WebmasterWorld's Search Conference :: Yahoo! Presentations
Yahoo! Search blog
The Yahoo! blog links to the Yahoo! presentations:
> Search Friendly Design by Tim Mayer
> Search Engines and Webmasters by Tim Mayer
> PFI Topics and Issues by Tim Mayer
> Yahoo! Shopping by Andy Chen
> Yahoo! Local by Ali Diab
> Weblogs, Community, and Search by Jeremy Zawodny"
Striking up digital video search
CNET News.com
Report that: "Google, Microsoft and Yahoo are quietly developing new search tools for digital video, foreshadowing a high-stakes technology arms race in the battle for control of consumers' living rooms. "
Concluding that "Video is in the spotlight as the Internet begins to mature into an entertainment platform and becomes a viable companion for television, convergence devices that combine PC and TV features, and the networked home....
Search is the glue that will one day bind these services and help consumers navigate the increasing amount of available content..."
Google "is recording live TV shows and indexing the related closed-caption text of the programming. It uses the text to identify themes, concepts and relevant keywords for video so they can be triggers for searching" and holding meetings with broadcasters to discuss " 'Don't sue us for nicking your closed captioning,' and then it's the commercial possibilities"
Google have also "filed patents related to video search and the display of relevant advertising"...Cnet give the example of a patent for a "method to search media." Its system relies on stored data sets, or text "metatags" that represent published content or media, to retrieve and match multimedia to query terms."
IHG and SideStep
Travel Weekly
IHG tactic aims to help its franchisees recoup business lost through its “decertification” of Expedia and Hotels.com.
“SideStep drives avid travelers straight to our Web site,” said Michael Menis, director of IHG’s global marketing services. “Whereas online agencies often look to own the customer relationship, SideStep helps us to promote our brands and continue building our customer relationships by driving direct interaction between valuable customers and IHG hotel brands.”
New Web Search Engine From Australia Coming Next Week
Search Engine Watch notes articles announcing the launch of a newcomer to search in Australia.
Search Engine Australia - Australia's independent search engine... MySearch.com.au
SEW lists the main features of MySearch.com.au in terms of ranking and crawl as follows:
::
Quality of data: focus on a relatively small list of the most popular websites in the world rather than those with the most number of websites linking to them
::
Ranking: based on usage rather than link farm size.
::
Focus on a site versus pages: IE's Geocities will feature in its database only once, rather than the extensive network of millions of free pages / Web sites that are found within Google. This will result in a natural tendency to feature more business/commerce sites.
::
Top sites index: a listing of top Web sites updated and ranked regularly.
::
Small data footprint: allows for a daily update of the top-ranked Web sites, as opposed to updates every six weeks."
They will also operate cpc and enteprise search services. Plus three other revenue streams that will be revealed in Quarter Four, 2005. Louise Williams, marketing manager, Ansearch is quoted as saying:"To the best of our knowledge, no other search engine -- global or Australian -- is addressing these other areas."
Two important daily SEO tasks
SEO Scoop: "Keeping up with SEO tasks on a daily basis can be very time-consuming. However, there are two tasks you should not overlook.
Add at least one page of content to your site.
Get at least one backlink to your site. "
I would add "original" to content and from "authority or hub site " to backlink....
This blog
SEO News - All The SEO Scoop got a mention in the SearchEngineGuide newsletter "Worth A Look" section...
Search Engines Offering SEO Services? - Best Practices Search Engine Forums
Lycos a laughing stock?
Ask Jeeves reviewed
USATODAY.com
Most interesting point: "Jeeves' most profitable move of all: deciding to partner with rival Google. It agreed to have the online company place its text-based search ads on Jeeves. Google-placed text ads, which appear atop Jeeves' search results, represent nearly 70% of Jeeves' income. Berkowitz is quick to note that Google acts as no more than an ad agency something Google also does for America Online and EarthLink. 'We profit from the income, and Google benefits from the additional eyeballs,' he says. 'The relationship is mutually beneficial.'"
Search Engine Disclosure: Better, but Still Wanting
Consumer WebWatch Update recommendations include "making the disclosures visible, written in English, easy to understand and in language that's not going to confuse [consumers]."
For "the 15 most popular search engines, as ranked by Nielsen//Net Ratings. The report was generally favorable, but noted that there are still some problematic areas" in disclosing their paid placement and paid inclusion policies.
"The bottom line in terms of paid placement is that all fifteen did better and are doing relatively well on paid placement, but none of the search engines were even close to being satisfactory on paid inclusion disclosure," said Beau Brendler, director of Consumer WebWatch."
Google - Reciprocal Links - Be Smart.
Cre8asite forums discussion of pros and cons of linking with some useful theories re Googles treatment of recripricol links
Yahoo Talks Turkey
Yahoo Talks Turkey: "The Yahoo search blog team is already in Thanksgiving holiday spirits. In their most recent blog post they discuss how searches are spiking for Turducken, Tofurky and other bird related items."
Internet use : experienced users and newcomers behaviour converge
iMediaConnection: Notes from the Digital Future
"For the first time the advantages of having Internet experience began to diminish and even disappear. "
"...long-time users still connect longer, in most other areas the differences have flattened enormously. New users are only slightly more likely to be looking at chat rooms or playing games online, and they are just about as likely to be looking at news, entertainment information or doing work related to their jobs.
Shopping differences have shown immense change. Today, new users buy online almost from the day they get connected. Indeed, the desire to make an online purchase is one the most compelling factors causing non-users to get an Internet connection in the first place...
...
the most dramatic change: Lack of live humans in the buying process has been transformed from a liability to an asset. Now buyers report they don’t want to have to deal with a real person and prefer buying through a computer -- unless they experience a problem and need customer service....
Another important change is that new users go online knowing what to expect from the Internet having, in many cases, been online before with a friend’s or relative’s connection. The learning curve for online behavior is much shallower. New users know what to expect when they connect and now get down to business much faster than new users of several years ago."
MSN Search: Sponsored results added
MSN Search: Travel to Britain
PubSub searches weblogs & RSS
PubSub now tracking Over 6.5 million weblogs in real time, pacing explosive growth of blogosphere
"PubSub Concepts, Inc. today announced that its "matching engine" — online at www.pubsub.com — is now tracking over 6.5 million Weblogs, making it the Internet's most comprehensive blog monitoring service. The company, which this week celebrates its second anniversary, also debuts a brand new, easy to use Web interface.
PubSub's Internet-scale matching engine is a "prospective" search tool that complements traditional "retrospective" search engines. Search engines like Google and Yahoo! search documents they've collected in the past. PubSub's prospective search matches user requests against new documents as they're published - in real time, all the time. Every day, PubSub's matching engine performs billions of matches of new items against user subscriptions."
Internet Daily Article
"By Frank Barnako, CBS.MarketWatch.com WASHINGTON (CBS.MW) -- While most search engines can help you sift through the archives of the Internet, PubSub Concepts looks for the new stuff.
Claming to filter millions of Weblogs, SEC/Edgar filings, Internet newsgroups and press releases, PubSub's 'matching engine' recognizes new information as soon as it's published and delivers it to subscribers on a Web page or an RSS reader."
iProspect: emarketing strategy advice whitepapers
iProspect: emarketing strategy advice and more with free information from iProspect
"White Papers
iProspect's Natural SEO Keyword Length Study November 2004)
iProspect's Search Engine User Attitudes Survey Results (April-May 2004)
What Converts Search Engine Traffic: Understanding Audience, Vehicle, Message & Perspective to Optimize Your ROI
Website Conversion Enhancement: A Strategy to Map the Selling process to the Buying Process
Search Engine Marketing Prospect and Clients' Bill of Rights
Search Engine Marketing Ethics: Adhere to the Highest Standards
Website Conversion Enhancement: Practical Advice and Best Practices
Maximize ROI of Search Engine Marketing by Measuring Beyond Clicks
Minimize the Impact of Website Changes on Brand Visibility on Google "
More re MSN....reviews, forums and opinions
MSN
"After 14 months of work and a $100 million investment, Microsoft rolled out a test version of its new search engine late Wednesday night"...Even with its own search technology, Microsoft will continue to rely mostly on Yahoo's Overture Services for paid search listings. Their agreement runs through June 2005. "I think that's absolutely going to change," said Nate Elliott, an analyst with Jupiter Research, who thinks MSN will offer its own paid listings program. "That's where the money is."
SiteProNews: MSN Search Launches
"SiteProNews:comments on guidelines"
MSN say: Use only well-formed HTML code in your pages: this means all pages/ sites should be W3c Validated. Maintain links & make sure that all tags are closed or MSNBot may not be able to index your site effectively.
MSN say: use URLs that are simple and easy to read:
could mean url syntax has implications for ranking as well as making them easy to crawl. MSN bot also respects the robots.txt file See MSN bot FAQ
MSN also say: keep your URLs static...Complicated URLs, or URLs that change often, are difficult to use as link destinations..could be to avoid link decay in their index
MSN say: Limit all pages to a reasonable size...under 150 KB...without any images... One topic per page. Could the latters mean MSN bot/ algo is pretty basic?
Rob Sullivan at Search Engine Guide reckons Microsoft have been palying a waiting game: " wait until others build it, and let them work out the kinks and bugs. The others make it popular, and then Microsoft sweeps in and takes over."
In
MSN Search's Beta Blunder he concludes:
"Microsoft, earth's largest software company. And it trumpeted this test launch with a public-relations campaign to ensure that users around the world knew the service was ready for widespread use. So when MSN Search went down, a bit of Microsoft's credibility in the search-engine business went with it.
That's not to say that MSN won't eventually give Google a run for its money. In addition to Encarta-aided searches, MSN Search comes up with results for musicians, with links to listen to songs and Web sites featuring the artists. And MSN Search is available in 26 markets around the world and 11 different languages"
All they have to do is show them how easy it is to use, and how relevant the results are. They can do a side by side comparison with Google, but they don't really have to. They just have to convince the average Joe that Microsoft search is good. It may take a couple of years, but by then they will have enough people convinced, so that when Longhorn comes out with integrated search, they will be so happy with Microsoft search that the extended benefits of Longhorn and MSN search tied together, that there will be no alternative.
Google will still be used by us geeks, but we don't rule the search world. Your parents do, in the end.
Microsoft Launches New Era in MS Search: Web Master World forum with appeparances by "Googleguy" and "MSNdude".
Webmaster World in Las Vegas : WWM Yahoo forum
Yahoo Pubcon Talk: "Pubcon Talk post your
Topics or Questions for Pubcon Panel"
Going to Webmaster World next week? (Jeremy Zawodny's blog): "I'm speaking on a panel about 'Blogs, Community, and Search' on Wednesday afternoon"
msn release their own search blog
msnsearch's WebLog it’s been busy here. In the 2 days, we’ve served millions of page views and queries, rolled out a couple of system updates (note the improved performance) and yet I was still able to go see The Incredibles last night (it was great!). We’ve had over 1000 pieces of feedback sent to us, in addition to what we’ve seen in WebmasterWorld, the Search Engine Watch Forums, our newsgroup, and on blogs. The top things that we’ve heard so far are:
UI suggestions & ideas – Thanks, we are paying attention to these and will evaluate them.
Developer API requests – We plan on releasing something next year, as soon as we can.
News Integration - There have been a lot of requests to integrate Newsbot with the Beta.
Availability – Our system updates should help this area, but this is a Beta product and we are only using a small portion of our server farm. We will be increasing the number of machines over time and soon we will start to take traffic from our live site.
Relevance – We have gotten a lot of feedback about relevance (over half our feedback) and we are actively reviewing them. As previously mentioned, we are using the feedback that we are receiving from you to get better.
Keep the feedback coming; we're listening.
--brady
Yahoo hires newspaper veteran | CNET News.com
Yahoo hires Budde: Underlines interest in original content: "Yahoo confirmed Friday that it has hired newspaper veteran Neil Budde to run its news operations...
The company recently hired TV veteran Lloyd Braun, who developed shows such as "The Sopranos," "Lost" and "Desperate Housewives," to run its media and entertainment operations. Braun will focus on courting Hollywood producers to develop online programming exclusively for Yahoo."
Microsites for PPC and SEM
Clickz.com Microsites and SEM: Explained: "A microsite is a completely autonomous user environment. It could be as brief as a single page (although that might simply be a new landing page) or a new page with new navigation, an offer, and a link or two back to your main site. Alternately, it could be a fully functional minisite with a privacy policy, contact page, and perhaps an e-commerce engine."
Rss & Using linking in search engine marketing
Pandia:
"RSS is a XML text file that presents the latest headlines from your site with links and a short description. These feeds can be read by special RSS readers, often used by bloggers and journalists looking for news.
If you provide a good service, some sites may even decide to include your RSS feed on their own site in form of a list of headline links. Unless these headlines are generated by a javascript feed, the search engines will find them, adding more relevant backlinks to your article pages.
Just make sure that the headlines (and through them the links are keyword rich and relevant).
Online RSS resources
On the Pandia RSS-feed"
dabs.com - favourite links
dabs.com - favourite links
Writing search engine optimized press releases
Writing search engine optimized press releases: "Using press releases in search engine marketing"
Trash Proof News Releases Writing Course: "How to Write Trash Proof News Releases"
Welcome to Internet News Bureau!
Pages in search engines indexes
Following yesterdays launch of MSN search technology beta a few changes in
Totaltravel search listings are already apparent, not least the almost doubling of number of pages listed by Google ...
Pages in MSN index today number:
.co.uk 11,555
.com.au 19,799
.com 2
Askjeeves pages indexed have also leapt up:
.co.uk .co.uk 11,555
.com.au 923
.com 86,800
Totaltravel.co.uk pages rank in the top 10 in
Ask Jeeves Results - Hotels in Wales near Snowdon web search results for all but one of phrases tracked. Paid listings dominate above the fold however
MSN ranks are very poor and in Google remain unchanged. Of the 3 UK phrases included in Yahoo index one is outside the top 100, the others rank 16 and 17.
Lastly Yahoo today lists 2 for both www.totaltravel.com.au and www.totaltravel.com... BUT DO NOT GET EXCITED. Once previously a few Australian pages reappeared in Yahoo only to dissappear again very quickly.
Search Challenger...Linux seller gunning for search | CNET News.com
Linux seller gunning for search | CNET News.com: "Michael Robertson, Linspire's CEO, says he believes OS searching will have a significant impact on the market.
'I'm confident that it won't be too long before going to Google.com will be as unnecessary and old-fashioned as going to Blockbuster for videos, since search will be accessible right from every program on your computer,'"
Google Search: pages also up....
Google Search: allinurl:www.totaltravel.com.au site:www.totaltravel.com.au: "Results 1 - 100 of about 117,000 from www.totaltravel.com.au for allinurl:www.totaltravel.com.au"
Google Search: allinurl:www.totaltravel.co.uk site:www.totaltravel.co.uk: "Results 1 - 100 of about 95,800 from www.totaltravel.co.uk"
All except the global homepage are marked as "Supplemental" for .com search about 36,900 from www.totaltravel.com for allinurl:www.totaltravel.com indicating that Google has also recognised the witch to .com.au It would be appropriate to contact Google and ask them to remove the .com pages (apart from HP) obviously.
MSN Search: site:www.totaltravel.co.uk ...results finally!
MSN Search: site:www.totaltravel.co.uk: "Web Results1-10 of 416 containing site:www.totaltravel.co.uk (0.07 seconds)" shows initially but on clicking through the results pages it became " Web Results Next 121-130
of 6,258 containing site:www.totaltravel.co.uk ...
Similar for Au 1-10 of 822 containing site:www.totaltravel.com.au becomes...11-20 of 11,845 containing site:www.totaltravel.com.au
...and the most accurate of any yet for .com... 1-2 of 2 containing site:www.totaltravel.com
Keyphrases will be tested in the morning...
Update 3: MSN Search Launch
Forbes.com: Update 3: MSN Search Launch: "Microsoft Corp. finally debuted its own Web search technology on Thursday, hoping to challenge Google Inc.'s long dominance of the field with results tailored to a user's location and answers from its Encarta encyclopedia.
Google signaled that it is ready for a fight, announcing Wednesday that it would nearly double the amount of Web pages available to search through its site.
The Microsoft search engine, offered in 11 languages, will initially be available on a special 'test' site. Gradually, some users visiting Microsoft's MSN site may find that the existing search bar uses the new search engine, said Adam Sohn, a director with the company's online division. But a full rollout, perhaps with new features, isn't expected until early next year"...
MSN have "devoted $100 million in an aggressive catch-up effort. The company also pledged to clearly separate paid search results from those based purely on the relevancy. That's something its previous search engine hadn't done but that the new technology will do.
Microsoft also plans to offer by year's end a test version of its hotly anticipated technology for quickly locating e-mail, Web pages and other files on desktop computers"...
Google nearly doubled the size of its search engine index to more than 8 billion Web pages Wednesday evening. A Google spokesman downplayed the Microsoft connection, saying the Mountain View-based company had been working on the expansion for months. Google last expanded its Web index to 4.3 billion pages in February when another rival, Yahoo Inc., unveiled a search engine powered by its own in-house technology."
"Microsoft says its site will sort through more than 5 billion Web pages"...MSN has new feature called "Search Near Me" (this) guesses where users are located based on their Internet connections and seeks to provide results nearby. Another feature promises to answer plain-language questions such as "What is the capital of Germany?" by culling through Encarta."
Reuters | Latest Financial News / Full News Coverage: "Microsoft is aiming to boost advertising revenue, gained by displayed text-based ads alongside search results, and also ensure that its software and services won't be overtaken by similar offerings from Google."
SEW review new MSN search
Still unavailable ...
Microsoft Unveils its New Search Engine - At Last: "new MSN search engine"
Web Advertising Info.com : Traffic Power & 1P Launch Fake SEO Forums : SEO Book.com
Threads following SEO shenanigans....
Webmaster Forum - WARNING: Web Advertising Info = Fake SEO Forum
Web Advertising Info.com : Traffic Power & 1P Launch Fake SEO Forums : SEO Book.com: "Further Reading on 1P / Traffic Power SEO Services:"
� MSN Search to Challenge Google and Yahoo - Launch today?
Today was announced as the launch date for a "final" preview release with the finished article sometime in the next few months.
A Search Engine News Journal post reviews the search market and MSN's attempts to catch up, especially with Google,by launching the new MSN search.
� MSN Search Challenge Search Engine News Journal: "The new MSN Search Beta format can be previewed at http://beta.search.msn.com, and the search results can be previewed on the MSN Tech Preview. But it will not be until Thursday when the true preview test is released."
Manual check 8am today:
techpreview very slow loading error page with the following message: The MSN Search Technology Preview is currently unavailable. The site may be down for a short while due to scheduled maintenance. Please try again later.
You can send your comments to MSN Search Feedback, or perform a search at the MSN Search home page.
MSN Search Beta This minimalist beta search page has the wording " MSN Search is improved! Check it out."
I have been tracking the beta version as and when available and todays results seem to be from the main pre Oct 5th MSN results not the beta.
For the UK pages listed went from 4 pre-beta to the following for the period 7th Oct 04 to date:
232
218
207
na
929
2,606
na
973
472
today 4
Similar for .com.au
0
9,552
8,839
0
12,267
na
4,247
6,514
na
3,703
2,414
Today 0
The article also lists the MSN guidelines These have been blogged previously but as today is the alledged launch day for the new MSN search a reminder is a good idea.
The guidelines are brief but are still open to some interpretation with no definitions or clarification for terms such as "link farm" and "appropriate HTTP redirection code". I will check out what the forums and blogs buzz is on this.
MSNBOT Guidelines: The best way to attract users to your site, and keep them coming back, is to populate your pages with quality content that users are interested in. MSNBot and other Web crawlers can help by making your site available to a broader audience. Below, we've provided recommendations that may help MSNBot and other Web crawlers effectively index your site. We've also provided a list of items and techniques that MSN Search discourages.
Technical recommendations for your Web site
• Use only well-formed HTML code in your pages. Ensure that all tags are closed, and that all links are functioning properly. If your site contains broken links, MSNBot may not be able to index your site effectively, and users may not be able to reach all of your pages. For more information about correct HTML syntax, see the HTML 4.01 Specification.
• If you move your page, use the appropriate HTTP redirection code to indicate whether the move is permanent or temporary.
• Make sure MSNBot is allowed to crawl your site, and is not on your list of Web crawlers prohibited from indexing your site.
• Use a robots.txt file or Robots Meta tags to control how MSNBot and other Web crawlers index your site. Using a robots.txt file will tell Web crawlers which files and folders on your site it is not allowed to crawl. For more information, see the MSNBot FAQ.
• Whenever possible, use URLs that are simple and easy to read.
Content guidelines for your Web site
• Limit all pages to a reasonable size. An HTML page with no pictures should be under 150 KB.
• MSN Search recommends discussing one topic per page. Use links to take users to related topics.
• To ensure your pages are easy to link to from other sites, keep your URLs simple and static. Complicated URLs, or URLs that change often, are difficult to use as link destinations. A persistent URL is easier for users to find and remember, and makes it a more likely link destination from other sites.
Items and techniques discouraged by MSN Search
MSNBot recognizes the following items and techniques as spam, an inappropriate use of the index. Use of these items and techniques may affect how your site is ranked within MSN Search, and may result in the removal of your page or site from the MSN Search index.
• Loading pages with irrelevant words in an attempt to increase a page's keyword density. This includes stuffing ALT tags that users are unlikely to view.
• Using hidden text or links. You should use only text and links that are visible to users.
• Using techniques to artificially increase the number of links to your page, such as link farms.
Be prepared for Google, Yahoo!, Microsoft, and others to rewrite the rules of search: MediaPost Advertising & Media Directory
MediaPost Advertising & Media Directory: "In the meantime, marketers should be prepared for Google, Yahoo!, Microsoft, and others to rewrite the rules of search (again). Even though people may be able to soon search for any kind of content (Web sites, e-mail, files, multimedia, etc) anywhere and any way they choose, it doesn't mean all searches are equal....
What happens when he uses it though? He's a gastroenterologist, and I've helped him prepare a few PowerPoints on the subject (I assisted with the technology; he did the content on his own). When he's searching for "colonoscopy presentation," all he wants is to find the file that never seems to be where he remembers saving it.
He has no interest in the 17,000 natural search results, and he surely won't pay attention to the search ads on the right, mostly hawking presentation improvement services. (As an aside, one of the sponsored links that came up for the search was entitled - and I swear this is real - "Sexy Colonoscopy Singles".)
"
WebProWorld :: What is GOOGLE doing?
WebProWorld :: What is GOOGLE doing?: "Here are three interesting points to note:
1. A lot of crawling
2. No significant changes, and
3. November 15 is the anniversay of the Florida update "
Result for the Google fight
Result for the fight between totaltravel australia and totaltravel uk: "Number of results on Google for the keywords totaltravel australia and totaltravel uk:
totaltravel australia ( 56 300 results) versus totaltravel uk ( 83 600 results)
The winner is: totaltravel uk "
Forbes.com: Update 1: Microsoft to Preview New Search Engine (to public?)
Forbes.com: Update 1: Microsoft to Preview New Search Engine: "Microsoft Corp., stepping up its efforts to compete with rival Google Inc., will offer consumers a preview of its technology for searching the Internet, beginning Thursday"
A9 Search Engine Optimization: Navigating The Amazon
A9 Search Engine Optimization: Navigating The Amazon: "At first glance, many webmasters will be tempted to think that their Google optimization efforts will already work with A9. Since A9 is �enhanced by Google results,� that might be partially true. The part that throws an anchor into the water is that A9 is also loaded with results favoring Amazon and Alexa listings. In particular, products offered by Amazon.com are heavily featured in the A9 search engine results pages (SERPs)....
In the A9 SERPs:
having images properly indexed becomes doubly important.
provide plentiful theme related content
need strong keyword rich link anchor text is important with A9, as it is with Google - make sure anchor text is not all identical, as it could trigger a Google filter
get quality links
While A9 search engine provides mainly Google results, there are some slight differences
Some search results include a heavier level of Amazon results than the standard Google SERPs
Ensure photos on your website include proper captions and easily indexed alt tags - a photograph series appears as part of the A9 search results"
The State of Search: Brief roundup of recent major changes....
The State of Search: "Another interesting development that was discovered is Yahoo! now seems to be banning cross linked websites from its natural results listings. A simple example of cross linking is building a website selling widgets using all static html pages on your hosting server, then building another web site on the same server with a different domain name selling those same widgets but using a PHP- or ASP-based website, and then linking the sites to each other."
Black Hat/white Hat Article -> High Rankings Search Engine Optimization Forum
Black Hat/white Hat Article -> High Rankings Search Engine Optimization Forum Discussion of white : black SEO....Source: High Rankings Forum - " To me, do all the black hat SEO you want if you're trying to make some quick big bucks... but do not even think about it if you have a REAL company that is in it for the long haul."
RSS
WebProWorld :: dropped from yahoo: "Here's some helpful RSS advice for Yahoo optimization - keep RSS announcements small - usually 5 (you may consume space in the user interface or Add to My Yahoo). Consider too that a users RSS aggragator will have several feeds, and if yours is heavy then they'll dump it, even on broadband connection..
If you're ready for RSS, open a Yahoo account, get their Add To My Yahoo button for your website (for RSS), click on your site ATMY button, and follow the simple process. After this Yahoo will have indexed your feed 2 hours later(but make sure your feed links to content).
And don't think RSS has to be traditonally news based - you dont have to run feeds from the Grudge Report, or CNN etc. You don't have to blog. Think of it as a simple notice board"
What is RSS Aggregator software
Search Innovation Looking for the Average Joe: dictates winners in search
Search Innovation Looking for the Average Joe: "Google will continue to roll things out of their search lab, and we early adopters will eagerly install the latest beta. Someday (probably soon) a major development will come out of Redmond about Microsoft Search. We 'in the know' will rush to pronounce it a failure, or success, but the judgment isn't really ours to make. It's the millions of people who have no idea that Google now has a desktop search tool, or that Microsoft is integrating search into their operating system, that will ultimately make the difference. And they will only bestow that success when they're good and ready, or when they have no choice. The winner of search will be the one who is the shrewdest about controlling that timeline."
WebProWorld :: forum: Are Links Hurting Search Relevance?
WebProWorld :: Are Links Hurting Search Relevance? Discussion from all sides of the argument...
First post by CRich concludes with: "A poster from the SEW discussion offers this, “I think the future holds that RELEVANT links will rule and irrelevant links will fall by the wayside, knocking a lot of the current wholesale linking into the dustbin.”
healthshopper posts on link requests "the top three types of offers that I have found particulary abusive: (ie no quality....)
"Trade Links with my robot link farm"
"Join my Trilateral Commission"
"Link to my site so I can put your listing at the top of its category in this great directory"
_________________
On-Site Search: analyse and use data: ClickZ Experts on Customer Data Analysis
ClickZ Experts on Customer Data Analysis: "Evaluate the Effectiveness and Value of On-Site Search
By Jason Burby
November 9, 2004"
90% of site users don't see the homepage? : E-consultancy.com
90% of site users don't see the homepage? : E-consultancy.com: "our own recent experiences and conversations suggest the average % of site visitors who see your homepage to be less than 40% and possibly less than 10%. Certainly for this site, E-consultancy.com, over 90% of our unique site visitors do not see the homepage, and on a few other large sites that we have done web analytics work on recently this figure was over 80%...
Customisation. For the more advanced you can, of course, customise the entry page dynamically based on the content of the referring search string. So if the referrer is something like http://www.google.co.uk/search?hl=en&q=web+measurement&btnG=Google+Search&meta=cr%3DcountryUK%7CcountryGB (which we often get as we rank top on this for Google) then we could customise the arrival page, or elements of it, to all the best things we have to offer on 'web measurement'."
Hitwise Large Search Engines More Popular Now Than Last Year MediaDailyNews 11-09-04
MediaDailyNews 11-09-04: "Web surfers visited the leading search engines more frequently this year than last, according to new data just released by Hitwise. This year, for the week ending Oct. 30, one out of 14 visits to the Internet by U.S. Web users was to one of the top 10 search engines, which represents an increase of 7 percent from the last week in October 2003...
Visitors to Google spend an average of 12 minutes and 31 seconds at the site, while visitors to Yahoo! Search remain for an average of 11 minutes, 24 seconds. But visitors at MSN Search spend, on average, only 7 minutes and 9 seconds at the site. Length of visit also varied among the newer search sites. For instance, users spent 10 minutes and 31 seconds on average at Vivisimo.com, but only about 4 minutes and 57 seconds at Snap.com.
"
iMediaConnection:SearchTHIS: What’s Really Happening in Local?
By Kevin Ryan, Search Editor New technologies are emerging from companies like
Welcome to Ingenio that provides pay-per-call advertising platforms for publishers and SME Global Solutions that places intelligent application and execution ahead of easy tech fixes for local marketers on a very large scale.
They are the new innovators, not yet discovered by mainstream press while slightly irreverent and boldly innovative. In short, I remain hopeful that change might just happen in my lifetime....
a... formal announcement at the Kelsey conference, Yellow Pages.Com will be acquired by BellSouth (RealPages.Com) and SBC (smartpages.com) in an effort to create a new powerhouse in the local Internet space. The new venture (as it has been called) will combine the efforts of the powerhouse publishers with the comparatively small local directory that, to many of us, was so much more than a clever URL identity... "
Will it happen?
Pay per call: Forbes.com: Search Engines Go Local
Forbes.com: Search Engines Go Local: " Searching For Dollars :
Search Engines Go Local : Arik Hesseldahl, 11.08.04
" NEW YORK - Sure, the big search engines have pretty much figured out how to find anything you want in the world, but try looking around your local neighborhood....
So how to measure whether that Web site is drumming up any business? Link it to the phone. "For most small, service-based businesses, the transaction is done over the phone," says analyst Niki Scevak, an analyst with Jupiter Research in New York. "The call is more relevant than the click."
That's the idea behind Ingenio, a San Francisco-based startup backed by investments from eBay (nasdaq: EBAY - news - people ), Microsoft (nasdaq: MSFT - news - people ) and Paul Allen's Vulcan Ventures, among others...Using Ingenio's technology, Findwhat's advertisers pay to plug their businesses under specific categories within a given area....those advertisers bid for the right to get the best placement...businesses pay for every phone referral generated via the ad. Potential customers call a special 800 number listed in the online ad that then routes the call to the business. When the phone rings at that business, a short message whispers that the call was connected via the search engine...results, Barach says, are pretty promising. "What we have found so far is that businesses are willing to pay ten times more for leads generated over the phone than for leads generated from a Web site...While businesses may pay 20 to 40 cents per lead online, Ingenio leads start at $2 and go up from there"
Best Practices for Search Engine Optimization Providers- KeywordRanking.com
Best Practices for Search Engine Optimization Providers- KeywordRanking.com: "Does the firm's plan incorporate the following strategies?
Page optimization
Title optimization
Keyword optimization
Description optimization
Body optimization
Link optimization
Link reputation
Existing link analysis
Initial ranking report for your keywords
Monthly ranking report after optimization
Keyword research
Competitor analysis
Product branding and goals research
Search engine visibility research
Periodic website auditing
Project planning and goal execution "
Link Building 101 SEW forum
Link Building 101
Brand Health Check: Lycos : Brand Republic
Brand Republic: "Brand Health Check: Lycos
The once-ubiquitous internet search brand's market share is diminishing, its users are spending less time on the site and its rivals are gaining in recognition"
Various branding experts offer analysis and solutions...
iMediaConnection: The Low-down: Search and Your Affiliates
iMediaConnection: The Low-down: Search and Your Affiliates The Low-down: Search and Your Affiliates By Kevin Ryan, Search Editor:
"Finding a best practice here is like trying to find an ‘84 Maxima with low miles... Natural search listings can be affected by affiliates. And, pay-for-position search can get really costly if your affiliates bid on your brand name or your terms..." most info available "is designed for up-and-comers -- not brands with solid foundations that place a great deal at risk when approaching affiliate marketing in general, much less the impact affiliates can have on search and your brand...
The best long-term strategy for any brand is to build solid partnerships, with strong affiliates (or any site for that matter) so that link strategies are not abused and by using available technologies, real positioning equity can be realized with tactical user value based off-page link rankings."
Business Blogging resources
Reported by NevOn:
"Business Logs (weblog consulting firm): Writing for the Web, free six-page PDF basic introduction to writing a business blog.
CorporateBloggingInfo: guide to corporate blogging "
SiteProNews: The Keyword Tools Trap
SiteProNews: The Keyword Tools Trap: "Many people today simply run through Wordtracker, grab the results that have a high KEI, and set about optimizing for those phrases. Some of the problems with this tactic are:
untargeted traffic, low conversion, not equipped to show seasonal variation or phrases...
Common-sense Keyword Selection
What many people miss is the common-sense aspect of search: what words will people who want to find your goods or services use to search for it? Besides consulting keyword research tools, your client, their salespeople, and their customers, below are 3 additional ways of finding out what people are typing in at the search engines to find what you offer:
1) Trade organizations or industry news sites
2) Usability testing/surveys
3) Log files"
Lessons Learned: AdSense
Lessons Learned: AdSense: "brainybettyA year and a half later with AdSense and still going strong - here are my lessons learned"
Yahoo Launches Precision Browsing
Yahoo Launches Precision Browsing...search results are returned, they include a clickable list of attributes on the left side of the results page. Shoppers can thereby narrow the natural results by the things that matter to them. For shoes, those might be gender, shoe type and manufacturer. For a search for refrigerators, attributes might include manufacturer, freezer location and the availability of an icemaker. While the electronics and computer categories have offered this function for some time, Yahoo Shopping now has extended it to all products..."
PRESS RELEASE (PRWEB Newswire) MakeGlobalCash.com - a Different Kind of Search Engine � Specific to Home Based Business - With New and Better Features.
PRESS RELEASE (PRWEB Newswire) MakeGlobalCash.com - a Different Kind of Search Engine � Specific to Home Based Business - With New and Better Features. MakeGlobalCash.com is one of over 100 search engines powered by jumpat.com and is the front-runner in integrated search engine traffic. One listing in any one of our 100+ niche portals will get you traffic from all of the top 30 search engines including Yahoo.com and Google.com via doorway pages. Advertisers can target audiences by country, keywords and zones offering utmost control of your advertising programs and audience relevancy.
Additional information is available at www.MakeGlobalCash.com; a search engine focused solely on the home-based business market and designed to deliver fast and relevant search information
Do keywords in URL influence your rank? Research by Web CEO Team.
Do keywords in URL influence your rank? Research by Web CEO Team.: "things need to be taken into account to judge how competitive a phrase is:
how many links the top sites have
how many of those are internal
how many are from distinct domains
how sharp their on page optimisation is
how effective their internal linking is
how much 'agressive' seo is on the first page of results and how well its done"
I and others including Anthony Parsons never really tire of saying:
"PageRank itself has very little to do with ranking a website actually. PageRank is a unique algorithm that is combined with the main algo's to rank pages. PageRank is "one" of hundreds / thousands or techniques scrutinized to rank a page."
danny sullivan brings thread back on track and points readers to past threads which dicussed the issue of keywords in URLs influencing rank:
Hyphenated URLs
SEO and file names Change To Link Bomb Sign Of New Link Analysis Shift?, July 2004
repeating terms in URL , Sept. 2004
URL Spaces & Alt Tag Naming Conventions, Sept. 2004 "
Page 2 of the thread fine tunes the testing methodolgy, and the whole thread is a great example of the interplay of the 100's of factors in each algo and their influence on SERPs.
Cendant sues Amazon.com over patent -- report - Entertainment and Leisure - Internet Services - Media - Internet - Company Announcements
Cendant sues Amazon.com over patent -- report - Entertainment and Leisure - Internet Services - Media - Internet - Company Announcements: "hotel and rental-car company Cendant (CD: news, chart, profile) claims that Amazon is infringing on its 'System and Method for Providing Recommendation of Goods or Services Based on Recorded Purchasing History' patent, the Associated Press reported, which was issued to Cendant in August."
The new European Exalead search engine
The new European Exalead search engine: "Exalead - new advanced search engine"
MSN pre-Christmas online ad campaign to promote search engine launch: newmediazero - from the New Media Age Group
newmediazero - from the New Media Age Group: "MSN prepares major pre-Christmas online ad campaign to promote search engine launch"
Impressions of Search Engine Strategies Stockholm
Impressions of Search Engine Strategies Stockholm: "Among the most interesting panels was the European Search Landscape panel, moderated by Jupitermedia's Julian Smith...
Other panels that Barry covered:
Search Term Research & Targeting
Successful Site Architecture
Writing for Search Engines
Link Building Basics
"
