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December 7, 2006

Google ManyBox

Google shows OneBox results at the top of the search results if there is relevant information from other sources: news, music, shopping etc. But now the famous OneBox has a new relative: ManyBox, that appears under some search results and shows structured information from that pages.

I reported in August that Google started to recognize addresses from web pages and included a link to Google Maps under those search results.


In this case, this search result for "Très Jolie" is the homepage of a business, so the address is relevant. By default, the map is not visible.

Google might use ManyBoxes to showcase some parts of a web page (think about a long page that includes sections) or links that create context for a page. In this experiment, Google shows an extended snippet and a search box for each search result.

4 comments:

  1. I spotted this the other day and have been trying to figure out how G decides which pages deserve a manybox. From my initial observations it looks like it's looking at the preceding text and if it looks like a person's name, then it may qualify for a manybox. In your example of "tres jolie", the obvious link is the actress Angelina Jolie. Have you looked into this any further? Have you found any other examples?

    ReplyDelete
  2. The best result for "tres jolie" should not be about Angelina. "Tres jolie" means "very beautiful" in French and there are many places that contain "tres jolie" in the name.

    Other examples: country family style restaurant, NY hotel, art museum, Seattle theater. Mostly local queries for US.

    ReplyDelete
  3. The official name for this feature is Google Plus Box, Webmaster Help says. But I like ManyBox better.

    "The address link shown below some sites in our search results (in an expandable area called a Plus Box) is meant to help searchers locate businesses and compare search results. We show the address link for results that are local in nature and for which we have an associated address."

    ReplyDelete
  4. For some strange reason, Matt Cutts blogged about this, rather than it being released by Inside Adwords or some other group.

    http://www.mattcutts.com/blog/new-google-ui-feature-plus-box/

    I signed up a client in the local business center about a month ago and they don't have that plus/many box yet.

    ReplyDelete

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