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How will Google Instant Preview affect your marketing? (It'll be an Adwords feature soon too...)

by Jack Duncan
7 replies
Hello Warriors,
I'd noticed Google Instant Preview "magnifying glasses" showing up in the SERPS for the last few weeks...on and off.

Looks like they are finally making it official and rolling it out.

A couple things that I'm still not sure about:

1. Do the instant previews show up in Google Analytics as a Pageview, Bounce, or what?


2. At the moment, it doesn't look like it properly supports a embedded video preview...so it makes the preview page look quite ugly...not sure how that will affect someone's perception of your page if you have a video above the fold.

If you're site was developed in Flash, Ouch!

Check out this screenshot of a flash site to see the problem:
http://twitpic.com/2zik6g



3. Will Google be using this new data as a "voting system" to "improve" their relevancy (A preview + click = + or a preview - click = -)



4. It seems they are also testing the functionality of actually highlighting and scrolling the page and viewing the contents, without actually ever visiting the page. This would be a big change over the News Preview pages, where in order to interact with the content, you had to be taken directly to the page...not sure how this will affect (help or hurt).


5. These aren't really "Instant Previews"...unless the word "Instant" is referring to the time it takes for Google to serve the preview. Google is storing the preview page (it's not created in "real time")...so it's not an exact image of the current page...and not sure how often they will "re-image" a page.


There doesn't seem to be too much by way of explanation from a Webmaster/Marketing standpoint.

Your thoughts?

All the best,
Jack Duncan





Edit: It appears that Google Instant Preview doesn't support Flash...which is what is causing the Video pages to show incorrectly.

Source: Google Instant Preview: What it means for site design | memeburn


Edit: Google has said they will also be adding this feature to Google Adwords as well...just not sure how soon. (Maybe they will use the Organic results feedback to improve the Adwords ad version?)

It'll be very interesting to see how Google Instant Preview will factor into their Adwords Quality Score.

Source: Google Launches Instant Previews





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#affect #google #google instant #google instant preview #google preview #google seo #instant #instant preview #marketing #preview
  • Profile picture of the author Quentin
    For google users users I think it will be great. No more multiple tabs to go through to weed out the junky sites.

    From a marketing point of view I also like it as people may now choose my well laid out sites from the other stuff. LOL

    Quentin
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    • Profile picture of the author Jack Duncan
      Quentin,
      That is definitely the reason they rolled this out.

      I'm sure their #1 target is the "made for adsense" and "splog" sites.

      I think this could actually help those who have a single page salesletter with a strong call to action headline...because it shows up quite well in the preview.

      However, I'm a bit more concerned to the problem that is being caused as Google comes up with more ways to "use your content" to generate their ad revenue.

      Especially if they start allowing users to essentially browse and read your content without actually delivering them to your page.

      It's still a bit early to speculate on what the final features of this will be though.

      Best,
      Jack
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  • Profile picture of the author KenThompson
    I'm sure their #1 target is the "made for adsense" and "splog" sites.
    Does the avg surfer know what an MFA or splog looks like? Or are you
    saying it's for their benefit, only, so their human reviewers can spot them
    more easily? lol


    I would imagine that they will factor in how many previews a site gets. I
    tend to doubt they'll provide any useful information about it for marketers.

    I also doubt they'll integrate page previews into analytics. Obviously I have
    no scientific basis for either statement. Just based on my collective impressions
    of them.

    An interesting thought is how useful page previews will be for people who can't
    see very well due to either problems or age. I don't have a problem seeing the
    preview, but I cannot read it very well.

    Plus, for me it's an added step. You know, I don't care if I click on a site, don't
    like it for whatever reason and then leave. So a person previews the site, decides
    to visit and they can very well not find what they're looking for and leave.

    I truly do not see a lot of value of the page preview. But that's just me and
    maybe a lot of other people may like it.

    Honestly, sometimes I think things are done just because they can. It's like,
    "Hey this is cool - let's try it. What good is it? I don't know, maybe they'll like
    it."

    Too early to tell about anything, Jack.


    Ken
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  • Profile picture of the author Jack Duncan
    Ken,
    Good points.

    I'm most interested to see how Google Previews show up/don't show up in Google Analytics.

    Are they counted as a pageview or not?

    I'm going to run some tests today on this and see what Google Analytics reports back.


    Cheers,
    Jack
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    • Profile picture of the author jan roos
      I'm excited for the change. My sites looks good in the preview and I think I'll get more clicks.

      Cheers
      Signature

      I'll teach you how to make money like a Mamba.

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      • Profile picture of the author Jack Duncan
        Jan,
        It will definitely be interesting to see how it all works out.

        I'm wondering how long it will be before somebody develops a script that serves a "Google Instant Preview" version of the page when it detects the "preview bot"...the same thing that is being done to serve different versions based on phone vs. computer surfers...

        It could get quite interesting to see what solutions crop up in Web design now.

        Best,
        Jack
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  • Profile picture of the author JonAlfredsson
    Thanks for posting. I noticed this as well as I saw small box after moving my mouse pointer. I agree that this can work for the benefit of both marketers and searchers. Searchers can easily see the website is offering while marketers can improve their design to make it more marketable online.

    However, I’m also thinking whether this can also affect a site’s traffic. Since searchers can now view a website through these preview boxes, it’s also possible or them to leave the other websites that don’t appeal to them. Just an opinion. We still need to see how this can really affect IM in the process.
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