SEO WORLD NEWS

Posted by rebecca

I hate MySpace, but then again, so does most everyone else. It’s not news or anything, but it’s just after Christmas and posting is light lately, so I thought I’d get this out of the way before the new year hits and Rand’s bugging me to put up actual, relevant posts.

Anyway, I created an account a few years ago, and within the last year I’ve been letting my account awkwardly hang out by the punch bowl while I make out in a corner with Facebook. Today I logged in for the first time in eons, and I was so frustrated with the experience that I felt the need to share it with my other MySpace-haterz. So, in no particular order, here are things that I hate about MySpace:

1. It takes eons to load anything. What the crap? I have a cable modem, and it feels like I’m back in 1999 trying to download an Our Lady Peace song on a dialup connection. Why the heck does it take forever to load anything on MySpace? I was trying to load a user’s image, for crying out loud, and it went something like this:
   • Click on "Album"
   • Click on first photo
   • Wait
   • Refresh
   • Wait
   • FIrst photo loads
   • Click on photo to see second photo
   • Wait
   • Wait
   • Wait
   • Click "Refresh" eighteen times
   • Blank page loads
   • Raise fists towards the heavens and curse the visual STD that is MySpace
2. Every 3rd click brings up some "internal error." It’s ridiculous.

   

3. Photo albums don’t give you a "Image 1 of x" status, so I click aimlessly through someone’s album until I realize that I’ve rounded the bend and am 1/3 through it again.
4. I don’t receive any more emails notifying me when I have a new friend request, new comment, or new anything. I understand that it’s a ploy to get you to log in regularly to see if you’ve gotten anything new, but I don’t do that because I largely hate the site, so unless I get some sort of heads up ("Hey Rebecca, we know you hate our site, but your friend just posted a comment so maybe you want to take a looksee"), I’ll continue to only log in once every few months to spy on folks I went to high school with (which is the only semi-useful thing MySpace is good for).
5. It’s made a half-ass attempt to emulate Facebook while still looking as ugly as Michael Douglas between facelifts. I’ve noticed that MySpace has added "Friend Updates" and the ability to tag people in photos, but it feels slapped together and is still wedged between blinking ads, AdSense, crappy featured profiles, and other nausea-inducing atrocities.
6. I’m in my extended network? If I look at my profile page, it says "rebecca is in your extended network." Uh, yeah, I know that because I’m Rebecca, and that profile you’re showing me is actually mine. Meanwhile, Facebook is smart enough to know when you’re looking at your own profile, and thus it personalizes your profile page with things like "What are you doing right now?", "View photos of me," etc.
7. All of the junk I don’t care about is front and center on my profile page. To the left is my profile picture, and to the right is a huge ad, "Cool new videos," a "Featured Profile," and "MySpace Links" I don’t give a rat’s ass about. There’s also "Sponsored Links" and a "Featured on Myspace: Comedy," all on my page. This kind of feels like MySpace’s page that they’re graciously allowing me to use a teeny part of. I will acknowledge that I use the "classic" view (the "new home skin" isn’t much better–it looks like a cheap Facebook knockoff and shoves all of the ads and crap to the left column) because I don’t give a damn about customizing my profile, seeing as how all of the "customized" profiles adrift in the MySpace Sea are akin to loud, obnoxious, fuschia colored, blinking Christmas light-adorned party cruises, while mine is a boring but smooth-sailing and sturdy rowboat.
8. The "New birthdays!" notification basically shows me any and all birthdays, past, present, and future, within a half-month radius. Today it showed me Scott’s birthday, which was about 10 days ago, CK Chung’s birthday, which was December 12, and my friend Kevin’s birthday, which was December 11. It wouldn’t surprise me if my friends are getting a "New birthday!" notification informing them that mine is just around the corner on August 6th.

I’d post more complaints, but frankly this site isn’t worth any more of my time. I know that some of you will undoubtedly post in the comments various ways I can fix #4 or how I can tweak #7 or whatever, but while I could feasibly fix a couple of these things on my own, the bulk of it is MySpace’s offense, and it’s really infuriating that they put out a sloppy service and aren’t on the ball about making positive changes to their site’s look, functionality, and user experience. I don’t care how many people use MySpace or how successful it is right now–I think they could really stand to improve their site if they want to retain even more of a userbase.

Oh, and I’m sorry for ranting, but someone emailed me a while back and complained to me that 1/10 of my posts are of a negative or complaining nature, and I thought "Hmm, that’s only 10%. Surely I can keep that going." So, in order to meet my internal quota, here’s the negative post. Happy Friday, everyone!

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Posted by great scott!

Well folks, Christmas is past but we’re here with the gift that keeps on giving: Another installment of Whiteboard Friday! To round out our last episode of 2007, we brought our good friend and search industry celebrity, Vanessa Fox, into Whiteboard studios to talk about Vertical Search (or Search 3.0, if you will).

Vertical, Blended, Shaken, Stirred…however you like your search results mixed, this aspect is one that is becoming increasingly more important in our industry. As the engines work harder to integrate results, it offers tremendous opportunities (and challenges) in getting different content media for the same site to rank for target terms.

In the video, Vanessa and Rand discuss the results they found at the different engines for the search "britney videos" (no, I haven’t bothered to ask). The screencaps below the videos show the difference in the results offered up by Google and Ask, respectively. As you’ll see, Ask is way more integrated (in fact, blended results seem to be their primary marketing focus), whereas Google suffers a bit, despite the presence of non-thumbnail YouTube links in the SERP.  Vanessa also mentions that the engines are all integrating their results because - while us savvy folk know to click the Image or Video or Shopping tabs to find targeted content - average users don’t even acknowledge the existence of specialized search tabs.

Without further ado, here’s the video (broken into two parts because YouTube will not hook me up with an account that allows segments over 10 minutes long).

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Posted by rebecca

It’s time for another roundup! This week was a bit slow going due to the holidays, but nevertheless there were still some happenings throughout the web. Oh, and every week I’ll be sure to also include what happened the Friday and Saturday before the start of the new week; otherwise, those days will slip through the cracks.

That being said…

New editions to the SEOmoz Marketplace:

Featured job postings:

• SEO product manager, SEM planner, and search marketing specialist for All Star Directories in Seattle, WA

Featured companies:

• Asia SEO Guru
• Comet Conversion
• Alliance Search Marketing

Featured resumes:

• Yelena Shapiro
• Jay Kaplan
• Sivaprasad Gunji

New events added to the Events Calendar:

• OMCAR 2008

Stories, news, and other notable items from the past week:

• The NY Times has a piece about how blogging is a low-cost, high return marketing tool. While I agree with the article stating that blogging isn’t suited for everyone, I disagree that it’s not recommended for the majority of businesses out there. I think that, with a good writer, any industry or business can have a blog. Many blog readers and Linkerati elite are thirsty for information–just look at some of the random stuff that gets on Digg. Yes, tons of blogs are technology-laden, but there are still plenty of niche blogs that do well because they offer a clever twist or certain insight that makes them unique.
  
• Barry Schwartz reports that Sam’s Club offers search engine optimization services on their website. No words on whether you have to buy a 24-pack of SEO, or if it’s located between the bulk spam aisle and the free sample lady. (Get it? A spam joke! Gimme a break, I’m still recovering from the holidays.)
  
• Over at Search Engine Land, Vanessa Fox takes a look at each search engine’s webmaster support forums. It’s a general runthrough of what each engine offers, what topics they discuss, how long they’ve been around, and all that good stuff.
  
• Rand and Vanessa were on the Good Karma show on Webmaster Radio. Here’s a link to her post on Vanessa Fox Nude, and also a link to the .mp3 format if you want to give it a listen (I recommend curling up in front of a fire with a blanket and a mug of hot chocolate while listening to the soothing sounds of the Fishkin and the Fox as they chat about nerdy SEO stuff).
  
• Quantcast put out a list of the U.S.’s top 100 websites, along with whether or not each site accepts advertising on it. I’m amazed that Geocities is still ranked highly (at #39)–insert animated .gif/frames joke here.
  
• Advertising online is still a fairly unknown prairie, so it’s interesting to find out that this study deduced that ads in online shows work better than ads on TV. This is exciting news for all of us advertisers out there who have to repeatedly explain to our friends and relatives that we do "marketing, but online" and then have to watch their eyes glaze over.
  
• For all you Americans out there, the United States is expected to hit a population of over 303 million by January of ‘08. Also, Nevada is the fastest growing state. Can you say Viva, vivaaaaa Nevadaaaaaa!
  
• Read Write Web has a great list of 36 startup tips. Though a lot of them may seem basic, the fact that the list is so comprehensive and covers all of the bases, from general things that you may forget to other aspects that you might not have even thought about, warrants this post a hefty five moz stars. Anyone considering venturing off and forming a startup should peruse this checklist of helpful hints.
  
• As Rand put it, this one’s an oldie but a goodie. It’s an article about the "myth of the market share," and about how focusing too much on your competition can actually hurt you. I’d like to think of it as the White Whale Syndrome, but it’s a really fascinating read and a good reminder that there is always a point where enough is enough, and that one shouldn’t focus his efforts on solely one thing, or he’ll risk damaging other areas.
  

That’s about it for this week. We hope you all had a safe and happy holiday with your friends and loved ones, and be sure to have a kickin’ new year, everybody!

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Posted by JaneCopland

I want to get a new telephone. There is really nothing wrong with the one I have right now: it’s been dropped a couple of (ten) times and I once dropped it into Lake Union. It dried. It calls other phones, receives calls and text messages, and it fits nicely in pockets and purses. But it doesn’t do Internet, and that’s not acceptable. Too often, I’m away from my computer and I want to look something up online. Often, my desire to use the Internet is driven by offline marketing that is aimed at Internet users.

As a consumer, offline marketing doesn’t mean as much to me as it will when I’m equipped to take advantage of it. However, there are already millions of people walking around our cities with iPhones, Blackberries and similar mobile devices who can look up the URLs they see while they’re away from a desktop or a laptop. Offline marketing is only going to become more important with the increased popularity of mobile technology. As Rob Kerry wrote a few days ago, many instances of offline marketing could be executed better. Writing about how the advertising on trains is aiming to have people convert online, Rob says, "99.999% of people travelling into/out-of London will use the internet regularly and most likely go online within minutes of leaving the train, at either work or home" Increasingly, people aren’t even waiting to get home. The "what’s that about?" question can be answered while they’re still sitting in front of the advertisement.

It is no secret that one of my favourite forms of offline viral marketing is Acquisio.com’s t-shirts. Simple, bold, well-designed and funny, no one at SMX Seattle didn’t want one of them. I can’t go a day wearing mine without someone asking me what shit I hate doing and where I got the shirt. You can’t wear a t-shirt online, but the company gained links, built their brand and acquired notoriety as a result of the offline campaign. The shirts were also strangely relevant to their company’s product: Agustin Vazquez-Levi explains in his blog post that they "(offer) ad agencies a solution for PPC management and the monthly reporting to clients… because we know they hate doing that shit manually. To make this perfectly clear, we decided to give out t-shirts to help people communicate this frustration, while offering them the solution."

If I didn’t know who created the t-shirts and saw someone wearing one, I may well be tempted to get out my (currently imaginary) Blackberry and look up "i hate doing this shit shirt" on a search engine. Agustin’s post ranks first. For the term "i hate doing this shit," the post ranks third. And don’t The Lisa, Susan and Curtis look stunning!

Some offline marketing campaigns are more obvious in their intent. DirtyBeach is comprised of a group of people who sit beside the Thames and create sand sculptures. Perched on a couch made of sand, the artists include their MySpace and Facebook URLs in their displays.

They claim to have also registered a domain, dirtybeach.tv, but the website currently does not load. Without a presence online, this group would be too easily forgotten as an amusing aside when one is wandering along the waterfront. While only a small percentage of people will think to look the group up later, virtually no one would ever think of looking them up with a search engine if their social networking URLs were not available. Similarly, a clever advertisement, seen by commuters on their way to work, is less useful if the ad gives them no way to follow up online.

Offline Internet marketing hasn’t developed the bad reputation that it has online. While Diggers bemoan the denigration of their precious website at the hands of marketers and linkbaiters and claim that SEOs have "ruined search engines", no one complains when a clever commercial - paid or not - includes a URL. While I smile when I see a piece of obvious linkbait becoming popular at a social news service, I love it even more when I see offline advertising that blatantly aims to draw people to the Internet. As Rob points out when he talks about the visibility of contact information, it’s tougher to get people to a website when they can’t just click on a link: you have to pay even more attention to the branding and prominence of URLs. How do you get people to link to something if they don’t know or can’t remember its address? Even someone using a mobile device could forget a domain name as soon as they get off the train or walk past the billboard.

Getting people to remember your website’s address when they discovered it offline is either made easier or harder with the introduction of alternative TLDs. I’m not sure which. The conundrum is obvious: competitive keywords suddenly become more accessible, but do you think your mum will remember the .info, .tv, .mobi and .biz TLDs she saw on a billboard? Or will she try and look up the domain names using ".com?" When you’re going to use offline marketing, this type-in problem becomes much more important.

Even my father now has a phone with good web capabilities. When people for whom the Internet was never much more than Yahoo! Mail can get online and look for the interesting thing they saw on their way to work, offline marketing for online purposes changes. You want your URL to be easy to remember, whether the domain be a business’s premier website or one developed exclusively for the ad campaign. You want to rank first for whatever catchphrase, keyword or slogan you’re pushing. You want whatever genre you’re using to be interesting enough to catch the attention and warrant the time of people who are used to seeing ads whenever they look up.

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Posted by rebecca

As a special pre-holiday treat, we decided to share our more long tail search terms from last month (November 2007). Enjoy!

• How to read minds: 225 searches. Ever wonder how Rand seems to have so many eerily accurate predictions about the future of search engine algorithm changes? Well, so do 225 other people…
• Titties: 52 searches (thank Lucas for that one)
• Better than google: 51 searches. Meh, we already knew that SEOmoz was better than Google, sliced bread, and real butter combined (mmmmm, butter and Google sandwich…)
• How to speak English: 41 searches. Sadly, we only offer a course on "How to Speak English with the Occasional Injections of Superfluous U’s into Words," taught by our favo(u)rite Kiwi, Jane.
• Barry bonds before and after: 22 searches. Sounds like a Jeopardy category waiting to happen…
• Good questions to ask: 22 searches. If you have to search for this, then you fail as a human being.
• Mud wrestling: 19 searches. How did they know about our team building exercises?
• Simpsonized pictures: 18 searches. I only threw this in because I geekily think it’s cool that we rank for something Simpsons-related.
• What is an encyclopedia: 13 searches. Seriously? Seriously?!
• 20 questions to ask a guy: 10 searches. Um, ask them anything. It’s not like Jane Goodall with the apes, for crying out loud.
• the incredibles: 10 searches. Hooray, we rank for a Pixar film!
• list of every website: 9 searches. Google returns a page saying "Displaying one of eleventy billion results."

6 searches:

• ive got a golden ticket. That golden ticket, of course, is *ahemshamelessplug* an SEOmoz Premium Membership! Woo hoo!
• fastest spider. I’d like to see a sequel search query called "2 fast 2 spider," but that’s just me.
• hot young things. That’s right. At SEOmoz we’re so damn hot.

4 searches:

• Good to great Collins: I’d say good Collins is True Colors, but great Collins is Sussudio.
• Gorgeous website:  Why, thank you! I’d say it’s not too shabby!
• Self cannibalization: I bet we taste like spam (zing).
• Most romantic proposal. Yeah yeah, we know, Rand’s romantic mushy mushy all that good stuff.

3 searches:

• how to freebase coke. Rand, is that how you’re able to stay up so late blogging? We may need to stage an intervention…
• things to do with your spouse. Oh, I don’t know, how about converse with them instead of spending all your time in front of a computer?
• set it and forget it rotisserie. My mom has one of these. When she first got it she made pork roast every weekend. I call that period of my life "the best ever."
• titties, titties, titties. Once again, thanks, Lucas.
• what to say to your loved one. Well, "I love you" is a start…
• how is oatmeal made? By grinding up pigeons, of course.

Two searches:

• internet makes people lazy.  I’d like to see Google return a one box answer of "No sh*t, Sherlock."
• pay attention to me. Aw, they think the Internet is people!
• paris Hilton thumbs. They’re probably covered with a mutant strain of gonorrhea.
• how does google see my site. Through the tiny camera they installed in you the last time you got knocked out at the dentist, silly!
• I work for google. I bet Adam Lasnik and Matt Cutts searched for this one, with Google returning a one box response of "Sigh, we know."
• Why Canadians are the best at hockey. Uh, a healthy diet of maple syrup and Tim Horton’s?
• What are titties. Ok, seriously, Lucas…
• Weird porn thumbs. Apparently, if you have weird thumbs then you are well-equipped for a lucrative career in porn.
• How to speak the English. The fact that it’s "the English" makes this search so much better.
• How big is the world wide web. Oh, I’d say it’s about 650 Courics big.
• Nambla site password: I bet there’s a fake retrieval site out there that promises the password and then busts the people who try to obtain it. It’s probably run by Chris Hansen ("Why don’t you take a seat…").
• How to read minds for real. The "for real" part cracked me up, as if Google only shows the real results to people who are serious about mind reading.
• Michael martinez hardcore seo. I bet the two people who searched for this term were Michael Martinez and his mom.
• Names to call your loved one. I don’t recommend "ho bag."
• What if ron paul wins? I wonder how many people were expecting a straight answer from Google (e.g., "Well, then you’re effed, I suppose").
• Rebecca Kelley arrested. Okay, for the record, that old lady deserved it.
• Hat sex xxx. Not only do these folks want hat sex, but they want it in its raunchiest form (hence the xxx).
• Things to do when your wife is away. How about hat sex?
• Underpants gnomes. Step 3: Profit!
• Naked john Michaels. John Michaels, I’m not sure who you are, but apparently some folks are looking for nude photos of you. Just a heads up.

One search:

• Whats the number to the guy who invented the world wide web? It’s 555-are-you-effing-serious.
• Good questions to ask people in truth or dare. How about "I dare you to get your ass off the computer and go for a walk outside, for crying out loud."
• Is crack and freebase same thing. Okay, seriously, Rand, I’m going to tell you about this nifty little program. There are 12 "steps" too, and I know how much you like lists…
• Why cliques are skinny. Because being able to see your sternum is all the rage now!
• I can’t live without you. Aw, thanks!
• Complete appetizer setup. Crab cakes and prawns of some sort are a definite must.
• Evil cattle. They’ll moo-rder you.
• Do you consider yourself to be lucky / unlucky? Give an example. It’s like this person is signing Google up for a dating site. "Google, describe your perfect date…"
• Words to make up. If you search for a word to make up and find one, isn’t that word already made up? Just throw some darts at a poster of the alphabet, for crying out loud.
• How to break a tedious day. This person has the freakin’ INTERNET right at his fingertips, and he performs a search on how to break up a tedious day. Clearly the man does not know what StumbleUpon is.
• Please stop it.  Aw, but I’m almost done!
• Art with elephant on stilts. This is so absurdly specific that I kind of want one for myself.
• How much is matt cutts worth. I bet Matt’s wife searched for this shortly after that life insurance policy kicked in…
• Letting employees create their own fun. Ten bucks says that Bruce Clay searched for this. "Here, Lisa, here’s a slinky. You get to play with it for five minutes, and then it’s back to work."
• Hammer pants blog. Oh man, I’d so read this. I bet it’s 2 legit, 2 legit 2 quit (hey heyyyyyyyyyy).
• How do people start getting famous. Don’t wear underwear. That’s a good start.
• Things you shouldnt do to your girlfriends dad. I’m guessing that asking him for a condom is at the top of the list…
• Why must people be very careful when using ether. Geez, I’d hate to see this guy’s search history (I bet we’ll find "why does fire feel ouchy," "how come I can’t breathe underwater," and "gasoline smells good").
• How is it anatomically possible for someone to have super powers? God, I love the Internet.
• Ten signs that a man is never going to marry you. #1: You have a Cathy comic on your fridge and instead of a blanket, you sleep with 12 cats to keep you warm.
• Why does someone keep bugging me. Maybe it’s because you’re on your computer all day, and your roommate needs your rent check, you lazy arse.
• Opposing views on how anorexia and bulimia are bad for you. I like how this person wants to hear "opposing" view, like "Con: You can die. Pro: You’ll fit into those skinny leg jeans!"
• How to make him think he cant live without me. The gift of an *ahemshamelessplug* SEOmoz Premium Membership is a good start! It’s the gift that keeps on giving!

Hopefully you enjoyed a peek at our silly search phrases. We want to wish our readers a happy and safe holiday, and best of luck to everyone in the new year!

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Posted by great scott!

Hey Gang! This week Rand talks to NetConcepts’ CEO, Stephan Spencer, about cloaking and redirection via black hat, gray hat, and white hat methods.  This is pretty high-level stuff but incredibly interesting, even if it is of questionable Glegality (that’s Google Legality, heyooo!).  Is it effective? It sure as hell can be. Will it get you into trouble? Well, only if you get caught I suppose, which is why Google is rumored to have the "Boser Tool" that they use to try and keep an eye out for this stuff.

Anyway, enjoy the video and happy holidays to all of you wonderful, beautiful folks!  We’ll be back next week with another brand new Whiteboard Friday. 

p.s. For those who may not be aware, Stephan’s blog was hacked this week - sorry about that, buddy

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Posted by rebecca

It’s Thursday, so you know what that means: another installment of Roundup Thursday! This week, I’m implementing a more formal layout that will be executed in every recap post from here on out. Hope you enjoy it!

That being said…

New Additions to the SEOmoz Marketplace:

Featured job postings:

• SEO specialist for the Seattle Children’s Hospital in Seattle, WA
• SEO specialist for the Latitude Group in  London, UK
• SEO specialist for Rocket Spider in Sheffield, UK
• E-Services producer in Danville, CA
• Senior designer in Danville, CA
• Internet marketing coordinator for On Target in Denver, CO
• Jr. SEO specialist in Jersey City, NJ
• PHP web developer for Digitally Imported in New York, NY
• Account manager for Rise Interactive in Boca Raton, FL
• Sales consultant and account manager for Rise Interactive in Chicago, IL
• Application developer for Rise Interactive in Tamarindo, Guana, Costa Rica

Featured companies:

• Rise Interactive
• Oban Denmark
• Unleaded Software
• TechWeb Media
• Performancing
• MoveYourWeb
• Latitude Group
• Sheffield Marketing
• SWAY
• WebpageFX Web Design
• Rudy Interactive
• Better Search Engine Rank

Featured resumes:

• Katherine Watier

New Events added to the Events Calendar:

• Current Issues in Complex IP Licensing on March 6, 2008 in Phoenix, AR
• BlogOnExpo January 15-18, 2008 (digital conference)

Stories, news, and other notable items from the past week:

• Eric Enge interviews Sep Kamvar, engineering lead for personalization at Google. It’s a fairly standard interview that covers the definition of personalization and basic factors Google uses, which is why this link gets 3 out of 5 Moz Stars (that’s right, we’re rating the links in our roundups!).
  
• FoundRead provides a post about Startup Math, and how 1+1 = 1/2 due to the time and effort it takes to train a new hire. It’s a cheeky observation, which is why I give it 4 stars.
  
• PBS has a piece about how journalists and bloggers suck at startups. It posits that the failure rate is due to writers thinking they know more than they actually do, and their excitement at being a part of something rather than just covering it or writing about it. It’s a pretty interesting (and kind of depressing–guess I’m doomed to never succeed at startups) article.
  
• Jon Mendez wrote his top 10 multivariate and A/B testing results in 2007. This is a really interesting list, and a lot of factors that you wouldn’t think would make a difference in conversions indeed made a big difference. We may need to test a few of these out for ourselves, as we’re in the process of tweaking our landing pages.
  
• Stephan Spencer brings us another solid interview for Roundup Thursday, this time with Matt Cutts. Some of their topics of discussion include social bookmarking links, the "value" myth of .edu links, are poorly constructed site maps really just doorway pages, and more. It’s a good interview, but it’s fairly long.
  
• The NY Times, ReadWriteWeb, and this interview with Peter Norvig, Google director of research, all state that Google admits to using actual, living breathing people for feedback on their search results along with user clicks/their algorithm. Danny Sullivan countered with a "Yawn, we already knew this k thanks" response on Search Engine Land.
  
• Apollo SEM brings us a comprehensive step-by-step on how to expose Adwords keyword data beyond "other unique queries" in search query reports. After implementing the changes, you should be able to see the exact search query a user typed in that brought him/her to your ad.
  
• Portent Interactive had a staff linkbait contest, and the winner created PPC Villain. The "Internet Marketing Domination Seminar" video (link to bigger video on YouTube) is very amusing if you’re in the industry (which I am, so I thought it was funny, which is why I’m giving it…)
  

Woo, that’s quite the roundup I served all of you! Expect something like this every week, and I hope you enjoyed this week’s version of web goodness.

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Posted by randfish

A great many tech-specific site owners consistently bemoan the fact that market share stats like these:

don’t come close to their own experiences with search traffic. Since I get into a lot of conversations around Google’s dominant market share and see plenty of raised eyebrows from savvy technologists, bloggers and marketers, I figured I’d ping my good friend Matt Tatham at Hitwise, to see if he could help solve the mystery, which of course, he did (thanks Matt!).

Take a look at the chart below - it shows the percentage of upstream traffic (that’s all traffic - search engines, direct type-in, referral links, email, etc.) to technology and tech media websites. Hitwise places these in two separate categories "IT and Internet" and "IT Media." A site like Sourceforge would probably fit in the former, while SEOmoz would be in the latter.

The graph tells us that Google sends 15.73% of all traffic to all websites. That alone is an interesting figure, as it tells us something about how we surf the web - yes, search is certainly a huge driver of traffic, but it may not be the juggernaut we sometimes think it is. 75%+ of web traffic comes from other sources - following links, typing in domains, email, bookmarks, blogs and social media.

More relevant to our discussion, however, is the data showing that 31.95% of all traffic to "IT Media" sites comes from Google and 5.78% of all traffic to "IT and Internet" sites has Google as the referrer. Let’s compare this data against Yahoo! and MSN/Live to see whether and how much Google is over-represented in the online tech world.

Yahoo! sends 6.92% of all traffic to "IT Media" sites, 1.90% to "IT & Internet" sites and 4.43% of all website referral traffic.

Matt’s taken the time to break out Live.com vs. MSN.com, which gives us a peek into the distribution between the two (Live’s still much smaller). But I’ve combined the data for easy comparison and between the two, Microsoft web search products send 1.61% of traffic to all websites, 2.1% of traffic to "IT Media" and 0.65% to Internet & Technology sites. Taken together, this data gives a chart that looks something like:

Takeaways:

• If you’re in IT Media, there’s a good reason you’re seeing 75-85% of your search traffic come from Google. Don’t panic - you’re not being "under-represented" in Yahoo! & MSN, that’s just the way it is.
• If you look at the Internet & Technology column, you might be surprised to see that Google’s only at around 70%, but my guess is that Yahoo! is actually listed in Hitwise as an "Internet & Technology" website, and they do a very good job of sending a lot of traffic back into the Yahoo! network. Still, 70% is bigger than the 64% market share number, and my guess is it’s even larger than that.
• Google sends 72% of traffic to websites compared to Yahoo!’s 20% and MS’ 7.4% - these numbers don’t quite match up to the search shares, but that’s to be expected. This data tells me that Google is slightly more successful in sending actual traffic to their search results than Yahoo! and Microsoft - perhaps there are more "frustrated" searchers on the other two engines, or perhaps they are both "retaining" more of their searchers inside their own content networks.

In any case, this should help to quell a bit of the fear around the common question:

I get 85% of my traffic from Google - what am I doing wrong in Yahoo! and MSN/Live?

It could likely be that you’re doing nothing wrong at all, and Google simply dominates the upstream search traffic in your niche. For those who are curious, here’s SEOmoz’s breakdown of search referral traffic:

Hitwise doesn’t specifically monitor the webmaster/Internet marketing niche, but I suspect the numbers are even more Google-centric as webmasters tend to be extremely biased in Google’s favor (at least, from a usage perspective).

BTW - I’m not 100% sold on the accuracy of Hitwise’s data. I think that relatively speaking, it’s usually solid, but I wouldn’t go out and swear in court that the numbers are precise. I usually take them with a +/- 25% swing, but it’s certainly better than nothing (and considerably better than Quantcast, Alexa or Compete).

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Posted by Adam Green

Intro by Rebecca: Coincidentally, Adam Green submitted this SEM post to YOUmoz last night, and it’s very informative so I decided to move it to the main blog and have it kick off SEM Tuesdays. Enjoy!

There have been a number of updates to Google Adwords and Google Analytics lately, so I thought the SEOmoz community might want a summary of them.  For the most part, I am impressed with the new features and Google should be applauded for listening to their user base and responding with these additions. 

Improvement #1 - AdWords Geographical Targeting with Google Maps

Although geographical targeting is not perfect, this new mapping feature does make it easier for the average user.  Google has introduced a new system where users can see targeted areas using Google Maps.  I like this feature a lot because it allows me to see the surrounding towns and cities which I might want to include in my targeting for a particular local client.  This is especially handy for those who manage clients outside of their geographic area. 

Some new improvements include Google’s creation of "bundles," where you can bundle together specific regions like Central America or Africa.

Where this system falls short, and this is a long standing issue with geo targeting, is the fact that a user sitting in City Example X, may not have an IP address registered to that location.  Thus, when developing campaigns it can be a good idea to develop campaigns with the city keyword as a geographic qualifier and even test the effectiveness of the polygon targeting tool. 

Here is what the map targeting looks like for a client looking to target the Toronto region in Canada:

Improvement #2 - Google Keyword Tool

Google has also improved the functionality of its keyword tool by adding features that allow you to filter results,  choose which statistics columns to display and select match types at the keyword level. They have also combined the ability to see keyword variations and site-related keywords into one tab, allowing you to see all keywords on one page.  This update isn’t a huge breakthrough, but the increased functionality is nice for those of us who use this tool on a regular basis. 

Here is a screen cap of the tool, using the ever popular "blue widgets" example.   

Improvement #3 - Google Analytics Graph Comparison

I really like the increased functionality that Google has included with this update.  Comparing date ranges has always been helpful, especially when demonstrating improvements to clients or patterns of behaviour on a site.  This new update allows you to compare different metrics like average page views and time on site to each other, and display them graphically.  

The metric comparison options change depending on which area of Analytics you are viewing.  If you have an e-commerce site, you can compare conversion rates, transactions, revenue, and more.  

Here is a screen cap of a dashboard view in Google Analytics:

Hats off to Google for implementing these useful additions.  In my opinion, the new comparison feature in Google Analytics will be especially useful.  I would be interested to hear if anyone else likes these updates…or if there are features and functions that are sorely needed and should be implemented by Google.

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Posted by JaneCopland

I know exactly what you should do with your blog because it isn’t mine, I don’t have to implement any of the changes and if my advice is bad, I don’t have to live with the consequences. This said, I’ve been poking around inside my favourite social networking site and I’m sure there is room for improvement when it comes to their blog.

One of the benefits of running a successful blog can be reputation management, and our friends at Facebook have had a little trouble in that department lately. No matter what your opinion on the company’s various public relations problems, you may well have noticed the violent backlash they suffered after launching the News Feed, opening their doors to the public, and after they deployed their most recent advertising platform. They did quite well during the uproar over their News Feed, which publishes a user’s actions to his or her friends. Posting an apology at the top of the offending News Feed and scrambling to implement security features, Feedgate was quickly forgotten. Facebook treated similar public announcements, apologies and explanations in a similar way: a "one box" entry at the top of the homepage.

However, step away from Facebook for a second (it’s hard for me; is it tough for you too?) and think about how websites and companies in our industry deal with reputation management crises. Most of us don’t have to post apologies on our homepages because we have blogs that people actually read. Good and bad news usually finds its way into our blogs posts. Our readers comment on the posts; we reply.

Have a look at that last sentence again: readers comment on the posts. One of the most astounding things about Facebook’s blog is that there are absolutely no comments. Facebook users are usually prolific commenters! We can’t click past a photograph without adding something. Given the chance to interact with the people who create and maintain the very service we’re using, we just stand there like shy five-year-olds?

The first reason why Facebook’s blog gets no attention is blatantly obvious: It’s completely invisible. There was once a link to the blog in the site’s footer, but it is now gone. The About Facebook link has a "Latest from the Facebook Blog" section which, on most monitors, is well below the fold. The link to the blog’s main page is grey and doesn’t look live.

In fact, the blog is so buried that it’s like they’re actually trying to hide it. While nobody arrives at Facebook specifically to read its blog, I’d make it a little more visible. Some of Facebook’s more controversial actions took place after staff had blogged about their imminent implementation; the company could have benefited from hearing users’ feedback before, as opposed to after, the changes were live.

Another reason for the blog’s lack of appeal is its authorship. Since its inception, forty-one Facebook employees have contributed content. I’m sure if you sat down and listed every writer you knew of who’d ever published online, you could come up with more than forty-one people. However, for a single company, forty-one writers is way too many. Readers just can’t connect with that many people, and most successful blogs rely on readers establishing a relationship with writers.

At SEOmoz, our core group of writers includes only four or five people, which is a small enough number for regular readers to remember who we are and what we’ve written in the past. You know a little bit about us and you’re familiar with our writing styles. If charged with remodeling Facebook’s blog, I would find five or six of the company’s best writers from a number of different departments. I’d look for a PR person, a developer, an executive, a product manager (or similar) from the advertising  platform, a privacy specialist and someone who works in TOS or quality control. Secondly, I’d make them blog regularly.

I feel a bit of a fool chastising Facebook for not having people write regularly enough, since their most recent post is from yesterday, December 18. However, the most recent entry prior to this is from thirteen days earlier. I get the feeling that if SEOmoz didn’t post anything for two weeks, very few of you would be checking back daily to see if we’d written anything new. People who blog irregularly usually rely on feed readers to let people know when they’ve composed something new, but with that reliance comes the assumption that readers are web savvy enough to use feed readers. Do Facebook’s members all subscribe to blogs? I seriously doubt it; however, I do believe that they’d read Facebook’s blog if it were more visible.

I would include new blog posts as items in users’ News Feeds. Currently, News Feeds show people which groups their friends have joined, who’s written on whose profile, who’s been commenting on whose photographs, etc. It would be very easy to include brief but regular notifications about new blogs posts. Also, I’d include a link to the blog in the site’s omnipresent navigation:

For maximum exposure with minimum interference, I’d include it at the top of the page, placed somewhere amongst the smaller links. This way, it’s not taking up too much valuable real estate, but it is more likely to be seen, especially by people who are going for the "home" link.

Going back to the subject of feeds for a moment, the blog does provide a subscription link. It’s well hidden at the bottom of the sidebar and there is no explanation of what it is. While the majority of you here at SEOmoz don’t need an explanation of RSS, there would be no harm in providing a little "What is this?" link for Facebook members who may be interested in learning more.

Next, I’d add categories. Blogs that belong to big, diverse companies often turn into scratch-pads for employees to record a manner of entries on many different subjects. However, what happens when I want to read solely about safety on Facebook, or about the changes they’ve made to their search features? Right now, I’d have to sort out which of the forty-one authors deals with my chosen subject and sort through their entries. With categorisation, I’m more likely to find what interests me.

Above the subscription link, there is a neat little section called "New on Facebook" that names some recent features the site has added. Did you know that if, like me, you were born with a different name than you have currently (I didn’t like it, so I changed it. True story.) you can tell Facebook what the name was and your current profile will show up when people search for your old name? And that the old name won’t appear anywhere on your profile? Isn’t that cloaking? Is it sad that I thought of that?

What about brand / fan pages at Facebook: how long did it take for you to notice them? How about the feature whereby you can make any one of your pictures into your profile picture immediately? Yes, they stole that from Bebo, but it’s a great idea.

The area explaining these new features is only available on the blog (I’m not counting an even better-hidden link on the About Facebook page) and the newly released features don’t link to anything.

The "See More New Features" link just doesn’t cut it for me: I want each item to link to detailed explanation of the feature. Perhaps this is just the SEO in me coming out, because I find the idea of not linking to helpful things kind of abhorrent.

As far as participation goes, I would encourage Facebook staff members to begin commenting on others’ posts to get the comments started. I’d also encourage them not to have Facebook listed as their primary network, so that their comments look as though they’re coming from regular members of the site and not from employees. People are notoriously shy when it comes to "serious" comments (as opposed to celebrity gossip blog comments): couple this with the fact that you’re forced to use your real name when commenting at Facebook, and it’s obvious that people will have to be baited into participating.

Then there is the constant debate regarding how much text to display on a blog’s homepage. You’ll notice that at SEOmoz, we display partial posts if you are not signed in and full posts if you are. Facebook is currently showing entire posts on their blog’s homepage. Upon arriving at the blog, there is a good chance that any given Facebook user won’t be completely enthralled by the current post. I’d show partial posts in the hope of presenting a range of content and retaining more readers.

Back to the sidebar. The New on Facebook page’s sidebar includes recent mainstream news stories about Facebook and a link to the company’s job openings. I see no good reason not to include this on the blog as well: the news headlines are especially relevant. Facebook can also carefully select these mainstream news stories for reputation mangement’s sake, linking only to those which paint it in the best possible light. The company’s blog is indexed, and those links it adds to external sites receive some very yummy link juice. The only thing I don’t like about this idea is that it may clutter the sidebar.

I also realise that this is nothing but cute talk without some actual implementation on my part, so I rearranged the blog to fit my recommendations. Please note that I’m no designer and all I did was copy, paste and re-word what is already on the page. However, I really do think that Facebook could use their blog far better than they are already… they could optimise it, so to speak! The horrible little image below links to a far larger version of the same thing which, of course, your browser will also attempt to shrink. On the left is the Facebook blog in its current form; the right-hand image is mine.

 

As I mentioned above, I think my sidebar is too cluttered, but the page is actually a bit longer than that which I’ve worked with here. Also, given more time and more blog posts to work with, I’d invent a far more comprehensive list of categories. At the very least, I believe the blog could be more interesting than it is currently.

As a second installment of "Wasabi Wednesday", which is our very odd name for the day on which we write about Social Media, this has far more to do with blogging than it does SMM. We’ll be back to writing about the top nineteen ways to spam Digg next week, I promise.

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