Chinese Newspaper Accuses Google of 'Malicious Revenge'
October 31, 2009
The official newspaper of the Chinese communist party has accused Google of intentionally blocking access to its website by displaying an allegedly unnecessary malware warning telling its visitors that the site might contain malicious software, shortly after the newspaper published an article against Google’s practice of scanning books for its online repository sometimes without the author’s explicit consent.
Looming Battle Over Online Privacy Strikes Fear in Publishers
October 31, 2009
New legislation, if passed in US congress next month, could drastically change how we use the internet. The bill, if enacted, would prevent websites from sharing information with unrelated third parties.
Whiteboard Friday - Future-Proofing Your SEO
October 31, 2009
Posted by great scott!
When individuals or companies are new to SEO they often wonder if SEO is a one-time thing, or if it’s an ongoing process. In order to stay on top of your game, you need to keep an eye on your rankings over time and adjust accordingly; but there is a lot of core SEO strategy that doesn’t change much and paying attention to these fundamentals (along with a little upkeep) can go a long way toward future-proofing your SEO strategy.
In this week’s Whiteboard Friday, Rand goes over the key components of three major areas of any SEO strategy–Technical, Content, and Marketing–to show you where and how you can plan your efforts so they won’t be obsolete next month or next year. Whether you’re just setting out to optimize your site, or you’re already working with an SEO strategy, this video will help you find places to tie-up loose ends and avoid potential frustration down the road.
PS - In the video Rand uses Hitwise as an example of a company that uses unique content effectively, referencing this post about Twitter traffic by Bill "Hold Me Closer Tiny" Tancer.
Local and Social: It’s all Coming Together
October 30, 2009
Google and Bing strike deals giving them access to real-time social feeds. What does it mean for the future of local search? …
Philosophy and Search: The Big Three Founders and the Philosophers
October 30, 2009
Does the thinking of Google’s Sergey Brin and Larry Page, Yahoo’s Jerry Yang and David Filo, and Microsoft’s Bill Gates mirror some of the great philosophers of history? …
Significant Portion of Online Video Viewers Willing to Pay for Content
October 30, 2009
A recent study by The Diffusion Group shows that more than 70 percent of US internet users surveyed watched online video during the surveyed week, and more than half watched online TV programs, reports e-Marketer. Interestingly, a significant portion (22.6 percent) of these users said that they might be willing to sign up for a service that required them to pay a fee for this sort of content.
New Improvements Announced on Google’s New Custom Search Engine
October 30, 2009
Google’s new custom search engine promises a lot: a tailored search experience that can be customized to reflect the user’s point of view or area of expertise.
This Week in Search for 10/28/09
October 30, 2009
Posted by Sam Niccolls
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- Eric Schmidt - What the Internet Will Look Like in 5 Years:
Google’s CEO takes a look into the future and talks about some of the ways the internet will change, such as Chinese language sites outnumbering English language sites, an increase in the number of digital natives in the tech workforce, and the difficulties search engines have around ranking real-time search.
- eCommerce - What the Telco Industry Tells us About Product Selection:
From button treatments to product matrices, there are likely a number of telco industry learnings highlighted on the Get Elastic Blog that can be applied to your eCommerce site.
- Retailers Going Too Far Tracking Web Habits:
I’m probably the only person on earth who puts items into his shopping cart and intentionally abandons sites in order to get product discount e-mails a week or two later, but the USA TODAY discusses two issues that are hot button topics for more normal consumers: Cookie usage and behavioral targeting.
- Grammatically Incorrect Keywords:
In her Search Engine Journal Post, Susanna Speier talks about how even though grammatically incorrect keywords aren’t going to win you any spelling bees, they might be the ones that’ll make you the most honey, er-um money.
- Andrew Chen - Building Lifestyle vs. VC-Backable Companies:
In an interesting post pulling from his VC experiences, Andrew Chen discusses the fundamental differences between building a self-sustaining company and one that’s VC-backable.
- SEO by the Sea on the Importance of Listening:
In a step away from his usual technical and analytical posts Bill Slawski takes a thoughtful and reflective look at how his life experiences have validated the importance of listening. Also, Slawski’s post about How a Search Engine might distinguish between bots and humans is not to be missed.
- Amazon vs. Walmart - The Battle of the Books:
Target is a distant third in the online book sales race, but Compete provides some interesting, in-depth analysis on the toe-to-toe battle this month between Amazon and Walmart.
- Halloween E-mails:
Campaign Monitor’s Halloween E-mail Roundup shows some creative, brand specific examples of Halloween e-mails that’ll give you some last minute idea fodder for this year or things to think about for next year.
- Update on Google Rich Snippets:
Google has been working on better using structured data and expanding rich snippets for a while, but this week’s post on the GWC blog calls attention to improved documentation and tips around their rich snippet testing tool.
- WSJ - Why E-mail No Longer Rules:
You may have caught the Wall Street Journal post earlier this month, but if you didn’t, it’s worth a read. The negative backlash across the e-mail industry continues several weeks later.
- Integrating E-mail with Other Marketing:
A well executed e-mail is no different from a fine wine… it’s good on it’s own, but it’s better when given the right pairing. In a useful post centered around e-mail marketing, Joel Book addresses how the most successful e-mail initiatives integrate with other marketing efforts.
- Google Analytics Qualification Test:
GA has had a more heavyweight certification for agencies for some time, but now available to individual marketers is a test that gives web analytics users personal certifications.
- Networks, Publishers, & the Evolution of Search & Display Ads:
Jonathan Mendez talks about emerging trends in the ad world and makes some predictions as to how the landscape will change for both networks and publishers.
- Creating a Multi-Cultural Website:
If you’ve ever tried to market a product internationally, Forrester’s post about the importance of market research when creating a multi-cultural website might strike a nerve.
- Google Website Optimizer API Released:
GWO rolled out a new API, which, depending on your CMS provider, can allow you to create and launch tests without touching any of your website’s code. Pretty useful stuff. Although a major limitation is that the API currently only integrates with two CMS providers.
- Google Analytics - Be Careful When Rearranging Goals:
With GA’s release the other week came a myriad of fantastic features, including customized alerts and expanded goals. But as James Svoboda points out, if you want to preserve your goal history, you might want to think twice before rearranging your goals.
- Seth Godin - Some People Are Better Than Others:
The short post about customer types earns a spot in this weeks roundup for one reason: The use of the word sneezers, which Godin uses to refer to the customers and brand evangelizers who are best at spreading your company’s word.
- 5 Social Media Lessons for Paid Search Landing Pages:
Scott Brinker takes a fairly basic, but worthwhile look at some things to consider when optimizing your PPC landing pages.
- Google Now Treating 410 Status Codes as More Permanent Than 404s:
Historically Google has treated the two status codes the same, but now, as stated by Google’s John Mu, 410 status codes will be treated as more permanent.
- Bing It On:
Google is still going strong, but Bing’s share of the search market continues to grow.
- How SEO and Sex Are the Same:
In a post with gratuitous use of the word ’sex,’ Joel Leydon’s parody highlighting the similarities between sex and SEO is an entertaining read. Both sex and SEO are basic needs, they’re both organic, and yes, as Leydon points out, you can also pay for each, too.
Top YOUmoz entries:
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*Third-Party Affiliate Programs: Roll Your Own Instead by MichaelC
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Case Study: How Building a Site for Users Improved Rankings by csaliba
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Web Analytics and Segmentation for Better Conversion by philou2803
* Indicates blog post was promoted to the SEOmoz Blog
Google’s Conflicting Push to Move Beyond Search
October 29, 2009
As Google has looked to increase revenues and move beyond being “just a search engine” they have put themselves at the top of the food chain in multiple categories. Power corrupts and absolute power corrupts absolutely, etc. 
If you search for books their book search is the result in natural search and when you search for movies they push their iGoogle application in paid search. Every holiday season Google tries to make further inroads in ecommerce by doing things like offering free Checkout services (at launch of Google Checkout), integrating Google Checkout with AdWords ads (and claiming this increases ad CTR by ~ 10%), and promoting Google Base / Google Product Search more aggressively in their navigation and organic search results. Some early Google Checkout users also got free links.
As Google dives into music services a new one-box with links to selected partners will appear at the top of the search results. And as Google makes tie-ins with more software providers you can look for Google to promote Google pack and other such offerings across the spectrum of search results.
Google has tested creating a mortgage marketplace in the UK and LendingTree is suing a business partner because they heard that the company might sell data to Google.
Everything is a beta and everything is a test. And then one day a new competitor appears from nowhere.
At times Google seems unbelievably savvy, but at times they seem unbelievably conflicted. Google claims that searchers are expecting more for advertisers and that advertisers need to start acting more like magazine publishers who publish (and advertise) great featured content. Sounds good, maybe. But then Google launches an AdWords ad translation kit. It is pretty safe to say that if a machine translates your ads in a competitive marketplace you are wasting an awful lot of profit margin.
Google claims to like brands, that brands are how you sort out the cesspool, and to show brands for generic keywords to increase user satisfaction.
But lets look at a recent search result for the eBay brand. Google knows that eBay.com gets a 90%+++ CTR, that the keyword is a trademark, that the keyword is navigational, etc etc etc. And in spite of eBay even bidding on their own brand, this is perhaps the first time Google takes a valuable partner hostage.
If Google claims that they need to show brands on generic search queries to increase user satisfaction then why do they pollute the associated brand search results with irrelevant nonsense? Navigational searches are the easiest ones in the world to get right, and if a site has historically got a 90%+++ click-through rate for a keyword, why would it ever make sense to risk putting a universal search result or a marginally relevant ad above the obvious #1 result?
If people are looking specifically for news when entering a branded 1 word trademarked keyword then surely they would skip past the #1 result for the official site. Sure there is money in promoting apps for eBay, but it seems so counter to Google’s messaging when justifying their algorithmic editorial philosophy elsewhere.
You Aren’t Average
October 29, 2009
Do you ever think that SEO is “obvious”? “Common knowledge”? “Pretty easy, really”?
Watch this:
In this video, “Scott” from Google asked 50 people on the street if they knew what a browser was.
Less than 8% of people surveyed did.
Many people confused a browser with a search engine. Google Chome - or Google “Crown” as one woman put it - was unheard of.
I bet you’re feeling smarter than you did before you watched that video! Fact is, if you’re reading this site, you’re already waaaay ahead of most people in terms of internet knowledge and how it all hangs together. Pat yourself on the back.
There is a downside, however.
The Distorted Lens Of Familiarity
We see the internet through our own lens, a lens that has been honed over the years by focusing on a specific thing. We study search engines, we experiment with algorithms, we hang on Matt Cutts every word - they should have asked the people if they knew who Matt Cutts was - “Matt Coutts?”, we upload sites, we research keywords, we study user behavior, we build links, and more.
Such attention to detail can provide clarity, but can also distort our view.
We need to keep in mind that most people don’t see the internet as we do. Most people don’t know what a browser is. Most people cannot tell a paid search result from a non-paid one. People certainly do not understand that the site they are seeing in first position may only be there because some smart SEO has helped ensure that happens.
What is “spam” to the trained SEO eye may be perfectly acceptable to the end user, so long as the user gets the answer they want.
normal people can’t tell the difference between AdSense style ads and all the other links on most web sites. And almost the same number don’t know what “sponsored results” on the Search Results Page are either. It’s just a page of links to them. They click the ones that look like they’ll get them what they want. It’s that simple
Beyond the tiny web-savvy crowd, these people are your market. So it pays to put yourself in their shoes, especially when making decisions about how your site functions and displays information.
According to research conducted by the Nielsen company, the average internet user now spends 68 hours online per month. That may sound like a lot, but it only comes out to an average of about two and a quarter hours a day
You have a tiny window of opportunity. There are so many other activities, and web sites, demanding a visitors attention. The fact someone has even arrived at your site should be seen as something special.
Here a few points I’ve found to be true.
1. When Designing A Site, Make It Stupidly Easy To Use
Internet users spend less than one minute per page while surfing. You have roughly four seconds to get their attention. The average time spent on a page is falling, indicating that if people don’t find what they want immediately, they will go elsewhere, and they can, because the supply of websites is endless. Ignore design rules predicated on the notion of information scarcity.
A user won’t wrestle with your site. Web design, particularly navigation, is not the place to get clever. Web design should be no more complicated than book design. You might notice every book shares the exact same user interface. As do cars. As do bicycles. I have no idea how my car works. People have explained the workings of the internal combustion engine to me, and I nod sagely, but really, I don’t have a clue. Nor do I need to know. I just turn the key and hit the pedal.
Your website design should ask nothing more of the user than a car does. Assume nothing, other than the user will point and click something obvious.
2. Make The Thing You Do Obvious
Once a person decides your page is roughly what they are looking for, you have a further four seconds to direct them to desired action or get them to continue reading. On the average web page, users have time to read at most 28% of the words during an average visit; 20% is more likely.
If you make your money via Adsense, then place Adsense prominently on your pages. If you make money selling subscriptions, make a huge button that says “sign up for a subscription here”. Place it where everyone can see it on their first - and possibly only - visit. If you want people to donate to your charity, make the donate button big and bold and place it prominently on every page.
Pretty obvious, right.
But it’s amazing how many sites bury what they want a user to do.
So, decide what is the one thing you want users to do, and relegate - or remove - all other distractions. The exception is a site to which users return to time and again. Make more features available to power users, but ensure there is always a clear, simple path for the first time user.
Language can also get in the way of conversions. Assuming people know everything that you do (including acronyms and industry jargon) is an easy way to passively lose sales every day.
3. SEO - You Don’t Need to Sweat The Small Stuff
There are people who spend their life finding and exploiting gaps in the algorithms, gaps that often exist only temporarily. I’m not one of those people. Neither is Aaron.
I think SEO is most effective when approached holistically i.e understanding how the different stages of attracting the visitor then converting them to desired action relate to one and other.
Identify the target market - keyword research and visitor profiling - and work backwards from there.
When the visitor who - and lets remember, s/he most likely doesn’t know what a browser is - searches for “lemon law” - what do they really want to achieve? Do they want to find information about this topic? Do they want to buy something? Do they want to compare one service provider with another? What’s really on their mind?
Sift through a list of related keywords until you can determine intent. Once you’ve figured out the intent, give the people the content they desire. Publish crawlable pages addressing that topic and intent, get the pages linked from other pages related to that topic and intent, and advertise your pages anywhere where your target market resides, either by buying space on high ranking sites or publishing your views, and links, on those sites. Read this.
That’s SEO in a nutshell. Leave the minutiae to the hackers, unless you are one!
4. The Most Successful Stuff Replicates Something The User Already Does
Email is a killer app because it enables a user to do something they already do more easily - write letters to people.
Search is a killer app because people have always looked for information, and search makes that process more efficient.
The computer games industry is huge because people have always played games.
Facebook and Twitter are huge because they are essentially txt messaging in another format. Txt messaging is a replacement for calling people on the phone.
Skype. Amazon. Ebay. All the big, successful internet plays took an everyday task the user already undertakes, and puts that task in an online context.
These services don’t ask the user to do something genuinely new. Most applications that ask users to do something genuinely new - a lot of Web 2.0 applications, for example - fail miserably for this reason. Most users don’t want to do anything genuinely new.
The people who do - radical early adopters - are highly unlikely to be your target market.
Try to frame whatever you do in terms of a task a visitor already knows well. Demonstrate, quickly and clearly, how you make that task easier or more efficient.
5. Even Google Users Are Not Typical
Studies suggest that Google users tend to be wealthier than average, and have more experience with the internet than users of MSN and Yahoo. The longer people have been using the Internet, the more likely it is that Google will be their search engine of choice, are more likely to have household incomes above US$60,000 than people who use competing search engines.
Whilst these numbers are probably getting more mainstream as Google grows their market share, it pays to remember that your target market may not be using Google at all! One of the secrets of search marketing is that the conversion rates from MSN and Yahoo can blow Google conversion rates out of the water, especially if you’re in the market of providing goods and services to the average punter.
A good example of this was when Aaron recently shared ad click-through rates per visitor for some large sites…with Bing in the clear lead…nearing double the rate of Google users.
Summary
In summary, the key to internet marketing is to know your audience. Really know them. It is not that people are stupid, it is that they are likely to be unfamiliar.
And remember that the average internet user is not you 