We've been having some discussion in the Small Business Ideas forums about Clicktracks, the analytics software that we're using in the Real Small Business, Real Big Ideas article series. To that end, the good folks over at Clicktracks have decided...
It's not often that I have cause for two blog posts about newspapers and search, but here we go... I just stumbled across a fairly surprising story from Mercury News that strongly implies that Google is paying some news sources...
Repeat after me..."outbound links are not my enemy." Now say it again...one hundred million times! I don't know who pulled that on Caroline Little, the chief of Washingtonpost.Newsweek Interactive, but apparently it's sunk in and Little has decided to join...
I've written quite a bit about the amazing increases in consumer generated media over the past year or two...especially in terms of blogs, podcasts and the self-publishing video outlets like YouTube. While corporate American and big name advertising firms seemed...
I neglected to mention that Bill Wise wrote an interesting article earlier this week for MediaPost Publications. It examines the difference in concepts between search engine "marketing" and search engine "selling". To put it more simply, Bill points out that...
Chris Garrett has a fantastic post over at Performancing today that talks about whether or not you need to be an "expert" in order to be a good blogger. He makes some good points that need to be considered by...
There's a thought-provoking article over at the Wall Street Journal (subscription required) that takes a pretty tough look at the online reality of the theories espoused in Chris Anderson's mega-hit "The Long Tail." The article features author Lee Gomes doing...
I wrote a while back about Google's plans to implement a new AdWords algorithm that would consider the "relevancy" of a landing page in determining what the minimum bid price would be for a particular PPC ad. The new system...
When it comes to PPC traffic it's important to note that generic term produces huge traffic volumes, but more specific term will cost substantially less per visitor. What Google, Yahoo, MSN et al would appear to be saying is that...
There's an interesting article over at the International Herald Tribune that talks about the different approaches being taken by Google and Yahoo! in their pursuit of search-related eyeballs. While both sites offer web search, free email services, mapping service and...
Pay per click advertisers that are concerned about click fraud rates will be pleased to hear that Google plans to expand their reporting to include more information about fraudulent clicks. According to the Google AdWords Blog, the new feature will...
$30,000 USD. A comprehensive website marketing report. 45 hours on retainer. And one extremely popular blog post. Rand Fishkin, AKA "randfish" and CEO and founder of SEOmoz, is one smart blogger. Just two days ago Fishkin laid it all out...
Thanks to the likes of Jakob Nielsen, we Internet marketers can edit and hack our clients' web copy with confidence (and often glee). Short and to the point is what most usability experts are arguing for these days. And if...
According to a recent article posted by Marketing Sherpa, "5-7% of home page visitors click through to the About Us page. Shoppers who view that page convert at a rate 30% higher than shoppers who do not see that page."...
There is an interesting thread over at Search Engine Watch Forums entitled "Blackmail by SEO" that deals with the issue of SEOs having the ability to tarnish reputations. In today's age of blogs, forums and good ol' SEO, it is...
Due to the back lashing that Business.com received during the last couple of weeks over placing the "nofollow" attribute on editorial listings but not on paid listings, they have decided to remove the links. Todd Sims who serves as Vice...
Ask has expanded their Smart Answers program with the release of RSS Smart Answers, a program that lists the last three posts from the feeds of popular blogs and news sites. The initial list was selected based on the most...
If you are an AdSense publisher and have logged into your account today, you will notice a new tab on the far right with the label "Site Diagnostics". This is a new feature that allows you to view detailed diagnostic...
Being asked to be a guest blogger at Search Engine Guide, I really didn’t get any rules or guidelines - other than - "make three posts in one day." Yeah - the three post thing was a surprise until I...
A few concepts have been bumping around lately, and it revolves around the power of the 1%, as referred to at The Church of the Customer. Many times we focus on the big groups, and overlook the individuals that can...
by Jennifer Horowitz - Imagine, rather than guessing at what to tweak on your site to improve results you can take our analysis and suggested changes and use that as a guide to improving your traffic and conversions. We can...
(Disclaimer: I've been doing some consulting/advising for this company.) There's an interesting search company out there called Optevi that's working on bringing customized search to a new level. The site works through the use of "bundles" that are basically a...
It's Dennis Hwang and he's been doodling Google's "special" logos since he signed on as an intern back in 2000. CNN.com has a fun article today that talks a little bit about Hwang's work. Readers may be surprised to learn...
Not sure if this is a good idea or not, but time will tell. USA Today reports that Yahoo! is launching a new viral marketing campaign that asks site visitors to create a 12 second video clip promoting the site's...
One of the things I always liked about Google's search results was that entering a business name and city usually resulted in quick and easy access to both a phone number and a map to the business's location. Now it...
For all the frustrated webmasters that have long lamented the fact that outdated and inaccurate DMOZ descriptions pop up with their search results on Google, there's finally a solution. Google has announced that they will honor a new meta tag...
I wrote earlier this week about the news that Google was instituting some new landing page calculations in the "Quality Score" that it uses to figure out how much AdWords advertisers will need to pay for their listings. The announcement...
News is out that KinderStart, the company that filed suit against Google after its PageRank fell to zero and it's search engine traffic dropped by some 70%, has lost the first round of its court battle against Google. KinderStart's suit...
It's only been about a month since I wrote an article explaining in simple terms just why the Google Sandbox doesn't exist. Obviously I'd love to think that a few little words from little old me could convince an entire...
This morning, I noticed quite a few provocative article titles showing up in my Google alerts and my RSS feeds. The article headlines all made the claim that a new report showed podcasts to be more popular than blogs. Obviously,...
by Casie Gillette - When Ask recently unveiled its newly updated site it surprised us with some exciting new features and brought attention to some of its older ones. One of these being a site preview tool in the form...
If you enjoy reading through information about search related patents to try and figure out what direction search is headed, then Search Engine Watch has a true treat for you this week. Search related patent expert Bill Slawski has an...
by Manoj Jasra - Having analytics in place is just half of the solution, actually using them and tailoring them to provide solid information and reasoning is what separates those on the leading edge from those on the bleeding edge....
(say that five times fast!) Jennifer Slegg reports on the new landing page quality guidelines that are being put in place by Google in order to try and squelch the ever growing "click arbitrage" industry. Basically, Google's not real happy...
For years now, my friend Matt has been saying that search engine marketing and usability are so intricately tied that they might as well be part of the same process. Turns out he's not the only one that believes this...as...
by Kim Roach - Google wants to create quality search engine results just as badly as you want to acquire high search engine rankings. Fortunately for us, Google provides web masters with plenty of guidelines and tips for building a...
In what could be taken as a slap in the face, eBay has announced that its sellers will not be allowed to offer the Google Checkout payment option to bidders on the popular auction site. eBay currently allows sellers to...
Not long after Google became the prevailing king of search, journalists, bloggers and people began using the engine's name as a verb to describe ANY online search. Google was never a very big fan of that approach, even going so...
It's bad enough to read the regular postings on discussion forums about webmasters that are upset that Google has destroyed their business due to a drop in rankings, but now the mainstream media is getting involved. An article over at...
ClickTracks' next free educational seminar is coming up next week and it actually features me as the speaker. The online seminar is titled "Who Loves You Baby?" and talks about the wide variety of ways that you can use your...
I've written time and time again about the need to stay on top of things when it comes to finding out what people are saying about your business online. I've also pointed out how essential it is for businesses to...
A new study that's been released by the research team at Outsell, Inc talks about the growing problems associated with click fraud and online advertising. The San Francisco Chronicle reports on the data and points out that internet advertisers paid...
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