Yahoo! Japan Search Team Blog [J] announced that their search results page by TV program names show products, services and point of interests (shops, restaurants, etc.) at the top.
Here is an example which I searched on Y!J by keyword “ladies 4″(in Japanese, of course), an afternoon program featuring lifestyle info on TV Tokyo.
At the top of the result, preceding to the official site, Wikipedia page and others, latest products links provided by Yahoo! TV G-Guide (online TV info).
In this case, food products and a restaurant taken up on today’s program were listed, and linked to a detail page, from where you can check the restaurant info and food products name, price and details. Each products are not linked to Yahoo! Shopping, but I think they should do that.
The official blog tells that every time some food and shops are introduced on TV, search volume of the food and shop names hikes up. But there are many inaccurate names also typed and those TV watchers might fail to reach the info. Yahoo! Japan recommend to search by the program name you are watching/have watched and they will give all featured info on search.
Currently this only works for TV stations in Kanto/Tokyo area, but as the area covers over 30 million of population, this may enhance TV program’s influence to shop-owners, e-commerce companies, etc., and some wise producers may also recommend Yahoo! Japan search more than competitors when they need.
