Google is celebrating the work of graphic designer Saul Bass today, giving him his very own Doodle video complete with a musical composition by composer Dave Brubeck. Born in New York City on May 8, 1920, Saul Bass made a career creating iconic film posters, title sequences and corporate logos. Many know Bass's work from the title sequence of The Man with the Golden Arm, the credit sequence of North by Northwest, and the disjointed text that races together and apart in Psycho. Bass worked with many of Hollywood's great directors, including Alfred Hitchcock, Otto Preminger, Billy Wilder, [...]

Related Topics: Channel: Consumer | Google: Logos | Top News

Despite effectively renewing its search deal with Microsoft recently, the Wall Street Journal is reporting that Yahoo wants a way to break that deal. Why didn't Yahoo take the opportunity it just had? I suspect that technically and financially, it couldn't. Yahoo's "Get Out Of Microsoft Free" Card The WSJ story says that Yahoo has been "quietly" trying to find a way out of its deal with Microsoft. There are some very specific reasons why Yahoo could break that ten year deal early. One of them is the failure for Microsoft to help Yahoo to reach promised "revenue per search" or RPS goals. T [...]

Related Topics: Channel: Industry | Google: Business Issues | Microsoft & Yahoo Search Deal | Microsoft: Business Issues | Top News | Yahoo: Business Issues

Alex Chitu reports Google is testing a new Google Maps interface, possibly to be launched next week at Google I/O. The new interface is a complete and major overhaul of the current Google Maps user interface. The design and interface changes touch everything from the map colors, icons and text formats to dropping the navigation elements on the left hand side and adding in Google+ integration. For example, you can filter local search results specifically to friends in your Google+ circles. The navigation seems to have been moved to button like methods, similar to how mobile apps work, wit [...]

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

Yahoo is giving Microsoft a further chance to prove that its search ads really can make Yahoo as much money as promised -- at a price. Microsoft has agreed to extend "search revenue guarantees" that it has continually paid since the two companies signed a deal in 2009. Yahoo Declares An Extension Reuters spotted the extension as part of Yahoo's latest quarterly financial filing: On April 30, 2013, Microsoft extended the RPS Guarantee in the U.S. for an additional 12 months commencing April 1, 2013. Second Time Guarantee Extended To translate into plain language, when Yahoo & Microso [...]

Related Topics: Channel: Industry | Microsoft & Yahoo Search Deal | Top News | Yahoo: Business Issues

Yahoo has apparently been working with search-ads network Chitika since 2006. Chitika ads appear on various Yahoo PC sites (e.g., Answers, Local) and Yahoo (Bing) search/text ads are syndicated across Chitika’s network of roughly 250,000 publisher sites. Now that relationship is expanding to mobile. According to the news out this morning: The multi-faceted agreement with Yahoo! includes; off--network search syndication, monetization of Yahoo! owned and operated properties, and mobile ad serving and monetization. This deal allows Chitika to continue to provide world-class monetization sol [...]

Related Topics: Channel: SEM | Top News | Yahoo | Yahoo: Business Issues | Yahoo: Mobile & Go | Yahoo: Partnerships | Yahoo: Search Ads

Google has quietly dropped yet another search feature; this one is related to local search results within a search on Google. Google has removed the "more results near..." link on local search results for queries with local intent. For example, if you search for [pizza] on Google.com, Google will show you local businesses selling pizza to consumers, as well as webpages, videos and so forth on pizza. This is part of the universal search initiative from 2007. Since then, when Google showed local listings in the organic search results, Google would show a "more results near..." link under t [...]

Related Topics: Channel: Local | Features: Analysis | Google: Maps & Local | Google: User Interface | Google: Web Search | Top News

Bing announced today a new version of their Bing It On Challenge, an online campaign launched last September that offers users a side-by-side comparison of Bing and Google search results. In the latest Bing It On Challenge, Bing asks users to perform five separate search queries on BingItOn.com and choose the unbranded search result list they prefer after each query. Users are told whether they prefer Bing or Google based on the search results they selected. An study commissioned by Bing last year revealed that Bing search results were chosen nearly 2:1 over Google search results in blin [...]

Related Topics: Channel: Consumer | Microsoft: Bing | Microsoft: Bing Ads | Microsoft: Bing Videos | Top News

About six months ago, Google's head of search spam, Matt Cutts, made a comment in a Google forum thread that links within press releases won't "benefit your rankings." Since then, we showed one case where Google not only discovers the links within typical press releases but uses the anchor text for ranking purposes. Maybe it was one fluke, or maybe that particular case was not fair? In fact, Matt has said this numerous times that press release links don't count. The other day, Daniel Tan released another press release, this time on a smaller release site and added the anchor text "l [...]

Related Topics: Channel: SEO | Google: SEO | Google: Web Search | Link Building: General | Link Building: Paid Links | Top News

When Google first released its updated Google Search app last October, it never made the iTunes top ten and, last week, wasn't even in the top 100. But the addition of Google Now helped the app make the top ten in less than a week. Google relaunched its app last October with Siri-like voice recognition and readback, but after peaking at number 16, it started dropping down to around the 150 mark last Sunday. With Google Now being added, the app has risen up to number 10 in the most recently downloaded free apps list. Coincidentally, it also just got named the 10th most downlaoded free app [...]

Related Topics: Channel: Mobile | Features: Analysis | Google | Google: Google Now | Google: Google Search App | Google: Mobile | Top News

The Local Search Association has released a new Local Mobile Search report, which affirms many of the big themes and trends in the market now: PC traffic is flat, mobile is gaining rapidly and mobile is heavily used for local search. The Q4 2012 data in the report are from comScore. And because the data are from Q4, the trends and traffic figures in the report are probably slightly higher now. The data argue that there has been zero-percent growth in PC Internet traffic since 2011. The PC Internet has plateaued (see our Marketing Land story: PC Free: 46% Used Only Mobile Devices In Purchase [...]

Related Topics: Channel: Consumer | Search Engines: Maps & Local Search Engines | Top News

The momentum of Google's PLA program didn't slow after the holidays. After seeing Google Product Listing Ad traffic jump 82% in Q1 over Q4, CPC Strategy followed up its latest quarterly review of top CSEs with a closer look. The agency hadn't been surprised to see the 87% increase in PLA traffic in Q4 over Q3 as Google's pay-to-play program ramped during the holiday season. However, the huge traffic spike from Product Listing Ads that occurred after the holiday shopping rush did catch them by surprise. Bucking the typical trend of CSEs (and e-commerce in general), paid Google Shopping traf [...]

Related Topics: Channel: SEO | Google | Google: AdWords | Google: Product Search | Google: Universal Search | Search Marketing: Shopping Search Marketing | Top News

Bing has quietly released an update for the Bing iPad App, adding new features and making optimization improvements to the app. The app can be downloaded for free over here in the app store. The changes, as listed in version 1.3 include: Bookmark Web/Image/News Search Query Provide Daily Trending Images with density layout Enable Map Local Business Category Search Add Popular Now in search suggestion Performance Optimization in iPad1 Enable Related Search in detail web page Enable Browsing Page Close Button Dictionary, Mind Reader, Voice Search (CN mkt only) I've te [...]

Related Topics: Channel: Mobile | Microsoft: Bing | Microsoft: Bing Mobile | Top News

Well look at that! Search traffic to news sites has dropped over the past eight months, according to how BuzzFeed tracks referrals to sites within its network. A change of user behavior? Or perhaps more the result of "Dark Google" and "Not Provided?" Come on, I'll explain how Google may be making itself look like it's in decline. Where Has All The Google Traffic Gone? BuzzFeed said that it looked at traffic to 200 publishers in its network and found a marked decline in Google traffic from September 2012 onward. The network includes sites like Rolling Stone and The Huffington Post. My mind is [...]

Related Topics: Channel: Analytics | Features: Analysis | Google: Analytics | Top News

Google's head of search spam, Matt Cutts, posted a YouTube video talking about a recent SEO misconception that he would like the SEO and webmaster world to "put to rest." Matt said, just because Google has a search quality or ranking patent it does not mean that the patent was or is currently part of the algorithm. Matt explained that there was a patent named ranking documents, which we covered in our story named Patent: How Google May Trick Search Spammers. He said that was one example of a patent Google holds that is currently not built into the ranking algorithm. Mr. Cutts added th [...]

Related Topics: Channel: SEO | Google: SEO | Top News

For the 20th anniversary of CERN making Web technology available to anyone royalty-free, the European science lab has restored the very first website to its original location. Could today's search engines of Google and Bing, which didn't exist when the site was first posted, find it now? Time for a test. The answer turns out to be tricky. Searching For The Page By URL The easiest test was to see which of them had the page listed by searching for it by its URL, which is: http://info.cern.ch/hypertext/WWW/TheProject.html It looks like this, by the way: Google found it when I searc [...]

Related Topics: Channel: Strategy | Features: Analysis | Google: Web Search | Microsoft: Bing | Stats: Freshness | Stats: History | Stats: Relevancy | Top News

Google doesn't always use the HTML title tag of a web page, choosing instead to make its own title for a page, if it thinks it can do a better job. Here's an example of it getting this completely wrong. I was searching for Dana Point Jet Ski, which is a real business in Dana Point. Google instead listed the official page for Dana Point Harbor first: Listing the wrong site first is a relevancy problem. But changing the title of the page to "Dana Point Jet Ski & Kayak Center" is a double-fail. That's Google reinforcing its error, because it's so sure that it's right. See, Google [...]

Related Topics: Channel: SEO | Features: Analysis | Google: SEO | SEO: Titles & Descriptions | Top News

What are the most popular activities done or content consumed by apps? Google's now bringing that information to its search results, assuming the app developer makes use of Google+ Sign-In, that is. Google+ Sign-in was launched in February as an easy way to let anyone sign into a site or app using a Google+ account. Now, apps that make use of the service will have popular activity or uses done within their apps shown in Google Search. These results will be front and center on the search engine results pages and are built to save clicks by highlighting popular content consumed within [...]

Related Topics: Channel: Social | Google | Google: Google+ | Top News

The only constant in search is change. The Periodic Table of SEO was created in 2011 to summarize the major factors that comprise search engine optimization. But, it's time to update the table to review those ranking factors and make sure we've got the right combination. This year, we're asking the SEO community to provide their insight as we revise the Periodic Table of SEO. Please take the Periodic Table of SEO survey below, where you'll review and rank each of the 33 elements. You might notice that Blocking factors have already been removed (going the way of Pluto) since Google effec [...]

Related Topics: About Search Engine Land | Channel: Other | Features: General | Top News

Google Now for iOS and Android are almost identical in their look at feel. And aside from a few "cards," the same is true of their content. But, there are some differences behind the scenes worth noting: one of them is the fact that with its launch on iOS this morning, Google Now is available to roughly 2.5 times more people than it is on Android. Google Now for Android is only available on those devices that feature Jelly Bean 4.1 or 4.2 (4.3 is apparently coming). What that means as a practical matter is that fewer than 200 million people out of more than 750 million Android devices activ [...]

Related Topics: Apple | Channel: Mobile | Google: Android | Google: Google Now | Google: Mobile | Top News

Previously Android-only, Google's "predictive search" tool Google Now is now available for the iPhone and iPad. It's part of an updated Google Search App for iOS. Google Now for iOS had been anticipated since March, when Engadget discovered a promotional video suggesting it would make the leap. Until its release this morning, Google Now had been available exclusively on devices running Android 4.1 ("Jelly Bean") or higher. We've written multiple times about Google Now in the past. But, if for some reason you're unfamiliar with it, Google Now is the company's "search assistant," of [...]

Related Topics: Apple | Channel: Mobile | Google: Google Now | Google: Google Search App | Google: Mobile | Top News