A great success to Microsoft with regard to the online search business is that Microsoft’s Bing has become the world’s second most often used search engine. This figure has been estimated by web analysis in the United States. Now, Bing is the second most popularly used search engine across the globe.
3rd June 2009 was the official date; Bing was officially released all over the world. However, it was available even before that in some countries as well. Analysis companies and other researches are still not sure on for how long Bing would be able to maintain this number two position. They have, in fact, said that it is too early to say about any changes that might take place in the near future.
Analysts, all from their own perspective, say that there is no core reason for Bing’s success. Initial interest to know about the product might be a possible reason. It is still not sure on what would happen to it after a while. The popularity of Bingo should actually be tested after the initial promotion and novelty for the product goes off.
Mr. Steve Ballmer, the chief executive officer of Microsoft said that he is expecting and wishing Microsoft to become the second biggest search engine in the world even if not now but after five years. Analysts review the current condition and say that it seems like Bing would be able to make the $40 billion dollars that he was willing to pay for purchasing Yahoo. This is just a guess and a statement that has no strong proof or evidence. According to these analysis companies, Bing holds approximately 16 percent of the worlds search population that uses search engine is using Bing. This is a very positive sign and something great thing that cannot easily happen. Though Google owns more than 71 percentage of the search population is owned by Google, and others the remaining percentage, there are many chances for improvement that can be well utilized.
It is also seen that Bing is not available fully or with all its features in some places of the world like the UK. Visitors to these pages are just given the options and displayed on how the various features would be available in tabs. News, images, shopping and other related features are all available in tabs that can be used as required. Whereas, if the user opens the US version of Bing, many other new features that are not available or not functioning at the UK’s Bing is available. The additional features that are available include travel information, location related features like information for queries like ‘restaurants in a given locality’, popular searches and much more.
Though it seems to be growing in a rate that is tremendous, the actual success of the new search engine would be possible to be estimated only after a while when the fever of this new search engine is reduced.
Tuesday, June 9, 2009
Monday, June 8, 2009
Microsoft Bing Ads
Microsoft’s new campaign for search engine Bing is centering its branding campaign over the coming months on four core categories: travel, shopping, health, and local search. The tightly focused television spots began airing this week, and are expected to be followed immediately with a concentrated online campaign.
“The first thing we’re trying to do with this campaign is to capitalize with the latent dissatisfaction that’s going on with the market,” said Danielle Tiedt, general manager, Online Audience Business Group Marketing at Microsoft, commenting that people suffer from “search overload syndrome” when a search returns too many results.
Banner Web ads will likely run on sites such as the New York Times, Huffington Post, and “any place where the audience is really engaged… We’re [using] real world examples about the questions people would ask,” said Tiedt. “The other marketing challenge we have is being part of the conversation around search.” Tiedt continued, saying that Microsoft is trying to get people out of the habit of just going to Google. “The way we’re trying to do that is to integrate beyond just traditional ads. We made a big bet in social media… We’re trying to go beyond just serving ads, and get the voice working for Bing. We’re trying a lot of in-show integration”
The very first broadcast of the new Microsoft television advertising campaign promoting Bing can be viewed on their YouTube channel - it shows a couple discussing future vacation plans. When the wife asks if her husband found tickets to Hawaii, he starts rattling off multiple results he found when searching online - which doesn’t help them at all with their vacation plans. The ad calls this “Search Overload Syndrome”, or SOS, and says that Bing is the cure.
The estimated ad spend Microsoft is expected to commit to promoting Bing tops out around $80-100 million ; quite an investment but worth it if they can manage to rock Google a bit on their pedestal.
“The first thing we’re trying to do with this campaign is to capitalize with the latent dissatisfaction that’s going on with the market,” said Danielle Tiedt, general manager, Online Audience Business Group Marketing at Microsoft, commenting that people suffer from “search overload syndrome” when a search returns too many results.
Banner Web ads will likely run on sites such as the New York Times, Huffington Post, and “any place where the audience is really engaged… We’re [using] real world examples about the questions people would ask,” said Tiedt. “The other marketing challenge we have is being part of the conversation around search.” Tiedt continued, saying that Microsoft is trying to get people out of the habit of just going to Google. “The way we’re trying to do that is to integrate beyond just traditional ads. We made a big bet in social media… We’re trying to go beyond just serving ads, and get the voice working for Bing. We’re trying a lot of in-show integration”
The very first broadcast of the new Microsoft television advertising campaign promoting Bing can be viewed on their YouTube channel - it shows a couple discussing future vacation plans. When the wife asks if her husband found tickets to Hawaii, he starts rattling off multiple results he found when searching online - which doesn’t help them at all with their vacation plans. The ad calls this “Search Overload Syndrome”, or SOS, and says that Bing is the cure.
The estimated ad spend Microsoft is expected to commit to promoting Bing tops out around $80-100 million ; quite an investment but worth it if they can manage to rock Google a bit on their pedestal.
New Google Penalty?
Once again, the tales of a dreaded Google penalty are making the rounds - this time a whopping 50 spot drop in rankings has been observed, which anomaly in Google’s results could indeed indicate a new Google penalty.
Several webmasters have reported that their websites lost top positions on Google and have plummeted to position 50 and below. Confusion reigns, as the normal metrics shows that the websites have not changed substantially - in one case, the website was older than two years, the inbound links did not change and the Google PageRank in Google’s toolbar did not change (although we know the toolbar is notoriously inaccurate at times and slow to update). Yet another website was older than 10 years, yet it too was penalized.
In the related forum thread at Webmasters World, several theories are being tossed around: one is that that the websites could have been penalized because of spammy methods used by a webmaster on another of his domains. It is important to remember that a website you link to might link to spammy websites even if you would never do that. Website widgets, counters and other plug-ins can place invisible links to other sites on your website as well.
Servers can also be hacked and there could be a link that you don’t want on your website. Google has ways of finding paid links, one of which is taking reports from your competitors - but some rivals are black hat enough to try and take you down by more aggressive methods.
One theory about the penalty that seems more likely is the use of paid links from .edu domains. It has been revealed that there are multiple hacked .edu servers that host websites on which these links can appear, and paid links from other sites can also cause problems. Again, this is a place where evil competitors could possibly harm you by purchasing links for your website.
It seems that Google is adjusting its paid link filters, and that paid links from .edu domains and other sites are the reason for most of the problems. Usually people catch on fast and fix their site, eliminating paid or spammy links. Remember to no-follow any links you pay for!
Several webmasters have reported that their websites lost top positions on Google and have plummeted to position 50 and below. Confusion reigns, as the normal metrics shows that the websites have not changed substantially - in one case, the website was older than two years, the inbound links did not change and the Google PageRank in Google’s toolbar did not change (although we know the toolbar is notoriously inaccurate at times and slow to update). Yet another website was older than 10 years, yet it too was penalized.
In the related forum thread at Webmasters World, several theories are being tossed around: one is that that the websites could have been penalized because of spammy methods used by a webmaster on another of his domains. It is important to remember that a website you link to might link to spammy websites even if you would never do that. Website widgets, counters and other plug-ins can place invisible links to other sites on your website as well.
Servers can also be hacked and there could be a link that you don’t want on your website. Google has ways of finding paid links, one of which is taking reports from your competitors - but some rivals are black hat enough to try and take you down by more aggressive methods.
One theory about the penalty that seems more likely is the use of paid links from .edu domains. It has been revealed that there are multiple hacked .edu servers that host websites on which these links can appear, and paid links from other sites can also cause problems. Again, this is a place where evil competitors could possibly harm you by purchasing links for your website.
It seems that Google is adjusting its paid link filters, and that paid links from .edu domains and other sites are the reason for most of the problems. Usually people catch on fast and fix their site, eliminating paid or spammy links. Remember to no-follow any links you pay for!
Sunday, June 7, 2009
Google / Firefox Add-on ‘PageSpeed’
Google has released a tool to help web developers build their pages correctly and with greater speed. Recently, Google released Firefox add-on Page Speed, which integrates with another add-on, Firebug. These are designed for web developers trying to make their pages faster. When you install Page Speed and restart Firefox, you can now expand Firebug and switch to a Page Speed tool tab.
Move to your page, then click the Analyze Performance button. What appears is a list of things you did right, and things that Google regards as having been done wrong. Expand this section for tips and help in regard to issues like “Leverage browser caching”, “Remove unused CSS”, “Combine external JavaScript”.
Google’s Code Blog says:
At Google, we focus constantly on speed; we believe that making our websites load and display faster improves the user’s experience and helps them become more productive. Today, we want to share with the web community some of the best practices we’ve used and developed over the years, by open-sourcing Page Speed…a tool we’ve been using internally to improve the performance of our web pages.
Page Speed’s suggestions are based on a set of commonly accepted best practices that we and other websites implement. To help you understand the suggestions and rules, we have created detailed documentation to describe the rationale behind each of the rules.
The Firefox add-on is interesting as it shows that Google is still heavily invested in Firefox - some proposed that with the advent of Google Chrome, new features for Firefox would be slow to appear.
Move to your page, then click the Analyze Performance button. What appears is a list of things you did right, and things that Google regards as having been done wrong. Expand this section for tips and help in regard to issues like “Leverage browser caching”, “Remove unused CSS”, “Combine external JavaScript”.
Google’s Code Blog says:
At Google, we focus constantly on speed; we believe that making our websites load and display faster improves the user’s experience and helps them become more productive. Today, we want to share with the web community some of the best practices we’ve used and developed over the years, by open-sourcing Page Speed…a tool we’ve been using internally to improve the performance of our web pages.
Page Speed’s suggestions are based on a set of commonly accepted best practices that we and other websites implement. To help you understand the suggestions and rules, we have created detailed documentation to describe the rationale behind each of the rules.
The Firefox add-on is interesting as it shows that Google is still heavily invested in Firefox - some proposed that with the advent of Google Chrome, new features for Firefox would be slow to appear.
More Widgets Included For Yahoo Mail
Many new applications and features have been added to Yahoo Mail, Yahoo home page TV Widgets and Zimbra. With the launch of these new features, Yahoo has expanded the Open Strategy.
In a blog, a senior vice president at Yahoo Mr. Tapan Bhat has written saying that they have spent a lot of money on this launch. He has written saying, “We’ve spent a lot of time thinking about how we can ease the pain of site-hopping to help you do more things at once,”
As announced in December, Yahoo has introduced the new applications that would be available for external developers as open source. Yahoo had mentioned in December that they would soon make their technologies as open source and have many other social networking features incorporated in it.
There are many applications that have been introduced and it includes Food & Wine Pairing application, Green Lifestyle application. Mint.com application and many more. All these applications have a specialty of their own. For instance, Food & Wine Pairing application provides information on recipes and menus, Green Lifestyle application talks about tips to become environmental conscious and mint.com application discusses about budget and finance management.
A WordPress application has also been added to Yahoo now so that users can post and make changes in their blog without moving away from the Yahoo network. Currently there are 18 applications available for the public use but in general, a choice can be made by the user of which applications he or she needs. By clicking on the ‘add content’ button on my.yahoo.com, users can select the applications of their choice.
Many other exiting things would soon be available for users at Yahoo mail. PayPal, photo editing by Picnik and Zumo Web storage system would all be available at Yahoo mail. Now paying and receiving money through PayPal. Favorite photos can all be edited and formulated using Picnik. Email files up to 100 MB can be stored for free and this is offered by Zumo.
All the additions that have been made to Yahoo Mail are available in beta and are not available widely. Those users who are interested in trying these new applications can sign up themselves with their Yahoo id at the overview page of Yahoo mail. The users, who sign up now, would also be intimated when these applications are actually being launched.
One more important feature that Yahoo has introduced is to access the internet through TV. Widget enabled TVs would now be able to view videos from YouTube. These widgets for YouTube and cable channel Showtime, would be able to connect to YouTube videos. A widget of eBay is also planned to be soon launched.
Zimbra has also been added that would automatically save all your mails and save them as a word document. This would be of great help in the future and would help in reading the old mails for reference.
In a blog, a senior vice president at Yahoo Mr. Tapan Bhat has written saying that they have spent a lot of money on this launch. He has written saying, “We’ve spent a lot of time thinking about how we can ease the pain of site-hopping to help you do more things at once,”
As announced in December, Yahoo has introduced the new applications that would be available for external developers as open source. Yahoo had mentioned in December that they would soon make their technologies as open source and have many other social networking features incorporated in it.
There are many applications that have been introduced and it includes Food & Wine Pairing application, Green Lifestyle application. Mint.com application and many more. All these applications have a specialty of their own. For instance, Food & Wine Pairing application provides information on recipes and menus, Green Lifestyle application talks about tips to become environmental conscious and mint.com application discusses about budget and finance management.
A WordPress application has also been added to Yahoo now so that users can post and make changes in their blog without moving away from the Yahoo network. Currently there are 18 applications available for the public use but in general, a choice can be made by the user of which applications he or she needs. By clicking on the ‘add content’ button on my.yahoo.com, users can select the applications of their choice.
Many other exiting things would soon be available for users at Yahoo mail. PayPal, photo editing by Picnik and Zumo Web storage system would all be available at Yahoo mail. Now paying and receiving money through PayPal. Favorite photos can all be edited and formulated using Picnik. Email files up to 100 MB can be stored for free and this is offered by Zumo.
All the additions that have been made to Yahoo Mail are available in beta and are not available widely. Those users who are interested in trying these new applications can sign up themselves with their Yahoo id at the overview page of Yahoo mail. The users, who sign up now, would also be intimated when these applications are actually being launched.
One more important feature that Yahoo has introduced is to access the internet through TV. Widget enabled TVs would now be able to view videos from YouTube. These widgets for YouTube and cable channel Showtime, would be able to connect to YouTube videos. A widget of eBay is also planned to be soon launched.
Zimbra has also been added that would automatically save all your mails and save them as a word document. This would be of great help in the future and would help in reading the old mails for reference.
Sunday, November 2, 2008
Inbound links are important but content is even more important
Google's Maile Ohye writes the following about inbound links in his article:
"Inbound links are links from pages on external sites linking back to your site. Inbound links can bring new users to your site, and when the links are merit-based and freely-volunteered as an editorial choice, they're also one of the positive signals to Google about your site's importance."
Nothing new here. If many related websites link to your site, and if these links look natural, this will help you rankings on Google a lot.
However, links are not the most important ranking factor. Maile Ohye gives a concrete example:
"Let's say I have a site, example.com, that offers users a variety of unique website templates and design tips. One of the strongest ranking factors is my site's content. Additionally, perhaps my site is also linked from three sources -- however, one inbound link is from a spammy site.
As far as Google is concerned, we want only the two quality inbound links to contribute to the PageRank signal in our ranking. "
The website's content is mentioned as one of the strongest ranking factors. The inbound links are additional. That makes sense. The content of your website tells Google what your website is about.
If you want to get a high ranking for the keyword "used cars in dallas" but your web pages are about microwave ovens then you won't get high rankings for that keyword.
For that reason, it is very important that you optimize your web pages for the keywords for which you want to get high rankings before you try to get links from other sites.
"Inbound links are links from pages on external sites linking back to your site. Inbound links can bring new users to your site, and when the links are merit-based and freely-volunteered as an editorial choice, they're also one of the positive signals to Google about your site's importance."
Nothing new here. If many related websites link to your site, and if these links look natural, this will help you rankings on Google a lot.
However, links are not the most important ranking factor. Maile Ohye gives a concrete example:
"Let's say I have a site, example.com, that offers users a variety of unique website templates and design tips. One of the strongest ranking factors is my site's content. Additionally, perhaps my site is also linked from three sources -- however, one inbound link is from a spammy site.
As far as Google is concerned, we want only the two quality inbound links to contribute to the PageRank signal in our ranking. "
The website's content is mentioned as one of the strongest ranking factors. The inbound links are additional. That makes sense. The content of your website tells Google what your website is about.
If you want to get a high ranking for the keyword "used cars in dallas" but your web pages are about microwave ovens then you won't get high rankings for that keyword.
For that reason, it is very important that you optimize your web pages for the keywords for which you want to get high rankings before you try to get links from other sites.
Saturday, November 1, 2008
Five internal linking tips that will improve your search engine rankings
Most search engine spiders do not type into your search boxes and they do not use pull down menus. The following tips will help you to make sure that search engine spiders will index your web pages correctly:
1. Use simple text links to link to your web pages
Most search engines cannot index fancy Flash or JavaScript menus. Some even have difficulty with image links. If possible, use simple text links to link to your web pages. You can make text links prettier by styling them with CSS.
2. Your most important pages should not be more than one click away from the index page
Web pages that can be accessed with a few clicks from your home page are considered more important than web pages that are buried deep inside your website. It's easier to get high rankings for these easy to access pages.
3. Use descriptive link texts
The text that you use to link to your web pages helps search engines to better understand your content. If you sell shoes on your website, do not use links such as but descriptive link texts such as business shoes
That makes it easier for search engines to put the page into a context and it will be more likely that the page gets high rankings for the keyword "business shoes".
4. Create a sitemap
A sitemap is a simple web page that contains link to all important pages of your website. You could add a link to your sitemap in the footer of every web page. By doing this, search engines can find all important pages with two clicks.
5. Check the validity of your HTML code
Errors in the HTML code of your web pages can prevent search engines from indexing your web pages correctly. For example, an HTML error might indicate the end of a web page before the actual content begins. That would mean that search engines would skip the content and any links of that page. You can access the official W3C HTML validator in the Tools menu in IBP.
1. Use simple text links to link to your web pages
Most search engines cannot index fancy Flash or JavaScript menus. Some even have difficulty with image links. If possible, use simple text links to link to your web pages. You can make text links prettier by styling them with CSS.
2. Your most important pages should not be more than one click away from the index page
Web pages that can be accessed with a few clicks from your home page are considered more important than web pages that are buried deep inside your website. It's easier to get high rankings for these easy to access pages.
3. Use descriptive link texts
The text that you use to link to your web pages helps search engines to better understand your content. If you sell shoes on your website, do not use links such as but descriptive link texts such as business shoes
That makes it easier for search engines to put the page into a context and it will be more likely that the page gets high rankings for the keyword "business shoes".
4. Create a sitemap
A sitemap is a simple web page that contains link to all important pages of your website. You could add a link to your sitemap in the footer of every web page. By doing this, search engines can find all important pages with two clicks.
5. Check the validity of your HTML code
Errors in the HTML code of your web pages can prevent search engines from indexing your web pages correctly. For example, an HTML error might indicate the end of a web page before the actual content begins. That would mean that search engines would skip the content and any links of that page. You can access the official W3C HTML validator in the Tools menu in IBP.
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