Google pushing Personalized Search w/ screenshot

[pk_synths]

Dont know if this has been shown before but I was doing a search and this monstrosity showed up. Kinda gaudy I think.

At least it's a good indication that your Search History plays a major role in the personalized search.

Screenshot:

[dazzlindonna]

Gaudy, indeed. However, Google has never been known for its web design ability (with the holiday logos being the exception). All the geeks in the geekoplex failed to hire some really good web designers, I think.

Why is that with each day that goes by, I get more and more disenchanted with Google. It's almost getting to the point where everytime I hear something else that G is doing, I groan and want to say bah, humbug. Maybe I'm just getting grumpy in my old age.

[rustybrick]

Never saw that before, nice (i mean, ugly) find.

[Dave]

I see something similar with Google News.

"New! Search History now includes Google News. Learn more."

[Dave]

Two questions:

1) What is the best way to search Google so I know for sure the results I see are in no way personalized?

I would like to see what a person who is not familiar with our niche would see if they began searching our category.

Is there some sort of a Google Proxy?

2) How do you folks believe this will play out in the search funnel?

Typically, people searching our niche do a considerable amount of research before they make a purchase. It is believed they start with a very broad and generic query then refine the nature of the research over time to become very specific prior to purchase.

Will the industry overview websites researchers first visited with the first generic queries become dominate across the entire vertical, even as the researcher refines the queries to become more specific if they use personalized search?

Or will niche websites still be able to dominate industry niche queries with or with out personalized search enabled?

Thanks,
Dave.

[rustybrick]

1) do not login (also if you are outside the usa, the results may change)
2) its the future of search people say, personalized results - hard to spam. :-/

[Dave]

Should I be regularly deleting my search history, cookies, etc?

[rustybrick]

Not if you want personalized results.

When I want unbiased results, I may use a different browser.

[Dave]

Good Idea…

I could use IE for regular searching and FireFox or Netscape when I need to see what the “Real” results look like.

Thanks,
Dave.