What is the Deal with Google Instant?

Google Instant is the latest enhancement that shows results as you type in your search.

This is going to make Google a much faster experience, it’s probably been timed and designed to make a search at Bing-Ahoo seem slow and clunky in comparison – effectively stealing back some share from the combined 28.1% search share they had in July 2010.

Google was at 65.8% in July 2010.

Here’s an example of how it works and what you will see:

Do a query at Google.com for “Gulf Shores Vacation Rental.” As you start to type, keywords are suggested and results start to appear (figure 1 below).  Many are saying this COULD be the beginning of the decline of the effectiveness of the long tail……I don’t necessarily agree.

Some Realities about Google Instant:

1. You DO NOT have to be signed into a Google account.  This was initially reported that you DID – but I just tested and was NOT signed in.
2. If you use iGoogle, you get the keyword suggestions, but not the results – so it looks like figure 2 below.
3. Users CAN opt-out, but are unlikely to because that’s something that takes time and a bit of know how.

What does this advancement mean for visitors finding your website?
From our research, we suspect these keywords are “suggested” based on relevancy, containing the keywords the user is typing and number of monthly searches. We already optimize websites based on this, so we are ahead of the game.