SearchCap: The Day In Search, October 25, 2007

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

From Search Engine Land:

• 
  Facebook Raises $500 Million More
  It appears that $240 million is not enough. Forbes is reporting that Facebook has raised an additional $500 million from two New York based hedge funds, each contributing $250 million at the same $15 billion valuation. That would mean Facebook has raised about $740 million in this round, giving up…
• 
  Microsoft’s Ballmer: Bidding On 700 MHZ Would ‘Alienate The Telecom Industry’
  Speaking on Tuesday at the CTIA mobile trade show, Microsoft’s CEO Steve Ballmer definitively said that the company would not bid for wireless spectrum licenses next year. Reuters quotes Ballmer as saying, “What would it buy us to buy a piece of spectrum, one piece of spectrum in one country…It…
• 
  Google Analyst Day Roundup: Search, Ads, Apps And The Big Dashboard
  There are a number of stories this morning recapping aspects of the Google Analyst Day discussions, which were overshadowed to some degree by the Microsof-Facebook announcement yesterday. While most of it appears to have been a basic overview intended to remind financial analysts and some press about the range of…
• 
  Google Made 20 “Improvements” To AdWords In Q3 2007
  Google bullish on advertising system from the Financial Times reports that Google has made 20 or so improvements to their search ad system in the last quarter. Nick Fox, director of product management in the advertising division, said that in the third quarter of 2006, Google only made 2 or…
• 
  Yahoo Launches Search Assist In UK
  Yahoo has informed me that they have launched Yahoo Search Assist in the UK. So if you go to https://uk.search.yahoo.com/ and conduct a search, you will see the Search Assist feature: Yahoo launched this in the US earlier this month….
• 
  Yahoo’s Ex-CEO, Semel, Sells Off 750,000 Yahoo Shares
  Yahoo Chairman Semel exercises options from CNNMoney reports that Terry Semel, Yahoo’s old CEO, has exercised 750,000 options. He exercised options for $15 each and then sold those options for $29 to $29.90 each. You can see the detailed transactions on this SEC filing, which shows he first exercised 500,000…
• 
  Eric Schmidt, Google’s CEO, Confident DoubleClick Deal Will Be Approved
  Google In ‘Good Shape’ Awaiting OK On DoubleClick Buy – CEO from SmartMoney reports that Google’s CEO, Eric Schmidt is very confident the DoubleClick acquisition will be approved by the U.S. Federal Trade Commission. Schmidt said at Google Analyst day, that Google is in “good shape” for the deal to…
• 
  Google To Re-Design Products For Chinese Users
  Google to focus on mobile Internet in China from Reuters reports that Google China will be re-designing their products for the Chinese user base. Lee Kai-fu, Google Inc’s president for greater China, said: These mobile users have very different usage patterns from the American users. Most Chinese users who touch…
• 
  Social Media Marketing: The New SEO?
  Fall is the time of year when we start to look at where search marketing is heading. Looking at the latest search marketing conference agendas, articles, and online news in the SEM space, it certainly appears that social media marketing and networking are the wave of the future. To…
• 
  Search Windows of Opportunity: Topicality, Regionality, Seasonality and the Small Business
  There are opportunites that small businesses have that large businesses might not even considering touching, or that they may not have the ability to respond to quickly enough. The aerospace industry uses the term “launch window” to describe the right combination of time and location for a rocket to…
• 
  Live Search Almost Certainly Coming To Facebook
  During this afternoon’s Microsoft-Facebook conference call, the question was asked whether the new deal would include paid search. Microsoft’s Kevin Johnson and Facebook’s Owen Van Natta declined to directly answer the question and made general statements about future collaboration and that the deal a “win win win.” Nobody listening was…
• 
  Microsoft Makes $240 Million Investment In Facebook
  The conference call is going on now. Here’s what the press release says: Facebook and Microsoft Corp. today announced that Microsoft will take a $240 million equity stake in Facebook’s next round of financing at a $15 billion valuation, and the companies will expand their existing advertising partnership. Under the…
• 
  Yahoo! 360 Quietly Slips Away
  Yahoo! has decided that their blogging and social networking platform, Yahoo! 360, is a failed experiment, and they’re pulling the plug. The news comes via Techcrunch, which noted that Jerry Yang announced it in a blog post on October 16. The Yahoo 360 blog explained the shut down in more…

Search News From Around The Web:

Applications & Portal Features

• Google Desktop adds Leopard support, Macworld
• API, gadgets, and tabs, oh my!, Official Google Blog
• Email Notifications for Blogger Comments, Google Operating System

Business Issues

• Google says MySpace deal ahead of plans, Reuters
• Yahoo Japan Shares Fall on Rating Cuts, Net Decline, Bloomberg
• Three Reasons Microsoft Underpaid For Facebook, Wired
• Should Google Be Afraid Of Facebook?, Read/Write Web
• Yahoo Executive Joins Nintendo, New York Times

Local, Maps & Mobile

• India: Click first, then drive, Yahoo Local Blog

Link Building

• Can Link Bait Mature? Yes, It Has To, BruceClay.com
• What is a directory submission worth?, Bob Massa
• Solving the Link Building Puzzle: Do or Die – Part 2, Search Engine Watch

Paid Search & Contextual

• Tips on Keyword Research from Wordtracker, PPC Hero
• Top Ten Tips for the Holidays, adCenter Blog
• A common misconception revisited, Inside AdWords
• The Ultimate Guide to Adapting your PPC campaign for the Christmas Season, www.sitevisibility.co.uk

Searching

• What Topic Do You Care About?, DMOZ Blog
• How Google May Blend Information From Feeds and Extracted Data For Search Results, SEO By The Sea

SEM Industry

• The Politics of Search: it’s just beginning, John Andrews
• The Clueless SEO – Meet Our Staff, SEO Consultants
• Amanda Camp of Google on Helping Webmasters with Webmaster Tools, Search Engine Roundtable
• New Website Design for and blog for SEO.com, Search Trends
• The Do Follow OPML Project, Greg Boser

SEO & SEM

• Best SEO Resources, Practices & Conferences : Reader Poll Roundup, Online Marketing Blog
• Recent Aesthetic Google PageRank Update in Google Toolbars Worldwide!!!, SEO Book
• Developing a Training Plan for In-House SEO, Search Engine Watch
• Fixed: Google Webmaster Tools Link Page Now Working, Search Engine Roundtable
• Google’s Set Crawl Rate Feature Works at Domain or Sub Domain Only, Search Engine Roundtable
• What Does This Google PageRank Message Mean?, Search Engine Roundtable
• Google’s Paid-link Smack in the Face, Search Engine Guide
• 2008 Presidential Search Marketing Face-Off: Round # 3, 10e20
• 8 Things We Learned About Google PageRank, Search Engine Journal
• Google Slams Paid Links? Good or Bad?, WebProNews
• I Never Bought Into Google’s Page Rank Score, Cre8PC
• Why is HTML being left on the side of the road?, Ogletree

Social Media

• Tagging tagging. Analysing user keywords in scientific bibliography management systems [Connotea], ResourceShelf
• Facebook Client for BlackBerry Mobile Phones – First Screenshots, Digital Inspiration
• Friendster Announces Developer Platform; Can You Say "Commodity"?, TechCrunch
• How to Market on Facebook, Performancing.com
• Bigger Not Always Better in Social Media, Search Engine Watch

Web Analytics

• Just Thought I’d Ask(.com), Hitwise

Other Items

• Google’s Cerf: Deep space Web decades out, News.com
• Ask.com Market Share Larger Than Reported?, Search Marketing Standard
• Microsoft’s Live Search Club Adds New ‘Insiders Guide’, Convera To Develop Search Verticals for Advanstar Communications, ResourceShelf
• MySQL to get injection of Google code, Computerworld
• Insider Domain Name Snatching Probed, Washington Post
• Facts You Never Knew About Yahoo, Google, Ask Jeeves, and AllTheWeb, HTML Goodies
• Language, Google and Translation Difficulties, Google Blogoscoped
• The World According To Google, www.internetnews.com
• Did he just say Internet marketing doesn’t work?, ClickZ
• Matt Cutts Start Menu Screenshot (Joke), SEM Spot

Hot Items From Sphinn, Our Social News
Sharing Site:

• Google PageRank Doesn’t Matter. Can We Stop Talking about it Now?
• StumbleUpon Will Love Us Even When Google Doesn’t
• 10 SEO Client Archetypes
• Microsoft Inks Deal with Facebook
• Social Media Marketing: The New SEO?
• More bloggers being hit with Google penalties
• 31 Tips on Writing Killer AdWords Copy
• Should SEOs Work For Commission?
• Toolbar Hysteria – It Isn’t Really a Penalty
• Digital Point Members put on Suicide Watch
• Does Anyone Care about the Customer Anymore?
• Trust me, I’m a Marketer
• Where is my Commission Check?
• Anyone Have Some Boots I Could Borrow?
• PageRank Isn’t The Question; Page Rank Is.
• Link Buying Poll
• The Importance of Images In Linkbait Articles