Anyone involved in online marketing has an innate sense that mobile is a big deal. We're never more than an arm's length from our phones, and we have a curious tendency to do everything on them. I once sat in front of a dark, Netflix-enabled flat-screen, watching Netflix on my iPhone. It was just easier, and I had it on, and I could switch back and forth with Facebook, and... ok, maybe I have a problem! In any event, our personal fascination with mobile phones shouldn't dictate our work decisions. And one question that needs deciding more and more these days is around mobile search: [...]

Related Topics: How To: Mobile Marketing | Mobile Search | Search Engines: Mobile Search Engines | Search Marketing: Mobile | SEO: Mobile Search

Last month, I took a look at mobile commerce and the issues that online retailers face when trying to adapt their desktop content (or worse, their offline catalog) to a mobile website. I left-off with a promise to revisit mobile site design, since this can have a big impact on your options for slicing and dicing content to maximize SEO performance. Dim Sum Versus Steak Let's start with user needs. Jacon Nielson recently published a study confirming that bite-size chunks of content are best for mobile users. "When in doubt, leave it out" was his sound-bite takeaway. Given our own personal exp [...]

Related Topics: How To: Mobile Marketing | Mobile Search | Search Engines: Mobile Search Engines | Search Marketing: Mobile | SEO: Mobile Search

Retail brands with popular mobile apps are benefiting tremendously this holiday season from prominent mobile app visibility in Google's organic search results. Search for Groupon, eBay, Amazon, Target, QVC or numerous others. Alongside the brand website listing, local listings, and social profiles, searchers are starting to see links to these brands’ iPhone, iPad, and Android app profile pages, right on the first page of Google. These app page URLs are presenting powerful new opportunities to "occupy” Page 1 of Google SERPs for desktop and mobile searchers, with big payoffs. [caption [...]

Related Topics: Google: Mobile | Google: URL Shortener | How To: Mobile Marketing | Mobile Search | Search Engines: Mobile Search Engines | Search Marketing: Mobile | SEO: Mobile Search

We're already well into Black Friday. In many US stores the frenzy began last night at 10 pm or midnight (as opposed to the normal 4 am door-busting start time). People barely had time to overcome the sleep-inducing effects of L-tryptophan before getting out into the melee. And the word "melee" aptly describes the scene in a Southern California Wal-Mart store as one woman unleashed pepper spray on her fellow shoppers to prevent them from getting in her way. Today and for the next few days people will be using a wide range of tools and resources -- hopefully not pepper spray -- to help them [...]

Related Topics: Google: Maps & Local | Google: Mobile | Google: Product Search | Microsoft: Bing | Microsoft: Bing Shopping & Cashback | Search Engines: Maps & Local Search Engines | Search Engines: Mobile Search Engines | Top News

Local mobile ad network xAd has released its first quarterly report detailing traffic trends and user behavior on its network. While all mobile ad networks offer geotargeting, xAd is one of a small number of  mobile networks that specializes in local (search and display). CPM rates are considerably higher than on more conventional mobile ad networks. The company says it serves 10 billion monthly ad impressions. The data in the report were collected between July and September. Here are a few key points: 37 percent of general mobile consumers use their devices for local search, while 75 [...]

Related Topics: Search Engines: Maps & Local Search Engines | Search Engines: Mobile Search Engines | Stats: Search Behavior