Healthy Blog Reviews

Ask has always been the red-headed stepchild of the search industry. It’s always lurking in the shadows as the #4 search engine and usually gets a mention in search share only if there was significant up or down movement. Accounting has the Big 4 but search only has the Big 3 which is soon to be the Big 2 ½ or something once bing and Yahoo fully consummate their relationship. Ask is usually not included in those talks but is making changes to differentiate itself and hopefully make more of a splash in that area. The key to that hope: good ol’ fashioned human beings! The Ask blog reports Today we’ve officially launched the public beta for the new Ask.com, which combines our proprietary answers technology (specifically tailored to extract questions and answers from the Web) with the human insight of the thriving Ask.com community drawn from our 87 million monthly uniques. Now available on an invite-only basis (you can request your invite here), the capability to pose questions to real people is now possible for those complex, subjective and/or time-sensitive queries that, no matter how advanced, computers simply can’t address. That means that Ask.com is now uniquely able to offer the most comprehensive and convenient approach to getting answers, combining pages and people to help users find the answers to all questions – even questions for which no answer is published online. In the search world there may just be a place for this kind of service if it can catch on with people who are ‘blue text link trained’ like myself. In this age of social media and trusting sources that reach far beyond our truly trusted circle of friends (be that a good or bad thing, it still is) there may be more of an acceptance of this approach. Mashable’s Jennifer Van Grove sums up the improvements for you The beta offering is a product of four new features: a completely overhauled look with a focus on highlighting trending questions from the community, semantic search with answers displayed on the page, a large Q&A database and a user community element that targets members for answering questions based on their areas of expertise. The latter somewhat mirrors Aardvark’s formula for finding answers to user questions, and is initiated when users click the “Ask the Community” button on the right-hand side of the results page. Even if this Q & A approach seems to be somewhat antiquated it could have some legs if for no other reason than it looks different. Once again, though, Ask needs to drive people to the site and in the past their approach has been mass advertising pushes that come on real strong then disappear. There has been very little attempt to keep the Ask brand in the mind of the searcher in a way to help them possibly convert from Google or somewhere else to the new Ask. I have always hoped that Ask would put together something that was worthy of challenging bing and Yahoo! to at least push them a bit. Whether this approach is the answer certainly is a big TBD. If it’s not the answer then the next question has to be, is there a place for Ask at the search table or is it time to move on and look for someone else to challenge the Big 3 (or 2 1/8 or whatever it’s going to be)? Your thoughts?

Tags: answer, answers, ask-com, cloud-computing, cloud-hosting, improvements, mind, proprietary, relationship, Search, search-engine, Social Media, thoughts, Yahoo
Posted July 27, 2010 by cgseo under Social Media

A few days ago Google launched a new “image search” user interface to the public. If you haven’t tried it yet you should go ahead and give it whirl–after reading this post. My first impression was wow! I really like how the images are positioned in a way that maximizes all available screen real estate. As I continued to search for images and test out the new UI, I had this feeling of deja vu. Something didn’t seem right with this search feature. For some reason it felt like I had used this before. And, then it dawned on me! Certain aspects of Google’s new image search resemble Bing’s image search. The most notable similarity is the absence of pagination navigation at the bottom. This feature change alone on a search engine can stick out like a sore thumb and create a remarkable difference in other similar image search engines like Yahoo for example. Many say that imitation is the highest form of flattery. But in business, there’s sometimes is a fine line between flattery and insult. And when the corporation at hand can drop millions in legal fees on a daily basis, the insult can have a devastating impact. But if you are Google that doesn’t matter. Why doesn’t it matter if Google blatantly copies the features of its competitors? It doesn’t matter because Google dominates a majority of the market. Which means that the vast majority of the folks running image searches have never even tried Bing’s innovative features. Likewise it doesn’t matter if Kevin Spacey imitates well know actors because let’s face it, it’s an honor to be imitated by Kevin Spacey! Having a strong brand isn’t just about making more money or building trust. Often times it’s also about playing by a different set of rules, and sometimes creating your own. So as you grow your business remember that even though there are other ways to create revenue streams, nothing can replace the power of strong brand.

Tags: Business, cloud-computing, cloud-hosting, corporation, images, matter-if-kevin, Search, search-engine, then-it-dawned, Yahoo
Posted July 24, 2010 by cgseo under Social Media

Last week Yahoo sent a letter to their search advertisers about a rather large window for when they can anticipate the integration of bing . In a post yesterday on the Yahoo blog they went a little further and said that they were currently testing the results. Here is what they said We’ve started testing organic (also referred to as algorithmic) and paid search listings from Microsoft for up to 25 percent of Yahoo! Search traffic in the U.S. The primary change for these tests is that the listings are coming from Microsoft. However, the overall page should look the same as the Yahoo! Search you’re used to – with rich content and unique tools and features from Yahoo!. If you happen to fall into our tests, you might also notice some differences in how we’re displaying select search results due to a variety of product configurations we are testing. Here is the screenshot of a page and the ‘changes’ that have occurred. To the untrained eye (and even the trained one) noticing this difference is well, next to impossible unless you had memorized the result set returned by Yahoo. I doubt that happens much. Since 25% isn’t a real large number your chances of seeing this out in the wild is not so strong. Also, unless you are an advertiser or you are a previously high ranked organic site in the Yahoo results this ‘change’ won’t even be noticed. Interestingly enough, this entire change over from Yahoo to bing search is quite disruptive to the industry side of the coin while probably going completely unnoticed by the vast majority of Yahoo search users. So now that we are on the cusp of this ‘historic moment’ how do you really view this play? Will bing being the back end of Yahoo search make a difference for those who use Yahoo as a search engine? Will regular users notice and are they even aware that this tectonic shift has happened? From the little guys’ point of view this is a non-event as long as the search function in Yahoo is not interrupted at great length. This shift effects 13 or so out of a hundred searchers according to the latest search shares . The real impact is to the advertisers and until they squeal this is going to be a non-issue in my book.

Tags: book, difference, event-as-long, industry, integration, look-the-same, Microsoft, screenshot, Search, search-engine, the-advertisers, untrained, Yahoo
Posted July 21, 2010 by cgseo under Social Media

When Twitter finally got to the point where it realized that there needed to be a next step (whether they felt ready or not they were told they were ready by everyone and their brother) they turned to deals with the search engines. It’s a rite of passage for businesses t reach the level where they can even be thought of as a viable source of information that the engines would actually pay to have. It appears as if foursquare is about there already. The Telegraph has the scoop Speaking exclusively to The Telegraph, Dennis Crowley, Foursquare’s co-founder, said that his company was in talks with “everyone” in the search space – including all three major players: Google, Yahoo!, and Microsoft about a data partnership. “Our data generates hugely interesting trends which would enrich search,” Crowley said. We can anonymise data and use it to show venues which are trending at that moment. Twitter helped the world and the search engines know what people are talking about. Foursquare would allow people to search for the types of place people are going to – and where is trending – not what.” Whether or not you are buying into the ‘check-in’ craze this is important to marketers since foursquare is showing signs of taking off. It recently reached the 2 million account plateau just three months after it had hit the 1 million mark. We have seen this kind of hockey stick adoption rate in the past so it is best for foursquare to strike while the iron is hot. Of course, any deals with the engines are gambles because of the fear that the location based game is still very wide open and plans by social giants like Facebook and Google themselves could put a dent in the idea that foursquare could dominate the space. Right now its biggest threat is Gowalla but this space is so new and is developing so rapidly that there could be an unknown lurking in the bushes that could come in and do something different. In fact, one of the concerns about the whole location based craze right now is just what can be done AFTER someone checks in and gets excited about being the mayor of a place that they are visiting. Foursquare is making strides in this area which will likely determine just how far they can go in the future. For now though it’s all good as Crowley says about his current competition “We are more social than Gowalla and ultimately have different visions moving forward. They are excited about different things.” So this will be worth keeping an eye on as more and more elements of search move away from the traditional blue text link. Real estate on the first page of SERP’s (search engine results pages) for anything with a location element are already crowded with maps and seven packs and more. It sure will keep the SEO community on its toes as it tries to keep pace with the change and figure out just what a search result is going to look like in certain circumstances in the very near future. Where are you on the geo-location craze? Are you active? Passive? Waiting to see what happens? Let us know where you are at .

Tags: cloud-computing, cloud-hosting, dennis crowley, engines, facebook, Local/Mobile, location, mayor, Microsoft, Search, search-engine, seo, Social
Posted July 19, 2010 by cgseo under Social Media

Well it looks like the “Will they renew or won’t they renew?” arc of “As Google-China Turns” is over and it has a happy ending for Google. In the past few weeks Google had backed off its hard line stance on China by not redirecting its in-country traffic to the Hong Kong site. Instead it started to offer the opportunity for Chinese visitors to go to the Hong Kong uncensored version via a link on Google China’s home page. Industry experts like Danny Sullivan wondered if that move would be enough to keep Google’s license in China. “If the Chinese government isn’t happy with them running uncensored search results out of the Hong Kong site — I don’t see why they’ll be any happier just because it becomes one click away,” Danny Sullivan, who runs the search-analysis Web site Search Engine Land, told Bloomberg News. I agreed by saying that this offering by Google seemed pretty weak. Well, one man’s weak is another company’s license I suppose. Reuters reports that all is well again between Google and China for now . Google Inc (GOOG.O) said on Friday that the Chinese authorities had renewed its license to operate a website, averting a potential shutdown of its flagship search page in the world’s biggest Internet market. Google is obviously happy with this development considering the size of the opportunity in China and the fact that it is playing a distant second fiddle to China’s own Baidu. I think Google likes a good challenge since bing and others seem to not provide it for them anywhere else. China has renewed our license,” a Google spokeswoman told Reuters. “We are very pleased that the government has renewed our ICP license and we look forward to continuing to provide web search and local products to our users in China.” So at least for today it looks like Google and China get to walk off into the sunset hand in hand while the credits roll. Also, we can all feel safe that Google will be able to continue its quest for world domination one Chinese searcher at a time. All is good with the world again.

Tags: China, chinese, cloud-computing, cloud-hosting, Danny Sullivan, development, google-china, hong, internet, Search, search-engine, sunset, world
Posted July 9, 2010 by cgseo under Social Media