Google Operating System discovered a new experiment Google is running named Preferred Sites. In short, users who are in this experiment will be able to add a list of sites in their search preferences page as their “preferred sites.” Google will then use that information to show those sites in a higher ranking order in […]
The Live Search Blog announced the addition of email alerts for Live Search News. Live Search had RSS results for a while, but did not have a way to subscribe to news alerts via email. Live Search now gives you the ability to get these alerts via email either once a day, twice a day […]
Like last year, today, the search engines are commemorating Martin Luther King Jr. Day. I attached a collage of logos and themes from the various search engines, including Google, Yahoo, AOL, Live.com, Ask.com and Dogpile. To see them all in greater detail, you can visit their respective home pages today or go to the Search […]
Valleywag is reporting that Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer met with Yahoo chairman Roy Bostock Thursday in New York City. As you can imagine, news of the meeting has restarted speculation about the on-again, off-again merger/deal talks. The New York Times says that spokespersons for both companies refused to comment about the Ballmer-Bostock meeting. Earlier this […]
Below are Search Engine Land’s 10 most popular stories from December 2008: Top 10 Most Popular Stories: December 2008 1) Santa Tracker 2008: Google & NORAD Team Up Again – My favorite Christmas activity is tracking Santa’s route around the world. Once again, NORAD and Google are making it easy. The NORAD Tracks Santa 2008 site […]
Below is what happened in search today, as reported on Search Engine Land and from other places across the web.
One of the power-packed tools inside AdWords is the Conversion Optimizer, which will help you reach Cost Per Action (CPA) goals using Google Conversion Tracking on your account. One of the best features of Conversion Optimizer is how easy it is to engage and manage. To start, go to your campaign settings and choose “Change […]
Yesterday, we got a new news search engine which taps into Twitter that Yahoo’s excited about, as it uses their BOSS system. That kind of annoyed me. Why didn’t Yahoo just build the service themselves? Or a regular Twitter search service, for that matter? And where’s Twitter search from Google? BOSS is Yahoo’s Build Your […]
In this week’s Search In Pictures, here are the latest images culled from the web, showing what people eat at the search engine companies, how they play, who they meet, where they speak, what toys they have, and more.
Microsoft Bid to Beat Google Builds on a History of Misses from the Wall Street Journal has a very detailed look at some of the mistakes Microsoft made early on in the paid search space. The piece goes through the failure of Microsoft’s original keyword ad platform, named bCentral Keywords, which was discontinued in early […]
Austrialian electronics maker Kogan Technologies has said it is “indefinitely” delaying what was an imminent launch of the second Android phone in Australia, because of technology compatibility issues. According to the Kogan Blog: The Agora did reach a very late stage of development. Manufacturing had commenced and it was a matter of days from being […]
As we’ve seen several times recently, there’s a chasm between consumer usage of search and SEM by small business advertisers (SMBs). Google developed its authorized reseller program to address this issue in part and create a network of third party relationships that could help it gain more traditional small business (SMB) advertisers, which it had […]
I’m an introvert by nature, so this whole social media thing has left me feeling like an outsider looking in. While everyone Facebooks and Twitters each other to death, I’m asking “What’s the point?” It’s a genuine item of curiosity to me. I can’t really relate to wanting to relate to everyone. I have a […]
Search Engine Land’s next Search Marketing Expo conference, SMX West, comes to Santa Clara, California this Feb. 10-12. I’m happy to announce that we’ve completed our keynote lineup. Google’s Vint Cerf, “The Search” author John Battelle and myself will all be kicking off each day. I’m going to start the show with a keynote after […]
TweetNews is a new search engine that uses hot Twitter topics to bring more relevance and freshness to news search. It’s a pet project developed by Vik Singh, a member of Yahoo’s BOSS team. As Vik describes it on his personal blog, fresh news often doesn’t have enough links to rank well in a traditional […]
Below is what happened in search today, as reported on Search Engine Land and from other places across the web.
Clearly “the market” loves the MicroHoo dance and would like to see a transaction. And Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer has said he would talk anew to the new Yahoo CEO. Now that it’s Bartz, apparently there has already been a call in which search was not discussed, according to the the Wall Street Journal: She […]
As we move into the new year, the “Web 3.0” references appear to be picking up speed, and most define Web 3.0 closely along the lines of the social graph, with Facebook and Twitter as the poster children. Its not so much social media though, that is powering a fundamental shift on the web, but […]
Yahoo has just announced that the Wikipedia SearchMonkey App is now turned on by default for all Yahoo search users. Wikipedia becomes the sixth app that all Yahoo searchers will see, joining LinkedIn, Yelp, Yahoo Local, Citysearch, and Zagat. SearchMonkey adds enhanced content to the search results page. The Wikipedia app includes a snippet of […]
One of the things I frequently mention is that content and advertising are blurring so much that in many cases people selling information would be willing to pay to give that same content away in a few years. It is not that all old information is bad (in many cases older information is more pure […]
In Rare Move, Microsoft Is Exploring Job Cuts from the Wall Street Journal reports the rumored Microsoft job cuts may come as early as next week. It is uncertain if the job cuts will actually happen, the Wall Street Journal said Microsoft is looking for alternatives to cutting jobs. Those numbers are likely going to […]
Google’s announced they’re closing or ceasing development of a variety of products as part of an already continuing move to keep efforts focused on other products with greater usage. These include an end to video uploads to Google Video, closure of Google Catalog Search, Google Notebook, Dodgeball, the microblogging service Jaiku and the Google Mashup […]
The Google Blog wrote that Google may have to cut up to 70 engineering jobs. Google implied the cuts would be due to the engineers based in Austin, Texas; Trondheim, Norway; and Lulea, Sweden not being willing or able to relocate to Google’s Mountain view headquarters. Google explicitly made a point to say that their […]
Below is what happened in search today, as reported on Search Engine Land and from other places across the web.
The PPC Hero blog said they received an email from Yahoo that they are shutting down Yahoo’s contextual network ads in the United Kingdom. This product is named Content Match, which allows Yahoo Publisher Network publishers to display Yahoo ads on their sites. Yahoo matches the advertiser’s ads by the contextual relevancy of the page’s […]
Ben Edelman, an assistant professor at Harvard’s Business School, forcefully argues that “Yahoo’s Right Media ad marketplace features widespread ads exactly designed to deceive.” In his lengthy article he offers 10 examples and lots of specific documentation of the kinds of deception he alleges. The ad types in question feature the following kinds of copy […]
The Center for Digital Democracy and U.S. Public Interest Research Group, the same groups that initiated the FTC’s investigation into “behavioral advertising” online, have “amended their complaint” with the FTC to extend to mobile advertising. According to the 50+ page document filed yesterday: Right before the commission’s eyes, many of the same consumer data collection, […]
Amit Agarwal reports that Yahoo and Adobe have decided to discontinue the Ads for PDF product they launched in November 2007. An email sent to current participants of the program blamed the economic conditions for the failure of the program. The email said the program was discontinued due to “reassessment of priorities in the current […]
VentureBeat reports Google has launched a reseller program for Google Apps. The program is aimed at developers, hosting companies and others to take on the responsibility of billing, support and training, in exchange for a twenty-percent discount on the services. In short, Google will charge you 20% less of the standard fee and you can […]
The Google Webmaster Central blog announced that they have just released a new Sitemap generator that works on both Linux/Apache and Microsoft IIS Windows-based servers. The Sitemap generator is different and possibly smarter than other Sitemap tools because it uses web traffic, log files and other methods to find new or modified URLs. You can […]
The Google AdWords team has announced a group of new features for Local Business Ads, some of which are in place now, and others that will be coming soon. In place now are new links that will appear at the bottom of the ad’s info window: Get Directions, Street View, and/or Save to My Maps. […]
Ask.com — saying it plans to compete against the likes of Google, Yahoo and Microsoft — has announced a new “Super Verticals” strategy to take on its much larger rivals. These are specialized search engines that provide direct answers to factual questions. First off the mark? A NASCAR search engine. And yes, Ask also becomes […]
For some companies, social media marketing is regarded as a fun engagement tool. Consequently, it’s often not a high-priority marketing initiative that gets the budget, attention, or credibility that other areas of marketing enjoy. However, social media marketing can provide serious value. In fact, a closer look at the scope and impact of social media […]
Below is what happened in search today, as reported on Search Engine Land and from other places across the web.
Following up on his call last week for help identifying spam issues Google should address in 2009, Matt Cutts today is asking for specific help identifying what he calls “empty review sites” or “no results pages.” That problem was mentioned most often in the public feedback from last week’s post. An empty review site, or […]
Already recognized in some quarters as the most feature-rich of the major mapping sites, Google Maps has announced the addition of public transit data in more than 50 cities around the world. The new Transit Layer is available as a choice under the MORE button on the Google Maps interface: Once selected, the Transit Layer […]
According to news out today from the Wall Street Journal, Carol Bartz, the former CEO (and current executive chairman) of software company Autodesk, will be named the new Yahoo CEO. Bartz has been praised for her management and deal brokering skills but has never run an internet company, nor does she have an advertising background. […]
In retrospect it appears that relative search query volumes (Obama vs. McCain) did presage the outcome of the November election. Now it appears they predicted the recession as well. The Yahoo Search Blog says that search query trends subtly predicted the recession long before its formal designation by economists: Though we learned only a month […]
Google’s Matt Cutts posted a twenty minute video summarizing two presentations he gave last year. The video goes over what he considers to be virtual “blight,” or when a site or community becomes stale with spam. In addition, Matt shows us how to put on a “blackhat” and think like a spammer. The video is […]
Just over a year ago, we reported how you can spice up your AdWords ads with ASCII art. I was unable to reproduce it back then and it might have been a link bait stunt, but I found it interesting so I shared it. The same company wrote how you can brand your URLs to […]