Google (Nasdaq: GOOG) is nixing its free product search model, opting instead to charge merchants and retailers to appear in Google product search listings.
Currently, retailers can provide information about their products and then add them to the search listings for free, where they are ranked by popularity and price. Under the new model, dubbed "Google Shopping," retailers will be required to pay in order to appear in search results.
Rankings will then be determined by merchant bid price in addition to relevance. The products will appear in Google Shopping boxes, which will feature the paid search results in "sponsored" boxes above the regular search results.
Google Shopping is currently in an experimental phase and will be complete this fall. The search company hopes that maintaining a commercial relationship with retailers will help them keep their product listings up to date. Fresh and accurate search results will lead to a better online shopping experience for consumers and consequently more revenue for merchants, wrote Sameer Samat, vice president of product management for Google Shopping, in a blog post Thursday.
Google didn't respond to our request for additional comment.
Boosting Profits
In addition to creating what Google says will be a better experience for both merchants and shoppers, the new model could also boost Google's profit 
margin.
"Based on our clients' results, we would expect Google Shopping to increase Google's paid click total in the neighborhood of 2 to 5 percent over the long term. That's not a huge percentage, but it would ultimately mean billions more in revenue for Google," Mark Ballard, senior research analyst at Rimm-Kaufman Group, told the E-Commerce Times.
Profit is likely to come without many complaints from retailers, Ballard said.
"The reaction from our retail clients has been more positive than I expected," he said. "While no one is happy about having to pay for traffic that we were previously getting for free, a number of retailers have expressed optimism that the change will help fight price erosion and eliminate low-quality merchants who turn customers off from the entire comparison shopping channel."
The updated business model could even help merchants' bottom lines in addition to Google's, Rob Abdul, an e-commerce consultant, told the E-Commerce Times.
"I'm sure to offsetting the cost of a paid placement with a larger number of click-throughs will balance out the books," he said.
The retailers this move might hurt are the smaller ones, Ron Rule, vice president of e-commerce for Infusion Brands, told the E-Commerce Times. While larger retailers such as Amazon (Nasdaq: AMZN), Target and Walmart (NYSE: WMT) can already offer competitive pricing and have the budget to boost advertising and search placement, smaller brands that might have lucked out with free Google product search offers could struggle under the new model, he said.
That may not necessarily be bad news for consumers.
"It's the smaller websites, primarily those who carry no inventory and sell through drop-shippers, that will be hurt by the change," he said. "But that's not necessarily a bad thing for buyers -- as it stands, Google shopping is fairly easy to manipulate, and I've often searched for a product and landed on an 'out of stock, consider these instead' page. I suspect a lot of those never even had the product for sale and were simply looking to capitalize on searches for a major brand's name so they could offer a lower-priced alternative."
Keeping It Fair
Google has already faced criticism for its general search rankings, and having retailers pay for a spot in Shopping might raise more eyebrows among regulators, said Ballard. However, the distinction between Google Shopping products and other search results should help Google's side if a legal argument should arise.
"It seems that the federal authorities themselves aren't sure how search engines like Google should be regulated, but one key concern is that paid results be distinguished from the organic or algorithmic results," said Ballard. "This change will probably raise another round of questions about Google, but as long as they clearly label Google Shopping results as sponsored links, as they intend to, I believe they will be in the clear."
Google could also likely argue that under the new model, anyone has the chance to compete, said Abdul.
"I believe this is Google trying to even out the playing field between small and larger online retailers to compete fairly," said Abdul.
Shopping police illegal parking caught on camera (From Watford Observer) - Watford Observer
Police caught on camera parking on yellow lines for shopping trips in Watford
10:00am Friday 1st June 2012 in News By Mike Wright, Chief Reporter
Police officers in Watford have been caught on camera for the second time in two weeks parking on double yellow lines to go on shopping jaunts to supermarkets.
The town’s force is facing a mounting outcry after officers were snapped on Friday parking up on a pavement in central Watford for a trip to Iceland.
The revelation comes just a week after pictures emerged of police illegally parking in St Albans Road to visit a Tesco Express.
The pictures have been branded “disgraceful” by one former police detective who said the abuses damaged the force’s standing with the public.
Watford’s Chief Inspector Nick Caveney has also come down hard on the practice, saying the officers involved have been reprimanded and prosecuted.
The town’s top policeman also described the two incidents as a “rare lapse” in the behaviour of his committed and dedicated force.
The latest picture taken by a Watford resident who saw officers park their car on the pavement in Albert Road South, a stone’s throw away from Watford Police Station, where there are double yellow lines.
The resident, who asked not to be named, said: “A patrol car pulled up with all four wheels on the pavement, two officers jumped out slammed the door shut and left the engine running, presumably with the keys inside.
“I thought they were going to make an arrest but they strolled over to Iceland to do a bit of shopping.
“They emerged from the shop 10 minutes later with a bag of shopping. I wouldn’t mind but it would be quicker to walk from the police station in Shady Lane than to drive there.”
A retired Metropolitan Police detective, Terry Hymans, who lives in Rickmansworth, said he felt there was no excuse for officers misusing parking privileges.
He also said actions like the ones caught on camera damaged the public’s trust in the police.
“I think it is disgraceful personally,” he said “I don’t think there is any excuse. This is part of the reason people have little regard for police officers today.
“It sends out a signal of don’t do as I do, do as I say. People will naturally assume they (the police) all do it and that is not true.”
The first pictures police parking on yellow lines was first captured by Abbots Langley resident Kevin Brown who submitted them to the Watford Observer last week.
He said he was “amazed” to see an officer park on a double yellow lines on a pavement in St Albans Road before spending seven minutes in Tesco Express and emerging with a shopping bag.
Following the revelations Chief Inspector for Watford, Nick Caveney said he was “shocked and surprised” to see the pictures.
He said: “As police officers, we have a very clear responsibility to operate totally within the law, whether this is when dealing with people we have arrested or while using a public highway in a police vehicle.
We have to set a good example to our communities and these incidents clearly do not. I am glad these have been brought to my attention and have since spoken with the officers concerned to establish the circumstances.
“Had they been responding to an emergency, illegal parking is justified and allowed, but this was not the case.
The officers concerned have been reprimanded for their behaviour and just like any other member of the public, are being prosecuted for their actions.”
“I’m very proud of our team here in Watford who work beyond the call of duty on a daily basis in order to keep our communities safe.
“These incidents are a rare lapse in an otherwise committed, dedicated and upstanding team.”
Comments(14)
TRT says...
10:02am Fri 1 Jun 12
Hornets number 12 fan says...
10:04am Fri 1 Jun 12
Taximan says...
11:07am Fri 1 Jun 12
AWatfordTaxpayer says...
11:34am Fri 1 Jun 12
One of the horses then did his business right there in the middle of the pedestrian walkway, a few yards from the entrance to McDonalds, leaving a load of manure for any lucky gardener passing by, or any unlucky pedestrian going by, if you get my drift.
I asked the rider, a policewoman, what she was going to do about it. She replied it was a job for the council and that she was going to do nothing about it. After chatting a while longer, the riders went on their separate ways, leaving the steaming deposit for the people of Watford to enjoy at their leisure.
As a dog owner, I would be liable to a £1000 fine for leaving a dog poo on the pavement. The police leave something altogether more impressive and just ignored it, and that outside a popular fast food restaurant.
It really is one rule for us, and one for them, isn't it? The policewoman was not embarrassed at all, it was really just a case of "tough luck, shoppers".
I took photos to send to the council, of the horse in the act and the mess left afterwards, but decided not to as I doubted they would care or do anything about it.
I must admit, I was very disappointed in the police for leaving this steaming manure in the middle of the street and doing nothing at all about it. The policewoman just tried to ignore it until I brought it to her attention, whereupon she dismissed it.
Taximan says...
11:47am Fri 1 Jun 12
Reg Edit says...
11:53am Fri 1 Jun 12
Reg Edit says...
11:59am Fri 1 Jun 12
garston tony says...
12:12pm Fri 1 Jun 12
TRT says...
12:25pm Fri 1 Jun 12
garston tony says...
1:05pm Fri 1 Jun 12
LSC says...
1:10pm Fri 1 Jun 12
TRT says...
1:14pm Fri 1 Jun 12
onlyonerodthomas says...
1:22pm Fri 1 Jun 12
Maclanx says...
2:57pm Fri 1 Jun 12
Electricity prices seen ‘moving in the right direction’: skyward - Houston Chronicle
Summer reading, Texas style? (AFP/Getty Images)
This is the summer of truth for Texas’ costly experiment in electricity deregulation. By the time the first cool front rolls across Texas in the fall, it should be clear that under our current system, electricity can be cheap, or it can be reliable, but it can’t be both. And it may be neither.
A study commissioned by the Electric Reliability Council of Texas, the state’s grid operator, recommends tripling wholesale prices to avert blackouts like the state experienced in February 2011. The Public Utility Commission will vote on a plan later this month to raise the wholesale price cap by 50 percent, with additional increases planned for next year. ERCOT’s study merely “confirms that we are moving in the right direction,” PUC Chairman Donna Nelson said in a statement today.
After the state embraced deregulation, Texans endured a decade of electricity prices that were higher than most of the country. We were told that was because natural gas prices rose, which no one expected. Now that they’ve fallen to the level they were at when this experiment began, we’re told prices must triple.
For more than a year, Texas has struggled with capacity issues. The wholesale price caps put in place to keep electricity affordable for consumers have prevented generators from investing in additional generating plants. Lenders are unwilling to pump capital into the market because the return on investment is too low.
The solution? Allow prices to rise. And that’s why, despite a decade low in natural gas prices, which account for most of the state’s generation, and falling coal prices, electricity rates are going up across most of the state this summer. The prices increases won’t bring new generation online fast enough to prevent possible shortages this summer, but hey, you have to start somewhere.
By lifting the wholesale price cap, though, the PUC is unleashing another problem: more market volatility. As I wrote a few weeks ago, some spot markets for electricity are already seeing this. The higher caps expand the range of fluctuation for prices. That means retailers — the companies that sell you electricity — must spend more to hedge against price swings. The more they hedge, the more it squeezes their already razor-thin profit margins. In 2008, five retailers shut down because of price volatility. This summer, more could be forced out of business or forced to break their fixed-price contracts with consumers.
On Tuesday, TXU, a Dallas-based retailer, suggested in a filing to the PUC that companies be allowed to break fixed-price contracts with residential and small commercial customers if higher price caps increase retailers’ costs. In what may be the understatement of the year, TXU said it realizes that “changing the price of a fixed-price product would likely create a negative customer experience.” It added:
If, however, this upcoming summer turns out to have extreme weather or extreme price volatility that affects TXU Energy’s wholesale costs, then TXU Energy might be forced to re-evaluate this position.
In other words, TXU wants a fixed-priced contract without a fixed price, and it’s not alone. NRG, which owns Reliant and Green Mountain, and Consolidated Edison Solutions made similar filings.
So 10 years into the deregulation fiasco, we’re looking at a summer in which consumers, having endured years of high prices, can expect them to only go higher; retailers may not be able to afford to honor their customer contracts and generators may not be able to afford to keep the lights on.
This is “moving in the right direction”?
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