Various types of search are carried out by vertical engines. An example of a vertical search in the generic model of Google would be the images search, the location search, the news search, and the web search. Many of these search engines can be considered separate, although they are all part of Google.
Search engines crawl databases of web pages to find and return the most relevant and useful pages based on the search query. Web search is the most common type of vertical search. Google ranks relevant web pages by relevance, authority, and PageRank, among other factors outlined in its algorithm.
Web search is a critical aspect of Google, but its other verticals are becoming increasingly significant and cannot be overlooked. The Google image search engine, for instance, has millions of daily searches, making it a highly popular search engine
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In the future, image search could become a highly sophisticated function with high SEO appeal and potential, particularly in industries like consumer retail where vision is a strong point.
Also, results from vertical searches other than web are increasingly being included in the search engine results pages, taking up a large portion of space previously devoted to organic search results.
Users can search across Google’s verticals with this type of blended search and get results that better anticipate their needs and provide them with relevant information.
An overview of Google’s major verticals is given below:
Web Search
Google’s search engine is primarily a web search engine. As a result, it has access to Google’s huge database of websites. Google returns web pages that most closely match a searcher’s search term when a searcher types in a search term.
With the web vertical, you’ll find more than just webpages. Rich snippets, cards and carousels, among other features, are provided in search results that draw on Knowledge Graph and structured data.
Image Search
Among Google’s verticals, image search ranks second. The New Image Search launched by Google on January 1st 2012 is able to not only match images to search terms, but also search for images based on images. The user can use Google to find the same or similar images using their own image, with incredible accuracy. Color, size, and age can all be used to sort images.
Map Search
In addition to Google Maps, the largest map search engine in the world is Bing Maps. An address can be entered in this vertical and it can be located anywhere in the world. This allows them to view the road map, 3D street view, or a satellite photographic view of that street.
A map can be used to search for nearby businesses, find directions, or find locations. A map is an incredibly useful tool when searching for local businesses.
News Search
Among the world’s largest news databases are those of Google, Yahoo, and Bing. Google, Yahoo, and Bing all rank first in terms of the most popular news search engine. The race is between Google and Yahoo. It provides real-time news feeds that flag-up the most important stories around the world. Whether you are a national or regional newspaper or magazine, optimizing for Google and Yahoo news is important.
