news A Google change could make domain research harder

[News]

Last week, I was renewing a lot of domain names ahead of this week’s price increase and ran into a problem.
I look at a lot of factors when I renew domains. When I’m on the fence, and the domain is more descriptive than brandable, I often look at how many search results there are in Google for the term. If there aren’t many results, it means the term isn’t very popular.

Read More.

 

[MKA]

Still shows the number of search results to me. But the idea of domains being valued after their search volume is a bit dated. It's a good indicator of a word's (or phrase's) popularity, which obviously affects value. But my general impression is that domainers tend to put too much stock in it.

 

[QUAD DOMAINS]

It’s reasonable to assume “an update to what constitutes available search data” is imminent. Especially in the case of major browsers. Businesses and domainers alike have bought heavily into the idea search data is supremely valuable; and now browsers can exploit this “dependence” through segmented monetization.

Those who rely on search data may as well get their debit/credit cards ready to be charged monthly/yearly for tiered access to keyword search information and more. This type of expense, along with renewals, Ai and the Blockchain naming sector, ought to make for some interesting changes in the domain investing landscape.

Mel
QUAD Domains

 

[twiki]

There will be second level search sources to provide that info, but likely not for free.

 

[Mr. Deleted]

Last week, I was renewing a lot of domain names ahead of this week’s price increase and ran into a problem.
I look at a lot of factors when I renew domains. When I’m on the fence, and the domain is more descriptive than brandable, I often look at how many search results there are in Google for the term. If there aren’t many results, it means the term isn’t very popular.

Read More.

www.searchvolume.io

 

[Mr. Deleted]

There will be second level search sources to provide that info, but likely not for free.

The information is already free

 

[Bob Hawkes]

Just to make sure there is not confusion in this thread, I think Andrew's post was about number of search results, not about search volume.

Clearly there are alternative sources, paid and some free, for search volume.

I do track, as Andrew does, search results to get how popular a term or phrase is, using the quotation marks search. It may or may not be very relevant, but one of many metrics I look at.

For me (I am in Canada and I think Google try things at different times in different markets) the quotation marks search still seems to work as it did, although some months (?) ago I noticed that Google show far fewer results than previously when one does a search without quotation marks. I presume that is an iteration of their AI for intentional search, with a focus on what their AI deems relevant to your search.

-Bob

 

[Acroplex]

The behavior described by Andrew in that article is true, only when:

• You use Chrome as your browser, and
• You are logged into your Google account

So if you:

• Don't use Chrome as your browser, or
• You use Chrome, but you are not logged into your Google account

...then Google displays the number of results as before.

Why has Google chosen to do this? I have no idea.

 

[Jannes]

Google search is just an ad spam engine.