Google Best Guess
Earlier this week* I saw a new addition to Googles SERP’s in the form of “Best Guess”.
When conducting a search where there is ambiguity in the results, it would appear that Google is best guessing the result. It appears to be doing so based on citations and references from high authority websites that are trusted within its index (e.g. Wikipedia, Yahoo etc).
Google Best Guess: Bury County
Overall, this appears to work fine, but every so often it does appear to slip up:
Google Best Guess: Newcastle Upon Tyne Which County
Whether this is the fault of Google or the “authority” websites that it references is up for debate, but the last time I checked Newcastle upon Tyne was not in Northumberland but in fact in Tyne & Wear.
What does this mean for users of the search engine? It’s a further addition to the solutions that are offered by Google when users are searching for an answer; other examples include:
Google: What Time Is It In New York
Google: Exchange Rate GBP to Euro
Google: Suicide
More importantly, what does this mean for SEO’s that are targeting ambiguous keyphrases? That remains to be seen.
* Thanks to Peter Stranney from Mediaworks for introducing me to this.
About the Author
Kev Strong
Kev Strong is an online marketing consultant at Newcastle Upon Tyne based digital marketing agency, Mediaworks. A lover of all things search and an ex-web developer, Kev Strong (a.k.a Goosh) is a specialist in advanced search engine optimisation.
Carly (11 years ago)
My boyfriend is in Moscow at the moment and told me last week that he typed ‘what time is it in Moscow’ into Google to find out if the clocks should have gone forward like the UK. He’s also been getting the exchange rate this way too – I’ll have to show him these & ask he was doing it this way… or determine that when he said he ‘checked google’ he meant he clicked through…?
Richard Carter (11 years ago)
Very cool, I’m having a play with it now!