The Knowledge Graph: Google’s Next Big Search Change

Today Google announced a change that’s going to be gradually rolled out starting today, called the Knowledge Graph. This is an effort to connect more with the variety in meaning all keywords tend to have, and help people find what they’re looking for a little more easily.

It looks very much like a way of giving people options within the search results. It’s based on all the data Google has been acquiring around keywords. So when enough people have searched for “JFK birthday”, then one of the pieces of data that will appear when you search for “JFK” will likely be his birthday. Google has taken a “most people are looking for X, so let’s show X for more generic searches” approach.

Details like this are what the Knowledge Graph is intended to do. It’s almost like a mini-Wikipedia entry displayed on the front page. Exactly what searches gets these types of displays we’ll have to see over time.

They’ve also added a “People also search for” entry that links related queries to the search. So perhaps you’re looking up your favorite movie, this extra element may help you find similar movies that you didn’t know about. It appears to be something similar to the Netflix “Top 10 For You” option, but instead of basing it off of movies you’ve ranked, it’s basing it off of searches all people make.

One other detail is that the Knowledge Graph is being customized for mobile devices so that it works well for anyone on their phone/pad. It’s a big move.

You can find out more details and see their related video on this post from Google’s Blog by Amit Singhal.