Website Review: Google Blog Search

Based on the facial expressions (e.g. confusion, embarrassment, disgust)  we get from many of our clients when we mention the subject of blogs, we have a sneaking suspicion that many professionals today still haven’t quite grasped the “blogosphere” as of yet — or harnessed its awesome potential for assisting them with their job search and ongoing career management efforts.

Just as with e-mail about 10 years ago, however, we’re rapidly reaching the point in time where an understanding of blogs is no longer “optional” for most corporate professionals, especially those whose careers relate in any way to technology, marketing, or executive management.  So if you haven’t yet dipped your toe in the blogging waters, so to speak, it’s a great time to start.  And while the concept may sound intimidating or formidable, it’s actually one of the easiest technologies for the average non-technical person to understand, since it’s really nothing much fancier than a collection of “online diaries” from people around the globe who feel strongly enough about a particular subject to want to write about it on a regular basis — and share their thoughts with the rest of the world.

As a result, there are blogs out there covering just about every conceivable topic under the sun, ranging from Animal Husbandry to Zen Buddhism.  Some people “journal” about their topics every day, while others only make entries once every few months.  Additionally, some bloggers write in a very casual way, while other bloggers (especially corporate ones) author their blog articles with the utmost seriousness and professionalism.  Most importantly, however, blog content does NOT tend to be found through a general Internet search on Google, Yahoo, MSN, or any other common search engine.  You can only access this content by searching on particular sites that specialize in the indexing/storage of blog data.

Which search site should you use?  Well, there are actually dozens of them out there, and some of them like Technorati have been around for years — but given that Google has jumped into this arena with their Google Blog Search site, we’re going to bet that they become king of the hill in this regard fairly quickly, if they aren’t already.   Plus, most job seekers are already familiar with Google, so they’re likely to be more comfortable with this new product if they haven’t played around much with blogs in the past.  So we’d encourage each of you to kick the tires on this new site and to try searching it with some appropriate language related to your job search, career goals, and industry targets!