A Search Engine For Geriatrics

Jan 10, 2007 at 6:59pm ET by Chris Sherman

Attention all you over-50 types: The folks behind new search engine Cranky.com think they’ve got just what you need to avoid search rage and information overload. The new service, which is really a select directory of 5,000 sites most popular among users 45 and older, simplifies search results by only presenting you four links and specially created annotations, along with ads served by partner Ask.com.

Like many new search services cropping up these days, there’s also a social component, with “member” ratings and reviews.

More coverage at CNN’s Tired of Google and Yahoo? Try Cranky.com, the AP’s New Search Engine for Aging Boomers, and ClickZ’s New Social Search Engine Targets Boomers.

Chris Sherman is Executive Editor of SearchEngineLand.com and President of Searchwise LLC, a Boulder Colorado based Web consulting firm. He also programs and co-chairs the Search Marketing Expo - SMX conference series.

See more articles by Chris Sherman >

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3 COMMENTS ON A Search Engine For Geriatrics

Michael Martinez, January 11th, 2007 at 12:46 pm ET:

Cranky is apparently part of or partnered with the EONS Web site, which is now running television advertising to build its membership. It sounds like a social network for the over-50 crowd, many of whom are now key decision-makers in various corporate and government structures.

I wonder how long it will take the marketing community to squelch the signal there?

RobRubin, January 11th, 2007 at 2:40 pm ET:

cRANKy is a web search engine that has been available at http://www.eons.com since the sites launch on July 31st. Earlier this week EONS publsihed some of the query and Compete data and launched cRANKy at http://www.cranky.com. The cRANKy kernel is truly a social ranking relevancy engine. The engine uses the ratings provided by Eons editors, Eons members (who are age 49+) the data collected by Compete, Inc. about where this demographic browses for information on the web, and the algorithmic ranking provided by our web search OEM partner to compute the relevancy ranking of the result set. cRANKy displays the top 4 results on the first page, and then 10 results on subsequent pages. The results are easily distinguishable from sponsored listings, particularly when they include Eons editorial and member reviews.

AussieWebmaster, January 11th, 2007 at 9:43 pm ET:

Nice I did not realise I was a geriatric. When do I get my AARP newsletter.

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