It was announced months ago, so where is it? If you go and look at the search results for pretty much any phrase, you are starting to see “some” universal search results appear, but not everything… yet.
So what’s the hold up Google?
If you don’t know what Google Universal Search is, feel free to watch this video we made here in the office that explains it in “human” terms. :)
As you can see, Google Universal Search is the future of search where they will bring in different “pieces” of content like blogs, news, videos, books, maps, etc… And regular website results as well. The point being that Google provides the most relevant and reaching set of results that help you find what you’re looking for.
So again, what’s the hold up Google? We want our universal search!
Perhaps it’s because they’re still trying to figure out the percentage of when/where to “put” outside results into the regular organic listings. Who knows, but I know we’re ready for it.
1 Comment »House email, natural search engine optimization and paid search lead the way in that order when it comes to the best ROI options, according to the latest MarketingSherpa Search Marketing Benchmark Survey.
MarketingSherpa just released a sneak peek of its Search Marketing Benchmark Guide 2008 based on a survey of nearly 3,100 search marketers. The ROI shows that house email is the strongest ROI tactic (25%) followed by SEO (18%) and PPC (16%).
Yet, it’s the other end of data that that’s astounding. Marketers (21%) find SEO problematic because it’s “hard to gauge” the ROI. You might expect that with public relations (30%) and print advertising (29%), but SEO?
You mean 1 out of every 5 marketers can’t find value in SEO?
With all of the analaytics available, you can’t tell what words drove what traffic to what pages?
OK, maybe e-commerce systems are a little more fun – plenty of extra data loaded for you. But jeepers, it’s not that difficult to figure out that a page is getting conversions. At least look at search traffic trends in general.
Maybe it’s just that marketers don’t know how to pick out the right keywords (they shoot for the moon). Or, they’re deficient in optimization tactics and SEO takes the fall for their failure to do a good job in the first place.
It’s the basics, everyone.
- Define target markets.
- Know your website viability - do you deserve the keywords you’ve thoroughly researched and debated?
- Understand ranking analysis and optimization techniques.
By all means, spend some time with web analytics. Please don’t blame it on the IT department. You do have some credibility after all of these years, right?
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I know many women are multi-talented and seem to have eight eyes (including the back of their heads) and 12 hands. My wife seems to know when I’m running late and calls me just when I’m about to leave.
As much as I love search, I was a little bit surprised at the high numbers in a new study of moms. Get this, an incredible 86% said search engines are the best way to find information, according to the story by DoubleClick Performics, Microsoft and ROI Research.
Get a copy of “Searcher Moms — a Search Behavior and Usage Study.”
The main point is that advertisers should take an interest (or a stronger one) in this demographic. Maybe moms are finding time to cut away in between a million other details.
For example, 70% say they use search engines to gather information before buying something online.
If you don’t trust the numbers, at least try a small natural search engine optimization campaign and a paid search program to see how these women respond to what you sell. Over the years, apparently, they’ve developed an appreciation for search and the Internet. Saavy moms are on the ball. It’s time to help more of them to find your products online.
2 Comments »Search Engine Land is in the midst of Local Search Week. I came across an interesting post Yahoo Local Now Features “User Denigrated Content” by Mike Blumenthal. He goes on to explain how Yahoo is giving a little too much power to the user.
The new Yahoo Local is making a strong attempt at encouraging user input and content about local businesses with reviews, soliciting and actually reading end user suggestions for improvements and even allowing users to add business level details to specific records.
He was able to knock off a flower shop by using simple tactics. This type of powers can be scary especially if your business relies on the internet.
I was awed by my new found god like “powers” and that the record was removed with such rapidity. I felt like I had found a solution for all of the real florists in the world in their “battle” against fake local businesses. Had I discovered the path to florist nirhvana or had I uncovered a pandora’s box?
I would have to agree with Mike this opens so many issues. Black hatters should love this right now! To be given the capability to flag Yahoo to tell them that a store is closed so they take the listing down both in Yahoo Local and search result. This practice by Yahoo gives the user a little too much power. As Mike says, “it defiantly raise a number of questions!â€
• Was 4 notations all it took to remove a business?
• Did Yahoo give more importance to members than non members?
• Was geo-location of the user input a consideration? (how would I know the NY business was closed if I was in LA?)
• Can I so notate any business in the country and thus tag them?
• Was there additional verification before the business was removed?
• Would typical viewers ever really take the time to tag businesses as closed?
• Would this become a tool for black hat endeavors?
I thought Yahoo was smarter than this. I sure hope they do other verifications before the listing is removed. In the end, is my business liable to my competitor simply by submitting a red flag without Yahoo asking me directly before they take my listing down? Please say it isn’t so Yahoo!
No Comments yet, your thoughts are welcome. »The links issue is an evolving topic with a few traps and a lot of hype that scares people.
A client contacted us yesterday because he’s all worried about his outbound links. He shouldn’t be and you shouldn’t be either in most cases.
Outbound links don’t help you in the sense that they could affect the ranking algorithms – at least not directly. Inbound links are another story. Depending on the authority of the website offering a link to you (i.e. how many and what sites link to it), you could receive some benefit.
Outbound links don’t hurt you in that you’re not penalized for linking to other websites. The only exception is when websites link to non-related website directories or link collections just for the sake of linking. In our client’s case, he is linking to relevant places, not a myriad links.
The concern was that he would erode the value of his own PageRank by linking to other places. PageRank that is assigned on a page by page basis. In other words, many pages can provide quality content and help your overall reputation with Google. If anyone is going to lose, it may be the websites you link to. If you have a page with many links, they all share whatever portion of PageRank you have available. It’s split multiple ways. Everyone gets a little juice, not the whole cup.
The client also was confused by the “nofollow†attribute. It was a great addition to our industry to help block people from spamming blogs, for example. If all blog posts have a “no follow†attribute, the place you give a link won’t qualify for any of the PageRank you otherwise might pass along.
But I wouldn’t take the time to bolt down your website and correct all of the website outbound links. Depending on the website, it could be a lot of work.
We told the client that his company likely linked to other websites because they offer value — not to boost anyone’s natural search engine rankings.
It’s not uncommon to link to organizations that can’t return a link back to you because of their own protocols. If a place does link to you and they use the “no follow,†you can still get traffic, just not the PageRank influence. In some cases, maybe you can review some significant links you’re getting and decide if you want the other place to consider removing the “no follow†attribute to help you — if it’s even using one.
Links — like much of the Internet and search engines — are about relevance. If you’re linking out for a good reason, don’t worry about it. You may have some real fires to put out elsewhere, not the artificial ones fueled by hype.
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