Google Planning Changes to Search Algorithm
Google is planning to make changes to its search engine ranking algorithm. Few activities of black hat SEO spammers seems to force Google to make these changes.
We often find links of malicious web pages in the top search results of Google. According to insider sources, the proposes changes are meant to fight these spate of links. Black Hat SEOs have been using techniques to manipulate search rankings during the past few months. They were successful to a certain level find top search queries and create targeted webpages to drive web traffic. Google Trends was being used for the success of this activity.
They became very disturbing during the last few months and this helped Google to decide on making changes to its algorithm. Sources at Google indicated that a ranking change is pending that tackles spam of this kind. Once the change goes live, users shouldn’t see it “nearly as often.”
Google's response to this issue looks like an admission of how difficult it is to provide fresh, timely search results and combating spammers at the same time. As Google have no control over the content appearing in its search results, these spammy websites have no issues to intrude into the top results. World wide web had become more dynamic during the last few years and this is a challenge for all search engines and search engine optimization specialists across the globe.
It is not evident from the statements at Google about the changes and consequences precisely. In order to understand this properly, we will have to keep a watch on Google's search results for the coming days.
SEO is gaining much more importance at this point. Let us hope for the best and keep a close look to the updates.
Labels: google, google trends, search engine optimization, search engine rankings, seo
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Merging Social Media Marketing with SEO
Social media marketing and search engine optimization have become buddies of each other. If you analyze the search results of Google, you will come to know about the influence of social media on search engine results.
When you search for any keyword in search engines, you will find few links like YouTube, Wikipedia, Blogs and Social media sharing sites like Digg, Reddit or Slideshare. Hence, social media marketing has become inevitable when we perform asearch engine optimization campaign. Especially, when someone search for your brand name, all the top search results need to be that of your company itself. If not, it may mislead the potential client/customer.
Social media and SEO are each other's half. The success of social media means making a buzz with people linking back to your website and writing content about you, your company, its products or related services. SEO's success lies in relevancy with content what people are looking for and getting backlinks or people talking about you.
Search results often overflow with social media content. Search engines look for websites with genuine, fresh and unique content. Latest addition to the list of social media sites along with Wikipedia, YouTube and others is that of Twitter. There is an opportunity of ranking better for tough terms using social media websites.
People try to find answer for questions like where to share the content to make their websites popular. This can often be done by merging social media marketing with search engine optimization.
Do share your comments!
Labels: google, search engine optimization, search engines, seo, social media marketing, twitter
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Web Tools Gets More Powerful
Introduction of new tools and features to the web frequently have become a common phenomenon in today's competitive world. Moreover, the tools that are popular are being enhanced with their new or additional functionalities on a regular basis.
It was not very long that Facebook updated its look and feel. LinkedIn is also making changes to its functionalities on a regular basis. Yahoo integrated instant messaging to its mail. Google is continuing its efforts in adding functionalities into all its tools. It is the turn of Google Image Search for few more changes. Google Image Search is enhanced with new color filter option.
After you search for 'roses', on the results page, click on "All colors" drop down in the blue bar and choose a color. If we try restricting the results to black, we will get all results of roses that are black in color. We can try other colors and see the colorful results with pages of beautiful images! It is also possible to combine the color filter with other images filter to further refine the search.
Yahoo had updated its search marketing tools with a new Ad Scheduling tool and more updates are in the process. Yahoo also updated its image search feature. We can now find images faster with new filters available on Yahoo Image Search.
These all updates helps users to get the desired results. Moreover, all these changes contribute to the online community and in turn helps in search engine optimization, pay per click, social media marketing, web usability and so on.
We need to explore the web and make use of all these changes to the best possible.
Labels: facebook, google, linkedin, pay per click, search engine optimization, search marketing, social media marketing, web usability, yahoo
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Happy Birthday Gmail!
5 years ago, on an April Fool's Day, Gmail was officially launched. The official press release from Google titled 'Google Gets the Message, Launches Gmail' came out with the below content:
MOUNTAIN VIEW, Calif. - April 1, 2004 UTC - Amidst rampant media speculation, Google Inc. today announced it is testing a preview release of Gmail – a free search-based webmail service with a storage capacity of up to eight billion bits of information, the equivalent of 500,000 pages of email. Per user.
At that time, a typical webmail was able to store only 5 megabytes of mail using Hotmail, Yahoo or other mail accounts. It's not easy to compare those days data transfer as compared to today. We are able to send 20 megabyte as an attachment itself, which is four times than the size of an entire web mail account.
Lot had changed in course of time. If it was the size of mail account (which accounted to 1 GB) which attracted people to Gmail initially, it's the features that draws attention of masses to Gmail now. There is so much in particular for that typical email experience today. It includes search, labels, integrated Gtalk, strong spam protection and so on.
This all started as internal email for Google employees and is now used by tens of millions of people in 52 languages and more than a million companies. The issues in email is totally different that of which we used to face before five years. If we consider the scenario of web browsers itself, it had changed dramatically as compared to 2004. They have become faster with great functionalities. Our email accounts have already become a suite of videos, chat, social networking and so on.
Google might consider subject or content in mails for ranking websites in their search results. Pay per click might get more vulnerable with its integration with mail accounts. Anything is possible. This will make SEO experts to work hard and come up with innovative strategies. :)
This was the case for last few years, we should get excited how this will be after 5 years. Let us hope for the best in the coming days.
Do share your comments!
Labels: email accounts, gmail, google, pay per click, ppc, search engine optimization, seo
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Google Implements Longer Snippets
Google announced changes to its search engine results. This change involves use of longer snippets when users input queries more than two keywords. The objective behind this move is that of providing more context to help user determine if the website is worth to visit. Google is not the first search engine to attempt the issue. Many search engines have attempted to address this using visual tools or previews.
It is not easy to predict how longer snippets are going to affect user behavior. However, it may create an awareness to put longer queries over time. As we know, longer queries will surely lead to better and more targeted results if search engine optimisation is done precisely..
Along with the announcement of longer snippets, Google also announced another significant change related to the acquisition of Orion search technology which was announced by Google in 2006. It was not launched to the public till now.
Refinements will be improved now and start appearing more frequently and that too at the top of pages. These changes are being launched globally in 37 languages in Google.
Google describes how the new refinements will be in the following way:
Starting today, we’re deploying a new technology that can better understand associations and concepts related to your search, and one of its first applications lets us offer you even more useful related searches (the terms found at the bottom, and sometimes at the top, of the search results page).
Let us hope for the best and look ahead for this as a positive aspect for our clients to acquire more targeted leads and business.
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Labels: google, keywords, search engine optimization, search engine rankings, search engines
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Top 10 Video Sharing Sites
In one of the previous posts, we have discussed about the increased popularity of online videos and video optimization strategies.
Video have become a great way for getting popularity in the web and it is becoming an essential part of Search Engine Optimization (SEO) as well as Sponsored Search or PPC. This helps companies to expose their products in a better way which is appealing and attract users with greater effect. Small and large businesses are marketing their products, service and brand introductions through videos.
It is seen that corporates are using online video as a medium for announcements of product features and events. This has increased the amount of business to companies during the past one or two years.
We can certainly expect more and more video results in the SERP (Search Engine Result Pages) of Google with the launch of Google Universal Search. There is a lot of unwanted or useless videos pretending to be informative even though it isn't. However, the effect of online video on increase in sales surpasses all these facts and seems quite explosive. There is also an increase in users looking for better quality videos and this is to grow in the coming days.
There are plenty of websites offering the service of video sharing and marketing. Please find a list of top performing video sharing sites where you can share or market your videos for free:
As video optimization is an important aspect of SEO, you should optimize it by understanding the target audience and how they would like to engage with your online video. Don't post a video just for the sake of posting it, instead consider the need and perception of your visitors.
Labels: google, online video, search engine optimization, search engine rankings, video optimization, video search
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SalesOnlineWorld Joins Twitter Revolution
No one seems to just wait and watch the revolution that Twitter is getting into. Once you realize that there is a positive revolution building up, you should never hesitate to join that. Yes, after realizing the growing importance of Twitter in todays's Internet, SalesOnlineWorld joined it today.
Twitter has emerged as a revolutionary micro blogging service that has put all others gazing at the tremendous reach it is building up in the world. If the evolution of Internet made the world into a global village, Twitter is making it more smaller with everyone knowing each other.
Terms like 'tweeps', 'tweet' and 'retweet' have already become popular among all. Tweeting is becoming part of daily routine of all the netizens. Twitter matters to all, not because it is popular but because of the people who are on it. When you consider the search marketing industry, you can find search engine gurus like Danny Sullivan from Search Engine Land, Aaron Wall of SEO Book, Matt Cutts of Google, Andy Beal of Marketing Pilgrim, Avinash Kaushik - Analytics Evangelist of Google and so on.
Regular Twitter users are also active in other media, and hence, have a great influence on the Web. Most of the frequent Twitter users are bloggers, podcasters, writers and so on. It is becoming easier and easier to publish content online using Twitter.
We thought that Twitter is giving competition only to social networking sites like Facebook, MySpace and others. But, is it trying to compete with Google as well? Lately, Twitter has entered search as well. It is possible to search in Twitter now.
Let us hope for the best in the coming days! Whatever it is, let the people and Internet win for a good cause – reviving the economy and bringing back the glory.
You can follow us on Twitter here!
Labels: aaron wall, avinash kaushik, blogging, danny sullivan, google, matt cutts, search marketing, seo book, social media optimization, twitter
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Branding - A Key Factor for Google Rankings
This is one of the hot discussions happening in the search marketing industry. It started with Google CEO Eric Schmidt commenting on cleaning up Internet which is a Cesspool referring to the content quality and abundant false information that is existing in it.
He clarified that “Brands are the solution, not the problem...Brands are how you sort out the cesspool.” It is no more the hype that need to be ranked, but if you need to increase the rank, you should improve on the relevance of your content.
Referring to this, it is now Aaron Wall of SEO Book who had come up with a detailed analysis with his own experience since he got into Search Marketing and SEO. He is explaining various aspects right from Florida update and using various findings in the past.
It is not possible to build a brand at once, as the process of brand building is quite time consuming. Other factors that can come into play include use of longtail keywords, relevancy of content and so on. It might be due to the fact that brands will retain unique content, Google is considering branding as the important factor for better search rankings.
Let us research on more aspects of search rankings by giving due consideration to pioneers in search marketing like Eric Schmidt, Aaron Wall and others.
Please share your comments!
Labels: aaron wall, branding, content writing, eric schmidt, google, google ceo, keywords, search engine optimization, search engine rankings, search marketing, seo, seo book
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Video Search Optimization and Search Marketing Strategies
Yes, growing popularity of online videos is the buzzword in today's web scenario. Internet users are watching online video content at a surprisingly higher rate than predicted earlier. Rather, awareness about producing and sharing video have increased globally in the last few years.
Video can be more effective than any other mode of communication. Moreover, it gains more importance in the Internet as the users can comment about the videos they see. The publisher can reply and get in touch with the queries of the user more interactively than in the case of conventional television audience. In order the exploit the current trend of video optimization, you should know few tips and techniques. Few of them are:
- Have keyword rich transcript and title for your videos
- Be sure to include 'video' among the keywords, as this will help you in search engine positioning
- Get referred by others or other websites (Get back links for your video from other websites)
- If you have more than one video in your website, create a sitemap of all your videos
- Ensure that you have a keyword friendly URL structure for your video in your website
- Keep a good thumbnail for your video as it the first thing that a visitor will see when trying to access your video
- Allow people to submit their comments or feedback, so that you can ensure better quality of your video
So it is going to be an era of online video coming up with video search engines like ovguide.com getting increasing popularity. It is no more just publishing videos in youtube, yahoo or google videos, it is going to be video search optimization.
Labels: google, keywords, online video, search engine rankings, search engines, search marketing, video optimization, video search, yahoo
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Are you in LOVE with Google?
I have always wondered to find an answer to this question. I have asked the same with many of my friends. I think more or less the answer from all of us will be 'Yes'.
If you need to know if you are in love with someone, you need to know how much you miss him or her when he/she is away from you. Can you ever think of waking up on a morning and accessing the web without Google? In this case, I am sure, you will miss Google badly.
This explains our love for Google. We can't imagine to live without it. Google has become a path of life for most of the people across the globe. At this time of financial crisis, not only individuals, even small and big companies are loving Google. SEO and search marketing is getting popularity and becoming one of the best alternatives for any kind of business affected by recession. Google is adding fuel to their need for more business and SEO experts are helping them out to achieve their objectives.
We are glad to know about few updates from Google. Personalized search is getting more and more better. New features are getting updated for all Google products on a regular basis. Google is getting into many more functional areas and getting ready to rule the world.
There might come a situation, when youngsters are asked about their valentine and their answer will be Google. In this context, let us celebrate this Valentine's Day!
Labels: google, personalized search, search engine optimization, search marketing, seo, valentine, valentine's day
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Rise of Personalized Search
We have seen the ups and downs of technology and businesses. The experience of modern Internet and information technology has gained much importance during the last decade and is still continuing to rule the world.
It was the era of web 2.0 that dominated over online marketing during the past few years. This is modern day revolution with rapid changes and the latest buzzword is personalized search. The search engines are transforming themselves into more user friendly, targeted and interactive than ever before. The rise of personalized search is very relevant in this context.
It is not just Google this time. Yahoo also joins the bandwagon of personalization. Google's personalized search is already out to the public from the labs and Yahoo with their 'Search Builder'. Yahoo's move gives much competition to search startups like Eurekster, Rollyo and so on, as it gives options to customize the search engines.
Google's personalized search reorders the SERP (search engine results page) based on the history of previous searches, giving more weight to content that is of interest to the user. However you need to sign in with your Gmail account to make use of this.
As the search engines are becoming more competent in finding the right results for its users, it is the user who is on the winning edge. However, it is SEO experts who are in the mode gearing up with more powerful or proactive ways of optimization. On one hand, they benefit from the fact that the users will get multiple results and will ensure quality business. They'll need to get more broad and will have to switch between personalized, local and universal search.
It is nice time coming up for the web enthusiasts, as web world is getting more interesting and focused.
Please do share your comments!
Labels: gmail, google, local search, personalized search, search builder, search engine rankings, seo, SERP, universal search, yahoo
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Removing site from Google search results
Some webmasters might be wondering if it is possible to remove the content of another website from the search listings of Google. However, this is not the case always.
Google allows the webmasters to solve the issue by consensus or mutual understanding. They ask the webmaster questioning the listing to contact the webmaster of the site which is in question.
To the contrary, Google might consider a removal request of the website from its listings in case there exist certain conditions.
The conditions in which they are problem sites or problem content can be listed as below:
- If the site is engaged in spam
- If the site is engaged in buying or selling links that pass PageRank
- If the content need to be removed from Google's index because of a copyright infringement which will need a DMCA takedown request
- If the site is infected with malware or malicious software
- If the webmaster does not make the changes after you request and the page contains your personal or private information
In all these cases you may contact Google through their URL removal tool.
We should inform Google about a URL or content from the search results, if we find any unethical SEO technique being used by the webmaster. This will ensure that all the sites in the web get equal treatment and follow professional as well as ethical methods.
Hats off to all SEO folks who follow White Hat techniques for optimization!!
Labels: google, search engine rankings, search engines, seo, SERP, webmasters
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Is “Google Dance” happening now?
"Google Dance" is the term that in the past was used to describe the ups and downs during the period that a major index update of Google search engine gets implemented. The Google database exists on many servers spread throughout the world. A large update of the Google databases can take several days. This happens in case of organic or free listings and not for sponsored or paid listings.
A Google dance is when the Google servers are out of sync with one another. Your web site could be the #2 result for your main keywords on one Google server, and the #9 result on another.
Since August 2003, the famous / infamous Google Dance is no more. Rather, it has become less dramatic. Google now performs updates every week, with most movement occurring on Mondays. These ongoing updates feature mostly minor search algorithm and index updates. Hence, it does happen even now.
There will be minor changes in rankings each month. This is because Google's bot or spider is always running and looking for new updates in the web. It also happens because the bot may have detected that a website no longer exists, and needs to be deleted from the index of Google.
At the time of dance, Google spiders will revisit each website, figure out how many sites link to it, and how many it links out to, and how valuable these links are.
Hence, let us sharpen our Search Engine Optimization efforts on a regular basis to match up with regular updates and changes to Google search algorithm. This will in turn help in mastering over the search results (SERP).
Labels: google, search engine optimization, search engine rankings, SERP
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4 SEO Tips to beat the recession
The economic slowdown has definitely brought down the businesses across the globe. But, does that mean that people won't spend or buy? Not necessarily. Customers have just wised up and think twice before spending. They put lots of research before reaching a decision. Studies reveal that Americans conducted 12 billion searches during the last month and Google accounted to about 63% of these searches. People have turned their back on the traditional marketing methods and prefer conducting researches themselves. So, how can you guarantee your brand visibility on search engines?
Here are 4 useful tips to ensure high search engine rankings for your site.
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Give relevant page titles for your pages. Make sure that you have different titles for different pages.
Start a Blog. Blogs help your SEO work in two ways. You can keep updating your website on a daily basis. Search engines love regularly updated content. Blogs also attract links. Linking your websites to other sites is a major step towards high search engine rankings.
Use good content with high keyword density on your website.
Get started with Social Media Optimization. Make use of the immense marketing potential offered by the social media.
One of the most important things about SEO is that it is a never-ending process. Keep doing the right things and business results will be just around the corner.
Labels: google, search engine optimization, seo, smo, social media optimization
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How to weather Google storm
Reading from multitude of webmaster forums, will no doubt cause you to wonder how to forecast Google's next move. With many clients on your toe, it's but natural for you to to carry this concern about how optimization can bear fruit.
With frequent changes in Google algorithm it's not a pleasant sight to see your site dancing in the search engine results page. So, how well can you weather shield from unpredictable fluctuation in Google's algorithm.
While there are many strategies you can adopt, let's explore two simple facets:
Befriend Google
Do not consider Google as your nemesis neither try to circumvent around the Google algorithms with unethical practices. Instead, take a long term approach to ensure consistent listing on Google's SERP.
The underlying fact to achieve high ranking is to base your site with quality content, good navigation and appropriate design. The bottom line is to make the site useful for your users by providing quality information and ensure increased customer interaction using web 2.0 techniques. Make use of reliable on-page and off-page techniques to bring your site on the radar of search engines.
Avoid excesses
Webmasters often commit the mistake of flooding the websites with too many SEO tactics. Apply all techniques in moderation, whether it relates to linking, content, tags, keywords density etc. Slow and steady use of all SEO activities is the sure fire way to lead up in the charts of search engines.
Closing thoughts
As an ethical webmaster, know the boundaries of overindulgence and right mix of strategies. Keep away from the “blackhat” techniques and stay firmly with “white hat” for success.
Labels: google, search engine optimization, search engine rankings, seo, SERP
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Google SERP changes revealed
Is SEO changing its focus point to Google? More and more posts and articles are circling around discussions about changes happening with Google. Does this mean Google have already taken monopoly and will play around with world wide web?
However, as it goes we are not left with any choice other than discussing about Google SERP changes. The current scenario or situation in the global web arena demands this.
Reports from various sources suggests that there are differences in huge numbers in results found on Google. For searches performed in the middle of the day, you may get 1 million results. Later in the day, the same search may find 2 million results. This may occur due to querying different datacenters (though that number is pretty large even to me). This might also happen due to capitalization issues.
Another important aspect that needs attention is that few of the indexed pages seems disappearing from the SERP. These pages were previously filtered 4-7 pages deep due to duplicate meta descriptions. This might come back if there are no major changes being done to the site.
Moreover, on page factors of SEO are becoming more relevant as compared to off-page factors. Looking forward to others reporting similar analysis.
Labels: google, search engine optimization, search engine rankings, search engines, seo, SERP
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