Google started testing it’s search within a search feature more than a month ago. As I said in my initial post, the important things to note about the new functionality were 1) the Google Shopping link and 2) the ever-present Google Adwords listings.

In Bob Tedeschi’s NYTimes article on March 24, he went with the shocker of a headline: A New Tool From Google Alarms Sites. In the article, industry pundits like Alan Rimm-Kaufmann expressed concern over the feature. Ice.com’s ever-present VP of Marketing, Pinny Gniwisch said “Google’s new feature did not appear when users searched for Ice.com, but he said he would object if it did.” And the article pretty much stated that Amazon had requested that Google remove the Amazon search within a search feature.

When the feature first launched, Borders, BestBuy, and OfficeMax were the other large retailers discovered to have the feature active. BestBuy is the only retailer that still seems to have the functionality live.

The main point I picked up from Bob Tedeschi’s article was that the basic problem publishers/retailers had with the new functionality was that Google is selling Adwords ads against brand names. A big no no in the eyes of so many.

But the most important line in the article is Alan Rimm-Kaufmann’s quotation: “Some of our retail clients have pretty horrible site search,” he said. “So for them, this will be a benefit.”

Well, I’ll go a step further and say that this will be an extremely popular and well accepted program for 1000s of retailers.

Why?

Because it’s not only that some retailers have horrible site search, it’s that 10s of 1000s of retailers have a long way to go to providing a smart shopping experience. When sites don’t have proper site search, proper categorization, and don’t provide a logical UI, consumers can’t find anything or at least give up fairly quickly.

There are a lot of factors which contribute to a low conversion rate for retailers, but with Google search within a search, 10s of 1000s of poorly thought out sites can benefit because Google will bring consumers directly to product pages.

And while I agree that the creme de la creme of the brand name retailers will not put up with Google Adwords ads featuring competitors next to their precious content, the creme de la creme might represent less than 1% of all internet retailers (there are only 400 IR top 400 retailers out of about 300,000 online merchants).

Some portion of the other 299,600 merchants on the web are going to be fine seeing competitor product listings right next to their own. In fact, 1000s are already are used to it. Amazon might not want Google to display competitor listings in Adwords ads next to Amazon search within a search content, but Amazon enables a similar ability on Amazon.com through its Marketplace and Product Ads programs.
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Last weekend Shopping.com encouraged its users to click on AdSense ads.

Here are examples for a couple searches. Notice the big SEE SITE buttons next to the ads:

According to my read of the Google’s AdSense Policy, Shopping.com’s actions are in violation of that policy:

In order to ensure a good experience for users and advertisers, publishers may not request that users click the ads on their sites or rely on deceptive implementation methods to obtain clicks. Publishers participating in the AdSense program:

* May not encourage users to click the Google ads by using phrases such as “click the ads,” “support us,” “visit these links,” or other similar language
* May not direct user attention to the ads via arrows or other graphical gimmicks
* May not place misleading images alongside individual ads
* May not promote sites displaying ads through unsolicited mass emails or unwanted advertisements on third-party websites
* May not compensate users for viewing ads or performing searches, or promise compensation to a third party for such behavior
* May not place misleading labels above Google ad units - for instance, ads may be labeled “Sponsored Links” but not “Favorite Sites”

When I asked Shopping.com about this, they said that their “relationship with AdSense is confidential.”

Does this mean that Google AdSense sanctioned this test? I figured that this was just a programmer error, but that’s obviously not the response that I got.

So I’ll put it to my readers:
1. Is this a violation of Google’s AdSense Policies?
2. Is this a good user experience or is this just tricking the users into clicking on a link. The SEE SITE buttons Shopping.com posted next to the AdSense ads are the same ones they use for product listing results: