As the third largest corporation in the world, Google’s marketing policy requires frequent revision in order to offer their customers better services as they run through billions of hits per day.
In 2009, Peter Linsley, Google’s project manager for image search marketing, gave a presentation at SMX West on their new strategy
Is Google putting more weight on brands in rankings?
Unlike the page search algorithm of Google, the image search cannot always directly interpret content found on a page since so many images from the Internet have few or no descriptions. The text around an image will be taken further into account, as well as its placement in the page?closer to text means it will rank higher.
Linsley’s presentation included an explanation on Google’s strategy for removing duplicate content will emphasize brands in image searches, since the algorithm for duplicate content will use a number of the images used in the ranking. Since many users enter very vague terms for their image search, such as only the title of a movie, it creates a staggering number of the same pictures.
Linsley suggested that the user interface of Google image search will become more interactive and dynamic. A rating system that allows users to explain the helpfulness (or lack thereof) of the top-ranked hits could change how both Google and their affiliate marketers approach advertising. Going even further, the system may add a comments feature so that it is possible to provide direct feedback on searches for certain terms.