Undoubtedly, you may have seen Google’s Instant Preview interface which provides glimpses for webpages listed in SERPs. What you may not be aware of is that they’ve added sophisticated code to make it unique on mobile devices. These Instant Previews provide compelling evidence that mobile optimization continues to be important. Google rolled out Instant Previews in November 2010, […]
Most companies measure paid search based upon revenue targets, ROI goals, and conversion rates. Metrics such as bounce rates are generally left for the web design team to figure out, or the paid search term to obsess about without any clear strategy. In this column, we will examine bounce rates and put them in the […]
As the other Mobile Mondays columnists have established, since mobile devices have become more popular, mobile sites are becoming an option for many organisations. Maybe this is because the decision makers are sporting iPads and smartphones in the board room, but there are also significant business reasons to create a mobile version of your website. Since […]
I hear this question, in various forms, quite often these days: “What’s up with Google now, post-Panda/Farmer/whaddayacallit? What am I supposed to be doing for SEO?” (Usually accompanied with a deep sigh, aggressive hand gestures, and/or grimacing.) It All Started With Caffeine “Caffeine lets us index web pages on an enormous scale.” – Carrie Grimes, […]
There are lots of different ways to speed up searching. Google, Bing and Yahoo all offer browser toolbars — no need to visit their home pages, just search wherever you are. Google and Yahoo both have their own versions of “instant search,” where search results appear as you type. Google’s Chrome web browser lets you […]
Austrian officials have lifted an almost year-long ban on Google Street View, but Google says it has no current plans to offer the service there, anyway. According to the Austrian Independent, Austria’s Data Protection Commission (DSK) announced on Thursday that it was ending the ban that started in May 2010; that’s when Google admitted that […]
Apple and Google are helping intensify an already intense digital privacy debate with last week’s revelations that both companies’ mobile software track your movements in detail without your affirmative consent. This morning the Wall Street Journal reported that the iPhone stores user location data even when location-services are entirely turned off: Apple Inc.’s iPhone is […]
Although Google Offers hasn’t formally launched yet, the service is already facing its first lawsuit. Walker Digital, a private R&D lab that created and launched Priceline.com in the late 1990s, is suing Google for allegedly violating four of the company’s patents. The lawsuit, which asks the court for a jury trial, seeks unspecified damages and […]
Below is what happened in search today, as reported on Search Engine Land and from other places across the web. From Search Engine Land: Bing’s Read/Write World: An Ambitious Project To Bridge Maps With Movies, Photos, Local Data & More It’s probably not something that you can wrap your head around pretty quickly. It’s also […]
It’s probably not something that you can wrap your head around pretty quickly. It’s also not something you can describe in quick, easily digestible terms. “It” is a new Microsoft Bing effort called Read/Write World that has some pretty lofty goals: things like indexing and connecting all of the world’s “geo-linked media.” And not just […]
Bing has added the Bing Rewards program directly to the top header bar of Bing’s search results. Now when you search on Bing, you will see the “Rewards” link and icon on the right of the “sign in” link. Here is a picture: Bing said that integrating this Rewards link into the header will give […]
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.
When I first started down this 6-lane highway called Online Marketing over six years ago, we used an absolutely archaic bid management software whose name escapes me. I want to say it was a Yahoo! (or precursor to Yahoo!) product, and basically it automated our bids so they would go up and down based on […]
On the face of it, Facebook marketplace and search advertising are similar. In both platforms, the advertiser places a bids for an ad, competes against other advertisers at the impression level and then pays the platform a CPC for every click. These similarities help search marketers who are increasingly being asked to manage Facebook campaigns. […]
Over the past several months, I’ve been trying to crystal ball what the future of search might look like. I’ve had fascinating discussions with several visionaries in the industry, including Stefan Weitz (Microsoft), Shashi Seth (Yahoo), Hampus Jakobsson (RIM) and John Battelle (Federated Media). In my last column, I started to sum up the overarching […]
Today on Google’s home page is a special interactive Google logo for Earth Day. Earth Day this year falls out on Good Friday and for the special day, Google made a fun, animated and interactive Google logo. Ironically, it seems as if you have Pandas playing (see the Google Panda update), the logo also has […]
Google has added a pair of features today that make Google News a little more personal. First, the “News for you” section of Google News now includes stories based on your previous Google News activity. If you click on a lot of articles about a certain topic, this section will begin to show more articles […]
While some countries have already completed their investigations, Belgium is just now launching a probe into Google’s collection of Wifi data over unsecured WiFi networks. According to the Flemish newspaper De Morgen, Belgian data protection officials believe Google is guilty of a “flagrant violation of privacy protection laws.” A Bloomberg report says the Belgian privacy […]
Below is what happened in search today, as reported on Search Engine Land and from other places across the web. From Search Engine Land: AT&T: 43 Percent Of Local-Mobile Searchers “Walk Through The Door” There are a number of studies (e.g., Pew, Forrester) in the market that question how interested or engaged users are with […]
There are a number of studies (e.g., Pew, Forrester) in the market that question how interested or engaged users are with “location based services.” Those studies tend to narrowly focus on Foursquare, Gowalla and mobile check-ins. They tend to miss the larger point about the importance of location on mobile devices. A new study from […]
The FOSS Patents blog reported that Google lost an important patent case on their Linux server kernels they have been using throughout the company. Bedrock Computer Technologies was awarded $5 million for Google infringing on their patent (U.S. Patent No. 5,893,120) named “Methods and apparatus for information storage and retrieval using a hashing technique with […]
Google Offers, the company’s not-so-secret coupon program, is taking signups in three areas: New York City, San Francisco/Oakland and Portland, Oregon. Users can subscribe to get discounts via email in any or all of those available cities. After signing up, Google’s confirmation promises “regular emails” — which sounds like not necessarily “daily” — with discounts […]
Google has released the latest version of Analytics to all users, introducing a completely redesigned interface, multiple customizable dashboards, event goals, more powerful custom reports, and a search term cloud visualization. When users log into Google Analytics, they can access version 5 by clicking on “New Version” at the top right of the page. (Toggling […]
With all the talk about diversifying your revenue and traffic channels, most people often miss that organic traffic itself can be diversified. Traffic from search engines takes on many flavors and paths. A deeper dive into understanding the life cycle of a shopper query will lead you to some interesting avenues. Here are a few […]
Google announced they have improved the Google Instant autocomple suggestions feature to work better at suggesting particular words, in addition to full search phrases. Google explained that many searches done at Google were never done before, so offering up predictions on a long tail query can be complex. But if you look at only part […]
If you’ve been hoping that someone’s search engine would turn into a social network, today is your lucky day. Sure, Google and Bing have been making search results more social, and Bing shows Facebook “likes” in its search results, and Google has its +1 button experiment … but that’s nothing compared to what Blekko is […]
Most of us in the PPC world know that testing ads is a great idea – almost necessary optimization work. There are plenty of articles around the web expounding the benefits: increase QS, lower costs, boost conversion rate … all good stuff. In this article, let’s tackle the basic block and tackling necessary to get […]
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 Testing Instant Previews On Ads (Here’s What It Looks Like) Google is testing a new feature that marries its Instant Previews with AdWords. The test gives searchers a chance to […]
Google is testing a new feature that marries its Instant Previews with AdWords. The test gives searchers a chance to see the ad’s landing page without clicking on the ad. As you can see, all of the ads on the screenshot above — whether above the organic results or in the right column — are […]
At the Where 2.0 conference today Google announced “Google Earth Builder,” which is a cloud-based solution for enterprises that want to render their data on maps. The idea is that enterprises of all stripes can upload and store all types of geospatial data on Google’s servers. Proprietary enterprise data is rendered and published on Google […]
B2B search engine marketers understand the value of inbound links but may struggle with execution. With an ever increasing plate of responsibility, emerging search industry trends, and the balance between short-term and long-term goals, it is easy to let a link building program fall to the wayside. Link building does not have to be perceived […]
Next month, I’ll be returning to my alma mater, Columbia University, to give a speech to this year’s Phi Beta Kappa inductees. Reflecting on what I ultimately took away from my time at school, I realized that those life lessons underpin my philosophy of marketing today. A brief background: never much into school as a […]
Adding to its LBS portfolio, eBay has acquired Boston-based WHERE.com, which has a popular mobile app and operates a “hyper-local” mobile ad network. Last year eBay bought local product inventory finder Milo.com. The terms of the WHERE deal were not disclosed. Great Mix of Assets WHERE, which began as uLocate, will apparently be housed in […]
Yesterday, Yahoo reported a second quarter of massive declines in its search revenue. Yahoo blamed the “headwind” of paying its partner Microsoft 12% of Yahoo’s net search revenues. Yahoo also said Microsoft’s ads are underperforming. But even without these factors, Yahoo has seen an almost unbroken quarterly decline in search revenues since 2008. Failure is […]
As the privacy screws tighten in the US and Europe, Yahoo is doing something surprising: extending the time it holds on to personal search records. In 2008 Yahoo decided to retain search records for only three months. Yahoo thus became the most “progressive” of the major search sites with its compressed data-retention policy. Now Yahoo […]
Google Instant continues to spread. The company has just announced that it’s one of several new features on Google Toolbar 7 for Internet Explorer 8 and 9. Google Instant has to be activated via the Toolbar Options menu, and once it’s on, Instant works the same way it does on Google.com. The Escape button on […]
When we search for websites to link to us, we often use inputs on Google in order to return results such as “KEYWORD resources”, “KEYWORD links” , or simply just “KEYWORD”. The problem with this process is that what we input is not what we are looking for. There is a fundamental disconnect between what […]
Yahoo reported Q1 revenues of $1,064 million, which represented a 6 percent decline vs. a year ago. The company essentially blamed the search deal with Microsoft for the decline: [The decline was] primarily due to the required change in revenue presentation related to the Search Agreement and the associated revenue share with Microsoft. For transitioned […]
Below is what happened in search today, as reported on Search Engine Land and from other places across the web. From Search Engine Land: Dutch Agency Orders Google To Remove Data About Citizens’ WiFi Routers Dutch data officials have ordered Google to give the country’s residents a way to remove data that Google has about […]
Dutch data officials have ordered Google to give the country’s residents a way to remove data that Google has about where their WiFi routers are located. It’s part of the ongoing dispute over Google’s collection of personal information via unencrypted wifi networks — something the company has said all along was accidental. According to the […]