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In the glory days of advertising, consumers could be influenced by whatever words the advertisers fed them. Today, advertisers must learn the language of consumers, and shape their messages to meet their needs.
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Apr 15
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Continuing from previous search stats from Hitwise
and Compete,
comScore is now
out with search engine share in
the United States for March 2008. Similar to Hitwise, Google hits a new high
while Microsoft and Yahoo hit new lows. But in terms of raw searches, Yahoo and
Microsoft showed gains.
Apr 15
Cuill, the stealth search startup backed by
former Google, AltaVista and IBM search experts, has completed a second round of
funding to the tune of $25 million. The round was led by Madrone Capital
Partners and follows on a first round of $8 million from Tugboat Ventures and
Greylock Partners. From the release:
Apr 15
Cuill, the stealth search startup backed by
former Google, AltaVista and IBM search experts, has completed a second round of
funding to the tune of $25 million. The round was led by Madrone Capital
Partners and follows on a first round of $8 million from Tugboat Ventures and
Greylock Partners. From the release:
Apr 15
Here is a recap of what happened in the search forums today, through the eyes of the Search Engine Roundtable and other search forums on the web.
Apr 15
Here is a recap of what happened in the search forums today, through the eyes of the Search Engine Roundtable and other search forums on the web.
Apr 15
by Sage Lewis
Legal details are the name of the game this week. First up, Sage covers Search Engine Watch’s story on Internet Advancement, the SEO agency slapped with a $100,000 scamming fine. Then it’s on to Georgia’s ruling on trademark infringement as it pertains to meta tags. Amidst the legalese, he touches on the info that Google Bots now fill forms to uncover invisible data, Yahoo!’s “no minimum bid” rule, and Facebook’s new IM tool.
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Apr 15
Below is what happened in search today, as reported on
Search Engine Land and from other
places across the web.
From Search Engine Land:
-
Compete: Microsoft Gains Share; Google Hits New High In Raw Searches
Having covered Hitwise stats yesterday, today I move on to the latest stats from Compete that for search engine share in the United States for March 2008. Unlike Hitwise, they show Google taking a very slight dip last month, with Microsoft getting a slight rise. But while Google’s percentage… -
iCrossing: Democrat Obama Winning In Overall Search Volume, Republican John McCain Outspending Rivals On Paid Search
The finding that Republican presidential candidate and presumptive nominee John McCain is outspending (by 2x) Democrats Barak Obama and Hilary Clinton on issues, as well as buying his opponents “brand terms” is one of the findings of a fascinating new iCrossing report, “How America Searches: Election ‘08 Update.”… -
Time to Refocus on Your Content
If you’ve been involved with social media at all lately you’ve realized that getting your linkbait on Digg has become increasingly difficult, if not impossible, especially if you’re trying from a commercial domain. This has left many social media marketers scrambling for ways to please their clients or find… -
AOL Acquires Sphere & Creates Search Interface For iPhone
Sphere, software that connects contextually relevant content to your content, has been purchased by AOL. The Sphere Blog confirms the acquisition, and TechCrunch suggests the purchase price was at about $25 million. Sphere initially launches as a blog search engine but then adapted into a “related content engine,” with clients… -
1 Week Left Until SMX Social Media Marketing
SMX Social Media Marketing takes place next week - April 22-23 - in Long Beach, CA. Not registered yet? There’s still time. Register and join us for this one of a kind event for internet marketers who want to learn the traffic-driving benefits of working with social media sites and… -
Your Site’s Manifest Linking Destiny
One of the challenges link builders face is pursuing links that will differentiate one site from competing sites in a way that still produces a natural ILP (inbound link profile). Backlink forensics is a method I use to see who already links to who, and part of that process,… -
Hakia Goes For “Quality” Over “Popularity”
If Hakia were using an automotive analogy, the site might be saying to Google, “We’re BMW, you’re Chevrolet.” The Hakia blog explains how the engine is taking a “quality” approach, trying to assess the credibility of sites in ranking them, together with the help of professional librarians. Hakia specifically discusses… -
Google Earth 4.3 To Launch, KML Becomes Open Standard
According to the Google Earth Blog, Google Earth version 4.3 (free) is coming later today. Among the upgrades and improvements are faster load times for 3D buildings, day/night lighting, new navigational options and StreetView images. (Google has also just started to let StreetView on to third party sites.)… -
Google’s VP, Marissa Mayer, On “Don’t Be Evil” Company Motto
Don’t Be Evil or don’t lose value? from The Sydney Morning Herald interviews Google’s vice president, Marissa Mayer on Google’s famous company motto, “Don’t Be Evil.” In that interview, she explains that the motto “wasn’t like an elected, ordained motto.” She added, “It [the motto] is good PR but really… -
Google Wants To Be Market Leader In China Within Five-Years
Google Seeks a Leading Role in China from the Wall Street Journal reports that Google China’s president, Kai-Fu Lee, wants Google to be a market leader in China in five-years. Kai-Fu Lee said, “Certainly, we would like to aspire to be a market leader in five years.” His plans to… -
Search Illustrated: Search Benefits Of The Blogosphere
There are many aspects of the blogosphere that make it attractive to search marketers: the sharing and distribution of content, the potential for viral marketing and link bait, and the associated linking opportunities. But, so much more goes into the relationship we have with blog communities. This week’s infographic…
Search News From Around The Web:
Business Issues
- Farecast sold in $75 million deal, SeattlePi
- Federated Media’s $50 Million C-Round Confirmed - No Plans to Buy Up Blog Partners, TechCrunch
- Is Search Recession-Proof?, Search Engine Watch
- On Leaving Google, Google Blogoscoped
- The Mighty Murdoch: Will He Ever Stop?, ABC News
Local, Maps & Mobile
- YouTube videos in Google Maps, Google LatLong
- Google Local Business Center Allows Free Form Categories Now, Search Engine Roundtable
- Iran slams Google for renaming Persian Gulf, sify.com
- Video on Google Maps Revisited, Screenwerk
Microhoo
Paid Search & Contextual
- Expand Your Keyword List For Free: 6 Keyword Tools You Should Be Using (but probably aren’t), PPC Hero
- Google AdSense Adds "Choose Units" Reporting Option, Search Engine Roundtable
- Google AdWords Picks Most Expensive Keyword From Most Expensive Campaign, Search Engine Roundtable
- Keyword research: what can you learn from a word? - adCenter Advertiser, adcentercommunity.com
- PPC Search Engine ABCSearch Partners with AdWatcher on Optimization, Search Engine Watch Blog
- Strong Q1 for Search Marketing Amid Signs of Weakness Ahead, www.businesswire.com
Searching
- Can Powerset Unseat Google in Web Search?, altsearchengines.com
- Indeed Now Lets You Search for Jobs by Salary, TechCrunch
- Marc Cramer, CEO of SurfCanyon on Search & Importance of User Feedback, Search Engine Journal
SEO & SEM
- 3 Steps to a Stronger SEM Training Program, Search Engine Guide
- An SEO’s Tools: A Hammer or a Paintbrush?, Small Business SEM
- Microsoft Live Search April 2008 Update?, Search Engine Roundtable
- SponsoredReviews Adds Google PageRank Filtering, Search Engine Journal
- When Talking SEO, Be On The Same Page, Search Engine Roundtable
- Yahoo Search Stops Grouping Results From Same Domain?, Search Engine Roundtable
Social Media
- Facebook News Feed Reports on You Behind Your Back, TechCrunch
- Twitter Spam Spirals Out of Control, mashable.com
- Twitter Testing Advertising In Twitter Streams, TechCrunch
- What Makes a Great Company Blog?, Search Engine Guide
- When Social Media Content = Great Blog Content, Search Engine Watch Blog
Video, Music & Image Search
- 5 Ways to Optimize Google Search Result Video Ads, Jonathan Mendez’s Blog
Web Analytics
- IndexTools & Yahoo: You Must Accept The Agreement Or Goodbye Customer, SEM Geek
- IndexTools (Yahoo!) Web Analytics goes FREE!, VisualRevenue
Other Items
- Google Expand TV Ad Service on Dish Network, International Business Times
- The end of Mowser, RussellBeattie.com
Recent Hot Items From Sphinn, Our Social News Sharing Site:
- Marketing Pilgrim. Dosh Dosh. Rich people go there!
- 100-Plus Tips and Resources to Become an Authority Site in Your Niche
- YABL Trusted Google sites
- Twits, Tweeple, Twitterverse & Twitterings
- What I Hate About the Internet - Everyone is a “Social Media Consultant”
- Google tackles child pornography
- 10 Golden Rules of Blogging (we’re going to need more monkeys)
- Rebuilding Your Blog Groove
- I am Pleading With You Microsoft: PLEASE Make Live Search Better
- Search Engine Optimization Firm Sued, Required to Pay More than $100K in Fees
- What Price Social Networking?
- How to Get Piles of Links, Subscribers and Comments
- Introducing New Bot: Yahoo Slurp 3.0
- The Ultimate (Free) Landing Page Resource
- 10 Ways to Improve Blog Traffic in 30 Minutes or Less
- Widgetbait Gone Wild
- Gab interviews 3 SEO stars: Stuntdubl, Graywolf and Sugarrae
- The New Social Media Democracy
- Should You Target Competitive Keywords, The Long-Tail or Both?
Apr 15
Comments Off
Having covered
Hitwise stats yesterday, today I move on to the
latest stats from Compete that for search engine share in
the United States for March 2008. Unlike Hitwise, they show Google taking a very
slight dip last month, with Microsoft getting a slight rise. But while Google’s
percentage share dropped, on a number of searches basis, it hit a new high.
Apr 15
Comments Off
The finding that Republican presidential candidate and presumptive nominee John McCain is outspending (by 2x) Democrats Barak Obama and Hilary Clinton on issues, as well as buying his opponents “brand terms” is one of the findings of a fascinating new iCrossing report, “How America Searches: Election ‘08 Update.”
Apr 15
If you’ve been involved with social media at all lately you’ve realized that getting your linkbait on Digg has become increasingly difficult, if not impossible, especially if you’re trying from a commercial domain. This has left many social media marketers scrambling for ways to please their clients or find new ways to attract links virally for their own sites. While Digg is the big daddy of the social news sites and getting a frontpage Digg is certainly worth its weight in gold, by no means is it the end-all. You can still attract just as many links leveraging other popular sites like Reddit and Delicious.
Apr 15
by Mack Collier
In Part Two of my Elements of a Great Company Blog series, I’ll look at
how to create a posting schedule and why it’s so important in growing
your blog’s readership.
Yesterday in Part One of this series, I examined how a great company blog creates content that engages its readers and provides them with the value and information they are looking for.
But what about your posting schedule? Does your blog even have a schedule? Should it?
Of course! If your blog has a regular schedule for when new posts will appear, it helps ‘train’ your readers to know when to expect new content. Don’t assume that everyone will subscribe to your blog’s feed, as many readers still prefer to manually visit and read their favorite blogs. If they find that there’s no new content every time they visit your blog, they might stop coming!
So how do you set your posting schedule? First, check out your blog’s traffic and determine which days of the week have the highest traffic. More than likely you will see that the weekdays, and especially the middle of the week, have more traffic. A general rule of thumb is that a blog enjoys its highest traffic levels on Tuesday-Thursday, followed by Monday and Friday. The weekend usually sees a dip in traffic.
Now that you know which days are best for traffic, you know when you need to be posting. But how many writers does your blog have? If your blog only has one writer, then you might only be able to get 1 or 2 new posts up a week. If this is the case, I would suggest running a new post on Tuesday and Thursday. If you can run 3 posts a week, go for one each on Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday.
If your blog has multiple writers, then the task of creating a posting schedule becomes much easier as the workload is shared by more people. But make sure that you make every effort to have a new post up when your traffic levels are highest, and work your way backwards from there.
Tomorrow I’ll cover Part Three in the What Makes a Great Company Blog series, how to encourage and respond to comments!
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Search Influence can help! Targeted Traffic. Increased Revenue. Results Guaranteed. Customized Internet Marketing you can afford.
Apr 15
Sphere, software that connects contextually relevant content to your content, has been purchased by AOL. The Sphere Blog confirms the acquisition, and TechCrunch suggests the purchase price was at about $25 million. Sphere initially launches as a blog search engine but then adapted into a “related content engine,” with clients from the Wall Street Journal, Time, Reuters and others.
In other AOL news, AOL Search has created a unique user interface for searching on AOL via your iPhone or iPod Touch. iPhone/Touch users just need to go to search.aol.com and to be presented with the new user interface. AOL’s Farhan Memon said “combining AJAX technology and the iPhone’s easy to use multi-touch surface, our designer Lisa Hoover and lead developer Alan Tai have created a user experience that allows the richness of the Web to be delivered on a phone.”
Apr 15
by Manoj Jasra
Recently I have been involved in creating a search marketing training program which some very clear objectives: help new search marketing strategists get up to speed quicker, allow them to work on billable client work sooner/more efficiently and get them prepared to participate in high-level brainstorming strategies. As much as I can teach the new strategists, I have learned it’s as important to learn from them to continually tweak and improve the program. Below I have outlined 3 steps to creating a stronger search marketing training program.
-
Constantly Reading, Sucks: Providing course material to your trainees is important but don’t overload them with constant reading. There will come a time where their ability to absorb content through line and lines of text will simply run out. I suggest mixing up the textual content with audio and video, additionally I recommend you introduce scenario based training. Scenario based training is way for trainees to get their hands dirty with tasks that they will face on a day to day basis. If you’re providing training for an agency or even in-house training, create tasks that are related to current issues that the company is facing, you never know what kind of innovative ideas some fresh minds could come up with.
-
Create a Relationship: When you’re training someone it’s important that you create an open door policy right from the start so that your student(s) can approach you with any questions related to the training program or search marketing in general. Throughout the training program, schedule some regular time with your students to ask them how they’re doing with course material. This will keep the students stay engaged with the training program and help you design a course which is custom rather than “cookie cutter.”
-
Get Feedback: Your search marketing training program is not going to be perfect right off the bat and it may not be perfect for a while, but the idea is to continually tweak your program with feedback from the people who are undertaking the training. Whether it’s your clients or your co-workers, it’s important to get their comments/suggestions in-relation to the course content, their ability to understand the concepts, the level of difficulty of the material and the relevancy of the course material to real-life business situations.
Want more from your web site?
Search Influence can help! Targeted Traffic. Increased Revenue. Results Guaranteed. Customized Internet Marketing you can afford.
Apr 15
SMX Social Media Marketing takes place next week - April 22-23 - in Long Beach, CA. Not registered yet? There’s still time.
Register and join us for this one of a kind event for internet marketers who want to learn the traffic-driving benefits of working with social media sites and tools like Facebook, Digg, StumbleUpon, del.icio.us and Wikipedia.
You will learn how to engage communities at social media sites in an appropriate and respectful manner from the experts who are pioneering the field. Check out the full agenda and roster of speakers.
SMX Social Media Marketing will be held at the Westin Long Beach, an ideal venue to host this intensive, 2-day program. We’ve crafted the ideal environment for learning: intimate setting, free Wi-Fi, and ample time for networking with the presenters and fellow attendees.
This is your only chance to attend SMX Social Media Marketing this year. Don’t miss out. Register today!
Apr 15
A Webmaster Talk forums member is trying to reduce the amount of search traffic he’s getting.
Allow me to explain. Basically, he’s looking to even out his traffic because other sources are yielding overall traffic success. Search alone hasn’t been cutting it.
What can be done to reduce the emphasis on getting traffic through search engines? The usual: link building, tools and services, community involvement, a forum, a newsletter, advertising, word of mouth, and contests.
Or you can go the extreme measure and disallow search spiders by updating your robots.txt. Still, some search traffic would be nice, right?!
The idea here is a good one. Don’t put all your eggs in one basket. Focus on getting traffic from a variety of sources.
Forum discussion continues at Webmaster Talk.
Apr 15
A Webmaster Talk forums member is trying to reduce the amount of search traffic he’s getting.
Allow me to explain. Basically, he’s looking to even out his traffic because other sources are yielding overall traffic success. Search alone hasn’t been cutting it.
What can be done to reduce the emphasis on getting traffic through search engines? The usual: link building, tools and services, community involvement, a forum, a newsletter, advertising, word of mouth, and contests.
Or you can go the extreme measure and disallow search spiders by updating your robots.txt. Still, some search traffic would be nice, right?!
The idea here is a good one. Don’t put all your eggs in one basket. Focus on getting traffic from a variety of sources.
Forum discussion continues at Webmaster Talk.
Apr 15
One of the challenges link builders face is pursuing links that will differentiate one site from competing sites in a way that still produces a natural ILP (inbound link profile). Backlink forensics is a method I use to see who already links to who, and part of that process, perhaps the most important part, determining why.
Apr 15