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Google’s Knowledge Graph Bringing Semantics to the MassesWith Facebook’s IPO upon us, the timing of Google’s latest press blitz should probably be regarded with a healthy dose of suspicion, but the unveiling of the Knowledge Graph is an important step in Google’s journey — and a reaffirmation of values diluted by recent dalliances in social networking. Writing for The Atlantic, Alexis [...]
SEO/SEM journal | 20-May-2012 18:00
Google Moves to Get Around ‘Google’s Pet’ Issue
Google has reportedly figured out a way to sort of avoid looking like it’s playing favorites if the Chinese ever decide to let it take over Motorola Mobility. With Jelly Bean, the next version of Android, the Wall Street Journal says it’s changed its strategy. Rather than work with just one Android pet on so-called “lead devices” before releasing the software to other OEMs, it’s going to work with as many as five vendors that will get early access to the code and also get to send their developers to the Googleplex to work shoulder-to-shoulder with Google and Google’s other pets.
SEO/SEM journal | 19-May-2012 22:00
Google Knowledge Graph: How It Changes Search
Google has enhanced its search service to augment search results with sets of associated facts, an improvement that demonstrates greater understanding of queries. Google calls this innovation a Knowledge Graph.Just as Facebook’s social graph is a set of associated data about people and their friends, Google’s knowledge graph is a set of associated data about [...]
SEO/SEM journal | 17-May-2012 17:51
HTC One V: Two Week Usage Review
I finally gave up on the Android dead end (no ICS upgrade) that was my Galaxy S i9003 and decided to jump to the ICS bandwagon. The only options for an out of the box ICS experience in India at this time are the HTC duo – One X & One V. Of these, the One X was beyond my budget, and so it was a pretty simple decision to go for the One V in the end. Reviews have been pretty positive, and I’m throwing in my 2 cents based on a 2 weeks of usage experience that wouldn’t have shown up in initial reviews. A caveat on my usage experience – I use the One V (and the Galaxy S before it) primarily as a mobile internet device (mails, browsing, e-commerce, social networking etc.) rather than for phone calls.
SEO/SEM journal | 16-May-2012 10:44
Chrome 19 Launches
Besides the usual bug fixes and performance improvements, the highlight of today’s Google Chrome release is the addition of tab syncing to Chrome. With this, Chrome users can now have their open tabs synced across all of their devices, including tablets and phones that run the Ice Cream Sandwich-only Chrome for Android beta.
SEO/SEM journal | 15-May-2012 19:42
Yahoo’s New CEO is Toast: WSJ
Yahoo’s so-called ResumeGate has reportedly claimed its short-lived CEO Scott Thompson. In the midst of Mother’s Day – when, as she says, everybody’s at brunch – All Things Digital’s ace reporter Kara Swisher, who seems to know everything that goes on at Yahoo, said Sunday – based on what she’s been told by “multiple sources” – that Thompson’s stepping down after a mere four months on the job.
SEO/SEM journal | 13-May-2012 20:40
Google Adds More Semantic Smarts to its Search Engine
Google seems to be eking out a major new tweak to its search results. Reportedly spotted by several users, the search pages are now displaying semantic data nestled to the right of the regular results. Such information tries to tie in relevant facts related to the subject of your search rather than just providing links [...]
SEO/SEM journal | 10-May-2012 11:30
Yahoo Gets New Ultimatum
When Yahoo ignored Third Point’s ultimatum to fire CEO Scott Thompson for cause by high noon Monday Third Point read Yahoo Delaware General Corporation Law and demanded that the company open all its records about how it came to hire the man at the center of “ResumeGate.” It wants them ready for inspection and copying by Friday, another deadline. Section 220(b) of the Delaware General Corporation Law says any stockholder can inspect certain books and records of a public company on written request. If Third Point doesn’t get what it wants it will doubtless sue in Delaware’s reportedly stockholder-leaning Chancery Court. Meanwhile, the Yahoo board is supposed to be doing its own investigation of how it came to make a regulatory filing saying Thompson got an undergraduate degree in computer science and accounting from Stonehill College, a Catholic school near Boston, when it was only in accounting. Yahoo claimed last week that it was just an “inadvertent error,” but it appears that Thompson has been making that “inadvertent error” for years like at eBay where he was president of PayPal. In a letter to the board Monday Third Point said, “We believe that this internal investigation by this Board must not be conducted behind a veil of secrecy and shareholders deserve total transparency.” Third Point is Yahoo’s biggest shareholder and is embroiled in a proxy fight with the company aimed at filling four board seats with its own people. The hedge fund happened upon and immediately advertised the discrepancy in Thompson’s CV last week. It also discovered that the head of the board’s search committee Patti Hart fudged her resume too and claimed to have a bachelor’s degree in marketing and economics when it’s really in business administration. It wants her gone too. Third Point wants any records related to her appointment to the Yahoo board as well as any records of how Peter Liguori, John Hayes, Thomas McInerney, Maynard Webb, Jr. and Fred Amoroso happened to get board seats. If it gets its hands on the documents, Forbes thinks Third Point is going to find that Thompson wasn’t vetted at all; that no head hunter was involved; that there were no other candidates; and that Thompson simply reached out to the board and two weeks later was CEO. If so it will strengthen Third Point’s case of board mismanagement, an easy enough case to prove given Yahoo’s history. It wants the board to drop its resistance to Third Point’s nominees for the board which include Third Point CEO Daniel Loeb, Maeva Group CEO Harry Wilson, former MTV Networks president Michael Wolf and former NBC Universal CEO Jeff Zucker. Yahoo claims Loeb isn’t qualified to sit on the board. Meanwhile, and utterly coincidently, Yahoo is supposedly working on a new deal to sell maybe 15%-25% of its holdings in Alibaba back to the China e-commerce company. A deal, which has previously eluded the two companies, could reportedly be done in weeks. Thompson has supposedly been leading the latest negotiations. This deal is supposed to be simpler than the others they tried and would see Yahoo pay heavy taxes on its gains. Of course selling an increasingly valuable asset that’s supposed to represent a large part of Yahoo’s $18.8 billion market cap may not strike everybody as the sensible thing to do right now no matter how much Alibaba complains. Yahoo owns about 40% of Alibaba and the valuation is unclear. Its valuation last year was $32 billion. Yahoo hasn’t been able to bridge a “valuation gap” with Softbank, the majority owner of Yahoo Japan, so that deal’s going nowhere.
SEO/SEM journal | 08-May-2012 16:15
Why You May Be Screwed If You Don’t Take Google+ Seriously
If you have recently checked your category’s Google search results, you may well have been as surprised as was when I recently checked our first page placement in the ‘content marketing’ topic.
SEO/SEM journal | 04-May-2012 12:00
Cloud Security: Encryption Is Key
Today, with enterprises migrating to the cloud, the security challenge around protecting data is greater than ever before. Keeping data private and secure has always been a business imperative. But for many companies and organizations, it has also become a compliance requirement and a necessity to stay in business. Standards including HIPAA, Sarbanes-Oxley, PCI DSS and the Gramm-Leach-Bliley Act all require that organizations protect their data at rest and provide defenses against data loss and threats. Public cloud computing is the delivery of computing as a service rather than as a product, and is usually categorized into three service models: Software as a Service (SaaS), Infrastructure as a Service (IaaS), and Platform as a Service (PaaS). When it comes to public cloud security, all leading cloud providers are investing significant efforts and resources in securing and certifying their datacenters. However, as cloud computing matures, enterprises are learning that cloud security cannot be delivered by the cloud provider alone. In fact, cloud providers make sure enterprises know that security is a shared responsibility, and that cloud customers do share responsibility for data security, protection from unauthorized access, and backup of their data.
SEO/SEM journal | 22-Apr-2012 18:00
The Web – Changing the Way We Work
The web is fundamentally changing the way we work – is your company ready? Intrigued by how more than 4 million businesses are using Google’s cloud to work in the future? Join us as we bring Google’s highly anticipated annual gathering of business leaders together to hear: Industry experts shed light on emerging business models Customers share stories of business transformation Our product experts unveil new products Our executives answer your questions
SEO/SEM journal | 21-Apr-2012 12:00
OK, So Here’s the Plan: Yahoo’s CEO
Yahoo’s still wet-behind-the-ears CEO Scott Thompson, who just laid off 2,000 Yahoos to save $375 million a year, has laid out the gist of the expected reorg he has in mind for the joint, and naturally his internal memo escaped into the wild. Whether there’s a redemptive strategy in it to stop Yahoo’s revenues from being chipped away by Facebook and Google rather than just an exercise in moving the deck chairs around on the Titanic isn’t clear. In the memo Thompson confirmed what is already widely known: Yahoo’s Chief Product Officer Blake Irving is leaving and taking the centralized products group with him. The company is supposed to be reorganizing around customers and starting May 1 it will be divided into three operating groups – Consumer, Regions and Technology – “charged with delivering the best customer experiences.”
SEO/SEM journal | 11-Apr-2012 14:20
Cisco Helps Back Cloud Storage Start-Up Ctera
Four-year-old Ctera Networks, which sells a hybrid cloud storage enablement suite to SMBs and enterprise branches, has gotten a third funding round, this one led by the ever chi-chi Venrock with a strategic investment from Cisco and participation by existing backer Benchmark Capital. Benchmark provided Ctera’s A and B rounds but nobody outside the Israel start-up seems to know how much has come in including this time. Venrock, which is thinking Big Data, gets a seat on the board. The new money is earmarked for expanding staff and addressing demand. Apparently Ctera has been seeing double-digit revenue growth the last seven quarters and claims to be reaching 100,000 business users.
SEO/SEM journal | 25-Mar-2012 20:00
Everybody Move Over, Quantum Wants to Own Cloud Backup
Quantum wants a piece of all this cloud action. So it’s going to loft cloud-based backup and disaster recovery that could severely challenge dumbed-down widgetry like Moxy and Carbonite – or for that matter the pricy high-end EMC and Hitachi storage-based options. It’s peddling faster restores and lower-cost disaster recovery, cloud backup with local copies as a safety net and deduplication to cut costs. Quantum says its users, who’ll have an SLA, won’t be days retrieving backed up data – if they can – from cheap cloud-only solutions or broke deploying fast but very expensive storage array-based replication, often on expensive new hardware as the data grows.
SEO/SEM journal | 25-Mar-2012 16:00
Five Free Tools for SEO Success
Before hitting this list, be sure you’ve done your keywords homework. It’s really pretty simple: make a list of the keywords relevant to your product or service. These are the words used to describe what you are offering and the words and phrases prospective customers are putting into search engines to find you. That’s really the long and short of it. What are you selling that you want people to find and which keywords do you stand a chance of placing for organically. Answer that question with your keywords. When answering, bear in mind that there may be many a number of common words or phrases that apply! For example if you are selling USB storage devices, “aka flash drives,” you may also want to include such common words as “data stick,” “thumb drive,” USB key,” and the like. So look for these word clusters.
Now, having said that, it is important to note that you are likely to have competition for your keywords. The less competition, the more unique your keywords are, the more likely you are to rank well if you follow standard SEO practices on your website. So it is a bit of a trade-off. The more popular and competitive your keywords are, the more difficult it will be to rank well. But here are some important tools that will help:
1) Google Keywords Tool. In the world of SEO, who’s your daddy? Of course, Google. And Google has a keywords tool that is free to use. While this is tied to AdWords, it can serve as a guide for you to build your SEO strategy. Plus, it’s great for generating related keywords that you probably haven’t considered. And for sure, it can inform a paid advert campaign if you decide you want to take it to the next level, eg., beyond just “organic” search term ranking. We talked about the potential “Catch 22” of keyword competition, right? This tool will give you insights. See our example below from this tool where we’ve plugged in “SEO marketing development” for our keywords. We’ve set the option for the matches to be “loose” instead of “closely related,” and we can see that terms like “SEO Marketing Blog” have low competition but also relatively low monthly searches:
Meanwhile, we have our work cut out for us, if we want to compete for keywords like “SEO Services:”
2) If you’ve already established keywords and want to find out how your SEO strategy is working, the free Search Engine Genie tool is a must. Rankings for keywords tells you how you are doing compared to the competition. If you still have work to do, then it is time to pull out the heavy equipment and reassess your techniques. That’s what the next freebie does.
3) Not sure if your site is up to snuff with SEO practices? Again Google comes to the rescue with Webmaster Tools. This essential service reports on site health and will allow you to tame both title tags, H tags and meta descriptions. You already know that you should be using keywords in your URLs, page titles, etc., right? See the example below where redundant title tags are run amok:
As an added bonus, now Webmaster Tools works hand-in-hand with Google Analytics. To get started, you just need a Google login and to paste a small piece of “verification” code into your site. After the tool has had a chance to crawl your site, just use the reports and then find and fix these title tags by plugging in more specific key words for your content and you’ll soon be on your way to SEO success.
4) If you want to find out more details about how to write content and create links that will put your results higher in those coveted search result listings, you can’t do any better by following the free SEO starter guide. Many of the techniques we’ve already mentioned in previous posts such as using keywords in building page titles, headings and links.
The additional tips and tricks provided by this guide are an invaluable resource. Get this guide! Read it, study it, follow it – even print out all 32 wonderful pages if you must.
5) As we’ve enumerated here, there are just a TON of available resources to get you on your way to SEO splendor, but one offer you can’t beat comes from HubSpot, their blog and CRM integration tools will show you how to take your site to the next level, so if you dare to endure a Free Assessment, be sure and check out their free website evaluation offering.
Okay, check out all the great SEO tools listed above. If you have any questions afterward, of course we’d be happy to help you implement an on-page website search engine optimization strategy!
Is your website getting found? Download our Internet Marketing Essentials Website Optimization eBook >SEO/SEM journal | 01-Mar-2012 11:05
Enterprise Social Search – as a Service
Our next upcoming best practices white paper is going to be called ‘Cloud Computing and the Drummond Report‘ – A special feature on how Cloud might be employed to help realize many of the cost-saving goals recommended.
SEO/SEM journal | 25-Feb-2012 13:00
Google Buys More Patents Off IBM
IP-short Google has gone back to the Big Blue well again for another 217 patents and patent applications. The transaction turned up in a search of the US Patent and Trademark Office’s patent assignment database the other day by SEO by the Sea, the blog that has been keeping tabs on the IP transfers that have been going on between IBM and Google for at least the last eight months. The PTO’s records show that Google has bought over 2,300 patents from IBM on undisclosed terms. The latest deal includes patents related to wireless phones and JavaScript widgets. Bill Slawski, who writes SEO by the Sea, says the 188 patents and 29 patent applications cover a “broad range of topics, such as presentation software, blade servers, data caching, server load balancing, network performance, video conferencing, e-mail administration, and instant messaging applications. A number of the patents cover specific Internet, phone and mobile phone technologies as well.” Florian Mueller, who’s been following Google’s patent travails, figures Google, with IBM’s connivance, may be building up to file suit against Oracle using IBM’s database and enterprise software IP in retaliation for Oracle’s Java suit and its recently revised (upwards) demand for $2.7 billion in patent damages alone and that’s before trebling. No figure has been put on its copyright claims. For a selected list of patents in the latest cache see www.seobythesea.com/2012/01/ibm-assigns-patent-filings-to-google/ . The December 28, 2011 deal was recorded by the PTO on December 31.
SEO/SEM journal | 06-Jan-2012 12:15
Google Buys More Patents Off IBM
IP-short Google has gone back to the Big Blue well again for another 217 patents and patent applications. The transaction turned up in a search of the US Patent and Trademark Office’s patent assignment database the other day by SEO by the Sea, the blog that has been keeping tabs on the IP transfers that have been going on between IBM and Google for at least the last eight months. The PTO’s records show that Google has bought over 2,300 patents from IBM on undisclosed terms. The latest deal includes patents related to wireless phones and JavaScript widgets. Bill Slawski, who writes SEO by the Sea, says the 188 patents and 29 patent applications cover a “broad range of topics, such as presentation software, blade servers, data caching, server load balancing, network performance, video conferencing, e-mail administration, and instant messaging applications. A number of the patents cover specific Internet, phone and mobile phone technologies as well.” Florian Mueller, who’s been following Google’s patent travails, figures Google, with IBM’s connivance, may be building up to file suit against Oracle using IBM’s database and enterprise software IP in retaliation for Oracle’s Java suit and its recently revised (upwards) demand for $2.7 billion in patent damages alone and that’s before trebling. No figure has been put on its copyright claims. For a selected list of patents in the latest cache see www.seobythesea.com/2012/01/ibm-assigns-patent-filings-to-google/ . The December 28, 2011 deal was recorded by the PTO on December 31.
SEO/SEM journal | 06-Jan-2012 12:15
Google Seeks Nortel Replacement
Having blanched at spending more than $4.5 billion for the 6,000 Nortel patents that were supposed to help it build a fortress against infringement claims – even if some of the money was Intel’s – patent-short Google is reportedly talking acquisition with InterDigital, whose wireless IP could reportedly help protect its litigation-attracting Android franchise. InterDigital reportedly holds and licenses 8,800 mostly handset-style patents on things like transmitting wireless data and canceling noise interference.
SEO/SEM journal | 24-Jul-2011 16:15
Google Confirms FTC Investigation
Google has confirmed in a regulatory filing that the Federal Trade Commission means to investigate its search and advertising business for abusing its dominance like the European Commission is doing. It got the subpoena last Thursday, the day the Wall Street Journal reported that the shoe was about to drop. Subpoenas to competitors and customers will follow. Observers like the Journal immediately drew comparisons to what happened to Microsoft and suggested that Google could be defending itself for years, condemned to distraction while facing a nemesis like Facebook.
SEO/SEM journal | 05-Jul-2011 10:00
Google Confirms FTC Investigation
Google has confirmed in a regulatory filing that the Federal Trade Commission means to investigate its search and advertising business for abusing its dominance like the European Commission is doing. It got the subpoena last Thursday, the day the Wall Street Journal reported that the shoe was about to drop. Subpoenas to competitors and customers will follow. Observers like the Journal immediately drew comparisons to what happened to Microsoft and suggested that Google could be defending itself for years, condemned to distraction while facing a nemesis like Facebook.
SEO/SEM journal | 01-Jul-2011 17:00
Google Sued for ‘Suffocating’ French Rival
Google’s been sued in Paris for anti-competitive behavior by 1plusV, a French specialty search firm that also complained to the European Commission last year and again this year about the search giant’s alleged habit of blocking rivals and depriving them ad revenues by manipulating search results. It’s asking for €295 million (~$424 million). Its beef goes back four years. It claims Google blacklisted 30 of its search engines from 2007-2010 and pushed its own services instead. Besides the EC probe, Google is now being investigated by the Federal Trade Commission for the same thing. Google owns at least 80% of the European search market.
SEO/SEM journal | 29-Jun-2011 14:00
Cloud Computing: Google Sued for ‘Suffocating’ French Rival
Google’s been sued in Paris for anti-competitive behavior by 1plusV, a French specialty search firm that also complained to the European Commission last year and again this year about the search giant’s alleged habit of blocking rivals and depriving them ad revenues by manipulating search results. It’s asking for €295 million (~$424 million). Its beef goes back four years. It claims Google blacklisted 30 of its search engines from 2007-2010 and pushed its own services instead. Besides the EC probe, Google is now being investigated by the Federal Trade Commission for the same thing. Google owns at least 80% of the European search market.
SEO/SEM journal | 28-Jun-2011 21:39
Opera Founder Out
Opera founder Jon von Tetzchner is leaving the company because of differences with the board. He wrote in an e-mail to Opera staff that “It has become clear that the board, management and I do not share the same values and we do not have the same opinions on how to keep evolving Opera. As a result I have come to an agreement with the board to end my time at Opera. I feel the board and management is more quarterly focused than me.” He told Reuters that “I’m probably more ambitious and would like to move faster in all areas than the board and the current management do.”
SEO/SEM journal | 28-Jun-2011 15:17
FTC to Investigate Google for Antitrust: WSJ
The shoe that’s been dangling at the end of Washington’s toe for ever so long has finally dropped, according to the Wall Street Journal. The Federal Trade Commission is reportedly ready to serve Google with civil subpoenas, kicking off what the paper says will be a “wide-ranging, formal antitrust investigation into whether the search giant has abused its dominance on the web.” Google should get served with demands for information in days. Competitors and customers will get theirs later.
SEO/SEM journal | 24-Jun-2011 12:00
Cloud Computing – FTC to Investigate Google for Antitrust: WSJ
The shoe that’s been dangling at the end of Washington’s toe for ever so long has finally dropped, according to the Wall Street Journal. The Federal Trade Commission is reportedly ready to serve Google with civil subpoenas, kicking off what the paper says will be a “wide-ranging, formal antitrust investigation into whether the search giant has abused its dominance on the web.” Google should get served with demands for information in days. Competitors and customers will get theirs later.
SEO/SEM journal | 23-Jun-2011 18:09
The Importance of a Link Building Service in SEO
Those who are into search engine optimization typically do a lot of activities to enhance the web visibility of the client’s website. They will change the meta tags, particularly the title, description, keywords, and the alt tags. They will change the HTML coding of the page to make it easier for the search engine robots to spider through it. Some SEO professionals will even remove tables, frames, and flash files to better the prospects. There are those who will write a lot of content because content always does well with the search engines. Some people will even try to spam the search engines by including the keywords deliberately. There are other issues too such as social media marketing, viral marketing through YouTube and other channels, and others like this. But among them all, link building service probably remains as the most important.
SEO/SEM journal | 13-Jun-2011 13:33
The Importance of a Link Building Service in SEO
Those who are into search engine optimization typically do a lot of activities to enhance the web visibility of the client’s website. They will change the meta tags, particularly the title, description, keywords, and the alt tags. They will change the HTML coding of the page to make it easier for the search engine robots to spider through it. Some SEO professionals will even remove tables, frames, and flash files to better the prospects. There are those who will write a lot of content because content always does well with the search engines. Some people will even try to spam the search engines by including the keywords deliberately. There are other issues too such as social media marketing, viral marketing through YouTube and other channels, and others like this. But among them all, link building service probably remains as the most important.
SEO/SEM journal | 13-Jun-2011 13:33
Google Introduces "Best Guess"
Try searching for “The capital of Oman”. What do you expect to see? Couple of sponsored link followed by ten resultant pages – right? When did Google introduce this feature? It was done quietly. There is a news item on 23rd March, 2011 in Realwebseo talking about this feature. When did IBM Watson win Jeopardy! – 16 February, 2011. Do you see the connection? In the post How intelligent are the Computers of 2011 I had asked the question “Why has Google not attempted something like this?” Now we know that the option (2) to be right answer.
SEO/SEM journal | 10-Jun-2011 10:05
How IBM Watson Has Influenced Google
Try searching for “The capital of Oman”. What do you expect to see? Couple of sponsored link followed by ten resultant pages – right? When did Google introduce this feature? It was done quietly. There is a news item on 23rd March, 2011 in Realwebseo talking about this feature. When did IBM Watson win Jeopardy! – 16 February, 2011. Do you see the connection? In the post How intelligent are the Computers of 2011 I had asked the question “Why has Google not attempted something like this?” Now we know that the option (2) to be right answer.
SEO/SEM journal | 10-Jun-2011 10:05