Section 7.2. Google s Parts

7.2. Google's Parts

Google's parts can, roughly speaking, be divided into the following categories:

Services

These let people do something (for example, search the Web or create a blog).

Tools

Software to make chores easier (for example, the Google Toolbar or the Picasa image software).

Developer tools

Programs aimed at software developers, such as the AdWords API.

Advertising solutions

Programs such as AdSense and AdWords.

Business solutions

Products intended to be used as part of an enterprise infrastructure, such as the Google Enterprise search appliance.

Obviously, many of these aspects of Google are beyond the scope of this book, which focuses on making money with Google advertising and the AdSense and AdWords programs. This section explains the parts of Google you should know about with this selective focus.

More Google Parts

Parts of Google not discussed in this section (because of limited relevance to Google and advertising) include:

• Alerts (automatic notifications of news and search results by email)

• Answers (humans answer research questions using Google)

• Desktop Search (searches the files on your desktop computer using an interface that looks like Google's web search)

• Groups (bulletin board posts on every conceivable subject)

• Images (lets you search for pictures on the Web)

• Language Tools (automatic translation of text and web pages)

• Maps (maps, satellite pictures, driving directions, and access to local search)

• MySearch History (tracks the history of your searches)

• News (lets you search news items)

• Picasa (image management and lightweight image editing)

• RideFinder (find taxi, limousine, or shuttle services, with real-time location of vehicles)

• SiteMaps (service for webmasters; lets you submit a site map to Google in XML format showing areas of your site that have changed and need reindexing)

These Google parts may not be the primary focus of this book, but even a quick glance should help give you respect for the breadth and depth of Google's offerings.

Google is a moving target; it's constantly innovating, releasing software, and acquiring software companies. No static list of Google parts is ever likely to be up-to-date or final.

Google has the custom of releasing software and services as beta (meaning still in a test period) and calling the software beta for a long period of time, even though most other companies would consider it up to normal release standards.

You'll find software that Google is still playing with at Google Labs , http://labs.google.com. If you go to Google Labs, you can try out this software. Many of the "graduates" of Google Labs are now real, live Google parts.

Some of the parts of Google can be opened directly from the Google home page , http://www.google.com. If you don't see the link you are interested in on the Google home page, open the Google Services and Google Tools page by clicking the More link on the Google home page.

You can reach this page directly by opening the address http://www.google.com/options/ in your browser.

You'll find links to almost all the parts of Google from the Google Services and Google Tools page; I'll also provide a direct address to each Google part I discuss in the body of that section.

7.2.1. Advanced Search

Google Advanced Search , shown in Figure 7-3, can be opened using the URL http://www.google.com/advanced_search. Google Advanced Search implements the operators explained in "Google Syntax and Operators" earlier in this chapter (and a number of additional operators which I didn't explain) using a visual interface, so you don't need to enter the operators as part of a search query.

Figure 7-3. Google Advanced Search lets you implement sophisticated searching without understanding Google's query language

7.2.2. Blogger

Blogger, http://www.blogger.com, is one of the largest hosted blogging services on the Web. Blogger hosts hundreds of thousands of blogs, and it is free and easy to use. From an advertiser's viewpoint Blogger (and other hosted blogging services) are interesting, because they provide Google with a venue for AdWords contextual ads, categorized by the specific interest of the blog author.

7.2.3. Catalogs

Google Catalogs , http://catalogs.google.com, is a library of scanned mail-order catalogs that users can search. There's no charge for getting a catalog included in this list, and Google does not currently place advertising on the catalog search results pages. But you may want to know that the listings from Google Catalogs can show up in regular Google search results and accept that these listings are possible competition for merchandise items of your own.

7.2.4. Code

Google Code , http://code.google.com, is a centralized repository of all the APIs, documentation for developers, Google open source projects, and everything else related to programming Google (see Part IV for information about programming the Google AdWords API).

7.2.5. Directory

Google Directory uses the categorization scheme and sites selected by the Open Directory Project (ODP) to find information that has been vetted by volunteer editors familiar with a particular subject. The URL for Google Directory is http://directory.google.com. As I explain in Chapter 2, the ODP is important to you if you want to drive traffic to your site. You can use Google Directory to explore Google's use of the ODP taxonomy.

7.2.6. Froogle

Froogle, http://froogle.google.com, is a comparative, searchable shopping service. It's currently free for merchants to list their offerings with Froogle, and as far as can be told, Google makes no money from Froogle. It should be in the sites of businesses working with the Google advertising programs, however, because Google will eventually do something to monetize this service and Froogle may end up competing with merchants who advertise on other parts of the Google network.

7.2.7. Local

Google Local , http://local.google.com, is used to pinpoint information related to a particular place. This is achieved by searching billions of web pages for information about local businesses, then cross-checking those results with Yellow Pages data. There are several implications for advertisers: Google Local results pages are excellent advertising venues for local businesses who have signed up with AdWords. Google Local has excellent mapping features and is very convenient to use. The trend that is underway of advertising moving from newspapers and Yellow Pages to the Web will only accelerate as people become more accustomed to using Google Local, meaning that it will become even more important for advertisers to learn to work with AdWords.

Businesses whose traffic is local should take steps to design campaigns that interact properly with Google Local (see Chapter 11 for more information).

7.2.8. Personalize Your Home Page

Personalize Your Home Page, http://www.google.com/ig, presents a variety of news feeds and other information on the Google Home Page. Figure 7-4 shows a generic version of this customized home page.

Figure 7-4. Google's personalized home page feature lets you add news feeds, weather, stock quotes, and more

At this time, it's hard to know for sure where Google is going to go with the home page personalization feature, but it's worth watching for advertisers because opening up the Google start pages to different kinds of information suggests that Google may extend the kinds of advertising it accepts.

7.2.9. Print

Google Print , http://print.google.com, lets users search through books submitted to the program by publishers and other copyright holders. Google takes care of scanning the books and hosting the resulting pages on Google servers. These pages are then used by Google to display contextual ads. A portion of the revenue from the ads is paid by Google to the owner of the materials.

7.2.10. Scholar

Google Scholar lets you search for academic, peer-reviewed articles and citations. You can open Google Scholar at http://scholar.google.com. Although Scholar has had some rather mixed reviews, it is certainly one of the largest free repositories online of scholarly materal, and Google Scholar search results are another place Google displays contextual advertising.