With our SEMpdx SearchFest taking place in just a few days on March 9, 2010, this blog post is to update the panel presentations which are being moderated by EngineWorks team members.
Last night, I was privileged to have attended a vibrant keynote presentation by Bill Weihl, Green Energy Czar at Google, during the Software Association of Oregon (SAO) 2010 Annual Member Dinner at Montgomery Park Glass Atrium here in Portland. During this formal event, Bill presented the impressive initiatives that the G-Men and Women from Mountain View are embarking upon to improve the energy efficiency of their company . . . and the world!
Yesterday, Danny Sullivan, editor-in-chief of Search Engine Land, reported in his article titled ‘Google Blurs The Line Between Paid & Unpaid Results Again’, that the world’s largest search engine is now allowing businesses to have Sponsored Links (i.e., paid listings) appear within their Local Business Center (LBC) results. Google’s LBC listings, also known as the “Seven-Pack of Local Listings”, appear at the top of their Natural search results, typically along-side a local map and directions information.
We, as humans, have a tendency to seek-out a cause for every effect. This, of unfortunately, can lead to the logical fallacy of ‘correlation equals causation’. That is, just because a correlation exists between two phenomena, it must mean that one is the cause of the other. It’s important to keep this fallacy in mind when asking yourself if Google’s recent decision to move its AdWords sponsored listings (from the far right side of their search engine results page, to closer to the middle of the page) was in response to the recent successful introduction of Microsoft’s newly branded search engine, Bing.
Status: Top Secret
Code Name: Caffeine
Access: Approved
The Associated Press revealed this morning that Google posted an announcement to their blog late last night that they are allowing individuals to have access to a new version of its search engine. That’s right . . . Google has released a new search engine. On a completely separate Web address. That looks exactly the same as its existing engine. However, the G Men and Women from Mountain View claim that ‘Caffeine’ (the new engine’s code name!) uses a different algorithm to rank sites for relevant queries within its index.
Today’s announcement that Yahoo! will be turning its search engine over to Microsoft made me a little nostalgic for early days when our online search universe was just forming with hundreds of rapidly expanding solar systems, dying stars, and ominous black holes. One of the largest galaxies in our universe during the late 1990’s (when I entered this fledgling space) was Inktomi, which was purchased by the very-same Yahoo! in 2002. As most veteran Internet star gazers know, Inktomi commanded a market share of more than 42% of all online searches performed in the United States in 1999. With today’s celestial collision between Microsoft and Yahoo!, it is safe to say that Inktomi has become a proverbial red dwarf.
Since you’re reading this blog post, you more than likely have seen many sources touting the fact that the overwhelming majority of search engine users click on the top three (3) Natural search listings for any given query. Recently, I came across an informative study performed by Richard Hearn, a freelance interactive marketing consultant in Ireland, that re-affirmed this well-known axiom in our industry.
Blogs aren’t just for kids any more.
More and more companies around the world are grabbing hold of the idea that their corporate blog can directly impact their image and enhance their communication with target audiences. The purpose for this blog post is to present a collection of effective corporate blogs, along with an explanation of the different approaches that these companies embrace with regards to the content, purpose, and tone of their blog.
Matt Cutts, head of Google’s Webspam team, weighs in on whether anchor text can carry through a 301 redirect. Great information for anyone redesigning their site or changing URLs.
I’m shaking my head.
I just received the June 10, 2009 e-mail blast from Search Engine Guide, the self-proclaimed educational Web site aimed at translating the search marketing world into something that small business owners can understand. This most current edition features at report from WordTracker that identifies the Top 300 search queries within the largest Meta engines (e.g., Metacrawler, Dogpile, etc.) during the past 48 hours.
