It used to be that Google Search
would show reviews of places, movies, TV shows and so on from a few, reputed
websites. Google is now bringing 'Reviews from the Web,' which will display
reviews from any third-party site. Google will now collect reviews from up to
three sites for any place, movie or TV show, ordered in terms of relevance.
This essentially means that
user-generated reviews can be displayed on the search engine and has the
opportunity to be read as widely as the more popular sites. Prior to this,
Google introduced best of lists and critic reviews for the search engine.
The company was earlier criticised
for allowing only critic reviews on its engine, while sites like Yelp or
TripAdvisor were ineligible since their content and reviews were
user-generated. Google's new update will now include sites with user-driven
reviews as long as the sites implement Google's review snippet markup., the
search giant said in a blog post on Wednesday.
Google will also collect its own
reviews which will be among the three review sources. The other two being
critics and third-party review sites. Qualified critics will be able to display
their reviews in the search engine's Rich cards which are large boxes with an
embedded snippet of the review.
The search giant will roll out the
new feature globally in the 24 hours. The company also announced a new 'Shop
the Look' feature currently being tested that allows users to search and shop
for specific outfits and home décor options all without leaving the search
engine. With these new additions, Google wants to make sure that its search
engine becomes a one stop destination for consumers.