Google has a special feature called integrated results built into the search page. This search feature searches across all types of content and displays results that are most relevant to your search. Integrated results could be from multiple content types, such as images, news, books, maps and videos.
Integrated results can help you find information more quickly. For instance, if you want to find the current weather for your city or town, you might go through the following steps: type your search query in the Google search page, sift through the search results to find the right website, go to the relevant website, click multiple links or type more text in the website to specify your locale, and, finally, wait for the website to load the results. However, with integrated results, you can just type the "weather" and the locale (the locale can be the name of your city or your zip code) in the Google search box to get the information you seek immediately. Let's say you are looking up the weather in Mountain View. Typing "weather 94043" in the search box triggers the integrated result to appear at the top of the Google search results page. You do not have to scroll down or click anything else to get the answer to your query.
The search result that is highlighted by the red box is an example of an integrated result.
A subscribed link is an integrated result that you create. The Subscribed Links API enables you to create your customized version of the special search results, as well as define the keywords or queries that would trigger your custom search results. Folks who subscribe to your subscribed links can add your information or services to their Google search results page.
Your Subscribed Links results appear in the fourth position of the Google search results.
You can create two types of subscribed links: basic and dynamic.
A basic subscribed link is the simplest type of subscribed links. You create a basic subscribed link with the Subscribed Links wizard. The wizard lets you create search keywords and the contents of your custom search results. It also lets you you preview how your custom results might appear on your users' search results page. Basic subscribed links are suitable for developers who want to create only a small number of custom search results with information that does not change.
A dynamic subscribed link allows you to specify more complex search keywords and custom results. Dynamic subscribed links are made up of text files that you upload to Google or host on your website. The subsequent pages in this developer guide will walk you through the process of creating a more advanced dynamic subscribed link.
Both types of subscribed links can include a title, a body of descriptive text, and a URL, but dynamic subscribed links can also include images and Google Gadgets.
Hello World
A good way to really understand a subscribed link is by creating one. We'll create our first subscribed link, then we'll look at the XML code underneath it.
Creating a Basic Subscribed Link
To create your first subscribed link, do the following:
Define the query and its corresponding result in the wizard. Your custom results can include a title, some descriptive text, and a URL.
The wizard lets you preview how your custom result appears on the Google search results page.
Read the Terms of Service, then select the "I have read and agree to the Terms of Service." check box.
Click the Next button. The second page of the wizard generates HTML code that you can copy and paste to your website. The HTML code creates a button that enables visitors to your website to subscribe to your subscribed link. But you don't need to add the HTML code to your website now; you can wait until you are ready to publish your subscribed link. For more information on making your subscribed link public, see the Publishing Your Subscribed Link page.
Click Finish.
Test your Subscribed Link by going to the Google search page, typing your query (if you are following the example closely, it would be "Hello" or "hello") in the search box, and clicking the Search button.
The custom result is the fourth result in the Google search results.
You can see your custom result because you are automatically subscribed to your own subscribed link. Other users will not see your Hello World subscribed link unless they have subscribed to you. For more information about sharing your Subscribed Links, see the Publishing Your Subscribed Links page.
Looking Under the Covers
You don't need to understand this yet, but if you want to look under the covers, this is the XML code that the wizard has created for you:
