Tame the Week: October 26, 2026

Google changed two things this week that touch a small business, and a new fake-store report is worth reading before holiday shopping.

1. Google is testing a new home base for your Business Profile

Google has launched a beta called Google Business Home, which brings together your Business Profile, Merchant Center, YouTube and Ads accounts. Search Engine Roundtable says it seems Google has been rolling it out slowly over the past couple of months to some businesses, and Google's help page, as quoted there, calls it a closed beta for select business categories in the US and UK. A day later, the same site reported Google is testing a rebuilt performance report covering engagement, reviews, search trends and audience.

What it means for you: Search your inbox and spam folder this week for an email from Google about Business Home. If you have access, open the Reviews and Performance sections first and treat their advice as suggestions only. If nothing arrives, keep your hours, phone number and photos current in your regular profile.

Source: Google Business Home (Search Engine Roundtable), New performance reports (Search Engine Roundtable)

2. Google Meet can now translate speech between 63 languages

Google says Gemini-powered speech translation in Meet now covers 63 languages and detects which language is being spoken. Each participant turns it on for themselves, and it is off at the start of a meeting. It works when the meeting organizer has an eligible Workspace or Google AI plan, and eligible base Workspace plans get up to 90 minutes per meeting. It does not work on dial-in calls or recordings.

What it means for you: If you deal with vendors, crew or customers who speak another language, test it this week on a friendly call. In a Meet call, click the translation control in the toolbar and pick the languages. I would not trust it for contracts yet. If you run your own Workspace, translation is on by default for eligible plans when the Gemini for Meet admin setting is enabled. To change it: Admin console, Apps, Google Workspace, Google Meet, Gemini settings. Scheduled Release accounts get it from November 2, 2026.

Source: Real-time speech translation in Google Meet (Google Workspace Updates)

3. Fake online stores are multiplying ahead of Black Friday

Savi Security, the company behind the Scamwise scam checker, released a holiday report on October 20 based on more than 1 million consumer submissions. It says users report a new fake store roughly every 3 minutes, and at least 1 in 5 fake stores traced back to an ad on a major platform, with Meta and Google the preferred channels. It also says myshopify.com was the most common domain among confirmed scam cases. This is the vendor's own data.

What it means for you: Before you order holiday gifts, supplies or equipment from an ad, look up how long the store has existed and whether anyone outside its own site has heard of it, which is the report's advice. If you sell online, put your real address, phone number and the year you opened on your site, so customers can tell you apart from the fakes.

Source: The 2026 Holiday Shopping Scam Report announcement (GlobeNewswire via FinancialContent)

I'm Jeff Goddard, and I build working AI tools for small businesses. This note is researched and fact-checked every week by an AI system I built. If you'd like something like that working in your business, let's talk: https://tamebuild.ai