MUM, Trivia, Shoppable, About This Discovering and More

Google had a number of announcements related to Google search on the go Google Search On 2021 event. Announcements ranged from improvements and more uses for MUM, to adding more to that result, to shopping search experiences, in-store inventory, Google Lens updates, and a number of Google Search features and redesigns.

It seems like Google is expanding the use of MUM just by finding out Names of COVID vaccines to many other applications since MUM started Last May was big news.

The day after, here is a recap of what was announced as promised at the event.

Google has redesigned Google Search and introduced new features that enable natural, more intuitive searches through the use of “advanced AI systems like MUM”. This includes additions such as trivia, new search refinements, visually searchable results pages and more – we have many of them as tests in ours Google user interface Section.

New for About this result: Google adds more details to the About This Result feature. In particular, there will be more information about the source, the search will be able to read what a site is saying about itself in its own words when that information is available. Searchers can see what others have said about a website, what others have written on the web – news, reviews, and other helpful background information – and can help you better rate sources. Finally, it shows you more on the topic information such as the top reporting or results from other sources on the same topic.

Google told me that a website owner cannot say that this information is incorrect or that it should be removed. Google said that it aims to offer a broader view of information, it knows it won’t be perfect, but it has a quality mark that the sites must meet to show in that result.

Google also said this feature has been used about 400 million times, which is obviously a small percentage of the total searches. So some publishers might get annoyed with some of the information displayed, but keep in mind that I doubt it will be seen by a large percentage of your users.

This will also be introduced for English search results in the coming weeks.

This is how Paul Haahr from Google put it on Twitter:

Today is one of those days when all the hard work is worth it. We are very proud of the team that developed More About This Result and look forward to releasing it over the next few weeks. https://t.co/M5juvTM8Mn

– Paul Haahr (@haahr) September 30, 2021

Things to know: Google said, “If you search on a subject like acrylic painting, you can see all of the different dimensions that people usually look for and find the right path for you.” This will extrapolate further details and provide categories for the topic. Then when you click on it, you will be presented with a Featured Snippet for that option and also the ability to click on it and see more results. Google is rolling out this feature in the coming months.

Refine this search / expand this search: More search refinements called “Refine this search and expand this search” will be rolled out to English search results in the coming months. It’s basically an advanced search feature.

Visually searchable: Google is also introducing a feature called Visually Searchable Results Pages, which makes it easier to visually search to find what you are looking for. We saw Google test this as I said, with Google having huge images in the search results. It also reminds me of that custom headers for idea queries but only part of it seems to be live. I believe Google calls these large images “universal image blocks” and they can be displayed for idea requests and clothing requests. This will be available in English shortly in the US if you’re looking for some visual ideas.

MUM with videos in Google search: Google said it can now better understand videos with MUM. Google said it had a new MUM-based experience that identifies related topics in a video even if the topic is not explicitly mentioned. This will be published in the English Google search results in the coming weeks.

The point here is for Google to understand not only the title and description of the video, but also the audio and video in the video. This, in my opinion, starts on YouTube first and then in Search as shown below.

Shopping Google search experience: Google introduced a new “shoppable search experience” in the US. This should make it easier to search for clothes on mobile devices directly from search results. The example from Google is that if you search for “short jackets” in Google search, you get a visual feed of jackets in different colors and styles along with other helpful information like local shops, style guides, and videos. According to Google, this is supported by the Google Shopping Graph.

In-store inventory: Google said people want to experience in-person shopping from home. As a result, you can now filter the results with an “in stock” filter to see if stores nearby have specific items on their shelves. It will launch in English on September 29 in the US and select markets including the UK, Australia, Austria, Brazil, Canada, Denmark, France, Germany, Japan, the Netherlands, New Zealand, Norway, Sweden and Switzerland.

Google Lens becomes MUM: Google added a number of MUM improvements to Google Lens. Google Lens lets you add text to your visual searches and ask questions about what you see. Google said if you see a shirt you like but prefer the pattern on socks, you can show your camera and ask the question. This will be published on Google Lens in the coming months, soon also in English.

It’s nice to see Google making further improvements in search with MUM. This is how it looks:

Google Lens is also coming to Chrome and other places in Google Search, such as the iOS app.

These are most of the big announcements from Google’s Search On event.

Forum discussion at Twitter & WebmasterWorld.