What is Google Base ?

Google Base is a Beta service that allows publishers to add their information to the "Google Base". It's a place where you can easily submit all types of online and offline content, which is made searchable on Google. All types of item submissions are accepted online and off-line information in a variety of formats. Google Base uses tagging similar to that found in many social-bookmarking applications.

Simply describe your items on Base to make them as easy as possible for people to find when they search. You don't even need a website to put your stuff online. In fact, based on the items' relevance, users may find them in their results for searches on Google Product Search, Google Maps or the main Google search.

• Cost: Free

• Languages: Google Base is currently available in English and German.

• Reach: Items submitted to Google Base may be found on other Google sites like Google, Google Product Search and Google Maps.

• What's different: Google Base allows you to add attributes describing the content, so that searchers can easily find it. The more popular individual attributes become, the more often Google will suggest them when others post the same items. Similarly, items that become popular will show up as suggested items in the Choose an existing item type menu.

Google Base currently accepts bulk uploads in CSV, RSS 1.0, RSS 2.0 and Atom 0.3 formats. Content providers who already have RSS feeds can submit content to Google Base without requiring a lot of additional work. Many publishers have merged topics and multiple RSS feeds into a single feed. This is inefficient and may ultimately hurt the structure of Google Base, as each RSS feed may contain items that are unrelated. One cool feature is a geo-targeting search feature that produces results for a very specific region. Unfortunately, many submissions don't include a product location so the geo-targeting feature, while a neat addition, will need some refinement.

As with all systems, there is the potential for abuse, and this one's no different. By submitting content using labels, the system is prone to rampant spam. There does appear to be a "checks and balances" in place with each listing showing a "report a bad link" button. This allows searchers to report content that has been improperly tagged, contains adult content, or is otherwise inappropriate content.

While Google Base is still in beta, it is clear that it may need to be polished.

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Jerry West is the Director of Internet Marketing for WebMarketingNow. He has been consulting on the web since 1996 and has assisted hundreds of companies gain an upper-hand over their competition. Visit Web Marketing Now for the latest in marketing tips that are tested and proven.

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