Google Rebrands Custom Search “Business Edition” As “Google Site Search”

Google launched its Custom Search Engine (CSE) in late 2006. It has gone through various changes and feature upgrades since that time and Google just announced that what it was calling CSE “Business Edition” has now been renamed “Google Site Search.” There are several new features that offer increased customization to site owners implementing the tool.

Those new features include look and feel customization, deeper crawling, the ability to upload specialized synonym dictionaries, “date biasing” (recent results can be more heavily weighted), and “Top Results Biasing.”

Google explains the latter category in the following way: “Google Site Search allows you to target the top search results from specific sections of your website (such as your product catalog).” Site owners can thus promote specific types of results in top positions. This can be used simply to highlight content or as a promotional vehicle (read: advertising).

Site search is also ad free. However, those that want them can get AdSense with their custom search results. Pricing depends on the number of pages indexed.

About The Author

Greg Sterling

Greg Sterling is a Contributing Editor at Search Engine Land. He researches and writes about the connections between digital and offline commerce. He is also VP of Strategy and Insights for the Local Search Association. Follow him on Twitter or find him at Google+.