Even though search engine giant Google is coming out with its new algorithm after the holidays, it doesn’t stop them from helping users by optimizing their search engine results page. Google currently has three innovative ideas in the works that is going to revolutionize search. Marissa Mayer, Google’s vice-president of search products and user experience, gives details in an interview with UK Telegraph about the new three functions: Translated search, Social Search and Personalization, and Intuitive Search.
Although information may have been inaccessible due to language differences, Google is developing a tool to help overcome that barrier. Mayer described the translated search function as a software that would not only present the results in the user’s native language, but also translate the entire page if the user clicked through one of the links. This tool is intended to help open up and expand our horizons by providing users with a translated page that they could read/understand with ease.
To access Translated Search, click on “Show Options” and select “Translated search.”
Social Search and Personalization
Personalization is the key idea behind this tool, says Mayer. Google is trying to make search results as accurate as possible, but also provide an individual experience. Facebook has recently allowed indexing with Google, meaning people are able to see updates and information if the users’ privacy settings are ‘public’. Twitter has also recently been incorporated in search results engine pages (SERPs) as mentioned in yesterday’s post. Mayer believes that it would be ideal to be able to search for your friend’s updates. This personalization also crosses Google’s recent announcement of enabled web history regardless if you are signed in or not. Although this may bring up concerns about privacy, Mayer explained that people can easily opt out and that cookies merely contain information, not the users’ identity.
Personalization is the key idea behind this tool, says Mayer. Google is trying to make search results as accurate as possible, but also provide an individual experience. Facebook has recently allowed indexing with Google, meaning people are able to see updates and information if the users’ privacy settings are ‘public’. Twitter has also recently been incorporated in search results engine pages (SERPs) as mentioned in yesterday’s post. Mayer believes that it would be ideal to be able to search for your friend’s updates. This personalization also crosses Google’s recent announcement of enabled web history regardless if you are signed in or not. Although this may bring up concerns about privacy, Mayer explained that people can easily opt out and that cookies merely contain information, not the users’ identity.
To access real-time search, select “Show options” and click on “Updates.”
Intuitive Search
Once again, Google is going above and beyond and changing search as we know it. Although it sounds quite far-fetched, Google’s intuitive search, which is aimed at determining and suggesting what the user is looking for before they even begin to search. Mayer explained that we already have information readily available on our computer via side wiki or browser (i.e. Google Chrome).
Mayer believes that her and her team are close to achieving what she calls ‘omnivorous’ search, which is taking the user’s context of where they are, what they are reading, and so forth. Google is going to determine what you want, before you even want it.
Written by Chris C.