NEW YORK – It sort of makes you cringe just hearing the title. According to BuzzFeed.com, the retailing giant Overstock told investors during an earnings call that the company has experienced serious difficulties with a Google Algorithm update it was hit with last year, calling it "very disruptive" to its business; the SEO Community called it "Fred". Overstock CEO Patrick Byrne said that sales and marketing expenses grew 105% to $77.2 million this quarter from $37.6 … [Read more...]
The Disappearing Act of the Web’s Best Web Directories; Where Are They Going?
NEW YORK, NY – Last week, news began to circulate the search optimization-spear that DMOZ.org, one of the oldest and most trusted web directories ever online, was discontinued forever (as of Mar 17, 2017). DMOZ was considered such an incredible resource, that Google itself mirrored it at directory.google.com, as did thousands of other sites across the net. However, Google discontinued the mirror on July 20, 2011, less than a year prior to announcing its “Google Penguin” … [Read more...]
More Than Great Start to Getting Handle on Google’s RankBrain Algorithm
The new Whiteboard Friday from Moz went over RankBrain, Google's new ‘algorithm’ to adjust, its ‘algorithm’. The concept discussed RankBrain being more designed to evaluate the actual query, while the normal algorithm we’re all used to is designed to evaluate the pages which are returned as results. This is why you can't just optimize your pages for keywords and key phrases like the good ole’ days; you need to first determine how "user intent" could effect a query, change … [Read more...]
The Google Conspiracy Theory: More Updates = More Revenue?
Back in June, the distinguished engineer Matt Cutts came out swinging to debunk the fact that many webmasters, particularly those considered to be in the SEO (Search Engine Optimization) space, suggest that Google loves flux in its search results because it increases pay-per-click revenues for Google. Cutts actually labeled this rumor a “Conspiracy Theory” noting that Google lost revenue when it first released Google Panda in February 2011. So how would Google loose … [Read more...]
Report: Social Media Deemed Least Effective by Online Marketers
How satisfied are you with the business value your company has achieved by using each of the following marketing channels? This was the question asked by Forrester Research, where social media advertising had measured up to be the least effective advertising medium when it comes to the opinion of ROI (return on investment) for online marketers when judging “business value” achieved among all online mediums used. The report, titled “Q3 2013 North American and U.K. … [Read more...]
Doing SEO to Your Site? Inquiring Minds at Google Want to Know
Out of all the posts and discussions on “SEO Profiling” through the years and with all sorts of opinions as well as speculation on what Google possibly wants or doesn’t want to know about someone’s SEO efforts, I believe there are finally some answers available for the taking as GOOG’s latest patent is sure to clear the air on some or all of these theories and misconceptions from both sides of the fence. A new Patent Application dated August 14, 2012 called “Ranking … [Read more...]
Two Different Google Penguin “Death Messages” from Webmaster Tools
Who knew a Penguin could be so deadly? Losing your traffic and search positioning on Google is bad, real bad. Showing up on Bing or Yahoo near the top of search is just sort of cool, but it doesn't really make much difference to your business. Sure it might make you feel all warm and fuzzy inside seeing you up at the top there, but even competitive terms, year over year, don’t seem to yield much traffic. Google, on the other hand, makes or breaks your business, … [Read more...]
Rich Snippets: The Absence of Star Ratings & Reviews In Google Search
Most Internet news agencies originally praised Google's decision to replace its local search business rating system with Zagat ratings. After all, the acquisition of Zagat data was a major business decision by the search engine giant who paid a hefty price for those scores, $125 million as originally reported by the Wall Street Journal (more recently reported by AP to be $151 million). However, it seems that business owners and local webmasters who run sites previously … [Read more...]
Google Unleashes Limitless Liability for Websites with Penguin Update
Never before has there been a negative factor when it comes to hypertext links, until now. On or around April 28th 2012, Google released its latest algorithm update dubbed “Penguin”. This update was specifically targeting web sites which have characteristics indicating they have used tactics to build what Google refers to as “artificial” or “unnatural links” pointing to them. Web sites which are deemed to be using methods of generating what Google feels are “unnatural” or … [Read more...]
Study: “Social Signals” Boost Organic Search Engine Rankings
Just over a year ago in February of 2011 I did a post on "social media" and "social signals" called Social Media 101 “Algorithmically Speaking”. The post detailed how social media was a necessary component of search marketing and how "social signals" likely effected search engine rankings, if not at that time, would soon thereafter. The idea, at least publicly, that social signals could or would influence rankings began a while back in 2010 but the buzz has grown … [Read more...]
Google Penguin: After Carefully Measured “Blowback” Penguin Released
In the beginning of last month (April) Google announced the release of a large scale update to its search algorithm which took place in late February. This particular update, which is referred to in the webmaster community as “Panda 3.3”, has been considered an extension of previous updates which have taken place over the last year ("Panda" through "Panda 3.3") but are unlike those which are related to content, identifying the originators of content, and brands - what Google … [Read more...]
One Year Into Google Panda; And It Still Isn’t Over Yet
The one-year anniversary of the original Google Panda update has come and gone and we’re still seeing significant tweaks in the aftermath . Google Panda was aimed at filtering out and eliminated junk content sites and/or sites heavily supported from ads by penalizing them for having poor content. While Google can’t physically remove data from a website, they sure can effectively prevent the masses from finding them by rating them lower than those with content perceived to be … [Read more...]
A Close Look at Quality Launch Reviews at Google Inc. (Video)
Each week (on Thursdays), Google engineers meet to go over anticipated changes and improvements intended to be rolled out onto Google.com. It is interesting to see how much detail goes into each of these decisions. Whether or not a new component will be added to Google search, is decided in these meetings, this one on misspellings and rolling out a change to Suggested Search. Google recently released a list of 50 changes on its blog “Inside Search” which stated: “We’re … [Read more...]
What’s Google Doing Now? The “New” Google Algorithm
The last couple of years have paved the way for many changes in the field and study of search engine optimization and online marketing. Social media awareness grew significantly in 2011 with many reports being released as to how companies may address new social challenges in the upcoming year. Domain names also took some heat in late December of 2010 as Google publically released information on the fact that they would reduce the benefit to ranking sites in their search … [Read more...]
Social Media 101 “Algorithmically Speaking”
A BASIC UNDERSTANDING OF HOW AND WHY SOCIAL MEDIA MATTERS: - FROM A SEARCH ENGINES PERSPECTIVE Why do I need a Twitter or Facebook page? Who cares about that stuff anyway? I just want to rank higher, isn't link building enough? Well, do you want the honest answer? No it isn't - Not necessarily anymore.... If you want to be even better and rank higher than your competitors it's a good idea to make sure you're covering every base and doing what they might not know about … [Read more...]