Comments on: Google moving to all paid Google Product Search listings

By: FTC

FTC — Sun, 22 Jul 2012 08:59:02 +0000

Google has moved to “advertisers only” as well for most commercial searches. Virtually everyone of them is an advertiser, something also reflected in the 42% ad-click growth.

By: hedonist666

hedonist666 — Fri, 13 Jul 2012 10:13:03 +0000

I think this is a terrible idea. Not only does it affect me personally as a small online retailer with a very low advertising budget, but it goes against the product search as being a search engine. How long before they roll out a new service where you have to pay to get in the first 10 pages or so of regular search results? It’s stupid. I use google product search a lot myself when I’m planning to buy something and the main advantage has always been that a lot of retailers are featured in it. Making it paid will most certainly reduce the number of products being displayed.

By: timtamtoboot

timtamtoboot — Fri, 15 Jun 2012 21:53:03 +0000

Might be worthwhile checking out sell anywhere links which allow adding products to a shopping cart directly out of Google’s natural search results. Do a search for ‘rough orange flakes’ to see an example. Or test a sell anywhere link such as http://iPod.santu.com to add a sample product right here to a checkout. Most people use the Google natural search anyway.

By: ano nym

ano nym — Thu, 14 Jun 2012 04:51:19 +0000

Shameful! We are a small online business, trying every day to get ORGANIC search results with Google with hard work. All the fairness out the window Google? Thank you! Only the money counts!

By: Jerry Ji

Jerry Ji — Wed, 13 Jun 2012 00:16:06 +0000

For everyone who is looking for a truly open, social, and real-time channel to search products or promote products, take a look at this startup http://bizspeaking.com/

By: denschaal

denschaal — Sat, 02 Jun 2012 15:04:11 +0000

Google may list ads as sponsored, but it is doing so in a very misleading way in Google Hotel Finder. As I wrote http://www.tnooz.com/2012/06/01/news/google-hotel-finder-ota-advertisers-commandeer-hotel-pages/ Google is labeling hotel listings as “Ads,” but the only practical booking links in bold red letters largely are from online travel agencies. Very misleading because at first glance these look like they are ads from the hotels. The hotel industry hasn’t yet woken up to this latest Google experiment, but I think the hotel industry will be very angry, to say the least. Google also isn’t very transparent about the total cost of booking the room. So much for transparency.

By: FPSWin

FPSWin — Sat, 02 Jun 2012 06:34:46 +0000

Google will be making huge revenue due to this drastic change and retailers will have to pay millions to fill in the sales gaps. There are also upside to it, as many retailers would list free products, making search results messy. Now that they will have to pay, the search results would be more refined.

By: Mike Speranza

Mike Speranza — Fri, 01 Jun 2012 16:13:51 +0000

So the question is … will they use a freemium business model which they do quite successfully with other services. Giving something for free, just to charge for the same service later just alienates customers. But then again, changes to the privacy rules have the same effect.
I suppose Google got to the point where it needs to choose who it wants to alienate: its customers or its shareholders.

By: threetwelvedavid

threetwelvedavid — Fri, 01 Jun 2012 03:15:16 +0000

Let’s see, where have I been hearing so much lately about how paid links are spammy and low-quality? Hmmm.

By: threetwelvedavid

threetwelvedavid — Fri, 01 Jun 2012 03:13:28 +0000

Now let’s see, where have we heard that paid links are low-quality? Hmmm…