Team Mindshare

As most of us already know, the Google Panda update brought with it significant changes to the way that the Google ranking algorithm evaluates website relevance.  We have referred to this update with our clients as Google “CUTIE”, that is “Cleaning Up The Internet for Everyone”.  While Google is understandably very close to the vest about the details of any such updates, they do emphasize one theme consistently; add value to the internet, and your site will do well.  Check out Google’s “Quality guidelines – basic principles” for more information. 
So what is Google Penguin?

Penguin, released on the 24th of April, is an update to the Google algorithm released with the intention of penalizing sites for over-optimization.  This is otherwise known as webspamming. (The “web” is inserted here to differentiate from “email” spamming).

I have an expensive HTC Thunderbolt Smartphone from Verizon. The phone is great outside of the fact that it comes with a battery that dies within 3 hours when not connected to a power source, but that is another subject. I visited by local Verizon store once I noticed that, after about 5 months, I had only once had access to a 4G network — and that was in Philadelphia. They advised that north of a City here in New Jersey called Perth Amboy, everything is 4G and that it is coming this way “soon”.

So there I am at Newark Airport (yes, north of Perth Amboy) and I still only have a 3G connection. My Verizon representative would likely have told me to “reboot”.

Article is a great summary of changes in technology that have been occurring for some time…

Granular – a buzzword – yes, perhaps. But it is a favorite word of mine nonetheless. Picture the pile of sawdust swept into the corner where a stack of 2×4’s have just been cut. Take each individual piece of that sawdust and spread it out on a table. Examine one piece at a time and identify characteristics that differentiate that one from the others. Repeat the process for all. Why would anyone ever want to do this? Well, they wouldn’t. It is about as exciting and productive as watching grass grow. But when it comes to traffic to your website and the measurement of your SEO efforts – you MUST demand this level of granularity out of your vendor. As a matter of fact, it should not be a demand, it should be part of the reports being supplied to you on a monthly — if not on a bi-weekly basis.

The new Google Chromebooks will be offered by Samsung and Acer. The Samsung model is $429 for Wi-Fi only, 3G version is $499. Acer is priced starting at $349 and up.

For all those leveraging Google Analytics to measure their results and who use advanced segments to differentiate their paid, non-paid, direct and referral traffic — you may have experienced a minor heart attack when it appeared that you had a significantly lower amount of traffic then expected. You probably noticed a message in a small yellow horizontal box that reads “This report is generated in fast-access mode. Learn more”. But clicking the “learn more” link leads to a page that tells you that you are looking at sampling data since the site you are managing had in excess of 500,000 visits. But what if you know the site did not have that number of visits?

Yes they did.  This time it was Overstock.com getting snagged gaming Google search results!

A colleague sent me a great article this morning on the subject.  It brought me back to the story of Google v. BMW Germany, 2006.  Google caught on to “black hat” techniques being employed on behalf of the defendant, and sentenced them to the “death penalty”.  That is, they were completely removed from the Google search indexes.

In this case,  JC Penney, a leading worldwide retailer — has been exposed.  It does not appear that the consequences will be as severe on this one…with Google’s renown spam “Chief of Police” Matt Cutts stating that Google is simply taking “corrective action”.  What ensued was a methodical series of demotions across a number of terms critical to the online marketing success of the company.

These days, no internet marketing strategy is complete without a strong YouTube presence.  According to Hitwise on November 13, 2010 – YouTube is now the #2 Social Networking website in the world with a market share of 19%, second only to Facebook.  Also, YouTube continues to increase their share of the search engine market – especially among users 18 years old and under.  If you have not created a YouTube channel for your company, it must be on the top of your to-do list.

YouTube has revolutionized the way that you can demonstrate what you do through inexpensive video productions.  That this medium is increasingly preferred to standard text and static image ads has been statistically proven.  Add to this the fact that you can quickly create compelling AdWords campaigns with high quality score tied directly to your YouTube videos, and the opportunity becomes even that much more appealing.