Hi Fellow Local Guides,
This is a really nerdy tip for editors using a windows PC to edit information on Google Maps.
I recently bought this new wireless mouse and noticed it has 2 extra buttons located close to my thumb.
Out of the box the two extra buttons does nothing when clicked. So I found a free Windows program called X-Mouse Button Control. It allows users to reprogram mouse buttons pretty easily.
As you can see in the screenshot below The front one called Mouse Button 5 has been reprogrammed to simulate Del and the back one called Mouse Button 4 is now Crtl+V.
Using this tip speeds up making edits on Google Maps quite a lot because I can now avoid moving my hand to the keyboard every time I need to press Delete or Paste (Crtl+V). So most edits can now be done by using only one hand.
This comes in very handy especially when I edit names. Many businesses like to add keywords referring to their Geographical location (street/district/city) or the Category. This is called Keyword stuffing. I love to remove keyword stuffing!
Also when a chain of stores uses ALL CAPS to attract attention, this can very quickly be corrected by double-clicking on the ALL CAPS name and then hit the newly reprogrammed mouse button for Crtl+V. For this to work, the Small Caps name needs to be stored in the clipboard.
I think my editing speed went up 30-40 % and it feels like I don’t get as tired as before!
Cheers
Morten
PS: This is also a #LGCTM Tip. Find more tricks to clean the map here.
PPS: Update: I just changed {DEL} to {BACKSPACE} which can save a few more hand-trips to the keyboard
UPDATE January 2022:
I assigned the press-scroll-wheel button to do crtl+c. This made a huge improvement so I literally can make 90 percent of my #LGCTM edits without moving my hand from the mouse to the keyboard