Search Engine Recap for July 2008

Here is a recap of search marketing industry news for July 2008:

Google and Yahoo! to Index Flash Files

During recent months, Google has been trying to extract text and content from Flash pages, but its methods weren't perfect.

Now, Adobe provides a Flash reader technology that enables the search engines to "read" Flash files and extract text and links from it. (Note: Google has adapted to this technology, Yahoo has yet to implement the technology, and Adobe hasn’t made the technology available to MSN at this point.)

Though Adobe's press release talks about "dramatic" improvements in search results and more relevant listings for "millions of RIAs" (rich internet applications), consider these points for SEO:

1. Most Flash content is made up of images, video, and animation. None of that content will be surfaced in the search results with this advancement, unless more text is added to it.
2. Flash implementation should provide a unique URL for each set of content. Some Flash implementations dynamically load text as the user interacts with the application, but the URL remains the same. In this scenario, Googlebot can now follow those interactions (in a limited way) and if the URL doesn't change, then all content that is dynamically loaded as the interactions progress is associated with a single URL.
3. Since the search engines don't execute most JavaScript, they won't crawl or index any Flash executed via JavaScript.
4. Any external sources that the Flash file loads will be indexed separately, not as part of the Flash file.

Where can we see improvements then?

In particular, the snippets - the descriptions that display under search results will be improved. There's a lot of room for improvement in the way the snippets for Flash are shown, so this may indeed be big news for search.

Google Retires Pay-Per-Action Program

Google announced that they are retiring the pay-per-action program that was in beta for the past year. Google is launching a new affiliate network named Google Affiliate Network to replace Google's PPA/Referral program.

Google Adds New Feature to Keyword Tool

Google has added a new feature to its external keyword tool. The tool now reports the approximate search volume numbers for keywords.

• The keyword tool now gives an approximate search frequency number based on the previous month, and an average number based on the past 12 months.
• The related queries/synonyms of keywords that the tool lists will be very useful in doing keyword research.
• For niche keywords that don’t have many searches, Wordtracker often returns zero results while the Google Keyword Tool gives some number for the 12-month-average (for the prior month, the Google tool reports insufficient data).

Though we see inflation in the number for some search queries, the search volumes are a very nice addition to the Google keyword tool.

Google Toolbar PageRank Update

Matt Cutts, a Google software engineer, announced on July 24th that new toolbar PageRank values should become visible over the next few days. Note that the PageRank that shows up in the toolbar has nothing to do with your actual site rank. Google uses an internal PageRank number for this purpose that it updates daily.

Yahoo! News Added to Search Results

Google changed its search results (in May 2007) to a “Universal Search” format to include results from Google News, video, books, etc. when applicable.

This announcement from Yahoo discusses how Yahoo now includes breaking news articles in its search results. It is a sign that Yahoo moving towards adopting “Universal Search” into its search results as well (albeit slowly).

Be a Social Media Go-Giver

I recently read “The Go-Giver: A Little Story About A Powerful Business Idea” by Bob Burg and John David Mann. The book focuses on the principle that you get what you give, and it lists important laws to follow in order to attain success in business. One of the laws, “The Law of Influence,” struck me as most true for marketers entering the social media arena. This law states, “Your influence is determined by how abundantly you place other people’s interests first.”

While this is true for real-world business situations, online communities are also great places to apply this principle. First and foremost in marketers’ minds should be the thought, “What can I do for the social media community?”, and not “What can this community do for me?” Think about what your brand can contribute to the community that would be of value to its members. Can you offer helpful advice or special coupons that they can’t get elsewhere? Can you design a widget that provides news updates or other exclusive content? If you can entertain them or meet some other need, you’ll be welcomed with open arms.

Real World Examples

An example of this is Last.fm, who offers a free widget service on their website that is fully compatible with your social networking accounts. They allow you to create your own widget, imbed it directly into your Facebook, MySpace, Bebo, etc, profile, and even share it with your friends. The community benefits- they can stream good quality music that is catered to their individual tastes, and Last.fm benefits- they have increased its client base and awareness of its product.

In June, Visa launched The Visa Business Network on Facebook. As part of the launch, they offered the first 20,000 businesses to register on the network a $100 advertising credit. Not only can the businesses also gain direct access to other businesses, they also have access to the variety of free business tools provided via the network. And Visa, through these offerings that are catered to the business community’s objectives, increases their position as a trusted advisor to the business community.

This past holiday season, RetailMeNot teamed up with Oxfam for its Goats for Gadgets campaign. They pledged to donate a farmyard animal for every widget that was downloaded from their site. This animal, goat, pig, sheep, etc, was then donated in your name to a needy family. This approach appealed to the giving spirit that surrounds the holiday, and allowed the users cost-free way to make a donation. RetailMeNot gave to the community, and the community gave back by using the widget to assist them in their holiday shopping.

Give Back to the Community

The main message behind “The Go-Giver” is that success comes to those who focus on “giving” and not on “getting”. In order to get ahead in life or business, you have to stop putting the focus on yourself, and instead put it on others. Responding to the needs and desires of an online community brings about more than just good karma. It helps to establish a feeling of good-will that makes people more receptive to your message and helps build positive relationships with your customers.

First Impressions of Cuil

There has been lot of news coverage and searches this morning regarding Cuil, the new search engine launched by several former Google employees. Since I specialize in paid search, the first thing I noticed is that there’s no information on the site at all about advertising, though it’s supposedly in the plans for the future.

Instead, I took some time to just try a few searches and form a first impression. There are some good points. I really like the design of the results page- the column layout, pictures and “explore categories” feature. The best feature is the extended preview text provided with each listing.

However, I’m not very impressed by the first-page results returned for searches, and for a search engine, that could be a small problem. Here are a few examples:

It’s severely lacking in “current” information. Searching on “dark knight box office” does not bring up any information about broken box office records, etc. Even worse, some of the results don’t even mention The Dark Knight. Compare that to the Google results, which reference the movie’s opening day and opening weekend records, and offer much more relevant “related searches”:

There are also issues with repeat entries. This can be seen in the duplicate subject lines in the Dark Knight results above. It became even more apparent as I searched for reviews on a Bluetooth headset. I saw three pages of one review returned as three separate results (Legit Reviews), and another listed as two (mrgadget.com.au).

Of course, the most embarrassing result is that Cuil does not show up as a result on a search for “cuil”:

I can see some potential, but Cuil has a ways to go before they’re a Google-killer.

SEMPO State of Search Survey Summary

If you caught the video highlights of the Great SEMPO Debate, you heard me reference the Annual SEMPO State of Search Survey that was recently released. Follow the link to check out the Executive Summary at the SEMPO site but here is an even shorter take on some key findings:

• SEM Definitions and Standards: The report starts with definitions and the first definition is
  
  “Search Engine Marketing (SEM): The entire set of techniques and strategies used to direct more visitors from search engines to marketing web sites.”
  
  It was nice to see this definition as it is the one we have espoused at DBE from day one – i.e., SEM is the umbrella term and should not be used as an alternative acronym for SEA (or Paid Placement per the SEMPO definition).
  
  I hope this marks SEMPO’s first step toward helping establish industry standards/best practices as the survey also cites the growing concerns and consensus on the need for such guidelines as search marketing matures.
  


• SEM Poaching Budget: The survey shows marketers are shifting budgets from other offline and online marketing programs to do more search marketing. And they aren’t waiting for the next budget cycle to do so. The reason is fairly obvious when you see the ROI value these marketers place on SEM (which is my segue to the next point).
  


• SEM ROI Value: Paid Placement (SEA) and Organic SEO were the top two marketing vehicles cited by survey respondents as the most efficient in terms of spend-to-return on investment. At 54% and 50% respectively, these search vehicles far exceeded the number three vehicle – email marketing – which was cited by 39% of the respondents. For further perspective, conferences was number four with 17%.
  
  Check out my video below (or at the DBE SEM Channel on YouTube) that further explores the correlation of these last two points.
  
  
  
  
  
  
• SEM Client Satisfaction: The survey reports clients’ satisfaction with their search marketing agencies had improved some from prior years but it is sad, and alarming, to see that only about 40% of respondents were “very happy” or “moderately happy” with their provider. This contrasts with our own recently-conducted client satisfaction survey where 100% of respondents gave us excellent/near-excellent grades. Why the big difference? That’s fodder for another blog but I think one reason is that we act proactively as “partners” with our clients, not reactively as “providers/vendors.”
  

That’s it for now, but expect to hear more from me in this area as I recently joined the SEMPO Research Committee….