Once you do you can save your own settings in presets in the Output Selection and consistently return the same data. We have also put a “recommended” section into the Pro section to get you started which extracts some of the most useful Pro tier data. Remember you can have ALL the Pro tier data for the same usage cost as just some of it, but you may not find some fields particularly useful and it will make your data more difficult to manipulate.

Examples:

• Place ID = Charged at Essentials Free Tier
• Place ID, Location, Display Name, Address, Primary Type, Types = Charged at Pro Tier
• Place ID, Location, Display Name, Address, Primary Type, Types, Website, Phone Number = Charged at Enterprise Tier

Bear in mind that even the Free Tier search has value, as you will get a list of IDs and the number of places that exist within the boxes you are searching. This is a great way to cover lots of area for free – initially finding out if something exists and then switching Output type to search again and get the detail but only in the areas that are worthwhile. You can find out more about optimising searches on this page: Optimising with Copy Boxes