The Golden Hat

The New York Times had an interesting article today about the future of the Web and the inevitable expansion of Mobile Search. There were those of us screaming “Go Mobile!” even a couple of years ago, long before the iPhone slapped us in the face and welcomed us to the world of mobile capabilities. Some research suggests that Mobile Search ad spend could climb upwards of $2.2 billion by 2010. Considering the current economy I’m not so sure that the push for online omnipresence by many major brands and companies will expand that rapidly. I’m no expert, nor am I a statistician, so what do I know? However, even if mobile search grows half as fast as the forecasts suggest we can still expect a multi-billion dollar mobile ad market within the next 5-7 years.

If you haven’t begun thinking about a mobile Web strategy, then perhaps you should start to.

Google, Yahoo! and MSN have all embarked on developing mobile search tools, functionality, guidelines and resources. Today though I chose to focus on Yahoo! Go 3.0 Beta. In the past I think I’ve been partial to Google (who isn’t?) yet I want to give Yahoo! some much needed love - and by love I mean blogging.

So what is Yahoo! Go 3.0 Beta? In Yahoo!’s own words, Go 3.0 is an all-in-one solution for anyone with a mobile phone. Go let’s you “send an email, upload photos, download a map, search for answers, check stock quotes, or get breaking news…” Basically, think of it is your iGoogle but on your phone - but it’s Yahoo! At a glance you can view how many new emails you have, updated news snippets, photos recently posted by your friends in social media, and all sorts of other widgets that help you customize the information supported by Go 3.0 Beta. If you’re an SEO’er trying to leverage widgets for branding, traffic, and possibly even link value then make sure you don’t forget about mobile widgets as well.

Yahoo! also lets users take a test drive of Go 3.0 on their desktop to get a feel for the look and functionality. Check out the Go 3.0 demo here.

With compatibility on over 270 phones, Yahoo! Go is a sure bet. With bugs inherent in anything that’s Beta I wouldn’t worry if you encounter some issues. Just make sure you report these or else they’ll never get corrected. If you’re more tech savvy than the average Joe then check out their developer’s section for information on mobile capabilities with Yahoo!.

Like this article? Share, save, and spread it!