Today, Facebook announced new simplified privacy controls designed to ease a settings overload problem that it admitted has challenged its users. Did it succeed? I'd give it an A for effort but a C+ to B- for actually solving the overload problem. Rather than a "one click solution" or a single-page recap, there remains a "flowchart" of options. Though less daunting than in the past, the complexity may still leave users feeling there are too many controls to be in control. Below, a "Before" and "After" comparison. The "Before" screens are what most people on Facebook currently see, when they [...]

Related Topics: Channel: Social | Facebook | Features: Analysis | Top News

The Pew Research Center has released a deep study today that paints an interesting picture of how U.S. adults use the Internet -- search engines, in particular -- to track their online reputations. One of the primary takeaways that contradicts previous research is that more than half of adult Internet users have "Googled" themselves. The study doesn't actually use that terminology, but you get the point. According to Pew's research, online reputation monitoring via search engines increased between 2006 and 2009: 57% of adult Internet users now use search engines to find information [...]

Related Topics: Channel: Social | Facebook | Legal: Privacy | Search & Society: General | Stats: Search Behavior | Top News

Below is what happened in search today, as reported on Search Engine Land and from other places across the web. From Search Engine Land: Doodle 4 Google Winner Announced: Melton’s Rainforest HabitatGoogle announced the winner of the 3rd annual Doodle 4 Google competition. The Doodle is viewable above and will be displayed on the Google home page tomorrow, May 27th. The winner was Makenzie Melton, a third grader at El Dorado Springs R-2 Schools in El Dorado Springs, Missouri for her “Rainforest Habitat” doodle. Besides [...] Live Blogging Facebook’s “ [...]

Related Topics: Channel: Other | SearchCap

Google announced the winner of the 3rd annual Doodle 4 Google competition. The Doodle is viewable above and will be displayed on the Google home page tomorrow, May 27th. The winner was Makenzie Melton, a third grader at El Dorado Springs R-2 Schools in El Dorado Springs, Missouri for her "Rainforest Habitat" doodle. Besides for her doodle being on the Google home page, she will receive a $15,000 college scholarship, a netbook computer and a $25,000 technology grant for a new computer lab at her school. The three national finalists included: Grades 4-6: Raymundo Marquez, Grade [...]

Related Topics: Channel: Consumer | Google: Logos

Facebook is holding a special press conference today, where it will be discussing the new "simplied" privacy settings that the company has developed in hopes of easing recent concerns over privacy. I'll be live blogging the news. NOTE: See Drill (Down), Baby, Drill: Facebook’s New "Simple" Privacy Settings Still Pretty Complex, our story after this was published, for a comprehensive look at the privacy setting changes. The press conference starts at 10:30 Pacific Time. It's happening at Facebook's headquarters in Palo Alto. From what the press has been told: Mark Zuckerberg and other [...]

Related Topics: Channel: Social | Facebook | Features: Analysis | Legal: Privacy | Top News

Just about a month ago Google shut down v13 of the AdWords API for v200909. Now Google announced the next version of the AdWords API, v201003 beta. Google explained that v200909 is not going away anytime soon. But they want to release this new beta to enhance the current offerings of their AdWords API. The enhancements include: ReportService beta: generate reports about the performance of your AdWords campaigns Bid simulator: see estimated clicks, cost and impressions corresponding to various Max. CPC bids Ad Sitelinks extensions: include up to four additional links in your ads to [...]

Related Topics: Channel: SEM | Google: AdWords | Google: APIs

A web page that ranks at the top of Google's search results gets twice as much traffic as the number two listing, and triple the traffic as the page listed third. That's according to some new research published by the online ad network Chitika. Chitika's Dan Ruby explains that they looked at traffic coming into their ad network from Google and separated it by placement in Google's search results. Pages in the number one position received more than 34% of all visits, compared to 17% for pages ranked second, and 11% for pages ranked third. That speaks to the value of a number one ranki [...]

Related Topics: Channel: SEO | Google: SEO | Google: Web Search | SEO: General | Stats: Search Behavior

Two months ago, Google confirmed an "alpha" test of new ads distributed on its AdSense network that featured tweets. Today, it appears more of these tweet-based ads are live an in the wild. Magne Uppman is part of that test and he has shared screen shots and examples of his Twitter Google AdSense ads in action. In fact, I personally see the ads live on an article at inpro.no. The ad is interactive in that you can click the right and left arrows to see previous tweets from that account. You can also click on the Twitter avatar and name, plus the "Follow me on Twitter" link to be taken [...]

Related Topics: Channel: Social | Google: AdSense | Top News | Twitter

Earlier this month, I led the Hot Seat Lab on Better Blogging for Business at MarketingProfs’ B2B Forum in Boston. In it, three brave B2B marketers volunteered to have their corporate blogs critiqued in front of a room full of peers. While the blogs obviously differed in design and content, their shortcomings from an SEO standpoint were surprisingly similar—and substantial. Here’s a summary of the problems they shared and what to do about them. Full posts on the home page Surprisingly, each blog was showing lengthy, full posts on the home page of the blog. As a result, many single- [...]

Related Topics: B2B Search Marketing | Channel: Search

As online marketers and conversion experts, we want our sites to be effective. But when does conversion optimization go too far? When does it stop being useful and become, well, evil?

Related Topics: Channel: Analytics | Search & Conversion

Finding the right mix of keywords is as much science as it is good common sense. When it comes to your brand, there are typo and URL derivation techniques that you should consider as part of your overall brand bidding strategy, even when the science (search volumes) appear too low to matter. Typos as keywords Most of our clients are well aware that using typo variations of their brand name as keywords is important, but, often typo use doesn’t go deep enough. Think about two types of keywords that include your brand: Stand-alone brands as keywords like "BarnesandNoble," "Wal [...]

Related Topics: Brand Aid | Channel: Strategy

Local business owners can breathe a sigh of relief: Google has ended the "community edit" free-for-all in Google Maps. According to Tuesday's announcement, "all community edits [will] be reviewed before they are shown." For local business owners, this means that competitors, spammers, jilted lovers, and the angry parents of the kid whom your son struck out last night at Little League will no longer be able to edit your business listing however they see fit. Huzzah! This "feature" (using the term loosely) got a lot of attention here on Search Engine Land when Danny Sullivan edited Yahoo' [...]

Related Topics: Channel: Local | Google: Maps & Local | Top News

Below is what happened in search today, as reported on Search Engine Land and from other places across the web. From Search Engine Land: Live Matrix Wants To Be Your Guide To The Live WebIf you’re looking for something to do, there are several event search engines you might use: Upcoming.org and Zvents are two biggies, while Joobili is a smaller one that combines events with travel search. But all of this is for finding offline events. What about the thousands of things happening on the web every day? Enter [...] The Death Of Web Analytics? An Ode To The Threatened ReferrerOn [...]

Related Topics: Channel: Other | SearchCap

If you're looking for something to do, there are several event search engines you might use: Upcoming.org and Zvents are two biggies, while Joobili is a smaller one that combines events with travel search. But all of this is for finding offline events. What about the thousands of things happening on the web every day? Enter Live Matrix. It's a new site that's just launched (into private beta) with enormous ambitions: to serve as a guide to everything happening online. "We don't include anything happening offline," says co-founder Sanjay Reddy. "We include anything happening online t [...]

Related Topics: Channel: Video | Search Engines: Audio Search Engines | Search Engines: Events Search Engines | Search Engines: Special Events | Search Engines: Video Search Engines

One of the most important online marketing tools is the referrer string. Little known to most web surfers, this is effectively the Caller ID of the internet. It allows web site owners and marketers to know where visitors came from. It's crucial marketing data, and data that might be going away. What's The Referrer? When you visit a web page, by default, every major browser (Internet Explorer, Firefox, Chrome...) reports the last page that you viewed before clicking over to the current page you're viewing. IE, what page "referred" you to the current page. This information is known as the [...]

Related Topics: Channel: Analytics | Features: Analysis | Firefox | Legal: Privacy | SEM Tools: Web Analytics | Top News

Google has announced the launch of a browser plugin that lets users avoid being tracked by Google Analytics. The company warned two months ago, in the midst of loud privacy-related complaints, that it was working on such a tool. Google says the plugin will work in the following browsers: Internet Explorer, versions 7 and 8 Mozilla Firefox, 3.x and higher Google Chrome It's not available for Safari, but Google's Brian Richardson hinted that may change in the future by saying today's announcement is a "first step" and that Google hopes to "build continuous improvements moving forwa [...]

Related Topics: Channel: Analytics | Google: Analytics | Google: Legal | Google: Privacy | Legal: Privacy

If  you have a tiny marketing budget but need big links, this sticky link bait tactic might be for you! A recent report from the Pew Research Center found 61% of all American adults (or 205 million people)  look for or completed a transaction on a government website in 2009. This information alone is impressive, but what made the report priceless from a link building standpoint was the breakdown of what people were looking for. As I read through the report, I realized the information had potential to be used to create a great piece of  sticky link bait. I say "sticky"  because [...]

Related Topics: Channel: SEO | How To: Links | Link Week

Several years after the introduction of feedback analytics, online retailers continue to find ways to put the priceless resource of the user's voice to work to increase conversions, sales and customer loyalty. Among the most innovative applications of direct customer feedback is analyzing trends to predict search queries, inform SEO design, adjust merchandising and improve overall marketing ROI. Let's say an online business selling apparel receives numerous feedback items related to a specific brand of shoe. Perhaps one customer is having trouble finding her size, another customer is requ [...]

Related Topics: Channel: Other | Features: Analysis

Google has released a report that shows its economic contributions to local economies in the US. Timed to coincide with National Small Business Week this is something of a "charm offensive" and effort to burnish Google's recently tarnished corporate image: Google's not just a search engine. We've also helped hundreds of businesses in every U.S. state to grow. Across the U.S., Google's search and advertising tools generated $54 billion of economic activity in 2009. Full of data, the report is interesting and desig [...]

Related Topics: Channel: Industry | Google: Business Issues | Google: Critics | Google: General

Yahoo announced that it has acquired an Indonesian site called Koprol. Think of it as a kind of cross between Twitter and Foursquare, with more emphasis on the latter. (Yahoo had been rumored to be in talks to buy Foursquare. This move may reflect its inability to close that deal.) It touches local, mobile and social -- but it's mostly about mobile. Here's how Yahoo describes Koprol: Koprol allows people to connect and share photos, reviews and additional information about locations in real-time using just their mobile phone browser, making the service accessible to a large [...]

Related Topics: Channel: Mobile | Yahoo: General | Yahoo: Maps & Local | Yahoo: Mobile & Go | Yahoo: Outside US