Did You Watch The Oscars? So Did Google

(Photo: “Oscars 2015 – 87th Academy Awards,” by flickr user Jim Pop via Attribution 2.0 License)

Google Knowledge Graph: We have been very interested in this recently here at Delucchi Plus. Glance at the latest ‘On The Brink’ blog post that takes a deep dive into the subject if you are itching to learn the ins and outs of this beautiful Google search feature.

To recap, the Google Knowledge Graph is here to make searching quick and easy. Instead of the need to click on one of the URLs, Google provides the answers to you right there on the results page in nice boxes either on the right-hand side, a carousel at the very top, or for mobile it is the first box in the SERP. Here is a very common example I’m sure everyone reading this has had, I know I have…

While watching Arrow on the CW (which everyone should do), you see China White and ask yourself, what a minute, where have I seen that actress before? So then you Google it. The Knowledge Graph pops up with her pictures and her filmography and wham! Duh! She was Pearl of course from The Vampire Diaries – you know Anna’s mom, remember Anna who was an evil vampire but then she and Jeremy fell in love but she just was using him to unlock the tomb to get her mom, Pearl, out? – (Another one you won’t regret watching, emotional rollercoaster and all). But hey! That took 2 seconds! Boom.

Moving on, Google has been making strides in making the search process more streamlined for the user. So what did Google do now you ask?

Well, on Sunday night, the Oscars were on, and some of us tuned in to watch. Our friends at Google did too. For the past month, both Google and Bing have had the nominees listed in the Google Knowledge Graph for any search queries for “Oscar nominee” or “Oscar nominations” as well as for specific award categories.  They included a “Winners” box as well that listed the award recipients going as far back as 2010. Obviously Google wouldn’t just stop there. As every single award was presented, Google was updating the Knowledge Graph to coincide. On multiple devices (screenshot below is from an iPhone 6) you could see that not one minute after the actor/actress left the stage the information was updated as the 2015 winner of said award. In real-time, Google was able to be sure that the Knowledge Graph was staying as up-to-date as possible. You could see the winner literally minutes after the award was given.

Photo: Screen grab via Google

Now this particular Oscar updating feature may not be of the direst necessity for all users, but it certainly does impact the searching experience. You can be confident that the information pulled into those boxes on Google is the most recent and relevant.  Google is working hard to provide the answers to us for our search queries without making us add the step of clicking on and searching through a website. As a Digital Analyst who works to drive traffic to websites, this may not necessarily help me out, but I have to say, seeing this happen simultaneously as I was watching the show was quite majestic.