By on May 7, 2008

Google Adds Features to Custom Search Engines

8



Google has announced enhanced features for custom search engines: the integration of sitemaps and AdSense for Search.

The new features will improve search results in a Google custom search engine for your site if you utilize sitemaps:

Custom Search is built on top of the Google index. This means that all pages that are available on Google.com are also available to your search engine. We’re now maintaining a CSE-specific index in addition to the Google.com index for enhancing the performance of search on your site. If you submit a Sitemap, it’s likely that we will crawl those pages and include them in the additional index we build.

Additionally, AdSense for Search will now be powered by Google Custom Search. As part of this integration, Google says that “you can take advantage of CSE’s most popular features without having to leave your AdSense account.” If you’re new to Google CSE, features of the integration include:

  • Site Search
  • Improved indexing of your pages
  • Vertical search
  • Tuning search results and ads with keywords
  • Selecting ad location
  • Quick and easy updates

Google explains the changes further in a short video:

Now, I know what you’re thinking—and so does Matt Cutts. He’s already posted this caveat on his blog:

this is not a backdoor way to get more pages in Google’s index or to improve your search ranking. The official blog post mentions that. But I think this is a win for webmasters all around. If you use AdSense for search, the product is now better and more tweakable. And if you provide a sitemap, your custom search can get much better as those urls are incorporated into a CSE-specific index.

One drawback: right now it looks as though existing CSE users may have to recreate their custom search engines in AdSense to take advantage of the new AdSense for Search integration. But other than that (or despite it), is this more likely to make you want to jump on board?


Similar Stories in: Display, Search News | Forward: Email This Post

Similar posts you may like...

8 comments on “Google Adds Features to Custom Search Engines”

  1. aLien Says:

    May 7th, 2008 at 11:33 pm

    Are this to boost google adword ?

    aLien’s last blog post..aLien bake web site with CMS

  2. Ralph Says:

    May 8th, 2008 at 5:02 am

    These new additions will definitely help adsense users.

  3. seo dude Says:

    May 8th, 2008 at 8:31 am

    This is great news. I stopped using Adsense for search because of a number of issues caused by the lack of customization.

    seo dude’s last blog post..April contest winners

  4. Adel Shehadeh Says:

    May 8th, 2008 at 10:18 am

    It’s a great seamless integration of Google Custom Search Engine ( Google CSE) product within Adsense.

    Adel Shehadeh’s last blog post..I am Going To Space in 2009

  5. Tiffany Says:

    May 9th, 2008 at 12:38 am

    Google’s spirit of improvement definitely give lot of benefits for the user.

  6. Brianne Keating Says:

    May 9th, 2008 at 9:17 am

    Actually, although Google says this does not improve organic hits for Adwords users, it does. Adwords users will have a precedence in organic placement. How do I know? I’ve tested it multiple times. Go ahead and test for yourself. I’ve launched multiple Adwords campaigns. The moment I do, my organic hits skyrocket. The day I stop those campaigns, my organic hits plummet again. I encourage you to try for yourself. A little scary how Google organic placements are no longer truly free.

  7. Paul Kevan Says:

    May 12th, 2008 at 12:03 pm

    I think its great news that google continues to improve its services, I have had my website [link removed] running for just over three months and its started to get ranked already,Adwords has been of a great help to give me a jump start.

  8. Ruthrbns Says:

    May 18th, 2008 at 5:51 am

    Good Post! The list of Google Custom search features good. The google adsense program provides this online business by google.