Visual Search with Google Goggles

Google released an update(v1.3) to the Google Goggles app for iPhone and Android on Monday. The latest update brings us fully into the virtual reality world of the future via visual search capability. Just hold your phone up to an object and BAM.... online content and search options are at your fingertips. What are some of the things you can search visually with Goggles?

QR Codes/Bar Code Scanner: Google Goggles makes interpreting a QR code or product barcode even easier...and faster (claiming under 2 seconds to process). Codes in Entertainment Weekly movie trailer ads. Codes on major ads in print media. You no longer need to take a photo in a reader app to launch the embedded content. You don't even have to press a button! With Goggles, just hold up the camera phone to the object so Goggles can recognize it using it's nifty visual recognition and watch the magic happen. Read product reviews, check availability and search competitor pricing in an instant.
Ad Recognition: Goggles will recognize print ads and launch enhanced online content on any ad published in a major magazine or newspaper published since August 2010. Google tested the advertising image recognition ability with some big brands before launch - Buick, Disney, Diageo, T-Mobile and Delta Airlines. Holy cow Batman...Is this the integration we've been talking about? A traditional print ad that launches digital content? Why... what will this mean for the traditional marketer vs online marketer war?

Now the goofy part is that Goggles can also solve a Sudoku puzzle. Of course the tech community is truly geeked about this one. Check out the Google Labs video to see the app beat Sudoku champion Tammy McLeod. It IS geeky cool, isn't it?

Melanie's Monday Mashup - Google Breaking News

Last week it was Twitter... This week, it's Google. For those of us who geek out on SEO, the search Goliath has stolen the limelight from Tiger, Twitter, TARP and tea parties, with these three big breaking announcements.

#1 Google Goggles – Just as I thought the Google app with voice search for my iPhone was the bomb, Google one-upped it with a new visual search application for Andriod devices. Need information about the business across the street? Or want information about the book the guy next to you at the airport is reading? Do you like the purse the girl at the next table is carrying?

No need to ask … Just snap a picture, and Google will send you the information.

#2 Google Real Time Search – Spending two hours a day commuting makes you appreciate devices like GPS, as well as the radio and cell phone - all of which can help you navigate through traffic more efficiently.

Those real-time updates, whether it’s the traffic on I-95 or reactions to the President’s State of the Union address, is something Google’s lacked. Now, however, you can find out what people are saying about your favorite sports team, traffic and anything else in real time. Google Real Time Search gives us the ability to see what is happening in our neighborhoods, and what people are talking about, as it’s happening.

Learn more about it by watching the Google Real Time Search Video.

#3 Google Personalized Search – While personalized search is nothing new, personalizing the results for you, me and all the other Googlers is...

Yes, that's right. On Friday Google announced it's personalizing everyone's search results by tracking everything you’ve searched for over 180 days, and using it to customize your results. And according to Danny Sullivan at SearchEngineLand.com, this shift is "the biggest change that has ever happened in search engines."

And while this will make determining ranking virtually impossible, it doesn't mean death for SEO or Internet marketing. You'll still need a solid strategy to get your site in the top results .

Read more and watch the video at Google, and then use your computer to click on your own site until it ranks #1!