Our newest Search Engine Land column, Analyze This, launches today. Analyze This focuses on analytics and measurement, two crucial aspects of search marketing that are often overlooked or underused. Columnists write about measurement techniques, compare analytics software programs, discuss strategies for using data to improve results and more. The Analyze This column appears weekly at Search Engine Land. In today's debut post, Brian Klais explores some of the reasons the work you're doing may be underappreciated, and what you can do to shift negative perceptions into a more avorable light [...]

Related Topics: Channel: Analytics | Search & Analytics

To truly understand web searcher behavior, search engine optimization professionals should know how searchers locate and follow the scent of information.

Related Topics: Channel: Content | Search & Usability

Below is what happened in search today, as reported on Search Engine Land and from other places across the web. From Search Engine Land: Google Launches “Place Pages,” Gets Rid Of Tabbed Info BubbleGoogle is swapping its “info window” in Maps out in favor a much richer full-page experience that offers more information and a number of new capabilities and features. The pop-ups on Maps previously opened to an expanded info-bubble view, featuring a tabbed experience that buried much of the information available about a business. The new “Place [...] Google [...]

Related Topics: Channel: Other | SearchCap

eBay has announced they have hired Dr. Eric Brill as their vice president of research and applied science to lead up eBay's research labs team. Prior, Dr. Brill was General Manager of adCenter Labs at Microsoft and before that, he Director and Principal Researcher and head of the Text Mining, Search and Navigation Group at Microsoft Research. Microsoft has quietly pulled his bio page but Google still has a cached version. "Search is all about predictions, highly educated guesses about what people really mean when they type in a word like Diesel or a phrase like 'red, white and blue'," [...]

Related Topics: Channel: Industry | Microsoft: Business Issues | Microsoft: Employees

Google is swapping its "info window" in Maps out in favor a much richer full-page experience that offers more information and a number of new capabilities and features. The pop-ups on Maps previously opened to an expanded info-bubble view, featuring a tabbed experience that buried much of the information available about a business. The new "Place Pages" offer a more user friendly presentation of the same information. Also launching today are Place Pages that cover cities, neighborhoods, points of interest and transit stops, in addition to business locations. (The Place Pages are accessible [...]

Related Topics: Channel: Local | Features: General | Google: Maps & Local | Google: Place Pages | Top News

I reported at the Search Engine Roundtable this morning that Google has a beta version of a new keyword tool available in the AdWords console. To get to it, login to adwords.google.com, go to a campaign, click on opportunities (if you have that tab), then on the left bar, click on keyword tool. A "beta" link should be available for you to click on in the top paragraph. If you don't see it, below is a big screen shot of the tool. The keyword tool integrates some of the other tools that Google has been releasing. It links to the Google Insights for Search tool and it brings in data from i [...]

Related Topics: Channel: SEM | Google: AdWords | SEM Tools | Top News

Google CEO sees one small acquisition a month from Reuters reports Google's CEO as saying they are back in the business of acquiring businesses. He told Reuters, "acquisitions are turned on again at Google and we are doing our normal maneuvers, which is small companies." "My estimate would be one-a-month acquisitions and these are largely in lieu of hiring. There may be larger acquisitions, but they really are unpredictable," Schmidt added. Google slowed or halted all acquisitions sometime around early January of this year. Most recently, Google acquired reCAPTCHA, but you can read abou [...]

Related Topics: Channel: Industry | Google: Acquisitions | Google: Business Issues

Below is what happened in search today, as reported on Search Engine Land and from other places across the web. From Search Engine Land: How To Measure The Value Of A Fan Or Follower In Social MediaIt’s hard to justify the time spent on social media account management. But there are ways to measure the real value (monetary or otherwise) of fans on Facebook and followers on Twitter. These top two social media websites offer free advertising, an open customer service and communication platform and a demographics database all wrapped up [...] What Happened To The Monthly Google Da [...]

Related Topics: Channel: Other | SearchCap

It's hard to justify the time spent on social media account management. But there are ways to measure the real value (monetary or otherwise) of fans on Facebook and followers on Twitter. These top two social media websites offer free advertising, an open customer service and communication platform and a demographics database all wrapped up in one, so knowing the value of fans and followers can be a big help when deciding how much time should be allotted to social media efforts. Here are some of the ways to measure how much Facebook and Twitter users are really worth. Number of quality fans [...]

Related Topics: Channel: Analytics | How To: Analytics | How To: Twitter | Social Media Marketing

Back in the 'old days' of Google and the SEO industry, "Google Dance" was a term used often in the industry. Back then, a "Google Dance" referred to the about monthly updates Google pushed out to their index. Every month or so, SEOs and Webmasters waited for the "Google Dance" to see if their rankings would increase or decrease - yes, this included PageRank updates. Nowadays, you rarely hear about people talking about a Google Dance because Google releases updates, mostly minor, throughout the day. These include index updates every minute and algorithm updates several times per month, ov [...]

Related Topics: Channel: SEO | Google: SEO | Google: Web Search

Now that Bruce has provided his dream agenda for SEOs, Matt for PPC, Jessica for the in-house crowd and Disa for the beginners, here’s a track for the business manager who needs to stay on top of the macro issues, develop investment cases and report back to HQ on future trends. You can have a peek at it now, or wait until you read through the below. Sunday, Arrival Day Five out of five search experts agree: Sunday’s SMX Meet & Greet is the way to kick it off. I am with Jessica in that social activities are a must. Meeting people and learning from their experiences is as important as at [...]

Related Topics: Channel: Other | SEM Industry: Conferences | SMX & DMD Alerts

Google Sidewiki is a new feature being added today to the Google Toolbar that allows anyone to leave comments about pages as they surf the web. Love something you're reading? Hate it? You can share your views with others who visit the page and who also have Sidewiki enabled. Share, that is, if Google thinks your comment is good enough. NOTE: Sidewiki is set to launch at 8am Pacific Time today. This post was originally scheduled to go live then, but the news started leaking out. The Sidewiki link above should start working then. There have been any number of similar tools like t [...]

Related Topics: Channel: SEO | Features: General | Google: Sidewiki | How To: SEO | Top News

Yesterday comScore reported search numbers for August. What they show is growth in overall search volume, including at Google sites (except YouTube). Google has 2.5 times the search volume as Yahoo and Microsoft combined. But Microsoft's Bing also grew its share of the overall US search market from 8.9 percent in July to 9.3 percent in August. Here are the charts: In the "expanded view" of search, what stands out are the following: Search volume declines at eBay, AOL and MySpace Growth at Bing/Microsoft and dramatic growth at Facebook (20 percent vs. July) All the typic [...]

Related Topics: Channel: Strategy | Stats: Compete | Stats: Size

The most important asset for an in-house SEO is the collective talent of the people that plan, produce and maintain a company's website. The better informed these individuals are about search engine optimization strategies and tactics, the better your chance of search engine success. Company-wide SEO education is, in fact, one of the key benefits of an in-house SEO program that you can (and should) be leveraging for competitive advantage. Logistical problems with execution notwithstanding, it is easy enough to delegate specific SEO-related tasks to the appropriate individuals in your organi [...]

Related Topics: Channel: Search | In House Search Marketing

Forget about your SEO investment. Disregard your PPC budget. B2B marketers should be asking themselves, "Am I getting all I can from search engines... for free?" Consider this: searching is the second most popular online activity today -- second only to email. In fact, comScore (August 2009) estimates that Google alone handles 304 million searches a day. Given this large volume of activity, search engines can tell you a lot about your customers. Today, I’ll discuss several easy-to-use tools that provide meaningful insights into your customers’ needs, emerging market trends, and comp [...]

Related Topics: B2B Search Marketing | Channel: Search

Search Week is an exclusive weekly newsletter for Search Engine Land premium members that recaps stories covered on Search Engine Land over the past week. Below are top stories organized by topic that happened over the past week. Each topic (or Search Engine Land column) is also a link, where you can click through and drill into the Search Engine Land members library to find other stories in that area. Because some stories are listed in more than one category, you may see them repeated. Top News Hidden Google Feature: Find What's New In The Last Minute Or Second Bing 2.0 "Visua [...]

Related Topics: Channel: Other | Search Week

Coming out of (private) and into public Beta today is a new hybrid travel and local search engine, Goby.com (GO-be), a new entrant into the foray of "deep web" search technology, led by a founding team with web and search experience from Endeca (CEO Mark Watkins), Lycos (Jim Fell) and Reprise Media (CTO Vince Russo), MIT (professor Michael Stonebraker, co-founder) as well as travel distribution experience with John Walsh (World Travel Holdings.) The start-up received its funding from Flybridge Capital and Kepha Partners. Using a 3-box format for search queries, Goby's intention is to help g [...]

Related Topics: Channel: Consumer | Search Engines: Maps & Local Search Engines | Search Engines: Travel Search Engines | Search Headlines

Dynamic Number Insertion (DNI) technology allows advertisers to track the specific search engine, web page or keyword that generated an inbound phone call using tracking numbers. Advertisers are using DNI to measure the performance of their online advertising campaigns and the impact on call volume. At the most basic level, DNI seamlessly replaces select contact phone numbers on a web page with call tracking numbers, which allows advertisers to measure volume. Combined with pay per click programs, DNI can help complete the online advertising performance picture by clearly outlining the results [...]

Related Topics: Channel: SEM | How To: SEM | Search Ads: Pay Per Call

Below is what happened in search today, as reported on Search Engine Land and from other places across the web. From Search Engine Land: Google Requests Hold On Book Settlement Hearings To Retool The AgreementIn the wake of last Friday’s objections to the Google Book lawsuit settlement, Google along with the two other parties that sued it, have asked the judge to delay further hearings on the settlement until an amended one can be put forth. Google, Authors Guild and the Association of American Publishers, made this request [...] What Do Y!ou Think Of Yahoo’s New Brandin [...]

Related Topics: Channel: Other | SearchCap

In the wake of last Friday's objections to the Google Book lawsuit settlement, Google along with the two other parties that sued it, have asked the judge to delay further hearings on the settlement until an amended one can be put forth. Google, Authors Guild and the Association of American Publishers, made this request today in the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York. A copy of the request is here. For more background on the case, see our post from Friday: Department Of Justice Files Objections To Google Book Search Settlement. [...]

Related Topics: Channel: Industry | Google: Book Search | Google: Business Issues | Google: Legal