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apps for local content to default.

First up, Yahoo profiles are going universal. In other words, you can manage your Yahoo profile from various Yahoo properties. The goal is to eventually be able to manage your profile from non-Yahoo sites embracing OpenSocial.

It will be nice when that happens, because I much prefer Yahoo’s minimalistic and easy-to-use profile than most social networks:

Meanwhile, Citysearch and Zagat are having their SearchMonkey apps set to default. That means all users will see their uniquely coded results (when relevant, of course) during Yahoo searches. Here’s how the Citysearch one will look:

In August, Yahoo set Yelp, LinkedIn and Yahoo Local apps to default.

Source: feeds.searchenginewatch.com

FCC Chairman Kevin Martin in Favor of Freeing Up White Space TV Spectrum

FCC Chairman Kevin Martin is in favor of freeing up the “white spaces” in the tv spectrum between television stations. While concerns over interference have been made by some groups, testing has not shown that to be a problem. As Techdirt points out, the complications found in testing were from failed devices, not interference.

Martin is seeking a vote from the full commission on the matter as early as November 4th, which just so happens to be another important election day.

Related Reading:
Google to Internet, FCC, Verizon and Viacom: Keep it Open
Google Joins the “Internet for Everyone” Initiative

Source: feeds.searchenginewatch.com

Move Over George Soros Google Wants To Play In the Forex Space

Seems legendary investor George Soros, who supposedly made a billion dollars trading on the foreign currency exchange, will have some competition from Google as they are now hedging against fluctuating currency exchange rates by investments in the forex market.

Cnet reports that Google has invested over $80 million dollars in forex trading hedges to offset the strengthening dollar against the global currencies many of their advertisers are paying them in.

Given that 51% of Google’s revenue comes from outside the United States, many large advertisers are given credit in their own currency which could be worth less at the time they actually pay Google.

The value of the US dollar against the euro, Canadian dollar and the British pound has increased substantially in recent weeks, thus Google gets less US dollars when someone pays them. The actual value of the clicks is done in US dollars at the base of the calculations, so Google advertisers get to pay less than what they would if there was just one currency used in the actual bidding.

Maybe the brothers Google want to emulate Soros who was part of the Google Author series that had CEO Eric Schmidt as part of the presentation.

His Wikipedia entry about his currency speculation profits may be alluring to the Google founders who have shown a penchant for aggressive investments into a number of markets.

“On Black Wednesday (September 16, 1992), Soros became immediately famous when he sold short more than $10 billion worth of pounds, profiting from the Bank of England’s reluctance to either raise its interest rates to levels comparable to those of other European Exchange Rate Mechanism countries or to float its currency.

Finally, the Bank of England was forced to withdraw the currency out of the European Exchange Rate Mechanism and to devalue the pound sterling, and Soros earned an estimated US$ 1.1 billion in the process. He was dubbed “the man who broke the Bank of England.”

Be careful guys, it is a highly volatile market and we wouldn’t want you to lose money.

Source: feeds.searchenginewatch.com

Forum: Search Engine Articles Posted By: SEO Chat Post Time: September 2nd, 2008 at 9:00:46 am discover more seo….

Have you ever been around a friend who points out a flaw about themselves and you say, “I would never have noticed that if you hadn’t pointed it out?”

Google is doing the same thing sans flaws.

On the Official Google Blog, Ben Gomes explains that sometimes Google’s search experiments are very subtle. They’ll test things like white space in the search results or how big the plus box should be next to a stock quote link.

The differences among the options being tested are very difficult to detect without being told what’s going on. But the results of tests show that even a small number of pixels can make a big difference. For example, it could mean the difference between a searcher spending a lot of time on one search result - and not necessarily the first one - or a searcher being able to scan the results more easily. And then Google has to decide which is better.

All in all, Google’s search experiments are not always about the alogorithm. What do you think of these experiments? Leave your thoughts in the comments!

Related Reading:
Google News Testing Updates
Google Testing Time Elements In Search Results
Google Testing Expandable “More Google” Links On Home Page & More

discover more seo….

Search marketers deal with landing pages everyday in their work, but not all landing pages are created for paid search campaigns. Many landing pages, or sometimes entire sites are created for offline advertising on television, radio, and magazine ads.

Should these landing pages be tested as well? I talked to Google Website Optimizer’s Tom Leung to get his thoughts on how testing can influence offline campaigns.

Leung said there are two ways that tools like Website Optimizer can be used in offline campaigns:

1. As already mentioned, to test landing pages created for traffic coming in from offline ad campaigns.
2. Using paid search or display ad campaigns to make informed decisions on creatives designed for offline ad campaigns.

The second point really got my attention. Leung expanded by saying that SEM’s can use landing page testing as a “bargaining chip to get a seat at the table with other marketers in your organization.”

This information gained from testing is highly useful to marketers planning offline campaigns. As a search marketer, you can use testing and analytics tools to be the one in their department or agency who knows the most about a target audience. That knowledge is highly useful to your colleagues, and can help you work more as an integrated team.

Even though offline and online campaigns can generate interest from consumers with different expectations, at the very least, testing can rule out things that don’t work. An image, text, or highlighted feature that just doesn’t resonate can be discovered through landing page testing. Marketers can test these factors in a paid search or other online ad test, and use the results to develop creatives for offline ads.

Online ad tests can also be used in advance of an offline-to-web ad campaign.

For offline traffic driven to landing pages, you can use those preliminary tests to narrow down the number of landing page options for the initial traffic driven from the offline ad. When the offline traffic begins to arrive (and you’re expecting enough traffic to run a test), you can test the first visitors. You don’t want to test more than 1 page per 100 conversions. Multivariate testing should generally be reserved for large, national campaigns.

WiderFunnel Marketing used Website Optimizer for Tourism BC’s TV-to-Web ad campaign for HelloBC.com. According to a published case study, the campaign targeted the Los Angeles and San Francisco markets. Tourism BC experienced a 52% conversion rate (filling out a web form), up 7% from the previous year.

Even though search marketing has been gaining ground for years, SEMs still may find themselves struggling to lend their insight to traditional marketing methods that have been around for decades. Landing page testing is not just a must for SEMs in their own work but can be a strength to participate in the greater strategy at hand.

What do you think about landing page testing and integrating marketing campaigns? Let me know your thoughts in the comments.

discover more seo….

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Ciao also includes consumer reviews and ratings with its search results. They boast a multimillion-user-strong online community and see more than 26.5 million unique visitors per month across seven countries. So far, more than 5 million product reviews have been generated.

Ciao joins Farecast, FAST, and Powerset in Microsoft’s portfolio of search-related acquisitions for 2008.

Ciao s success has been led by a team of talented people who took a unique combination of intuitive technology and the insight that comes out of their passionate consumer community to become one of Europe s leading shopping comparison sites, said John Mangelaars, vice president, Consumer and Online, Microsoft Europe, Middle East and Africa. This makes the company a fantastic asset to the future of our search offer. Integrating Ciao s capabilities into Live Search will provide a strong launchpad for our commercial search offer in Europe and enhance our e-commerce offering on MSN.

Source: feeds.feedburner.com

Google’s Search Experiments are Sometimes Subtle

Have you ever been around a friend who points out a flaw about themselves and you say, “I would never have noticed that if you hadn’t pointed it out?”

Google is doing the same thing sans flaws.

On the Official Google Blog, Ben Gomes explains that sometimes Google’s search experiments are very subtle. They’ll test things like white space in the search results or how big the plus box should be next to a stock quote link.

The differences among the options being tested are very difficult to detect without being told what’s going on. But the results of tests show that even a small number of pixels can make a big difference. For example, it could mean the difference between a searcher spending a lot of time on one search result - and not necessarily the first one - or a searcher being able to scan the results more easily. And then Google has to decide which is better.

All in all, Google’s search experiments are not always about the alogorithm. What do you think of these experiments? Leave your thoughts in the comments!

Related Reading:
Google News Testing Updates
Google Testing Time Elements In Search Results
Google Testing Expandable “More Google” Links On Home Page & More

Source: feeds.feedburner.com

SEW Experts: For Local Search, It’s All About the Online-Offline Gap

Though search volume continues to rise and capture a growing percentage of product research, more than 95 percent of actual purchase behavior in the U.S. still takes place offline. In today’s vertical search column, “For Local Search, It’s All About the Online-Offline Gap,” local search expert Michael Boland explains that the need to bridge the gap between the online and offline worlds is a key issue in local search.

» Full story

Source: feeds.feedburner.com

SEW Experts: Get Links Now: Make a Difference, Make Connections

Want to solve the link building riddle? Stop thinking about money and start thinking about something bigger. In today’s link building column, “Get Links Now: Make a Difference, Make Connections,” Sage Lewis shows you how getting outside of your own little world can expand your horizons, as well as your link portfolio.

» Full story

Source: feeds.feedburner.com

For years we have been using the title of the article in the Alt tag and the title of the images in our articles. Does anyone see a problem with that discover more seo….

Have you ever been around a friend who points out a flaw about themselves and you say, “I would never have noticed that if you hadn’t pointed it out?”

Google is doing the same thing sans flaws.

On the Official Google Blog, Ben Gomes explains that sometimes Google’s search experiments are very subtle. They’ll test things like white space in the search results or how big the plus box should be next to a stock quote link.

The differences among the options being tested are very difficult to detect without being told what’s going on. But the results of tests show that even a small number of pixels can make a big difference. For example, it could mean the difference between a searcher spending a lot of time on one search result - and not necessarily the first one - or a searcher being able to scan the results more easily. And then Google has to decide which is better.

All in all, Google’s search experiments are not always about the alogorithm. What do you think of these experiments? Leave your thoughts in the comments!

Related Reading:
Google News Testing Updates
Google Testing Time Elements In Search Results
Google Testing Expandable “More Google” Links On Home Page & More

discover more seo….

Is it better to have abbreviated folders where there is not much value in the ‘folder term’ ? I can’t decide based on this business and the results gi discover more seo….