Google Tests On Search Page Keyword Bookmarking Service?

Mike Grehan spotted Google testing a new feature that appears to enable you to add URLs of your choice to particular searches. Mike searched on “digital cameras,” and at the bottom of the results up came a message from Google that looked like this: The box says, “Know of a better page” and invites you […]

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Mike Grehan spotted Google testing a new feature that appears to enable you to add URLs of your choice to particular searches.

Mike searched on “digital cameras,” and at the bottom of the results up came a message from Google that looked like this:

google-marker-080207.png


The box says, “Know of a better page” and invites you to enter the URL of a page for that search, promising:

Next time, we’ll place it up top for you, with this marker: *

Do the search again, and this should mean that the result will come up at the top of the search page with a red asterisk next to it. It’s a form of personalized search, with tagging and bookmarking all in one.

I hope to get more details on this from Google, and update this post at that time.

Postscript From Danny: Yahoo MyWeb used to somewhat like this, but that the feature was pulled in October 2006, when the Yahoo Toolbar was updated to have Yahoo Bookmarks functionality. Meanwhile, Google Bookmarks also allows you to annotate your search results at Google.

Postscript From Barry: Here is a response from Google:

We are always working on innovative ways to improve our index and provide users with relevant information. What you are seeing is an experiment that we are currently testing. We run between 50-200 search experiments at any given time and based on user feedback, we may or may not develop new features and products. For more information on our live experiments, please visit https://googleblog.blogspot.com/2006/04/this-is-test-this-is-only-test.html.


About the author

Barry Schwartz
Staff
Barry Schwartz is a Contributing Editor to Search Engine Land and a member of the programming team for SMX events. He owns RustyBrick, a NY based web consulting firm. He also runs Search Engine Roundtable, a popular search blog on very advanced SEM topics. Barry can be followed on Twitter here.

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