Google Suggest

Google Suggest not all it seems

by Rupert Sharp
of http://www.oyster-web.co.uk

Last updated: 9 Oct 2007

The Google Labs app 'Google Suggest' has caught the attention of the office recently. For those who haven't heard of it before; Google Suggest is a drop-down list that appears under your search box entry as you type and suggests possible keyphrases that it thinks you might be looking for; for example typing 'hello' will bring a list underneath the box with phrases such as 'hello kitty' etc. Although you might presume this would bring you the most relevant keyphrases that are searched for; it doesn’t. We suspect that it focuses on anchor text rather than most searched terms, and to prove this we searched 'click here' in Google Suggest and as expected we got a list including 'click here to activate your account' 'click here to find out more' and so on, why in the name of the great market on the wire anyone would ever search for 'click here' I do not know but one thing is for certain is that it is no replacement for good ol' overture for related search. Keep smart.