New Search feature with Google Sitelinks

Just another regular day of good old SEO ass kicking here at eVis… My office mate Fumi is on the phone with a client chatting away while I’m doing my unintended eves-dropping because we sit a few feet away from each other. Then I hear Fumi yelp a “Whaaaaaaat???” in mid-sentence and I had to look at his screen.

He’s already calling me over, and pointing at his screen while getting back into his conversation. I look at his screen and I see search results for “ftc” on his screen. I notice the usual Sitelinks and then, the unexpected:

WHOA!! What the heck is that “Search ftc.gov” doing there?

Is Google trying something new behind my back? I haven’t heard of any buzz about this new feature yet, so I can say I was truly surprised.

Is this something Google is awarding sites with extremely high authority, like ft.gov for example?

Is this something Google is just testing out but will be implemented to every site that is awarded Sitelinks?

Will we have any control over this tool through Google Webmaster?

There will be some researching here on my end, as I’m sure there are many other blogs writing about this right now, so let me figure this out write a bit more about it later.

Just wanted to share the new findings! Take care and please do comment about it with your thoughts.