SearchCap: The Day In Search, November 16, 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 Experiments With Paid Inclusion & Does “Promoted” Meet FTC Guidelines?
  

  Just when you thought paid inclusion was finally dead with holdout Yahoo getting out of the space, it’s come back from the most unlikeliest of sources: Google. Below, a look at the experiment plus reexamining the FTC’s guidelines about disclosing paid ads. Does saying “Promoted Videos” on YouTube rather than “Sponsored Videos” meet these? For those [...]

• Attribution Wars: A Plea For Small-e Enlightenment (Part 2)
  

  Pssst. Over there, next to the purple wing chair. Behind the foosball table and just beyond the 2002 vintage lava lamps. It’s a gaggle of digital marketers, munching on Pez, and screaming at the unfortunate Fortune 500 brand CEO who made the mistake of visiting this digital agency’s hip warehouse space conveniently located just steps [...]

• Two Special Training Workshops Offered at SMX West
  

  In-House SEM Exchange and Bruce Clay’s SEO Training Will Run March 5th Join us for workshops that take a deep dive on search engine optimization (SEO) or issues confronting in-house SEM professionals at Search Marketing Expo – SMX West. The seminars will be held March 5th, immediately following SMX West on March 2-4. Keep [...]

• Bug: Google Social Search Goes Offline Temporarily
  

  Over the weekend, I received several emails, noticed dozens of Tweets, saw several forum posts and noticed for myself that Google Social Search experimental search feature went offline. If you have opt in to the Social Search feature at google.com/experimental you will notice an error on your Google searches that reads, “The experiment you’re trying [...]

• Track Google Sidewiki Comments Via RSS
  

  Google Sidewiki launched in September, giving Google Toolbar users the ability to comment on your web site in a new way. Tracking those comments meant you had to have the Google Toolbar installed and check those comments manually. That is no longer true. The SEO Mofo blog explained how you can track Sidewiki [...]

• Google Fast Flip About To Jump Into Google News?
  

  Many publishers have complained repeatedly that Google and Google News (not the leading online news site) reduces their content to “commodity” status or otherwise adversely impacts their brands. Google’s Fast Flip is a response to this in part. It offers a more “branded” and visual way to consume news and magazine content from major publishers. We [...]

• Supporting A Global Brand Campaign With SEM, Part 2
  

  Last month I took a look at how to plan, budget and organize a global brand campaign with paid search. Now I’d like to walk you through the launch process and talk a little bit about how you’ll need to set your campaigns up for tracking and optimization. Hopefully my experience will serve you in [...]

• Local-Social Search: A Powerful Marketing Channel For Small Businesses
  

  The courtship of social networking and local search will result in a marriage that diversifies the mix of sales tools and empowers circles of families, friends, co-workers and organizations to share experiences and opinions in the local search space. For a number of years, consumers have had a collective, powerful online voice through ratings and reviews. [...]

• Josh Cohen Of Google News On Paywalls, Partnerships & Working With Publishers
  

  Want to do a paywall with no “first click free?” That’s fine with Google, says business product manager Josh Cohen. Want to do micropayments? Google will be “flexible” in considering support of new business models like this. But if you charge, expect less traffic, and also expect that your competitors will be [...]

• How To Create Brand Awareness On Facebook
  

  To successfully promote a business through social media means walking the finest of fine lines. To market without intruding, to advertise without offending; these things are not easily done. This week, I was thinking about online marketing opportunities using Facebook. And nowhere is the line finer than on Facebook. On that platform, you need to [...]

• Google Gets Water On The Moon Logo
  

  NASA said yesterday it had discovered water on the moon, and Google — always big on space exploration — wasted no time producing a special logo to celebrate the event. Google’s backing a contest to put a private rover on the moon. Who knows? Maybe one of those rovers will visit sources of water. And we’ll [...]

• Revised Google Book Settlement Filed & Live Blogging The Press Call
  

  As expected, a revised Google Book Settlement has been filed today — about as late as possible. The agreement narrows the scope to the US, UK, Canada and Australia. It alters how revenue generated by “unclaimed works” will be handled. It formally grants retailers who license out-of-print books covered by the settlement — including Google [...]

Search News From Around The Web:

Business Issues

• Microsoft’s Loss, Google’s Gain. Don Dodge Gets A New Job, TechCrunch
• Obama Pushes for Internet Freedom in China, Wall Street Journal
• Thanks Microsoft, Hello Google, Don Dodge
• Twitter’s New Headquarters As Shown Off By Employees (Pictures), TechCrunch
• Yahoo! Co-Founder Jerry Yang Keynotes IGF Conference in Egypt, Yodel Anecdotal
• YouTube And Univision Are Now Amigos, TechCrunch

Local, Maps & Mobile

• Superpages’ Android App Offers AR, Screenwerk

Link Building

• Advanced Link Analysis Charts, SEOmoz

Paid Search & Contextual

• Anti-Phishing Reminders, Yahoo! Search Marketing Blog
• SEM: Pricing Revolution, Rimm Kaufman

Searching

• The Next Frontier in Search: Questions, Ask.com Blog
• LexisNexis Goes Mobile With New iPhone App, ResourceShelf
• Google publishes Stanford dissertations online, San Francisco Chronicle
• New from ebrary: Free Access to a Searchable Database of Materials about H1N1, ResourceShelf

SEO & SEM

• Help Google index your mobile site, Official Google Webmaster Central Blog
• 3 SEO Browsers to Evaluate on-Page SEO, Search Engine Journal
• 4 Tools for Advanced Google SERPs Analysis, Search Engine Journal
• Analyzing the Relationship between Organic and Sponsored Search Advertising: Positive, Negative or Zero Interdependence?, SSRN
• Google’s FeedBurner Tagging URLs : Duplicate Content Issue, Search Engine Roundtable
• Is Google Caffeine At 216.239.59.103 Data Center?, Search Engine Roundtable
• Search Taxonomies and Search Engines: Answering Questions vs. Indexing Webpages, SEO By The Sea
• Social Media For PR: Why It’s Vital You Embrace It, Online Marketing Blog
• The 3 Variables of Google Local Search, Search Engine Guide

Social Media

• First Third-Party Facebook Ad Manager Launches Using Facebook Ads API, All Facebook
• Twitter.com Is Still the Most Popular Twitter Client – TweetDeck a Distant Second, Read/Write Web

Video, Music & Image Search

• Welcome to YouTube, Univision!, YouTube Biz Blog
• YouTube Gem-Hidden Gems of Googlenew.mov, YouTube

Other Items

• Vatican meets Facebook, Wikipedia, Google, The New Haven Register