Did you think the launch of Google’s Universal search back in 2007 was revolutionary?
Well it looks like the introduction of Universal search formed baby steps to Google’s new search feature called Search options.
Google’s search options adds an extra layer of dynamic filters to the search engine result page (SERPs) – with a single click a search result has extra filters (on the left) that shows your search query results as Video, Forum posts or Review only results. You can also further filter your results by time or choose to display more text on the description area of the SERPs.
I think the most impressive features are the Wonder Wheel, which is a visual SERP that suggests similarly search queries visually, and the Time Line option that displays search results by time with a graph that shows search volume over time.
Here is an example:
- You search for ‘Nikon D90 review’ on Google
- Filter the search to display the mention of ‘Nikon D90 review’ from only forums
- Then further add a filter to display SERPs in the last 24 hours
- Finally arrange the results to display the by time using the Sort by date option
You will get this search result i.e. Nikon D90 reviews on forums only in the last 24 hours with the newest forum post display first.
Google want us to see its new search options feature as:
a tool belt that gives you new ways to interact with Google Search, and we plan to fill it with more innovative and useful features in the future.
It really makes things interesting.
