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Friday, October 28, 2005

"Google's Flight Search Takes Off"

Google released yet another search feature to their very popular and beloved search engine and this time it's geared towards airline travelers. That's right... airline travelers.

Google's new search function will allow its users to quickly access airline flight information when they type in two different cities, or airport codes, into the Google search box. Doing so will bring up two additional boxes for entering departing and returning flight dates.

In addition to that, Google is also listing links to the travel websites Expedia, Hotwire, and Orbitz. By clicking through on any one of those links, users will be directed to flight options for their selected itineraries on that site.

I spent a little bit of time this morning messing around with this new search feature and found it to be very user-friendly and easily accessible. I simply typed "Chicago to New York City" into the Google Search box and the new flight option came up, among the other Google listings. You can check out my search by clicking here: Chicago to New York City.

Google's move to release this search function comes one day after Yahoo! debuted its new Trip Planner (currently in BETA), which allows people to create, share and print personalized trip itineraries. This goes to show that Google will not be "Trumped" so easy, especially by Yahoo!, in their efforts to create the best search engine on the Internet.

 posted by Karl Ribas
Friday, October 28, 2005
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Friday, October 21, 2005

Yahoo! Enters Bidding War For AOL

A month ago, September 23rd to be exact, I wrote an entry regarding AOL and how Microsoft and Google were competing (most likely bidding) against one another in their attempts to partner-up with the popular web portal. Now, this week, Yahoo! has reportedly left the sidelines and entered itself in this ongoing struggle for a piece of American Online.

That's right, Yahoo! is in talks with AOL, a unit of Time Warner, and is looking to attain AOL's millions of search and portal users, not to mention the near $400 million in ad revenue that currently goes Google's way. In fact, I bet that the only reason why Yahoo! is now even interested in AOL is to ensure that the "kool-aid" that is generated from AOL's / Google's paid-search agreement does not go back into Google's refrigerator... or Microsoft's for that matter.

Time Warner has yet to comment on whether or not they have received offers from Internet search giants Google, MSN, or Yahoo! or if they are even interesting in partnering up or potentially selling AOL. It seems for Yahoo!, Google and Microsoft, a bid for AOL is merely a defensive move against the others.

One thing is for sure and that is if Yahoo! is in the running, the stakes could get high. In general, when you've got multiple players going after a property, like anything, you get increased competition and companies tend to bid higher. Well when we're talking Yahoo!, Google, and especially MSN, who as we all know is a division of Microsoft and has seemingly bottomless pockets, we're talking a huge increase in competition and bids.

 posted by Karl Ribas
Friday, October 21, 2005
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Friday, October 14, 2005

Yahoo! Dabbles In Blog Search

Do any of you remember my posting about a month ago regarding Google's new blog search tool? Well guess what? Yahoo!, one of Google's primary competitors, has made the next stride in this market by revamping its basic news search tool to grab material from the millions of blogs out there, in addition to just the regular headlines from 6,500 newspapers and magazines.

Yahoo! launched a test version of the new tool on Monday, saying it aims to give consumers a more complete view of the news. Obviously this addition will increase the consumer's ability to find events that matter to them, from major news stories, citizen reporting, commentary and pictures that might not be covered by the mainstream media... and that in itself creates a more user focused experience.

The new search feature separates blog headlines from other headlines, displaying them in different columns. By clicking on "all blog results," users can find photos related to their search from Flickr, Yahoo!'s photo sharing service. They may also find relevant material from websites they've marked as favorites via user-generated tagging, which again is a plus in the user-ability department.

It's quite obvious that Yahoo! and Google are facing off in the blog arena, as they do with everything else related to search. Such competition is a great thing because it not only makes the top dogs reconfigure and revive old tools but it also breeds the development of new tools for finding the content that we are wanting. I give Yahoo! and their new blog search feature TWO thumbs up!

 posted by Karl Ribas
Friday, October 14, 2005
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Friday, October 07, 2005

Yahoo! Acquires Upcoming.org

This past week, Yahoo! publicly acknowledged that they have acquired Upcoming.org, a social events calendar website, in an effort to expand on its local-content offerings.

Upcoming.org, which will now operate as a Yahoo! company, is a free website that lets people manage their social calendars and share information about upcoming events like local concerts and festivals. Users can also comment on events others have attended and can include a continuously updated listing of Upcoming.org events on their own websites.

Yahoo! recently revised its local search program back in August, adding such features as user-reviews and interactive maps. Now, with this acquisition, the company will have access to tons of local content and will no doubt use it to enhance their search capabilities and features even further.

For those of you unfamiliar with what has been going on in the local search industry, local search is now being thought of as a very profitable growth area for advertising. More and more people are booting up their PC or turning on a cell phone to find local services or to book local events. Because of this, search providers such as Yahoo!, Google, and American Online (AOL), are now banking on the draw for small and medium-size businesses to advertise when people are most interested.

Search engines such as those listed above have been doing their best to stay on top of the local search industry by finding different ways to locate and provide local search content, services, and tools... and why shouldn't they, the local search market is expected to attract somewhere in the neighborhood of $4 Billion in revenue within the next five years.

If you're a search engine marketer or if you operate an online business than I would highly suggest that you start taking advantage of the numerous local-advertising outlets that these "Search Giants" have made available. Local is where to be!

 posted by Karl Ribas
Friday, October 07, 2005
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