Google Taking More Control????

[Kurt Henninger]

Has anyone else seen Google's new feature on Natural Search, the "ranking arrow". On each natural search item, there is a feature to interactively "vote" on whether you think a search feature should be moved up or down.

What does everyone think of this new interactive feature with Google?

[rhwebs]

I have never seen that feature. Where exactly does it show up? Is it on the google home page? Or the toolbar? I don't see it in either of those places.

[torka]

It's part of their SearchWiki initiative. You have to be logged in to a Google Account in order to see the up and down arrows.

The votes will only affect your own search results, although any notes you might choose to add will potentially be visible to other searchers.

Eventually, if they gather enough data points, it's possible they might use the voting data in general search in some way, but that's sheer speculation at this point. According to Google, "The changes you make only affect your own searches." (Read the Official Google Blog entry I linked to above for more information. There's a quick and informative video there that walks you through the features.)

It might be a good idea to periodically log in to your Google Account and check the SearchWiki notes associated with important target phrases for your company site just to see what customers might be saying about you (and to make sure competitors aren't sneaking in and trying to badmouth you behind your back).

--Torka

[rhwebs]

Thanks. I did a search on "google search wiki" and found this useful video by a google engineer describing the search wiki.

[acwebguru]

Ok, i have read the entire blog of Goolge's webmaster and even watched the video. But I want to know if it is going to affect the onging SEO techniques some how. Or is Google gearing up to give more importance to user's feedback? Should we have to prepare ourselves for braving more complicated SEO techniques?

[SashaMike]

Ok, i have read the entire blog of Goolge's webmaster and even watched the video. But I want to know if it is going to affect the onging SEO techniques some how. Or is Google gearing up to give more importance to user's feedback? Should we have to prepare ourselves for braving more complicated SEO techniques?

I don't think so. This means Google search engine becomes more like a social interactive website like digg, reddit or stumble. Competitors or simple bad boys working on arrows to bring results up and down, eventually Google jumping in to get the results sorted, KILLING the entire concept of Algorithm based search results (without bias).

Thank you

[acwebguru]

I am keeping my finger crossed because I fear that Google is going to give more importance to users feedback in near future and therefore a dramatic change in the ranking report might emerge in near future which means more competition and more challenges for the seo workers.

[Tom Lindstrom]

The more links you can build to your site the better, there is not so much more we can do about it.

[Kurt Henninger]

Agreed about what Google is currently doing with this information. Only should pertain to your personal search results......but....guaranteed they are keeping close track of the results......you never know if it might affect your relevancy score of your site in the future.

[acwebguru]

Originally Posted by Tom Lindstrom

The more links you can build to your site the better, there is not so much more we can do about it.

I think that it is not going to be so simple as it appears to you. Just wait and see. Some radical change is coming within few months.