Google UK
Like JR the Meta Keyword Tag is back!
Posted By Sam,
September 20th, 2012
About 6 years ago I came across a local Estate Agent site that was painfully slow. It was awful. Finally it loaded but had very little content on view. I looked at the source code and saw that it had over 10,000 keywords forced into the Meta-keyword tag.
Now if there is one thing that even the most amateur SEO knows, that is the Meta Keyword tag is useless. Many have suspected so for ages, then Google admitted it itself a few years ago.
Due to over-use and spammy behaviour, such as that Estate Agent, Google stopped even looking at it. It’s pointless, a waste of time and a waste of space.
But now, like JR, Bobby Ewing and Cliff Barnes, it’s back – but with a bit of a facelift and on a different channel. (more…)
Google puts itself in position 1 of SERPS for “credit cards” and “bank accounts”
Posted By Sam,
August 29th, 2012
Search for ‘bank accounts’ or indeed ‘credit cards’ or even ‘best bank’, some of the most lucrative and therefore competitive search terms around, and you will see that Google has displaced the normal natural search results for an Ad-box of its own, paid-for results. Click on this ad-box and it take you to a Google comparison site where the content is streamed by getthatquote.com
Previously if you searched for ‘credit cards’ or ‘bank accounts’ in Google you would get two ads above the organic content and 8 or so ads to the right of your page. As seen in the example below for “Insurance”. (more…)
Google Places should sort out usability rather than SEOs that use virtual offices
Posted By Sam,
There is a lot of confusion around Google+ Local (previously Google Places) at the moment regarding verification, uploads, images, naming convention etc. But whilst reading the blogs, discussion forums and Google’s own Guidelines it seems that Google would like to curtail the activity of some SEO companies that use Virtual offices to boost their client’s presence in local searches. The Search Engine is ramping up attempts to cut down the practice on the usage of multiple virtual offices or PO boxes to gain presence in Google Places or Google+ Local (an activity that IP has never undertaken). But will Google actually be able to do this? How will it manage and police this process? Should it even bother?
Natural Search accounts for 94% of Search Engine clicks, PPC 6%
Posted By Sam,
August 28th, 2012
With further proof that successful natural search is the overwhelming method of attracting users to your website, a recent unprecedented study has claimed that Paid search or PPC only accounts for 6% of total successful clicks from search engines, against natural search which accounts for the remaining 94% of clicks.
The research, compiled by GroupM UK and carried out with Nielsen’s statistics, stated that of the 1.4bn successful search queries in UK search engines in June 2012, the vast majority clicked on natural search results as opposed to PPC. (more…)
Google referrals can help push web search results
Posted By Andy,
August 10th, 2012
Some searchers will be totally ignorant (and rightfully so) to the planning and foresight that goes into a successful long term SEO strategy for news content generation. Many online newspapers and media publications must have a strategy in place for breaking news. Google has done a lot of work over the past year to serve up the latest results for a specific search term.
In this example I look at the recent announcement that Tom Cruise and Katie Holmes are to be divorced. This event occurred on Friday June 29th 2012.
Should I use Google Translator for Business?
Posted By Sam,
July 5th, 2012
Q: Should i use Google Translate for business?
A: No, or at least not without it being fully checked by a native speaker.
Whether it is for a search engine bot or a real searcher, the best translator is a real one, not a free translator service provided by a search engine such as Google. Google and Bing’s Translator works without the intervention of human translators using this supposed “state-of-the-art” technology.
Search for “Translation Disasters” and there are a huge amount of spurious (and unproven) mishaps involved in using the service. Whether urban myths or not, there seem to be a few instances recently where real issues occurred. The overall recommendation is that Google and Bing Translator is great for doing minor translations, but never rely on any translation tool if your business or reputation relies on it. (more…)
The impact of Twitter in Google SEO – Part 1
Posted By Andy,
May 23rd, 2012
The battle for online and mobile supremacy rages on between the big four (Apple, Facebook, Amazon and Google), whilst we sit back and wait for the victor to emerge.
Google’s aggressive push with Google+ sets the tone for their social ambitions while Facebook still remains the king of social – no matter how much their share price has dropped since the IPO. Whilst Twitter has been a revelation in how people go about their every day lives.
Owning all assets on Page One
For all businesses and brands owning all possible page one assets is now key in search strategy. But how do these social platforms compare in the Google SERPs for celebrity searches? Do these assets dominate page one for a popular celebrity or sportsperson? Do the amount of followers/tweets/posts impact the position of the asset?
Here I take a look at the phenomenon of Twitter and how Google has improved the rankings of twitter.com within the SERPs over the past few years. Part 2 and Part 3 will look at Facebook and Google+ respectively.
‘Keyword not provided’ impact in Google Analytics
Posted By Andy,
March 28th, 2012
We’ve been asked by a lot of people “What is Keyword Not Provided” in Google Analytics?”
In order to make our searches ‘safer’ Google announced in October 2011 that it would start to encrypt searches for users who were logged in to their Google account through Google.com. This would include their subdomains such as Google Plus. This has since rolled out in the UK as of March 5th and I wanted to document the initial impact of the change for webmasters and brand managers.
Bing slow at updating whilst Google enters new speed realm
Posted By Sam,
March 2nd, 2010
Back in May 2009 Bing’s Webmaster Spokesman told us that:
“We are busy adding upgraded and updated technologies to provide better search results. That’s good news for you!” (more…)
Google can’t find search results for Yahoo
Posted By Sam,
November 4th, 2009
I use my Google search bar to find even the most obvious URLs, it’s a lazy practice i know. So instead of typing in the full URL into the browser bar, i search one inch below for it then click. It actually probably takes longer. (more…)