SearchCap: The Day In Search, August 31, 2011

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 Tightens Review Process For New AdSense Publishers

  Google has added a new review step to its process for adding new AdSense publishers, presumably to better eliminate abuses and improve the quality of the AdSense network for advertisers. In the new process, publishers’ sites will be reviewed after they’ve placed the AdSense ad code on their sites, and real, paying ads won’t run […]

• Sanity Saver: Seek Out Local Search Meetups In Between Conferences

  I have attended many conferences in the last ten years, including Search Marketing Expo, Search Engine Strategies, and Internet retail events. Generally speaking, I’ve been pretty impressed with all of them. However, the reality is, these conferences are expensive. In fact, the average cost of attendance is around one-thousand dollars, not to mention the cost of […]

• Google Makes Chromebooks More Useful With Offline Access

  Google Chromebooks are great — unless you don’t have an internet connection; then they’re essentially useless. (Other colorful descriptors I’ve heard include “suck,” “blow,” “fail” and so on). Now Google is taking steps to address the problem with offline access to Gmail and, very soon, Calendar and, most importantly, Docs. According to the Gmail blog: […]

• US Move Against AT&T-Mobile May Spell Trouble For Google

  A big story today is the US government’s effort to block the proposed $39 billion acquisition of T-Mobile USA by AT&T. AT&T wants T-Mobile’s spectrum and network and the US thinks it will harm competition in the wireless market. According to the New York Times the government’s lawsuit boils down to the argument that less […]

• 4 Areas To A/B Test For E-Commerce Websites

  Out of all websites found on the Internet, online retail stores have the most potential for improvement through A/B testing. Amazon, Ebay and Etsy are just few examples of e-commerce websites that do a ton of A/B testing. The potential for A/B testing is enormous because of the sheer number of variables that these stores can […]

• 5 Steps To Improve Your Customer Driven B2B Lead Generation

  To maximize online lead generation campaigns, B2B marketers need to focus on the multifaceted customer they serve. Design campaigns to meet their needs across the entire decision cycle and business buying process to achieve the optimal ROI from their program. The Many Faces Of The B2B Customer In the realm of the B2B marketer, one […]

• Yelp CEO: 50 Percent Deal Margins Unsustainable

  Following the elimination of daily deals (though not check-in deals) from Facebook’s lineup of products, Yelp followed suit this week by scaling back its daily deals program. Many people incorrectly interpreted the news, presented in a Bloomberg article, as Yelp’s total exit from the space. Some have also seen it as an indication that the […]

Search News From Around The Web:

Applications & Portal Features

• Blogger’s fresh new look, Blogger Buzz
• Using Gmail, Calendar and Docs without an Internet connection, Official Gmail Blog

Business Issues

• Google investor sues board over online drug ads, Reuters

Local, Maps & Mobile

• 5 Ways to Improve Your Local Listing, Search Engine People
• Adwords Express: Things that are Easy to Hate, Mike Blumenthal
• More 3D trees in the western United States, Google LatLong

Link Building

• Let’s Kill the “Bad Inbound Links Can Get Your Site Penalized” Myth, Search Engine Journal

Searching

• Google News Archive Bug With Internet Explorer 7, Search Engine Roundtable
• Upset Google Users Threatens To Switch To Ask.com, Search Engine Roundtable

SEM Industry

• The Stars of Search Marketing [Infographic], SEO.com

SEO & SEM

• Update on Yesterdays Microsoft Advertising adCenter API Outage, adCenter API Blog for Developers
• 10 Things EVERYONE Should Know about SEO In 2011, Outspoken Media
• 5 Powerfully Awesome Htaccess Redirect Tricks [How To], Search Engine People
• Blog Post Publishing Process – Best SEO Practices, Search Engine People
• Does Google PageRank Really Matter?, quicksprout.com
• eCommerce Syndicated Content: How to Win, SEOmoz
• Ethics and SEO, SEOptimise
• Google Launches Product Snippets in UK, BigMouthMedia
• Hiding Content To Non US Users But Giving Google Access, Search Engine Roundtable
• How to impress at an SEO interview, Econsultancy
• PPC Bid Reductions: Why You Might Want to Make Some, blueglass.com
• Reputation Management – Tactics that still work, distilled
• Why Passive Online Income is so Elusive, SEO Book

Social Media

• New “Choose What You See” Filtering Options Could Be Coming to Facebook News Feeds, Inside Facebook
• Twitter Adds More Ads To Timelines, AllThingsD

Video, Music & Image Search

• Facebook Launching Music Service September 22nd, TNW Facebook
• Fortt: Facebook Plans to Launch Music Platform in September, CNBC
• YouTube Improves Resumable Uploads For Chrome, Firefox & Internet Explorer, Search Engine Roundtable

Web Analytics

• Two new versions of Google Analytics Management API, The official Google Code blog
• Linking all of your AdWords accounts to Google Analytics, Google Analytics Blog

Recent Hot Items From Sphinn, Our Social News Sharing Site:

• Discussion: How Much Search Traffic is Too Much? – Marketers, do you pay attention to the breakdown of traffic to your website (or your clients' sites)? We look at traffic as coming in three ways: Search, Referral and Direct. In the new "Discussion of the Week," we want to know: Is there such a thing as too much search traffic? What do you consider to be the ideal breakdown between those three traffic types? Or, do you not care at all where traffic comes from? The floor is open….
• Are You Losing Sales By Giving Customers Too Many Choices? – The power in having many options to choose from is in it's appeal to our desires to find the exact things that will fit us the best.  The dark side of having this many choices is confussion and being overwhelmed to the point of not making any decision.  This post details how offering many choices can affect decisions online.
• New “Choose What You See” Filtering Options Could Be Coming to Facebook News Feeds – A new Facebook test gives users the ability to personalize their news feed settings by each friend, dividing up content into Life Events, Posts and Other Activity. EdgeRank just got a whole lot more complicated.
• Misadventures in VC Funding: The $24 Million Moz Almost Raised – A very transparent look at the SEOmoz VC Funding that didn't happen.
• Getting Started as a Freelance SEO – Good post on freelancing SEO services with advice on Taxes, Finding Work, and Practical Tips.
• Google Analytics Visits Metric: Change > Implications > Opportunities – Good post, with video, from Avinash Kaushik the recent Google Analytics changes to their visitor sessions algorithm.
• Report: Young women are 'power users' of social media sites – People keep on flocking to sites like Facebook and Twitter, and young women are leading the way.
  The percentage of Internet users who are on social-networking sites continues to climb, according to a survey released Friday by the Pew Internet & American Life Project.
• The Ultimate Guide to Google AdWords Quality Score – This guide will help you understand the different types of Google Quality Score, why they’re important, the misconceptions about Quality Score, and it will provide you with a checklist of actions you can take to help raise your Quality Score.
• STUDY: Women Click More Facebook Ads Than Men – Worth a read if you engage in Facebook advertising, especially if your employer (or client) caters to a specific gender.