Zentury Spotlight – Google Discover Feed for Desktop Users

Google Conducts Experiment to Extend Discover Feed to Desktop Users

Google is testing a feature that might make its Discover feed available to desktop users.

Along with the standard Google search bar, the Discover feed displays suggested content such as news, weather, sports scores, and stock prices right on the Google homepage. Firstly, the testing was done only in India, as Google confirms. 

Similar to the mobile version, the Discover feed on desktop is filled with news, entertainment, sports, financial, and other items using an algorithm. Posts are made in the form of carousels, meaning they scroll horizontally. 

The classic, minimalist Google homepage has stayed mostly untouched for more than 20 years, so the launch of Discover on desktop would be a significant change.

Google may be experimenting with Discover on desktop to increase user engagement on google.com.

Discover can tempt users back to the site to view suggested content as many people only use the search box in their browser.

Discover offers innovative ad-free ways for content promotion for “free” to publishers. But it also implies that there will be greater competition for a small number of positions on the popular Google homepage.

Google Adds Vehicle Inventory Markup Support for Car Dealerships

Google has introduced a better way for auto dealers to advertise their available inventory of automobiles on Google Search and other Google platforms.

Dealerships of all sizes may now more easily submit vehicle inventory data to Google thanks to newly supported structured data markup.

Car dealerships may display their available inventory on Google Search, Maps, and Business Profiles by using structured data for vehicle listings.

Compared to Google’s earlier strategy, which required dealerships to provide data feed files, the new markup method is simpler.

Dealerships may include vehicle descriptions, pricing, availability, and other information into their current car listing sites by using structured data.

Dealers that find feed files to be too complicated or who haven’t yet signed up to supply inventory data to Google may find this new alternative more advantageous. Feed files are still a choice, though.

The structured data makes it possible for potential customers to filter and learn about the automobiles that are available on Google, including crucial information like cost, features, and availability.

Currently, this feature is now offered only in English in the United States, on both mobile and desktop.

Google Enriches Rich Results Test Tool with Paywalled Content Support

The Rich Results Test tool has received an upgrade from Google that now lets you verify structured data markup for paywall content.

With the help of this new feature, publishers will be able to correctly label subscription-based content on their websites.

The modification occurs as Google continues to improve its indexing and presentation of paywalled content in search results.

Google wants to direct visitors to pertinent paywall articles, but it also has to stop tricks like “cloaking,” in which websites display different content to users than Google.

Specifically, the “isAccessibleForFree” and “cssSelector” attributes Google suggests using are covered by the new validation support.

The markup is applicable to a variety of CreativeWork content types, including articles, blog posts, courses, reviews, and messages.

Publishers can define numerous cssSelector values in an array for websites with multiple paywalled sections.

Examples of both single and multiple paywall systems may be found in Google’s documentation.

The announcement follows rising publisher apprehensions about Google technologies like Search and the AI chatbot Bard that unpaid paywall content is being surfaced by.

One thing publishers may do to make it clear what is hidden behind a paywall is to provide the appropriate markup.

Google advises users to be aware that just uploading structured data does not ensure that paywalled content will show up in search results or AI-generated summaries. Various other elements, such as a website’s indexation and crawlability, can affect the page display by Google.

Google Employees Express Doubts About Bard’s Accuracy and Effectiveness

As Google integrates its brand-new AI chatbot Bard into more of its products, questions about the technology’s potential are surfacing in the background.

Conversations between Google employees who worked on Bard’s development that were recently released show doubts within the firm about the chatbot’s efficiency and if the enormous investment required is paying off.

In September, Google announced its largest expansion to date by integrating Bard with services including Gmail, Maps, and YouTube. However, accusations about Bard giving incorrect information and risky advice have dogged the implementation.

Google included a search button the same day as the significant expansion so that users could verify Bard’s responses.

Google has been under fire from both internal and external critics for allegedly trying to stay up with competitors while neglecting moral problems, such as the treatment of low-paid contractors teaching Bard.

For Google, ensuring Bard’s success is essential. About 80% of parent firm Alphabet’s income comes from its main search business, but the emergence of AI chatbots poses a danger to its dominance.

WordPress Update Enhances Page Speed With Smart Script Loading

With the latest update to WordPress, in version 6.4, there will be new changes in how scripts are loaded on the front end. That will lead to improvement in page load times and performance for many sites.

The efficiency of loading scripts using defer and async characteristics has been improved by the incorporation of script loading techniques into the core and packaged themes of WordPress.

The time it takes for a website to become interactive may be considerably sped up by using these properties to tell the browser to load scripts in the background (async) or after the rest of the page has loaded (defer).

Pages with WordPress content will load more quickly for website visitors following an update. After the page loads up, there will be less “jank” or page element moving.

Thanks for these updates, there will be room for even better optimization in the future.