Today, some of you may have noticed that in conjunction with their organic listings, Google has implemented social ranking tools. Now users have the power to promote, remove, comment or add a link to a page that they feel is more relevant for a particular search term. This is similar to the social networking site, Digg where the first page results are based on the thumbs up or down votes cast by members. The difference with the SearchWiki is that your vote is specific to your own secured user experience.
Doing a little research, I’ve found that while people can see the innate good in having this capability, many are skeptical and asking some of the same questions that I have…How long before this gesture to improve personalization will start to impact the overall natural listings and allow us to affect a site’s ranking based on this voting system? If this becomes the case, then how do we keep Pandora’s Box from opening and giving companies a new space and opportunity to unethically push competitors further down in the search results? If this is really about personalization of search, then why are comments made public? What is the real motivation behind this social engagement? Will paid search be impacted at all?
As it stands today, your vote only counts to you. So, the majority of the decisions that you make about your Google search experience are kept nice and safely tucked behind your login information. To the everyday Google user this may seem to streamline their virtual life, but for those of us in the business it raises eyebrows and red flags. It seems all good on the surface, but if the foreseeable changes that the above questions have brought to life come into fruition, this new property may discombobulate the entire search industry.
For now, I’m not committing to an opinion of good or bad. I’m searching for understanding by way of alternate perspectives. So, if by chance you have one, please share.
If you’d like to read more about the new SearchWiki, here are a few resources:
