Google knowledge graph showing product specs

[MrSavage]

I do think these are noteworthy updates. I know, your mileage may vary. Sure, sure. The point is, today for me CNET content was displayed in a box for a product spec that I was looking for. Just for fun, I didn't click through. I say now, one less website visited today! At times if traffic dips, consider that people like me didn't visit because we got what we needed without visiting your site. Again, this is a point of information. I haven't seen specs like this pulled off a site. Call that more tipping of the scale I guess.

[toidi]

The knowledge graph has been packaged into the "google app" so now we can access all the answers to everything instantly.

I wonder if the answers in the app contain the websites supplying the answers.

[MrSavage]

My point is that it's essentially traffic diversion. In real terms, it would be like the road in front of your store being detoured into the Wal Mart parking lot. I'm just suggesting I've never seen product specs, but now it's happening. It's one less thing to bother writing about. That's essentially my point. As these things progress, there is really less to write about. Or am I wrong in saying that?

[EditorialGuy]

Google, Bing, Yandex, Baidu, etc. have as much right to display a manufacturer's boilerplate product specifications as any other Web site does.

Your "value add" is what you write about those specs. (For example, a real product review, as opposed to the many "product reviews" we see that are nothing but boilerplate specs or press releases.)

[MrSavage]

If 90% of the worlds population wasn't getting detoured, then I get your point. However, are you really going to waste your time writing up specs if Google, Bing, etc start populating their so-called SERPS with the info? To clarify further, it's not like Google employees entered the information themselves. The chart in this example wasn't assembled by Google, but it was merely taken off of CNET. There was no manual effort required. Specs are not specs unless you yourself add them to your site. Correct? It's apples and oranges in my opinion. So just to clarify, you think it's worth pursuing writing a specs article in hopes of gaining organic traffic from it? As in, time invested is a worthwhile venture? Sure, beat the graph. That's a nice futile waste of time in my opinion. Glam up those specs so you outrank the graph. LOL. If I'm CNET I'm internally asking for a royalty. A machine didn't add the info to their site. People powered correct?

[netmeg]

If your business model is based on product specs, you're in trouble anyway.

From a user standpoint, it's one less click. Most users who get what they're looking for in the knowledge graph would consider that a good user experience. It's up to you to figure out how to make your content worth the extra click. We can all lament Google's incursion all we want, but the bottom line is, it's up to you to figure out how to make your content (and/or your brand) worth the extra click. If you can't figure that out, then you probably should think about your future in web publishing. Because it's not going to just "get better" one day. Only you can decide what your time spent is worth.

[MrSavage]

As a point of information, is it still prudent to consider product spes as a means to organic traffic? Once people get to your site, the specs make sense. But from attempts at ranking, are people still in pursuit of those types of keywords? If I'm looking at page topics, specs would be on my don't bother list. They might be on my site, but it will be a copy paste. To think about enhancing specs in hopes of beating a detour? I have better things to do with my time. Or am I a lone wolf? We're trying to get organic traffic and if the search engine is showing specs, then I'm trying to grasp how that keyword pursuit is not dead.

[netmeg]

It's one thing. Stop thinking of your site piece by piece in tiny chunks and start looking at it holistically.

[EditorialGuy]

If your business model is based on product specs, you're in trouble anyway.

Exactly. Product specs are like press releases: Most of the time, they're just boilerplate that was supplied by the product's source.

[Selen]

From a user standpoint, it's one less click. Most users who get what they're looking for in the knowledge graph would consider that a good user experience.

I sort of agree. To follow this path and to make the user experience better Google could remove all affiliate links (and offensive / questionable content), useless flash script, and large-size images before a page is loaded. If not for all users then at least for Chrome users who opt-in to have a better user experience.

[rish3]

This is step 1. It creates an obvious spot to then monetize, with the added benefit to Google of yet another area where they can push down organics.

Their site, their prerogative, of course. Personally, though, given their market share as the defacto landing page of the internet, I don't see this being particularly good for consumers.

[mrengine]

Take those product specs and combine them with Google images, their new buy now button and there is no need for a consumer to visit a retailer's website. That's Google's end game IMO, and that does not bode well for either consumers or businesses. The ability for retailers to upsell, cross-promote and educate consumers prior to purchase will be lost. This will undoubtedly lead to lower profits and higher costs for businesses while Google reaps the fruits of our labor and even the added labor that will result once all the pieces of the puzzle are in placed and deployed. Consumers will pay a premium for Google's take on the entire purchase process from start to finish, and since Google will likely limit competition there will be few alternatives to avoid Google's demands.

Just as there are those that believe giving up some of our Constitutional freedoms for security is a good idea, I'm well aware of the fact that there are those who feel giving up a portion of our free market for a better user experience is a good idea. I personally don't agree with either of these points and see a bleak future for those who enjoy the freedom and flexibility of being self-employed in the retail sector.

[netmeg]

None of which changes the fact that

Most users who get what they're looking for in the knowledge graph would consider that a good user experience.

I said users. Not webmasters. Civilians. Not us.

[EditorialGuy]

This will undoubtedly lead to lower profits and higher costs for businesses while Google reaps the fruits of our labor

"Our" labor? Product specs come from manufacturers. Why should a manufacturer object if Google, Bing, etc. choose to promote its products?

[rish3]

"Our" labor? Product specs come from manufacturers. Why should a manufacturer object if Google, Bing, etc. choose to promote its products?

For the same reasons that they maintain lists of authorized resellers, and generally wish to control their sales channels. There's more than one airline, for example, that successfully pressured Google into stopping their practice of publishing schedules and fares.

Also, not all product specs and information come from manufacturers. We make a fair amount of sales on the basis that we test the products, do integration with them, etc...and publish information that the manufacturer does not.

[glakes]

I'm a manufacturer and don't want Google displaying my product specifications in their search engine for a number of reasons. People searching for product specifications are typically in the presale stage - which is why Google probably wants to gobble this up and make a lot of money by surrounding our product specifications with "relevant ads". On our site, we steer people to the most appropriate product for their application. Google won't allocate enough space in their search results to show the alternates we have available, and we will lose sales to their ads. There's no ifs, ands or buts about it. Google is not "promoting" our products but will instead use the specifications as bait for their ads just as ordinary low life scrapers do.

[incrediBILL]

I warned people about cached pages, to use noarchive, most ignored the warning

I also warned they would start replacing local directories with Google places, they did that too

Then came reviews off review sites into Google and people are just letting it happen

Now they're getting bolder

Google wants your sites to just feed them data, they don't want to actually show your sites.

If you don't start to pull back you'll all end up being nothing more than a footnote in a Google store or some crap, your site individuality, along with most of your income if you live off ads, will be kept at Google which is happening more and more.

Sadly, some people still think cache is they friend, naive, just like the dinosaurs

[EditorialGuy]

I'm a manufacturer and don't want Google displaying my product specifications in their search engine for a number of reasons.

As IncrediBILL suggests, it's easy enough to use noarchive, and to require that your vendors do the same thing. And don't be like the many manufacturers (including many big brands) that dispatch press releases far and wide with detailed product specs.

[MrSavage]

Jesus. Nobody, not an employee manual entered the damn specs! That's my point. The point. If Google or Bing wants to be the world's greatest scrapers, then let the festivities begin. It's about one less road into your site. Lots of things are better for people, like free movies. Those we are supposed to pay for. Free music is amazing, but there is a thing called a royalty for a reason. Any commodity that's free is amazing, but really they don't exist. I guess some countries charge for water.

Google and Bing are setting on a path to be the biggest diversion to the thing we need, which is "organic" traffic. If it's about user experience, then sure, show me newspapers content for free, full articles on serps, free movies on YouTube (okay, that's already there), etc. What's best for the consumer? The people? Free everything. A $2 pair of runners that's made from slave labor. People don't care so long as it's convenient? At some point right vs. wrong enters the equation. The book scanning project was better for the masses yet it stumbled. The argument that things are good for people and therefore everything else goes out the window is weak at best.

I think my whole point was that the expansion of "things in a box" = traffic diversion. We won't need weather websites either. Their use? Just supply the info, the actual website isn't needed. That's the scope I look at.

So I guess, based on my original point, who here is going to try and out SEO Google or Bing on specs? As in, you might need to have it somewhere on site for users, but in terms of gaining organic traffic, how is that not essentially a dead end road now? Surely nobody with seeing what I saw would tomorrow launch a specs page for a product and think that it serves any hope in hell of being a reasonable ranking search result. Perhaps the moral of this story is that these types of content should be simply no indexed. For the sake of having more original content rather that other duplicated info online, why bother adding more ununique content if it's not got any hope of being an organic traffic stream.

I do sort of wish there was a sticky because instead of SERP changes being relevant, I think that answer boxes are far more relevant. Reporting what you see can save a webmaster a possible pursuit. That is of course if one believe they can out rank Google or Bing.