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It seems as though Google is considering inserting 5-star rating into paid search results, and has begun testing it in selected results. From an example we’ve seen it appears to be drawing through Amazon product ratings, but there is potential for using a wide range of website rankings. What chance of Google showing us Ebay seller ratings, or property reviews for accommodation results?
UPDATE: Google Blog announces seller rating extensions for reviews given in Google Product Search.
Concerns for rating in paid search
This could be a potentially interesting idea from Google, and another step in what appears to be a plan to provide as much information as possible without actually leaving the search results. However, local and map searches drawing through reviews and associated content quite clearly doesn’t work at the moment, with most agencies seeing incredibly odd results and significant amounts of ‘gaming the system’. Until these problems are sorted, would including reviews into paid search ads just further muddy the waters and actually reduce the trust in the rankings?
Tags: Google, Google AdWords, PPC
The other interesting element of this is the continual march towards making “merit” (aka relevance/quality) harder and harder for advertisers to obtain.nnPaid search optimisation becomes more and more like organic optimisation every day. nnGoogle has the ability to force this need for intense optimisation. Yet it still has a business model that will relieve advertisers of the highest possible margin they are willing to hand over to Google.
I think sensible search marketeers realise that with an increasing reliance on quality and reviews the system is going to get harder and harder to play, and as such an all-encompassing internet marketing strategy is often a better option than one of short-term optimisation or PPC bursts.
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