Here is a recap of what happened in the search forums today, through the eyes of the Search Engine Roundtable and other search forums on the web.
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Google
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Official Google Webmaster Central Blog (325 unread)
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Daily Search Forum Recap: July 29, 2010
Posted: July 29th, 2010, 11:00pm CEST by rustybrick
Tags: Search Forum Recap
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Deja Vu: First Time Matt Cutts of Google Saw Web Spam
Posted: July 29th, 2010, 4:03pm CEST by rustybrick
Tags: Spam
Aaron Wall posted an example of a large brand manipulating Google through an old spam technique. In short, they were buying expired domains to piggy back off of the link popularity and anchor text of those old domains.
Aaron wall said, "buying expired domain names for links is something Matt Cutts loathes." What I find most interesting is the video he posted after (spam doesn't always interest me all that much these days).
This video was done by Matt Cutts of Google about two years ago. He talked about the first time he found search web spam.
One thing Aaron Wall (and Michael Gray) are good at is calling out double-standards specifically with Google.
Forum discussion at Sphinn.
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Yahoo Search Marketing Reporting Goes Down For Many
Posted: July 29th, 2010, 3:58pm CEST by rustybrick
Tags: Yahoo Search Marketing
There are several complaints at both WebmasterWorld and DigitalPoint Forums that the Yahoo Search Marketing campaigns are missing all their data.
One person received a response from Yahoo, where Yahoo presumingly said:
Upon researching your account we found there is a known issue causing frustration among many clients. Our reporting systems went down at approximately 8pm on Monday evening. However we have created a case for you within your account and are currently working to get this resolved as soon as possible. Please be patient while we work to resolve your concerns.
So since Monday night, some advertisers are still without accurate reporting data for their search ad campaigns.
I am not sure if this is related to Yahoo testing Bing powered ads or not, but it is around the same time.
Forum discussion at WebmasterWorld and DigitalPoint Forums.
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Searcher Concerned After Wired's Google / CIA Article
Posted: July 29th, 2010, 3:50pm CEST by rustybrick
Tags: Other Google Topics
Wired published an article last night named Exclusive: Google, CIA Invest in 'Future' of Web Monitoring. Here is a snippet of that article:
The investment arms of the CIA and Google are both backing a company that monitors the web in real time - and says it uses that information to predict the future.
The company is called Recorded Future, and it scours tens of thousands of websites, blogs and Twitter accounts to find the relationships between people, organizations, actions and incidents - both present and still-to-come. In a white paper, the company says its temporal analytics engine "goes beyond search" by "looking at the 'invisible links' between documents that talk about the same, or related, entities and events."
The idea is to figure out for each incident who was involved, where it happened and when it might go down. Recorded Future then plots that chatter, showing online "momentum" for any given event.
There has always been speculation about Google "being in bed with the CIA" but this isn't exactly Google working with the CIA, not exactly.
In any event, people read Wired and people are searchers on Google. Some may stop using it, like this concerned young guy at Google Web Search Help.
Zac Jackle Reala has his username reads said:Ok, I've been reading about the whole CIA/Google cracking down on the criminal race on the Interwebs. I've been using Google for a while. And I'm just a kid having fun on Google/Youtube. My privacy is a big deal... I don't like my "space" invaded. I'm sorry.
I find it interesting he took the time to set up a Google account and post his concern in a public Google forum.
Do you think we should be concerned?
Forum discussion at Google Web Search Help.
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More On Google Alerts Quality Control
Posted: July 29th, 2010, 3:44pm CEST by rustybrick
Tags: Google Search Engine
A couple months ago, we wrote on how Google Alerts tweaked their algorithm to be more more quality focused and send out less alerts.
A recent Google Web Search Help thread has more on how Google Alerts works from Google Product Manager, Marcel.
Marcel responded to a quality complaint saying:
You're right, both of those are matches for your query, but neither of them are interesting documents. To get only higher quality documents, choose "Up to 20 results" for the email length. If you already have that setting, then I'm afraid there's not much I can do to help. We do send some poor quality documents, either because we're too quick, and our search engine hasn't had time to figure out that they are poor quality, or because we don't get the quality rating right at all. We're constantly working on both those problems.
I love the end, where he says, "we do send some poor quality documents, either because we're too quick, and our search engine hasn't had time to figure out that they are poor quality, or because we don't get the quality rating right at all.
I just find it interesting to see that come from a Googler.
Forum discussion at Google Web Search Help.
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Image SEO Expert Knocks On Bing Image Search
Posted: July 29th, 2010, 3:28pm CEST by rustybrick
Tags: Microsoft MSN Search
A WebmasterWorld thread has Zeus, someone well known in the SEO forum space as tracking the image search engines, as not speaking positively about Bing Image Search.
The thread talks how Bing is slower than Google to index new content. Which is often the case, simply cause Google is much faster than most search engines. But Zeus breaks it out to say that their image search is even more disappointing.
Zeus said that typically he sees at most 10% of his pages or images in Bing Image search, sometimes only 5% or less. He said:
Bing Image which in my case has 45 images listed of 22,000.
Now, Bing has made some very good strides and I believe many are rutting for them to gain some more share. Heck, I even think it would be a good idea and I am an Apple guy.
Forum discussion at WebmasterWorld.
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SEO Is Not All About Technical Changes
Posted: July 29th, 2010, 3:20pm CEST by rustybrick
Tags: Search Engine Optimization
A WebmasterWorld thread makes a basic and obvious point that many newbies miss. SEO is not just about technical implementation. You can place your title tags in the right place, have a nice site architecture, get links and so on but still not rank well if your site is not useful.
The thread creator said it nicely:
People come here with a problem about traffic dropping and people try to help by asking technical questions about the website in question.
I often wonder what is the business model of the site that dropped. Because Google appears to be grading business models. Example. I have a prospective client who wants me to fix his traffic loss. He has 20 domains each one for each brand. No real info on any of his sites and he is selling some information on each brand. I can see some value to his service but I am sure Google considers it a spam service. 20 sites all the same linked selling the same product.
No amount of tweaking to this site or that site is going to fix his problem in my opinion.
In fact, today, someone forwarded me a site that fit this example. It was built fine, but it had almost no useful content. Nothing was there and the guy was looking for technical help on how to fix it.
To fix it, you need content - content that gives people a reason to want to go to the site, read it and recommend it to others. If the site has nothing to offer, why would it rank well even if it is technically SEO friendly?
So many new SEOs, new webmasters and new site owners just don't get this. It is a shame.
Forum discussion at WebmasterWorld.