This day in search marketing history: February 6

Google AdWords announces Enhanced Campaigns

In 2013, Google AdWords announced Enhanced Campaigns. This major update was designed to simplify campaign management across multiple devices and increase adoption rates of mobile advertising among small and medium-sized businesses.

Among the notable changes:

• Tablets and desktops would be grouped together, rather than treated as separate devices.
• Advertisers would set a baseline bid that applied to both desktop and tablet, and then set the mobile bid as a multiplier of the desktop/tablet bid. 
• Targeting at the operating system level would no longer be available.

Google planned to upgrade all campaigns in June 2013 (though the full rollout would actually begin July 22 and would take several weeks to complete).

Read all about it in The Big AdWords Update: Enhanced Campaigns Puts The Focus On Mobile.

Also on this day

Happy 15th birthday to Google Maps, the company’s second most important product

2020: Google introduced a refreshed version of its app for Android and iOS with some new features.

Now, get your Google Shopping ads on Gmail, Discover, YouTube

2020: Google kept finding more places to show Shopping ads as merchants prioritized them over text ads.

Google Search Console to consolidate Search Performance reports to canonical URL

2019: Starting at the end of March 2019, Google would change how the Google Search Console Performance reports counted metrics.

Google My Business supports hotel check-in and check-out times

2019: Google would display that information to searchers looking for more information about those times.

Google officially announces the new Google Search Console is available for everyone

2018: The beta version had reached nearly everyone as of a couple of weeks ago.

Google removes tappable shortcuts from search app

2018: Less than a year after it launched, Google removed the shortcuts offering quick answers on weather, sports and entertainment info.

Bing explains how AI-powered intelligent answers can show users two points of view for the same query

2018: Bing believed there were many questions where getting just one point of view was not sufficient, convenient or comprehensive

Quora adds more contextual & behavioral ad-targeting options

2018: Quora offered more options for behavioral and contextual targeting to either narrow or widen audience targets.

Google makes it easier to see and share publishers’ real URLs from AMP pages

2017: The AMP header area would display a link or chain icon, what it called the “anchor” button. Clicking on this would make the publisher’s direct URL appear.

84 Lumber and Avocados From Mexico among Super Bowl advertisers that stood out in paid search

2017: Both advertisers opted to drive users to their own sites instead of YouTube.

Google Maps updates Android app with real-time traffic info, nearby places & bus schedules

2017: Swiping up from the bottom of the Google Maps app home screen on Android displayed a Places tab, Driving tab and Transit tab.

Google Confirms Making “Tweaks” To The Search Results But Says No “Update” To Announce

2015: Google said he latest update the SEO community noticed was not related to the Penguin or Panda algorithms.

Google Removes “How Can I Join ISIS” Autosuggestion

2015: Google censored out the Google autocomplete results to show ISIS for the search term [how can I join].

Bing Ads Rolling Out Updates To Quality Score Reporting

2015: Changes were designed to make quality score easier to use as a guide to where to focus your optimization efforts.

Yahoo Gemini Gaining Mobile Search Share, But Not At Google’s Expense, Yet

2015: The spike in Gemini traffic appeared to come almost entirely at the expense of mobile ads served by Bing.

Google Penalized A Germany Agency & Their Clients For Link Schemes, Says Matt Cutts

2014: He added that Google would be going after more Germany link schemes in the near future.

Google Requiring Some Business To Reverify Their Listings Or Be Removed From Google Maps

2014: Some business owners received emails from Google requiring them to reverify their listings within three weeks or their listings would be deleted from Google Maps and Google+ Local.

Two New Link Analysis Tools Available: OpenLinkProfiler.org & WebMeUp.com

2014: Two new link tools were available for those looking to analyze their own links or competitor links.

Google’s “Olympic Charter” Logo Stands Up To Russia’s Anti-Gay Legislation

2014: The logo included a quote stressing that the official Olympic Charter was against discrimination and using the colors of the rainbow gay pride flag.

Update: “When Do The Olympics Opening Ceremonies Start?” Now You CAN Ask Yahoo

2014: Yahoo inserted a Search Shortcut that displayed not only the live start time but the TV broadcast time at the top of the search results.

Google On Will They Ever Remove PageRank From The Google Toolbar?

2013: Matt Cutts said the “writing is on the wall” for this feature. Google would remove Toolbar PageRank just over three years later, in March 2016.

Australia’s Highest Court Relieves Google Of Liability For “Deceptive” Search Ads

2013: The Australian Competition & Consumer Commission sued Google six years earlier, claiming that certain travel-related ads appearing in search results were misleading.

Has Google Overtaken Naver In South Korea?

2013: Despite reports that Naver controlled somewhere between 70-80% of the search market in South Korea, StatCounter was showing Google soundly defeating Naver since February 2012.

Google Buys Channel Intelligence For $125 Million

2013: Channel Intelligence offered a range of services built around data management and product feed optimization.

Super Bowl Commercials 2013 Edition: For Search Visibility, Most Brands Bought AdWords Too

2013: Eighty percent of brands bought AdWords for branded searches and 50% bought AdWords for commercial taglines.

Google Maps Adds Ski Resort Trail Maps For Android & iPhone

2013: The new feature overlayed lifts and trail maps for 38 major ski areas in the U.S.

Find Content Quicker On The Go With Twitter’s New Mobile Search & Discover Upgrades

2013: The Search, Discover and Connect tabs were all updated.

Google Instant: Only On When Your Computer Can Handle It

2012: If you went to the search preferences it would say Google Instant was only enabled when “my computer is fast enough” and then showed whether Google thought your computer was fast enough.

Report: National Marketers Love Local, Fail At Basic Tactics

2012: Insufficient funding, a lack of education or just plain ignorance were the factors behind the flawed national-local approaches.

Bing Webmaster Tools Adds Markup Validator

2012: The tool scanned for HTML Microdata, Microformats, RDFa, Schema.org and Open Graph.

Yahoo Launches Mobile-App Search (For PCs) In The UK

2012: As an app search tool, it was quite nice. Neither Google nor Bing offered anything comparable in their main search engines.

Under Threat Of Being Blocked Google, Facebook Comply With India’s New Internet Censorship Rules

2012: The law made online publishers potentially liable for the acts of individual users and third parties.

A Google Super Bowl Ad? Eric Schmidt Hints At It

2010: His tweet suggested that Google would run its first major broadcast television commercial during the Super Bowl.

Another Survey (Incorrectly) Predicts Google Could Lose Search Crown

2009: Forrester Research had concluded that Google, for lack of user loyalty, was vulnerable to being dethroned and that another “Google killer” was lurking just around the corner.

Privacy Critics Don’t Give Google Enough ‘Latitude’

2009: An example of overreaching in an effort to gain (media) attention.

Google Offers A Peek Into Its Internal Eye-Tracking Studies

2009: An interesting look into how Google tested its search results pages and how searchers interacted with them.

Search In Pictures: Google Doodle Wall, Ask.com On Labonte’s Helmet & A Google Boat?

2009: The latest images showing what people eat at the search engine companies, how they play, who they meet, where they speak, what toys they have, and more.

The Latest From Jerry: Stay Focused, Yahoos!

2008: No real news other than Yang telling employees no decision had been made, proposals were being evaluated, and people loved Yahoo.

Berkowitz Had Hoped To Turn Around Microsoft, But May Find Himself In “Turnaound”

2008: Several internal groups were slated for leadership changes.

Google To Fight Baidu In China With Legal Music Downloads?

2008: 7% of Baidu’s traffic was to access free music, but Baidu had been a target of copyright actions because of this.

Ask Launches BigNews

2008: It was similar to Google News, with a side of Digg.

Searching For Southern Tornado Maps

2008: There wasn’t much map content about the tornadoes that tragically tore through the Southern U.S.

SphinnCon Israel 2008 Recap

2008: Coverage of first SphinnCon event in Jerusalem, Israel.

Google Hiring In Africa

2008: The company was hiring in its Nairobi, Kenya headquarters and opening new offices in several Africa countries.

What Yahoo’s Panama Update Means For Searchers

2007: With the new ad ranking system in place, Yahoo hoped people would start looking at the results more as a whole.

Keyword Research And Consumer Demand

2007: How marketers were using search volumes to help conduct research and development, launch new products and predict potential product success based on perceived consumer demand.

Google’s Pen Flatlines For Ask, Parody Of Recent Capacity Problems

2007: They described the flatlining of the Google pen to cause “considerable inconvenience and loss of data.”

IAC Earnings Drop But Ask.com Grows

2007: IAC’s profits dropped 98 percent in the fourth-quarter.

Search Engine Land: January 2007 Statistics Review

2007: How Search Engine Land was growing.

Past contributions from Search Engine Land’s Subject Matter Experts (SMEs)

These columns are a snapshot in time and have not been updated since publishing, unless noted. Opinions expressed in these articles are those of the author and not necessarily Search Engine Land.

• 2020: The importance of building brand awareness through Amazon advertising by Andy Taylor
• 2019: Pixel problems: Troubleshooting your paid media tracking implementation by Simon Poulton
• 2018: Technical SEO in the age of semantic search and Google by Ryan Shelley
• 2018: Case study: On-page + off-page SEO working together = success by Eric Enge
• 2017: 2016 was a coming-of-age year for Baidu SEO; why you should invest in 2017 by Hermes Ma
• 2015: 4 Search Engine Optimization Techniques for DuckDuckGo by Neil Patel
• 2014: Authority Is The New Links: Reading Between The Lines Of Matt Cutts’ Guest Post Critique by Nathan Safran
• 2013: Opinion: Why Google Should Crack Down Harder On The Mugshot Extortion Racket by Jonathan Hochman
• 2013: Facebook: The New Display & Search Channel by Gus Spathis
• 2013: TEES Your Visitors For Higher Conversion Rates by Brian Massey
• 2012: Latest Google Search Revamp Brings Opportunities For Local Businesses by Stephanie Hobbs
• 2012: 3 Ways Enterprises Cripple Their Online Marketing Efforts by Eric Enge
• 2012: Using The Mobile Ratio To Measure Mobile SEO Success by Sherwood Stranieri
• 2012: Managing PPC Through The Fog Of Long Tail Keywords by Matt Van Wagner
• 2009: The 7 Habits Of Highly Effective Advertising by Gord Hotchkiss
• 2008: Two Practical Landing Page Tricks That Will Save You Money by Jon Miller
• 2008: New—And Unfortunate—Changes To Google Local Search by Daniel Bower
• 2007: Digg Friending 101 & The Top Diggers List by Neil Patel

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