Written by Scott Van Achte and published at 6:25 AM
For years now, Google and Yahoo have been making a significant portion of their income on the paid sponsored ads to the right of the search listings, and that is about to expand. Google has recently discovered a loop-hole in anti-trust legislation which will allow for the ultimate sale of organic rankings - the catch – they must partner with Yahoo.
Current laws do not allow for paid sponsorship of unlabeled organic listings; however Google has found a way around this – by spidering and indexing paid listings at competing site Yahoo, and including them within their own search results.
Google will soon start to spider and index select ads posted through the Yahoo Search Marketing platform, and rank them within Google’s own organic results. These paid ads will be given an artificially high ranking and will appear at the top of the organic results – appearing as free listings to searchers. Google will receive 80% on the per-click spend; this in itself may sound great, but it barely scratches the surface.
In order for Yahoo Advertisers to open up their ads to Google, they will need to pay a monthly service fee, of which Google will take the lion’s share. While the actual dollar amount for these fees has not been officially released, industry experts are anticipating the flat rate fee to be well in excess of $10,000/month - a small price to pay for first place ranking in a competitive industry.
It is expected that the increased revenue from this initiative will result in a boost in Google’s market value by as much as 30% in as little as a year; however, this may be an understatement given a 21% jump in Google’s stock shortly after markets opened this morning (increasing by $81.01 to $424.37).
This is only one of a number of plans that Google has for the very near future in order to ramp up its overall market value. With a looming sale to occur in April of 2010, Google wants to ensure that they get top dollar. Earlier this week, the next phase of buy-out negotiations was reported between Google and the White House with an agreement in principle that the US government will pay fair market value in April of next year.
Google has become one of the biggest players in the technological world, but lesser known is its growth as a high-level power in the political world and the US government wants control of this power. This potential government acquisition of the search giant is no big surprise given the extensive bank of in-depth information Google has amassed over the years.
"Google has been selling information to the US government now for several years," Frederick Grinder, head of Google's Secret Search Team, noted in a press conference early this morning. "An acquisition seems like a natural step."
Several years ago, Google was fined $15.5 Billion by the World Court for unleashing a virus-like spider that infiltrated many world-wide government databases and amassed an immense amount of sensitive information. (You didn’t thing that Google actually paid $2.2 billion for YouTube, $3.1 billion for DoubleClick, and billions more for others did you? These were merely cover-ups for the fine). While part of the court order was to have this data permanently deleted, many conspiracy theorists believe that Google still holds all this information, and the US government wants unrestricted access. The only way to secure this access is through full ownership of Google.
You’ve probably heard of Google Webmaster Tools, well Google also has Google People; A complex database consisting of confidential information on the vast majority of the world’s population accessible only to those with high-level clearance. Google knows what you bought using your super market discount card, they know what you charge to your Visa, they know your SSI and all your personal numbers, and they have all your internet passwords. For the US government to have access to all this same information they can significantly expand their anti-terrorism campaign which began during the Bush administration.
"With the help of our top secret satellite imagery and foreign personnel files we were instrumental in the capture of Saddam Hussein – with unrestricted access there is no telling how far the US can go to increase the safety of our nation," Grinder went on to say.
We will continue to keep you informed as this story develops. In the mean time, have a wonderful April 1st.
Written by Scott Van Achte and published at 10:31 AM
Google announced yesterday morning over at the two improvements they have made to the search results. These improvements include more refined results for specific searches, and longer snippets for long tail searches.
Search Refinements
This refinement will allow Google to offer more “related searches” for various queries that users perform. Now when you do a search in Google, at the bottom of the results there is small section of links titled “Searches related to:” These are links to other related searches.
This addition expands Google’s ability to recognize related searches and as a result will now not only give more suggestions to users, but (hopefully) increase the relevance of its suggestions.
Impact on SEO
This change is relatively minor when it comes to SEO but does have some impact. With this refinement, Google shows other key phrases that it deems relevant to the initial search. This can be used to help refine your keyword research.
If you are interested in ranking for a particular phrase, do a search in Google and investigate the phrases Google notes in the "related to" section. You may find valuable keyword targets here worth pursuing. Including these phrases within your site may also help Google relate your site to the initial phrase and could help with your search rankings. This is something that one was able do before the upgrade, but now, these suggestions will likely be more refined and valuable.
Longer Snippets
Previously Google search descriptions were limited in length to around 150 characters. Now when you perform a longer search query of more than three words, the snippet is expanded considerably. I have noticed snippets as long as 413 characters, but some may be longer. This change was made to help people recognize relevant results when more detailed searches are performed, and in some cases provide the information that someone is searching for right within the result pages.
Impact on SEO
Longer snippets will not likely play a big role when it comes to getting a site ranked, but it may very well help determine if a ranking is clicked by a searcher or not. With these longer site descriptions appearing it will be that much more important to ensure that the description Google is using is appropriate for the search phrase.
If you find yourself ranking in the top 10 for a particular phrase but are not happy with the description, do what you can to help guide Google to use something more appropriate to entice users to click on the listing. This will give you a little more opportunity to attract visitors and perhaps make a few extra sales.
You may be able to find some insight by checking out your site's analytics for long tail phrases driving traffic from Google. Search for these phrases in Google and see what your description looks like and take it from there.
These two new improvements to the Google search results really play only a minor role in the big picture of SEO, but as with all adjustments they can contribute to your site's overall performance. In this case the main impact is in getting the right users to your site. If you take these two changes into consideration when you are working on improving your site's visibility it may help improve your overall SEO campaign results.
Written by Scott Van Achte and published at 9:05 AM
It's no secret that a continually updated website with new content being added regularly stands a good chance of doing well in Google. One of the long standing methods to regularly expand a site's content is through the use of a blog.
While there are numerous platforms to choose from for managing a blog, few can compare with the immense flexibility offered with WordPress, and at a cost of free, the price can't be beat either.
Google likes fresh new content, and setting up a blog on your site, assuming it is updated often with interesting and relevant material, can be one of the best things you can do to help out your search rankings. The beauty behind WordPress is that there is a wide array of totally free plug-ins you can easily install that will make your blog totally search engine friendly.
The following are some basic guidelines and essential plug-ins you should consider when you install your WordPress blog.
Template Design The first configuration you need to do is work on customizing the design template to match your existing site. I suggest finding a template that matches as closely as possible to the look you are going for then work on tweaking its graphics, colors, and other particulars till you achieve the desired appearance.
Most of your changes will occur in the header.php, footer.php, index.php, and page.php files in the theme editor, however, the theme you install will dictate which files actually need to be updated. You will also need to make some adjustments to your CSS file. These changes all involve working with code and graphics, and are most likely left to a professional.
Once you have your design set up, the rest of the customization is considerably less technical. The following are suggestions that most people can do themselves and you probably will not need an expert to help you here.
Settings
Permalinks The next thing you need to do is customize your URL's. You do not want the default post URLs ("pageid=#") as they are simply not search friendly and you want your default names to have some meaning to them. While you can customize your URL's with various plug-ins, you may not always think to do this, so be sure to have a default you can live with.
Under the settings tab in your dashboard, click on permalinks. Here I suggest choosing one of the settings that includes the post name. Including the month and year is totally optional as it will have little to no impact on your search rankings, but you definitely do want to include the post name.
WWW or no WWW With WordPress, there is no need to worry about the www vs no www redirects. It is handled for you, but you do need to select which variation you want, and it's very simple to do. Under "General Settings" you will see two fields; one for "WordPress address" and the other, "Blog address". Ensure that both these fields include the "www" (or not), whichever you prefer, and that's it. (I always recommend using the "www" version of your URL as most people linking into your site will use it, and this will help keep a consistency among your site.
Required Plug-ins There is an almost endless supply of free plug-ins out there that you can add to your site ranging from photo galleries and spam protection, to social media integrators for Twitter, Facebook, Digg, and others. While many of these others will benefit your blog and search rankings, the XML Sitemap, and SEO plug-ins are truly essential.
SEO Plug-in When setting up your new installation, the first plug-in you need to install is one that will allow for totally customized title, meta description tags, and page URL's. There are a number of tools that do this ranging from the widely popular "All in One SEO Pack" to a relative newcomer "HeadSpace2".
While I personally have yet to try HeadSpace2, it is high on my list, as it has been recommended by many industry professionals as the best WordPress SEO plug-in. For any new blog installation I highly recommend this plug-in be installed right away.
XML Sitemap Plug-in To the best of my knowledge, HeadSpace2 does not have an XML sitemap option, and as such I highly recommend "Google XML Sitemaps". This plug-in will automatically generate XML sitemaps for you on the fly and submit it to Google every time you add, remove, or update a page or post. This helps ensure that Google has the latest information at all times. It's a very simple plug-in to install and configure and once setup, you can forget about it and it will do the job for you.
A well optimized site loaded with relevant content can do very well in Google if setup correctly. The power of WordPress can make this process incredibly easy so all you have to worry about is writing those great articles and selling your customers. The plug-ins and functionality of WordPress are endless and when installed correctly can make the optimization of your blog considerably easier, increasing your chances for top rankings.
In the following video Google's "Business Product Manager for Trust and Safety" (phew what a title) Shuman Ghosemajumder discusses Google's interest-based advertising, how to opt-out of it and some of the misinformation that may make the technology seem invasive.
I think this video may be helpful to you if you are curious how Google targets you with advertising content based on your online activities.
Marissa Mayer, Vice President of Search Product and User Experience at Google was interviewed by Charlie Rose this week.
In the interview Charlie Rose got Marissa to discuss the expected advancements Google will have within 10 years (this transcript snippet from TechCrunch):
Marissa Mayer: So for example we’d like to make progress on both vision and voice, [unintelligible] what’s in an image, how well can we recognize it —
Charlie Rose: And where are we on that?
Marissa Mayer: – a spoken image and a spoken word. And I think voice is actually a lot further along than images in recognizing shapes and that. I mean, if you look at the academic research, that’s generally the case. So sometimes you have to follow the technology, what’s possible. I think we’re going to have really good voice search, really good speech to text on YouTube videos so you’ll be able to search it, that will happen sooner than you’ll be able to say give Google an image and say find other images like this or find me images of a monkey, those types of things.
Charlie Rose: When will it happen?
Marissa Mayer: I think that the voice breakthrough will probably happen in the next five years, maybe 10, and I think that — and then I think the vision will probably happen in more than a 10-year timeframe, maybe 15. Those are of course guesses just off the top of my head but —
The whole interview is about one hour but if you want some insight into the powerhouse that drives our Internet experience then this is a worthwhile investment of time.
Written by Scott Van Achte and published at 8:54 AM
Google is developing a service to try and impact electrical energy consumption by allowing users to easily track their energy usage.
PowerMeter software will tap into the information provided by "smart meters" installed currently on many homes. It will display to customers exactly how they are using power and relate it to specific appliances in the home to help them to pin point the biggest contributors to their consumption.
By having a clear idea where the electricity is being used up, it will allow for a much easier means to conserve energy and lower power bills. "If half of America's households cut their energy demand by 10 percent, it would be the equivalent of taking eight million cars off the road" noted Google Engineer Ed Lu on the Google Blog Last Monday.
While the project is still in the early stages, Google hopes that PowerMeter will be introduced publically within the next couple of months.
Last night I was looking through some of my favourite You Tube videos and stumbled across something of which I was completely unaware. You Tube is muting sound from a lot of user’s videos.
I am a huge Lord of the Rings buff and avidly seek related content on You Tube. One of my all-time favourite videos is called Namarie, a recitation of Galadriel’s lament. This is a poem taken from the Fellowship of the Ring book, recited in spoken Quenyan, an Elvish language created by J.R.R Tolkien. The original audio consisted of a reading by the person who posted the video, over a background sample of the Lothlorien track from the Fellowship of the Ring soundtrack.
This was one of the most hauntingly beautiful pieces I have ever seen on You Tube and I have watched it often. I say “was”, because as I found out last night, You Tube has completely ruined it by removing the audio.
According to the person who created and uploaded this, she wasn’t notified of this change and has no way of retrieving this even for her own personal collection.
I did some research to find out what this was all about and it didn’t take long. There were over a million results for a “WMG and You Tube” search, including quite a few of them with some pretty explicit commentary from angry users who have had their own videos or a lot of their favourites ruined.
This started back in December of last year with this official post from You Tube, which seems a little vague on what was to follow. In that post they mention the options available upon receipt of a takedown notification. However, many of the complaints I viewed were from people upset at the fact that they weren’t notified before or after this was done.
Perhaps they aren’t getting takedown notifications because, rather than actually taking the content down, You Tube is just chopping out the audio.
Upon looking into this further, I came upon a more detailed reason for all this…money. Warner Music Group wants more money from You Tube for users viewing videos that contain any portion of music copyrighted under any of their many labels.
One would think they’d like having the free advertising. Do they really think having their music removed from You Tube is going to generate more sales?
I find it difficult to believe that I can’t hear this video anymore because it contains a small part of the movie soundtrack, and yet I can watch the Lord of the Rings movies in their entirety on You Tube for free.
Ironically, it was this video that encouraged me to go out and buy a copy of the movie soundtrack, which is in fact owned by Reprise Records, a Warner owned label.
I checked out a lot of videos of many artists under WMG labels on You Tube and there are large numbers still unaffected by this. I suppose it’s a lengthy process to effectively neuter so much content.
In the long run, I think this will hurt both You Tube and WMG. You Tube for the poor treatment to their users and the end result of having a ton of useless content when this is all done. And now, rather than receiving “too little” WMG will now receive zero revenue from this media.
Personally, I tend to agree with the headline of this post. This whole thing is ludicrous and it’s too bad for WMG if the advent of technology is making them obsolete. Perhaps they should just accept the inevitable and fade away.
“Two thumbs down” to both Google-owned You Tube and the Warner Music Group on this one.
Today at the SMX West conference, Google, Yahoo and Microsoft just announced a new tag that will have a major impact on reducing the amount of duplicate content issues found online and it will help website owners reclaim valuable link popularity.
In this article Canonical URL Links by WordPress specialist Joost de Valk he explains the tag and reasoning behind it. I will give a quick synopsis myself below but his article has some more detail if you need it.
These two URLs lead to the exact same page but the search engines interpret them as different URLs:
You see the information from the question mark onwards in URL #2 is actually just tracking information that was added to show that a person who visited the site arrived after clicking on an advertisement from "campaign1". Unfortunately, since search engines see these as different URLs the link popularity coming from a specific advertisement is placed on the campaign URL instead of the actual URL (#1); this is not a good situation because the more link popularity a link has the better chance it has of ranking in searches.
Today, the big three search engines announced they still see the URLs separately unless you place a new tag called the Canonical Tag (say that 10 times fast!) in the heading of the affected page. In the case of the example I used above the canonical tag would look like this:
What that tag says is the search engines should consider http://www.xyzname.com/company/ as the main address of this page. As a result, the link popularity for all variations of this URL will be consolidated to the canonical URL specified in the heading of the page.
Who is Affected by This News? This is amazing news for anyone using Pay Per Click marketing will be all over this as well as anyone with an advertisement such as a banner or text link where tracking intelligence has been appended to the URLs.
From a slightly different standpoint this has a great affect on anyone with a content management system (CMS) where two URL versions of a single page may have been indexed; the rewritten search engine friendly URL and the exposed database-driven URL. With this new tag it is entirely possible to retrieve some significant link popularity and substantially increase your rankings.
At least a few times a month I get asked various questions about why a search engine ranking looks the way it does.
For example, someone might ask me how they can influence the description and/or title that Google gave their website in their search engine ranking. But easily the most prominent question is "what are those links that show up under some #1 rankings? How can I get those?"
Well, I think it is time to introduce you to a great little video featuring Google's own Matt Cutts in November 2007. The video is an excellent section by section walkthrough of what you know as a search engine ranking but Google calls a snippet. Enjoy!
This week Google announced the addition of a new feature for its Google Mobile Maps application called Google Latitude. The enhancement allows people to share their location via GPS, cellular tower triangulation, or manually. Check out the video below created by Google to learn more about this cool technology that may not be new to the Internet but Google has upped the ante by embracing it:
Written by Scott Van Achte and published at 10:11 AM
Fourth quarter financial results for 2008 are in at both Yahoo (pdf) and Google, and while Google still showed a sizable profit, the numbers show that 2009 may be a tough year for both search giants.
Yahoo In Q4, Yahoo saw revenues down 1% compared to the same period, ringing in at $1,806 million. While revenues approaching $2 billion sounds good on the surface, when you take away the expenses and the dust settles, they were left with a net loss of more than $303 million!
2008 on the whole wasn’t a total loss for Yahoo. Their revenues finished with a 3 percent increase compared to 2007, at $7,209 million and an overall net income of over $424 million. This number is certainly reasonable, at least by my standards, but when you look at the huge loss in the 4th quarter alone, unless things get turned around, 2009 could show to be a tough year for Yahoo.
Google Just like Yahoo, Google also took a hit in the fourth quarter of 2008, only their hit managed to remain on the plus side. Compared to the three quarters preceding (all over $1.2 billion) Q4 saw a net income of only $382 million.
While 2008 saw total revenues reach nearly $5 billion more than 2007, at $21.7 billion, Google’s net income for 2008 was nearly identical, only about $20 million more than 2007.
Written by Scott Van Achte and published at 9:46 AM
Google market share is down – or level, depending on who you trust most. The December numbers are in over at both Nielsen and Comscore, and while both agencies are reporting very similar figures for Google, one is actually showing a loss.
Comscore is reporting Google seeing no change between November and December with back to back months being at 63.5%. Nielsen, after reporting a jump of 2.9% for November, is showing a 1.2% drop for December, down to 62.9%.
This drop in Google’s shares is really quite minor if you look at their performance over all of 2008. Nielsen figures show Google’s share increasing by 6% from 56.9 in Jan 2008. Comscore shows a similar increase of 5% over the same period up from 58.5.
I suspect that Google’s market share is not on the decline and that in the coming months we will continue to see their figures rise.
Whether it is for spreading propaganda to a nation’s populous - or suppressing it - governments have always sought to control new forms of media. From the printing press to the radio and the television, there has been the presence of political powers.
Today’s new media is, of course, the internet. And, it is the most potent form of media yet. However, though the internet's power to broadly and immediately reach an audience is unparalleled, it is far too large and complex a system to be controlled exclusively by just one group or entity.
Nevertheless, world governments still try to manipulate what they can; however they can.
Recently, the Chinese government has renewed its crusade against the evils of a free internet by placing more responsibility on search engines, like Google and Baidu. What the Chinese government wants is help purging porn and other forms of ‘thought crime’ from their citizens desktops. Moreover, China’s government even seeks to rehabilitate those afflicted with “Internet addiction”.
Meanwhile, following the air attacks on Gaza, the Israel Defense Forces have been releasing video footage of their attacks on Hamas militants by posting on YouTube and Twitter. The IDF claim their intentions are to use the videos to present their perspective, in the conflict, to the world.
Attempts by governments to control information or set boundaries by limiting access to particular content (or websites) have created unprecedented growth for social applications such as Facebook, which is growing by 600,000 users a day, and MySpace to provide an alternate forum for the masses. Who can say what 2009 will bring? May we all look to the future with a measure of enthusiasm and a degree of circumspection.
Written by Scott Van Achte and published at 2:24 PM
The latest figures are in over at Comscore, and as far as search market share is concerned, Google continues to increase its lead.
It is never a surprise to see Google leading the pack, its been this way for several years, and it will remain this way for years to come. The only change is, how big is their lead.
Google has seen yet another small increase in its share, up 0.4% to 63.5%. Yahoo trails way back at 20.4% (down 0.1%) and Microsoft dipping 0.2% down to 8.3%.
Written by Scott Van Achte and published at 9:25 AM
It's 9:20 am PST on Monday November 24th, and access to Both Google AdWords & Postini, appear to be down. It seems strange that both Google services would be down without any formal notice stating a maintenance outage.
I first noticed the problem shortly after 9:00 am. Could Google be under a denial of service attack? I guess we’ll have to wait and see. Are you able to access either of these services, or are you having any problems accessing any other Google services? If so let us know, drop us a comment!
NOTE: Wouldn't you know it, only a few minutes after posting this (9:33) I was able to gain access to both services, but now Keyword Discovery and ZDnet appear to be having the same problem.
Less than 2 weeks ago Shaw Cable, a major internet provider for Western Canada, had a brief period where Google and Youtube were both inaccessible to users - perhaps today's issues are also related to Shaw. Again, let us know if you are having any strange problems today, and also note your internet provider.
Written by Scott Van Achte and published at 8:33 AM
As if Yahoo doesn’t have enough financial troubles. San Diego based DivX is suing Yahoo for $25 million in damages. Allegedly Yahoo had breached an advertising agreement with DivX accounting for more than 20% of their revenue.
The contract between Yahoo and DivX was set to expire at the end of 2009, and only 9 months into 2008 Yahoo had stopped making payments. During those first 9 months DivX received $15 million in revenue under the deal.
When a similar agreement with Google ended last year, Yahoo snatched up the opportunity and won the deal with DivX that would have the Yahoo Toolbar incorporated into DivX downloads.
Yahoo has been slashing costs lately including mass layoffs. Trying to get out of this deal is likely just another way for them to try and save money. On Nov 11, Yahoo had demanded that DivX renegotiate the contract to eliminate termination restrictions and reduce the payment terms.
A lot of people are unaware of Google.org, the philanthropic wing of Google. Since its inception, Google.org has been involved in a variety of initiatives covering such global issues as health and disease, climate change, education, poverty and alternative energy.
Their involvement includes grants for a wide variety of projects, encouraging employee involvement and use of their own innovative technologies to help make the world a better place.
While this program has its detractors, there are those who claim Google does this only to toot its own horn or to make money. While this may be true, Google does seem to do quite a bit more than most, if not any other corporation, to help improve the world we live in.
Last week I was reading about Google.org’s latest venture, Flu Trends, which I found to be a very interesting use of their search technology.
Basically, through coordination with experts in the field at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) and using search data on specific “flu related terms” they have started to track overall patterns of flu infections throughout the US.
While there is some question as to how accurate using search terms is to determine how many people are actually sick in a given area, the results are surprisingly close to the data collected by the CDC. Also of interest is that this data was obtained up to 2 weeks more quickly.
The use of search trends is hardly new; Google has this incorporated into its keyword research tool to help track trends for marketing and keyword visibility purposes.
It also has Google Trends for viewing and comparing specific keyword search patterns graphically.
Google Insights for Search can also be used to obtain this sort of data categorically, by date range and across specified regions worldwide.
This provides a nice map interface that can be viewed from a world level right down to a state/regional view.
So, essentially, all Google has done with Flu Trends, is to take data anyone can get using their tools and focused it on one specific set of search terms and made it available for view on a site for everyone to see. There are some differences though.
In Flu Trends, you can click from state to state to compare and also you can see results from previous years charted in advance of the current year's display progress.
The thing I find odd, is the geographical limitations they've imposed on the Flu Trends site. They could easily display the same type of information for countries other than just the US. Nor do I really understand why it's limited to state level. They could just as easily show flu trends by city.
Google can track these trends by geographical region because each search query is tagged with the searcher’s unique IP Address. Anyone can track the rough location using software or even web based applications. As an experiment I used the latitude and longitude values for our office IP address that I obtained here, pasted them in the decimal value fields on this site and a map location within about 9 blocks showed up.
Certainly not exact, but close enough to be able to track search queries at least by city, if not down to individual municipalities. Personally, if I was after this information, I would rather know if there was a big surge in my immediate area, rather than the whole state.
Maybe they don’t want to make users nervous about privacy issues, as seems to be implied in this interview with Elizabeth Landau, from CNN.com.
As Google has IP’s for all search queries, I can’t see the fuss about them knowing who searched for flu related terms, but that’s just me.
While this seems like a great idea, there are shortcomings with this sort of tool, for example:
1) People who are sick with the flu but don’t search. 2) Searchers not actually sick with the flu, just doing research for whatever reason. 3) Searchers looking up info out of concern for a friend or relative who is sick but in an entirely different area.
I’m sure this is just a first step as there’s much, much more that this could be used for, as we can see on the Global Health Watch site (incidentally powered by the Google Maps engine), the incidence of influenza in the US is not the only going health concern.
What else could they do?
Google is uniquely placed for these types of services; not only because they have the resources and the apparent desire, but because of exposure. A lot of people go to Google, not just for search, but for their mail service and a host of other integrated free services.
Given that, I starting wondering what else they could do to improve the accuracy and utility of this sort of thing.
One way I could imagine, would be to have some sort of direct user input - something like a Google suggest tool for self diagnosis. I can see how doctors and lawyers both would be horrified at what I just suggested, but I’m talking about a way to not only track patterns of health issues but also to better prepare the consumer who is ill for the next stage(s) of dealing with their issues. Obviously, this is not to provide a substitute for consulting a physician.
I know I tend to drag my heels about going to see a physician unless I’m bleeding to death, but by the time I get there I forget a lot of possibly important details that my GP might not be able to dredge up in our brief appointment.
I would love to have something like a logical, online questionnaire/checklist with some sort of flowchart type progression of questions based on my answers that I could fill in at my leisure. Even better, if I could then print off the results and hand it to my doctor when I got to my appointment. This would save their time and reduce the number of irrelevant questions that need to be asked.
Even if the tool only gathered symptomatic data, rather than conclusive diagnostics, it would still be valuable. For example: if in a short period of time an specific area shows a higher than normal set of specific symptoms, it could tip off health authorities or even people browsing the data that something out of the ordinary is taking place and they could track down that contaminated water supply, or previously unknown environment hazard or whatever. Likely this could enable problem identification and resolution much quicker than by normal means.
Another public service field that Google could provide is a plug for the huge gap in emergency notification.
Currently, disaster notification is kind of all over the place. There are all manner of solutions ranging from those that require people to have their TV or radio on right through to commercially available corporate notification and disaster recovery services, and anything and everything in between. One great model for updated alerts and information is GDACS, but that is geared towards keeping the international emergency response community notified and not designed to handle specific area notification to the average Joe.
Some sort of system that provides rapid, mass notification to subscribed users in affected areas could be right up Google’s alley. Imagine if this sort of system was in place a few years ago.
Picture this scenario:
You’re going to Phuket, Thailand for Christmas holidays in 2004. You do all the standard trip planning for medical insurance, booking, itinerary, etc. You go to Google Emergency Alerts and update your subscription to receive SMS text (mobile texting) and gmail emergency notifications for Thailand for the duration of your trip. Your vacation is wonderful and the beach is a dream. Suddenly, you receive a text message on your cell, warning of a possible Tsunami. You snatch up the kids and head for high ground immediately, warning everyone you pass by. Those critical moments, could mean the difference between life and death.
This could be used for more than just disaster notifications; subscription channels could be used for prescription drug alerts, food allergy alerts, all sorts of things beneficial to the safety and wellbeing of users.
I think Google is capable of great things and kudos to them for instituting Google.org in the first place. I could name a lot of other big corps that could sure use that kind of PR, but they never seem inclined to go that extra distance.
Written by Scott Van Achte and published at 12:35 PM
The figures from Nielsen Netratings and comScore are not in as of yet, but Hitwise has posted their latest numbers for October, and they show Google closing in on the 72% mark.
According to Hitwise, Google now sits with 71.7%, up 0.54%, Yahoo is down 0.3% to 17.74%, and MSN is pretty much the same at 5.4% (up a miniscule 0.04%).
As Google grows ever so slowly month after month, it will be no surprise if they manage to reach the 80% point. Will Yahoo or MSN ever manage to steal back some of this market share? Not likely in the near future, but time will tell.
Written by Scott Van Achte and published at 9:30 AM
Google has now made one big step forward in its initiative to have out-of-print books online. Tuesday, Judge John Sprizzo approved a lawsuit settlement between Google and numerous authors and publishers to the tune of $125 million. This money will be placed in a fund to go to copyright holders and will allow Google the rights to placing out-of-print material online.
This lawsuit has been going on now for a few years and Google is undoubtedly glad to see an end to it. This could see Google becoming one of the biggest out of print book retailers around. Any revenue received by Google from its print services will be split 37 / 63 between Google and its publishers – the publishers getting the lions share.
Once fully operational, Google print will make it easy for users world wide to access a vast amount of difficult to find information – as Sergey Brin noted, "It's a real win-win for all of us, the real victors are the readers."
More information on the settlement can be found over at Google.
Written by Scott Van Achte and published at 11:49 AM
Last night in a blog post at the Official Google Blog, Google announced that one of its Google Labs projects, Lively.com, will see its doors closed forever.
After only a few short months, Google has decided to pull the plug on this popular chat platform in order to direct resources to more important areas such as core search, ads, and apps.
While I have never used Lively, it seems to me that if this site is popular, there must be a way to make some money off of it, and I am somewhat surprised to see them choosing to shut it down so quickly. Would it not make sense to try and sell? Surely a company out there could make use of this to earn a living and keep the current user base happy. Maybe they should approach Facebook and turn it into yet another app?
Written by Scott Van Achte and published at 9:09 AM
It sounds more and more like Yahoo should have taken the Microsoft buy-out offer at $31 a share back in February. Since then Yahoo shares have been up and down, but as of today, they are hovering around the $10 mark, a small fraction of what they once were.
Yesterday Yahoo shares dropped to below $10 – the first time their value has dipped into the single digits in more than 5 years. One thing’s for sure, if Microsoft does step up and give Yahoo another offer it will be substantially less than the previous $44.6 Billion.
Yahoo is not the only major player in the search game to see significant value declines on their stock. Around this time last year Google shares were over $700 and as of today are at less than half that with the value at $310.31 at the time of this post. 2008 has also brought significant declines to Microsoft shares as well - at just under $20 today MS has seen shares drop by almost half with their 52 week high of 36.72 from back in December of 07.
Written by Scott Van Achte and published at 7:00 AM
Last week Google began turning PDF files of scanned printed documents into digital text, and as a result their searchable index has expanded once again.
Previously, only rarely would a scanned document appear in the organic search results. With the technology of optical character-recognition (OCR) implemented now these scanned PDFs will find their way into the results.
In an article posted at Information Week, one downside to this is the possibility of personal information appearing in the search results. Social Security numbers that could have gone unnoticed in scanned court documents could be discovered by Google.
"Public.Resource.org, a project that aims to make public government publicly accessible, recently found about 1,700 documents with Social Security numbers or alien identification numbers out of a corpus of 2.5 million court documents that go back decades."
Unless Google wants more future lawsuits on its hands, I can imagine that issues such as this will be rectified rather quickly.
This process of turning an image back into readable text will likely have other uses such as reading text stored within images in a website. This could open the doors to using image based text more freely in one’s site design. While this use is not in place at the moment, it seems like a natural step forward.
Well, this has certainly been a busy week at Google. One thing I can say for Google, they are very energetic and we’re never wanting for good writing material.
Yahoogle Deal Abandoned Right on the heels of revising the scope of the agreement between the two search giants, Google announced this Wednesday that the deal will not go forward. This came to pass after the US Department of Justice decided it would file an anti-trust suit if the agreement was implemented.
Many thought this would be a disastrous alliance and the effects it would have on the industry were very difficult to predict. We’ll never know, but I for one am glad we won’t have to find out.
Adsense Publishers Blocking Ad Display While searching around for article content, I came across this forum thread and it’s a real eye opener. Some advertisers are jamming in last minute political ad displays that are getting placement on completely irrelevant sites. While this isn’t exactly new, what most incenses site owners is the controversial, issue based advertisements that are not relevant and could offend large numbers of visitors to their sites. More information can be found in this article.
Google is aware of this and has posted on their blog the means to block unwanted ads, but apparently, the ads get displayed well before the AdSense publishers can review them to block. This delay in the system has caused many site owners to turn off AdSense altogether as it is the only means of getting unsuitable ad display off immediately.
I am not really surprised by this, as I’ve always been pretty skeptical about how effective an automated system is at determining relevancy. The wide variety of sites that are complaining of this reinforces my opinion of general content display.
Regardless, the time lag involved is something Google really needs to take a look at.
Quality Score Change is a Go
Google has been doing a lot of work on overhauling how their ad ranking system works and last week they announced upcoming changes to QS. This has been made live as of Monday.
There were two major changes made:
1. They have adjusted their algorithm to take into account the effects of ad position on click through rate. Presumably this means if your ad is not always in a high position or on the first page, you will not be penalized for a low CTR (Click through rate).
2. They have also made an algorithm that allows promotion of lower bidding ads to the top slots on the basis of meeting a certain (unspecified) Quality Score threshold. The use of the term “threshold” implies that it may be a fixed score point i.e. 8/10 QS, but they haven’t made this clear.
I’ll be interested to see what effects these changes will have on existing campaigns.
Google says, “Keep in mind that these enhancements may cause changes to your ad position, spend, and performance.” “While we don't believe that any immediate changes are needed on your part, we encourage you, as always, to watch your key metrics and to make adjustments as appropriate.”
You betcha! I’m going to have to plow through all my accounts over the next little while and make sure to compensate for this.
Written by Scott Van Achte and published at 8:15 AM
According to Bloomberg.com the FCC has approved a proposal by Google to utilize unused television airwaves for wireless internet access. Approved by a vote of 5-0 yesterday, this will ultimately allow for free Wi-Fi web access, especially in rural areas.
Any devices built to access the free wireless web will be required to utilize anti-interference technology, and makers of such devices will need to obtain FCC certification for each product.
Craig Mundie, Chief Strategy Officer for Microsoft noted a week ago, that if the FCC approval went through, that devices might be available to the public in as early as 12 months.
While this may take us one step closer to free internet for everyone, I think I may just prefer to pay for my access as I can only imagine the ads we will be bombarded with for this free access – it has to be paid for somehow. A PDF released by the FCC is available with more information.
Written by Scott Van Achte and published at 12:53 PM
The entire “Microsoft seeks Yahoo, Yahoo turns down Microsoft, Yahoo & Google hook up, and then break up, now Microsoft may be back with Yahoo” thing seems like an ongoing plot in a bad soap opera.
Back in June Google announced an advertising agreement that would allow Yahoo to use Google Ads on its websites. Many search marketers were left speculating the impact this would have on campaign effectiveness, however, this was all for nothing now that the Department of Justice has ended the deal.
Now that this deal is no more, the possibility of a Yahoo acquisition by Microsoft will likely be revisited. After news came yesterday that of the collapse of the deal, Yahoo shares saw an 8% rise by close.
According to CNN Money, many Yahoo shareholders are hoping that Microsoft will get back to the table with Yahoo and make a new offer.
The original offer by Microsoft, nearly a year ago, was for $29.06 a share. At the time Yahoo was looking for something along the lines of $35 to $37. Microsoft was willing to go as high as $33.
With Yahoo shares currently trading at around $14, if Microsoft does step up again, you can bet the offer will be much less than it was before. Perhaps Yahoo should have taken the original deal.
Good news for users of Google Adwords. Last week Google added the option to allow AdWords users to view separate statistics for Google search and the Google Search Partner Network (such as Aol.com and Ask.com). Prior to this, performance data was only listed for both networks combined.
I spent some time reading through various forum threads on this topic and I got the impression that I would be turning off the display for the search partner network; a lot of folks seem to be skeptical about the relative value of advertising on the partner network.
The first account I viewed using this feature showed zero conversions on the search partner’s network, while the conversion rate was pretty decent on the Google network. However, other accounts showed the search partner network actually out performing the Google network. From what I’ve seen so far, it can be worth advertising on both networks.
One thing that would be nice to see, now that we can view this information separately is the ability to turn off the display on either network. Currently, the only options are to have either both search networks turned off or to display the Google network only. It we were allowed to manage these in separate campaigns, we could optimize to make the most of this additional data.
After looking these stats on a number of older client accounts, I came to the conclusion that Google shows historical statistics data for the search partner network dating back to Dec 2006, so we can view nearly 2 years of accumulated data.
All things considered, this is a very nice addition to the already robust feature of the AdWords system. Kudos once again Google, for making my job easier.
Written by Scott Van Achte and published at 7:15 AM
Google, in their Webmaster Central Blog, has introduced a nice little feature to the webmaster tools interface recently. The new feature identifies source URL's for various errors that they detect.
For instance, when they display a 404 (not found) error for your site with a link to the missing page, now they will also tell you where they found the link to this error. This added feature can save a webmaster a ton of time in some cases.
While there are other tools out there such as Xenu Link Sleuth, to help detect broken links, this added feature in Google gives site owners one more tool to help troubleshoot a website. The tool will display the source of all URL's causing any errors that Google reports.
In Google's "Not Found" and "Errors in URL's in Sitemaps" sections, you will now notice a "Linked From" column.
While this addition is not a major breakthrough, it does show that Google is actually listening to its users, and does increase the usefulness of Webmaster Tools. (On a side note I found it interesting that in Google’s own screenshots, they had 258 "Not Found" errors - I would have expected a few less.)
Written by Scott Van Achte and published at 2:14 PM
With the stock market crashing and Google’s shares at the lowest point they have seen in a few years, Revenues for the third quarter of 2008 remain high. The quarter ending Sept 30 saw total revenues reaching $5.54 billion.
After paying out commissions and crunching the figures, the end result comes in at $4.04 billion, $10 million less than the expected $4.05 billion.
So while the value of their shares may be plummeting, Google, at least for now, appears to be recession proof. In many ways this is not surprising. As consumers are getting tighter with their money and businesses are struggling to make ends meet, boosting up advertising spend online to try and grab what shoppers are out there bodes well for Google.
Google shares closed at $372.54 Friday, down about $5 from opening.
As the time for implementation of the Google/Yahoo agreement drew near, there was little doubt that some sort of action by the US Dept. of Justice would surface. It remains to be seen what direction the DOJ will go, but there is obviously something happening behind the scenes.
On Friday, both search engine giants announced a delay in moving this initiative forward. This move seems contrary to the previous position of Google's CEO Eric Schmidt, which indicated that the deal would proceed as planned.
What this delay portends is still anyone's guess. For now, the waiting game that kicked off in June will continue.
Will Yahoo Acquire AOL?
This has certainly been a busy and yet, unproductive year for Yahoo. Beginning with the failed takeover bid by Microsoft, followed by the looming uncertainty over the Google deal, one can only wonder what's next.
While talk of a partial acquisition by Yahoo of AOL services has been ongoing for some time, nothing concrete has come about. The consensus seemed to be that this was a move designed to increase Microsoft's offer for Yahoo, if not to thwart the takeover altogether. If that was the case, then it stopped making sense months ago.
Likely, Yahoo looks upon this potential acquisition as a way to expand both their content services and advertising revenue.
Despite indications of progress, details of these discussions seem as vague and uncertain as anything else involving Yahoo of late.
So far this year, we've seen Microhoo, Yahoogle and YAhOoL. I wonder if we'll see YAskhoo! next.
Perhaps we should start a betting pool, winner take all if guessing the correct date when (if) Yahoo will actually successfully conclude one of their negotiations this year.
Microsoft Search Incentives
While Google innovates and Yahoo spins around in circles, Microsoft adds an unusual approach to gaining additional search market share.
Beginning last spring with the launch of the Cash Back program, Microsoft introduced the notion of search advertising rebate incentives. This allows advertisers a means of paying for advertising on a Cost per Acquisition (CPA) basis and buyers some savings on purchases. If you are unfamiliar with this, Techcrunch did a great analysis of this feature. While many had doubts about this approach, it appears to be working.
Last week, Microsoft added to this type of service by releasing >SearchPerks!, another means of attracting traffic through a points-based reward system. While this is not a new concept, it certainly is unique in the search engine world.
Participating users can expect to receive rewards for redeeming saved up "tickets". There are many types of rewards, such as air miles, music downloads and more. This is a limited time offer and sign up for participation expires on Dec 31, 2008.
While it's too early to tell, some believe this idea does have potential.
No surprise to anyone, this feature is only available to Internet Explorer users. That leaves me out of this program. Like many people, not only do I find that browser (regardless which version) extremely annoying and frustrating to use, I resent Microsoft's constant efforts to restrict compatibility for so many services and 3rd party applications to their browser alone.
Written by Scott Van Achte and published at 9:30 AM
Google shares are at a considerable low today. They opened with a value of $420 and by 12:26pm ET, had dropped below the $400 mark to $396.29 (according to a Google search for "goog")
At one point the stock had reached a new 52 week low of $395.34 - a far cry from the 52 week high of $747.24 set in November of last year. That’s a drop of more than $350 since the peak which is a lot of coin for all serious Google shareholders.
With this considerable low, perhaps now is the time to buy, but I have been thinking that for a few months now, and it seems to keep dropping. The last time Google shares were below $400 was back in Sept of 2006 according to Google Finance. With all the troubles over on Wall Street I am curious to see how much impact this will have on Google shares. I am no finance expert, in fact, far from it, but I see shares dropping further in the coming months.
UPDATE(Only minutes after original post)
I find it rather interesting how Google finance seems to be wrong. When I took the screenshot above it said the 52 week low was $395.34 - that was at 12:26pm ET on Sept 29, 2008. Take a look at the screen shot below, taken only 8 minutes later - it shows a 52 week low of $397.27. Guess it goes to show that Google Finance is a little off on their numbers.
Written by Scott Van Achte and published at 2:16 PM
How would you like to have Google cut you a check for a few million dollars? Well, if you have the right ideas that could help change the world you just might get some cash from Google. There is of course a catch.
If your idea to help make the world a better place is chosen by Google, you will get a share of $10 million, but the money you get must go directly towards putting your idea into action. Google is putting up $10 million which will be divided up among the top five submissions to be used for project funding.
Submissions must be made by Oct 20, 2008. In late January 2009 Google will select 100 of the ideas and leave it up to the public to narrow down the list to 20 semifinalists. The five winners will be chosen and announced in February by a Google-sponsored advisory board.
To submit your project ideas or for more information, visit Google's project10tothe100.com.
Yesterday Google Webmaster Central posted a video response to numerous questions the department had received from webmasters. The following video addresses duplicate content, search engine friendly web design, spider blocking, and more.
Written by Scott Van Achte and published at 4:29 PM
The latest search market share figures are in at Nielsen, ComScore, and HitWise, and, for the most part, Google continues to rise.
Depending on which provider you prefer, Google saw yet another increase in market share in August as did Yahoo. MSN has dropped according to all three providers.
Over at Comscore Google has seen an increase of 1.1% to 63%, Yahoo is down 0.9% to 19.6%, and MSN is also down 0.6% to 8.3%. Nielsen Netratings reports Google down 0.2% to 60%, Yahoo up 0.7% to 18.1%, and MSN down 1.2% to 10.7%. Finally, Hitwise is showing Google up 0.3% to 71.07%, with Yahoo and MSN both down slightly to 18.26% and 5.32% respectively.
While the numbers between these providers range a fair bit, there is no denying that Google’s strong hold is not going anywhere.
Written by Scott Van Achte and published at 2:46 PM
When poking into twitter earlier today I saw a post from Matt Cutts who had linked to an interesting TechCrunch article.
It seems that Kristin Armstrong used a GPS and Google Earth to help her train for her Gold Medal performance in Beijing last month.
During a trial in December of '07, Armstrong brought along her husband's GPS to capture elevation along the cycling route. She then took this information home and after exporting the GPS data into Google Earth was able to plot out a similar route in her home town of Boise. Having a close match to the course in terms of elevation and distance, gave Armstrong the ideal method of training, which, in the end allowed her to grasp that coveted Olympic gold medal!
Written by Scott Van Achte and published at 8:45 AM
For those of you out there who use WebPosition Gold, you will be happy to know that it is now properly reporting on Google results. While news had circulated all over the forums and various SE News sites that WebPosition had been banned by Google, apparently this simply was not true.
Supposedly Google had changed the way in which they display results within the HTML of the site, a change not visible on the site when performing a search. As a result of this change, it essentially broke WebPosition, and the software then required some updating to correct the issue. Back in August Google posted to the official GoogleBlog that they were testing a number of items within the search results. One test included creating slightly more whitespace between the first and second listings. It is some of the small HTML changes like these that are likely the culprit to the temporary down time experienced by WebPosition.
As of earlier this month, the leader in reporting software did in fact complete the update and now reported results do appear to be correct. While there is much speculation as to how long reporting software will continue to work without being permanently banned by Google, for now, things are working once again.
Written by Scott Van Achte and published at 2:30 PM
Like most websites Google keeps a log of IP addresses in order to track visitor behavior, and to help serve up more useful ad targeting. Previously they held onto this non-identifying information for 18 months following your visit to their site.
Over the past couple of years regulators and policymakers have had privacy concerns over the storage of this data, and as a result Google has cut the time it holds onto this information by half, down to 9 months.
Peter Fleischer, Google's global privacy counsel was noted as saying:
"Finding the right balance between data retention and privacy is a tough issue for policymakers, Google and our industry. There is great utility in data, but we also believe that limiting the amount and types of data we keep can improve privacy while continuing to provide a strong user experience. Anonymizing the data earlier will have costs, particularly in terms of future search quality improvements. But our engineers are working hard to minimize those losses."
At some point, most people have had some sort of encounter with internet scams, viruses, spyware or other security problems. Hackers and scam artists are a pervasive reality in today's world and making assumptions about security is unwise. A pay per click account makes an attractive target to a technically savvy criminal and gaining access to someone's account allows them to promote their schemes at someone else's expense.
Originally trained in Network Security, I have always taken such precautions very seriously and now even more so, since a recent fraudulent act affected one of our client's accounts.
Early this summer I arrived at the office on a Monday morning and proceeded to check my weekend mail. Two emails caught my attention right away. The first from AdWords, informing us that the client's credit card was declined and the second, from the client asking " What is the campaign "Qwasde" - Campaign #1"?
Upon reading that came the realization that this account had been hacked. This was further confirmed by a review of the account's recent activity. I discovered that on the previous Friday someone had created this new, innocuously named Campaign #1 with a daily budget of $7000. It contained only the single "Qwasde" ad group, with a single ad:
No doubt this was intended to phish for bank account details of anyone unwisely clicking on this ad.
This hacker was pretty slick. The whole scam was set up late in the day on Friday, when it was less likely to be detected. The domain the ad was directed at was registered in Australia to a "resident" of New Jersey. The website was put up on Friday and gone by Monday morning and in 2 days the ad generated $13,000 in click charges.
I immediately called Google and an investigation was initiated. They agreed this looked like fraudulent activity and promised to contact us with their investigation results within a few days.
Concerned about the means by which this person gained access, I checked my security for any indications of a breach. Finding nothing unusual in my own logs, I then contacted the client with instructions for locking down and cleaning his computer system, advising him to change any sensitive passwords in case his system was infected.
Google got back to us a couple of days later confirming the results and promising to refund the client's money. This was good news, as it appeared the fallout from this would be limited to a loss of only a week or so in the client's Google marketing initiative. In reality though, this had a far greater impact.
According to Google, the account needs to remain inactive until the refund process reaches completion. This took place nearly 2 months ago and still there is no sign of the refund. The account is still frozen. Google has no ETA on completion of this process; apparently their refund department has a huge backlog, due to the numerous email phishing scams that keep cropping up.
We still haven't figured out how the breach occurred. For my part, I think it's possible the client inadvertently became a victim of the phishing scam.
This scam is similar in some respects to the Paypal phishing scam of 2 years ago. It's pretty slick and can easily fool the uninformed. In fact, another of our clients with an AdWords account received an email some months ago asking me what to do with it and I had them forward a copy of the email to me. Thankfully, they hadn't clicked on the link, as it was indeed one of these scams.
Here is the email they had received:
-----Original Message-----
From: Google AdWords [mailto:adwords-noreply@google.com] Sent: Sunday, May 25, 2008 4:49 PM
To: xxxxxxxxxxx
Subject: Google AdWords Account Verification Email
Dear Google AdWords customer!
In order to confirm your contact details, please click the link below:
Google AdWords Form
This should take you directly to the Google AdWords Form.
Thank you for choosing AdWords. We look forward to providing you with the most effective advertising available.
Sincerely, The Google AdWords Team ------------------------
This particular scam differs from most emails of its kind because it looks like a legitimate AdWords support email. Also it lacks the spelling and grammatical errors common to spam n' scam emails.
There is a tell tale flaw though:
In the original email if you mouse over the link, you would see it is not actually pointing to google.com but rather to google.com.adwdl.org.uk, a completely different domain and unrelated to Google.
Other email variations report imminent account closure unless account details are verified. Even if you don't provide account details, just following the link can expose your system to malicious software.
Tips to Protect your account
Here are some guidelines to help keep your account secure. Bear in mind this is best practice for security of any sensitive financial, business or personal information, not just AdWords.
1. Google will NEVER ask for your account information by email; they won't even ask for your password on the phone. All they ever ask for whenever I phone them is the 10 digit account number. They don't need any other information to open up the account for viewing. Most legitimate enterprises don't need your login details, so if someone requests them, be very cautious.
If you receive notification about something you didn't initiate, likely this is about something not to your benefit. i.e.: receiving a confirmation of a password change when you didn't change your password, etc.
Always use security solutions and keep them up to date. Virus protection, firewall and spyware protection are vital for any system that connects to the internet.
Use strong passwords. Weak passwords, while easy to remember, are also very easy for password cracking programs. A strong password contains both alphabetical and numeric characters and utilizes capitalization, length and special characters. As well, stronger passwords don't use recognizable or easy to guess words.
Examples: lame password = your name, password (the actual word) or 123456; weak password = date of birth, newgirl22, ItsaSecret, p@$$word; strong password = tP%m34!pX
Use different passwords. If you use the same password because it's easier to remember, then everything you do becomes compromised if any forums or sites you use become breached. I have hundreds of logins and passwords, so I use RoboForm to securely store them. This type of program can also reduce vulnerability to keylogger type spyware.
Keep the number of account users with administrative access to the minimum necessary. The more people who have access, the greater the chance of an information leak.
Turning your computer off or disconnecting from the internet when you are done using it greatly reduces the chance of bad things happening unnoticed.
Don't send login or password information by insecure means such as email or instant messaging. Generally if I have to pass on that sort of info, I always do it by phone.
Monitor your account regularly; particularly at the end of the week and take random peeks on the weekends. It only takes a minute to log on and check for abnormal account activity.
The most important thing to remember is that there are people out there who will rob you blind if you leave yourself open, so a modicum of paranoia along with a bit of common sense will go a long way to saving yourself some real hassle.
Poor Matt, he is always getting the brunt of the abuse when Google does something that could, even remotely, be monopolistic. Fortunately, Google Chrome, in my opinion is yet another great idea from a great company that is slightly evil but much less than most ;-)
PS. I forgot to mention in my previous Google Chrome post that Google has earned another star in my book for creating such a cool logo for Google Chrome! Hmm, now I just need to get my hands on a sticker for my laptop! Hint hint Google!
Google Chrome, Google's unexpected open source web browser was announced over the Labour Day weekend and launched only a day later - it is now available for download in more than 100 countries.
Here are some excerpts from the Google Blog announcement on September 1st, 2008 "A Fresh Take on the Browser":
"On the surface, we designed a browser window that is streamlined and simple. To most people, it isn't the browser that matters. It's only a tool to run the important stuff -- the pages, sites and applications that make up the web. Like the classic Google homepage, Google Chrome is clean and fast. It gets out of your way and gets you where you want to go"
Under the hood, Google claims is a browser that runs today's complex web applications much better:
"By keeping each tab in an isolated 'sandbox', we were able to prevent one tab from crashing another and provide improved protection from rogue sites."
"We improved speed and responsiveness across the board."
"We also built a more powerful JavaScript engine, V8, to power the next generation of web applications that aren't even possible in today's browsers."
And Google claims (with a great deal of credibility) "Google Chrome is far from done." In fact, they are "hard at work building versions for Mac and Linux too, and will continue to make it even faster and more robust."
Google thanked the open source community because they "used components from Apple's WebKit and Mozilla's Firefox, among others -- and in that spirit, we are making all of our code open source as well. We hope to collaborate with the entire community to help drive the web forward."
Hear more about Google Chrome direct from Google in this video from Google outlining 10 Features of Google Chrome (updated from last video that turned out too short):
You can also see the Google Chrome comic book that was "accidentally" released a couple of days early explaining the technology. Big thanks to the always attentive Google Blogoscoped for picking up on the leak and breaking the story to the blogosphere. Here is the latest article from Blogoscoped providing a great walk through of browsing with Google Chrome.
Also here is a video from the Google Chrome development team providing additional insight into their reasons behind the product:
If you want to learn more just stay tuned to the blogosphere because there is no doubt Google Chrome will be on the top of many blogs for a while; especially with the inevitable add-ons and upgrades coming for the platform. Here is a link to my personal news feed for any news directly from the search engines themselves - check it out and feel free to use it as your touchstone.
Written by Scott Van Achte and published at 11:03 AM
The Los Angeles Times reports German researchers, through the help of Google Earth, have discovered that 2 out of 3 cows point North.
Using Google Earth, the researchers studied more than 300 herds of cattle from around the world. Of the 8510 cows they observed, two thirds of them had aligned themselves to face magnetic north while grazing or resting.
This is the first discovery of large land mammals to have this built-in compass. Other animals such as birds and most bees have a similar trait to aid with migration.
So, if you ever find your self lost out at the farm, take a look at the near by cows to help guide you safely home.
Written by Scott Van Achte and published at 10:30 AM
Is there no end to lawsuits against Google? On Tuesday Judah Klausner, an inventor from San Francisco, filed a patent infringement lawsuit against Google, Verizon, LG, Citrix Systems, Comverse Technology, and Embarq.
Klausner's company, Klausner Technologies, filed a patent back in 1992 for "visual voicemail", a way to apply a graphical means of interacting with voicemail messages, similar to the use of e-mail.
Back in June, Klausner had a similar lawsuit settled against Apple, AT&T, and eBay (Skype) over its "visual voicemail" features on iPhone devices.
Verizon apparently had anticipated the lawsuit from Klausner and two weeks ago filed their own lawsuit in US District Court, to have the inventor's patent declared invalid.
In an article published on Reuters Tuesday Jim Smith, a Verizon spokesman stated: "We anticipated Klausner's action. We are seeking a declaration that Klausner's visual voicemail patent is invalid and that Verizon's system does not infringe the patent in any event."
The latest lawsuit is just a series of suits filed by Klausner dating back to the first in 2005 against AOL.
Google Dance 2008 was, as usual, a great time and I felt it was time to share the festivities with the rest of the world that can't make it and may just be a little curious about Google's headquarters. So here we go, welcome to Google Dance 2008:
I hope I can count on seeing you at Google Dance 2009! Just sign up for Search Engine Strategies San Jose when it comes around and in addition to learning about web marketing you will enjoy some great parties (that includes the spectacular Search Bash!).
Written by Scott Van Achte and published at 1:12 PM
Possibly the most exciting post for me was from Oliver Marksat ZDNet . Here is a company that is thinking outside the box and developing an alternate interface for search on the internet; it involves returning results based on aggregate sets of information. Freebase Parallax is a fascinating peak into the future and it utilizes the strongest attributes to browse and explore data, a sort of marriage between Google and Wikipedia. This article has been placed under the Google section because I predict they will quickly snatch up this company and its revolutionary approach.
"Still technically in alpha, Freebase will be the underpinnings of many future companies - some would say this approach is the future of the entire Internet.
"It’s built by the community and for the community - free for anyone to query, contribute to, build applications on top of, or integrate into their websites - basically an open database of the world’s information."
Written by Scott Van Achte and published at 12:46 PM
News.com says Google is number 4. For a brief period of time last week Google's market cap slipped from third to fourth position. Apple’s market cap reached $158.84 billion and edged out Google which was at $157.84. Wikipedia defines market capitalization as "...a measurement of corporate or economic size equal to the share price times the number of shares outstanding of a public company. As owning stock represents owning the company, including all its assets, capitalization could represent the public opinion of a company's net worth and is a determining factor in stock valuation."
The post states "Google's share price is much higher, at $505.82 compared with Apple's $178.97, but Google has only 314 million outstanding shares while Apple has nearly 886 million." Microsoft is still the leader at $255 billion and IBM follows at $170 billion.
by Bill Stroll, Sales Manager, StepForth Web Marketing Inc. Celebrating over 10 years of web marketing excellence.
Written by Scott Van Achte and published at 12:48 PM
When you look at it on a global scale Google is by far the leader when it comes to searching for online information. Nobody really questions that. But what is the next step for Google? For some time now they have been helping users to find images, videos, news reports, and so much more - but once the internet is fully categorized within the depths of Google, and the monetization is solid for all its efforts, what will Google move to after that?
It seems that I cant escape the mention of anything work related during my personal life. This weekend when reading the September issue of Discover Magazine I saw an article on DNA testing that mentioned Sergey Brin and Google's contribution of $3.9 Million to 23andMe, a genetic testing company back in 2007. This is old news, but it got my brain thinking off to a tangent.
Could the goal behind this investment be to prime the company for a future takeover by Google? Perhaps the future for Google is to index you, and me, and all our deceased relatives. By fully indexing DNA, perhaps we will someday have the ability to load in a drop of blood, saliva, or a hair, into our computers and have Google spit out a complete list of all our relatives, their info, and real-time Google Earth images or videos from above showing what they are doing at this exact moment, all with ads of course.
It may sound far fetched - (and okay, maybe it is), but less than 50 years ago so was the idea of us having personal computers in our homes - and only a few centuries ago the world was still flat! So while it may be unrealistic, in a few generations we may be able to research the DNA of potential mates from our homes by simply entering their name (probably telepathically) into Google. What a scary thought.
Written by Scott Van Achte and published at 2:48 PM
About three years ago Google took on a 5% stake at AOL for a whopping $1 Billion. Today Google is not so sure that the investment was a good choice.
While they are not saying the value they believe the investment is worth, they are certainly not pleased by the past decision.
"Based on our review, we believe our investment in AOL may be impaired. After consideration of the duration of the impairment, as well as the reasons for any decline in value and the potential recovery period, we do not believe that such impairment is 'other-than-temporary'." Google noted in their lengthy 10-Q on June 30, 2008.
AOL apparently has also been looking for potential buyers - Certainly MSN and Yahoo have been in consideration, but one must wonder, that even if they think their $1billon investment may have been a bad idea, would they be willing to buy out AOL to keep it out of Yahoo and Microsoft’s hands? Time will tell.
Written by Scott Van Achte and published at 2:45 PM
Looking for free music online in China just got a lot easier - and its legal! Google recently launched Music Onebox over at Google.cn to try and grab a larger percentage of the search market over in China according to the LA Times. Currently Baidu is the Chinese leader in search - one of its strongest features is music, however, most if which is illegal.
By providing a legal alternative Google hopes to snag some additional market share. According to a Google spokesperson: "We are launching Music Onebox to give users an easy and legal way to find the music they're looking for, and to give music labels and publishers a new channel to distribute, promote and make money off of their valuable music content."
When visitors at Google.cn perform a search for music they are directed to top100.cn where they can download and stream music. Ad revenue on the site is split between top100 and the record labels and publishers.
Baidu is currently under pressure due to music piracy issues, which gives Google the perfect opportunity to swoop in a grab what they can.
June 30th 2008 was a day that Flash developers had been waiting for a long time; Google and Adobe had finally announced that Flash .swf files could be crawled by Google! In fact, the extensive news release from the Adobe Developer Center also stated that Yahoo would be incorporating similar technology in short order. When I read this news and the consequential articles from the web marketing community it became very clear that this update was a great step but far from the fix that some Flash developers are likely to pitch to their clients. As a result, I wanted to add my voice to the buzz on this topic and share with you my thoughts on how to optimize a site using Flash while considering the current updates.
What is Flash? Okay, lets get down to basics. To introduce and establish what Flash is all about I am going to fall back on Wikipedia for a concise description:
"Adobe Flash (previously called Shockwave Flash and Macromedia Flash) is a set of multimedia technologies developed and distributed by Adobe Systems and earlier by Macromedia. Since its introduction in 1996, Flash technology has become a popular method for adding animation and interactivity to web pages; Flash is commonly used to create animation, advertisements, and various web page components, to integrate video into web pages, and, more recently, to develop rich Internet applications." Source, Wikipedia
BEFORE: Search Engines Could Not Crawl Flash Up until recently the textual content found in .swf Flash files was, for all intents and purposes, just as unreadable for search engine spiders as the text in images; only HTML text on a page could be read and indexed by search engine spiders because they could not yet (and still cannot) conduct on-the-fly optical character recognition.
To explain this differently I think of the HTML that spiders can read like the braille-like feeling of running your finger over a letter written in ball point pen; you can feel the contour of writing. Whereas something unreadable like Flash or an image on a page is like running your fingers along a 4x6 picture of a road sign... you won't feel anything, so by the same token the text on that road sign cannot be read by a search engine spider.
NOW: Search Engines Can Crawl Text in Flash For the first time, on June 30th, 2008 Google announced it could accurately spider the textual content hidden within Flash files found on the Internet. This major announcement was enabled by a partnership between Adobe, Google and Yahoo where Adobe provided their proprietary Flash Player technology to the search engines so they could integrate it into their systems and successfully 'read' the content within Flash files. This technology has vast implications for Google's and soon Yahoo's indexes because, at least in Google's case, this allows the search engine to index the content within over 70.4 million Flash (SWF) files. That is a vast amount of content that was previously inaccessible to the search engines and the ability to access it could add a lot of value for search engine users.
For example, an inspiring and eloquent Flash site like Forests Forever could be indexed which would expose more viewers to a website that provides a wonderful introduction to the world's forests. Of course that is just one Flash site of many that will add value to search engines when indexed; it just happens to be one of my personal favourites.
Search Engine Optimization Now Possible with Flash The implementation of Flash crawling technology means that the text within Flash can now be indexed and links can be followed. Here are some examples of the basic optimization that is now possible within Flash:
Optimizing page content for specific keyphrase(s) to ensure a visiting search engine bot will correctly perceive the page's topic.
Using keywords within internal links to pass link juice from page to page; only applicable for sites where the Flash pages are broken down onto separate URLs.
Providing emphasis (bolding) to particular words may help to emphasize keyphrase(s); but I am reaching here... it is unknown if this new technology provides text-importance recognition.
The Limitations of Flash Search Engine Optimization Now that you have some idea of what can now be optimized for search engines here are a few pitfalls that still limit the search engine friendliness of Flash:
Single URL Flash Websites: Many websites I encounter still incorporate all of the website in a single Flash file; in other words as a user navigates the site they are still using the same URL but different pages appear. In such an instance the search engines will index the content and potentially drive traffic to the site but as Google cannot link to content within a Flash file all users will be sent to the beginning of the file. That type of indirect search result is likely to infuriate many searchers who have come to expect immediate results.
Here is a quote from Google's comment area on this topic:
"We’ve heard requests for deep linking (linking to specific content inside file) not just for Flash results, but also for other large documents and presentations. In the case of Flash, the ability to deep link will require additional functionality in Flash with which we integrate."
That last line is interesting because it leaves room for interpretation. Do they mean Adobe will have to add the "additional functionality" to Flash or that Google needs to beef up their indexing technology to take advantage of the existing Flash functionality? Perhaps some Flash gurus out there could weigh in on this one. It is definitely an ambiguous way for Google to answer the question.
If you need a work-around to deep-link single SWF files Adobe notes a solution: "you can create multiple HTML files that provide different variables to the SWF and start your application at the correct subsection. By creating multiple entry points, you can get the benefits of a site that is indexed as a suite of pages but still only need to manage one copy of your application."
Text in Images is Not Indexed: Many Flash websites inexplicably incorporate a great deal of textual content within images and currently search engines cannot index text in images; I expect that will remain true for at least another year or two. As a result, a Flash website that includes a vast amount of text within graphics will not see a noticeable benefit to this enhanced crawling technology.
Resource-File Based Content Not Indexed: I noted this in Google's comment area from their support team: "At this time, content loaded dynamically from resource files is not indexed. We’ve noted this feature request from several webmasters -- look for this in a near future update."
In addition, Google's news release announced the following limitations to Flash that Google expects to surmount soon (quoted from Google blog):
"Googlebot does not execute some types of JavaScript. So if your web page loads a Flash file via JavaScript, Google may not be aware of that Flash file, in which case it will not be indexed."
"We currently do not attach content from external resources that are loaded by your Flash files. If your Flash file loads an HTML file, an XML file, another SWF file, etc., Google will separately index that resource, but it will not yet be considered to be part of the content in your Flash file."
"While we are able to index Flash in almost all of the languages found on the web, currently there are difficulties with Flash content written in bidirectional languages. Until this is fixed, we will be unable to index Hebrew language or Arabic language content from Flash files."
Verdict: SEO for Flash is Still in Diapers It is wonderful news that Flash is becoming more search engine friendly and there is no question that the addition of previously unattainable Flash content to search engine indexes will prove valuable. But the fact of the matter is that at this moment I wouldn't dream of telling a client that Flash can be a competitive medium for search engine optimization. There are simply too many roadblocks that still exist and need to be addressed before a Flash website has any hope of competing with an HTML website on the basis of just search engine optimization. I do, however, see a couple exceptions to the rule:
At a certain point a threshold can be met where significant incoming links can push even the most un-search engine friendly website to the top rankings. As a result, it is highly likely that some Flash websites with a decent incoming link support structure will see vast improvements in rankings when their content is finally considered thanks to this new crawling technology.
In less competitive arenas (obscure keyphrases or keyphrases with little competition) the basic search engine optimization capabilities opened to Flash may very well be all that is needed to attain top search engine rankings.
In conclusion I would like to pass on extreme kudos to Adobe, Google and Yahoo for working this new technology into their systems. With all of the new multimedia formats coming online it has always seemed quite silly to me that Flash, having been around for years, was still not fully indexable. Thankfully Flash can now be crawled and the day where it could potentially compete for competitive rankings is on the distant horizon.
Written by Scott Van Achte and published at 6:45 AM
Rambler Media, a Russian company, has recently sold their contextual ad service, “Begun” to Google for $140 million according to Reuters and announced in a Google Press Release Friday. As part of the deal, Rambler also agreed to use Google results and advertising on its Russian based site, www.rambler.ru. Ramblers search results will be enhanced by Google with Google Ads being displayed along side.
"Google is very committed to giving Russian users, advertisers and partners the best possible service and experience," said Mohammad Gawdat, Managing Director Emerging Markets, Google. "This agreement will result in better search results and more relevant advertising for our Russian users and publishers."
Currently Rambler Media owns 50.1% of Begun and will be buying the remaining 49.9% from Bannatyne Limited before selling the entire firm to Google.
Written by Scott Van Achte and published at 4:17 PM
Google’s earnings are in after the second quarter report was issued yesterday. While their net income is up from the same period in 2007 by approximately $325 Million (925.1 Million in Q2 of 2007, 1.25 Billion in Q2 of 2008), this is not as high as was expected – Wall Street was expecting to see $4.74 per share – actual earnings were $4.63 per share.
With the economy down on its luck Google still managed to make more than $300 Million – roughly a 35% increase over the same period last year.
Microsofts profits for Q2 are also up by roughly 46 cents a share. They saw earnings in Q2 of 2007 at $3 Billion, and an increase of 42% to $4.3 billion for 2008. These are impressive earnings, however, Microsoft’s online business did not help much in terms of this profit. Compared to 2007, Q2 of 2008 actually saw a loss of $488 Million!
Had Microsoft’s Internet division actually turned a profit, they would have achieved Wall Streets estimate of 47 cents per share, rather than their actual 46 cents.
Yahoo has not yet released their Q2 Earnings for this year. Their shareholder conference call to discuss earnings is scheduled for July 22 at 5:00pm ET.
Written by Scott Van Achte and published at 4:09 PM
comScore released the latest figures for search engine rankings and their respective market share Friday, and Google has actually seen a drop! For all you Yahoo and Microsoft fans out there, don’t get too excited, it’s quite small to say the least.
For June 2008 Google has shown a 61.5% hold on market share, down 0.3% from May of 2008. Yahoo also showed a 0.3% change, only in the positive direction moving from 20.6% up to 20.9%. Microsoft had the biggest leap of a whopping 0.7% up from 8.5% to 9.2%.
When comparing numbers from June 2007 with June 2008, Google has seen a sizable gain stealing users from MSN and Yahoo. In the past 12 months Google has seen an increase of 6.6% with Yahoo and Microsoft both losing, 2.9%, and 3.1% respectively.
Users running a PPC Campaign in the Google AdWords platform are given the choice of displaying ads on the Google Search Network and/or on the Content Network. I have never been a big fan of advertising on Content Networks, as I find the automated matching process to be less than ideal. I can generally browse the net and quickly find ads that are irrelevant to the sites they are displayed on. This can give one a healthy dose of skepticism.
While advertising on Content doesn’t generally cost a great deal, we have never seen much in the way of results. By and large we do Search Network only, however recently I have had to re-assess that view.
Back in March of this year, Google AdWords released a tool for Demographic bidding from beta into mainstream use. This allows advertisers to specify demographics for age and gender, to filter out unwanted sites. This tool is for use with the Content Network only. I was skeptical as to the value and accuracy of this tool and had not tried it out until just last week.
One of the AdWords campaigns we manage was having some difficulties in an extremely competitive market. Costs were remarkably high, paying $10+ per click on Search Network keywords in order to achieve decent ad positioning. While making some headway towards improving the conversion rate, it was taking too long to get results.
This campaign was a slow starter and had difficulty getting impressions from the beginning. I had tried displaying on Content earlier on in the campaign in a bid to generate more traffic, with predictably poor results. Last week we decided to try this again, this time using the demographic bidding tool to narrow the focus on a more specific audience.
The results were astonishing.
In the first 2 days, we had more conversions from Content than from Search, at a fraction of the cost. I thought this might be a fluke, but we continue to see conversions from that source.
I decided to try this on a campaign for a new client. The first conversion was from Content within a few hours of campaign launch. Needless to say I am testing this out on any existing client accounts that can be targeted in this manner.
For anyone interested in trying this, it can be found on the lower right of the campaign settings page within AdWords.
Here’s a peek at what it looks like:
You can also specify age groups, as this sample shot shows
In this particular case, we have set a higher bid percentage offering for display on sites that would be viewed by women in the 25-34 age range, which is the primary demographic target for this campaign.
Oddly enough, the table shows only impressions. There’s a considerable amount of data from this particular campaign that’s not showing here. There are quite a number of clicks and conversions for the time period this purports to display yet the numbers don’t show. Hopefully it’s just a glitch.
On this page a third image is displayed showing overlapping bid totals for gender and age. (See example on left.)
The difference in stats between the two networks is quite significant. As you can see in this ad group example, the Content cost per click is significantly lower than that of Search.
When the demographic bidding feature is implemented, reports can also be generated in the AdWords reporting tool.
Overall, I like how this is shaping up. It’s nice to find inexpensive new ways to drive more customers to clients.
One thing Google excels at is constant innovation. With the announcement of a beta utility called Ad Planner, more features are in the works for assisting advertisers with Content Marketing. Hopefully we’ll all get to see more of this great stuff in the near future.
Earlier in the week I was going through a Client’s AdWords account and saw a reference to PPA pricing. This reminded me of Google’s seemingly vanished venture.
Back in March of last year, Google AdWords announced the launch of a US only Beta for a new AdSense Network pricing model Called PPA or Pay Per Action.
Ostensibly, this would allow ads to be displayed on participating AdSense publishers sites, with cost levied only upon completion of the Advertiser specified conversion action.
What this means, is the advertiser only pays for results. If a participating AdWords client specified an ecommerce purchase completion as the goal point for which Google would charge them, then that is the only point cost would be incurred.
This is quite different from to the current CPC (pay for every ad click, regardless of results) and CPM (pay for every 1000 times an ad is displayed, regardless of result or clicks) price models.
It would be very interesting to work with this type of model, however, the question is “where is it?”
In June of last year, the Beta had been extended to advertisers for testing outside the US with pretty much nothing to follow since.
I looked this up in the AdWords help center and found a Quick Start guide to setting up a PPA Campaign. Oddly enough, if you look closely at the wording, it’s all written in the future tense, which I don’t believe I’ve ever seen before in this type of document.
Is this dead in the water, or upcoming? Perhaps someday, Net Archaeologists will find the corpse of this idea buried in virtual rubble.
Recently, Google announced an agreement with rival search engine, Yahoo. In their blog, Google maintains that this agreement does not signify a merger, nor will it harm competition in advertising. However there is general concern over the extent that Yahoo will make use of these ads.
Although there are not a lot of details available as yet, some further information can be found in this blog post. According to this post, this agreement will enable Yahoo to display some Google Ads on their Search and Content Networks. The real question (and concern) is how will Yahoo make use of this.
If they only use Google Ads as filler for less competitive phrases, then likely this would likely have little impact on their own advertising clients. If they go further and start pitting their client’s bids against those of Adwords, costs will soar for advertisers using Panama.
How Yahoo will determine bidding between Google advertisements and their own remains to be seen, but if cost per click is a factor (as I’m sure it will be), then Yahoo’s advertisers may be in for a shock.
I must admit, I am curious as to what effect this integration will have on AdWords advertisers as well. Will we have to optimize for a new Quality Index/Score now? Presumably they’ll work out some sort of common rating algorithm, but I’m a bit concerned about the potential for migraines.
Additionally, the deal includes adding interoperability to their instant messaging platforms. How they intend to accomplish this has yet to be disclosed, but it would be a positive step for users.
While this would be a good move financially for both Google and Yahoo, I am skeptical that the search advertising “partnership” side of this arrangement would have no adverse effect on competition. Having the two top competitors working so closely together could have negative effects for users and advertisers both.
While there is speculation as to whether or not this will even go through, we can expect to see significant changes in the industry one way or another.
While cruising Google Reader I noted some great articles and tips that you shouldn't miss. Have a great read and an excellent weekend!
Google's Matt Cutts gives tips on what page extensions Google does not index. In summary, don't expect Google to index .exe extensions or URLs that end with a ".O" such as "www.xyzname.com/web2.0"; although Matt did note that the ".O" extension is being re-evaluated and tested for less troublesome indexing by Google.
Robert X. Cringely wrote a great article on a "Microsoft-killer" strategy that he believes Apple is putting into play based on the new MobileMe service coming soon. Here is an excerpt:
"Microsoft's success is based on two products and only two products -- Windows and Office. Microsoft is obsessed with the idea that Google will undermine one or both of those monopolies through Google Apps. This is all Steve Ballmer thinks about and is what made him so eager to spend $40+ billion for Yahoo. But what if the real threat isn't Google at all, but Apple?" ...
"Given the code Apple already has for its iWork applications, how much more effort would it take to webify those apps, too? Not much, I'd say. A year from now I guarantee you that MobileMe will offer a complete suite of web-based Office applications."
"Recently, we improved our algorithms to process new information faster, and the result is quite tangible -- you should now see fresher suggestions for queries on current topics of interest."Because information on the web is constantly changing, we think this improvement will help you find relevant information faster. To give this a test drive, try searching for iphone. You should see related queries around the brand new 3G iPhone announced earlier this week."
Jerry explained his reasoning for the Google partnership in 3 statements which I summarized below:
1) "First, it does not signal that Yahoo! plans to exit paid search. Quite the contrary. Through the financial benefits of better monetizing our search traffic, we’ll be investing in search services and ad platforms, including Panama. ..."
2) "Second, this deal is good for competition. ... as search and display continue their convergence, it puts Yahoo! in a better position to innovate and compete aggressively with Google and others for ad dollars. It also offers advertisers more choice and publishers gain better distribution and monetization to grow their business."
3) "Finally, this agreement is non-exclusive. We remain completely free to display any paid search listings across our properties — whether from Yahoo!, Google, or any other third parties."
New details have surfaced of Microsoft's most recent dealings with Yahoo and another offer from Microsoft that was again swatted down by Yahoo. BoomTown's Kara Swisher talks of Microsoft's most recent bid that was designed to stifle the Google and Yahoo partnership before it was signed; a very tempting bid at that.
"Yahoo decided that the strategic drawbacks of the Microsoft deal outweighed the potentially huge financial and operational benefits... and told Microsoft to take a hike."
In closing, I noticed that Microsoft put out a plain-jane press release in response to Yahoo's signed partnership with a few very simple words indicating that doors are still open for partnership:
“In the weeks since Microsoft withdrew its offer to acquire Yahoo!, the two companies have continued to discuss an alternative transaction that Microsoft believes would have delivered in excess of $33 per share to the Yahoo! shareholders. This partnership would ensure healthy competition in the marketplace, providing greater choice and innovation for advertisers, publishers and consumers.
“As stated on May 3rd and reiterated on May 18th Microsoft was not interested in rebidding for all of Yahoo!. Our alternative transaction remains available for discussion.”
Today I happened across an interesting speech on YouTube from the always engaging CEO of Google, Eric Schmidt. The speech was made on June 9th, 2008 at the exclusive Economic Club of Washington, D.C. and it is available below for those who wish to watch it. If you don't have the time I compiled a rough list of statistics, thoughts and quotes from Mr. Schmidt that I related below. Incidentally, the introduction by the venerable Vernon Jordan is lengthy but well worth the time; after looking up Mr. Jordan online I am definitely going to read his memoirs - a fascinating man.
Speech Notes in Point Form:
When discussing the growth of the Internet Mr. Schmidt discussed burgeoning countries such as:
China where over 50% of all Internet users are in their early 20s and live in rural areas
In India mainstream Internet use is accelerating and the country is a powerhouse for mobile phone use.
He then noted some interesting stats:
There are currently over 500 million registered domains,
There are at least 120 million blogs with, he noted humorously, an average of only 1 reader each,
There are 30 million photos uploaded to Google per day "in one form or another" he said,
There are currently 3.3 billion mobile phone users,
Every minute 10 hours of video is uploaded to YouTube,
After these introductory statistics Eric Schmidt then launched an example of the combined power of Google Sky, Google Maps and Google Street View. A dramatic presentation illustrated the immense combined power of the three Google applications and how generally inconceivable it is to imagine 100 times the power of technology that is expected 10 years from now (Moores Law).
In the following exerpts from his speech Eric Schmidt relates Google's values based on open technology and knowledge:
"Open beats closed and competition is better."
When addressing the future of the Internet Mr. Schmidt captured what is required to be successful in the present and future Internet eloquently with this quote: "The traditional model of control and exclusivity and so forth is replaced by speed and distribution."
To round off his presentation Mr. Schmidt provided some business advice:
He feels strongly about "establishing a principle of yes" with employees to bolster positivity.
When hiring outside contracters Google requires them to provide a single sentence overview at the end of every week describing what was completed that week. He noted that this is more difficult than is imagined but it is a good practice for ensuring work is being completed.
It is understood that every discussion at Google must begin with facts.
And that's all folks. Eric Schmidt did answer some questions from the audience that were pretty interesting but my notes are spotty on that; if you are interested I suggest skipping ahead and watching that portion of the video.
Written by Scott Van Achte and published at 2:32 PM
The latest numbers are in, and Google continues to dominate search - we already knew that, but by how much?
The latest figures from HitWise released this morning show Google up a little over 3% compared to May of 2007. Google was accountable for approximately 68.29% of searches performed in the US in May of 2008. Yahoo and MSN fell to 19.95% and 5.89% respectively.
Yahoo’s figures for May 2008 are down marginally by about 1% and MSN down nearly 2% compared to the same period a year ago. HitWise figures are based on a sampling of 10 million U.S. Internet Users.
Written by Scott Van Achte and published at 9:58 AM
As Google Earth advances, they have offered 3D views of several major cities and attractions world wide, but with the help of Disney providing intricate models, a 3D walk through has been created providing users with incredible detail in their virtual visit.
Information is made available on all of the parks 1500 attractions and contains videos and photos as well as booking details. Restaurant menus are also available for the many dining establishments at the theme park.
While currently the virtual tour only includes the outside of the parks buildings, a future update will allow visitors to see the inside of hotel rooms and enter the various attractions.
If you are interested in taking a break and viewing the 3D tour, ensure you have the latest version of Google earth and the "3D Buildings" layer is enabled, and perform a search for "Disney World". Clicking on any one of the colored Mickey Mouse logos, will get you started.
Written by Scott Van Achte and published at 9:33 AM
A case was brought to French court surrounding the use of certain keywords through the use of Google AdWords.
Google AdWords offers advertisers a keyword tool which will often suggest variations of certain keywords to be added to a given campaign. Fashion retailer, Louis Vuitton is unhappy as AdWords has been noted to suggest terms such as "Louis Vuitton fakes" and "Louis Vuitton replicas".
Because Google is essentially selling the advertising rights to these trademarks, Louis Vuitton alleges a trademark violation, and took the search giant to court - and won! Naturally Google has appealed and the case will now go to the European Court of Justice in Luxembourg.
Google celebrates many holidays with pizazz by presenting a themed logo. On Memorial Day Google has not opted to provide a themed logo as long as I can remember, yet as Search Engine Journal depicted today many of the other search engines do a decent job of theming their logos.
So what is it with Google? Obviously no one in their right mind would have any problem with honoring active members, veterans and resting military personnel.
Photo Credit: I am afraid I found no attribution for the above photo on the website I found it on... if you know who took this please let me know as they should have proper credit for this amazing shot.
I decided to look into Google's explanation of their behaviour and found a forum post that claims to have a reply from Google on the subject; it certainly sounds like a Google reply to me.
From a forum post dated May 29th, 2006.
I sent an email to google asking them about this issue. Here is the answer they sent me:
Thank you for your note. We understand your interest in seeing a Memorial Day Google logo. If we were to commemorate this holiday, we'd want to express reverence; however, as Google's special logos tend to be lighthearted in nature, this would be a particularly challenging design. We wouldn't want to create a graphic that could be interpreted as disrespectful in any way.
We have a long list of holidays that we'd like to celebrate in the future. We have to balance this rotating calendar with the need to maintain the consistency of the Google homepage. We really appreciate your feedback regarding the Google logo, and please be assured that we're actively pursuing ways in which we can acknowledge Memorial Day and other such occasions in the future.
Regards, The Google Team
Link Caution: this page is where I found this post but please note the site has (in my opinion) questionable content outside of the link I provided. Please keep this in mind - unfortunately it seemed to have the only feedback from Google (that appeared legitimate) on this topic.
So what do you think? Does Google have a good point here? In my opinion Google is right that they should be concerned how they portray their themed logo for such a solemn day. That said, I think it sends the wrong message to break their themed-logo tradition on such an important day. In fact, Google's thoughtlessness clearly breeds confusion in the minds of many Americans.
What do you think? Speak up and leave a comment!
Post by Ross Dunn, CEO, StepForth Web Marketing Inc.
Blink
Del.icio.us
Digg
Furl
Google
Simpy
Spurl
Y! MyWeb
Google announced yesterday morning over at the two improvements they have made to the search results. These improvements include more refined results for specific searches, and longer snippets for long tail searches.
It's no secret that a continually updated website with new content being added regularly stands a good chance of doing well in Google. One of the long standing methods to regularly expand a site's content is through the use of a blog.
As if Yahoo doesn’t have enough financial troubles. San Diego based 
Google has now made one big step forward in its initiative to have out-of-print books online. Tuesday, Judge John Sprizzo approved a lawsuit settlement between Google and numerous authors and publishers to the tune of $125 million. This money will be placed in a fund to go to copyright holders and will allow Google the rights to placing out-of-print material online.
Last night in a blog post at the 
Last week, Microsoft added to this type of service by releasing 
When poking into twitter earlier today I saw a post from Matt Cutts who had linked to an interesting 
For those of you out there who use WebPosition Gold, you will be happy to know that it is now properly reporting on Google results. While news had circulated all over the forums and various SE News sites that WebPosition had been banned by Google, apparently this simply was not true.
Like most websites Google keeps a log of IP addresses in order to track visitor behavior, and to help serve up more useful ad targeting. Previously they held onto this non-identifying information for 18 months following your visit to their site.
pervasive reality in today's world and making assumptions about security is unwise. A pay per click account makes an attractive target to a technically savvy criminal and gaining access to someone's account allows them to promote their schemes at someone else's expense.
Robert X. Cringely wrote 
On the Yahoo Anecdotal Blog Yahoo CEO and co-founder Jerry Yang announced 
New details have surfaced of Microsoft's most recent dealings with Yahoo and another offer from 
