SearchCap: The Day In Search, September 21, 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: Just Because You Can Doesn’t Mean You Should: Why DIY SEM Isn’t The Answer Everywhere you look today you can find books, television programs, and websites specializing in do-it-yourself. While this […]

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Below is what happened in search today, as reported on Search Engine Land and from other places across the web.

From Search Engine Land:

  • Just Because You Can Doesn’t Mean You Should: Why DIY SEM Isn’t The Answer

    Everywhere you look today you can find books, television programs, and websites specializing in do-it-yourself. While this may be a great thing for folks who want to refurbish their homes with stylish but affordable interiors, it is not always the best choice for all things. Just because you can re-wire your home doesn’t mean you […]

  • Google: Stop Suing Over The Meta Keywords Tag, We Don’t Use It

    Google is telling the world what every seasoned webmaster and search marketer should already know: The keywords meta tag has no impact whatsoever on how Google’s search engine ranks pages. None. Zilch. Nada. And while Google often needs to be somewhat ambiguous when talking about how it ranks pages, the message in today’s blog post […]

  • Google’s Schmidt: Independent Yahoo Still Important To Competition

    Last year, Google and Yahoo were denied a deal that would have left Yahoo with its own search technology, after the US Department Of Justice rattled its anti-trust saber. This year, Yahoo’s pursuing a deal to sell off its tech to Microsoft. While Google CEO Eric Schmidt sees his company’s former […]

  • Microsoft Bing Search Ads To Test Favicons

    MediaPost reports Microsoft adCenter, Bing’s search ads, will be testing placing favicons and logos in the search ads. I have conducted about 20 queries to try to bring up such an ad, but I personally do not see them myself. MediaPost wrote, “James Colborn, director at Microsoft Advertising and long-time adCenter veteran, believes the […]

  • Yahoo’s New Ad Campaign: It’s You!

    The Wall Street Journal is reporting that the new consumer-facing Yahoo branding campaign is starting to appear in New York, with a personalization theme: It’s You!. According to the article:
    Yahoo is planning to reintroduce its battered brand to the public Tuesday with a massive global marketing campaign, according to people familiar with the effort. The Internet […]

  • Google’s Flying Saucer Logos Lead To H.G. Wells, Father of Science Fiction

    Google has come clean on what all these flying saucers Google Doodles were about. It is to honor the 143rd birthday of H.G. Wells, the Father of Science Fiction, who’s birthday is today. We actually expected this logo to show up today. Many of the logos, Google tweets and evidence or hints, […]

  • Seven Compelling Reasons That Now Is The Time To Ramp Up Paid Search

    Paid search accounts for about 50% of all digital advertising spending today in most major markets, give or take 10% (the UK clocks in as one of the most impressive English-speaking markets for paid search, clocking in at 58% of digital spend, according to econsultancy). For we diehards, the reasons for running paid search campaigns are obvious. […]

  • Big Brands & Social Media Part 3 – Putting The Plan Into Action

    After my last column on how big brands should organize around social media marketing, I thought it might be useful to get tactical and look at some specific ways that big brands can begin to move the needle on social media. Again, I’m crediting Bill Hunt with inspiring some of these thoughts in a great […]

  • Harvard’s Edelman Proposes A Bill Of Rights For Online Advertisers

    It’s time for an online advertisers bill of rights. So says Harvard assistant professor Ben Edelman, who has spent years researching Internet advertising and compares the current landscape to a “wild west.” Edelman recognizes the “staggering” opportunity that online advertising provides, but says the current system has problems that “threaten to destabilize online advertising—wasting advertisers’ […]

  • SMX East & The Return Of The Evening Forum

    One of my favorite sessions at the search conferences I’ve programmed for a decade now has been the Evening Forum. It’s been over two years since I last held one, and I’ve brought it back for our SMX East search engine marketing conference this Oct. 5-7. There’s no agenda to the Evening Forum, which will be […]

  • Eric Schmidt’s Favorite Google Product? Chrome!

    What’s Google CEO Eric Schmidt’s favorite Google product at the moment? When I asked him that this week, I expected a “I love all my children equally” answer. Instead, Schmidt surprised me answering without hesitation: Google’s Chrome browser. “The one that I am the most pleased with is Chrome. This is a personal […]

  • A Primer On Website Testing

    Search marketers can learn a lot from scientists. Scientists spend their life testing things, one after the other, incessantly trying to discover new interactions between atoms, molecules, viruses, bacteria, etc. One of the greatest scientists of all time, Albert Einstein, said, “A theory is something nobody believes, except the person who made it. An experiment […]

  • Dream: Google’s “Did You Mean” Meets Kanye West

    It’s not real. But I sure wish it were, Google going all Kanye West on people searching for Taylor Swift. In the mockup above you can see Google responding “I’m really happy for you, and I’m gonna let you finish your search, but did you mean: beyonce” instead of the usual “Did You Mean” spelling correction. The […]

  • What Google’s “Caffeine” Update Means For Paid Search Campaigns

    Google recently announced that a massive operations overhaul is in the works. “Caffeine,” as it’s known internally, is described by Google’s Matt Cutts as primarily driven by “under the hood” changes to improve Google’s indexing technology, allowing the engine to be more flexible and efficient in the way it collects pages. He went on to […]

  • Department Of Justice Files Objections To Google Book Search Settlement

    As expected, the US Department Of Justice today has filed a list of objections and modifications it would like seen made in the proposed settlement to the Google Book Search lawsuit. It’s not saying that the settlement should go back to square one. In fact, it suggests that “momentum” potentially could be lost to improve […]

  • There’s No Caffeine In Google Results Yet, Cutts Says

    Google’s search results change regularly, but with the impending rollout of Google Caffeine, there’s a lot of people wondering if that’s what the changes are. Google’s Matt Cutts told us today that Caffeine has not yet been rolled into the main Google.com search results.
    Twitter has seen its share of questions about the Caffeine rollout: […]

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Opinions expressed in this article are those of the guest author and not necessarily Search Engine Land. Staff authors are listed here.


About the author

Matt McGee
Contributor
Matt McGee joined Third Door Media as a writer/reporter/editor in September 2008. He served as Editor-In-Chief from January 2013 until his departure in July 2017. He can be found on Twitter at @MattMcGee.

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