Ecommerce

Halloween ’09 From Google, Yahoo, Bing & Others

Today is Halloween and the search engines have logos up for the special day. Before I post the logos, here are some posts from others in the community on Halloween. Matt Cutts of Google had a holy costume. Google Blogoscoped noticed Google added trick or treat to their robots.txt file. Bing has a special visual […]

Bing

I Vant To Suck Your Bing

Here’s a post for a relatively slow Friday afternoon: two ads for Bing that vaguely tie in with Halloween. Halloween is generally speaking a children’s holiday. So first comes a “Bing Goes the Internet” video featuring elementary school children. Years from now this may qualify as a pop-culture nostalgia moment: [youtube]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EaFY7hVxjek[/youtube] And then a more […]

SEO

SearchCap: The Day In Search, October 30, 2009

Below is what happened in search today, as reported on Search Engine Land and from other places across the web. From Search Engine Land: Bing Adds NFL, Flight Information To Mobile Browser Bing has announced a couple additions to its mobile browser today: expanded NFL information and airline flight status reports. The NFL feature works […]

Bing

Bing Adds NFL, Flight Information To Mobile Browser

Bing has announced a couple additions to its mobile browser today: expanded NFL information and airline flight status reports. The NFL feature works by typing in a team or player’s name, and provides stats, scores, and schedule details. Bing also says you’ll get “eal-time updates on the plays” while a game is being played. The […]

Google SEO

Despite PageRank Dropping In Webmaster Tools, Google Pushes Toolbar PageRank Update

Fifteen-days ago, Google dropped PageRank values from Webmaster Tools and the search community took that as a bold statement. The statement was clear, webmasters “shouldn’t focus on PageRank so much,” said Google. Last night, Google pushed out a Google Toolbar PageRank update, despite making that bold statement just a couple weeks ago. As Danny explained […]

SEO

Outside.in Expands Its Hyperlocal Search Capabilities

While real-time search gets all the attention these days, there’s also increased interest in hyperlocal search. Where real-time search answers What’s happening right now?, hyperlocal search answers the question, What’s happening right here? It’s like local search on steroids, you could say. Outside.in has, for several years, been somewhat like a clearinghouse of hyperlocal information […]

Content

Facebook Wins Big Anti-Spam Judgment

Facebook has been in an ongoing fight against spam and yesterday announced a significant victory in court. The company said it had obtained an eye-popping $711 million judgment against Spam King Sanford Wallace who had had posted unwanted messages on Facebook users’ Walls. Wallace, who is reportedly bankrupt may also face time in the big […]

Paid social

Twitter Lists Goes Live

A month ago, Twitter said they would be rolling out Twitter lists. That day has finally come and almost all users can create their own lists. Lists are basically a way for Twitter users to create groups of Twitter users into categories. For example, you can find the Search Engine Land team all in one […]

Analytics & conversion

Is Web Analytics Easy Or Difficult?

Two rockstars have emerged in the web analytics field to date. We all know who they are: Eric Peterson has demystified analytics for us, while Avinash Kaushik has helped us take it one day, or dare I say, “an hour a day,” at a time. And one of them says web analytics is easy while […]

Google SEO

Google’s Additional Discovery Method: RSS and Atom Feeds

For years, Google’s discovery of web pages was solely based on links. If a page had no links to it, Googlebot had no way of knowing about it and therefore, would never index it. Along the way, Google provided an option for submitting individual pages, but that wasn’t really a viable option for site owners […]

Google Maps

Google Maps Makes Real Estate Search More Visible

Google continues to make real estate listings more prominent inside Google Maps, and in doing so, it continues to inch closer to being a full-fledged real estate search engine. The company announced today that a new “real estate” option has been added across Google Maps. It appears under the “More” tab, along with Photos, Videos, […]

Google Ads

Google Launches Comparison Ads, Starting With Mortgages

Google’s now officially announced “Comparison Ads,” starting with a way for mortgage advertisers to have their products compared against each other but which may expand to other products in the future. “If you’re looking for a mortgage, you really care about a specific offer. You want to know the APR and based on your specific […]

Google Analytics

SearchCap: The Day In Search, October 29, 2009

Below is what happened in search today, as reported on Search Engine Land and from other places across the web. From Search Engine Land: So What Are We To Make Of The “Ying” Search Delay? I got two calls yesterday from people asking what I made of the Yahoo-Microsoft failure to meet their self-imposed search-deal […]

Bing

So What Are We To Make Of The “Ying” Search Delay?

I got two calls yesterday from people asking what I made of the Yahoo-Microsoft failure to meet their self-imposed search-deal deadline (October 27). I said it was probably just a case of needing more time to work through some of the details rather than a warning sign that the entire deal was in jeopardy. There’s […]

Local

One Cannot Live By PPC Alone. Can You?

Much has been written lately about the value of combining text ads with display/image advertising online in order to boost visibility and brand awareness. This trend is not necessarily a new one: Yahoo/comScore issued a study in 2006 showing an increase in “online and offline purchasing by consumers who are exposed to integrated campaigns” that […]

SEO

The Science Of Scoring Your SEO

SEO is an art. (Hence, the name of my and my co-authors’ brand new book, The Art of SEO). Crafting copy that sells, as well as ranks, is an art. So is link baiting. But SEO is also a science. Crafting rewrite rules, robots.txt directives, and so forth is pretty geeky stuff. The science side […]

Google

Study: Google, The “Most Attractive Employer”

Universum released a report that shows Google is the “most attractive employer” globally. Google was ranked number one in both the top 50 global businesses and engineering companies. Microsoft was also up there on that list, ranked as number three for business and 2 for engineering. The study asked about 120,000 students at “top academic […]

Apple

Live Blogging From The Google Discover Music Launch Event

The expected Google Music Search is real, and our Google Music Search 2.0 Launches With Musical “OneBox” story provides the play-by-play of how it works. Be sure to read that! From me, the color commentary out of today’s launch event at Capitol Records in Hollywood. I’ll be live blogging the news. We’re expecting some musical […]

Google

Google Music Search 2.0 Launches With Musical “OneBox”

Saying that it wants to bring music fans “closer to your favorite artists,” Google has added a new Music Search OneBox to its search results. The new OneBox includes content from partner sites such as MySpace, Pandora, Lala and others, and lets searchers listen to song clips right from Google’s search results page. Searchers should […]

Google News

SearchCap: The Day In Search, October 28, 2009

Below is what happened in search today, as reported on Search Engine Land and from other places across the web. From Search Engine Land: Fall In Line: Understanding SEO’s Place In Company Ecosystem We’ve all been there. Heck, many of us are still there right now. We come to work every day, game to do […]

Content

How To Maximize Your Trade Show Investment Via Search Marketing

For B2B companies, exhibiting and participating in trade shows can be a significant expense.  TradeShow Handbook estimates that the average cost of exhibiting at a show is $10,000. This might be an underestimate if you bring in a full team of sales and marketing personnel to work the show. You can use this online trade […]

SEO

Use Transient PPC Campaigns To Support Branding Efforts

In today’s real-time brand management world, separate teams often control strategy and channel tactics for SEO, PPC, public relations, online reputation management and social media. In many cases, however, out-of-box thinking and creative silo-breaking to cross traditional boundaries can yield sweet marketing fruit.

Ecommerce

Yahoo Search Adds Google Profiles & Content To Search Filters

If you search on my name and location, [barry schwartz, ny], in Yahoo Search, you will see a Google Profile matches and other related content from Google within Yahoo’s new search format. Notice the Google filter on the left hand side: When you click on the Google button, you are taken to results only found […]

Search features

Live Blogging Yahoo Investor Day 2009

It’s Yahoo Investor Day, where Yahoo is briefing institutional investors and financial analysts on the company. I’m here for the morning portion, and I’ll be live blogging out of it. You can also watch the live web cast here. Bartz Welcomes Carol Bartz, CEO, on stage. Saying thing they have great opportunity. Lots to fix. […]

Apple

Disruptamundo: Google Adds Turn-by-Turn Navigation To Mobile Maps

I hate the word “disruptive,” as it’s often used in the internet world, because it’s something of a cliche. But I use it here because the new Navigation for Google Maps for Mobile will in fact be — disruptive. On Monday we covered Google Navigation, the then rumor, asking “Will A Free Google GPS Sink […]

Google

Find Similar Images Now In Google Image Search

Six months ago, Google released an image search labs project that allowed you to search by similarity within image search. Google announced that they have promoted that labs project as a default feature in Google Image Search. Now when you search on Google Images, you may often find a link under the image that says, […]

SEO

Diller Says He’s Willing To Sell Ask.com

Barry Diller, CEO of IAC — the parent company of Ask.com — said today that he’s willing to sell the struggling, fourth-place search engine. His comments came during a conference call with investors after IAC reported its 3rd quarter earnings. “We’ve been asked a lot whether we’re open to consolidating transactions in the area of […]

Google Analytics

SearchCap: The Day In Search, October 27, 2009

Below is what happened in search today, as reported on Search Engine Land and from other places across the web. From Search Engine Land: Chinese Newspaper Says Google Censored Its Web Site Oh, the irony: The People’s Daily, the main newspaper of China’s Communist Party, says Google censored its web site by adding a malware […]

Content

Chinese Newspaper Says Google Censored Its Web Site

Oh, the irony: The People’s Daily, the main newspaper of China’s Communist Party, says Google censored its web site by adding a malware warning to search result listings for the newspaper’s book section. The paper says the malware warning appeared after it ran an article about a Chinese group that has suggested Google’s book search […]

Ecommerce

Google Voice Now Lets You Use Your Existing Phone Number

The Google Voice Blog announced that you can now use your existing phone number, with limited features, with Google Voice. Technically, I believe this is not considered porting your phone number, but it does allow you to use your existing number with Google Voice. Google has created a nice chart showing the difference in features […]

LinkedIn

DMOZ: A Solid Directory Or The Great Pumpkin Of Search?

Love it or hate it, the Open Directory Project (ODP or “DMOZ”) always seems to creep into the conversation when we’re discussing links and/or SEO. Check any forum, social news or answer site and you’ll see a wide variety of opinions on the 11 year old directory and how it’s managed. When talking about the […]

Bing

iCrossing: Google’s Share Of Search Almost 77 Percent

We received some interesting data from search agency iCrossing yesterday. The data show US search market share percentages and distribution quite different than the major traffic metrics firms. The company says its numbers are “based on a large representative sample of Fortune 1000 companies, across all major verticals,” which use its search tracking tools. Accordingly […]

Paid social

The Stories Brands Can Tell In Social Media

Since its invention towards the end of the 20th century, the Internet has changed a great many things. And one of the things that is has done time after time is dismantle business models that had seemed, until its arrival, absolutely rock solid. From music to publishing to TV, the Internet has swept away seeming […]

Google

Google Rolls Out New Custom Search Features, Including Wikipedia Integration

Google has made a series of announcements today about its Custom Search Engine service, including a new integration with Wikipedia that substantially changes the search experience on that site for users who opt-in. Other Custom Search announcements today include new custom themes and layouts, as well as better support for “rich snippets.” More on those […]

Google Analytics

SearchCap: The Day In Search, October 26, 2009

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 Social Search Launches, Gives Results From Your Trusted “Social Circle” Google Social Search is rolling out, a new service from Google that allows you to easily find material written by […]

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