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Archive for the ‘search engines’ Category
Monday, September 20th, 2010
Danny Sullivan and other journalists challenged Google at a lunch meeting during a Google Zeitgeist conference over the secret recipe of the search engine’s ranking algorithms. The bottom line, according to Google CEO Eric Schmidt, is it’s a business secret. Sullivan just wants to know why Google won’t publish the list of ingredients rather than the complete recipe.
Let me just say that I have no way of knowing what’s in Schmidt’s head or what’s in the secret sauce. SEOs and Internet marketers have guessed about those ingredients since Day One. But it’s safe to say that most of those 200 ingredients are already public knowledge. Some of them have been acknowledged by Google itself. Others are just things that have come to light as a result of SEO testing and experimentation.
So why doesn’t Google publish its list of ranking factors? Schmidt says it’s because the company doesn’t want the pressure of being obligated to serve those ingredients up on a regular basis. In other words, as I’m interpreting it, if Google said X was a ranking factor then later wanted to take X away as a ranking factor then there might be some sense of obligation to keep listing it as a ranking factor. But, of course, there’d be no obligation. Google can do whatever it wants with its ranking algorithm.
But I think there is a deeper reason why Google may not want to divulge the ingredients to its secret sauce. In a way, it’s the same reason why Danny Sullivan thinks Google should.
Sullivan says Google would benefit public relations-wise by listing those ingredients. I say it would hurt Google to list them. The reason it would not benefit Google to list those ingredients is because they do change, as Schmidt said, on a regular basis. Let’s say that today Google announced that X, Y and Z were ranking factors. Next week, let’s say that Google decided that X and Y no longer needed to be ranking factors. What now? They’d have to publish a new list of ranking factors. Every time Google changed its ranking factors, which is every day, then it would have to publish a new list. That seems like a lot of work for a relatively low PR pay off. In the end, many users would become confused about what the latest ranking factors are.
Many Google users do not get their information from Google itself, but from other blogs and news sources like Search Engine Land and Small Business Mavericks. What if certain news sources didn’t update their list when Google updated its list? The potential for confusion and misinformation is greater doing it the way that Sullivan suggests. Isn’t it already confusing enough?
Tags: google, search engine ranking
Posted in search engines | 2 Comments »
Saturday, September 18th, 2010
While social media and social media marketing may be the flavor of the month (or is that year), search engines are still holding their own when it comes to the important issues. For small businesses, there is nothing as important as steady sales. According to a recent report, 57% of consumers still use search engines as their primary tool when looking for products.
Okay – so does that leave 43% for social media? Apparently not. It seems that 20% of consumers prefer to head straight to a brand site and another 18% search for products through retailers. When it comes to social media, they only receive 3% of consumers traffic.
It is understandable really. If you know what you want to buy, why go to a social site? It makes more sense to search for the product via a search engine, or to go directly to a known website. Social is more interactive. Consumers are more likely to seek opinions on products or services through social media than look for sellers.
What is missing from a set of statistics like this is what has preceded the product search, or indeed the visit to a retailer or known brand. For example, have they spent some time reading reviews, talking to friends and acquaintances to find information. From the statistics mentioned, 20% of consumers go directly to branded web sites. Has social media had any influence?
Search engines are still are primary source of traffic when it comes to product searches. However, social media is now one of the primary channels for building brand awareness, and for interacting with potential customers. These days, both are important to the future viability of any online business.
WebProNews has an interesting post on these statistics here.
Tags: product search, Social Media
Posted in search engines | 2 Comments »
Thursday, September 16th, 2010
John Battelle is proud of the fact that he predicted Bing would surpass Yahoo! as the No. 2 search engine. OK, one point for John Battelle.
Dear John, that’s not really much of a prediction. When you consider that Yahoo! has been on the downward slide for about two years now and that it’s been public knowledge for most of that time that Bing would be taking over their search functionality, well, that kinda spells it out for us, doesn’t it?
Of course, no one could predicted exactly when Bing would pass Yahoo!, but I think all of us with an eye on the search industry have seen it coming.
So what’s the big news? According to Nielsen, Bing now has 13.9% of search and Yahoo! has 13.1%. Google is still way ahead at 65.1%. But if you add the Bing and Yahoo! numbers, which I think we should all start doing now, then that spells 27% for the Bing-Yahoo! team. Ask and AOL are still way down the line.
In fact, AOL lost 1.1% of its share of search (to Bing) and I think we might just go ahead and expect AOL to bow out gracefully. It’s not really a search engine anyway. It’s an aggregator and always has been. But fewer and fewer people are using AOL and I think that will continue to be a trend. Who will pick up those users? Probably Bing.
What do you think? Will Bing ever be a true competitor with Google?
Tags: bing, google, search
Posted in search engines | 1 Comment »
Sunday, September 12th, 2010
One of the benefits that Google has claimed for its new product Google Instant is that it will save you time on searches. But will it?
Let’s review what Google Instant is exactly. Google Instant is Google’s new algorithmic innovation that delivers results to you as you type them in, which means you no longer have to wait until after you’ve typed in your search results to see what they are.
There are some definite benefits to this search feature. No. 1 of those is that there is huge potential to save some time on searches. Google claims you’ll save a few seconds for each search. However, you could end up spending more time searching. Here’s how.
Let’s say you want to find an auto mechanic near where you live in Chicago, Illinois. You type in “Auto” and you see a drop down menu of results that includes “autotrader”, “autozone”, “auto zone” and “auto locator”. Not seeing anything close to what you are looking for, you decide to keep typing. You type in the letter “m” and see another menu; it’s changed. Back up, you need a space between the “o” and the “m”. There’s another menu, which starts with “auto meter”, “auto museum” and a few other results. At the bottom you see “auto mechanic” so you click it.
Of course, you get a list of search results showing you auto mechanics. But are they all local? Chances are you’ll see a 7-pack or 3-pack Google Maps result. Maybe some of those are close to you and maybe some are not. But you don’t see any auto mechanics that are close to your neighborhood in Chicago. Back to the search drawing board.
This time you type in “chi” after “auto mechanic” and you get a narrower list of results. Did you save time? Maybe.
But what if what you are searching for is a bit more complex than auto mechanics? If you keep clicking on potential results in your drop down box while typing in search queries there may actually be a loss of time. Is that good?
We can discuss whether you’ll save or lose time on your searches, but from a business perspective, will Google Instant deliver you more traffic? I think it could. But you may have to tweak your SEO a bit. What do you think? Will you see more traffic as a result of Google Instant?
Tags: google, search
Posted in search engines | 3 Comments »
Thursday, September 9th, 2010
Google has always been an innovator. Of course, they’ve done their share of following too. But in the core business where Google makes its money, it is an innovator. Google Instant is the latest development by the search engine to maintain its leading edge and competitiveness over other search engines, particularly Bing.
So what is Google Instant? In a word, the search engine has changed its search feature to give you results as you type them in. The net savings, in time, to you is a few seconds for each search. But if you perform a lot of searches throughout the day then you’ll save a lot of seconds. Seems like such a small deal, but when you go to use Bing it will seem awfully slow.
Looking around the web, I’ve noticed a few other headlines about Google Instant. I think you’ll want to read some of these.
I think the important thing to think about here, from a marketing perspective, is how will this change search behavior? If it changes search behavior in any way, and we won’t know for at least a week how it will change, then search marketing behavior must change with it. I say give it a month before making any judgments either way.
Tags: google, Google Instant
Posted in search engines | 1 Comment »
Tuesday, August 17th, 2010
According to a report by Chitika, Bing has passed Yahoo! as the No. 2 search provider in the U.S. Google still holds No. 1 with more than 80% of all searches.
This isn’t really that a big a deal. Since Bing is taking over Yahoo!s search technology anyway, and that move should be finished by the end of this month, it really just means that Bing can count more searches in its share than it could before. With Bing holding onto 11% of the searches made in July and Yahoo! at 6%, that means the No. 2 search engine has the lion’s share of the 19% of search share that Google doesn’t have with a total of 17% of the complete pie.
Bing really passed Yahoo! in January of this year when it garnered more than 7% of search and Yahoo had just over 6%. Google at that time had 83.59%. Since then, it seems, Bing has taken a couple of percentage points away from Google. Now the question remains: Can Bing take any more search share from Google?
It will be a long road uphill for Bing, but I wouldn’t say it’s impossible. What do you think?
Tags: bing, google, search
Posted in search engines | 1 Comment »
Monday, August 16th, 2010
It’s interesting watching developments in emerging markets like search and social media. For the past decade Google has dominated search and has just grown its market share more and more while its competition has declined. It just hasn’t seemed possible that anyone could catch up. Then, enter Facebook.
Facebook and Google have not exactly been competitors. But, technically, they are.
Google is a search engine. Facebook is a social media platform. Its growth into one of the largest and most trafficked websites online is itself an extraordinary success story. As is Google’s. Even though these two companies appeal to their respective users in very different ways, they can be considered competitors in one very important respect. They compete for traffic.
You could also say they compete for advertisers. After all, advertisers want to spend their money where the greatest hope of success is. Generally, that means where the people are. Traffic.
In Facebook’s case, however, that hasn’t exactly proven to be a huge feather in the cap. Google AdWords is still the No. 1 choice for online advertisers, which makes Facebook’s recent acquisition of Chai Labs an extraordinary event.
Google has had so many acquisitions that not many people even notice them any more. And no acquisition has taken the company from its emphasis on search, which is a good thing. But Facebook has not made a habit of adding new companies to its portfolio. The fact that one of its first acquisitions is a search technology provider means that Facebook is planning to enter into Google’s domain – and it’s just as well since Google has entered into Facebook’s a number of times. The question before Facebook today is whether it can take a purchase like Chai Labs and churn it into a public offering that will help it to rival Google in the one area where Google has excelled better than anyone else? Can Facebook become a search monolith without compromising its ability to provide a social platform?
Tags: facebook, search, Social Media
Posted in Social Media, search engines | No Comments »
Tuesday, August 10th, 2010
Earlier this week Google launched a small business blog. It’s a significant development for Google, and for small business owners, for a number of reasons.
- First, have you noticed that all of Google’s blogs are on Blogspot, the free blog host? It’s another way for Google to promote the free blogging platform although I recommend that you get your own domain name and run it with WordPress.
- Google has been catering to small businesses for some time, but not all small business owners know what Google has to offer. The small business blog gives them a chance to see first hand.
- Google used its small business blog yesterday to announce a partnership with the U.S. Small Business Association in “Tools for Online Success.”
When Google, the largest search engine online, tells small business owners that it’s time to have a web presence then you know it’s time to get a web presence. In a few years it won’t have to be said. Small business owners will just know. If you’re not online now, you’re late. But it’s never too late.
Tags: google, small business
Posted in search engines | 2 Comments »
Monday, August 2nd, 2010
If your business was listed multiple times in Google Places, would you be happy? Yelp isn’t.
Here’s a good summary of what may be going on:
Moreover, Google is using Yelp data to bulk up their Places offering. Yelp can’t like that too much. In fact, we’ve heard they’re particularly unhappy because they used to have a deal with Google for this data, but they pulled out of that deal a couple years ago. But Google decided to use Yelp’s data anyway simply by crawling it. Yelp can’t stop them from doing that unless they want to delist themselves from Google — a move which could kill them.
In other words, Yelp used to pay Google (or Google paid Yelp) for the privilege of getting its information in front of searchers then Yelp decided not to do that any more. So Google just started crawling Yelp’s pages and listed the information for free. It’s for user benefit, right?
But whose users?
Obviously, Google is concerned that users of its search engine will appreciate the information and that’s what they’re catering to. But Yelp would rather see those users on its own website. The problem is, some of those users likely will end up on Yelp’s website since Google Places links to it. Rarely does Google provide searchers with results without linking to the page from which the information is taken (I can’t think of a time that it ever has).
Google can’t make searchers click on the link and visit Yelp, but it’s likely that Yelp will pick up some users it doesn’t already have because it is listed in Google Places. I doubt that Yelp will lose any users to Google Places. If it does, that would be a turning point in search behavior.
What do you think? Should Yelp be happy with its privileged status on Google?
Tags: google, yelp
Posted in search engines | 1 Comment »
Sunday, July 11th, 2010
According to Experian Hitwise, Bing gained 7% in search share from May 2010 to June 2010. But if you look at the numbers they are 9.23% and 9.85%, respectively. That’s a 7% increase.
But here’s the kicker: Google lost slightly less than 1% of its share of search. In fact, it was .52%. That fell to Bing, plus some.
So what are we to make of these numbers? Is Bing more competitive now? Not hardly.
Well, let’s qualify that. Bing is more competitive, but only slightly so. They aren’t exactly overtaking Google by a storm or anything. But when you add the Yahoo! search percentage in there, the two search engines together own over 24% of the share of search. That’s starting to get there.
Bing definitely has a better share of the search market today than it ever has before. But it’s creeping up at a snail’s pace. It just doesn’t seem to be fast enough to give Google any real competition. But do you think it will ever happen? Will Bing become a major player in search?
Tags: bing, search
Posted in search engines | No Comments »
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