SearchCap: The Day In Search, May 14, 2008

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 & Other Search Engines Dominate Traffic Drivers To Wikipedia
  When writing about Powerset this week, I covered how its hopes to gain Wikipedia users was complicated by the fact that Wikipedia itself gets so many people from search, rather than direct navigation. New stats (PDF) from Nielsen Online reaffirm this — four of the five top referring sites to…
• Hitwise: Google Again Hits New High; Microsoft & Yahoo Again New Lows
  Hitwise released the latest statistics for search engine share in the United States for April 2008. Google has again hit a new high, jumping up 0.65% from the prior month’s high, to 68% of the US search market. Microsoft and Yahoo hit all-time lows — though Yahoo, at least,…
• Summize Gains "Local" Twitter Search Option
  Summize has already turned into my preferred tool to search for what people are saying on Twitter. Now it’s gained a way to see what people are twittering about near a local area. Say I want to see what’s been happening in Newport Beach, California, in terms of Twitter activity….
• Travel Search Engine Kango Relaunches As UpTake
  Does the world need more travel sites and search engines? UpTake (formerly Kango) thinks so. Travel is one of the most developed and "mature" vertical online. It’s also one of the most competitive segments. However, there’s still considerable frustration in doing online travel planning notwithstanding the plethora of tools and…
• Google Updates Earth Imagery & Begins To Blur Faces
  Google has announced a new earth imagery update has been pushed out to their mapping product. With that update, Google has updated their Manhattan images, which includes higher quality images, better naming of specific buildings and areas, plus Google has begun blurring the faces of people in their street view…
• Increase Online Registrations By Improving Downloadable Assets
  Many B2B search marketing programs are designed to generate online registrations, inquiries and leads. Typically, something of value (such as a white paper, product demo, or presentation) is offered in exchange for personal contact information. Today I’ll offer three tips to enhance the value of these downloadable assets and…
• Are We In-House SEO Experts? Not Really… And Here’s Why
  When you hear the phrase "in-house SEO expert" or "in-house SEO," certain things immediately flash to mind. There’s the glamour bits built around the perceptions fostered from hearing of six-figure salaries, or direct involvement in big projects and depth of contact many in-house search marketers seem to have within…
• Can Icahn Or Microsoft Stop Google’s "Natural Monopoly"
  Reports are that Carl Icahn has acquired about 3 percent of Yahoo’s shares, apparently in hopes of taking over the company. And then? Well, you know – maybe go back to Microsoft. Except Microsoft may no longer want to talk, plus that poison pill of a Google-Yahoo ad deal still…
• Searching for "Kitten Videos?" Me Neither
  A new survey from ClipBlast! about how people find video content has started a discussion about search and how it relates to entertainment content. In the survey, ClipBlast! asked 1000 online consumers if they had a preferred method for finding video content on the Web. Of those surveyed, almost…
• Bidding for Dollars - Margin Dollars, That Is
  As the competition in search becomes more sophisticated, refining tactics becomes more important than ever. For online retailers, bidding by margin is all but essential. Every firm has a different marketing objective: some look for maximum ROI, some are willing to spend to break even in hopes that future…

Search News From Around The Web:

Applications & Portal Features

• Breaking: Facebook to Launch Jabber/XMPP Support for Chat, Allfacebook
• Zoho No Longer Requires Accounts. Sign In With Your Yahoo Or Google ID, TechCrunch
• Google accidentally enables ratings on some Blogger accounts, ZDNet Googling Google

Business Issues

• Google to Present at the NASDAQ OMX 21st Investor Program, Google
• Google founders have grown up, Reuters
• IAC, Liberty Resolve Legal Dispute, Wall Street Journal
• Mass. figures large in Google’s game plan , Boston Globe
• Google’s Superiority Complex, Search Engine Watch

Local, Maps & Mobile

• Google Maps Adds More: Wikipedia Entries and Geo-Coded Photos, TechCrunch
• OpenTable Ranks Restaurants, Guarantees No Fake Reviews, TechCrunch
• Rebranding your business for fun and profit in Maps, Mike Blumenthal
• Verizon Wireless joins LiMo Foundation, Reuters

Paid Search & Contextual

• AdWords Downtime: May 17, 10am-2pm PST, AdWords API Blog
• Demographic Targeting - Is it right for you? , adCenter Blog
• Advertisers Can’t Sell Hard Liquor But Google Can, Search Engine Watch Blog
• How Click Arbitrage & Dirty Ad Syndication Killed Yahoo! Search Marketing, SEO Book
• Emotional Motivators in Landing Page Optimization, Search Engine Watch
• The Display URL May Impact Your Google AdWords Quality Score, Search Engine Roundtable

Searching

• Looking towards IPv6, Official Google Blog
• Keeping good news stories together: just part of what it means to work on Google News, Google News Blog
• How Might the Machine Understand Text Relevance, Search Engine Journal
• Google China Homepage Links to Earthquake Information, Google Blogoscoped
• Student Searches: The Top 15 Searches for the K-12 Set, Search Engine Watch Blog
• What Is Acceptable For "People Search Engines?", SEOmoz
• YouTube Video Listed Multiple Times in same SERP, endlessplain.com

SEM Industry

• Search Engine Watch Forums Names Chris Boggs Associate Editor, Search Engine Watch Blog
• What Is The Definition Of SEO?, ShoeMoney

SEO & SEM

• Eric Enge Interviews Yahoo’s Chief Scientist, Andrew Tomkins, Stone Temple
• Can Links From Porn Sites Hurt Your Search Rankings?, Search Engine Roundtable
• Does Google Index Content in "The Cloud" (Amazon S3, etc), Search Engine Roundtable
• In 2008, Is The NoArchive Tag a Red Flag in SEO?, Search Engine Roundtable

Social Media

• comScore: Yahoo! Buzz Overtakes Digg in April, Read/Write Web
• How to Get More Twitter Followers: Some Methods That Work, Dosh Dosh
• A New Wave of Reputation Management Issues, ViperChill
• FriendFeedLinks: A Memetracker For FriendFeed, TechCrunch

Video, Music & Image Search

• YouTube’s (GOOG) Secret Ad Plan Revealed: ‘Buzz Targeting’, Silicon Alley Insider

Web Analytics

• Google Analytics loses a weeks e-commerce data, BlogStorm

Other Items

• Search and Searchability, SEOptimise
• Top Third-Party Results for "Google", Google Blogoscoped
• Podcast: Google Brain Drain? Twitter Faster Than USGS? Auction Rant! Telescope Tears , Daily SearchCast

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