Have you noticed some of the personalization Google has been adding to their Search Engine Result Pages (SERP)?

Besides the new ‘sidewiki’, which we won’t discuss here, Google has added the option to add public comments to a website and have that comment show up right in the result page. As you can see in the image to the right the top arrow is pointing to a new icon after the URL, this let’s you put your own comment about that result. Below that line you can see the note “Comment by Searcher, Today” and then the actual comment. Google will use your Google account nickname on your comment post if you have one, if not then it defaults to ‘Searcher’.

Once you click on the comment icon you will see a box, like illustrated below, to write out your comment. Needless to say it will be interesting to see how this gets added in to the SERP algorithm in addition to how it will affect reputation management. And I haven’t found much said about this new feature from Google.

I can see how comments, assuming they are authentic, could be very helpful in selecting which URL you want to dive in to. On another note, it will make it even more imparative to get your marketing message right at the title tag. If people start depending on this comment information to make decisions they will never see your great offer on the site. But if people are writing great things in your result comments you would be golden anyway!

As you use this comment feature come back and leave me some feedback on the results you are finding