Images on SERPs

[papamaku]

A bit of a shock, did a query for boracay [google.co.uk] (a small tropical island in the Philipines) and on top of the results, normally where the news links are, there were three images, as a preview of Google image search.

Never seen this before - anyone else?

[Brett_Tabke]

I can't find the previous thread on this, but it has been going on with selected serps for some time.

nice working example though. (alot have asked for it in the past and we couldn't produce one).

[rj87uk]

yes I got the same when looking for a map + area.

I think its a good idea.

[sem4u]

More and more are showing up. Did a search for 'uk map' the other day and three images came up first. Exactly what I wanted.

[rj87uk]

I would think that Google will be looking for other ways like this to incorporate more of the functions into the main search. Just like the 'Did you mean'

[jimbeetle]

I've been seeing this for a lot of the searches I do, but it never quite sunk in. My web blindness must be really bad.

Wonder if a week on a white-sand beach will cure it.

[rj87uk]

<off topic>

Wonder if a week on a white-sand beach will cure it.

That depends... are you taking a laptop? ;)
<off topic>

[Atticus]

I think that these pictures are initially attractive to the searcher -- they click on them -- and then they back out.

At least that's my experience. When folks reach my page through regular SERPS they tend to stick around. Those users searching for a general term for which an image from my site appears, but which would not have brought up my listing in the regular SERPs, tend to back out right away.

I don't think my ad impressions are paid when they show up in the G cache, so these hits on my pages are a waist of bandwidth for me.