Microsoft’s Bing search engine is having a bit of an overhaul right now. Not only are they holding celebrity-laden parties to announce their changes to the entertainment-based results that they’ve made, they are also including plenty of other useful changes including one which could become very important to searchers – the inclusion of deep content in their search.

The search engine is also unveiling a revamped look and feel, dropping the tabs directly below the search box and also a fairly substantial overhaul of the way the results are presented for autos, health and financial searches.

Search Engine Optimisation

It’s the deep content results that could have real implications for the search engine optimisation community. Bing is now indexing complete articles – some of which are thousands of words long – and posting them in search results. This is definitely something that could be leveraged for results in a Bing-orientated SEO campaign and is also a useful feature for users too.

There is always the concern that this could confuse matters a little if the algorithm isn’t quite selective enough and all your results are articles which aren’t really that relevant to what it is you’re searching for. Only time will tell if that’s what happens.

Ultimately, this latest update and the new features that Bing is rolling out is a bold move at separating it from the ubiquitous Google and cementing it as a ‘Decision Engine’ rather than a ‘search engine’ per se, but that doesn’t mean that it’s not important for the search engine optimisation community to know what’s going on with it and how to help clients to get the best possible results.

Following a ‘You & A’ session with Matt Cutts at SMX Advanced, there is finally some solid information about the Caffeine update, which has now gone live, and what it could mean for search engine optimisation. Google Caffeine, according to Cutts, has the capacity to allow content to be searchable just seconds after it has been crawled, and a wider range of content will now be deemed relevant than before.

Google Caffeine

Caffeine is not a change to ranking algorithms, so in theory should not have an effect on SERPs, it is a revamp of the indexing architecture; a lick of paint to the old structure as it were. Google Caffeine can now acknowledge videos, images and text and associate them with more than one factor, creating a complex network of relevancy to improve the quality of search queries.
Additions such as a video sitemap can help Google find content and improve relevancy further. Cutts hinted that the update has brought about to improve the performance of the Google search engine in the future, as more types of content are used. Caffeine will then have the power to use this information for ranking purposes.

Search Engine Optimisation

Although Cutts claims that the change will not affect SERPs, website owners may well see a change in results. Basically, because Google will now be able to take more types of content into account, any website that has used organic search engine optimisation strategies may see an improvement in SERPs, because a diverse range of strategies will have been used which will reflect the genuine nature of the site.
Websites that have been using spammier, black hat, or narrow search engine optimisation strategies, concentrating solely on inbound linking for example, may well see their pages slip further down Google’s listings. This is good news for genuine search engine optimisation, and for those who search the internet using Google. The changes that have been implemented will however affect SERPs in the future, favouring rich and diverse sites, bringing the need for content another step closer to the need to please Google and site visitors.

The D8 Conference has been electrified by an interview with Apple’s CEO Steve Jobs, in which he cleared up some big issues surrounding the iPhone platform. Much of the subject matter revolved around Apple TV, competing with Android and shunning Flash, but in this post we’ll be looking at the search aspect of internet marketing on the iPhone.

One of the big questions he laid to rest was the issue of limiting or banning Google from Apple’s iDevices – they will not be doing so.

Search Engine Optimisation

Another big question regards notions that Apple might go into search. Again, Jobs denied this rumour, despite the recent acquisition of the ‘personal assistant’ Siri – which many argue has very search-like capabilities. But when asked about this Jobs stated: “I wouldn’t call them a search company…” preferring instead to call them “an AI company”. So will the search engine optimisation community need to get their head around a new search platform? Not exactly, Siri is unlike standard search engines in that it is bereft of an index. Despite this, it seems likely that people will use much like a search engine.

Internet Marketing

All this attention on the iPhone’s search possibilities is slightly misplaced, perhaps, because people prefer to enjoy apps much more than they use search. Google Maps, Facebook and The Weather Channel all come out way ahead of Google Search – or indeed any search – as most popular uses across the various smart phones. Only on Android-based devices does Google Search get a foothold on the top five. This is quite significant for those associated with internet marketing on the iPhone.

Another big topic was the use of analytics – Jobs said that it could be used for advertising purposes, but that there were many other details to define properly. In relation to this Jobs was particularly upset by Flurry’s recent violation of Apple’s Privacy Policy.

Die-hard fans of Apple’s iDevices will no doubt also be fascinated to learn that the iPad actually preceded the iPhone – and millions of smart phone users will be very glad the iPhone got the green light first.

It appears to be development season for microblogging phenomenon Twitter – in the last week, we’ve seen the advent of two substantial updates, though they are only in the testing phase. Perhaps the most important update for developers, SEO experts and internet marketing specialists is the Annotations function which will allow for the addition of any type of meta data to Tweets.

At this stage, it’s entirely up to the developers what kind of meta data they would like to attach to the Tweets, providing it doesn’t exceed 512 bytes. Twitter has recommended that developers begin by attaching annotations regarding location, websites, reviews, music and similar.

As important as Twitter has shown to be for internet marketing companies, this new development could prove to be invaluable if the right applications are developed to support it.

Search Engine Optimisation

Obviously, anyone worth their salt in the search engine optimisation industry knows that meta data is a very important piece of the puzzle, but is the addition of meta to Tweets likely to make Twitter more useful to SEO in a direct fashion? Although it’s not certain yet, the answer is ‘probably not’.

Optimising Tweets is all well and good and we would argue is eminently likely providing either applications or the UI is developed to allow for this the way YouTube does now, but it’s unlikely that even an optimised Tweet will be able to pass on much – if any – power as part of a linking campaign.

Twitter applies the ‘nofollow’ attribute to all outbound links and while there is some debate amongst the search engine optimisation community about exactly how much or how little link power is passed on through these, it’s certainly unlikely to replace a good old-fashioned linking campaign.

What there is no denying, however, is that now that Tweets are indexed by search engines, optimising them correctly could well be an excellent way of pushing social media campaigns forwards and driving more traffic to the site you are trying to optimise which, ultimately, should be the goal of any SEO campaign.

This is all speculation until the Annotations application is rolled out across the board and developers begin to get involved with it, but it’s certainly something that is worth keeping an eye on for search engine optimisation specialists, social media experts and internet marketers alike.

The rumour that Bing may be chosen as the default search engine for the iPhone has resurfaced once again. This crucial platform has long been a big prize for the search engine industry – and so far Google has claimed it for itself. But Techcrunch have said that multiple reliable sources are pointing to a Bing-iPhone Hookup.

SEO

Securing the default search engine on the iPhone is worth a huge amount to both Google and Bing in terms of controlling a burgeoning area of internet marketing. But Google’s rival platform Android (and with it the Nexus phone) is becoming a significant threat to Apple, which is increasingly concerned with Google’s dominance in the iPhone application market (think search and maps) and so notions of detaching from Google are understandably going to increase, turning heads across the SEO community.

Search Engine Optimisation

Google is rumoured to have paid 100 million dollars for the right to be iPhone’s default search engine, which highlights how valuable this platform is to search. But if Microsoft, in the form of Bing, have managed to wrestle the default accolade from Google, it means that we in the search engine optimisation industry must continue to evaluate how much we optimise for Bing. There are distinct differences in the way that SEO specialists optimise for these sites, and if Bing grabs a bigger slice of the search market, any serious SEO campaign must take this into account.

As usual, these rumours have not been confirmed officially, and much has been made of the fact that they have appeared before. But as Google encroaches on Apple’s various markets, we seem to be facing the rather ironic situation of the old school rivals – Microsoft and Apple – being pushed together in a strange new marriage. This is one happy day we’ll all be attending – the shunned lover role being played by Google.

When Google was attacked by Chinese hackers earlier this year, it looked like they came in through an Internet Explorer vulnerability, so it’s perhaps not surprising that the search company are gradually phasing out the Windows operating system in their offices.

The Financial Times is reporting that they have been flocking away from the popular operating system since January, shortly after the attacks took place. New employees are offered either a Mac or a PC with Linux installed and although some workers can install the OS on their laptops but authorisation from “quite senior levels” is required if they want to keep it on their desktop PC’s.

On the one hand, Windows and particularly Microsoft’s native Internet Explorer browser have long been implicated as entry points through which hackers have accessed Google’s account data and obviously Microsoft are one of the company’s larger competitors.

But what implications – if any – does this have for the internet marketing and search engine optimisation communities?

Internet Marketing

On the face of things, the answer to this would be ‘probably nothing’, but as we all know, nothing is certain in this game.

While this move shouldn’t affect your search engine positions and – unless you’re Microsoft – probably won’t have any impact on your internet marketing campaign, it’s worth keeping this shift in mind when looking into Google’s latest foibles and potential algorithmic changes.

Search Engine Optimisation

Whether you’re new to search engine optimisation or an experienced specialist, there is always a certain stigma around paid linking. It’s something that you either avoid like the plague for fear of being penalised and thus invalidating all the time and effort that you’ve spent on your SEO campaign or something that you shouldn’t shout about, but might want to use if you’ve got some spare cash and are after some quick and impressive results. In the wake of Matt Cutts claiming that Google have “taken action” and no longer trust links from a major newspaper over paid links, it might be worth siding with the former.

Obviously paid linking is against Google’s Terms of Service, but that doesn’t automatically mean that search engine optimisation specialists haven’t used it now and then in order to get some page one results, however they’ve always had to be a little bit sneaky about it. In light of this, it’s interesting that one of the country’s main newspaper sites openly offered links in exchange for money in their SEO Editorials section.

SEO

The initial penalty handed out to the Express Group (which also features the OK Magazine website) in the wake of the email which stated that links were available from £1000 was simply to penalise the page rank in Google’s toolbar, but Matt Cutts’ recent comments suggest that a second penalty has followed – Google simply no longer trusts the Express and assumedly the OK site and consequently passes on no page rank from these links, making them all but useless for SEO.

Whether or not Cutts is directly referring to the Express incident or another major UK newspaper group which has somehow managed to slip their paid linking offers and subsequent admonishment under the radar, it’s certainly a sharp reprimand for not applying the ‘nofollow’ attribute to a link which has been paid for. Whether you’re an experienced SEO technician or are new to the game, it’s certainly a sobering reminder to make sure that you stay inside the lines.

Top search engine Google have celebrated the 30th anniversary of one of the top computer games – Pacman – by placing a useable game on its home page. The walls of the Pacman game were designed to spell out ‘Google’ and clicking on the logo allowed you to play the game as a single player and even had a two player mode. This bought about Pacman related terms being among the most searched for across the entire internet that day.

Of course, there are some people complaining that when they open up Google’s home page they are greeted with the ‘annoying sound of Pacman’. These same people complain that productivity is lost among staff who are wasting time playing the game to the point where offices are deleting Google as their home page. Of course, these are the type of people who complain about everything! I say it’s a bit of fun, if you don’t like the sound turn off your volume – besides, how many people leave the home page sitting open on their computer for any length of time?

Not something I shout about, but I can remember Pacman when it first came out. It was a huge hit and has entertained generations of people with its simplistic style and frustrating, panic inducing beeping.

Google are very inventive when it comes to designing their front page and when it’s not their typical branded banner on show, you can be sure it will be typically topical for the news that day, celebrating things going on around the world such as the Olympics or the World Cup – one to watch out for this summer!

Google has launched a secure encrypted version of its search facility, prompting concern about implications for internet marketing.

Anyone who has used a secure transaction website, such as a bank’s, will be familiar with the encryption symbol of a little padlock which appears in the address bar of internet explorer, which denoting that the information being sent is encrypted and therefore highly secure.

Now, by visiting https://google.com (notice https instead of http) your Google searches will be encrypted in the same manner, keeping them obscured from anybody who may try to snoop when you use an open WiFi network, for example.

Search Marketing

While this is attractive for privacy reasons, the implications for web analytics and search marketing are somewhat more serious. If users search using the Google SSL web search and click through to your site from the SERP, then it is unlikely their keyword data will be passed through to your web analytics, even if it’s Google Analytics.

There would be less data, specifically keyword data, available on how users came to your site. It wouldn’t be Google itself blocking this data; it would be due to the way browsers interact with referrals from sites that are secure in this way.

Search engine optimisation

Of course, this would seriously affect your ability to know how people reached your site through natural search, and would confuse search engine optimisation efforts and strategies.

To speculate on an extreme possibility, if Google made its SSL web search the default, analytics packages as a whole would no longer report keyword data, and search marketers would be left clueless as to what keywords users typed in, and which keywords led to conversions.

Google has not yet said what it plans to do about these implications for search engine optimisation and analytics, and the new SSL site is still in beta release due to its being much more resource intensive than http. In reality this means that SSL as default from Google would probably be a long way off, if at all. SSL capabilities are expected to be rolled out across other Google verticals however including Google Maps and images too.

Conspiracy theories so far include speculation that because Google itself will still have access to keywords, it could offer this information through Google Analytics in order to beat competitive analytics packages, something that Google has strongly denied, arguing that Google Analytics is on a level playing field with other packages as it receives no information when traffic arrives from HTTPS sites.

Whether Google wishes to harness a keyword monopoly against its rivals, or the new SSL site is the dawn of a new era in analytics remains to be seen, and is presently dependant on whether or not Google wishes to roll out its labour-intensive encryption options as defaults across all its platforms, or simply leave them as available options for privacy-conscious users.

Today the Times announced the launch of two new websites in preparation for charging readers to access online content. Whilst this story has dominated the news with regards to the future of journalism, search engine optimisation companies and online marketing professionals are now debating how best to harness the potential available revenue through tailored advertising campaigns. An effective solution could determine the success of such publishers in returning to profit at a time when printed publications are losing popularity. The changes could mean that companies will be willing to pay more for an online marketing campaign if the audience is going to be a high quality target, which will pay the wages of high quality journalists.

Online News

There is no doubt that we are on the verge of witnessing a major change in the way we access our news, despite the doubts that are being cast over the newspaper’s move; it is expected that they will instantly lose 90% of their online readership. As a writer, it is evident that journalism will make an inevitable shift from print to pixel, and for too long high quality journalism has been literally given away online. The changes are set to spark a chain reaction and transform the way we consume online news content. But before that happens, other publishers will be waiting to see what mistakes the Times will make in the way they implement their new form of publishing.

The Times

The Times has opted for a paywall that will no longer let Google crawl it’s pages, therefore Times stories will no longer appear in SERPs. The tight restrictions of their paywall option will also only direct links that have been shared via social networks to the pre-payment sign-in page. Some online marketing professionals have already condemned this as the virtual equivalent of shooting oneself in one’s own foot. It has been a growing trend to optimise for social networking sites, and it was recently announced that Facebook has outpaced Google and become the most popular search platform, so restricting the ability to share popular news stories could backfire dramatically.

Online Marketing Potential

Other online news forums that have implemented a paywall still allow Google to crawl pages and visitors to the site can read a few articles before committing to buy. However, two of the biggest newspaper publishers in the US that have an online presence have decided they can capitalise on the popularity of search engine optimisation considerably by offering advertisers SEO services that will help advertisers place highly in Google SERPs when they advertise with the newspaper.

Local Search Engine Optimisation

This has the potential to harness local search engine optimisation services offered by online marketing companies, and could potentially change the way SEO companies choose to implement online advertising campaigns. The jury is still out as to how changes in the way we consume news via a computer or mobile device will affect online marketing, but there is no denying that targeting readers with tailored adverts online will reap more favourable returns on online marketing investment.