In some cases yes. In a lot of cases no. Take barbers for instance. Acquiring new customers used to be somewhat "automatic" and organic through Google. You'd se

In some cases yes. In a lot of cases no. Take barbers for instance. Acquiring new customers used to be somewhat "automatic" and organic through Google. You'd set up a website. You'd set up a Google my business listing. And if you did an average job people could start finding you through search and Google Maps. Now the digital competition is way fiercer. There are way more advertisers. They've improved their craft, websites and copy. Any random barber can't go into the Google marketplace and expect results without either being really good at CPC advertising and CRO (which 99% aren't) or pay top dollar to an agency. All the while Google is increasing their profits by skimming off what originally was organic search results and moving it into paid results. Through new Ad placements on Google Maps. Shitty placements provided through the "Performance max" placements. Or just even more ads at the top of the SERP. On top of this the ad bidding system is inherently set up to be extractive. In a perfectly measurable market the price you pay for an acquisition through CPC ads will increase until it has extracted all the profit an advertiser can reasonably give. This distorts the economy greatly. It concentrates power to those who are the best at digital - at the cost of the average business owner who has no resources, interest or skills in learning it. This goes for barbers, bakeries, restaurants and all kinds of brick and mortar stores. In a lot of these cases it's a zero sum game where Google has inserted itself in the perfect position to be extractive. Not to mention the advertising dollars that used to go to the local newspaper is now going to a California behemoth.