Search engine news of the week
Google opens bidding for print media"Google [...] has opened up the bidding on its much-talked-about print venture. AdWords advertisers can now bid for 1 page, 1/2 page and 1/4 page ads in nearly 30 different lifestyle and technology magazines."
MSN launches 'Search and Win' contest"MSN has come up with a new plan to draw users away from Google: free stuff. The company launched a contest on Monday that will give users a chance to win prizes simply by using the service's search engine. Over $1 million in prizes will be available during the months of February, March and April."
Search engine traffic soars"People in the U.S. use the Internet for more everyday research than any other medium, a fact proven by the 55 percent year-on-year surge in online searches in December, according to market researcher Nielsen/NetRatings. [...]
The number of online searches in the U.S. soared to nearly 5.1 billion searches in December from 3.3 billion a year earlier, despite just a slight uptick in the total number of Americans connecting to the Internet, according to Nielsen/NetRatings."
Microsoft buys mobile search company"Microsoft came late to desktop search; it doesn’t intend to make the same mistake with mobile search. [...] Now with MotionBridge in the fold, Microsoft has a foothold in another aspect of search."
Google still king of search"The Keynote Customer Experience Rankings for Search Engine Sites is based on an examination of 2,000 consumers as they searched and performed relevant tasks on the AOL Search, Ask Jeeves, Google, MSN Search, and Yahoo! Search sites. [...] Google is still king of the Web when it comes to search, and wins consumers."
Bigdaddy: Big changes on Google to come
Google has announced a major update that will affect the ranking of web pages in Google's index. In contrast to the usual algorithm updates, this update will be much bigger because it changes the way Google works behind the scenes. Google has given the update the name "Bigdaddy".
What is Google's Bigdaddy update?Google uses a network of data centers with different IP addresses to answer search queries. These decentralized servers share the workload of indexing web sites.
The upcoming Bigdaddy update is not an algorithm update but a change in Google's data center infrastructure. It contains new code for sorting and examining web pages. According to Google's search engineer Matt Cutts, the update will be live in February or March.
Less spam, more content and a new Google spider?Google is updating the data center infrastructure to handle potential spam problems such as 302 redirections or canonical URLs more efficiently. In addition, the new infrastructure will allow Google to develop more advanced algorithms and larger databases.
Another reason for the new data center infrastructure is that Google wants to be able to index different content types. Google is now testing a new search engine spider that is based on the Mozilla browser.
The new spider should be able to index more than traditional search engine spiders, possibly links within images, JavaScripts or Flash files.
How can you test how Bigdaddy will affect your rankings? Some Google data centers that use the new Bigdaddy system are already online. For example, if you go to 66.249.93.104 you can test Google's new data center.
Google even wants your feedback. Click the "Dissatisfied? Help us improve" link at the bottom right of the result page. Enter your feedback and use the keyword bigdaddy so that Google knows that your feedback is about the new data center
Search engine news of the week
Google stands up to US government porn probe"US Federal prosecutors preparing to defend a controversial Internet pornography law in court have asked Google, Microsoft, Yahoo and America Online to hand over millions of search records -- a request that Google is adamantly denying.
An attorney for the ACLU said Microsoft, Yahoo and AOL received identical subpoenas and chose to comply with them rather than fight the request in court."
Google moves into radio"Google pitched their fork into the radio advertising market yesterday by agreeing to pay up to $1.2bn for a digital platform that will schedule and implement radio advertising airtime."
Google News is out of beta"Google Inc. on Monday said has taken its online news service out of beta, and has added a feature that automatically recommends stories to subscribers of its personalized search offering."
Study suggests search engine advertisers waste time, money"Many online advertisers are overpaying to have links to their business on search engines like Google and Yahoo, according to a study. [...] Researchers at Stanford Graduate School of Business say the auction system used for placement of the ads result in some users overpaying and others wasting time trying to figure out how to beat the system."
Can online press releases really increase your search engine rankings?
What are online press releases?
Online press releases are normal press releases that are distributed through the Internet. Popular online press release services are PRWeb and PRLeap. These services list your press release on their web sites and on a number of partner web sites.
Some people think that the links in these press releases can help the link popularity of a web site and thus increase the search engine rankings of a site.
What does Google say about online press releases?
Matt Cutts is the person in charge for fighting search engine spam on Google. He says the following about press releases and high rankings in his blog:
"A legit press release can get you written up by reporters, or editors/sites may subsequently choose to link to your site. But the actual content of the press release itself doesn’t directly affect a site. For example, those hyperlinks don’t help [the web site in the press release] in Google."
What does this mean to your web site?
Online press releases don't hurt your search engine rankings. However, they also don't increase your rankings (if no one writes about your business). The press release alone and its distribution on various web sites has no effect on your placement in search engines.
If you don't have something people really want to hear then do not send a press release. You should only use press release services if you have something newsworthy to say. If you have an interesting press release then your web site can be mentioned on many other sites.
What can you do if you don't have any news for a press release?
Press releases are not the only way to attract links to your site. The best links to your site are links from related sites that recommend your web site in the normal text.
