Vertical search is the term people sometimes use for specialty or niche search engines that focus on a limited data set (as already mentioned, Google calls them onebox results). Examples of vertical search solutions provided by the major search engines are image, video, news, and blog searches. These may be standard offerings from these vendors, but they are distinct from the engines’ general web search functions.

Vertical search results can provide significant opportunities for the SEO practitioner. High placement in these vertical search results can equate to high placement in the web search results, often above the traditional 10 blue links presented by the search engines.

1 Vertical Search from the Major Search Engines

The big three search engines offer a wide variety of vertical search products. Here is a partial list:

Google

Google Maps, Google Images, Google Product Search, Google Blog Search, Google Video, Google News, Google Custom Search Engine, Google Book Search, Google US Gov’t Search, etc.

Yahoo!

Yahoo! News, Yahoo! Local, Yahoo! Images, Yahoo! Video, Yahoo! Shopping, Yahoo! Audio Search, etc.

Bing

Bing Image, Bing Video, Bing News, Bing Maps, Bing Health, Bing Products, etc.