Froogle emerged shortly before Google's IPO. It was part of a flurry of new services designed to show that the company was about more than general search. Well, general search has been pretty good to Google, but Froogle has not. It was removed from the Google front page last month, and now it will be "de-emphasized" further as Google turns its energies to the development of Google Base.

Listing a product on Google Base means that it is retrievable through a Google search, according to a Bear Stearns report: "When users conduct a product search on Google.com, they will be [presented] with an additional search box where they can refine their search. When the user refines the search, Google takes the user to a second page, which will be filled with product results only from Google Base."

I like this idea for a number of reasons, but mainly because Google has partnered with Intuit to integrate QuickBooks and Base. Small business users will be able to upload directly from their inventory records in QuickBooks to Google Base. Here is a press release describing the plan.

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