A rose by any other name (probably isn’t a rose)

Search engines are very important to most internet users with over 80% of all folks starting with a visit to their preferred engine.

Such is the level of familiarity with this method that users will often type a full web address into Google as they just aren’t aware that it can be entered directly into the address bar … the equivalent would be to ring the operator and ask them to connect you to “0116 254 9888”.

We all know how frustrating irrelevant or weak results can be so the major players do their upmost to make sure we get what we ask for, Yahoo is now going one step further and tryin to give us ‘more than we bargained for’ with the introduction of semantics into Yahoo search.

You may be aware of html the language the web is [mostly] written in, well with some additions this mark up can convey a wealth of information, both factual and relational. Groups passionate about the web have developed formats that attempt to pass on information such as peoples relationships to each other, detailed event information, contacts/vcard and even images of the folks concerned.

Here at Cite we’ve already attended workshops on semantic web (to be honest it’s a personal interest of mine), especially Microformats and so we can advise our clients on the potential benefits of working this way … if a customer has to trawl through pages and pages to find your contact info they are less likely to contact you, if their browser can pick out the info and add it to their favourite mail client with a push of a button, then they will always have your details and be ready for your business.