The Google Custom Search team sent out an email this week reminding/announcing users that they now offer a business edition of Google Custom Search which does not serve advertising and total customization. Google Custom Search lets users build their own search engines based upon a custom search index, and others socially contribute to those search indexes.
- Many businesses have approached us about using the Custom Search Engine to power site search on their websites. Businesses expressed great excitement about what Custom Search can do, but they often had two requirements for search on their site:
no ads, so that visitors stay on their site instead of leaving for a different one
complete customization of the look and feel of search results
So that’s why we developed Custom Search Business Edition.
The Business Edition turns off ads and allows you to access search results through an XML API. This means that you can create your own user interface for search results and have your search engine fit in seamlessly with the rest of your website. Custom Search Business Edition starts at $100 per year for searching less than 5,000 web pages.
You can create a new Business Edition search engine by visiting http://www.google.com/coop/cse/business/create
Alternatively, convert your existing Custom Search Engine to the Business Edition through the control panel at http://www.google.com/coop/manage/cse/
For businesses looking for a more defined and site specific search which is not based upon Google’s web search technology, and instead a proprietary site search technology, PicoSearch has also been on the market for years and specializes in business site search.
Before making a decision on the search service you want to use on your website, I suggest giving PicoSearch’s FAQ page a look.
Targ8.com in top 10 ‘all-in-one’ search engines using Google custom search technology.
‘All in one’ search engines often called ‘meta’ search engines have been available to use online for many years but have never been more popular than single search engines like Google, Yahoo and Microsofts’ live search. However, one new entrant might change that.
Rather than merge all search results into one results page like most meta-search engines, Targ8 simply offers its customers the choice of 8 different search engines to search from, on the Targ8 homepage. But that’s not all, Targ8 offers 8 of everything; – news sites, shopping sites, video and image searches, social networking sites and free-ad searches, all in one place.
Its proving popular as Targ8 has moved into the 9th most popular ‘all-in-one’ search engine category and is now in the top 10,000 most popular worldwide websites.*
Neil Bant, the founder of Targ8.com said, “Our aim was to make searching popular sites from one place quick and simple for everyone. Its great to be listed alongside established sites like Dogpile, Mamma and Metacrawler, but simply giving customers the ability to search the site of their choice was our aim.”
“We would like to thank our customers on the social network sites for using and providing feedback on Targ8.com. We will continue to improve Targ8 with your feedback, to make Targ8 a great starting page for people to use. And remember our slogan: Don’t Google it, Targ8 it.”
Targ8 was built in the UK and has both US and UK sites. As the British public love an underdog, it would be great to see a UK developed site, dominate in the search market.
Category Rank
Web Rank
Domain
1
267
dogpile.com
2
290
search.com
3
326
mamma.com
4
463
findthewebsiteyouneed.com
5
826
info.com
6
1,656
searchby.net
7
2,465
metacrawler.com
8
5,146
jayde.com
9
9,961
targ8.com
10
10,833
ixquick.com
*Source: Ranking.com, September 2007