Well, as you are reading this the odds are that you have realised a few reasons to care already – great start.
Although Google, Bing and many other search engines are performing anywhere in the spectrum from the good to the brilliant in finding relevant content for your searches, it doesn’t yet provide you with the type of up to the second results we’re getting used to at Facebook and Twitter. It’s no secret that both Google and Bing are looking to implement real-time support to their search services (check out Bing Tweets and read on TechCruch about Google), and I’m sure that by this time next year both will have very solid real-time search implementations that has altered many search behaviours. Hence we need to prepare for the future, today.
With everyone getting serious about real-time  search you need to start thinking about how it is going to impact your strategy.
Well firstly, it depends on how it will be implemented. Today anyone looking for the freshest articles on Google typically use Google News. I imagine that Google’s final real-time implementation will not just be a separate feature, but integrated as per their ‘one-box’ approach and sit pretty right between the PPC ads and the Organic results for suitable searches. This could of course potentially harm your PPC ads click-through rates and detract from your SEO listings. From a PPC perspective this will put even more emphasis on feed and stock management and for SEO it puts even more pressure on relevant up to date content.
Another service that I can see thriving in a real-time world is online reputation management services, as brand marketers will be worried out of their minds about what people are saying right now about their products and services. And with Google as the vehicle delivering the consumer stories, the massive reach could potentially make or break any campaign if not brand.
How are you preparing for real-time search?
Update 2 october: This brilliant post outlines ten ways that real-time search can be used beyond just the immediate inclusion of Tweets.
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Enjoyed reading your post. Real time search becomes important and relevant when you are interested in what is going on out there right now. It is a great tool for marketers in order to see how people talk about their business or brand right now; for journalist who mine the online data and might find great resources in what people are talking about right now; for any surfer who wants to monitor a fav topic and be kept up to date at all times and not to mention that it is also helpful for those who are searching for keywords that drive traffic right now.
Monika Lorincz
http://surchur.com