Much has been made of Google’s willingness – and now need considering the economic downturn – to monetize Google Images search. Google has even suggested that it may mean an incremental $200 million.

But they’ve been cautious to add AdWords to Image search – perhaps because it is a difficult balance between matching user intent and relevancy….

Until today – the first day I noticed prominent ads within image search. I don’t believe that this implementation is effective – and certainly not capable of generating $200m. The trouble is that it does a poor job of matching ads with what the user is looking for: imagery. Even if the ads are interesting – my eye immediately seeks graphics… because that is my clear, stated intent.

Google has graphic inventory to leverage – from AdWords to DoubleClick to Froogle. There has to be a better solution.

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