Google is giving voters a new way to learn more about the U.S. presidential candidates. The company has unveiled what it says an “experimental,” non-paid feature enabling Democratic and Republican presidential bets to generate content that will show up in a special window on the search results page.
The candidates’ campaign-related content and messages will appear in a horizontal carousel in search results once a user performs a relevant search.
The window is going to bear some resemblances with the way Twitter posts presently appear for candidate-related searches. However, Google’s module seems to be more accommodating. With this feature, presidential candidates aren't just permitted to push out a text with as many as 14,400 characters, they are can also include up to 10 images, videos or GIFs for every single post as well.
These candidate cards will be constantly updated, and even though older cards get pushed off the slide carousel, these cards will still be found on the Web. On top of that, as soon as a content goes popular, it will likewise be displayed on the search engine.
Google shared on a blog post that “political search interest spikes 440 percent on average during live televised debates as people turn to the Web to learn more about the candidates and their platforms.”
It says that this experimental feature will offer an alternative way for individuals to hear straight from their candidates in real-time.
Google underscores that this module "levels the playing field" for presidential candidates to talk about their positions and ideas on issues that they may not have tackled during debates. What's more, this feature can help voters make more knowledgeable choices.
Beginning Thursday (during the presidential debate which Google co-sponsors with Fox News) through the political election in November, people will expect this feature to crop up in search results.
It is worth mentioning that these presidential candidate cards will also show up on Web search results.
Right now, the Mountain View-based company has only allowed Republican and Democratic presidential candidates to benefit from this module.
Furthermore, Google does not go into the details whether it is thinking about expanding this feature to other content areas.
