Google improves enterprise search offering

Google's On-Demand Indexing can quickly update search results when more web content is added

Google has enhanced its enterprise search offering to allow businesses to incorporate new pages into web site search results more quickly.

The new On-Demand Indexing feature offers site owners an 'Index Now' button, which Google claims can be used to quickly update search results when more web content is added. Previously, publishers had to wait for Google to automatically update the index on an ad-hoc basis.

One of the first users of On-Demand Indexing is Adobe, which is using the solution to keep its new online Adobe Community Help site up to date.

"We are now able to index thousands of new pages and make them available to millions of users worldwide within hours," said Tanya Wendling, Adobe Learning Resources senior director.

Large companies with popular web sites that are frequently crawled by Google will not see a significant difference to search result quality by using On-Demand Indexing, according to a source close to the firm. But web sites that are indexed less regularly should notice an improvement to the relevancy of their search service, the source said.

Google has also published a set of best practice guidelines for web site owners to maximise their site's performance on Google, including better title and description meta tags, URL structure, site navigation, content creation and anchor text.

"We plan on updating the guide at regular intervals with new optimisation suggestions and to keep the technical advice current," said Brandon Falls, from Google's Search Quality Team, in a blog posting.