The Financial Times (FT) is reporting that the thrust of Google’s antitrust settlement proposal to European Competition Czar Joaquín Almunia primarily involves “labeling” its own services to distinguish them from other organic search results. According to the FT, citing “people familiar with the search giant’s submission”: Under the proposal, Google would put its brand on any […]
In the roughly two years since Google launched flight search and hotel search, Kayak CEO Steve Hafner says, “We haven’t seen any impact on our business.” This statement, made in a CNBC interview, would appear to directly contradict the central claim of the lobbying group to which Kayak belongs, FairSearch.org. The central claim is that […]
Financial services, hotels, flights, products… what’s next for Google’s paid inclusion vertical search engine plans? It appears to be new cars, if a Bay Area test is any indication. The test was first spotted by auto industry publication DealerELITE. If a person has indicated he is in the San Francisco Bay Area, searching on specific […]
Google Product Search is getting a new name, Google Shopping, and a new business model where only merchants that pay will be listed. It’s the first time Google will decommission a search product that previously listed companies for free. The company says the change will improve the searcher experience, but it will also likely raise […]
European Competition Commissioner Joaquin Almunia issued a statement this morning offering “preliminary conclusions” of the EU’s investigation of numerous antitrust complaints against Google. It lays out “concerns” about Google’s market power in four areas. Almunia acknowledges Google’s prior statements about a willingness to settle and suggests that if a settlement can be reached Europe and […]
Google has had what it has called “comparison ads” for some time, but these comparison units are getting a new look in Google’s search results beginning today. Google hopes the change will better explain to searchers that comparison listings come from companies it has a commercial relationship with. It also highlights how three Google search […]
Our next Search Engine Land conference, SMX West 2012, comes to San Jose from February 28-March 1. This is my preview of what we’ve got on the agenda, over 50 sessions covering all aspects of search marketing. Consider it a personal invite of why you should come. SMX: All Search, All The Time SMX West […]
Google’s favoritism of Google+ in its new Search Plus results is just the latest in the line of favoritism it has done with vertical search? It’s not, because Google hasn’t really favored itself with vertical search. It is favoring itself with Google+, and that’s why things are so disturbing. Vertical Search Is What Search Engines […]
Bing’s not-so-newest push into online travel hasn’t begun to roil the industry, the latest example of where if Bing does something, no one cares, but if Google does it, it’s time for a Wall Street Journal story examining the potential evilness of the move. In case you missed it, the Wall Street Journal has a […]
During his written responses to questions from the Senate Judiciary Subcommittee on Antitrust, Google Executive Chairman Eric Schmidt identified a range of competitors that Google faces in the market today. Some were well-known and some more obscure. One of the smaller companies that Schmidt mentioned was FindTheBest. He identified the company in a list of […]
FairSearch, a group of search companies including Microsoft which lobbies that Google is too dominant, has sent a white paper outlining its anti-trust concerns about Google to the 50 state attorneys general in the US. Below, a review and some fact checking of the paper. You’ll find the paper here, if you wish to read […]
Google has made what amounts to a promising downpayment on more ambitious travel search tools with its new Flight Search, debuting today. Launching initially for a select group of US cities Google users will have access to an expanded range of airline search options and a much more verticalized experience than has been available in […]
Anonymous complainants have thrown more fuel on the antitrust fire. Additional complaints have reportedly been filed against Google with European regulators. According to Reuters, the total number of complaints now comes to nine. Previously there were four formal complaints before the European Commission: Ciao (owned by Microsoft) Ejustice.fr (which has also filed a civil suit) […]
Searchmetrics has conducted a data analysis on what type of content appears most often in Google Universal Search results, as well as which sites are most visible in them. Video and image content wins, as does content hosted on Google’s own properties. Universal Search Loves Video, Images The most revealing data from the study, which the […]
Perhaps sensing “blood in the water,” a French company called 1plusV has sued Google in the Paris Commercial Court for the equivalent of $421 million. (The civil complaint was orginally filed on February 22, 2011.) An operator of vertical search sites, 1plusV is the corporate parent of legal search engine Ejustice.fr, one of three companies […]
Yesterday, Search Engine Roundtable and InfoDocket both pointed out that Google’s U.S. government specialty search tools, Google-Uncle Sam and USGov.Google.com had been offline for several days. Additionally, Google’s long time specialty search tools Linux Search, Microsoft Search, Apple Search, and BSD Search were also unavailable. Google has now confirmed both to us via email and […]
For those who follow search it was initially one of those “WTF moments”: Walmart acquiring erstwhile Google challenger Kosmix. However AllThingsD reports that the price was $300 million-plus vs. $55 million raised. So the founders and investors get a seemingly nice exit. Kosmix will now become part of the newly established “@WalmartLabs.” When it launched […]
Google has launched Google Instant Search for Google Place search results. To see this yourself, conduct a search on Google and then click on “Places” in the left-hand panel. Then type in the search box and Google Instant will predict and auto fill your searches. Here is an example query for pizza: Google continues to […]
Last week we reported on two extensive questionnaires being used by the European Commission to gather factual information as part of its antitrust inquiry against Google. Agencies, advertisers, ad networks and publishers are being solicited for their input through these documents. We obtained a copy of what appears to be the shorter questionnaire. In it […]
According to the NY Times, EU antitrust officials have developed a lengthy questionnaire directed to advertisers as part of its antitrust inquiry into Google’s business practices. Broadly speaking the 120 question document “seeks to ascertain whether Google manipulated search results and used its popular platform to keep business and disadvantage rivals in online advertising and […]
I’m in San Francisco waiting for the start of the Bing Search Summit. There are a huge number of things rolling out this morning. It will be interesting to see what they emphasize and demonstrate here at the event. I’m not the master of live blogging that Danny is but I’ll do my best to […]
The European Commission has opened a formal antitrust investigation into whether Google abused its market power and position in Europe. A number of complaints have effectively been consolidated in the action, which comes after a preliminary inquiry by the EC. The individual complainants include Microsoft-owned shopping engine Ciao, price comparison site Foundem and French legal […]
I did a search at Google today for “cars” and was shocked. Rather than list links allowing me to search for “cars” on Bing, Yahoo, Baidu, Voila, Naver and Yandex, Google instead favored its own search results. I’m glad the EU will be investigating whether this favoritism violates anti-trust laws. Consider the evidence. Here’s a […]
Blekko, the long anticipated search engine founded by Rich Skrenta, has finally opened to the public. The service offers an interesting way to “slash” or create specialty search engines for any topic, along with new features the company hopes will improve relevancy. My previous article, Blekko: New Search Engine Lets You “Spin” The Web, goes […]
Texas Attorney General Greg Abbott is conducting an investigation into Google’s business practices as they relate to search listings, in particular whether Google is manipulating its paid and editorial results in a way that violates antitrust laws. We received a tip about the investigation this week, and Google confirmed today that an investigation started in […]
Did you think the search engine wars had devolved into a fight between only Google and Bing? Think again. New challenger Blekko is stepping into the fray, opening to limited beta testing today. It offers a compelling way to “slash the web” and put a particular spin on your search results. Blekko isn’t a Google-killer. […]
Video, local, and other search verticals focused videos, slide presentations, and podcasts recorded at various Search Marketing Expo conferences. To see the full presentation, click on either the screenshot, or the session’s title. SMX West – March 11-13, 2013 – San Jose, CA Slides & Speaker Audio: Being National, Going Local Large national retailers and […]
Move over Google, Yahoo, and Bing; blended results or not, personalized search, Twitter results and OneBoxes … you guys are just too predictable for this article. There’s a new breed of search engines out there, and they’re letting users search and find some utterly crazy stuff. And by “crazy,” I mean a lot of things: […]
The tnooz blog reported that after searching for [hotels] off the Google home page, he was shown hotel room prices directly in the search results. Here is a screen capture: Now, we know Google was testing hotel prices in Google Maps via AdWords but these are prices directly in the organic results. How is this […]
The Yahoo strategy of outsourcing content and technology continues. According to a press release, Healthline will support and augment the existing content and provide search for Yahoo Health. In the Healthline partnership, Yahoo! gains a technology partner that already provides over 90 million users a month with the most contextually relevant and clinically accurate health […]
Relatively quietly Yahoo has decided to outsource most of Yahoo Shopping to PriceGrabber. This is analogous to what Yahoo is doing with Microsoft-Bing in search — just not with Microsoft. Merchant listings will now come from PriceGrabber and e-commerce sellers will only be able to get into Yahoo Shopping via PriceGrabber or Yahoo Search (Bing). […]
For Search Engine Land PRO members, below you will find selected sessions from our SMX: Search Marketing Expo conferences on key topics relating to search marketing. You need to be a logged in SEL PRO member to watch them. Log in here, and click on any session title to view the video. Unfortunately, we are […]
Now that Google Search Options has added new features, I thought it was a good time to revisit how everything works — and in some cases, doesn’t work. Let’s get up close and personal with all the filtering options! NOTE: See Meet The New Google Look & Its Colorful, Useful “Search Options” Column for important […]
Netbase is an enterprise-facing software and search company that appears to have one of the most advanced search platforms in the market. Earlier this week during a briefing Netbase marketing and product VP Jens Tellefsen asserted that no other search provider in the consumer or enterprise segment was as advanced — an audacious claim. Tellefsen […]
Below is what happened in search today, as reported on Search Engine Land and from other places across the web.
In a “what’s wrong with this picture?” moment, AdWeek reports that Forrester Research has concluded that Google, for lack of user loyalty, is vulnerable to being dethroned and that another “Google Killer” may be lurking just around the corner. First the caveats and then the criticism of these findings and their implications. All of my […]
Ask.com — saying it plans to compete against the likes of Google, Yahoo and Microsoft — has announced a new “Super Verticals” strategy to take on its much larger rivals. These are specialized search engines that provide direct answers to factual questions. First off the mark? A NASCAR search engine. And yes, Ask also becomes […]
Below is what happened in search today, as reported on Search Engine Land and from other places across the web.
Yahoo announced an expansion to the BOSS technology named “vertical lens” technology. In short, this allows developers build their own vertical search engines using Yahoo’s search technology, through BOSS. This new technology is replacing Yahoo’s old Search Builder tool. TechCrunch is one of the first to deploy a “vertical lens” on their site. TechCrunch’s solution […]
Day three of the Search Engine Strategies San Jose show is now over. Below is a recap of all the blog posts that I have found covering the day’s sessions, news and activities: