Explainer: How Google’s New SSL / HTTPS Ranking Factor Works
Last Thursday Google launched a new ranking signal to give HTTPS sites a ranking boost, small ranking boost, to encourage webmasters to migrate their sites from HTTP to HTTPS. In our story from Thursday, we covered why Google is doing this and the conc…
Google Investigating Bugs With Structured Data Report In Webmaster Tools
There are hundreds of complaints within the webmaster and SEO community around the Structured Data report within Google Webmaster Tools showing massive drops in structured data elements being shown. The good news is that everyone seems to be affected by the issue and that Google’s John…
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Microsoft’s Catapult Project To Power All Bing Data Centers Next Year [Report]
After a successful test, Microsoft says it will expand its Catapult server project to all Bing datacenters in 2015. When Microsoft first detailed the project two months ago, the company said it would use the new technology in one datacenter starting ea…
Google Webmaster Guidelines Update Calls “Low Quality Guest Blog Posts” Spam
Google has updated their webmaster guidelines, specifically in the little or no original content guideline, to add “low-quality guest blog posts” as an example of “scraped content.” Brian Ussery first spotted this change, noting how Google has been fighting the use of guest…
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Indian Govt. Rages At Google Maps Outing Of Secret Bases
In 2013 Google imitated a “mapathon” project in India, offering prizes to encourage people to help fill in gaps and improve Google Maps in the country. At the time, India’s Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) asked the company not to collect “classified data,” such…
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Chinese Man Sues Baidu Over “Gay Conversion” Ad In SERP
A gay Chinese man sued search engine Baidu in Bejing for allowing an undisclosed ad for an allegedly unlicensed psychological counseling center to appear at the top of search results. He underwent “gay conversion” therapy and was traumatized by the experience. Without the benefit of…
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Google: No Comment On Possible Google Algorithm Update Over The Weekend
On Friday, August 8th, there appears to have been a Google algorithm update that Google said they will not comment on. It may likely be a monthly Google Panda refresh but we cannot confirm if there was an update and if so, if it was Panda or not. I reported the details at the Search […]
The…
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Music Is Google’s Latest Ad Test In The Knowledge Panel
Search Google for bands or musicians from Katy Perry to Cat Stevens, and you’ll now see ads appearing in the Knowledge Panel. The ads are Google’s latest effort to test new ad formats and monetize the prominent real estate of the Knowledge Panel. It should also be noted that the ads…
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Google Settles Shareholder Suit, Will Set Aside $250M To Disrupt Rogue Online Drug Ads
Google will create a $250 million internal program to battle rogue online pharmacies as part of a deal to end a shareholder lawsuit, Reuters reported today. The litigation was sparked by Google’s $500 million settlement in 2011 with the U.S. Justice Department, which alleged that the search…
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Mobile Search Spend Share In UK And Australia Outpaces US
Mobile spend and click share in three of the most mature paid search markets – the U.S., UK and Australia – increased significantly over the past year. The share of paid search spend allocated to mobile paid search spend in the UK and Australia continued to outpace that of the U.S. The new data,…
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Why You Can’t Hide From Mobile PPC
“Mobile is coming.” This Game of Thrones-esque quote has been thrown around a lot this past year, serving as an ominous warning of our mobile-dominated future. However, I’d argue that it’s time to stop talking about mobile in the future tense and bring it to the present: for…
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Bing Gets Technical: Rolls Out Code, Software Download & Microsoft-Related Search Updates
Aiming to make its search results more “developer friendly,” Bing says it has streamlined API, code and non-alphanumeric queries, made software download searches safer and added instant answers to the top of search results for Microsoft-related technology queries. Using a side-by-side…
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SEO Industry Tweets Its Reactions To Google’s SSL Ranking Boost
The SEO industry is abuzz today with the news of Google’s latest ranking signal: Using SSL certificates will provide a boost in Google’s search rankings. (The web hosting industry is all abuzz, too, if you’re curious.) Google says it’s a “very lightweight signal”…
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Google Starts Giving A Ranking Boost To Secure HTTPS/SSL Sites
Google To Give Secure Sites A Ranking Boost Google has announced (the blog post hasn’t gone live yet, actually) that going HTTPS — adding a SSL 2048-bit key certificate on your site — will give you a minor ranking boost. Google says this gives websites a small ranking benefit,…
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Google Management Lessons Book Coming From Eric Schmidt
Google Executive Chairman Eric Schmidt and former Google SVP Jonathan Rosenberg have written a new book called How Google Works. Not yet published but available for pre-order, it’s a wide-ranging discussion of corporate management drawing upon the lessons the two men learned over a decade at…
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Google Maps Currently Taking Users To The Moon & Mars
Google Maps used its Google+ profile yesterday to announce a new out-of-this-world feature, allowing users to explore the craters on Mars and take a virtual trip to the moon. The announcement marked NASA’s Curiosity Rover expedition to Mars, which has spent the last two year’s roaming…
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New Foursquare App Bets The Company On Personalization
After months of anticipation the new Foursquare app has finally arrived. It will be available this morning from the three major app stores. The new app is built around two principal concepts: Tips and Tastes. It attempts to create a better “local search” experience using data (in the…
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Bing Mobile Domain Returns Service Unavailable 503 Error
If you try to access Bing Mobile at m.bing.com, you will be presented with an error message. The error will read: The page you want isn’t available We’re working to restore service as soon as possible. The server error code also returns a major error, specifically a 503 error code which…
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For More Accurate Shipping Rates In Google Shopping, Merchant Center Gets Shipping Configuration Tool
Google launched new features today to help merchants customize the shipping rates that display in Google Shopping. The shipping configuration tool is now available in Google Merchant Center, and a new shipping label attribute can be used in product fee…
Despite Crackdowns, Tech Support Ads In Search Are Still Cause For Consumer Confusion
Just last month, six international tech support scam operators were ordered to pay more than $5.1 million as a result of charges filed by the Federal Trade Commission in 2012. The scammers typically posed as representatives of major technology companie…