There has been lots of talk about Google’s new local carousel in the local search community lately. Most of this talk centers on strategy and less on how to trigger a carousel search. Internally we have been wrestling with a couple of questions:
1) How broad has the carousel rollout been?
2) Is the carousel the future for local search?
How many verticals has Carousel affected?
There were numerous early answers to this question, particularly this list created via live query research by Adam Dorfman of SIM Partners. Besides the specific queries that cause a local carousel to trigger, Mike Blumenthal did some quick research and determined that in order for a carousel to trigger, the query has to return at least five results.
Anybody who knows me knows I am data driven, so Dave Rodecker and I talked about using our existing crawlers and large database of clients to see if we could figure out some really specific queries that trigger carousel results.
Methodology
One of the quirks of the carousel is that when it triggers, there is no pack result triggered as well. Luckily, thanks to our technology team, our crawlers are able to distinguish between different pieces of a Google SERP so we can see which search queries trigger what types of vertical and universal search features. We compiled a list of queries from recent crawls that triggered carousel results. We verified these were carousel queries by checking to see if a Places result was also triggered, then we spot checked several of them with live searches. Here is a list of queries that we know are currently triggering carousel results:
| Accommodations |
| Adult Entertainment Club |
| American Food Catering |
| American Restaurant |
| American Restaurant Fremont CA |
| Amusement Center |
| Art Gallery |
| Auditorium |
| Authentic French Cuisine |
| Authentic French Restaurant |
| Banquet Hall |
| Barbecue Catering |
| Barbecue Catering San Diego CA |
| BBQ Ribs Restaurant |
| Beach Motel |
| Beach Resort |
| Beachfront Weddings |
| Bed & Breakfast |
| Boat Charter Service |
| Box Lunch Supplier |
| Brunch Restaurant |
| Butcher Shop |
| Cakes |
| Campground |
| Campgrounds |
| Caterer |
| Caterers |
| Catering |
| Catering Service |
| Catering Services |
| Children Entertainment |
| Children’s Entertainment |
| Clowns |
| Cocktail Bar |
| Coffee Shop |
| Conference Center |
| Corporate Caterer |
| Corporate Catering |
| corporate fishing charters |
| Custom Cake Designer |
| Dance Company |
| Deep Sea Charters |
| Deep Sea Fishing |
| Deep Sea Fishing Charters |
| Deli |
| Deli Catering Service |
| Delicatessen Counter Services |
| Dive Instructor |
| DJ |
| Dog Friendly Restaurant |
| Entertainment Agency |
| Event Caterer |
| Event Catering |
| Event Planner |
| Event Room |
| Event Venue |
| Charter Fishing |
| Family Fishing Trips |
| Family Restaurant |
| Fine Art |
| Fine Dining Restaurant |
| Fishing |
| Fishing Area |
| Fishing Charter |
| Fishing Charters |
| Fishing Store |
| Fishing Supplies |
| Fishing Tours |
| Food Catering |
| Food Store |
| Ft. Lauderdale Steaks |
| Gluten Free Produce Store |
| Grocery Store |
| Guitar Instructor |
| Home Stlye Cooking |
| Honey Shop |
| Horse Boarding Stable |
| Horse Riding School |
| Hotel |
| Hunting Club |
| Indian Grocery Store |
| Indoor Party Place |
| Inn |
| Italian American Catering |
| Italian American Restaurants |
| Italian Catering |
| Italian Delivery Restaurant |
| Italian Food Caterer |
| Italian Food Delivery |
| Italian Food Restaurant |
| Italian Food Restaurants |
| Italian Pizza Restaurants |
| Kids Entertainment |
| Live Music |
| Local BBQ restaurant |
| Local Diver Tours |
| Local Produce Store |
| Lodge |
| Lodging |
| Lodgings |
| Luxury Hotel |
| Magic Shows |
| Magician |
| Maui Scuba Diving |
| Meeting Caterer |
| Mexican Bar & Grill |
| Mexican Takeout Restaurant |
| Mobile DJ Service |
| Motel |
| Motel Ronan |
| Music Instruction |
| Music Instructor |
| Music Lessons |
| Music School |
| Music Studio |
| Musical Instrument Rental Service |
| Musical Instrument Repair Shop |
| Musical Instrument Store |
| Natural Foods Store |
| Overnight Fishing Charters |
| party painter |
| Party Venue |
| Photography Gallery |
| Piano Classes |
| Piano Instruction |
| Piano Instructor |
| Piano Lessons |
| Piano Repair Service |
| Piano Repairs |
| Piano Restoration |
| Piano School |
| Piano Service |
| Piano Tuner |
| Piano Tuning Service |
| Pizza Catering |
| Pizza Delivery Restaurant |
| Pizza Delivery Restaurants |
| Pizza Takeout |
| Private Chef |
| Professional Recording Studio |
| Psychic |
| Psychic Medium |
| Psychic Reader |
| Psychic Readings |
| Recording Studio |
| Restaurant Bakery |
| Resort |
| Restaurant Bakery |
| Saltwater Fishing |
| SCUBA Tour Agency |
| Sightseeing Tour Agency |
| South American Restaurant |
| Sport Fishing |
| Sport Fishing Charters |
| Sportfishing |
| Sports Fishing |
| Steakhouse Restaurant |
| Supermarket |
| Surf City Motel |
| Tarot Card Reader |
| Tarot Psychic |
| Tarot Readings |
| Thai Takeout |
| Tourist Attraction |
| Tourist Information Center |
| Used Musical Instrument Store |
| Wedding Bakery |
| Wedding Caterer |
| Wedding Caterers |
| Wedding Ceremonys |
| Wedding Chapel |
| Wedding Planner |
| Wedding Receptions |
| Wedding Venue |
| Wine Bar |
Obviously, this list is not comprehensive; it is limited to our client list. We do hope to unleash our crawlers with a more robust mission in the future.
Takeaways
This list reveals queries triggering Google’s local carousel spreads across many more verticals than many people, myself included, initially thought. It runs the gamut from professional services (wedding planner) to the more traditional food and beverage industry queries that everyone knows about, to the hyper specific i.e. piano tuner. Seeing the extensive number of queries triggering carousel results leads me to think this may be a live beta that Google is testing for user experience and value before rolling it out to more verticals over time. Are there any other odd queries or verticals that you see triggering carousel results? If so, I would love to hear of them.