Google just launched a customized search service called Google Co-op (screen shots below). Co-op allows a user to create and launch a search engine with just a few specific websites included. Searches will return results from only that website.
Users have a number of options to customize the search engine: choosing which pages they want to include in their index, how the content should be prioritized, whether others can contribute to the index, and what the search results page will look like.
This isn’t new - Rollyo, Eurekster and Yahoo already have similar products. But Google is also offering, as an option, to bundle the service with Google Adsense ads and share revenue with websites that embed the custom search engine into their site. Only Eurekster currently shares revenue with users. Yahoo’s product, which got a lot of press at launch, has barely been mentioned in the nearly three months since then.
For bloggers, using Google Co-op may be a better choice than the built in search feature. A search engine can be created that searches just a single site, and Google search is generally better than search features included with blog software, and with the addition of Adsense this will generate a separate income stream as well.
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I don’t think the other offering will be able to compete with this new service from Google. The ad revenue sharing is going to make everyone switch.
http://google.com/coop/cse/
Oh god, not another half-assed Google beta.
They should go back to working on their search engine and making it useful again, instead of the utter crap it’s become.
This “search results for ipod” sample page looks like a domain link-spam site. Thankfully, the jerks that make these useless pages won’t have to create the pages themselves anymore.
What would really be useful is a brandable/skinnable intra site search feature that is adless. Atomz used to be king of this arena, but they too now have ads. i would be willing to pay for this.
Looks good so far. I created 3 niche search engines for 3 domains.
However i am yet to try customising the look and feel of my site… i feel Google is not allowing to customise the search box and similar stuff while Yahoo allows the same.
I tested this new service but I prefer Blogbar (blogbar.org). It is easier to install, and prettier
And I like to be able to seek on several search engines at the same time.
google is so smart. i guess they want to collect people’s favorite search habit. I noticed there is an option called “invite people to contribute”. if people would like to contribute the same thing with you, google can get the majority behavior. it should be helpful for google to optimize search engine.
if google wants us to use it for monetizing our website, could not we do the same from adsense for search?
I wrote a review and included the XML files that were used in developing the advanced feature examples on my blog: http://zooie.wordpress.com
Three quick examples on how to brand and embed a co-op search on your own site:
http://vik.singh.googlepages.com/techstuff
http://vik.singh.googlepages.c.....ingsearch2
http://google.com/uds/samples/cse/index.html
I’ve collected some known CSEs here http://wink.com/Google_CSEs.....ollections
Raj, please add your three to this list. Anyone else, If you’ve made one - tag it “google cse” and add it to this list.
Isn’t it just like microsoft live macros ? They launched a service allowing you to create specific searches once you’re logged
Sten
I have just created a simple job search engine to check this out and to me it works well: http://google.com/coop/cse?cx=.....omqe11dgyy
Is this the end of sites like Indeed or Simply Hired? Yes, they have maybe more filters, menus and all that stuff, but still? This is totally free, no server infrastructure needed. And the business model is the same - promote the site to get traffic and make money on Google AdSense.
If you want a job search engine, it is even easier to just combine Indeed, Simply Hired, etc. etc., as I have done with http://www.resultr.com It is much easier than using google coop, although the results are not mixed, but shown according to source.
Upon checking this out, three features stood out:
1) You can exclude sites that you do not want in the results
2) You can easily do so using the Google Marker
3) Anyone can volunteer to help
So we decided to throw up an experiment to encourage everyone to mark spam sites to be excluded from search results.
Working together as a community we may be able to radically improve the quality of the search results (or perhaps just get in a blacklisting war?)
The result is Putch - http://www.putch.com
Adsense for search does the same. Isnt there any way else to make money of a custom search engine rather than all this customization.
No, Google Co-Op has existed for ages now. Google simply launched the Custom Search Feature of it. You’ve even mentioned it in two articles in the past.
http://www.google.co.uk/search.....&meta=
Google Co-Op isn’t new it came out back in May (IIRC); they’ve just changed the main page for it. What’s new today is the “Create your own search engine” part of Google Co-Op.
Great, more ads. Thank god for Adblock.
AdBlock def.comes handy
Cheers,
Dreamchaser
Pretty useful. I just created a Web Tech Blog search so I can easily search for say “calendar web apps” and just query TechCrunch, Mashable, Micro Persuasion, and many other great blogs that are focused only on web apps.
Seems like a simple and powerful way to focus searches to content that is relevant.
here’s the url for the Web Tech Blog search I created:
http://www.google.com/coop/cse.....prbwmqm5nw
I think that Google will keep competition few miles behind. I find this feature very useful mostly when you are precisely looking for something. Search narrowing is just it!!
Interesting…the implications for this are potentially significant. Aside from the additional revenue stream, This coud be very beneficial to public schools and government organizations.
The only scary thing is now Google has a sharper scalpel to measure traffic…
I tried to set up a service this morning, but received a “Bad Request - Your client has issued a malformed or illegal request” error. The message gave no hint of what was wrong with my request.
Not a very auspicious start IMO.
–rj
This is likely not unique to Co-op, but what happens when one of the Sponsored Links displayed is a competitor of yours…?
I was at Search Engine Strategies San Jose in August where a guy from Google was presenting Google co-op (it actually soft-launched about 6 months ago) and it seemed to be the case of a product created without an audience. That conference had several social search sessions with Yahoo (flickr and del.icio.us), eurekster, and others that had big turnouts and everyone seemed very interested. When Google came to talk it really seemed like they didn’t know what they wanted to do with their product, and the audience lost interest and a lot of people left. There is a lot more to Google co-op than the Rollyo-like functionality, but it is very very hard to understand. Even I had difficulty grasping it, and eventually gave up, and building search engines is what I do for a living.
I easily added this to my webpage that is currently my most pofitable check it out here : http://www.bishamon-pallet-jack.com sells 20k in pallet jacks a month! - if that isn’t a hard internet sale I don’t know what is …
I am also going to be using it on a little start-up I’m working on
I think its marvaleous but Also I had to lie! - to get no ads
later - RB
Google Blog has been updated with information about this…
http://googleblog.blogspot.com.....e-has.html
Great to hear that. I was just waiting for google to do something like this.. I think I will build one myself..
Clearly just another way for them to push out ads. Search aggregation is far better…try http://www.srchr.com, a true search aggregator complete with a badge.
Surprised
it took Google so long to do this
This is a great search resource
mattcutts.com/blog/review-custom-search-engine/
here is a good overview by one of Google’s Engineers
I made a Web 2.0 Search Engine:
http://www.google.com/coop/cse.....kfzgid8_jc
The yahoo code is not very good. It takes up too much space.
While reading this article I want to invite users for a discussion in my blog
Can google get Gods mind?
This was one argument in 2004.I want to validate this argument with diverse opionions by comparing the current trends of google like the one which is described in the post above
http://ragusivanmalai.blogspot.....-mind.html
Come on Google users
Not good for Squiddo.
My biggest concern about using Google Coop would be the same concern I have about using any Google service for my business. Google Customer Support is terrible. They cannot resolve the most basic issues given any amount of time. I have gone back and forth with them over a simple AdSense account for months. My clients have tried to get assistance with the purchase of search engine ads for nearly a year. That is their primary income source and they cannot support that! Google may be picking up new investors but that are alienating customers at the same time.
They don’t exactly make it easy to figure out that you can share the proceeds. Interesting…
To be honest, customer support at any rapidly growing business or any business with more than 1 million customers is usually terrible. Customer Support departments are the red-headed stepchild at nearly every business. I purchased a brand new Pontiac this year and two months later Pontiac Customer Support could not and would not help me find a replacement tire. Told me to look in the phone book for tire store!
I just made this site in about 30 mins. They did a good job with this Coop thing. Stand alone search engines.
http://stbartsearch.com
As another example of what you can do, I made this information architecture search engine: http://iasearch.net/
Took about 2 hours (I guess I’m slower than some of the others here!)
hi, gr8 thing, I just create my own search engine
http://www.google.com/coop/cse.....eqmj0nzgei
hi, I think this is nice service, we can use adsense here in search results.
thanks - Ritika
Putch,
I’m not sure how well that’s going to work (excluding spam sites from results). There has to be a limit on the number of domains they let you associate with a CSE. I’m not sure what the limit is for Google but for Windows Live it’s 25 so I wouldn’t expect Google’s limit to be much higher if any. It’s certainly not going to be in the thousands which is what you’d need for this project. Keep in mind that these CSE definitions have to be turned into SQL on the backend so Google (and anyone else) is going to want to limit the size of that SQL.
-Steve
As a means of avoiding the need to type “wikipedia.org” every time I wanted to search for something on Wikipedia, I spent 2 minutes creating http://www.wikp.com .. Enjoy…
I’m a huge Disney fan and just ran across 2 Disney sites that are already using GCSE:
http://www.searchdisney.com/
http://www.thedisneyportal.com/tdp/portal.asp
The 2nd one (Disney Portal) uses a number of so-called Refinements.
Wow! the power of being a search engine master. The SEO power I now could have being number 1 in all my keywords.
Great service
It is great to see Google roll out with new search capabilities!
I just used the CSE to build a custom search engine for heavy metal music ( http://find-metal.com ). Very nice. Only took a couple of hours to set up. Now I’m tweaking the mix of sites to search and refinements.
I have been testing Coop now for 1 wee, with my “SEO Search Engine”:
http://www.seoking.eu/seo-search-engine/
People seem to love it. The Engine has good traffic, and lots of requests. I use it myself and administer it as well as I can, to boost the quality of the SERPs.
http://www.SEOking.eu
If you are interested in publicising your CSE you may want to be an early bird submitter at our CSE links directory at http://www.cselinks.com - your submission will include as long a description of your CSE as you wish together with relevant keyword lists, both of which you will be entitled to edit and keep up to date if you register as an Editor. You can also add new CSEs as you build them. All Editors will also have permission to rate and comment on other CSEs thereby constantly improving the overall quality of our visitors’ experience. The site will officially go live on Thursday.