May 16, 2012 at 1:00pm ET by Danny Sullivan

Hinted at for months, Google formally launched its "Knowledge Graph" today. The new technology is being used to provide popular facts about people, places and things alongside Google's traditional results. It also allows Google to move toward a new way of searching not for pages that match query terms but for "entities" or concepts that the words describe. Knowledge Graph? "Graph" is a technical term used to describe how a set of objects are connected. Google has used a "link graph" to model how pages link to each other, in order to help determine which are popular and relevant for part [...]

Confirmed: Bing 411 Closing June 1st

May 10, 2012 at 9:34am ET by Barry Schwartz

Microsoft is closing down their toll-free voice search program named Bing 411. I have confirmed the Bing 411 service is closing by calling the service and hearing immediately the message: Bing 411: On June 1st, we are discontinuing the Bing 411 service. There were reports of this via LiveSide where they said they "received a tip" on this news. But this is indeed happening and Bing is closing down their 411 service. Google shut down their GOOG-411 service back in 2010. Bing kept theirs live hoping to fill that void, but clearly with the rise of smartphones and voice search embedde [...]

Google Testing “Sources” Area With Info About Movies, Books, People, Music & More

May 9, 2012 at 1:38pm ET by Danny Sullivan

Last November, Google tested a new "Sources" section in its search results, in the third column where ads normally appear. It seems the testing is underway again, showing extended information about actors, films, musicians, people and more. It also seems likely everyone may see this extended information soon, and that it's the "search refresh" the Wall Street Journal wrote about in March finally arriving. Experiment Confirmed I noticed these appearing yesterday in my own search results, and Google has confirmed that there's an experiment happening: We're always experimenting with ways to im [...]

Google Discussion Forum Snippets Now Showing “Top Answers”

Mar 28, 2012 at 8:53am ET by Barry Schwartz

Google has expanded the search descriptions to show the "top answer" and sometimes the "question" for discussion forum like search results. For example, a search for ["incoming search terms"] in Google returns results from Google Groups and StackOverflow and in those snippets, it shows the "top answer" listed in the forum. Here is a picture: Both these forums support the functionality of labeling an answer to the question as a "top answer." Google is clearly picking up on that, structuring the data as such and then displaying that directly in the search results. This is all likel [...]

WSJ Says Big Google Search Changes Coming? Reality Check Time!

Mar 15, 2012 at 4:26am ET by Danny Sullivan

The Wall Street Journal is out with a story saying that Google is about to make one of the biggest changes in its history of offering web search, providing more direct answers and gaining "semantic" smarts to understand more about what words mean. I'm scratching my head, since Google already does this. Methinks Google's PR has exploded in ways it didn't expect. Beyond Blue Links! From the story, we learn things such as: Over the next few months, Google's search engine will begin spitting out more than a list of blue Web links. It will also present more facts and direct answers to queries at [...]

Become a PRO member and see all articles in our Search Features archives!

PRO Members get unrestricted access to all archives - and more!

Get Our News, Everywhere!

Follow @sengineland

Got a tip? Tell us here!

Most Likes
Most Tweets
Comments

Our Stories Being Liked on Facebook

Search Engine Land Sponsors

Advertise With Us

Free Daily Search News Recap!

SearchCap is a once-per-day newsletter update - sign up below and get the news delivered to you!

Click to watch SMX conference video

Join us at an upcoming SMX event:

North America

SMX Advanced - June 5-6, 2012
SMX East - Oct. 2-4, 2012
SMX Social Media Marketing - Dec. 5-6, 2012
SMX Toronto - April 2013

EMEA

SMX Paris - June 7-8 2012
SMX Stockholm - Oct. 15-16, 2012
SMX Munich - Apr. 9-10, 2013
SMX London - May 2013

APAC

SMX Melbourne - Sept. 5-6, 2012
SMX Sydney - May 2013

Search Engine Land produces SMX, the Search Marketing Expo conference series. SMX events deliver the most comprehensive educational and networking experiences - whether you're just starting in search marketing or you're a seasoned expert.