TechFold - Bold tech & web commentary

Bold tech & web commentary

TechFold is technology discussion, commentary, reviews, and opinions from well outside the valley. There's no koolaid to drink here, and TechFold is not in SL, or on Twitter.

Merchants of Death: FuneralHomes.com, or “everything has a vertical”

Here’s a pretty uninspired vertical, that looks to be built for search engine rankings: FuneralHomes.com. Say what you will about “directory” sites of this type, FuneralHomes.com does have a surprisingly comprehensive list of funeral homes, though their resources are sparse. Oddly enough, the site seems to have a real advertising model, as opposed to the endemic AdSense placements.

Anyway, the point of this post is that “everything has a vertical.” Its a strange quirk of search engine algorithms that has created this republishing ecosystem; whether its in consumers best interests is a matter of perspective - a vertical like FuneralHomes.com may quickly connect users to relevant listings — but lacks the true credibility of purely organic search results or the agnosticism of phonebook listings.

Earlier today I was rambling on about the ability of Recommendation and Discovery services to supplant search engines; if that indeed came to pass many verticals would be cut out of the new search ecosystem.