Understanding Google My Business & Local Search
Some of the More Bizarre Local Carousel Results from Google
Google has always been a somewhat “agnostic” resource for local results returning the good with the bad. But when combined with a total waste of good time and Twitter it can produce some interesting results.
Dan Lieibson noted some “unusual” results that Andrew Shotland and I could not resist pursuing to their (ill)logical conclusion.
With their help we were able to surface some carousels that seem to take the cake for tasteless.
Please do not shoot the messenger.
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Comments
7 Comments
Looks like the Google Bomb is getting a carousel ride.
A pity the carousel wasn’t around 2 years ago, when I did my “Google Places Freak Show” post…
You’d think that some of this stuff would have been QA tested out before going live…
I don’t understand that why Google introduce this feature over search engine? I don’t think so there is a advantage for user while using this feature and now you showed in your post. People are facing QA problem as well.
That last one got me thinking. Did Google really understand the search? So, I did a quick test searching for “bad Mexican restaurants in Tampa” and then “good Mexican restaurants in Tampa”. The carousel results were nearly identical. It seems Google doesn’t understand or care about the modifier, they only see “Mexican restaurants in Tampa”.
The results aren’t tasteless, they are just lists of restaurants.
Taken in context with the queries, they might strike an observer as tasteless, but that is the fault of the query, not the result.
@Jim
Google decides when and where to show the carousel (and any other results). While an organic search result is clearly the result of any given input, this is a combination of my input and Google’s very visual output. Do a search on Escort Service Las Vegas to see what I mean.
Google effectively makes editorial decisions ALL the time. To contend that they don’t is naive and to note that all results are a function of the searcher implies that Google is free from any editorial bias. It just is not the case.
While I agree that my searches were bizarre, I also will stand by my contention that Google perhaps should not be showing carousels on these sorts of results.
This reminds me of when we discovered our client ranked for NYC Dick. I am still afraid to show him his dashboard because it shows up as one of his most searched queries lol.
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