Here’s an interesting post on searching for properties on Google from the Google Blog. Here’s their “OneBox” real estate search for Seattle Real Estate:
Here’s where you land after doing that basic OneBox search:
There’s no announcement that I’m aware of to prompt this. It may be an effort to gain more interest/involvement for Google Base, which remains obscure to many.
But this search –> OneBox –> vertical results environment is a central component of how Google is seeking to use Base to deliver richer vertical experiences via Google.com results. In this segment Google has a fundamental challenge in seeking to compete with Zillow and Trulia (or even Yahoo! RE), which are focused entirely on real estate. Yahoo! takes a “templated” approach to verticals, which makes them somewhat more scalable.
But there’s a disconnect between a totally “scalable” approach and one that responds to the nuances and unique content of a vertical market.
Curbed is a great example of a unique vertical experience that is hard to duplicate across categories (although they’re trying for dining) because it’s so labor intensive and specific. Chowhound (Chow.com), now owned by CNET, is another.
