Why can't we all just get online?

According to a recent report from PEW Internet 73% of americans are now online, which is up substantially from 66% last year. Broadband access is up even more--at 42% compared to 29% in 2005.

Glad you all could join us.

Google Notifying webmasters of penalties

Matt Cutts explains that Google is trying to do more in terms of actually notifying webmasters when they do stuff that Google considers a no-no. He says they won't bother letting obvious spammers know when they've crossed the line, but they will notify innocent-seeming offenders so they can correct the problem. I see this as a very good step in the right direction. It will hopefully take some of they mystery and fear out of the SEO process for many webmasters.

Webmaster-Talk.com SEO Contest

SEO competitions are a dime a dozen these days, so maybe that's why I somehow missed hearing aboutthe Webmaster-Talk.com SEO Contest that officially started April 3, and goes through September 1, 2006. I like the idea of promoting charities along with it...I don't really have time for contests like this, though.

I'd really like to see one of these contests with like a $500K prize or a million bucks. I think you'd get a lot more participation with something like that, and it would be a heck of a lot harder to get that top spot.

Google Juice Article

Anyone thirsty for a little Google Juice? from a Washington Post article. Nothing really earth-shattering here. Good publicity for v7n.com, though. I like to link to these articles in the bigger mainstream media outlets because it's interesting to read an outsider's perspective and it's also good for the biz to get the word out about SEO.

Yahoo Shows More Ads than Google

Yahoo Catching Google Where It Hurts - The 360 - reporting on recently release data from comScore qSearch that shows 59.7% of Yahoo searches display ads, compared to 52.9% of Google's searches. Actual volume is a different story, of course, with Google serving up 322 million clicks in March, and Yahoo only 180 million clicks.

Google Testing User Interface Changes

Google has confirmed rumors that they are testing some changes to the user interface.

Why Marketers Need to Take Search Seriously

From Advertising Age

What's missing in most marketing plans involving TV commercials? A search component.

That's what I've been saying for years...but it's nice to see some of the "traditional" ad rags finally talking up search like this.

Most Popular Words on the Web

Blogoscoped has a list of the Web's most popular words. It's pretty much a useless list in terms of SEO, but it's interesting to see what the most commonly used words are on the web. Also very intersting is the list of gainers over the past 3 years.

Steve Berkowitz Leaves Ask.com to head up MSN's online business group

Danny Sullivan Reports on Steve Berkowitz's move from Ask.com to MSN.

Linking Building Campiagns by Eric Ward

Everyone should do what Eric Ward did and make their presentations avaialable online. Eric gives a good overview and offers a unique take on link building. Eric's been doing this link thing since way before it was cool. He didn't care about SEO when he started in the biz and in a a lot of ways, he still doesn't care about SEO when he's getting links. The irony is, by not focusing so much on SEO, I bet he actually achieves better results in the search engines than 99.9% of SEOs out there. That's the beauty of links.

Fifty Ways to Take Notes

I have to admit, even though I'm a certifiable geek, I'm a true luddite when it comes to taking notes. For some reason I can't give up the old yellow note pads. I really need to check out these 50 simple ways of taking notes on the computer:

read more | digg story

What's Your Entrepreneurial IQ

If you're wondering if you've got what it takes to be an entrepreneur, you should take the Entrepreneur Test from Entrepreneur Next Door. It's kind of a long test (9 pages) but it goes quick and if you've got 15 minutes to kill, why not? I don't put a lot of stock in these types of tests, but if nothing else, it will get you thinking about some of the traits you might need to successfully start and build a business.

Marketing to Hispanics Online (Part 2 of 2)

Nacho Hernandez offers some excellent information about reaching a hispanic market online. He emphasizes the importance of SEO in reaching this audience.

WebmasterWorld PubCon 2006 & SES Japan

PubCon and SES Japan are both happening this week. I obviously didn't make it to either of them, but I try to keep up with what attendees are saying about the sessions on their blogs. Danny Sullivan posted a list of sites covering the conferences. Unfortunately, SERoundtable didn't go to PubCon this time. They're usually the best source for conference coverage. They promise to be at PubCon Las Vegas, though (coming up in Nov.).

Who is the Next American Idol? Ask the Search Engines

From the Hitwise blog - shows search the search trends of this year's American Idol contestants. Of course, search volume does not always equate to actual votes, so who knows who will actually win. At the time of the blog post, Kellie Pickler was in the lead.

Competition for Brand Name Searches

I think many companies figure people will automatically find their website if they search for their brand name. In actuality, this isn't always the case. Natural search often reveals many competing sites and the PPC search engines' keyword bidding policies often allow competitors to bid on your company and other brand names.

I just got an email from Hitwise that gives some numbers to back this up.

From the Hitwise email:

Hitwise has released the Hitwise Search Brand Management White Paper, which is based on analysis done in February 2006 among 30 leading online brands in the Travel, Retail, and Business & Finance categories defining best practices for search engine brand management and tracking brand strength online. As today’s users are increasingly searching by brand name, these results often end with a brand’s competitors among the first sponsored results.

One of the paper’s key findings shows that an average of 85 percent of brand name searches resulted in a visit to one of the brand owner’s websites. The remaining 15 percent of visits went to competitors, affiliates and price comparison websites, underscoring the importance of managing your brand through search online.

Hitwise Research also shows that Internet users are increasingly searching by brand – 75 of the top 100 search terms across all categories in February 2006 contained brand names, an increase of 17 percent versus February 2005.

Do you know who's competing for your brand name?

Utah Blogger List

This list of Utah bloggers looks strangely familiar...I have a hunch this was the original list.

Utah Valley Movers and Shakers - who me?

I have no idea what the special offers bulletin board is, but nonetheless, I was glad to see I made it onto this list of Utah Valley bloggers. A couple of the bloggers listed aren't actually based in Utah Valley, but it's a good idea, anyway. I was thinking about putting together a list of Utah bloggers as part of my off and on series of Utah-related lists. Still may do it someday if I ever get time. I've got to add some of these people to my daily dose of rss...several new ones I hadn't heard of before...not a lot of ladies on the blogroll. I guess most women in Utah aren't geeky enough to blog, is that it? Or maybe they're too busy actually doing stuff to blog about it like us.

Why Peel Your Butt Off the Couch If You Don't Absolutely Have to?

Has anybody else noticed that there are two huge trends competing for my attention these days. There is the healthy living trend, which is seen by all the fad diets, organic foods, health food stores, nutritional supplements, etc. Then there's the couch potato trend--the one that offers more and more conveniences so that I don't have to actually pick my lazy butt off the couch unless it's absolutely necessary. Lately, I feel like my inner couch potato is winning the battle.

Case in point: I just moved to a new house, so I signed a new contract with Dish Network. By getting a new contract, I was able to upgrade to the new dual receiver DVR. What's that? Well, it's the Tivo-like digital video recorder that allows you to record television shows, pause live TV, rewind and watch your favorite scenes in slow mo...all that good stuff. Anyway, I had one of the single TV DVRs before, and I absolutely loved it, but it was annoying when I wanted to pause or rewind something on my other TV because it only worked on the one television.

I was thinking about buying another one, but I've been holding out because I didn't want to have to shell out a ocuple hundred bucks. This new one lets me watch and record my shows while the kiddos are recording Barbie Swan Lake or whatever tickles their fancy. Plus it's technically one reciever, so I don't have to pay a second receiver fee each month. How sweet is that?

To top it off, since it's plugged into the phone line, this thing will show me who's calling right there on the TV, so I can decide if I need to even bother pausing the show to go pick up the phone. Now if I could just get one of these that would give me a footrub and make me a chocholate milkshake, I'd be set.

In case you're wondering, no, this doesn't really have anything to do with search marketing, although they do have a pretty cool search function built into this DVR that lets you search for shows by keyword. I think we'll continue to see more of this type of built in search funtionality in media products and services in the future.

Going back to my first thought about the two competing trends...I don't have any data to back this up, but I bet there are some pretty big players in the liesure and convenience market that also have businesses offering weight loss and health-related businesses. First they cause obesity by giving us the tools to become lazy slobs, then they give us the tools to get back in shape. It's all some wacked out conspiracy!

Online Searches Precipitate Offline Buying

I think it's easy for online marketers to forget that many customers search for product and pricing information online, then go down to the local mall or department store to actually make the purchase. Too impatient to wait for it to ship, I guess.

MediaPost Reports:

A recently released comScore research study confirms the importance of search influence of offline buying. 63 percent of searchers completed a purchase in offline retail stores following their search activity, while 25 percent of searchers purchased an item directly related to their query, with more than 1/3 of them buying online. The study reflects the searching behavior of 83 million Americans who conducted more than 552 million searches in 2005 in the categories analyzed using one or more of the 24 leading search engines.

Also,

More than 80 percent of buyer conversions occurred offline in categories such as Consumer Electronics, Toys & Hobbies, Video Games and Consoles, and Music/Movies/Videos.

And

This study found that more than half of consumers' online holiday buying actually happened in subsequent Internet sessions, clearly demonstrating the strong latent impact of search.

Cool.

Check out the press release from ComScore for more info.

Google Calendar Reviewed

As I mentioned in my last post, I wasn't too impressed with Google Calendar at first glance, but everyone else seems to love this thing. There's a good review of Google Calendar on The Unofficial Google Weblog. I use Outlook's calendar, which I have tried syncing with Yahoo's in the past, but really I don't even use Outlook's calendar function all that much. Brad has used Yahoo's calendar for a long time, so he's a lot more qualified than I am to know a good online calenar system when he sees one and he loves Google's.

Google Calendar goes live

After weeks (or was it months) of speculation, Google Calendar is finally live. I logged in late last night after I noticed the post on ZDNet. It looks like just about every other online calendar app out there. Nothing special that I noticed, but this is Google, you know, the company who specializes in simple efficiency.

Check out Google Calendar (you can login with your Google account)

Online Marketing in China

I've always been fascinated with the idea of online marketing in China for some reason. I don't speak Chinese, never been to China, don't even know very many Chinese people. I guess the allure is partially the unknown of it all as well as the huge market oppportunity that exists due to the sheer size of the Chinese population. I just read this article on MarketingSherpa.com with some good info about marketing online to a Chinese audience.

They list the following as the biggest players in China:

o Baidu –The number one search engine in China, according to Alexa, and Google’s main competitor. The NASDAQ listed company went public nine months ago.

o Sina, NetEase, Sohu– Top tier portals (and NASDAQ listed) that deliver online games, advertising, and mobile value added services (MVAS).

o China.com, Tom.com, and Allyes.com – Recognized brands in China with niche markets. China.com, for example, serves Chinese professionals.

o QQ/Tencent – Also known at “2Q,” QQ delivers online messaging services.

o Alibaba – The company assumed responsibility for Yahoo! China in 2005 and who runs the successful Chinese auction site (and eBay competitor) TaoBao and escrow payment service Alipay.


I found it interesting when it talked about a gaming portal that is available in over 20,000 Internet cafes in China. Do we even have 20,000 Internet cafes in the U.S.? I kind of doubt it. We have little place we like to access the 'net called the privacy of our own home. Lots of other very interesting demographic and psychographic background info on China. If you have an interest in marketing to China, you need to check out that article.

Another interesting quote from the article:
China, rather than imitating the US search model, is pioneering a whole new way to search. China’s search model is building on technology and community – both of which are very important here in China.

And last, but not least (in case you're hoping to make a few quick bucks in China):
Don’t underestimate the Chinese and their sophistication. It is very difficult to make money in China – so you have to market smart to achieve success.

Vote for Your Favorite Search Engine Blog

SearchEngineFeeds.com is having a poll to see what people's favorite search engine blogs are. go there and vote. Yes, I'm on there, but no, I didn't vote for myself. I think there are a lot of better blogs than this one (although I'm getting better)...you can vote for me if you want, or vote for one of the others. All the big ones are on there along with a ton I've never even heard of. As of right now, there aren't a lot of votes in, but the Beanstalk Blog is in the lead. It's a decent blog, but I have a feeling they recuited all those votes because it's not as good as many of the other blogs t there. I voted for Todd Mailicoat's Stuntdubl, because I've enjoyed his posts lately, although there are a lot of other great SEO blogs that could have gotten my vote. I have a feeling nobody ever visits that searchenginefeeds site anyway, but I got the email from them so I thought I'd put in my vote.

SEO for Journalists

This New York Times article talks about how journalists are starting to pay attention to SEO. The truth is, search optimized titles are better for the users because they tell us what the heck the article is about, so everyone benefits. I think news organizations need to balance the whole keyword s in headline thing with some creative headlines on some articles, but overall, it's a good idea to include relevant keywords in titles and headlines.

Yahoo Copies Google (again)

According to a report from Forbes.com, Yahoo is set to test a new algorithm for their sponsored search ads that factors in relevance in addition to max bid price to determine ad placement. It's not clear from the Forbes article exactly what that means, but Yahoo should be making the official announcement very soon.

John Battelle's Interview with Gary Flake

John Battelle interviewed Gary Flake from Microsoft's research labs. Gary makes some very insightful comments about the industry and is very candid about Microsoft's current position and the room there is for improvement.

The Missing Element in Search Engine Marketing...creativity?

Robin Nobles says creativity is the missing link in search marketing...while I think that could be true to a certain extent for many search engine marketers, I've seen some very creative ideas and sites coming from SEOs over the past 8-plus years I've been in the industry. There are a lot of copycats, but there are also a lot of innovative, creative ideas that pop up every day.

Online Traffic School

I got a speeding ticket a couple weeks ago. I should have known better...it was a street that is notorious for having cops lurking around, but I was tried and just trying to get home. Anyway, they now offer the option to do traffic school online. The dumb thing cost me $65, and it is kind of a silly thing, but it was sure a lot more convenient than having to go down to the courthouse or whatever to sit through the course. I was able to do it late at night and since you just need 70% on the test to pass, it's easy enough to pass the quizes and tests without even reading the material. I have to go to the dentist today, I wish there were a way to go to the dentist online.

Is Click Fraud Really That Bad?

A great post about click fraud over on SEOMoz this is actually part 2 in the series (see part 1). This guy talked to some of the guys from the "underground web" that are acutally making a lot of money from very questionable practices as search engine and contextual ad affiliates. I've been interested in the topic of click fraud for quite a while, and just today we had an incident where a client's YSM account racked up a ton of clicks for a single keyword that had previously not been clicked on. The results of the traffic: zero sales. Hmmm...smells like click fraud to me. Yahoo is supposed to be investigating, but chances are they'll come back and say it was valid traffic. I'm anxious to read the next posts in this series.

The Real Simpsons intro video

I'm really not a big Simpsons fan, especially since I have kids and don't want them picking up on Bart's bad habits, but I just saw a funny live action version of the famous Simpsons intro.

Check it out:

Best ecomXpo speaker so far - Bryan Eisenberg

I've always been impressed with Bryan Eisenberg from Future Now. When it comes to improving conversion rates--persuasion marketing--he's the expert. I'm listening to a presentation by Bryan right now at the ecomexpo and once again, I'm impressed. He has some great real-life examples, and gives good insight into what it takes to improve your conversion rates. He says we should focus on these three questions:

1. What action do we want the customer to take?
   
2. Who are we trying to persuade to take action?
   
3. What does that person need to feel confident taking the desired action?
   

In the Q/A he reiterated that you need to give them exactly what they're looking for with your PPC landing pages, or people will back out quickly. You need to be sure to leave the "scent" of the keywords or info that they are expecting based on their search keywords.

Self-Parking Cars Coming To U.S.

I'm full of weird new gadget ideas today, I know, but check this one out that I just saw on Slashdot -- a self-parking car. I guess it basically parallel parks fo r you while you sit there and twiddle your thumbs. Kind of cool, except if I had a car as tiny as that, I woudn't have any problems parallel parking, especially since I live and work in a place where I very rarely have to parellel park. Cool concept though.

rsstroom reader - toilet paper printer

Yeah, I need one of these. My wife might even let me since it detects who's sitting on the throne based on the weight of the person sitting there, she could get her celeb gossip news and I could keep up with the latest in search marketing while I have a little time to ponder.

This has to be fake, and yes, I'm a geek for wanting one of these.

E-Com Expo - virtual tradeshow for search marketers and affiliate marketing

You may already be aware, but the E-com Expo started yesterday. It's an online "virtual tradeshow" for search marketing and affiliate marketing types. I think it's a good idea since most affiliates don't attend real world conferences. I've done the ecomexpo in the past and was always able to pick up a few new ideas and make a few connections.

I popped in for a minute yesterday, but didn't have a lot of time to stick around. I don't know if I'll have much time today, either, but if you're interested and haven't already registered (free) you might want to check it out:

www.ecomxpo.com/freepass01

Mickey Mouse Misses the Mark

What's up with everybody dissing on search lately? The latest report is from Gord Hotchkiss from the OMMA conference in Hollywood. He talks about some VP dude from ABC/Disney that totally slams search as an advertising medium.

Here's an excerpt:

First of all, other than the introduction, ABC was barely mentioned. It was the Disney banner that Cheng unfurled and praised for its long standing dedication to quality content. And he then reminded us that this same quality content is not cheap to produce, then proceeded to take a swipe at the search engines. He took exception to the engines seeking to monetize that content through aggregation and disintermediation, echoing a sentiment common with almost all creators of content. But rather than just leave it there, Cheng went on to say that advertising presented by search engines can never hope to be as effective as advertising presented on video.

Read the full article

Analytics: Forget about unique visitors, Visits is where it's at

It seems like everyone's talking about "unique visitors" these days as the end all be all when it comes to web analytics. It's interesting to read Matt Belkin's comments on the subject. He recommends scrapping that stat for the more reliable visits number. He includes several reasons for this but basically his argument is that visits is a more accurate representation of actual site traffic. This is very interesting, especially coming from a guy in the web analytics industry. Matt works for Omniture, a local company here in Utah, but also a very big player in the web analytics industry. He makes some good points. I think it makes a lot of sense to focus more on the number of total visits to your site, although unique visitors figures can be helpful in certain situations, as long as the exact meaning of unique visitors is defined and you understand the inherent inaccuracies involved.

Read Matt's full article

Yip Yips Meet the Computer

I loved watching Sesame Street as a kid. Heck, I still love watching, although it's a lot different than I remember when I was younger. I liked the old version better. Some of my favorite characters were the weird Yip Yips.

Hillarious!

Google Romance - contextual dating April Fools Joke from Google

When it comes to April Fools' day, Google never lets down its loyal fans. This year they launched Google Romance, a "contextual dating" service.

Here's an excerpt from the press release:

"Our mission, as you might have heard, is to organize the world's information," said Jonathan Rosenberg, Google's senior vice president, product management. "And let's face it: in what area of life is the world's information more disorganized than romance? We thought we could use our search technology to help you find that special someone, then send you on a date and use contextual ads to help you, ya know - close the deal."

Google Romance users who find one another via Soulmate Search™ may then select the Contextual Dating option, which offers an all-expenses-paid romantic evening in exchange for viewing contextually relevant advertising throughout the course of the users' date. "Our internal projections say Contextual Dating is going to be unbelievably huge, just a total cash cow," said Google CEO Eric Schmidt in prepared remarks placed into the notes section of an executive PowerPoint presentation and intended solely for internal use but promptly leaked onto the web and then roundly mocked on Digg and Slashdot. The product, a beta release currently residing on Google Labs, can be experimented with at www.google.com/romance/.

The funny thing is, I wouldn't be surprised to see Google come out with a dating service. They've dabbled in everything else, so why not dating? This one's obviously not the real deal, but someday, who knows?

Be sure to check out the product tour to catch the funniest parts of this whole thing.