The way people search for and discuss information on the web is changing. No one can deny that social networking is a highly valuable source of new information and links to it; via tweeting, friends on Facebook, social network plug-ins and also apps to name but a few. Google, while not in any respect shaking in its boots at the threat to some of its search traffic, has indeed meandering onto the path with the release of Buzz. The emphasis on the increasing importance of Discussion is further displayed by the new Google SERP (search engines results page) format as I wrote about yesterday.
In the left hand search tools panel which drops down to show the filters including: Images, Videos, Shopping and Books. What is most interesting is the ability to filter by blogs and discussions. And not only this, it is now possible to break these results down by time. So you can view Discussion and Blog results for a particular subject in the past year, month, week, 24 hours or hour. Real-time Jack Bauer would be proud of. You can even refine your Discussion search by length, sites with images and date.
With these filters making some uncharted depths of search results a little bit riper for the picking, it is all the more important for those looking to keep their page, business or opinions exposed to work within the fields of live discussion. Social media, blogs and Q&As have a new channel of exposure, and those in the know should take heed of the opportunities this brings.
Yahoo whose Yahoo Answers Q&A recently served its 1 Billionth answer reported that:
“From the small beginnings when we received our first answer from the public back in December 2005 we have now become the largest and most popular global Q&A site on the internet, available in 9 languages across 21 countries.”
“The volume of contributions we receive from the Answers community on a daily basis is mindboggling. Yahoo! Answers currently receives:
823,966 questions and answers per day…
that works out to 34,331 per hour or 572 per minute
which is 10 questions and answers posted EVERY second!”
Hilary Clinton once asked, “Based on your own family’s experience, what do you think we should do to improve health care in America?” This prompted over 38,000 answers.
This much traffic responding to a Q&A is a clear indication of the importance of Discussion within search results and a justification for its increasingly important position within Google’s updated SERP. As Bob Hoskins once said, ‘It’s good to talk.’
- Search The Human Body With Google Body Browser - December 21, 2010
- Has This Site Been Hacked? - December 20, 2010
- How Do Twitter & Facebook’s 2010 Trends Compare With Google’s? - December 14, 2010
- Google Zeitgeist 2010: What Have You Been Searching For Planet Earth? - December 10, 2010
- Google Chrome Gets Store And Talks Chrome OS - December 8, 2010
- Google Issues Security Email For Website Optimiser - December 7, 2010
- Google Launches AdWords Global Market Finder - December 7, 2010
- New Android Phone Promises A Pure Experience - December 7, 2010
- Google AdWords Wants Your Products! - December 3, 2010
- Know How Mobile Internet Affects Your Website? Google Analytics does… - December 2, 2010
You may also be interested in:
- Google Discussion Results Forums and Q&A pages can come in pretty handy when you have a small problem that you can't seem to...
- The Death Of Yahoo! The merger of Microsoft Bing and Yahoo heralds a sad day in search engine history... ...
- Has This Site Been Hacked? Just check your Google search results page. Google provides a new notification to let you know when someone's been compromised...
- Yahoo and Facebook Integration Reaches Milestone Yahoo integrates Facebook into more of its services. Who will benefit more?...
- Ramsay’s Web Wire – Issue #28: For Yahoo the Bell Tolls This week Bing possesses Yahoo and Google's too busy to perform an exorcism. ...
Cozy Digital is an