 Meta
search engines have been around for years now, but
ever since the new kid on the block named Google
took over, meta search all but disappeared. Today
meta is making a comeback by including the big three
(Google, Yahoo & MSN). Stephen Scarr
of Info.com
will share how meta has come of age and why it is
different now than it used to be.
Recorded Live: August 25, 2006
Watch out Google, Meta
Search Engines Are Coming of Age!
Meta search, once all the rage is now back in
fashion and stronger than ever. Find out what
meta search is and how you can use it to your
advantage.
How does a Meta Search
Engine Work?
Technology and the quality of data on the Internet
have both contributed to bringing meta search
alive. Find out how these work together to bring
what some consider to be the best search experience
today.
How Does Meta Search Compare
to Vertical Search?
Although meta search and vertical are two very
different things, the meta search engines of today
are incorporating vertical search topics and providing
information from authority sites.
Summary
Can Meta Search Engines outdo Google and provide
superior search results? In the August 25th 2006
edition of the e marketing talk show, Steven Scarr,
CEO of Info.com, enlightened Cindy Turrietta,
Todd Sarouhan and all the devoted listeners of
emarketingtalkshow about Meta search engines:
What Meta search engines are, how they work and
a comparison of meta search and vertical search.
Steven Scarr delighted listeners with his in depth
knowledge and his charming British accent.
What is a Meta Search Engine and how does
it work?
In the first segment Steven defined a Meta Search
as being an aggregation of search results from
a number of search engines such as Google, Yahoo,
Ask Jeeves. He said that it aggregates results,
deletes duplications and then puts them in one
list. An astounding feat especially when it’s
the users that ultimately benefit!
Steven explained that the Meta search engine
has an arrangement and agreement with search engines
and, as a result of this the users have access
to the search feeds. The meta search engine pulls
the data required by the users, gets rid of duplications
and then ranks different sites according to the
average ranking e.g. if one site ranks very high
on Google and very low on some other search engine
e.g. Yahoo, it may appear in the middle of the
list displayed by the meta search engine. So in
order for a site to be ranked number one, it must
rank number one on all engines.
Are All Meta Search Engines The Same?
Steven informed listeners that although there
are a number of Meta search engines, most of them
don’t pull search results from all the three
major search engines; Google, Yahoo and Microsoft.
This is because some only have relationships with
Google, and others only with Yahoo or Microsoft,
but not all three. Info.com, on the other hand,
pulls search results not only from Google and
Yahoo but also from Ask Jeeves, Microsoft, Look
Smart, About and a whole plethora of other pay-per-click
directories.
Apart from this, when users search on Info.com
the engine delivers the free results on the left
and the paid listings on the right. On top of
the free results there is a little button which
reads “view results individually’.
When the user clicks on this button it merges
together the free results with the paid results
for Meta search. Then the user can click on the
individual tabs for Google, Yahoo, Ask Jeeves
and Microsoft. Info.com delivers the results highlighted
in yellow, displaying what is unique to that particular
search engine and clearly showing to the users
what they are missing when they use a standalone
search engine.
Info.com is also a popular site for college students
because it provides reference information from
the deep web or invisible web i.e. stuff that
is not available to conventional crawlers either
because it is not crawling it or it is proprietary.
In the reference vertical, Info.com provides propriety
information from:
- magazines
- encyclopedias
- atlases
- almanacs etc.
Meta search benefits users because it is delivering
results from all the engines and taking out the
duplications. Also, it provides users with a data
base which is 50% bigger and fresher and users
end up benefiting from not only Google’s
technology, but also from that of Yahoo, Microsoft,
Ask Jeeves etc.
How Does Meta Search Compare to Vertical Search?
Steven made a startling revelation stating that
“The overlap of the search engines is
surprisingly less than 3%” so 97% of
the results users see on Google will not be seen
on Yahoo. There is a lot of disparity in these
statistics; hence, if users stick to using just
one standalone search engine, they will be missing
out on a great deal of relevant information. That’s
how Meta search gives users access to a lot more
information.
Apart from this, Steven revealed that only 6.99
% of US internet traffic is made up from search
using Google, Yahoo and Microsoft. This figure
shows that there is a lot of traffic coming from
the verticals i.e. the specific niche categories
such as:
- travel
- health
- jobs
- reference
- and other sources.
Info.com took the view that as a search platform
it would be best to look at the other verticals
too. Info.com spends a lot of time and effort
in assessing who they think is best in a given
category, e.g. for travel with Cayak.com, for
shopping with Shopping.com, for reference with
Answers.com and for health with Healthline.com.
As a result, users no longer need to go to different
destinations to get specific information. Meta
search engines provide all this specific information
from each vertical under one umbrella. With a
tab for each vertical near the top of the homepage,
users can go directly to each vertical by typing
in for example, Shopping.Info.com. If users go
to web search Info.com provides links which give
hints as to other alternative suggested search
terms. Apart from this, users can get Meta search
results from the address bar by typing, for example
for info on Costa Rica, Info.com/costa rica. Users
should remember to put spaces between the words
e.g. between “Costa” and “Rica”
and type names normally.
The advantage of specific verticals that are
not related to broad search is that the user has
the benefit of navigational tools that are able
to focus far more heavily on the user. For example,
if a user goes to Google or Yahoo and puts in
“accountant jobs”, the user just gets
a bunch of ads from the likes of Monster, Hotjobs,
Yahoo and classified ads. On the other hand, if
the user goes to Info.com and clicks on the “job”
tab, and puts in accountant, and then the zip
code, followed by city and then narrows his/her
search down further by specifying what sort of
accountancy jobs etc the meta search engine will
help the user “cut to the chase” much
sooner.
Meta Search is making a come back. Now that most
people have broadband, the results of Meta search
engines are aggregated and the duplicates are
removed much faster than before. Steven says,
“in effect users are literally pulling
out the results from different engines in real
time because Info.com does not index results,
it just pulls the feeds.”
Info.com has an edge over Google and Yahoo because
these standalone search engines tend to take a
propriety position e.g. Google won’t do
a deal with Yahoo and Yahoo won’t do a deal
with eBay. As an independent platform, Info.com
integrates with the search engine technology providers
and gives users a cross border offering that typically
one provider wouldn’t offer. In addition,
Info.com is actually integrating the very best
and leaves out the rest.
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