Content

London Car Bombs: The Big Fat Search Failure

I was in London last night right smack in the area where a large bomb was defused this morning. Naturally, I was curious about what exactly had happened. I hit the news sites, but then I wondered what would happen for those searching generally for information using search engines. Both Google and Ask.com in particular […]

Apple

Searcharazzi: Potpourri

How, we ask, can Searcharazzi compete with the iPhone today? Any salacious details on the first malfunctions? Disappointed users? Easter egg functionality? Do tell, as Searcharazzi is not exactly camping out in front of an Apple Store. We did, of course, get our email from Apple saying that the iPhone is indeed here. So let’s […]

Ecommerce

Google Launches “Question and Answers” In Russia

Googling Google reports Google Russia has launched a Questions & Answers service in Russia. Although Google closed down Google Answers late last year, this launch of Questions & Answers is a new flavor of such an application. To me, it looks more like a Google Groups approach than anything else.

Content

Google Sued In UK For Defamatory Postings In Search Results

Google sued over defamatory postings found on web search from The Independent reports that the company could be held liable for the publication of inaccurate, malicious or damaging material on the internet, even though Google did not create the content and is simply listing what’s found on the web. The plaintiff, Brian Retkin, claims he […]

Google Ads

Google Released Referrals Beta To All

The Inside AdSense blog announced the launch of “Referrals 2.0.” Now instead of AdSense publishers seeing only Google ads within their referrals section of the AdSense setup page, they will also see ads from Google’s AdWords advertisers. The new releases for this Pay Per Action product include: Mass release to more AdSense publishers More inventory […]

Content

The “Slums” Of Search

A few weeks ago in Toronto at Search Engine Strategies, I mentioned in one of the sessions I was moderating that in Canada, the sponsored search listings are the slums of the results page. In this case, I meant that until the big brands and the recognized advertisers move into sponsored search in a meaningful […]

Local

Google Customizes Map Directions

Not long ago Google introduced an “avoid highways” checkbox on Maps that provides alternative routing. Now Google has gone much further in that direction (so to speak), allowing users to drag icons on the map to create customized routing. With each change directions update automatically. Here’s the Google Lat Long Blog discussion and here’s an […]

Google

Is Google Losing Its Magic For Employees?

Today’s Wall Street Journal featured an article entitled Start-Ups Make Inroads With Google’s Work Force, which focused on emerging potential retention problems at Google (in particular vs. Facebook). Yahoo has recently shed – both voluntarily and involuntarily – a number of high profile employees and suffered negative publicity from some of those departures. Now it […]

Paid social

Buttons, Buttons — Let’s Clean Up The Feed Buttons!

As part of adding our new "Lands" tabs to Search Engine Land last month, I cleaned up our feed page that helps people understand how to add our feeds to various feed readers. The biggest challenge was dealing with the inconsistent sizes of feed buttons from the different providers. I wanted to share how we […]

Content

Mossberg, Ask.com “Goes Much Further” Than Google

Ask.com Takes Lead In Designing Display Of Search Results by Walter Mossberg of the Wall Street Journal reviews Ask.com’s new 3D look. Mossberg gave Ask.com great reviews, comparing Ask.com’s three-pane approach to Google’s Universal Search approach. Mossberg said Ask.com “took greater strides” than Google with their user interface. The new Ask.com user interface makes for […]

Ecommerce

Google Desktop Now Available For Linux

Google Desktop is now available for those running Linux as their operating system. You’ll find Google Desktop for Linux for download here.. Google Desktop for Linux was developed by Google’s Beijing engineering team and runs on Debian 4.0, Fedora Core 6, Ubuntu 6.10, SUSE 10.1, and Red Flag 5. The available languages include English, French, […]

SEO

Google Gadget Ventures: Get Paid To Develop Google Gadgets

How do you help encourage the growth of a widgets or gadgets ecosystem? Being big is a good, natural start. It has helped people flock to develop Facebook applications or Yahoo Widgets or Google Gadgets, just for exposure to the traffic at these places. But Google wants to encourage with more than traffic. Now it’s […]

Google

Google Now Reporting Number Of Users Per Gadget

Got a Google Gadget? Google’s now reporting how many users make use of it, in addition to the pageviews figures it started posting earlier this year. The new user stats can be found via Google’s Homepage Content Directory. There you’ll see gadgets that can be added to your iGoogle personalized homepage, with the number of […]

SEO

Wired Mag Waxes Wordy About Maps & Local

First, for map and online mapping lovers, there is the Wired piece, Google Maps Is Changing the Way We See the World, an interesting survey of the history of the mapping at Google, mashups, mapping APIs, Google’s acquisition of Keyhole (now Google Earth) and user-generated content on maps (My Maps). Then there is the tiresome […]

Google

Google Launches APIs For Custom Search Engine

The Google Custom Search Engine blog announced the launch of the new APIs for Google Custom Search Engines. The new APIs enable you to better manage the linked CSE feature. In short, instead of you managing all the criteria on Google’s console, you can manage it via your own tool by using this API. The […]

Content

What To Do When Your Company Wikipedia Page Goes Bad

It happens to many companies: their Wikipedia page evolves and starts reporting bad stats, inaccuracies, legal stories you thought were water under the bridge and more. Wikipedia is a web 2.0 success story, and almost always ranks on page one in Google search results for your brand. Anyone can make changes, and there is little […]

PPC

SEMPO Opens Advanced Search Advertising Course

SEMPO has announced their third training course, Advanced Search Advertising, is now live. Advanced Search Advertising consists of 13 lessons: An Evolving Opportunity, PPC Models, Keywords & Campaign, Copywriting for Ads, Bidding & Ranking, Landing Pages, Success Metrics, PPC Program Specifics, Reporting & Analytics, I.P. – Click Fraud – SPAM, Alternative PPC Search Engines, Feeds […]

Apple

Apple iPhone Craze: A Search Volume Look

Hitwise sent me some data on the search volume for the term “iPhone.” As many of you know, Apple is releasing the iPhone this Friday, and the press and craze over this product is unprecedented. Just take a glance at the coverage at Techmeme and you can see, the news reports are overwhelming, to say […]

Google Ads

Google AdSense Adds Corner Styles Format

The Inside AdSense Blog announced that they have added corner styles as a method of customizing your AdSense ads. Corner styles currently come in three styles, the default square, slightly rounded, and rounded corners. Here are images of all three:

Content

MySpace TV To Compete With Google’s YouTube

MySpace, Chasing YouTube, Upgrades Its Offerings from the New York Times reports that MySpace will be launching MySpace TV tomorrow, to better compete against Google’s YouTube. MySpace TV will be an independent site and will not require a user to have a MySpace ID. There will be integration between MySpace and MySpace TV, enabling MySpace […]

SEO

Tolles Replaces Skrenta As CEO Of Topix

Chris Tolles announced that he would be taking over the roll of CEO at Topix. Rich Skrenta, the former CEO of Topix, will be a member of the board and an advisor. Why the change? Chris explains that Rich wasn’t having “as much fun” as he did in the past. Chris explained that Topix needs […]

SEO

Marchex Simultaneously Launches 100K Local Search Sites

If you can believe it, Marchex has simultaneously launched more than 100,000 local and vertical search sites representing over a billion pages. The move is probably unprecedented outside of a search index. In May 2006, Marchex acquired local search site OpenList and has used its technology assets and methodology to enable this launch. Before this […]

SEO

The In-House SEO Life Cycle

Every in-house SEO program follows a typical life cycle that has for main phases: Courtship, Honeymoon, Reality and Synergy. The duration of time it takes to get from Courtship to Synergy varies with each company, and it can also very for each division within a company. Today’s in-house article will give you an overview of […]

Ecommerce

Yahoo Images Gains Flickr Photos

Yahoo Image Search now contains photos from Yahoo’s Flickr photo sharing service, ironically catching Yahoo up to Google, Microsoft and Ask.com — all of which already included Flickr photos in their respective image search engines. Yahoo blogged about the change:

Content

Search Illustrated: The Power Of Link Baiting

Link Baiting is the latest in a procession of strategies search marketers have concocted over the years to ease the often laborious but absolutely necessary process of getting other web sites to link to your pages. Search Engine Land contributing writer Nick Wilson is often credited with coining the phrase linkbaiting, and SEL columnists write […]

Content

New “Google News Image Version” Of Google News

Google Blogoscoped reports that Google News has added a link to the left bar that enables you to view an image version of Google News. I suspect Google found out that a picture, really does, tells a thousand words. If you mouse over an image, the news on the right hand side scrolls to focus […]

Content

Survey: Mobile Users Most Receptive To Paid-Search Ads

An Ingenio sponsored survey conducted by Harris Interactive, released today, captured a broad range of user attitudes and behaviors toward mobile phones and mobile advertising. The survey polled just over 4,000 adults in the US. Among other things, it confirmed that more people own mobile phones than landlines and that users were most receptive to […]

Get the must-read newsletter for search marketers.