Google’s Latest News
“This new meta tag is something to think about. It would be a good idea to use if you are advertising a sale that you don’t want in the search results after the sale ends.”
Google to acquire GrandCentral
“Google is in acquisition discussions with telephone management startup GrandCentral [...] The basic idea around GrandCentral is ‘one phone number for all your phones, for life.’”
“Google Voice Local Search is Google’s experimental service to make local-business search accessible over the phone. [...] Search for a local business by name or category.You can say ‘Giovanni’s Pizzeria’ or just ‘pizza’.”Google Developing Artificial Intelligence (AI)
“The worlds most dominant online company, with the largest conglomeration of computing power the world has ever seen, is trying to build artificial intelligence, and according to [Google CEO] Page it isn’t that far away either.”Google Began Charging Using Adwords API
“Google began charging this month for usage of the API for AdWords, its flagship advertising tool. When Google initially published this API last year, the press speculated that software companies would quickly emerge to take advantage of the new access to AdWords.”Google Radio Ads hit a Snag
“Google Inc.’s nascent radio advertisement business, known as Google Audio, has run into an unexpected snag: it seems Google doesn’t have access to enough radio airtime for would-be advertisers to thoroughly test out the initiative.”Google Movie to Radio Ads
Google is now movie to radio for it’s adwords platform. You can find out all of the details from Google itself at this page.Google Releases Custom Search Engine Service
“Google has launched a new service designed to let Web site publishers build their own search engines using Google’s massive index of page links. [...] With Custom Search Engine, Google joins others that provide similar services, including Yahoo Inc. and Rollyo Inc.”Google Faces YouTube Dilemma
“Google’s acquisition of YouTube provides a ‘tantalizing opportunity’ for the search giant to boost its advertising model, but the success of the partnership is far from certain.”Google puts lid on New Products
“In another sign of Google Inc.’s growth from start-up to corporate behemoth, the company’s top executives said Thursday that they had begun telling engineers to stop launching so many new services and instead focus on making existing ones work together better.”Google Snaps up YouTube for $1.65 Billion
“Internet search leader Google is snapping up YouTube for $1.65 billion, brushing aside copyright concerns to seize a starring role in the online video revolution.”Google Releases SearchMash.com
Google has just released a new web site that doesn’t show the Google logo: SearchMash.com. It seems that Google plans to test user interface ideas on that site. The privacy policy of SearchMash.com reveals that it is a Google site. Google Plugs Phishing Hole
“Google has acknowledged the presence of a phishing hole on its Public Service Search application and has blocked access to the service until the problem is fixed.”Belgian Newspapers Win Court Action Against Google
“A Belgian court has ordered Google Inc. to stop reproducing articles from French-speaking newspapers in the news section of one of its Belgian websites.”Google Removing Ads Based on User Behavior
“Google is testing a new advertising layout on search results pages in which ads are removed if a user consistently chooses not to interact with any of the ad elements on the page.”Google Launches News Archive Search
“News archive search provides an easy way to search and explore historical archives. In addition to helping you search, News archive search can automatically create timelines which show selected results from relevant time periods.”Google CEO Eric Schmidt joins Apple’s Board
“CEO Eric Schmidt is joining Apple Computer Inc.’s board of directors, the computer maker said on Tuesday, creating a close tie between two of Silicon Valley’s most iconic companies.”Google, eBay form alliance
“Google will begin selling advertising for eBay outside the United States and help buyers quickly ring an online merchant to do business.”Google Launches Enterprise Software Solution
Google launched a free packaged business solution for enterprises today including online chat, email, calendars, and hosting. Called “Gmail for Your Domain” (a ghastly name that is only slightly better referred to as “Google Apps” within the actual admin area) this application package will allow a business owner or administrator to create a separate account per employee. (skip to “Google Launches Enterprise Software Solution” by Ross Dunn)Google Sitemaps has been renamed to Google Webmaster Tools
“With our latest release, we’ve done more than just change our name – we’ve listened to you and added some features and enhanced others as a result.”Google breaks 60% – U.S. July search volume numbers
“The top engines combined account for over 94% of all search volume in the US. [...] Google has increased its share from 59.3% to 60.2%, Yahoo! Search has increased from 22.0% to 22.5% and MSN Search has decreased slightly from 12.1% to 11.8%.”Google now supports the NOODP attribute
“Some site owners want to be to able to request not using the ODP for generating snippets, and we’re happy to let you all know we’ve added support for this. All you have to do is add a meta tag to your pages.”How Billions of Bogus Pages Undermine Search Engines, Advertisers and The Web
“Over the weekend, Monetize, a blog dedicated to tricking search engines, described how a blackhat got Google to index over 5 billion webpages within three weeks. Yahoo and MSN were fooled, too, though nowhere near as badly. (MSN, for example, indexed just 62 pages before cutting him off.)”Google’s Computers are Full. With Spam?
“Some sites have lost 99 per cent of their indexed pages,” reports one member of the Webmaster World forum. “Many cache dates go back to 2004 January.” Others report long-extinct pages showing up as “Supplemental Results.”Google’s “Big Daddy” Failing to Deliver?
Typically when a search engine rolls out a new update, it’s supposed to provide results that are better than what existed before. According to many within the industry, that’s not necessarily the case with Google’s “Big Daddy” update. Barry Schwartz points out an article in The Register along with a round-up of links to forum discussions. If you’ve noticed problems with 301 redirects, old cache data and spidered pages that never show up in the index, you might want to check out some of Barry’s discussion links. Google Notifying Webmasters of Banning
I did not comment on this earlier, because it was old news and not much relevance. Today, however, Matt Cutts of Google has included information on this in his blog. It seems they are warning legitimate sites ahead of time, but not others who are blatantly abusing the system. To find out more follow Matt Cutts blog link below. http://www.mattcutts.com/blog/notifying-webmasters-of-penalties/Google Explains Interface Tests
There has been a lot of talk about Google results changing in Google groups with changing rankings of new terms, number of pages indexed, etc. I mentioned early on that they were probably testing and not to worry about it yet. You can see my postings at my seo blog. Google noticed all of the comments and posted today an explanation of what was going on. You can find the response at my blog or at Google’s blogspot.Google tests expanded search option
“Google is testing an enhanced search feature that presents users with additional result information . . .” ” The feature appeared at seemingly random moments with online searches, and appears to be related to the Orion technology that Google acquired earlier this month.”Google patent for user targeted search results
“Google has filed a patent for user targeted, or attention targeted, search results which will change the ranking of Google’s organic results per each individual user based upon that user’s search behavior, location, sites visited, and even ‘typing behavior’. [...]
Such profiles are created by Google and gathered from previous queries, web navigation behavior via tracked links and possibly sites visited which serve Google ads, computers with Google Applications installed such as Desktop Search, Google Wi-fi Connection or Sidebar, and personal information which Google identifies which may be ‘implicitly or explicitly provided by the user.’”Latest comScore Data Shows Google Still Leading the Search Wars
The latest data to be released by comScore Networks shows that Google has continued to maintain their spot as the most popular search engine. During the month of March, Google served up results for 42.7% of searches. That number represents a significant lead over Yahoo’s 28% and MSN’s 13.2%. Search as a whole experienced a whopping 10% increase over February numbers and marked a 15% increase over the same month last year. Google (48.9%) and Yahoo (46.5%) are a little closer together when it comes to toolbar searches, separated by just 2% points.Google Testing More Interface changes
Barry at Search Engine Watch points to a post by Dave Winer that describes a new interface that is apparently being tested by Google. According to Winer, the new interface features blue wedges next to the search results that can be clicked on in order to reveal more information about the site, including the ability to search that specific site from right there on the Google results page. Winer has screen shots posted of this option in action. Google buys Rights to new Search Engine Algorithm!
Google has won the bid to purchase Ori Allon’s algorithm that offers a revolutionary way to search the internet. More details will be posted when they become available!
Google, Earthlink Win San Francisco WiFi Deal
Google, EarthLink Win S. F. WiFi Deal The City of San Francisco finished its review of proposals to create a city-wide wireless broadband network, and chose the EarthLink/Google submission out of the six finalist proposals they considered.Google still leading search engine
“Google received 48.5 per cent of all web searches, according to tracking firm Nielsen Media Research. Yahoo was second with a 22.5 per cent share, followed by MSN with 10.7 per cent, AOL with 6.6 per cent and My Way Search with 2.7 per cent.”Baidu and Google dominate search engine market in China
“Baidu.com is the leader with 56.6 percent, while Google comes next a share of only 32.8 percent, despite its efforts to dominate the online Chinese market. However, their about 90 percents held together surpass every other engines, such as Yahoo! which has less than 5 percent.”Google’s Print Auction Fizzles
“Google’s effort to roll its advertising juggernaut beyond digital and into the world of print publications is struggling. [...] Google’s struggle to transfer its online success to magazines doesn’t necessarily bode well for the publishing industry.”Google Base Being Integrated into Google Results
Just four months after announcing the Google Base project, Google is already working to integrate the content into it’s traditional search results. Just recently, reports have started to show up in blogs about searches that lead to a results page with a Google Base search prompt for refining the original search. (skip to “Google Base Being Integrated into Google Results” by Jennifer Laycock) Google’s Alternate Internet and the Google Computers for sale less than $100
Google shows plans on creating an alternate Internet already under development and offering selling computers to the masses for less than $100. Judge orders Gmail disclosure
“Online search engine leader Google Inc. is devoting a section of its Web site to information about the stock market and corporate America, filling a gaping product hole as it continues to battle for Internet traffic with rivals Yahoo Inc., MSN and America Online.”Google to introduce finance section
“Online search engine leader Google Inc. is devoting a section of its Web site to information about the stock market and corporate America, filling a gaping product hole as it continues to battle for Internet traffic with rivals Yahoo Inc., MSN and America Online.”Google sued over page ranking
“A parental advice Internet site has sued Google Inc., charging it unfairly deprived the company of customers by downgrading its search-result ranking without reason or warning.”Both DOJ and Google Claim Victory in Court
The word is out that California U.S. District Judge James Ware will be ordering Google to serve up some of the data being demanded by the DOJ, but not all of it. Judge Ware basically ruled that while Google did have to give up some data to the government, the government’s original request was “overreaching” and would be an “invasion of privacy.” That has both sides claiming victory in a court battle that stands to set a strong precedent for the future of privacy issues when it comes to search. CBC news has the full story.How Much does Google Make?
“You may not know it, but every time you search on Google, the company makes 12 cents in revenue. [...] No longer do the different search sites compete on how many results they can provide to people not least because, as even Google admits, most people get what they want in the first five results returned to them.”
Google: Changing Business or a Business in Need of Change?
There’s an article over at Business Week today that talks about some of the problems Google is having dealing with investors and Wall Street. The article throws some heavy criticism at the company over the way that it relates to investors, citing issues like Google’s preference for announcing news on its blog rather than via a press release and it’s recent click fraud settlement that came on the heels of its claim that click fraud wasn’t a problem.Google Looking to Backup Your Drive?
The Washington Post is running an article today that talks about the info leak from Google that discusses future plans to offer online storage to consumers so that they can backup their hard drives and then access the data from anywhere. The leak is interesting considering Google’s current battle with the Department of Justice over whether or not they’ll give up data on their users and considering the recent hype about online privacy issues. The US Government Calls Google’s Bluff
Earlier this month, Google rejected the United States Department of Justice’s request for search data. The DOJ had made similar requests to Yahoo, MSN and AOL, all of which complied but Google strongly rejected arguing that the disclosure of the information could give competitors insight into its user habits. In a latest move, the government has rejected Google’s assertion that a government subpoena for search data threatens the privacy of Internet users. Google names Head of Philanthropic Arm
According to a newly issued Google press release, Dr. Larry Brilliant is the man that will be in charge of Google.org, the group that will oversee Google’s new philanthropic efforts. Dr. Brilliant is a founder and director of The Seva Foundation, a Policy Advisory Council Member at the University of California, Berkeley School of Public Health, and a member of the Strategic Advisory Group of Kleiner-Perkin’s Pandemic and Bio-Defense Fund. Google admits Desktop security risk
“We understand that there are a lot of security concerns about the Search Across Computers feature, but Google won’t hold information unless the user or enterprise opts in [to the feature].”Google Book Search security hole
“When you search for a book, like intitle:Miracles, and then click on the result you are required to log-in. After doing so, you will be forward to the book page. Now copy the URL (which includes an ‘auth’ – authentication – parameter) and send it to someone else… and that someone else will suddenly be logged in to your Google Account.”Google argues against disclosing search results
“Google has argued that turning over more than a million of its search records to the U.S. government would undermine users’ trust in its service and compromise its trade secrets.”Google operating without Internet license in China
“Chinese authorities are investigating US Internet giant Google for launching its local service without the proper license. [...] Instead of its own ICP licence, Google.cn is using the same one as Ganji.com, a Chinese information web site.”Google Posts Truth About Ban on the SEO Company ‘Traffic Power’
Having already made a bad reputation for itself by hiring a legion of phone solicitors to cold-call small businesses, Traffic Power had accumulated a fairly large client list. This weekend, the story took another twist when Matt Cutts, Google’s chief search engineer, posted definite confirmation of the penalty on his blog. (skip to “Google Posts the Truth About Traffic Power” by Jim Hedger)Google Continues to Take Heat Over China Stance
The Times Online features an article today about Microsoft, Yahoo!, Cisco Systems and Google taking the stand before the House of Representatives human rights subcommittee to talk about corporate responsibility and the need to do business abroad. Google and Yahoo! faced some harsh criticism for their actions in China. Google, for launching a heavily filtered version of their search engine to appease government officials and Yahoo! for sharing information that has led to the arrest and jailing of two Chinese dissidents.Google/Dell Custom Computer?
Thanks to a ground-breaking agreement between Dell and Google, SEO may soon be a mainstream topic of conversation. Dell, the world’s leading maker of personal computers, has announced that it is testing a pre-installed package of Google software, including a Google-powered Dell home page, Google Desktop Search, and a Google Toolbar. Fahrvergoogle?
The American arm of Volkswagen has teamed up with Google and graphics chipmaker nVidia to produce an in-car navigation system prototype using Google Earth software. Google and VW say the 3D display is more real looking than anything currently available.
Click the title above to read more. . . BMW Back in Google
Less than a week after being tossed out of Google for the use of doorway pages, the German version of BMW’s site has already been placed back into the index at Google. Matt Cutts talks about the re inclusion in his blog today and there’s obviously been a bit of feedback from readers about the decision. Gbuy – What Every Web site. Owner Must Know
Many news sources and blogs are anticipating Gbuy to quickly become a PayPal killer given Google’s huge brand name recognition and reach with consumers. But the whole PayPal killing talk is really much ado about nothing.
Bad BMW…Bad!
Search engine marketing is back in the mainstream news this week as word spreads that German auto maker BMW has been penalized by Google for using tactics that violate Google’s Webmaster guidelines. BMW.de had been using doorway pages that were designed to rank well for one phrase and then redirected users to different content. Google, upon discovering this, removed the entire site from their search results, thus sending BMW.de into a virtual black hole.
Rumors mount over Google’s internet plan
“Google is working on a project to create its own global internet protocol (IP) network, a private alternative to the internet controlled by the search giant, according to sources who are in commercial negotiation with the company.”
Google Removes BMW Germany For Spamming
Search Engine Watch Forums – “Google’s banned BMW Germany for doorway page spam. A brave new move against large corporations that spam, or will navigational needs just see BMW Germany get back in?”
Google, DOJ Headed to Court
Earlier this week, I wrote an article examining the battle taking place between the U.S. Government and Google with regards to a request from the Department of Justice for access to Google’s index. With neither Google nor the U.S. Department of Justice willing to give in, it looks like the battle over Google’s data is headed to the courts.
New! Google Extensions for Firefox (Two new extensions)
Add powerful new tools to your Mozilla Firefox browser
New! Google Transit
Plan trips using public transportation (currently in Portland only)
New! Google Reader
Use Google’s web-based feed reader to keep up with what’s important to you
New! Google Video
Search TV programs and videos
Yahoo’s Latest News
“It works like this: When you do a search on Yahoo!, you’ll automatically be given suggestions based on what you have typed – as you’re typing.
So, not only does this limit the number of words you need to type into a query, it may also present similar queries to shorten your searching time and get to what you’re looking for quicker.”Panama likely to boost Yahoo Search revenue more than 20 percent
“The gains may boost Yahoo’s revenue growth from searches to more than 20 percent in the second half of this year, instead of his previous estimate of 15 percent.”Panama Puts Yahoo Back in the Race
“If the Web’s search engine industry is the race track, Yahoo has just taken a timely pit stop to try and win back ground lost against the new leader, Google.”Yahoo’s top searches of 2006
“Yahoo! released the 6th annual Top Searches of the Year, which shows what the world was searching for in 2006 across news, sports and entertainment.”Yahoo’s search growth beats Google
“Yahoo’s share of search traffic has grown faster than Google’s in the last year, according to new data from Nielsen//Netratings.
Nielsen’s October U.S. search share rankings show Yahoo with 1.46B searches, up 30% from last year and representing 23.9% of all U.S. searches. Google was used for 3.02B searches, up 23% from last year. Google is responsible for 49.6% of all Internet searches.
MSN/Windows Live Search fell 8% year-over-year. IAC InterActive Corp.’s Ask.com saw search traffic jump 25%, although the search engine only accounts for 2.8% of the market.”Yahoo’s search crawler now upports wildcards in robots.txt
“You can now use ‘*’ in robots directives for Yahoo! Slurp to wildcard match a sequence of characters in your URL. You can use this symbol in any part of the URL string you provide in the robots directive.”Yahoo to join MSN and Google in Supporting NOODP Tag
Yahoo will finally support the NOODP tag, at least according to Tim Mayer who announced this after being questioned about it by Barry Schwartz on The Pulse last night. This following MSN and Google’s support of the tag earlier this year. What is the NOODP tag anyway? It is a meta tag that allows a web site owner to opt out from having the search engines display the Open Directory information in the organic SERPs. Many of us have been waiting for Yahoo to follow suit because there are times that the Open Directory information will be displayed for a site as opposed to the site’s title tag and either snippet of content or meta description tag for the actual description.Yahoo Launches ‘Social Search’ in Britain
“Yahoo! will launch a service today that allows users to ask other people’s advice, when looking for anything from a good hotel or bar to an apple pie recipe, rather than rely solely upon electronically generated search results.”Yahoo Search becomes the second most used search engine in China
“Yahoo! Search’s market share has become the runner-up in China. According to the Research Report of Searching Engine Market in China, issued by the CCW Research, it has surpassed Google and now follows after Baidu.”Yahoo updates Site Explorer
“We’re now organized around sites you’d like to track. You can explore these, and add feeds to each site. Once you authenticate your site, you can see much more information about your URLs as you explore your site, and monitor feeds you’ve submitted.”Yahoo announces Yahoo! Search Builder
“With Yahoo! Search Builder you can create a custom Web search engine by selecting a set of trusted sites to search across or you can tune the search algorithm to the topic of your choice. Beyond Web search, Search Builder includes Site search and News search.
Then generate the code you’ll need to add your search engine to your site. You also have control over the look and feel of the search box and search results page.”The new Yahoo! Search Crawler (Slurp)
“We launched a new Yahoo! Search Crawler, Yahoo! Slurp earlier this week. In addition to crawling the Internet faster, our new crawler is more efficient at visiting websites. As a result, site owners will notice as much as a 25% reduction in the number of requests and bandwidth consumed by the crawler. [...]
With this change of behavior in the crawler, you may see some shuffling of the pages that are included in the index and some changes in ranking as well.”Yahoo! Expands Publisher’s Network Help Center
Site owners that make use of the Yahoo Publisher’s Network will be pleased to note some new additions to the YPN control panel. With much of the new content focused on guiding YPN partners through the ins and outs of the network via a brand new help center, there’s been some speculation over whether this might signal an end to the beta stage of the Yahoo Publisher’s Network.Yahoo! Boosts Presence in South Korea
Yahoo has expanded its interests in South Korea, buying a strategic stake in e-commerce provider Gmarket. The US internet search and media firm has paid 57bn won ($60m) to buy a 10% holding in the Seoul-based business. Yahoo! and eBay Deal Could Mean Good Things for Small Business
Blogs are buzzing today with the news that Yahoo! and eBay will begin sharing resources with each other on things like payment systems, search and advertising. The duo will also begin exploring click-to-call and/or pay-per-call technology as well as a co-branded toolbar. The good news is that the pairing may spell good news for small business owners, especially ones that heavily depend on eBay and Yahoo! stores for their online income.Yahoo! Exec Balks at Idea of MSN Pairing
An article over at Silcon.com sheds some light on Yahoo!’s opinion of the recent speculation over a possible Microsoft/Yahoo! search pairing. The article features several quotes from Yahoo! CEO Terry Semel that make it clear that we won’t be searching at Microhoo! or Yasoft search sites anytime soon.
Yahoo Has Announced Another Index Update
“We rolled out an index update last night. As usual, you may see some changes in ranking as well as some shuffling of the pages that are included in the index.”Yahoo Announces a Ranking Algorithm Update
“We will be making changes to the ranking of our index tonight. I would expect that this update will be mild and quick compared to recent ones but will impact the ranking of some sites.”Yahoo! Adds Satellite Imagery to Maps
Yahoo! announced yesterday on their corporate blog that they had added satellite imagery to their mapping service. The new feature is also available through Yahoo!’s API and the Yahoo! Developer Network so that mashup creators can being hacking together Yahoo! powered features. (skip to “Yahoo! Adds Satellite Imagery to Maps” by Jennifer Laycock) Yahoo! tests new search engine ad model
“Yahoo! has released a test version of its new search monetization in Scandinavia and will expand the rollout to the U. K. in July. [...] Code named ‘Project Panama,’ Yahoo’s new model will be similar to that of Google, which ranks search-engine ads by both the amount advertisers pay for keywords and the relevance of the ad.”Yahoo Used in Spyware Click Fraud Scheme
The problem of click-fraud is an ever-present danger in pay per click advertising, one that troubles Google as well. The problem is not going to go away. In fact, it is likely to get worse. (skip to “Yahoo Used in Spyware Click Fraud Scheme” by Jim Hedger)Yahoo! outnumbers Google
“Despite Google’s reputation, Yahoo! ranks as top search engine and Yahoo Mail grabs the top telecom/internet services site spot week ending March 19.”Yahoo! Search index update
“We completed an index update over the weekend. As a result, you may see some changes in ranking as well as some shuffling of the pages that are included in the index. You might also be seeing a temporary spike in crawler activity. As these things go, all this should stabilize in the near future.”Yahoo Offers Up Free Training to New Orleans Businesses
Next month, the team at Yahoo! is going to be heading to the big easy to share free tips and advice with small business owners that are interested in search marketing. The “Back in Business” event will be held at the InterContinental Hotel on Friday, April 9th from 9am to 5pm. The event is free to attend and open to small business owners, web developers and marketers. Yahoo will be sending a team to the event to help teach attendees about web development, e-commerce and search advertising. Interested small business owners can register online. Some Insight on the Yahoo Publishers Network
If you’ve been thinking about checking out the Yahoo Publisher’s Network (YPN), Yahoo!’s alternative to AdSense, but still have some questions about exactly how things work, you aren’t alone. That’s where Rae Hoffman comes in. Rae (known in the forums as Sugarrae) has put together an excellent set of Q&A with Josh Siegel, Sr. Mgr Business Operations, Yahoo! Publisher Network Online. The piece covers issues like ad targeting, the publisher’s interface and even ways to better optimize the performance of ads. It’s a good read for anyone looking to learn more about YPN. Yahoo! releases local news
The new service allows you to see the news for your area.Yahoo! Research Expands Globally with Centers in Spain and Chile; Dr. Ricardo Baeza-Yates Joins Yahoo To Lead Research Efforts in Barcelona, Spain and Santiago, Chile
Yahoo! Inc.
Yahoo! Inc., a leading global Internet company, today announced that it has expanded its research operations into Europe and Latin America with the opening of new facilities in Spain and Chile. Renowned Web retrieval and mining expert Dr. Ricardo Baeza-Yates will lead both centers in their focus on topics related to Web search and information extraction. He will be mainly based in Barcelona and report directly to Dr. Prabhakar Raghavan, Head of Yahoo! Research. Read the full article »
Mind set: Intent-driven Search
A demo that applies a new twist on search that uses machine learning technology to give you a choice: View Yahoo! Search results sorted according to whether they are more commercial or more informational (i.e., from academic, non-commercial, or research-oriented sources). Learn more »
MSN Latest News
“Microsoft has gathered a team of twenty or more ‘rock star’ developers who’ve been tasked at building their next generation search engine. [...]
We have few details on their approach to the product, other than hearing that it is definitely a ‘horizontal’ engine (so, it’s not limited to a specific vertical like images), and is ‘very cool.’”Microsoft is Going to Launch Free Analytics
It looks like MSN is aiming to join the ranks of Google in the “we’ll give you free analytics in exchange for access to your data” team. Rumors started buzzing last week about a possible MSN analytics tool. The news was then confirmed by two of the project team members on their personal blogs. MediaPost Publications has the story today. Microsoft launches new global ad site
“The site, available in 15 local languages, will contain advertiser information for MSN, Windows Live, Live Search and Microsoft Office Online. It will also shows the new opportunities available to advertisers through its recently formed Microsoft Digital Advertising Solutions network.”MSN Mobile Search Tool to List Clickable Ads
“Microsoft plans to place advertising on MSN’s Windows Live Search for Mobile service that will let users click on an advertisement to place a call for more information.”MSN adds Behavioral Targeting to Search
“With the new service, advertisers can arrange to have their pay-per-click ads shown to users who MSN has identified as likely purchasers based on their Web-surfing history.”MSN Live Search is live
“Now, we feel it’s time to unveil the new Live Search … no longer in beta, and powering searches on both Live.com and MSN. In related news, Live Local Search is coming out of beta, and Live.com is too!”Windows Live Q&A Launches
It’s a relay race that never ends. The baton passes from one player to the next as the search engines vie to put up the best of the best in all areas of search and search utilities. The latest runner into the game is Windows Live QnA, a combination search engine, answering service and social media site. The beta version of the site is Microsoft’s attempt to combine “applied human knowledge” with a “dynamic, social community.” (skip to “Windows Live QnA Launches” by Jennifer Laycock)Microsoft: noise improves search results
“So-called ‘noisy behavior’ — information on where users click, how long they stay on sites and whether and how they reformulate their queries — can improve search results by 31 percent, according to a new study from Microsoft Research.”MSN spiders have new names
The MSN Shopping bot is msnbot-products, the MSN News bot is msnbot-news, the MSN Image Search bot is msnbot-MM, the MSN Search bot is still just plain msnbot.Microsoft research develops spam killer for search engines
“‘The Strider Search Defender’ looks like a foolproof response to the onslaught of spam URLs on social networking sites, blogs and forums which spread rapidly and even start to appear on popular search engines like Google, Yahoo, and Microsoft’s MSN.” [info] Is MSN Going to Add Free Web Analytics Soon?
Jennifer from Search Engine Guide has made an interesting observation over at Google Watch and MSN Latest News Microsoft Mapping The Real-Time World
This is an interesting article on MSN’s plan on providing the most updated local mapping search info by adding live feeds showing how much traffic is on the road and right down to finding out how many people are in line for the local Red Lobster. My opinion??? You would have to have A LARGE amount of people willing to participate to make this happen (Red Lobster example). However the live feed of traffic jams for mapping could be a real go and a push for popularity for MSN.Amazon switches to Microsoft from Google
. . . Microsoft Corp. scored an important win against rival Google Inc. over the weekend, as Amazon.com began using its technology to power the Internet retailer’s A9 search unit. . . MSN to Create Pop Ups for TV
MSN has recently applied for a patent that will allow them to add pop-ups to cable and satellite subscribers. MSN AdCenter Plans Upgrade
I had a note come through from MSN this morning that said they’ll be conducting another update to their services on April the 18th. They note that the AdCenter will experience some down time on the 18th while the upgrades are made, but that existing campaigns will not be affected.MSN Search restored after hours-long outage
“Microsoft Corp.’s MSN search engine stopped working for about four hours Thursday morning, and the company couldn’t immediately say what caused the problem.”US Backs Microsoft in Antitrust Fight
Microsoft has long complained that antitrust regulators with the European Union have been holding back information related to the investigation, and US diplomats have raised the issue as well. MSN Rolls out new search interface / algorithm
Search Engine Watch Forums – “MSN’s ever changing search algorithms are frustrating some search marketers, but is the instability just a necessary means to find the right formula?”MSN’s ContentAds To Launch in 2006
Jennifer Slegg at JenSense reports today that Microsoft has disclosed the long awaited name of their new contextual ad program, ContentAds, as well as a much narrower timeline for the program to launch. She found this information on the upcoming Mix06 conference web site within the session information.MSN launches ‘Search and Win’ contest
“MSN has come up with a new plan to draw users away from Google: free stuff. The company launched a contest on Monday that will give users a chance to win prizes simply by using the service’s search engine. Over $1 million in prizes will be available during the months of February, March and April.”Microsoft buys mobile search company
“Microsoft came late to desktop search; it doesn’t intend to make the same mistake with mobile search. [...] Now with MotionBridge in the fold, Microsoft has a foothold in another aspect of search.”MSN Search provided DOJ with “absolutely no personal data”
“57 bloggers/online experts gathered in Redmond yesterday at the ‘MSN Search Champs’ event were invited to discuss with senior MSN management the recent news and concerns around the data MSN Search, Yahoo and AOL provided to the US government.
The precise nature of the information hadn’t been disclosed …until now. It turns out that it was nothing more than an innocuous two-column list of search terms and frequency.”
Headline : WASHINGTON –
