April 2008 Archives

Here is a recap of what happened in the search forums today, through the eyes of the Search Engine Roundtable and other search forums on the web.

Continue reading "Daily Search Forum Recap: April 30, 2008"

If you were interviewing an SEO firm to see if they're for real, what questions would you ask them? A High Rankings Forum thread touches upon some of the must-know questions, and they're outlined below:

1. How long they have been doing SEO?
2. Can you give me three clients that you have had first-page results for?
3. What are some campaigns you have succeeded with?
4. Can you illustrate any significant traffic boosts or conversion boosts?
5. What is your general SEO process?
6. What is your criteria for choosing keyword phrases?
7. How is success measured?
8. What should you expect from us as a client?

And the list goes on and on. What would you add to this for desired results?

Forum discussion continues at High Rankings Forum.

Kevin Ryan of Search Engine Strategies spoke with Daron Babin and discussed the current state of the conference circuit with regards to individuals believing that they have been banned from either SMX or SES events.

Danny Sullivan kindly transcribed the event on Sphinn (which I'm very grateful for!) Here are some key points:

According to a series of events, Rand Fishkin believes that he was banned from SES events. To respond to that allegation, Kevin says:

. There are folks we’ve asked not to come to the event primarily because they were on the competing side of the business from the commercial side of the business and defaming SES. So naturally what kind of a business manager would I be if we didn’t meet with our senior management and ask these people not to come. You don’t go to a Coca Cola convention and the Pepsi people don’t show up at the Coca Cola convention and defame Coca Cola. It’s just not done. It’s childish and foolish and I’m disappointed that Rand is perpetuating a rumor. That’s just not accurate.

Kevin also adds that he believes that there was some sort of exclusion due to his focus on paid search versus organic search:

I was an ad guy doing search, so the red-headed stepchild in the ad community, and I come into the search community and I’m not welcome because I not a search insider.

In his response, Danny says that there was never such a thing and that Kevin has always spoken on panels in conferences that Danny himself arranged.

Finally, one of the last key points is that Kevin believes that the attendees were looking for "fresh" content at the events. Danny responds that the content issue was addressed, but the primary selling point in his experience was the better food (which SMX boasts over SES).

What about banned attendees? Danny says:

At SMX, we banned the staff of one particular show from attending finally in February, in reciprocation for a ban placed on our staff stretching back to December 2006, for a myriad of reasons that would change. If that ban is ever lifted, I'll happily lift ours.

However, Danny is quick to mention that he's always looking for good talent to speak at these events and there should be no perception of exclusion at all.

Forum discussion continues at Sphinn.

A WebmasterWorld thread has discussion on what type of advertiser would you automatically add to your AdSense competitive filter list. I.e. which type ads do you not want showing up on your site?

Here are some of the responses:

• Adult Related Sites
• Ringtone Sites
• Win Free Stuff Sites
• Irrelevant Sites
• MFAs
• Deceptive Sites
• Parked Domains
• Work From Home
• Etc.

I would create a poll here, but the answers can be so open ended. Which type of ads would you block immediately?

Forum discussion at WebmasterWorld.

Now that Google admitted to crawling JavaScript and forms SEOs and Webmasters need to be aware of how to manage even more duplicate content issues.

In the past, a good strategy was to build out filter pages (filter by color, size, price, etc.) using JavaScript pull down menus. Google would typically stay away from such forms and you would not necessarily have to worry about Google seeing the same content filtered or sorted by color, price, size and so on.

But now with Google crawling JavaScript and forms, Webmasters need to take an extra step towards preventing Google from crawling and indexing such content. Why? Duplicate content.

A WebmasterWorld thread has discussion on this topic and offers tips on what to do, to help you with this problem. Some of the advice includes:

• Include the duplicate content in an external Js, assign it to variables, and do innerHTML to some divs.
• Use XmlHTTPRequest (GET) to retrieve the data in XML format and then put it into the page.
• Use an Ajax POST and retrieve the XML content with this.
• Use robots.txt to block specific files and/or page naming conventions.

Forum discussion at WebmasterWorld.

Google is making a major promotional push for iGoogle (Google's personalized home page), with the new artist themes section. If you go to the Google home page, you will notice a special logo that looks like the logo on the right of this post, and a line that reads:

What happens when great art mixes with your homepage? iGoogle Artist Themes

Clicking on the logo or the link will take you to that special iGoogle Artist Themes page, for you to select from about 70 iGoogle personalized themes made specifically by artists. Here are a few sample themes:

This promotion is not just based in the US, Gabs notes Google is pushing it in the UK as well.

Forum discussion at Search Engine Roundtable Forums and DigitalPoint Forums.

Here is a recap of what happened in the search forums today, through the eyes of the Search Engine Roundtable and other search forums on the web.

Continue reading "Daily Search Forum Recap: April 29, 2008"

According to a Yahoo News report, Yahoo will be outsourcing the Internet telephone functions of its instant messaging program to the startup Jajah.

Of course, this is great news for the startup -- but forum members wonder why Yahoo seems to be outsourcing a lot of its internal affairs. However, that may not necessarily be a bad thing, as another forum member says. The less important things are fine if outsourced; the more important things are when one needs to worry. As long as they focus on what they're good at and keep it internal (web, email, search), that's the way to go and avoids the distractions that can cause the company to go into turmoil.

Forum discussion continues at WebmasterWorld.

The New York Times reports that "Google researchers say they have a software technology intended to do for digital images on the Web what the company’s original PageRank software did for searches of Web pages." The algorithm, dubbed VisualRank, weighs and ranks images that look most similar.

WebmasterWorld members fear that this could be a problem for spammers -- just like folks aim to build links for PageRank, so too this may happen in the image arena.

However, it may build traffic to images too, which some individuals are hoping for.

Perhaps this is the beginning of greater software technologies that will "index audio spoken in videos" and podcasts. Those transcription services would be super cool.

Forum discussion continues at WebmasterWorld and DigitalPoint Forums.

A WebmasterWorld thread has discussion around one advertiser noticing Google displaying three scores directly under a Google Netherlands ad. Here is a picture of the ad with the scores underneath the ad:

So I began to do some research and it seems someone else saw the score for a different search today as well, on Google.de. Here is a screen capture, but even though the webmaster highlighted the score with the middle ad, I have a feeling the score is associated with the top ad:

Here is another:

So what does the scores mean?
- Pscore: 0.00101
- mCPC: 10.0000
- thresh: 0.0001

mCPC, seems logical, the minimum cost-per-click for the ad is $10? The Pscore and thresh, I am not sure about.

It seems like many folks are spotting this in Google's international search engines.

We have forum discussion at WebmasterWorld and at Abakus German Forum.

A newish term, named SEOicide, caught my attention via a WebmasterWorld thread. The thread discusses how an SEO has the opportunity to buy 70,000 links from a PR7 site for a great price. He asks if it he should do it.

Most everyone says, don't - you are setting yourself up for a penalty. In fact, words like SEOicide are being used to describe what you would do to yourself. But others are not convinced, they say, if the site will drive traffic to your site, then do it.

I would buy, if the direct traffic from those links brings you a profit. Otherwise it sounds very questionable a I would not sign any long term agreement/contract.

Anyway, back to the term SEOicide. I did some searching and it appears the Jane Copland of SEOmoz used the term on February 21st of this year in a comment on a blog post. So WebmasterWorld was not the first place it was used in writing.

Forum discussion at WebmasterWorld.

A recent WebmasterWorld thread is complaining that Google seems to have changed the yellow background color of the Google sponsored ads to a color just a bit different then the white background.

Tedster explains that the color he sees now for the top ads are #FFF9DD, which he said, "is very close to a pure #FFFFFF." On my screen they look different, but on a typical PC monitor, it may look very similar to white. Here are the two colors, side by side - so you make the call.

Google first changed the background color for the top ads to yellow back about a year ago. Based on my screen capture then, the color was #FFF9DD, so I am not sure why we are hearing complaints now? Maybe what I am seeing and what others are seeing are something else? Maybe Google is testing something even closer to white?

Tedster is strong about this, saying:

#FFF9DD is just a cop-out. If Google is going to blur the line between paid ads and organic results, they should just go all the way and use #FFFFFF for the whole page. Somehow, this near-match sends an even worse message, to my sensibilities.

Forum discussion at WebmasterWorld.

I am seeing reports from across the SEO forums that Google has updated or begun the update of the PageRank score found within the Google Toolbar.

We have threads at DigitalPoint Forums, Search Engine Roundtable Forums, WebmasterWorld and Search Engine Watch Forums - all discussing the recent PageRank update that began yesterday some time.

The last time Google updated toolbar PageRank was in late February. Google did recently update the Directory PageRank scores earlier this month. You can see some history on these recent PageRank updates over here.

What this all means for your Google rankings? Not much. Typically, a Google Toolbar PageRank update will have zero direct impact on one's ranking in Google. As Google has said, time and time again, the toolbar PageRank scores are older exports and do not resemble the PageRank score Google uses internally, at the time of ranking your pages in Google.

Forum discussion at DigitalPoint Forums, Search Engine Roundtable Forums, WebmasterWorld and Search Engine Watch Forums.

Remember the Google Maps stickers spotted throughout the UK? They looked like the image on the right of this post.

Well, a while back, probably a year or so ago, I convinced Google to send me one. It never actually made it to my office. I didn't really think about it until now, when I spotted a Google Groups thread that has word from Google that the stickers are forever gone!

Google Maps representative, Jen, said:

I've been trying to track down these stickers for months for some other people in this group but sadly it looks like they've disappeared into the abyss of aged promotional materials. If we ever make more, I'll be sure to follow-up with you. I don't know if we're planning to do that though ever, so... :o(

Say it ain't so! Can those stickers become collector items? Did I miss out on my opportunity on receiving one of these collectables?

Maybe a neat tip for Google would be to start a map game, to find the missing Google Maps stickers. Or maybe not.

Forum discussion at Google Groups.

Here is a recap of what happened in the search forums today, through the eyes of the Search Engine Roundtable and other search forums on the web.

Continue reading "Daily Search Forum Recap: April 28, 2008"

At Search Engine Land, Barry writes about how a US court has decided that META keywords don't matter -- they are "immaterial." The tip came from Eric Goldman's blog where he writes about a recent case that held a company responsible for including trademarked terms in their meta tags.

In this case, because search engines don't use the actual META tags, there is no case. Jill Whalen says on Sphinn that you can test this easily by including a page with an arbitrary word and seeing if that word will come up in your search results once Google spiders the page.

META keywords are not discussed in this Google Help document which should support the law's findings.

However, as another member points out, Yahoo may be using these keywords to rank. In other words, the US Court is overly focused on Google, but perhaps they should weigh in on other search engines.

Forum discussion continues at Sphinn.

WebmasterWorld members are talking about receiving Google Sitelinks, and overall, most forum members who are impacted this way are obviously happy about the expanded link opportunities. Some are a bit afraid that their sitelinks may drop off (as a few members have observed).

Others are noticing that the "algo broke." There's no specific information into how the algorithm broke but some note changes.

I had them a while now but they changed radically about a week ago. Previously, they were showing country specific subdirectories on my static content... now they only show links to country sub forums on my forum. I guess that means the algo thinks my forum has grown and is more important than the static content. Fine by me, I guess.

Moderator jdMorgan notes that Google Webmaster Tools lets you now exclude Sitelinks that you don't want. Simply go to Google Webmaster Tools, click to Links > SiteLinks, select the sitelink that you don't like, and click the "Block" link to the right of it.

Tedster notes the following changes when sitelinks were implemented:

One of my clients had a sitelink that pointed to a very obscurre page - they requested a deletion and it happened with no trouble. But that particular issue highlighted a problem with their entire "mouseover" menu system - the same menu label appeared in three different places! That one little strange sitelink has now generated a major project to re-structure their entire information architecture.

Another client has sitelinks for a single generic keyword. That's a very startling event, since there are 16 million results currently reported, and the keyword triggers many Adwords plus a Google Shopping OneBox at the top of the SERP. In other words, there are serious competitors who must be furious about those sitelinks.

In other words, these are "early bugs," as he notes.

Forum discussion continues at WebmasterWorld.

Over at WebmasterWorld, users are discussing the potential value of a link from social bookmarking site StumbleUpon. Is it worth trying to submit to or is it completely not worth the effort?

Well, it depends on the content. Is it "worthy of being stumbled?" That's something that you must seek out. Of course, if you choose to take the plunge, the right person might come along and StumbleUpon your page and then blog about it, which can be an incredibly valuable link building experience.

Just a word of caution though: don't use social networks to be overly self-promotional. As one person mentioned in the thread, he was banned for submitting his own content. As a heavy StumbleUpon user myself, there's absolutely nothing wrong with submitting your own content but you must be sure to avoid being self-promotional. In other words, don't only submit your own stuff; mix it with other content as well.

[Note: StumbleUpon links are nofollowed, so from a search engine perspective, it doesn't help much.]

Forum discussion continues at WebmasterWorld.

In the first quarter of 2008, Click Forensics announced that click fraud has decreased across Google and Yahoo to 27.8% (from 28.3% in Q4 2007).

Is that a number to be worried about? As Barry says on Search Engine Land, these numbers may not account for discounted questionable clicks. Google has said before that click fraud only accounts for 0.02% of clicks.

Meanwhile, forum members believe that the report by Click Forensics may be misleading. After all, they are a traffic quality management firm and as such "has an interest in reporting exagerrated click fraud rates," according to martinibuster. He says that if the numbers were in actuality this high, "I am certain we'd hear about it in the AdWords forum." After all, that translates to millions of dollars lost.

Forum discussion continues at WebmasterWorld.

A DigitalPoint Forums thread asks other Google AdSense publishers which day of the week, do they make the most amount of money with Google. Most say, Monday and Tuesday are their highest yielding days, while some say the weekends are.

I am very curious, which days our readers do best on. Please take the poll below, you can select multiple days.

Which Day(s) Do You Make Most Your AdSense Income:

I promise to report the results of this poll very soon.

Forum discussion at DigitalPoint Forums.

A search for flight results in the syntax of flight from A to B, i.e. fly jfk to sjc returns a Google OneBox result, that by default, links to Expedia but offers links to other travel search engines including CheapTickets, Hotwire, Orbitz, Priceline and Travelocity.

This is really nothing new, in fact, we wrote about it back in 2006, but a new WebmasterWorld thread is now wondering if Google has a financial agreement with any of these travel search engines, maybe an affiliate agreement?

Besides for Google not labeling the results as paid, nor stringing them through an AdWords URL, it is pretty hard to assume they are paid. The redirect URLs do go through a few parameters that may imply some type of fee structure, as Receptional Andy implies:

• GoogleAirTest
• googleFlightsLink
• fexp [flights experiment?]
• PLGOOGLECPC [cost per click?]

Should Google clarify if there is any payment going back and forth here. To me, I think it is an unpaid extension of Google's Travel Information OneBox result.

Forum discussion at WebmasterWorld.

Last week Yahoo added a nifty feature to Yahoo Local Search. For example, let's say you are looking for the nearest ATM machine. You can type in ATM, and then your zip code. But you won't be shown the nearest ATM within an X mile radius always.

Yahoo let's you plot the diameter of the circle and drop the center of that circle anywhere you want. Yahoo will then refine the local results based on the radius you selected and the center of the circle. Here is a quick video demo:

It doesn't seem like this tool is without bugs. A WebmasterWorld thread reports a blackhole issue.

I went looking for pizza places in Manhattan and noticed certain places disappeared even if you move the circle a hundred yards or so. You'd suddenly find black holes in the middle of Manhattan where there were, according to yahoo, no pizza places. Budge the circle over an eighth of an inch and the same pizza-free streets would suddenly fill with pizza joints, so there's still some work for them to do.

In any event, a unique and interactive solution to searching locally.

Forum discussion at WebmasterWorld.

Here is a recap of what happened in the search forums today, through the eyes of the Search Engine Roundtable and other search forums on the web.

Continue reading "Daily Search Forum Recap: April 25, 2008"

In this week's recap, I discussed my sickness with the flu, announced the winners of the Twing schwag and how to win Yahoo schwag. Also, I discussed Earth Day and Passover. Yahoo, Google & Microsoft announced earnings. Microsoft offers paid organic search support and Google messes with AdWords. Plus a lot more, so watch the video!

To win, watch the video and comment at this post below with the correct answer. Make sure to subscribe to our video feed or subscribe directly on iTunes to be notified of these updates and download the video in the background. Here is the YouTube version of the feed:

For the original iTunes version, click here

Some Of The Topics Discussed:

• Earth Day 2008 Logos: Google, Yahoo, AOL, Ask.com & Others
• Yahoo's Q1 Profits: $542.2 Million, Google announced last week and MSFT announced today Microsoft Quarterly Figures Show $14.45 billion
• Microsoft adCenter Customers Get Premium Organic Listing Support in Live Search?
• Google Tests Higher Placement of AdWords URLs
• Microsoft Launches Revamped News Service and today got RSS
• Google Sitelinks in Position 60?
• Webmasters Report Proxy Hijacking No Longer an Issue at Google
• Google Partners With Domain Tools For Whois Information

Please do subscribe via iTunes or on your favorite RSS reader. Don't forget to comment below with the right answer and good luck!

I may not be able to mail schwag outside of the United States.

I am back from Puerto Rico but the Passover holiday isn't over. It was fun, thanks for asking. ;) It rained for all of 20 minutes and I got some crazy weird sunburns and lots of bug bites. In other words, it was great fun. Seriously.

Earth Day

This week, while taking in a breath of fresh air, we celebrated Earth Day. Google, Yahoo, AOL, and Ask had some nice designs, and Cre8asite Forums as well as Search Engine Roundtable changed their theme. Did you do anything useful for Earth Day? I actually walked around old San Juan!

Q1 Earnings Released

Last week, Google's Q1 earnings saw a surge in stock prices after everyone jumped on the announcement about how well they've done. Yahoo has gone up substantially since Q1 2007, and Microsoft just announced their earnings as well. Life looks good for search giants.

Does Microsoft Favor adCenter Customers?

After a Microsoft adCenter user complained that his organic rankings plummeted after opting in to use adCenter, a Microsoft rep joined the forum discussion and gave the individual personalized attention. Do they get premium organic support if they use Microsoft's adCenter? Food for thought.

Google Sitelinks in Position 60?

A forum member pointed out that he discovered sitelinks in position 60 which looks strangely odd to most of us. This begs the question if it has anything to do with the -60 penalty and if sites ranked #60 are really supposed to be #1.

New: Microsoft Live News

Microsoft Live has launched a revamped news service that is still shadowed by Google but has promise. It'll take time, though.

Google Tests Higher Placement of AdWords URLs

What has a higher CTR, a Google AdWords ad with the URL first followed by the description or an AdWords ad that displays the description followed by a URL? Google is testing out the display of ads in this way, much like A/B testing, I suppose. :)

Google Teams Up with DomainTools for Whois Information

This is very cool news because I always found that DomainTools gives the most relevant whois information without having to worry about CAPTCHAs and the like--and also because I think that Jay Westerdal of DomainTools is a pretty cool guy. Google has partnered with DomainTools to provide Whois information, so if you type "whois seroundtable.com" in Google's search, it will show up on top. That's hot.

Gone Goes Google Proxy Hijacking

Google has been proactive about proxy hijacking and it seems like a thing of the past. Let's hear it for a sigh of relief! ;)

Google is Spidering Weird URLs

More specifically, as our friend Ben discovered, Google has spidered encoded HTML in URLs -- that is, ampersands that are declared with & in the result. If you ask me, it's a bit confusing -- and why? It's probably a bug.

Google CPC Lawsuit

A class action suit is holding Google liable for implying that a blank input box should inherit costs that are input in another box instead of assuming that blank means zero. I totally hear that concern, because if I left a box blank, I'd hope that Google or whatever service I was using wouldn't fill in the box with random gobbleygook or make assumptions for me (remember what ASSuME means, people!). Personally, while some forum members disagree, I think that this lawsuit actually is stronger than a lot of other weird Google lawsuits that I read about.

Yahoo Search Marketing Offers Click Filter Report

If you're a YSM user, you might see the new click filter report that Yahoo has provided to let you wade through statistics that relate to invalid clicks. For example, you'll get CTR, cost, and a bunch of other statistics and graphs as well.

The Large Rectangle is Annoying

While many people think that the largest Google ad yields the most clickthroughs, others think that the most annoying AdSense unit is the large rectangle. Oh well. To each his own.

Do You Want to Work at Google?

Most of you do want to work at Google, according to a recent poll. To be honest, I like the perks that Googlers are offered, but I also like what I do. What about you?

A WebmasterWorld member asks if there's any penalty for adding H2 text (4 words) for the search engines because his logo is displayed in an image.

The answer seems unclear. Tedster responds that he's asked Google twice about this -- one said that it can get a spam penalty and the other said it was perfectly fine if it was not keyword stuffing and was used only for accessibility.

In other words, we'll need someone from Google to let us know what the real answer is. :)

Forum discussion continues at WebmasterWorld.

Have you ever wanted to see what interests Google employees? Now you can. Google has combined research written by Googlers in Papers Written by Googlers. Currently, there are a variety of sections that are broken down into the following:

• Algorithms and Theory
• Artificial Intelligence and Data Mining
• Audio, Video, and Image Processing
• Distributed Systems and Parallel Computing
• Education
• Human-Computer Interaction
• Hypertext and the Web
• Information Retrieval
• Machine Learning
• Natural Language Processing
• Operating Systems
• Science
• Security, Cryptography, and Privacy
• Software Engineering

Pretty heavy duty stuff and very computer-science oriented.

For search enthusiasts, tedster has found two really great papers entitled Finding Near-Duplicate Web Pages: A Large-Scale Evaluation of Algorithms by Monika Henzinger and Structured Models for Fine-to-Coarse Sentiment Analysis by Ryan McDonald et al. Ted believes that these two papers can shape the future of search, especially the latter one which deals with semantic processing.

Forum discussion continues at WebmasterWorld.

Earlier this week, Reuters said that Google has announced technology to provide brand images on cell phones. In other words, based on a user's query, they'll be provided with some sort of image advertisement that has been scaled to fit on the screen of a mobile phone.

The ads work on a CPC basis and must link to a mobile-phone optimized website, according to the article. They are also currently available in 13 national markets (Australia, China, France, Germany, India, Ireland, Italy, Japan, Netherlands, Russia, Spain, the UK, and the United States).

Beyond the initial suspicion, people are worried that mobile ads will penetrate even further beyond web surfing. One forum member says that he is dreading the day when his phone will ring with an ad instead of with his selected ringtone. You never know.

Forum discussion continues at WebmasterWorld.

A little over a month ago, I ran a poll asking Would You Want to Work at Google? The results were a bit surprising, 69% of the 143 responses said they would like to work at Google.

98 respondents or 69% of our readers said they would like to work at Google, while only 45 respondents or 31% said they do not want to work at Google. Here is the cute pie chart:

The pie chart, is almost pacman like, sorry Matt.

Continued forum discussion at DigitalPoint Forums.

A Sphinn thread has discussion about a new AdWords experiment where Google flipped the URL location in the ad from the bottom of the ad to above the description line of the ad. The Get Elastic Blog has a screen shot, which I used here to show you the difference, side by side:

The ads on the left are typical AdWords ads, that I see now, and have the URL at the bottom of the ad, under the ad description. The ads on the right are the new format, which seems be being tested in some parts of the UK. These ads move the display URL from the bottom, up above the ad description.

Very interesting test, which seems way off to me, since I am used to seeing the URL under the ad description for years now. So I am too accustomed to seeing it the other way, which makes this new test seem wrong. But it can be right, it depends on how this impacts CTR and ROI for advertisers.

Forum discussion at Sphinn.

I would consider this Google Groups thread a "gem thread," since you don't always see a thread at this level - it is precious. A Googler, Wysz, discussed in detail four methods of hiding content and how Google may interpret each method.

JavaScript-Only Navigation: Wysz explains that this tactic does not fool or confuse search engines, so it likely won't hurt you in your rankings but from an "accessibility perspective," he says it is "not desirable." Wysz then goes on to answer specific questions posed by a webmaster, which you may gain some clues from.

CSS-Enhanced Navigation: Seems like Google and Wysz both love this method. Wysz said, as long as you do not have "intent to deceive search engines," then you should be fine. On the accessibility front, it is a win-win, "since it degrades gracefully as JavaScript and CSS support are removed," Wysz explains. Wysz adds, "Google should be able to follow these links and rank your pages normally."

Hidden Links via Positioning/Color, for Design/Accessibility: Wysz explains that this method can bring you "dangerously close to a grey area." The example he gives is that if you use the word "SkipToContent," which "isn't likely to be interpreted by anyone as an attempt at deception", said Wysz. He then adds, and this is important, "unless the term "SkipToContent" becomes a highly competitive keyword." Wysz does go on record saying, "If implemented in a non-deceptive manner, these aids should not cause a problem." But that leaves it up to Google to decide and intent is not always easy to judge. So, try not to use this method, if possible.

Hidden Links with No Mention of Accessibility or User Value: I think I will just quote Wysz here, cause he said it best. :)

I'm going to assume that these links are only intended for bots to see as attempt to deceive search engines. That's probably not an assumption you want a Googler to make. When making this judgement on your own, just ask yourself this question: "Is all of this text here for the user?" If you want to make Google (and your users) happy, the answer should always be "Yes."

Forum discussion at Google Groups.

A Google Groups thread confirms that Google Maps is lacking support for a common feature needed both here in the States and overseas, support for multi-language listings.

A Google Groups member asked:

As a multilingual company our website is in more than one language and each language has the same name but different URL. Should I create a listing for each language?

Google's official response is that there is no way to add more than one language URL for a single listing and that you should not add more than one business profile for the same physical address. Google Maps Jen said:

We don't have any way to handle multi-language listings at this point in time, and we strongly encourage businesses to only create one listing per physical address. However, it's a great suggestion to support these types of business listings - maybe we'll be able to support this in the future.

I am pretty sure many local search engines ask for languages spoken at the company when creating a business profile. I am not sure if those are one of the questions asked by Google Local. In any event, if multiple languages are spoken, adding a special URL for each language, should not be too hard.

Forum discussion at Google Groups.

Here is a recap of what happened in the search forums today, through the eyes of the Search Engine Roundtable and other search forums on the web.

Continue reading "Daily Search Forum Recap: April 24, 2008"

Maybe so, just a spidering glitch, weird links, or sitemap error? I was searching this morning in Google doing some tests on Google's new Whois feature. When I plugged in a domain what popped up in the first page of the results was a weird URL including encoded ampersand and other characters in front of the shown URL for the website (aboutus.org). Once I clicked on the link I got a 404 error.

Screenshot:

Link to Result.

Thoughts? Comments?

Yahoo News reports on Yahoo's Q1 earnings of $542.2 million, which is substantially higher than 2007's Q1 earnings of $142.4 million.

Forum members are hoping there can be insights into this financial gain. WebmasterWorld moderator martinibuster quotes Jerry Yang's comment: "Not only does Yahoo! have a unique franchise, it increasingly has industry-leading tools, technology and, most importantly, people."

He adds that Yahoo is shutting down their tools that aren't yielding results (e.g. Yahoo 360 and Yahoo Music Jukebox). It's interesting to note that Yang says that Yahoo has great people, though. Does he also mean the employees that were laid off in January?

Forum discussion continues at WebmasterWorld.

A WebmasterWorld member has been banned from Google AdSense and wants to try again after several years on hiatus. He says that the past banning was due to fraudulent clicks but does not know the origin, and he'd like to start anew from a clean slate.

Is it possible, or is the ban for life?

AdSenseAdvisor says that you are able to appeal your account termination, but if you get banned for invalid clicks, you cannot participate in the program again. Since it's been several years for the publisher, it appears that the appeals process is the only way to go. In other words, you can't reapply, but you can certainly try to talk to Google about your previous banning and see if there's any recourse.

Forum discussion continues at WebmasterWorld.

InformationWeek discusses a recent lawsuit that Google is facing over some ambiguity in an ad.

(Photo courtesy of Valleywag)

More specifically, from the image above, you see that there are 2 boxes. If you leave the second one blank, it doesn't imply that the amount is zero. Google implies that you're using the Default CPC bid for the second box if left empty.

Understandably, some forum members are thinking that Google is in the wrong here. It may not warrant a class action suit, but it still warrants something. In general, Google's CPC input boxes have been a problem before -- one forum members says that if you miss a decimal point (e.g. you set your ad to $015 instead of 0.15), you could end up paying a LOT more than you intended to.

Other forum members believe that this is linkbait at its best and that Google AdWords has help documents explaining all of these fields. If you don't read the fine print, you shouldn't hold Google liable that you've lost money. You should also not "test and forget" your ads; if something looks fishy, stop it before you lose money inadvertently.

Forum discussion continues at WebmasterWorld.

WebmasterWorld members are reporting strangeness when using the Google AdWords Editor to retrieve statistics. According to some, the editor tool is pulling information, but "not all of it."

Google is aware of the problem according to the user. At this point, however, there is no solution and users report that they are still having difficulty getting all the data.

In the meantime, the suggestion is to use the online interface rather than the Google AdWords Editor. Forum members also believe that using the online interface is just better. netmeg puts it nicely:

I don't use the AdWords Editor for stats anymore; too often it doesn't match the online console. I've been given various reasons by Google as to why this might be (connecting to different servers that aren't completely in sync, console can see today's numbers while the AE can't, I'm making it up, etc etc) but the bottom line is, if I need to get stats, I have to log in.

Forum discussion continues at WebmasterWorld.

Want to see invalid clicks on your Yahoo Search Marketing campaign? The YSM team has launched a new feature called the Click Filter Report. This report shows you data on clicks that Yahoo has deemed invalid, and can be customized with a variety of data points, including impressions, clicks, invalid clicks, invalid click rate, CTR, cost, and average CPC.

This new feature is accessible under the "Reports" tab in YSM accounts.

Here's a screenshot:

Forum discussion continues at Search Engine Watch Forums, WebmasterWorld, and DigitalPoint Forums.

A Google Groups thread has discussion about one webmaster that sees Sitelinks for his site in position 60. The search is for vacation realty and in the 60th position. While, I do not see the Sitelinks at that position, the webmaster does and provided a screen shot:

So there is really no doubt that this webmaster is seeing this on his computer. The question is, why aren't any of us? Typically, I wouldn't report something like this, but it is very unusual, so I wanted to draw more eyes to it.

What I do find very interesting is that Googler, JohnMu, tells the webmaster to look at the -60 penalty Google Groups thread. Does he mean to imply that some sites with the -60 penalty, that deserve a number one position, will see Sitelinks in position 60, in these cases?

Forum discussion at Google Groups.

Search Engine Watch Forums moderator, abbottsys, posted detailed feedback on Google Ads Being on Yahoo Search. The Search Engine Watch Forums thread has only one post but deserves a lot more participation, in my opinion.

Normally, I would summarize, but I am not feeling so well and abbottsys does a great job, so let me quote him:

1) My ad was subscribed to Google Search and the Google Search Partner Network, but it was not subscribed to the Content Network

2) I bid high so I could be sure of seeing the ad. I also shut down all my native Yahoo campaigns. As soon as I shut them down my adwords ad took over on Yahoo.

3) My ad appeared at the top of Google and Yahoo. My ad ranking on Yahoo was slightly better than on Google.

4) Changes to the ad were reflected with equal speed on both Google and Yahoo.

5) I found it *very* convenient that I could manage my Yahoo campaigns from AdWords. I've always been a big fan of the AdWords management interface, which I feel is *far* superior to Panama, AdCenter, or any others out there. In fact, I was surprised how refeshing it was not having to mess with multiple ad management platforms.

6) As regards ad performance (CTR, conversions) I was very happy. Of course, since this was a Yahoo test I have no idea if these clicks were charged or even reported in my AdWords account. But the ad did perform well.

7) I've been doing this PPC stuff since 1998. My overall comment on this particular experience is that it was great. I really liked it from all aspects.

8) If this test leads to a full ad distribution agreement between Yahoo and Google my only additional request would be that my AdWords ads show up on the Yahoo Content Network. Currently ad distribution on this network is a mess, and needs to be upgraded. Yahoo clearly has infrastructure problems with ad delivery on their Content Network. Letting AdWords handle this would be a much needed upgrade!!!!

9) Bottom line. As an advertiser I simply loved this! Two thumbs up!!!!!!!!

In the meantime, the DOJ is investigating the Google/Yahoo ad test. So even though some advertisers might love to see Google provide the search ads for Yahoo, the DOJ might prevent that from happening.

Forum discussion at Search Engine Watch Forums.

A Google Groups thread asks if one can transfer their Google Advertising Professional exam scores from their old company to their new company. The Google Advertising Professional program was launched in 2004 to help Google give certification to professionals selling AdWords services. Part of the certification is completing an exam to earn rights to show the Google Advertising Professional Certification Logo on your site.

So when employees move from company to company, they may bring along their individual certification status. But if the company has not received the certification on the company level, it seems like when an employee with the certification leaves, it goes with the individual.

But in cases where the company earned the certification, it cannot be transferred from an old company to a new one.

According to AdWordsPro.Jordan, an official Google AdWords representation, in a Google Groups thread, you cannot transfer the certification:

At this point, it's actually not possible to transfer Google Advertising Professional Exam scores between companies or their My Client Centers. Instead, we'd suggest that your former employee re-take the exam and associate her score with her new company's My Client Center.

Forum discussion at Google Groups.

WebmasterWorld moderator posted a detailed thread at WebmasterWorld claiming that he feels the proxy hijacks that Google has suffered from in 2007, and was getting better towards the end of 2007 seems to be 100% cleaned up now.

IncrediBill concluded:

Therefore, based on all of the evidence presented, I'm drawing a conclusion that Google Proxy Hijacking may be a thing of the past and no longer a clear and present danger to webmasters.

I think this is no longer a problem and welcome anyone to sticky me if they think they're still seeing proxy hijacking in order to review the situation in details.

WebmasterWorld administrator, Tedster, agreed:

From what I have seen recently, Google does seem to have a handle on the problem now. Haven't stumbled over any proxy urls for a few weeks at least.

I personally have not seen any recent complaints that conveyed such a proxy hijack issue in Google. So maybe it is true. Maybe Google has fixed the proxy hijack issue that plagued them throughout 2007 and parts of 2006.

Forum discussion at WebmasterWorld.

A Search Engine Watch Forums thread has a member complaining that after he signed up with Microsoft adCenter, he noticed his site was removed from the Live Search index. For those that do not know, adCenter is the search ad product that goes along side the organic, pure and unbiased search results at Live Search.

To my surprise, an official Microsoft adCenter representative came into the thread and said:

I can understand the importance of this matter and I am happy to assist in this.

Can you please contact support and have this documented so that we can launch an investigation. Thanks so much.

Does that mean that if you are an adCenter advertiser, Microsoft will assist you with your ranking issues in the organic search side? If Google or Yahoo ever did this, all hell would break loose. I hope this was a miscommunication on the Microsoft side, because this implies, strongly implies, that there is not separation between the paid side and organic side of their search services. (Or maybe I am still sick and I missed something).

Forum discussion at Search Engine Watch Forums.

Here is a recap of what happened in the search forums today, through the eyes of the Search Engine Roundtable and other search forums on the web.

Continue reading "Daily Search Forum Recap: April 23, 2008"

As Danny reported over the weekend, Google added a significant search feature (Matt Cutts mentioned it first to let us know). You can now type into Google, whois domain.com and get the whois information for that domain.

For example, whois seroundtable.com returns this result:

When you click on the whois link, you are taken to Domain Tools. Domain Tools is one of the most widely used whois databases out there. Curious if it was a formal partnership or just because Google likes the resource? In any event, the Sphinn thread has one comment about that:

I can't believe that they have "partnered" with a site the does an SEO analysis upon clicking? http://www.domaintools.com/seo-score/

Forum discussion at Sphinn and DigitalPoint Forums.

A WebmasterWorld member discusses an interesting scenario regarding Google's requirement to have you log into your Google account when you access any service tied to Google. For example, if you have a Gmail account, you're likely also posting onto Google Groups with the same identity. What would happen, then, if you needed (for whatever reason) to share your login to Google Groups with someone -- say, a coworker? You'd be giving them access to everything else tied to that Google account.

The issue is not that simple and many users, especially those who use Google for various business purposes, opt to have 5-6 email accounts rather than one single account where the identity can be confused. If you have to, you can use different browsers (Windows users can now use Firefox, IE, Opera, and Safari!). And if you're paranoid, anonymous proxies are the way to go because of no IP tracing.

Many forum members point out that Google isn't trying to make your life difficult. It just makes life easier to consolidate logins than to have to worry about logging in and saving different usernames and passwords again and again. (Of course, the other argument, which is obviously presented, is that Google wants to track every move you make...)

Regardless, the desire for Google to have such uniformity is obviously causing concern among forum members who feel that any of their information can be accessed simply because they're almost always logged into Gmail.

Forum discussion continues at WebmasterWorld.

The Seattle Times reports that Microsoft has launched a brand new Live Search News portal that combines video, news, and video.

It's not that different than Google News, WebmasterWorld member Robert Charlton says. He notes that Google feels more like a "big city newspaper" than Live Search News, but notes that there's some localized news on Live Search's end. (I'm still in Puerto Rico so I see no local news at all and I may be at a disadvantage with my reporting, though forum members do believe that it's being rolled out in different geographic locations at different times.)

The other big observation is that Microsoft is feeding news releases whereas Google is offering secondary and tertiary news sources where applicable. That said, many forum members believe that Microsoft has much work to do to make it a comparable service to Google News.

Forum discussion continues at WebmasterWorld.

Loren Baker reports at Search Engine Journal that copy that stands out from the crowd gets higher click through rates. He explains that a campaign which utilized ASCII art (e.g. //~vw^v^vw~\\ and the like) got a 50% higher CTR than without the art.

Barry mentioned in January over at Search Engine Land that such a practice can "spice up your ads," but that Google may filter out such art because it obviously gives one an unfair advantage over the other. Loren says that Google has been doing the same thing to the individual who reported the findings.

Meanwhile, it'd be interesting to discover if the CTRs are yielding higher conversions or if there's a higher bounce rate than previously as well. The data there is lacking.

Forum discussion continues at Sphinn.

CNet News reports that Google is the best brand -- once again -- for the third year in a row, according to a market research firm. Google's brand, according to the data (which is calculated based on interviews and financial information), topped the charts at $86.1 billion. (Compare this to the second place holder which was GE with a value of $71.4 billion and Microsoft which hit third place with $70.9 billion.)

Surprised? Probably not. After all, this is the third year that Google has struck gold with these guys. And forum members don't seem to be fazed at all either.

Forum discussion continues at WebmasterWorld.

Here is a recap of what happened in the search forums today, through the eyes of the Search Engine Roundtable and other search forums on the web.

Continue reading "Daily Search Forum Recap: April 22, 2008"

Today is Earth Day and the search industry is sporting special logos for the day. Here is a run down for the 2008 logos:

Google:

AOL:

Ask.com:

Cre8asite Forums:

Search Engine Roundtable (our theme, it actually glows):

Past earth day themes and logos from the search industry:

• Google, Ask.com & Yahoo! Earth Day Logos, 2007
• Search Engine Commemorate Earth Day 2006, 2006
• Ask Jeeves & Google Earth Day, 2005
• Google Commemorates Earth Day, 2004

Forum discussion at Search Engine Roundtable Forums

Guess what? After forever (it seems), Google has taken Google Website Optimizer out of beta. Now, anyone can access the Google Website Optimizer to increase your site's conversion rate. (Previously, you had to open a free AdWords account to use the product.)

If you haven't used Google Website Optimizer yet, perhaps the benefits of A/B Split & Multivariable Testing and Intuitive Reports will woo you. The goals, of course, are to increase sales, improve landing pages, get more leads, determine cost per acquisition (CPA), increase time spent on site, estimate guesswork from your site design, and more.

Forum discussion continues at DigitalPoint Forums.

Udi Manber, VP of search quality for Google, sat down with Popular Mechanics for a rare interview and issued some insights into the state of Google search today.

The article deserves a read in itself, but some WebmasterWorld members particularly liked some of the statements about Manber's emphasis on keyword density and how Google rolls out tests (at least with regards to algorithm analysis):

I wish people would put more effort into thinking about how other people will find them and putting the right keywords onto their pages.

I’ll give you an example of something that came last week. We were evaluating a certain algorithm that adds diversity to the result. We did live experiments, which means we launched the algorithm to a very small percentage of users and then see how that compares to the result without the algorithm.

The results we show you are based not only on what we know of the Web, but also what other people have searched for.

Furthermore, forum members were happy to see that the algorithm changes have no relationship to Google AdWords.

All in all, very informative and useful, and forum members welcome the insights.

Forum discussion continues at WebmasterWorld.

Here is a recap of what happened in the search forums today, through the eyes of the Search Engine Roundtable and other search forums on the web.

Continue reading "Daily Search Forum Recap: April 21, 2008"

A DigitalPoint Forums thread asks if PageRank sculpting, be it through the nofollow attribute, JavaScript or robots.txt file, can it penalize you in Google? Will Google ever look at that to penalize your site? And so on.

I am 99% sure Matt Cutts of Google said you will not be penalized for using the nofollow attribute to flow your internal PageRank, as you see fit. We have some more conversation on quotes from Matt on that over here.

But will it ever raise a red flag? I would be lying if I said no. I would think it could be used as a measure to see which sites are overly optimized for search engines. Heck, what normal webmaster would nofollow their internal links? Most webmasters have no idea what a nofollow attribute is, let alone use it for internal links.

So to say it will never raise a red flag and possibly lead to Google reviewing your site and then penalizing it for reasons outside of the realm of PR Sculpting, is not possible to say. In my mind, it seems like a natural step for some Googlers to look for, when bored.

Forum discussion at DigitalPoint Forums.

Note: This post was written last week and scheduled to go live on April 21st.

WebmasterWorld members are reporting that they're logging into their Google AdSense accounts due to an addiction that needs to be stopped and are finding that AdSense is reporting much lower clicks. One person in particular said that his ads are showing zero clicks but even had it clicked on by someone "overseas" to see if it was a problem on Google's end).

Everyone agrees that "something is weird" and only martinibuster suggests that you should check your server logs for an indication of what's happening with your ad clicks. Till then, though, on April 17th and on the 18th, this seemed to be a problem. (Ed note: As of this writing -- the 18th at 4PM EST -- this issue hasn't been resolved as no forum members report anything but strangeness.)

Forum discussion continues at WebmasterWorld.

This post was written on April 18th and was scheduled for publication for Monday, April 21st.

About 6 weeks ago, I polled our readers on which Google AdSense unit they found to be the most annoying. The results are in and the winner of the most annoying AdSense unit is the large rectangle unit.

As you can see, the Large Rectangle, by far, beat out all the other units. What does the large rectangle look like? Here is a live large rectangle:

Here are the full results from the 108 responses:

Large Rectangle (336 x 280) - 29 - 27%
Medium Rectangle (300 x 250) - 21 - 19%
Leaderboard (728 x 90) - 14 - 13%
Wide Skyscraper (160x600) - 14 - 13%
Skyscraper (120x600)v8 - 7%
Banner (468 x 60) - 7 - 6%
Square (250 x 250) - 5 - 5%
Small Square (200 x 200) - 5 - 5%
Small Rectangle (180x150) - 3 - 3%
Vertical Banner (120 x 240) - 2 - 2%

Forum discussion continued at Google Groups.

Note: This article was written the week prior and scheduled to go live on August 21st.

AdWordsAPI Advisor posted in a Google Groups thread that Google is now able to drop the prices they charge for using the AdWords API. How can they do this now? Debbie Leight, Product Marketing at Google, said because Google was able to enhance the API system to "drive greater efficiencies." Those new efficiencies are now represented in a new lower rate.

Here is the revised rate chart:

Service Name, Former Rate (in API units), New Rate
* addAds: 125 -> 50 per item
* addCriteria: 25 -> 20 per item
* updateCriteria: 10 -> 3 per item
* getKeywordVariations: 25 -> 20
* getKeywordsFromSite: 25 -> 20
* estimateAdGroupList: 25 -> 20 per item
* estimateCampaignList: 25 -> 20 per item
* estimateKeywordList: 25 -> 20 per item
* scheduleReportJob: 1000 -> 500

Debbie ends by explaining:

API units will continue to be charged at a cost of US$0.25 (or local currency equivalent) per thousand units consumed; but these per-service rate reductions will bring substantial savings.

Forum discussion at Google Groups.

Note: This article was written the week prior and scheduled to be posted April 21st.

A DigitalPoint Forums thread kind of laughs at an ad they spotted within the Google AdSense network. An ad leading to Fragrance Net shows how sometimes advertisers can get too busy to remember to not publish an ad that is just a test.

To be fair, this doesn't have to be an ad from Fragrance Net, it can be from one of their affiliates.

In any event, the lesson is the same, be careful with your creatives before publishing. An ad like this may jump out to readers and people might click out of curiosity or just ignore that ad. The creative is one of the most important criteria in qualifying the click before they click. So instead of wasting $0.10 or $10, whatever that click might be, hopefully your ad content will qualify them beforehand.

In this case, it likely can lead to a wasted click.

Forum discussion at DigitalPoint Forums.

Note: This post was written last week and scheduled to be published automatically on April 21st.

Googler, JohnMu, has some basic linking advice in a Google Groups thread. In short, John explains that logic behind who you should or should not link to. I'll quote John:

In general, if you can provide relevant links for users of your site, feel free to link to them. That's how the web works :-), even if those links partially come from sites that you also own or work on.

That said, if those links are not relevant to the site, it's generally safe to say that they will not provide any significant value to your users, even if the sites you're linking to happen to be owned, made or run by the same owner. If you own or have made a group of fairly unrelated sites, it might be best to keep them on a portfolio page.

In general, thinking about where and how you would link to these sites will provide a good guideline. Would you want to keep this link visible in your main content? Or would you prefer to keep it in 5pt light-grey on white text on the bottom of your pages?

Did we learn anything new from this? Not most of you, but for our new readers or those searching for "advice on linking out," this article may come in handy.

If you have more questions, join the thread at Google Groups.

Note: This article was written last week and scheduled to be published automatically on Monday, April 21st.

Here is a recap of what happened in the search forums today, through the eyes of the Search Engine Roundtable and other search forums on the web.

Continue reading "Daily Search Forum Recap: April 18, 2008"

In this week's edition of the video search buzz, I talked about the Yahoo, Google and Live Search tax day updates. I also talked about the new Yahoo slap and a new AdWords slap. Google's bot is now crawling forms and Yahoo releases Slurp 3.0. Plus many more topics - make sure to watch to win search related schwag!

To win, watch the video and comment at this post below with the correct answer. Make sure to subscribe to our video feed or subscribe directly on iTunes to be notified of these updates and download the video in the background. Here is the YouTube version of the feed:

Some Of The Topics Discussed:

• Subscribe To Our New Video Podcast: Hosted By Barry Schwartz
• Tax Day Theme is Live
• Yahoo Search April 2008 'Tax Day' Update
• Microsoft Live Search April 2008 Update?
• Major Google UK Search Changes? 'Dewey' Crosses The Pond
• Possible Google AdWords Slap on April 12, 2008?
• Yahoo Jacks Up Advertisers Minimum By 2-4X Overnight
• Google Ads Now Live on Yahoo Search
• Google Now Crawling Content Behind Forms
• Yahoo Adds Slurp 3.0, Reminds Me Of Peanut Butter Memo
• Bigreds Sues Yahoo Over Click-Fraud For $1 Million
• Buy A Google-Plex Tour on eBay
• Google (GOOG) Stock Surges Overnight After Awesome Q1 Announcement
• Winners Announced in This Video

Please do subscribe via iTunes or on your favorite RSS reader. Don't forget to comment below with the right answer and good luck!

I may not be able to mail schwag outside of the United States.

While you're all reading this, I'm in sunny (rainy?) Puerto Rico preparing for the Passover holiday. This means that you'll see a little less of Barry and me over the upcoming days, at least until the holiday ends. As for me, this isn't much of a vacation since I'm blogging, and why would I want to keep you away from search news? That would be unfair, wouldn't it?

By the way, we're still looking for sponsors for our weekly video series that summarize these events. If you're interested, tell Barry I sent you. Additionally, the schwag addict in me needs duplicates. Send lots. Cool? (kthx.)

Tax Day in the USA

Ah, the day I realize I hate more than ever this year. It was Tax Day on Tuesday, and we "celebrated" (for lack of better word) with a theme:

For what it's worth, the theme DID put a smile on my face, but tax day still sucks. I can't believe the government thinks it's entitled to about 50% of my wages.

Yahoo's Tax Day Update, and Microsoft is in a Similar Boat

In preparation for their own tax due date, Yahoo had a major reshuffling of search results. The sentiment? More Wiki pages on top and "really bad" traffic. On the Microsoft update front, there are "awful SERPs" and it's a "total disaster." With Google's Dewey shuffle, it's not looking good for any search engine right now.

Google 'Dewey' Update Hits the UK

Yup, speaking of which, the reshuffling is back, as the Google "Dewey" update is beginning to impact UK-based users. I, too, keep seeing shuffled results. Maybe I should report my findings to Matt after all.

Google's AdWords Slap, Yahoo Minimum Bids Live

On April 12th, advertisers reported a Google AdWords slap with $10 minimum bid rates. Our commenters saw the same behavior. Is the Yahoo Slap next? Nope, not yet. The Yahoo minimum bids are live but the costs aren't exorbitant. Actually, that's because (as we later learned) that only Yahoo's minimum bid interface is live, but not the new pricing. It'll happen soon, they say. Well, it just happened, prices surge for some advertisers.

And finally, on a similar note, Yahoo was displaying Google AdWords ads in search results as part of a test earlier this month. The test appears to have stopped early, then came back again, and the Wall Street Journal suggests that a partnership could be underway.

Google is Crawling Content Behind Forms

For the SEO-unsavvy webmaster, you're in luck. Google is beginning to submit GET forms and see the content behind web forms. For the SEO-savvy-but-really-want-privacy webmaster, you're going to have to tweak your code to prevent Google from doing it.

Google Sitelinks Update

Google has updated sitelinks for numerous sites and added other sites to the list. Are you one of them?

Yahoo Gets Slurp 3.0

A new Yahoo crawler, Yahoo Slurp 3.0, has been unleashed into the wild. Your biggest concern is that new IP addresses will be used which is important if you're using IP-based checking.

Blended Search Changes Behavior

We're starting to see that blended search is changing user behavior and people are more inclined to click on news stories, videos, and images than the regular blue link. It's time to optimize!

Flickr Video Support Added to Google Reader

Now that Flickr video is out, it was only a matter of time for Google Reader to support the videos. And they did this week. That didn't take long. :)

Google is an Informational Search Engine?

A Penn State study reported earlier says that 80 percent of Google searches are informational, whereas the remaining 20% is split about evenly into navigational and transactional queries. Do you agree with that?

Snake Oil SEO Firm Sued with $100K+ Fine

Eric Pender says it right. "It's firms like these that, in aggregate, can give our industry a black eye." Here we are, defining SEO standards, and there Internet Advancement is, lying about true SEO offerings. I'm sure folks are glad they got what they deserved...for the most part.

Yahoo Sued by Internet Retailer Bigreds

It seems that there's another lawsuit brewing this week. The news is that internet retailer Bigreds is suing Yahoo for $1 million for click fraud that they believe begun in 2002. They refused to settle for $17k, instead requesting nearly 100x as much. Good luck.

Google Local Gives Businesses More Leeway

How do you best feel like you want to represent your company? Well, if you're offering some adult services or something sketchy, chances are, Google doesn't have a pre-filled box for you to select your business type. No need to worry any longer. Google now gives you, the business owner, the ability to enter a category that you feel is the best fit for your company or business, so you can get more targeted business results.

Googleplex Entry Fee? It's Yours to Determine

An eBay auction of a tour of the Googleplex has surfaced in the interwebs this week. The winner gets an insider's view of the "best place to work." Proceeds go to Foundation for the Future, educational organization.

Google AdSense Allows "Choose Units" Reporting Option

For Google AdSense users, you can now filter your reports by a new field called "Choose Units" which lets you either view your results by Ad Units, Link Units, or the two combined. The Google AdSense Blog expounds on the features.

Get Your SEO Terms Straightened Out

It seems that more and more people are not understanding basic SEO terms. Look things up if you're not sure. Maybe this is why people are fighting for SEO standards... not that it would help someone who doesn't know where to look!

Google's Earnings Soar, Again

Google announced outstanding earnings, sending their stock price up 18% so far today. Profits were 30% higher and revenue was up 40%.

Have a wonderful weekend and subsequent week! Don't miss us too much! (I know those of you who are going to SMX Social Media are going to have to hold it in!)

Whenever Google announces earnings, we have a thread at WebmasterWorld that summarizes how much share Google is taking from the earnings AdSense publishers make.

So if you click on an AdSense ad on my personal blog, how much of that cost-per-click am I get and how much is Google getting.

Based on the earnings report, Google is taking 21% and the remaining 79% is going to me. Now, I doubt this is an exact number, because this includes premium publishers, special partners and so on. So I am sure some of those partners get a higher or maybe even a lower share than the typical AdSense publisher.

But overall, Google is being fair. In fact, Google seems to been paying out publishers more then they have done historically. The thread summarizes:

The past few quarters have been between 75% and 79%.

One other member has a nice post as well:

Revenues up 41%, earnings up 31% - doesn't sound like they're ripping anyone off to me. Now if revenues were up 30% and earnings were up 40%, that would be a different story.

Forum discussion at WebmasterWorld.

Yahoo's new minimum bids are now official live, and several advertisers have posted their new minimum bid increases at both WebmasterWorld and Search Engine Watch Forums.

Each advertiser who noticed a change in their minimum bid said they noticed an increase by two to four times of their original minimum bid price. Here is a quote from the thread:

yahoo just raised my minimum bids by 3 -4 times on many keywords.. they must be out of their minds..

Some advertisers feel stranded, having to now deal with Google Slaps and now the Yahoo Slap.

Google was impossible. And now Yahoo. Where to go?

But this is the reality of the game now. If your quality does not meet the definition of quality at Yahoo or Google, you will pay for it.

Let's poll our audience... Did your minimum bid increase in Yahoo?

Forum discussion at WebmasterWorld and Search Engine Watch Forums.

Yesterday I reported that Google stopped running the Yahoo ads test that they started a week earlier and then asked why. I asked why would they stop the test early?

Well, the answer is that they did not. The individual we are tracking to see if the Google ads are live or not on Yahoo, saw that they went down. But now he is reported at Search Engine Watch Forums that the ads are currently showing again.

So I was premature in reporting that Google stopped testing the ads. They have continued the test and outlooks are continuing to look positive for advertisers and Yahoo, with this test.

Forum discussion continued at Search Engine Watch Forums.

There seems to be a major bug in Google Webmaster Tools where Google is telling virtually all webmasters that their sites are not indexed in Google. For example, I am personally getting the following message for all my sites:

Yes, that reads:

No pages from your site are currently included in Google's index. Indexing can take time. You may find it helpful to review our information for webmasters and webmaster guidelines.

Hmm, but this site is indexed in Google:

So, I would not worry, it just seems to be a display issue in Google Webmaster Tools. As you can imagine, there is a lot of forum noise about the issue.

Forum discussion at DigitalPoint Forums, HighRankings Forum and Google Groups.

Can Google disappoint? I am personally don't get it, but I did help cover the announcement last night at Search Engine Land with Google Beats Forecasts With 30% Increase In Profit. The news is still dominating Techmeme, here is the overview:

Google's reported revenues of $5.19 billion for the quarter ended March 31, 2008 and a net income of $1.31 billion. Previous quarter revenues was $4.83 billion in Q4 and $3.66 billion in Q1 2007. Previous quarter income was 1.21 billion in Q4 2007. Google's shares are currently up over 12% in after market conditions, now at $506.87.

In short, they totally beat expectations and now their stock has climbed $77, 17% plus, overnight in after-market conditions.

The forums are buzzing about the news. Many are saying things like, "wow" and Google is making too much profit on their dime, and so on.

Forum discussion at WebmasterWorld,Search Engine Watch Forums and DigitalPoint Forums.

Here is a recap of what happened in the search forums today, through the eyes of the Search Engine Roundtable and other search forums on the web.

Continue reading "Daily Search Forum Recap: April 17, 2008"

In March, we reported that Google AdWordsPro was getting inundated with questions and feedback, and two new representatives were added. Well, it's a month later and it seems that the trend is continuing.

AdWordsPro announced Tuesday on Google Groups that three new staff members have been added. They are AdWordsPro.Jordan, AdWordsPro.Sarah and AdWordsPro.Steph.

The new staff members will be checking the forums about an hour a day to read and respond to concerns. Since issues can arise at various times of day, there will be staff members checking in the morning and later in the day. The goal here is to have "no unanswered questions remaining" by the end of each business day. High aspirations but I think it's doable. :)

Forum discussion continues at Google Groups.

Bigreds, an internet retailer has decided to sue Yahoo for $1 million over click fraud starting back in 2002. Yahoo offered Bigreds $17,000 back, but Bigreds wants more and they are suing for over $1 million in damages and penalties.

I wanted to pull out some of the best comments on this lawsuit, which you can read more about at InformationWeek, from a WebmasterWorld thread:

Look if you are going to build your billion dollar business around PAYPERCLICK then you should probably have systems, people, backups for the most obvious exploit.

It's the modern day equivalent of a bank without a safe.

Um, i'm looking at this site, and I really don't see how any traffic would convert, regardless of whether it's fradulent or not. Sorry Red, but I'm thinking that maybe the lawyers are the only ones that are going to come out ahead here.

I don't really see the problem with advertisers bringing suits against garbitrage because the advertiser foots the bill for the middle man market they create.

Decide for yourself...

Forum discussion at WebmasterWorld.

Beu posted a Search Engine Watch Forums thread on a new eBay listing to bid on getting a VIP tour of Google's Mountain View office, aka the Googleplex.

The private tour is for two individuals to get an "insider's look at the "best place to work." In fact, this is being organized by Foundation for the Future, an organization that "raises private funds that allow Menlo-Atherton High School to address the real-time needs of its diverse and high-performing students." Note that the winning bid will go in its entirety to the foundation.

If you win, you get to pick a date on the weekdays only for a two and a half hour tour, which includes lunch. Only catch is you need to pick a date before July 31, 2008.

The eBay auction runs until Apr-20-08 21:00:00 PDT and the current bid is only $265.00, with 15 bids already. So, if this is for you or if you just want to give a nice donation, go to the eBay listing and bid away.

Forum discussion at Search Engine Watch Forums.

Google has finally written a formal post at the Google Webmaster Central blog named Best practices when moving your site. It honestly is a nice place to send a client or webmaster when the question comes up. Does it give any of us more information then we already know? Not really, but it is nice to know that what we know and practice is confirmed by Google.

We have covered this topic over and over again, here are some of the articles I found at the Search Engine Roundtable (I am sure there are more than what I listed):

• Want To Switch to a New Domain? 301 Redirects vs. 302 Redirects
• Moving From Old To New Domains: What To Expect In Terms Of Google Traffic
• Moving Site to a New IP: How to Prepare
• How to Launch a New Website With (and Without) SEO in Mind
• Don't Let Your New Domain Hurt Your SEO
• Changing Domain Name Ownership Whois Information & Google Search Ranking Impact

What I really want to see from Google is what we proposed back in 2006, the Google Certified Domain Change, that is something I think should be instituted already.

Anyway, it is nice to see this article from Google. But it is never enough, is it? We would love a tool in Webmaster Tools that aids the process, specifically for moving to a new domain.

Forum discussion at Google Groups.

Yahoo told us they were Search Engine Watch Forums by abbottsys states that his Google ads are now no longer showing up in the Yahoo Search ad slots. He also helped us break the news on when Yahoo started showing Google ads back on April 11th. But, as of April 16th, the Google ads no longer show on Yahoo.

That test was only one week. Did the test go really bad quickly? Was Yahoo not happy with the Google ads? Was Google not happy with Yahoo? Or is it simply that they both have enough data to make a decision going forward?

Maybe Yahoo decided to pull the Google ads in anticipation of earning more money through their new minimum bid prices that are suppose to go into effect any time now?

Forum discussion at Search Engine Watch Forums.

Update: There is related news at the WSJ on this:

Yahoo Inc. moved closer to outsourcing its search advertising to Google Inc. after an initial test of the system yielded what the two firms deemed positive results, people familiar with the matter said. — A partnership could give Yahoo some needed leverage …

Something is up, for sure. More coverage can be found at Techmeme.

Update: Yahoo Ad Test on Google Continues...

Yesterday I inaccurately reported that Yahoo's new minimum bid prices were live. That was wrong. What is live is the new user interface that shows one's minimum bid. In fact, I showed a screen shot of the location of where Yahoo will show you your new minimum bid:

But, an official Yahoo representative, YahooPete, came to WebmasterWorld to notify us that only the user interface has changes and the new prices have not yet gone live. That honestly surprises me, because I was told the new prices were coming early this week and being Thursday, we are not late this week.

In any event, YahooPete clarified saying:

Since we're close to launching minimum bid changes, some advertisers may notice user interface changes. We expect the actual bid changes to go live soon.

I will keep watching the space and let you know as soon as I see an update.

Forum discussion at WebmasterWorld.

A new rankings system is now available within Alexa, we have learned. The new rankings system "now aggregate[s] data from multiple sources to give you a better indication of website popularity among the entire population of Internet users," according to the official announcement.

Here's more information (in illustrated form):

Most people are seeing a huge decrease in rankings due to the algorithm change. Few, however, are seeing an increase.

While most people have seen Alexa rankings as a false representation of real traffic, the new rankings may indicate otherwise. Until then, perhaps it's still just a number that nobody needs to really worry about.

What do you think?

Forum discussion continues at DigitalPoint Forums and Webmaster Talk.

Here is a recap of what happened in the search forums today, through the eyes of the Search Engine Roundtable and other search forums on the web.

Continue reading "Daily Search Forum Recap: April 16, 2008"

If you rely on Google's email server, be it Gmail or Google Apps, you may have noticed a major issue with connecting via the IMAP server.

As I reported at Search Engine Land, Google's IMAP server seemed to black out, along with Google Talk features. So I went over to check how wide spread the issue. There were two thread about the IMAP issue, which quickly turned into dozens of threads, with dozens of posts in each thread. Here is a quick video showing you the thread after thread of people reporting the IMAP issue:

Yes, the threads keep coming, even though it is fixed. But as you can see, IMAP threads have over taken the Google Groups forum.

The Google Groups thread I posted in at this time has about 37 posts. About 45 minutes later, a Google represented created a thread in the announcements area, telling us that they are aware of the issue. Then at about the same time, a new thread propped up that IMAP was back. So the outage seemed to be for about 45 minutes and seemed to impact every single Google Email IMAP user. The Google rep said:

We're aware of a problem with IMAP access and chat in Gmail. Users are reporting the inability to see IMAP in their account settings and inability to access IMAP. Also, users are reporting receiving a 'We're experiencing technical difficulties that may prevent your chats from being sent' in their Chat list. Our engineers are currently working to find a solution. We appreciate your patience, and we apologize for any inconvenience this may have caused.

Forum discussion at Google Groups including the announcement thread.

It looks like Google Sitelinks have had a update, and now mine look a lot better than they were previously.

Here are my new sitelinks:

Whereas before during the March update that added sitelinks to my domain just didn't look as clean:

(Matt, if you had anything to do with this, thanks.) :)

Additionally, new sites are reporting that they now have sitelinks.

Forum discussion continues at WebmasterWorld and Search Engine Roundtable Forums.

The SEM Insights blog discusses four reasons why big brands don't have good SEO. They are:

Requirement: ease of maintenance: Therefore, they may not be using CMSes that are SEO friendly.

Requirement: personalization and tracking: They need quantifiable results, but they don't understand that search results are going to display the most applicable page to a search query and that that every related page probably won't rank in the top 10 for a search.

Requirement: language: Big brands often serve content to different countries under a single TLD. The problem is that when people in different companies search for in-country results, they won't locate the big brand.

Corporate policy and legal issues: The last thing is that it takes forever in big brands to get things done. To put it simply, there's way too much bureaucracy in the corporate world.

At Sphinn, the discussion continues. Forum members believe that sometimes they'll take the easy sale (an ad representative with a solid presentation) and ignore SEO (especially since they have the money to afford PPC).

Another thought is that they're just so used to doing what they're doing that change is difficult. Indeed, the IT department makes things difficult. Their mantra: "if it ain't broke, don't fix it."

Additionally, some copywriting just sucks. Some people just won't use keyword-rich text because they want to sound more professional and that prevails over search friendliness.

What big brands need is a shift in thinking. Unfortunately, they need to kick it off if they're serious about it.

Forum discussion continues at Sphinn.

TechCrunch explains that Marissa Mayer of Google discussed the "evolution" (if you will) of the motto, "Don't Be Evil." She says:

“It really wasn’t like an elected, ordained motto. I think that ‘Don’t Be Evil’ is a very easy thing to point at when you see Google doing something that you personally don’t like; it’s a very easy thing to point out so it does get targeted a lot.”

At Search Engine Land, Barry shares a bit of history of exactly when it started. He explains that it was coined in 1999 when Google was afraid that its organic search results would be impacted by the business units of the company. It was used more heavily when the company grew to 300 employees and corporate policy was put in place.

Forum members at Cre8asite Forums find the quote interesting, since it's still heard very often today. There's just too much of Google "doing something that [people] personally don't like," it seems.

Not everyone agrees, though. Other forum members feel that Google has been indispensable for their needs, and some other weaker search engines (perhaps because of this) haven't measured up. Others believe it comes down to potential for being evil, but they haven't necessarily fulfilled their "evil plan[s]."

Then there's another reaction entirely. Pierre Far, a friend of mine who wrote a killer entry on social media marketing on my blog, says that Google is a bit pervasive today with its consumerism at heart and users' privacy thrown out the window.

But then again, EGOL points out that Google users opt-in for all of this, so it's up to the user to decide whether s/he wants it.

The debate is roaring on and continues at Cre8asite Forums. Good stuff.

A Cre8asite Forums discussion pointed me over to a UK hosting company named UKFast that has a white paper on Server Speed and SEO.

The paper makes the argument that server speed is a critical component to your SEO campaign. Here are some quotes from the white paper:

Website response speed helps search engines to assess the site’s relevance because speed is one of the criteria recognised in a successful site.

If a more powerful, faster server is used, the site loads more quickly and is rewarded by being moved higher in a the search engines’s displayed results.

Server speed is intrinsically linked to search engine optimisation.

If a server operates at a higher speed the business is more likely to be noticed by search engines. This is because Google, which is the world’s favourite search engine, offers rewards for businesses that provide excellent customer service.

Additionally, a fast server means spiders and robots find it easier to trawl a website. This means your website is indexed on a more regular basis and updated more frequently by search engines.

Technically, a really slow server can really hurt your rankings in many search engines. But can a super fast server improve your Google rankings? I don't think so. It might let Googlebot spider more of your pages quicker, but even that seems like a bit of a stretch to me.

You see, what they claim is half-true. If you have a really slow server, it can have a negative impact on your rankings. But having a super fast server, as opposed to a fast server, won't increase your rankings. I.e. A super fast site won't rank higher than a fast site, if all else is equal. At least as far as I know.

Forum discussion at Cre8asite Forums.

Update: It seems like Google Reader is showing embedded Flickr Videos, for me at least. I inserted a picture below showing the Flickr Video in this post, rendering in my Google Reader (on Apple Safari).

A Google Groups thread has word from a Google representative, Roger from the Google Reader team, that Flickr Video will soon be supported in Google Reader.

For example, if you are using an RSS reader, you might not be able to see the embedded Flickr video below this line:

But soon, if you are using Google Reader, you will be able to see embedded Flickr Videos - like you can see embedded YouTube or Google Video videos.

Roger of Google said:

Thanks for reporting this. We're currently working with Flickr to get Flickr videos to embed properly when viewed in Reader. We should be able to straighten it out shortly. Thanks for your patience!

Flickr first launched 90-second video clips on the night of April 9th.

Forum discussion at Google Groups.

Here is that picture:

I'll be honest, I keep watching the WebmasterWorld thread discussing the April 2008 Google update, code named Update Dewey.

The latest thing that I noticed were recent reports from very senior members saying that Google is shuffling around the results, in a major way, at Google UK. Here are two posts I isolated from the past 24 hours specific to Google UK and this update:

Oooo! (too effeminate?) Big changes on Google.co.uk ... big, awful changes ... if you've got a bunch of paid links looks like their about to pay off. Top spots in lots of industries have been overtaken by paid link buyers, and not subtle paid link buying either! 2,000 backlinks from just 2 sites with a paid sponsored links section in the bottom right for example.

There's a significant change in the UK algo today. For our top target term the site that recently bought it's way to the top and was rewarded with a site link listing because it has links out to sites that pay it affiliate fees has dropped to #2 and of course lost it's site links. The new #1 has dropped in from nowhere but probably should really be at #1 if it had someone doing at least basic SEO.

In fact, there is a stand alone thread named No.3 in every Google tld except our own - .co.uk at WebmasterWorld, that digs into one issue. The senior WebmasterWorld member says that his UK based site ranks number three in all Google sites except for Google UK, where it ranks 256. Weird, don't you think?

Forum discussion at WebmasterWorld.

Yahoo told us to prepare for a minimum bid change, where now quality and value will impact an advertisers minimum bid for a keyword buy.

Those minimum bids have now gone into affect, according to a WebmasterWorld thread. We knew it was coming this week, but we didn't know exactly when it would hit advertisers.

First reports suggest it happened sometime before midnight last night (EST). The first post was at 11:13pm (EST), and the next report was about thirty-minutes after midnight.

So far there has not been an out cry of advertisers being hit with minimum bids of $10, like with Google. I will keep an eye out for you and report back if things change.

Forum discussion at WebmasterWorld.

Update: Correction: Yahoo's Minimum Bid Interface Live, Not The New Pricing, see this new post for more details. Sorry about the confusion, we will keep watching and keep you up to date.

Here is a recap of what happened in the search forums today, through the eyes of the Search Engine Roundtable and other search forums on the web.

Continue reading "Daily Search Forum Recap: April 15, 2008"

A Webmaster Talk forums member is trying to reduce the amount of search traffic he's getting.

Allow me to explain. Basically, he's looking to even out his traffic because other sources are yielding overall traffic success. Search alone hasn't been cutting it.

What can be done to reduce the emphasis on getting traffic through search engines? The usual: link building, tools and services, community involvement, a forum, a newsletter, advertising, word of mouth, and contests.

Or you can go the extreme measure and disallow search spiders by updating your robots.txt. Still, some search traffic would be nice, right?!

The idea here is a good one. Don't put all your eggs in one basket. Focus on getting traffic from a variety of sources.

Forum discussion continues at Webmaster Talk.

WebmasterWorld members report that Yahoo has announced its new crawler, Slurp 3.0. Now, when you analyze your weblogs, you'll be seeing Slurp 3.0, though it recognizes the same user-agent and robots.txt as before.

More importantly, they are invalidating all other Yahoo Slurp IP addresses and using brand new ones for this update. IP-based rules will need to be changed.

Search Engine Land provides more information, where Barry writes that the new IP addresses will still reverse DNS lookup to crawl.yahoo.net.

On WebmasterWorld, your work is getting more complicated, according to Wilderness. There are still 11 different spiders and 5 user agents to keep track of. But Barry explains this clearly: "If you set directives for "Slurp" or "Yahoo! Slurp," those will remain working, but if you specified "Slurp/2.0," then you may have an issue."

It is kind of funny, in that Yahoo's spiders are having the same old problems that Yahoo's business unit is having. Remember the Peanut Butter Memo, where Yahoo talks about their lack of clarity between all their business units and properties. It's all too familiar once again.

Forum discussion continues at WebmasterWorld and Sphinn.

Note: "Me" in this case refers to Barry. I'm only here to report about Slurp 3.0. ;)

A WebmasterWorld member is having difficulty understanding how and why she's seeing an overlap of broad match terms within her campaigns overall. She explains that broad match is "kick[ing] in for a more generic term, when the specific term is included in another campaign/ad group, at the same bid price."

Why is this happening? It looks like broad match is confusing advertisers in a big way. As moderator skibum points out, the ad that gives Google the most money is the one that is displayed. Also, if one of your campaigns has exhausted its daily budget but there are still users performing pertinent and another campaign has not reached its budget, you may see some "overlap" on the other campaign to even out the budget.

One way to get around this is to split the match types into separate groups. Applying negative keywords to the campaign can ultimately yield higher results.

Forum discussion continues at WebmasterWorld.

A High Rankings Forum thread is a perfect example of how people can misinterpret SEO terms. In this particular case, because a site has lost its rankings, an individual is looking to build a "link farm."

Well, sort of. A "link farm," he says, is how he builds reciprocal yet relevant links. (A real "link farm" is frowned upon by Google.)

If you ask me, that doesn't sound like a link farm. But there's a problem within this industry that can cause serious penalties (without any idea why) if you're not understanding the proper SEO terms.

My guess is that in this particular member's case, he lost rankings because his boss misinterpreted another SEO tactic yet again. It's very important to understand these terms clearly. If in doubt, ask a forum member for help.

Forum discussion continues at High Rankings Forum.

A HighRankings Forum thread asks when did Yahoo stop grouping search results from the same domain together? We reported on an issue with Google not grouping certain results a few weeks ago, but it is rare to see Google not group results in many cases. But Yahoo doesn't seem to be grouping any results from the same domain together, at least not today.

For example, a search on george bush at Yahoo shows three results from the White House web site, and two right next to each other, but none of them are grouped together:

A search at Google on george bush groups a few of the results together, when the domain is the same, including the White House results:

So where did the indenting go Yahoo Search?

The thread also talks about missing how Yahoo used to number the results, but that is an older topic.

Forum discussion at HighRankings Forum.

Update: Yahoo has actually never grouped results. I have official confirmation from Yahoo on that.

I am not a huge report guy on Google AdSense, but according to a WebmasterWorld thread, Google has added a new filter option on their advanced reports. You can now filter the reports by unit type.

If you want to see how much money you are making from "ad units" versus "link units," you can now easily do that via the "Choose Units" option in the Google AdSense advanced reports section. Here is a screen capture:

Honestly, I would not have known if this option is new or not myself. So I am going by the word of three different WebmasterWorld members, who are reporting it is brand new.

Forum discussion at WebmasterWorld.

Update: Confirmed, The Google Inside AdSense blog has now announced the new reports. More coverage at Techmeme.

There is some recent additional chatter in the WebmasterWorld thread, that was discussing the Live Search March Update, from late March.

It appears from the chatter that Microsoft is either still working out the kinks in the past update or rolling out a new update. We have two forum posts that suggest this behavior:

"Anyone else see the update rolled back?"

No I see a shake up going on right now

I think I have never seen such an awful SERPS in my life. It's a total disaster now. Lot of widget-in-domain.com, shopzillas, and spammy junk.

It looks like link quantity rules, and link quality doesn't matter. I can see websites that have nothing but 1,000s of links from article directories and spammy blogs ranking 1st to 3rd in a quite competitive niches.

The discussion continues about how much webmasters and SEOs dislike the current state of Live Search.

Forum discussion at WebmasterWorld.

You can now enter any category that you feel is best for your company in the category section of your Google Local Business Center listing. In the past, you had to select a specific category that was in Google's database. Now, if the business category is not listed in the database, no worries - you can still enter it.

For example, "web software" is not an available Google Business Local category. But I added it below and clicked "next" with no problem.

I discovered this new feature via a Google Maps Guide post at Google Groups, where Google Maps Guide Jen said:

Up until a few weeks ago it was true that we couldn't create new categories.

However, thanks to your many request, and to our Local Business Center team, you can now enter free form categories for your business in your Local Business Center account.

I believe the category you set in the Google Local Business Center is extremely important in ranking well for local specific results in Google Local and Google Web Search, when universal search kicks in.

Forum discussion at Google Groups.

Here is a recap of what happened in the search forums today, through the eyes of the Search Engine Roundtable and other search forums on the web.

Continue reading "Daily Search Forum Recap: April 14, 2008"

WebmasterWorld administrator tedster urges each and every webmaster to ensure that their 404 custom error page actually returns an appropriate 404 error code. He explains that he sees more 200 response codes than ever, lately, because custom 404 pages are often redirected using 302 to a page that then serves a 200 error.

What this means is that eventually all of these "bad" URLs pile up and you have a duplicate content issue on your hands.

The most vulnerable web servers to this type of activity is IIS/Microsoft. Ted explains that custom error messages are set up differently (versus Apache).

He explains what you should do if you use IIS:

For the IIS user, there is one other caution I should mention about 404 handling. If you are using .NET, then there are two levels of error handling: at the IIS level and at the .NET level. It is also common to find that only one of these two levels is set up correctly. So when you're checking your site, try a bad url with a .asp (.aspx) extension, and also try a bad url with a .htm extension.

And yes, Apache may not be as vulnerable, but it still is, especially if it serves JSP pages with Tomcat.

With all that said, everyone should take a moment and check their server headers of their custom 404 page as directed by Tedster.

Forum discussion continues at WebmasterWorld.

A study performed out of Penn State College found with reasonable accuracy that "about 80 percent of queries are informational and about 10 percent each are for navigational and transactional purposes." At Search Engine Land, Barry breaks down the behaviors and says that the informational queries include searching for a fact or topic, navigational searches include looking for a specific website, and transactional queries address buying products or services.

According to Bill Slawski on Sphinn, this data was obtained from Dogpile. It appears, then, that the information may not be accurate if accounting for searcher behavior on Google. Indeed, as forum member evan420 points out, navigational searches make up for 5-7x what they cite in the study. He says that if the same study would come out on Google, you'd see different results.

Google has a nearly ubiquitous toolbar and is the "navigational gateway" for so many who bypass the browser address bar, so I have to think a new study using the major SE's search logs, while improbable, would yield far different results.

It makes a good deal of sense. Is anyone up for doing research on searcher behavior on Google? :)

Forum discussion continues at Sphinn.

Kevin Heisler writes at Search Engine Watch that an "SEO agency" called Internet Advancement has been sued by Washington State and required to pay over $100,000 in fees for scamming its clients. Among the restitution includes penalties against offering services to new members and requiring refunds to be handed to scammed clients.

Some of their failures are outlined in this complaint (doc link) document. They include:

• Defendants represent they will be able to secure top 10 search engine rankings for their customers. In fact, in many instances, they are unable to do so.
• Defendants represent that their customers will obtain increased sales by obtaining defendants’ services. They have told customers to expect a “flood of traffic,” have promised thousands of “hits” a day, and have said the customers’ “only concern will be having extra employees to fill the orders.” In fact, in many instances, defendants’ services do not result in increased sales.
• Defendants represent that they have a “96% success rate” with their “over 47,000 clients.” In fact, they do not.

So what did they do wrong? They made false promises and lied about their service offerings. Additionally, as Kevin Heisler notes, they made unauthorized charges to clients' credit cards and lied about their standings with the Better Business Bureau.

Hopefully, for the sake of their clients who were scammed out of thousands of dollars, this company will be put to rest.

Forum discussion continues at Search Engine Watch Forums.

iProspect has released findings of a blended search results study that shows that user behavior is being impacted by search results. According to the findings, users are more likely to click on the blended results (news story, video, or image) than one of the ~10 actual links themselves. Search Engine Watch provides a summary of the findings and concludes that a lot of companies are still not taking advantage of blended search. However, perhaps you now should.

According to the data provided, 36% of users recall clicking on a news item, 31% recall clicking on an image, 17% recall clicking on video, 25% don't remember what they were doing after they completed the search, and only 19% say they clicked on a "regular" search result. The numbers are substantial and they speak for themselves. Blended search is here to stay and you need to evolve or die out.

Forum discussion continues at Sphinn.

We should have seen this coming, based on the number of reports that Google was submitting GET forms. But often, it is hard to validate those types of reports, due to people spoofing Googlebot and similar tactics. In any event, Google now admits to Crawling through HTML forms. Here are some things to know about this announcement in bullet form:

• For select menus, check boxes, and radio buttons on the form, Google will choose from among the values of the HTML.
• After gaining access to content pass the form, Google may or may not index that content
• You can block Googlebot from crawling your forms by excluding them in your robots.txt file
• Googlebot will only attempt to crawl GET forms
• Googlebot tries to avoid forms requesting userids, login, passwords, contact information and so on
• This should not impact PageRank

Matt Cutts of Google explains how this meets a need of so many webmasters that are clueless to SEO. In fact, from making the web more accessible, this new crawling technique rocks. But for SEOs and webmasters who want to block Google from accessing content, it will require some change on their part. I.e. they will have to restructure some of their sites to block Googlebot from crawling their forms.

The forum reaction is very mixed. We have threads at Sphinn, DigitalPoint Forums, Search Engine Watch Forums and WebmasterWorld.

Pros: Google can crawl places they haven't and index more of your content, which gives you more visibility.
Cons: Pages you do not want indexed, might require you do more work to block them.

The big joke in WebmasterWorld is that Googlebot now has a credit card. For example, if it can submit forms, maybe Googlebot will start messing around with conversions. Obviously, it won't place orders but what about submit a simple form that you consider to be a conversion (i.e. like user agreements or more)? In fact, I found GoogleBot filling out this Google Checkout form to buy itself some WD40 (kidding of course):

But you get the point.

Forum discussion at Sphinn, DigitalPoint Forums, Search Engine Watch Forums and WebmasterWorld.

There are a few early reports that some Google AdWords advertisers received what is called a Google Slap, basically a spike in their minimum CPCs due to Google's quality score.

A WebmasterWorld thread has two confirmed reports over the weekend that their cost-per-click (CPC) prices have skyrocketed overnight. Here are quotes of the two reports:

Well, I got around 8,000 keywords with a bid of $10.00 today, which most where on $0.15 and $0.30.

We had exactly the same problem! On Fri 11th we got slapped hard by Google. Our bids which were normally 5c-10c cpc with a great QS jumped to $10 for a min bid. This was on a site that had been doing extremely well for the past few months then with no warning Bam!~

This site had a similar set up to what you described: lots of campaigns all leading to different landing pages for different products.

Have tried several things to revamp the campaigns but nothing seems to be working.

The first report comes from a very senior member with 1,524 posts and a join date of January 2005 at WebmasterWorld. Now, this could have impacted just a few people, but it seems like it might be more widespread. We will see if the thread takes off today, being Monday and all.

Note, this week, likely today or tomorrow, Yahoo's is changing how they handle minimum bids. They too will be having a quality score factor that can impact one's minimum bids. Soon to be labelled the Yahoo Slap, I guess. I have more details on that, over here.

Forum discussion at WebmasterWorld.

This weekend, we have reports coming from WebmasterWorld of major ranking changes at Yahoo Search. It appears Yahoo has started an algorithm and indexing update at their search engine.

Currently there are no "weather reports" with the status of an update at the Yahoo Search Blog, but based on the conversation at the thread, there appears to be an updating taking place. The last update took place in early March, but in reality, most SEOs and webmasters did not notice any changes. So maybe this is the legit update?

Here is some of the feedback from the thread:

I did some more thorough investigating and these results are really bad....

We lost about 50% of our Y! traffic during the last update and we noticed a nice lift today.

Looks like an update to me. See wiki pages climbing to the top for many results. Why do they even want for each term a wiki to turn up. If I want a wiki explanation or information, I'll go to it myself. I find it a step back for search results.

I suspect Yahoo will have a post on the update soon at their Yahoo Search Blog. Since this is happening on the tax day weekend, why not call it the Yahoo Tax Day update? Heck, maybe some of you can use this update as a deduction for 2008? ;-)

Forum discussion at WebmasterWorld.

In this week's video recap, I discuss the major business turmoil Yahoo is going through with Microsoft, Google, AOL and News Corp. I also go through Flickr adding video, Yahoo acquiring IndexTools, Google's new AdWords policy, the guy who trademarked SEO, how one can penalized their competitors in Google, and so much more. The video is under ten minutes long and you can win some great schwag by watching.

To win, watch the video and comment at this post below with the correct answer. Make sure to subscribe to our video feed or subscribe directly on iTunes to be notified of these updates and download the video in the background. Here is the YouTube version of the feed:

Please do subscribe via iTunes or on your favorite RSS reader. Don't forget to comment below with the right answer and good luck!

I may not be able to mail schwag outside of the United States.

Here is a recap of what happened in the search forums today, through the eyes of the Search Engine Roundtable and other search forums on the web.

Continue reading "Daily Search Forum Recap: April 11, 2008"

Big news this week. Barry loved my weekly roundups so much that he now has a video podcast. And we're giving away prizes for people who watch the videos. As part of promoting the project, if you spot a piece of schwag in the video, you have to comment on the post and if Barry selects you, you'll be getting some schwag in the mail. As a heads up, if you want to give away schwag for the event, contact us, and don't forget about me since this idea would not exist if not for the fact that I love schwag. (Well, maybe not.)

Flickr Videos Are Now Here

Want to watch some video on Flickr? Now you can, since Flickr now supports videos of up to 90 seconds in length. That size is perfect for me. You know, if Barry would just recap the Search Buzz Roundup in 90 seconds, I may actually watch them.

Yahoo Acquires IndexTools

Congratulations to both Yahoo and Indextools for their recent acquisition. Here's to hoping that the service becomes free. Yippee!

Yahoo Confuses Us

But besides that good news, there's some confusing news. Barry reports that Yahoo is wowing us with all this interesting news about a possible merger with AOL, a partnership with Google for AdSense ads, a breakup with Microsoft on paid search partnerships, and that News Corp may also try to bid for Yahoo. Whatever it is, please stop. That's way too much drama for us little people to handle.

MicroHoo Confusion

Microsoft wants to finalize their deal with Yahoo. Yahoo wants more money. This isn't a story that looks like it can end well. It must be very stressful.

Google Analytics Adds Beta Graph View

Want to see weekly and monthly graphs on your Google Analytics accounts? You can with beta graph view for Google Analytics. Perhaps this is, as commenter Carlos points out, a way to narrow your scope of the new benchmarking tools.

Google isn't Enforcing the AdWords URL Policy

We've been expecting a new Google AdWords URL policy for quite some time. Now that it's April, the policy is supposed to be in effect. But is it? My sources say no. However, commenters may have observed different behavior. I guess Google will be going through every AdWords account one-by-one to verify the destination URL.

Slimy SEO

Some guy in California (or is he really in CA?) is trying to trademark the acronym SEO. Does he realize how many people he's angering? If you're upset by this news, tell the United States Patent and Trademark office about the ramifications of such an action. You wouldn't want to be charged for using the phrase, would you?

Slimeballs Continued

Speaking of sliminess, if you wanted to penalize your competition in Google, you apparently can. Get some bad inbound links, generated hundreds of links from one IP address, build duplicate content, and apply 301/302 redirects. Google, are you safeguarding against these deceptive practices?

Does a DMOZ Listing Help You Rank?

We polled our readers about the inherent value of a link in DMOZ. The answer was relatively unclear. About half of you thought that the link is powerful, while the other half of you thought it wasn't.

Block Shady Advertisers in the Google AdSense Ad Review Center

If you're not liking the advertisers you get in the Ad Review Center, you can block their ad. This only works for placement-targeted ads, though, and not contextually targeted ads. In any event, it's a cool feature, and here's a screenshot if you want to see how to do it.

Initial Feedback on Google Ad Manager Reports

Barry showed us Google Ad Manager Reports complete with screenshots that look like they've been painted on by a two year old. Nothing personal, Barry. :) In terms of feedback, so far, reaction is mixed. Some love it and others hate it. Will the haters get used to it? They'll have to.

Your Boring House is on the Internet

If your last name is Boring and you live on a "private road" in Pennsylvania, you've been in the news lately because your house has appeared in Google Street View and you've decided to sue Google. I believe it's a little far-fetched to take such an extreme stance. Other readers disagree with me. But the point is that this is America, that's public property, and photography is not illegal in public areas. Here, you can read the photography bill of rights for more information.

Google Code in Google Universal Search

More and more pages are being added to Google Universal Search. Now, it's Google Code snippets. This may be completely not helpful, but for some, it may actually teach you how to code. I'd love to hear from programmers themselves. Do you find that the results are just random snippets that have nothing to do with what you're searching for, or do they help you get past a hump?

Google Suggest Test Expands

More and more people are seeing that Google is offering Google Suggest to their searches. Helpful? What do you say?

Yahoooooooooooooooooo!

Barry has a video of the Yahoo yodeler -- an easter egg that you encounter when you click on the exclamation point in the "Yahoo!" logo. Like it? I think it's fun. :)

Advertise on Google TV

Google is trying to get more advertisers to advertise on TV, according to reports. Are you ready for that?

Google's Local Algorithm Changes

Barry illustrates how Google's Local Algorithm has changed and believes it has something to do, perhaps, with new factors, such as ratings and PageRank. What do you think is contributing to the new shift?

Webmaster's Wish List: Link Unbuilding

Sometimes webmasters don't like their links. They feel that it can affect them in negative ways. The idea now is to perform link unbuilding -- that is, to ask webmasters to take those links down to your site. But wouldn't it be easier if you can remove icky quality links in Google Webmaster Central? I think this will be in heavy demand in the near future.

May 2nd is SphinnCon North Carolina

Rob Kerry wants you to know that he is an evil green monkey SphinnCon North Carolina is on May 2nd. In fact, that means that the bloke will be on this side of the pond to help organize the event. I believe my friend Jay Young will be helping out as well. I know both of those guys and can tell you that you're in good hands.

Some link builders spend a significant time just trying to build up some sort of rapport with other webmasters. Eventually, they may feel that the pool is drying out. With so many link requests nowadays, you can't blame but feel helpless since everyone seems to be getting numerous link swap requests daily.

Where else can you go to build those valuable links? Perhaps your scope is too narrow. There are millions of sites on the internet, so look at related sites, local sites, un-related industries that still have some sort of relationship to the topic, how-to sites, blogs, history sites, and more. There really should be no shortage.

And truthfully, if you're feeling limited, perhaps you're also looking for "high authority" sites. Look into sites that may not be as authoritative but still show some promise.

Forum discussion continues at WebmasterWorld.

A Google AdSense publisher at WebmasterWorld is reporting that his highest earning day had poor performance. He wonders if it has something to do with a new AdSense glitch or if this problem is just personally impacting him.

Fortunately for him, he's not alone. One member reports that the ads were not very contextually relevant. Another reports that it may not be a glitch after all but is reporting instead that his earnings dropped after Google added scrolling arrows to AdSense adds.

What recourse do you have? Martinibuster lists four things you can check in your website's log files:

1. What keywords did your visitors use to access your site? Is it different than previous days?
2. What are your most popular pages? Are those different than previous days as well? What were the earnings on those pages?
3. Are more people abandoning your pages than in previous days?
4. How deep did your visitors venture into your pages? Is this any different than how they performed previously?

Martinibuster (and other forum members) also report that he didn't have a problem with AdSense during this time. Other members believe that it may just be tax season playing into the behavior of some website visitors who cannot make a purchase until they finish paying their dues to the IRS.

I guess you never know.

Forum discussion continues at WebmasterWorld.

We all have to make website updates some time or another. Sometimes it's an easy fix that you can do within the scheme of your web design. In other cases, a 301 must be implemented. How does this impact other activities?

Well, if you have a Google AdWords campaign and you just established a permanent 301 redirect to the landing pages, is that enough? Will that cause an extra load time? Is it better to update all the URLs in the campaign so that it bypasses the .htaccess with your 301 redirect and goes straight to the new URL? Sometimes, there's a fear that this will kill the good-established history on the account.

Justifiably so. And there should be no severe slowness if you keep your 301s intact, according to forum members.

Got anything to add? Forum discussion continues at WebmasterWorld.

Are you afraid of changing your domain because you're afraid that you'll lose your rankings? It's a valid concern and one that a Google Groups member is quite worried about. What's the best possible way to handle domain changes without any loss of rankings?

Two Google Webmaster Central staff members, Wysz and JohnMu, explain that the best procedure is to implement a 301 redirect. In May of last year, this question was addressed on the Google Webmaster Central blog.

JohnMu explains that it's best to "redirect incrementally" instead of doing hundreds (or thousands) of redirects at once. His reason is that you should be able to check that it's working properly before continuing.

A word of caution: don't use a 302 (temporary) redirect. What that tells Google is that you're saving the old URL. John explains that this can "confuse the crawlers." Finally, he mentions that he moved a site with about 100,000 pages before he joined Google and noticed no long-term negative effects.

While all of this is helpful, you can't help but wonder if Google Webmaster Tools should give webmasters the ability to specify that they're changing domains so that Google has some awareness before (or during) the process -- and I'm certain that it would alleviate some stress that is impacting these webmasters.

Forum discussion continues at Google Groups.

I covered this years ago, with Yahoo!'s Logo Surprise (Yahoo! Easter Egg). Basically, if you go to Yahoo.com and click on the exclamation point in the logo at the top, it will Yodel for you. The Yahoooooo yodel.

I am pretty sure Yahoo took this down for a while and probably recently added it when they launched the new logo placement a couple weeks ago. Here is a video of it in action:

In light of all the Yahoo news, this bit fun is always welcoming.

Forum discussion at DigitalPoint Forums.

A report from Search Engine Watch Forums says that all of a sudden, the option for Google TV ads appeared for him when he logged into his AdWords account.

Just logged into my AdWords account and was greeted by a message announcing that TV Ads are now available. Not yet checked out the details.

I don't see the option myself, but it appears Google may be doing an additional push to test their TV ad distribution system. Google has been sending out beta invites in the past, in fact, you can read most of our coverage on Google TV ads here.

Here is some screen shots of what it looks like to set up a TV ad in Google AdWords:

Forum discussion at Search Engine Watch Forums.

Back about 6 months ago, one of the main factors in ranking well in Google Local and other local engines, like Yahoo, was to have your address as close to the center of the city as possible.

A new Search Engine Watch Forums thread comes out showing that this pattern seems to have changed. Whereas once it was the center of the city that seemed to be one of the most important factors in ranking well for specific sets of local searches, now that may not be the case.

Jazajay, Search Engine Watch Forum moderator, has been watching a few local spots for a long time now and has noticed this new pattern based on his Dad's business:

• My dads listing has 1 review in G maps, the bussiness in position A doesn't.
• He has his bussiness name in the title, as I suggested to him, the site above does but listings below him do and don't, agian no noticable pattern.
• My dad's listing doesn't have the category name in nor does the one above it. Listings below do.
• He has submitted to my knowledge to 2 local directories since listing. The competior below and above him has submitted to quiet a few, they are the same listing. Same bussiness that has submitted 2ice.

So I decided to check my local results. I was never number one for web design, 10901 in the local Google results. But now I am:

So what I did was search on 10901 and looked where Google placed the center arrow (green arrow). I then overlaid that arrow on top of the local results for that query, to see which result is the closest to the center of the town (if the center of the city is that arrow, which is my assumption). Take a look:

Based on this, it seems like A, which is me, is not as close as C and B much further than C and the others. So other criteria is now coming into play, possibly ratings, possibly PageRank, possibly other factors.

It has changed, I wasn't always position A for that query and the consensus of the thread suggests Google Local's ranking algorithm has changed.

Forum discussion at Search Engine Watch Forums.

I don't think this is exactly related to Google mixing up titles and URLs from yesterday (if you have examples, please comment, so Matt can address them at Google). But over at Search Engine Roundtable Forums, PPCBlogger showed us an example of something I found to be a bit out of the norm for Google.

A search in Google for www.quiltersguild.org.uk/index.php?page=56 returns no results:

But when you search for that URL in this syntax, site:www.quiltersguild.org.uk/ 56, it shows the result:

Now, typically, if the page is indexed, it should come up for a search on the URL alone. For example, a search on http://forums.seroundtable.com/forumdisplay.php?f=2 returns a result.

Just seems a bit strange to me.

Forum discussion at Search Engine Roundtable Forums.

Yesterday I reported that one of the many Yahoo announcements were that Yahoo was going to test running Google ads on Yahoo Search USA.

According to a Search Engine Watch Forums thread, the Google ads are now live on Yahoo. Note, if you don't want your Google ads to show on Yahoo, you need to opt your ads out on showing on third party search providers. In any event, some advertisers are noticing that their Google ads are showing up in Yahoo sponsored results.

As expected, the ads don't appear as AdSense ads - they simply look like Yahoo ads. SEW moderator explains, "Yahoo seems to be configured as a Google Search Partner, not as an AdSense publisher." In addition, he adds, "Initially (i.e. earlier today) I was only seeing my ad a small percent of the time (i.e. Yahoo was only including it on a fraction of the SRPs for a given search), but now I'm seeing my ad 100% of the time." But the ad is only showing when he stopped showing his native Yahoo ad, i.e. the Google ad won't show for him until he tells Yahoo to stop showing his Yahoo ad.

His conclusion so far?

The net effect is like a pooled ad resource, where Google and Yahoo have pooled ads to run on Yahoo (and maybe soon on both engines?)

Note, this is supposedly only suppose to impact 3% of Yahoo's search ads in the US. It is also suppose to run only for about two weeks.

Forum discussion at Search Engine Watch Forums.

Here is a recap of what happened in the search forums today, through the eyes of the Search Engine Roundtable and other search forums on the web.

Continue reading "Daily Search Forum Recap: April 10, 2008"

Flickr has announced that it is supporting video in addition to the standard digital photograph or image. Videos are limited to 90 seconds in length and 150MB in size and will still inherit other Flickr features, including geotagging, comments, captions, and privacy restrictions.

Want to see it in action? Here's a video that Barry took:

The biggest gripe for many people is the 90 second restriction. Personally, since I'm not too keen on video, the 90 second limit is a breath of fresh air. Maybe this will actually get me to be more interested in video content knowing that I won't be confined to my chair for all the much longer. Some other video services have unpredictable lengths, and it's nice to know that I won't have to sit through video that long on Flickr. Additionally, some people don't have the attention span for it. I'm not saying I don't, but I'm always busy reading and video requires my undivided attention. ;)

Forum discussion continues at WebmasterWorld.

Yesterday, we learned that Yahoo will be acquiring analytics package IndexTools.

Forum members overall think it's an interesting move. While some gripe about past customer service issues with the analytics company, others have had better experience. They hope that the acquisition will improve things for everyone.

Why now? Yahoo is going to continue to improve their offerings. You can't really blame them. Maybe IndexTools will be available for free in the future. ;)

Forum discussion continues at WebmasterWorld and DigitalPoint Forums.

Webmasters at Google Groups are reporting that some verified sites' sitemap URLs are not being accepted by Google Webmaster Tools. The error some webmasters are receiving is: "URL not allowed - This url is not allowed for a Sitemap at this location."

Susan Moskwa of the Google Webmaster Central team says that this is a problem that exists for those who have numerous domains in their accounts. The alternative way is to specify the Sitemap through robots.txt. She writes:

As you've noticed, our cross-submissions system may experience some problems if you have a large number of sites in your account. For now, I'd recommend submitting your Sitemaps via your robots.txt file, or submitting separate Sitemaps for each subdomain.

The robots.txt sitemap protocol is explained in this Google Webmaster Help document. Simply add the following line to your robots.txt file:

Sitemap: [path to sitemap]

Forum discussion continues at Google Groups.

After Barry's incredibly successful SphinnCon Israel in February, the SphinnCon series is continuing with a get-together in North Carolina on May 2nd. If you're in the area or want to attend, here are the details:

Date: May 2nd, starting at 10AM
Location: Kress Terrace (Greensboro, NC)
Cost: $150 which includes a really good lunch
Hotel Accommodations: Special arrangements have been made with the nearby Proximity Hotel for $169/night.
Number of tickets: 150.

So sign up today! And if you're going to attend, reserve your spot at the Facebook page.

Forum discussion continues at Sphinn.

There are 10 threads at Google Groups about a bug that appears to be impacting many Google AdSense publishers. In short, when you go through the process of creating a new ad unit, you are taken backwards instead of to the ad code page.

When publishers click the "submit and get code" button, instead of being sent to the code page, where they can obtain the code for their site, they are sent back to the "manage ads" page.

Again, like I said above, there are now 10 threads that I know about at Google Groups on this topic. They are now all consolidated and references in this single Google Groups thread. In that thread, AdSensePro Stephanie said, "Thanks for compiling the threads on this issue! I'll take this back to the relevant teams to see if there are any known issues."

Forum discussion at Google Groups.

The saga continues with a very unusual night for Yahoo yesterday. Let me catch everyone up with what happened yesterday. Follow the timeline, all reports are linked via Search Engine Land (times are estimates and EST):

• 15:00 (EST) - Confirmed: Yahoo To Test Google AdSense For Search Ads, has confirmed reports from Yahoo that they will be testing Google's ad on Yahoo.com search results in the US for a 2 week period.
• 16:00 (EST) - Microsoft: Forget It On Paid Search Partnership, Google & Yahoo, has a response from Microsoft that they will take them to court if they made an ad deal with Yahoo. Basically, it would give Google a 90% or more share of the search ad space.
• 21:30 (EST) - Report: Yahoo & AOL Approaching A Deal, has a second report from the WSJ that now even thought they are testing things with Google and Microsoft wants them, they may make a deal with AOL to bring in the AOL division in exchange for a cash investment.
• 22:00 (EST) - News Corp, Google, AOL, "MicroHoo" The Movie Enters A Surreal, Climactic Sequence, now we have reports from the NY Times that News Corp is interested in joining forces with Microsoft to make a bid for Yahoo.

Got all that, now that all happened in a 12 hour period yesterday. It was like, a wow, after a wow, after a wow and then another wow!

Michael Arrington thinks Yahoo is making a huge mistake:

It’s time to end this thing before Yahoo ends itself. I don’t care if they throw AOL, MySpace, and half the rest of the Internet into the deal along with Yahoo. But the health of the Internet demands a counter balance to Google.

He now says, "Yahoo-Microsoft, given the current state of things, is the only reasonable outcome."

I wonder what the major shareholders are thinking right now, especially after Yahoo's second largest investor, Legg Mason backed Yahoo against Microsoft, only now to have to deal with all this crazy news.

How will this impact SEMs? It is unclear right now. But if Google does power Yahoo's search ads, then it will make Google even stronger and that quality score and the Google slap can impact more SEMs then ever. Of course, it will give SEMs once less search ad company to master.

Forum discussion at these following threads:

• Confirmed: Yahoo To Test Google AdSense For Search Ads, Sphinn
• Breaking: Yahoo, AOL Close In on Tie-Up Deal, DigitalPoint Forums
• Microsoft Said to Be Talking With News Corporation About Joint Yahoo Bid, WebmasterWorld
• Microsoft: Forget It On Paid Search Partnership, Google , Sphinn
• Report: Yahoo , Sphinn
• Yahoo , Cre8asite Forums
• Yahoo search result show up Adsense?, Search Engine Roundtable Forums
• Yahoo Search to run Google ads, DigitalPoint Forums
• Yahoo to test search ad outsourcing with Google, WebmasterWorld
• Yahoo! Teams up with Google to Offer AdSense Ads in Yahoo! Search Results, DigitalPoint Forums
• Yahoo, Time Warner closing in on AOL deal: source, WebmasterWorld

There are reports from several sources including WebmasterWorld that Google is having a tough time mapping the proper URLs with the associated page titles for those URLs.

One report says that Google is treating searches for portal A on a subdirectory of a governmental site all wrong. So a search for a keyword that would trigger a result from portal A on subdirectory A, would in fact return a result from subdirectory B, with a page title from subdirectory C. I.e. A search that would typically return a page title and URL from domain.com/subdirectoryA/ is returning a URL from domain.com/subdirectoryB/ and a page title from domain.com/subdirectoryC.

Other reports are saying that on some [site:www.domain.com keyword] command searches, Google is returning results from totally different domains, outside of the restricted domain you entered.

I am not sure how wide scale the issue is and I have no hard examples that I can provide, due to WebmasterWorld's guidelines - but there are several reports on this behavior.

Forum discussion at WebmasterWorld.

I was doing my forum research this morning and I spotted a HighRankings Forum thread with the title "Link Unbuilding." I love it! The new link building, for some, is link unbuilding!

Here is the SEO's concern and this concern is pretty common in the SEO circles:

Over the past few days Google has been reporting a phenomenal increase in the number of links to my index page. While there are a few genunine new links, the majority come from a single site - in Japanese and hosted in Japan which seems to be causing Google to believe that it has over a 1000 new links to my site every day.

The site seems genunine enough so I am assuming that this is the result of a glitch whatever forum management software they are using. Given that I cannot translate the site using Google the option of politely writing and asking them to stop is out of the question. I assume that Google is smart enough but I am wondering if it could penalize me for flooding it with spurious external links in this way although I have no control over what is going on. Any ideas?

I find it funny that this is a concern - because as Google has said in the past, most of the time, you cannot control who links to you. It is only an issue when your linkage patterns look to be very very spammy and unnatural. But this doesn't stop a concern that is spreading through our space - that links can and do harm your site. It has happened and is becoming more and more of an issue very day.

Confusion is probably the biggest issue, as we demonstrated in this poll. In fact, one of the most requested new features SEOs want in Google Webmaster Tools is a way to label links that they don't want. Will it happen - I would bet on it, before the end of this year.

In any event, a thread like this is now not uncommon these days and expect to see a lot more of them.

Forum discussion at HighRankings Forum.

Since mid-February we have been reporting that Google to Lay Down the Law on AdWords Display URL Policy. We have issued reminder after reminder, heck, even Google posted reminders all over the place - sometimes in big red backgrounds:

But it appears, from what I am hearing in the forums and from back channels, that Google has not yet enforced this rule. Advertisers are reportedly still getting away with having their display URLs not match their destination URLs. What happened to the strict enforcement of this rule?

Here are some reports from Sphinn and WebmasterWorld. What seriously shows a sign that nothing is happening are the few complaints in the forums. Actually, I haven't seen anyone impacted or complaining about being hit by this rule. I have seen people complain that this rule is not being enforced.

From the Sphinn thread, Bill Hartzer said:

We have received word that ReachLocal is not affected by the new Google AdWords display URL policy. More coming soon...

ReachLocal has a huge client base, so if true - and I believe it is true - then what is going on?

From the WebmasterWorld thread:

Absolutely no changes whatsoever. I'm still seeing old ads with violations. New ads with violations are also being created. When I report yet another keyword with three ads going to the same website, the CSRs hum and haw and then say they'll escalate it to the "specialists"....then nothing gets done about it.

And my test ad that I launched a few days ago is still running. Nobody has visited the destination URL since a few minutes after I launched it, so either ads are not reviewed or they're reviewed by monkeys that don't understand English.

I'm normally fairly respectful, but at this point I'm convinced that idiots are working in the AdWords team. Did everyone with half a brain cash in their stock options and flee to Facebook?!

Ouch!

Google, are you going to enforce the display URL rule or not?

Forum discussion at Sphinn and WebmasterWorld.

Over the past several weeks, I have been experimenting with producing weekly video recaps. You can view those recaps in the Search Buzz Roundup category.

The main issue was that many folks were not able to sit and watch the 10 minute or less video while at their computers. They asked if I can make a podcast version that they can download and listen/watch later on their computers, iPod or iPhone. So after a week or so of work, I have finalized that set up.

Today, I published a new RSS feed exclusively for the video recaps. You can find that feed over here. Now, if you are an iTunes user, you can subscribe with the single click of a button by clicking here.

Keep in mind, these are videos and can take a long time to download. So let it go in the background - I will look to compressing the videos even more. Of course, I will keep the YouTube version going as well, so if you like YouTube, stick with that and subscribe to the standard feed but if you use iTunes/iPod or an iPhone, the iTunes subscribe link is probably best. I have archived these details at the subscribe page.

FYI - I promise to keep trying to improve these videos as I go. And you can win prizes by watching!

So please subscribe and let me know your thoughts by commenting below.

Here is a recap of what happened in the search forums today, through the eyes of the Search Engine Roundtable and other search forums on the web.

Continue reading "Daily Search Forum Recap: April 9, 2008"

If you're like me, you live on the internet for a big chunk of your day. You thrive on the internet. The internet is a big key player of your being, and if there's no internet, you can hardly imagine your existence without it.

This feeling is only going to grow with time. We become increasingly dependent on our online activities. We become increasingly dependent on search. Whereas 20 years ago, we had to do research in, uh, libraries, we can now do it at the tip of our fingertips at any time of day (wearing nothing or everything).

So what would happen in a world where, if you got banned by a search engine, you had some recourse? Imagine that if you got banned from Google, it would actually be illegal? In other words, search engines were not allowed to ban sites without a reason (assuming there is no reason already).

Search Engine Watch Forums members are discussing the possibility of exactly that. And forum members believe that it would be a great idea to take legal action against those search engines who ban you or who lower your position in the SERPs.

But more than that, search engines are becoming viewed as commodities and this can't necessarily be as far fetched as some folks imagine. Could they eventually be regulated by government entities? Probably -- or probably not. In a "probably" scenario, there would be rules on who would rank, where they'd rank, and the like.

I foresee that to be an incredible undertaking and waste of tax dollars if implemented. Right now, there may be a few unhappy webmasters, but overall, the state of search is pretty good. Bringing in a big player (like the US government) would be a mistake.

There's more to this really interesting discussion. Worth envisioning or not? I still think not. But if you want to read more about what forum members are saying, check out Search Engine Watch Forums.

I remember working as a private investigator and visiting the United States Patent and Trademark Office way too often as part of my job. And when I read Sarah Bird's post on SEOmoz about an individual named Jason Gambert who is looking to file a trademark for the term SEO, I knew exactly where to go.

The background: an individual named "Mr. Gambert" is trying extremely hard to get his "process" of SEO (or so that's what he claims it is) to be trademarked. He's been rejected but he's been narrowing his scope every so often so that he can persevere and succeed with the trademark filing.

This will hurt the industry heavily if such a thing actually pans out as any SEO could be held accountable (and have to pay) if the trademark goes through.

I encourage anyone interested in pursuing this further to speak with a lawyer (particularly one involved in trademark litigation) to dispute this filing.

Forum discussion continues at Sphinn and Search Engine Watch Forums.

Face it. Sometimes you can exchange links for free, and other times, you just have to buy a link. But is there a minimum toolbar PageRank number that you should go by before buying that link?

Obviously, this isn't a black and white question. Consider the content of the site. Two of the key questions you should ask yourself are "Is it relevant?" and "Can it deliver traffic?"

But beyond that, there's more that can be had if you consider buying that link now. A site that is PR0 can go nowhere but up. If you believe the site has potential, buy the link now and then just wait until the PageRank increases. You'll benefit from getting the early start.

Forum discussion continues at WebmasterWorld.

On February 20th, I asked our readers if they thought a listing in the Open Directory Project would have a major impact on a site's Google ranking. The response was split down the middle.

We only had 58 responses, which is very low for a typical Search Engine Roundtable poll, but the results were really down the middle.

As you can see, 47% said that a link from ODP does not have a major impact on your Google rankings. While 45% said a link from ODP will have a major impact on your Google rankings. Of course, the question is not clear cut and there can be "it depends," answers.

Forum discussion continued at WebmasterWorld.

It is that time of the year again, just a few more days until Tax Day in America. That reminds me, I need to call my accountant and see the status of my returns...

In any event, this is typically when AdSense publishers try to come up with a list of what they can deduct from their AdSense earnings. Keep in mind, I am not an accountant, so any advice here must be run by someone who is a professional in this area.

A WebmasterWorld thread has a list of items you may be able to deduct. I have complied some of the items into this bulleted list below:

• Internet Connections
• Hosting Fees
• Tax preparation fees
• Bank fees
• Computer Costs
• Forum Membership Fees (i.e. WebmasterWorld)
• Conference Fees (hotel, food, travel and event - careful with this)
• Lunches & Dinners for Business
• Office Furniture & Supplies
• Ads & Site Promos
• Health Insurance
• Telephone
• Postage
• etc

You can find our coverage of this from two years ago at Tax Deductions For Google AdSense: It's Tax Season.

Forum discussion at WebmasterWorld.

I have been tracking a thread at WebmasterWorld where this webmaster is shocked to learn that the site he just acquired now has a PageRank score of 10. Before buying the site, it had no PageRank score at all but soon after, it jumped up to a 10 out of 10!

Lucky Webmaster!

Well, not really. My first impression was that someone was spoofing the PageRank, which it turned out to be. So, someone was showing Google.com's PageRank value when you visited the site. There are many tools that check a site's true PageRank, so it is best to go with one of those tools in these cases.

The webmaster confirmed the issue and expressed his confusion:

OK, thanks very much to Miamacs here on WebmasterWorld for catching that some previous design of the site did the 'nasty fake redirect to Google.com' trick to get PR 10.

What I'm still confused about is why it didn't show up until they switched to the new site. Still, I'll be extremely pissed if it comes back to bite them... because, as their current provider, it'll be up to us to fix it.

Forum discussion at WebmasterWorld.

If you take a look at virtually any Google Local listing with reviews, you might notice that Google is showing twice as many reviews, as the company really has. For example, my company listing shows a review count of 4, but in reality, I only have two reviews.

Here is a picture:

Yes, Google shows the number 4 but only really has two reviews listed.

A Google Groups thread has confirmation from Google that this is an issue that they are looking to address:

It's a known issue that we're working to resolve. Sorry about that. For now, it's best to just assume that you only have 4 reviews.

Forum discussion at Google Groups.

Here is a recap of what happened in the search forums today, through the eyes of the Search Engine Roundtable and other search forums on the web.

Continue reading "Daily Search Forum Recap: April 8, 2008"

At High Rankings Forum, a member is looking to submit to web directories and wonders if it's worthwhile to submit the entire optimized website title to the directory. Will it go over well?

Not usually, from what I've seen. In the directories that I've encountered, they're looking for the actual business name instead of an optimized title. In fact, many High Rankings forum members say the same thing. If you're looking to submit optimized titles (or keywords), you're seeking out "SEO friendly" directories, says moderator qwerty.

But if you end up going along the route of SEO friendly directories, whatever you do, don't submit the same "SEO terms" to every single directory. Diversify your search terms as much as possible. It gives you more of an advantage and looks a lot more natural.

Now, let's consider some basic rules for directories. This should be pretty much self-explanatory but may be helpful to some. First, make sure that your directory is indexed by Google. It's not worth the effort to get yourself submitted to a directory that won't actually help you. Second, make sure the directory has good quality sites. The directory shouldn't accept just any website. Third, check that the directory ranks for its own name. If it doesn't, it may have been penalized, and again, it's not worth the effort. Finally, check if the sites use a nofollow on links. That won't really help your SEO efforts if it does.

Forum discussion continues at High Rankings Forum.

Google is dominating the search share once again with over two-thirds of searches, according to CNN Money (which cites Hitwise). In March of 2007, Google only dominated 64% of the market. That number has jumped 3% in a year.

Surprised? Not so much. Forum members are used to hearing the news. One points out, however, that Baidu has 70% of the Chinese search share.

Forum discussion continues at WebmasterWorld.

At Search Engine Watch Forums, Discovery talks about how numerous competitors and clients are clicking way too much on PPC ads. The costs are running up and it seems that there's no end in sight. Discovery wonders if there will be an end to PPC as we know it since there are no huge safeguards to prevent costs from going into the negatives.

It's a question to which forum members don't really know the answer. If nothing at all, it's something you need to look at when you analyze your campaigns. You should check if the ad spend is too substantial and are not receiving conversions. You should consider contacting those who are click-happy or by excluding those who do.

Forum discussion continues at Search Engine Watch Forums.

When you're in the hiring phase for an SEO expert, you should get to know a little about the potential candidate you're considering by asking the right questions. The SEOpranos blog has 10 questions that should be asked at every interview. One of them in particular resounds well for webmasters:

Can you tear this website apart?

Chance are, if they don't find anything wrong with the site, they're not ready for "SEO expert" work. That's not to say they can't be trained, but they're beginners, not experts.

Other questions include asking what types of blogs they read, how would they go about building links, how they track results to prove success, and others.

While some folks have trouble believing that the list is accurate at Sphinn, a good number of Sphinners believe it to be very useful. And if you're not an SEO expert, it definitely provides advice on how to hone your craft. You can't really go wrong with having some knowledge of these questions and their answers.

Forum discussion continues at Sphinn.

Google has been rolling out a new AdSense feature that you can likely see by going to the "Ad Setup" screen and clicking on the "Competitive Ad Filter" link. Then you should see access to the "Ad Review Center" (aka ARC).

It gives you more granular control over the ads displayed on your site. Here is a screen capture:

But it does not work exactly like the "competitive ad filter." In fact, in a WebmasterWorld thread, AdSenseAdvisor confirms that if you block an advertiser in the Ad Review Center, it will not block that advertiser from showing up in the contextually relevant area. So, it will only allow you to block ads for placement targeted ads and not contextually targeted ads. Here is more Q&A from AdSenseAdvisor:

There is no limit on how many ads/advertisers you can block in a session.

An ad group is either placement or contextually targeted. If you block a placement-targeted ad, it will not then appear on your site as a contextually-targeted ad.

If you add a site to your Competitive ad filter, ads for this site will not appear in your ARC.

Forum discussion at WebmasterWorld.

Juicy title, isn't it? Well, that is the topic of discussion at a WebmasterWorld. A senior member decided to post some generic, not specific examples, ways to hurt a website's Google rankings. Here are some of the methods you can take:

• Inbound links from "bad" places.
• Hundreds of links from one IP address.
• Duplicate content (a) from competitors scraping your entire site and creating their own from it
• Duplicate content (b) from competitors stealing your articles and submitting them to article submission services
• 301/302 redirect hijacking (after all this time it STILL happens!

Yes, there are many other ways to do this. Can it happen to your site. I am told it can. Can it happen to a site that has years and years of authority? Hard to believe, but people say yes. Can it happen to an Amazon like site or a Wikipedia? I doubt it is achievable.

The member also added that there is a new method to harm a site's ranking in Google, but said he couldn't give those details:

There is a new one that is very quick to work using 301's that I daren't put in here but a black hat "associate" of mine said she's dropped quite a few of her client's competitors within days!

Watching Google's most recent language, they seem to have moved from saying it is impossible for a competitor to hurt your rankings. Here are some past articles on it, but the language seems to be changing from words that symbolize "impossible" to words like "almost not possible," "very unlikely," and so on.

• Google Says Spam Links Can't Hurt You; Again
• http://www.seroundtable.com/archives/006312.html
• Can a Competitor Hurt Your Google Rankings?
• Bad Links Can Kick You Once You Are Down
• Companies Offer to Damage Your Competitors Search Engine Rankings
• Google's Adam Lasnik Speaks On What Links Can & Can't Hurt You

I use to not feel that this was a major issue or an issue most webmasters should have a valid reason to worry about. I am not convinced that this is no longer an issue for webmasters.

Forum discussion at WebmasterWorld.

A few weeks ago we reported that Google was testing search suggestions as the default option when searching at Google.com. It appears that more people are noticing this new Google Suggest test.

A new WebmasterWorld has reports from a couple members who have seen this behavior from Google recently.

A senior member said:

Today, for the first time, searching on google.com I noted that Google "suggests" me the most requested phrases.

I thought I clicked the wrong bookmark ( I have a boomark for googe.com and another one for Google suggest), but in fact the "suggestions" seem the default choice...

It can be that this user went to Google Experimental and clicked on the "Join experiment" button under "Keyword suggestions."

However, this searcher said he did not join that experiment.

Forum discussion at WebmasterWorld.