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Want to try my custom search engine based on my favorite environmental news sources? Click this image. |
I'm sitting in another
BlogHer session about technical tools to help build traffic. Most of what they're discussing I already knew about -- but one thing
Elise Bauer discussed early on is
Google's custom search engine tool.
It works like this: You create a custom version of Google that searches only the sites you specify, or that searches the whole Web but emphasizes the sites you specify. I thought this sounded cool. Since the wifi is working well at this conference (Yay!) I decided to build a custom search engine.
In my feed reader, I have many feeds sorted into categories related to various ongoing projects. I write regularly for the biweekly TipSheet of the Society of Environmental Journalists, so I track many sources to get ahead-of-the curve leads on environmental news topics. I just took all the sites included in that feed folder and added them to a custom search engine called "environment." Here it is.
Frankly, I'm not clear on how exactly building a custom search engine can increase traffic to your site -- but I do think that this is an intriguing option for news or community sites.
Imagine this: Instead of offering a list of local bloggers or syndicating their content on your site, what if your news organization added all those sites (and other resources, such as Web sites of local governments, organizations, etc.) to a custom search engine? Search results from a collection of sites selected by a trusted news organization with a long-term vested community interest might prove especially helpful to readers.
Of course, Google allows you to syndicate this tool out to your site as a Google Gadget. However, I imagine that it probably wouldn't be rocket science for a good geek to code a custom search engine, if you want search results to appear on your site rather than on Google.
This sure seems like it has news site potential, and to offer value to communities. At least that's how it looks to me. What do you think? Are any news sites already doing this? Please comment below.
