• by Laurie Sullivan  @lauriesullivan, May 5, 2010

Simplicity has always been Google's mantra. Keep the search results free from clutter and make it easy for people to find information in the least amount of time. Some believe pictures, rather than words, provide an easy way to accomplish the task, especially as search moves on to more mobile devices running Android and tablets with touchscreens, such as Apple's iPad.

Search is going visual and Google plans to take it there. It appears the ever-changing Web prompted the Mountain View, Calif. search engine to once again shake up its special formula -- the one that gets people to click on paid-search ad links and sponsored links Sitelinks, which sometimes appear as blue links under the first listing in search results because each time a consumer clicks on an ad, Google hears 'chi-ching.'

Google announced visual changes to its user interface Wednesday. This time it added icons accompanying words that sort results down the left panel. The options and tools give people the ability to only see the most relevant searches on queries. A click-everything option allows the person to see it all. The new design refreshes and streamlines the look, feel and functions, writes Marissa Mayer, Google vice president of search products and user experience, in a blog. Google has been testing these changes with users during the past few months, and what launched today reflects the feedback.

"All this information was readily available in the top navigation bar, but it appears that search engines have begun to try and interact with people more on a personal level, making search more visual," says Nick Talbert, director of product marketing at Eyeblaster. "The changes actually look more like WolframAlpha, instead of Bing."

Making search more visual allows advertisers -- especially retail stores and manufacturers -- the ability to show consumers, rather than tell. Advertisers, at one time, had only 25 characters to make a point. Now they have a picture, which gives then 1,000 words, Talbert says. David Goldman, senior search specialist at MRM Worldwide, likes Google's approach to keeping the environment clean and less cluttered, but says they simply move the filters to the left side of the page. "Google probably conducted lots of research to determine users are more likely to interact with filters on the side rather than at the top of the page," he says. "The experience is clean, but I feel like there's unneeded blank space on the page."

The search engines are definitely trying to improve user experience through filters. Brett Brewer, general manager at Microsoft Live Labs, demonstrated at the Search Insider Summit last month in Captiva Island, Fla. that the visual search application Pivot, a Sliverlight plug-in, could become the future of search, Goldman says.

Google's decision to alter the page will impact how people interact with the search engine, but it's not clear whether it will have an impact on ad sales.