It is all over the airwaves, er ‘netwaves’… Yahoo has signed a deal with Twitter to create a relationship that rivals any other search engine’s connection to the tweeting platform. I am short on time so here are some excerpts from the very unpunny Yahoo release titled “@yahoo + @twitter Sitting in a Tree…T.W.E.E.T.I.N.G.“: More on the Yahoo Twitter Partnership »»
I am in the midst of a project at the moment and I got distracted by a couple of interesting articles from Google that, I expect, are well worth the read for many of you:
25 Google Website Optimizer Tips for Better Product Pages
Segmentation with Google Website Optimizer = Testing on Steroids! Not all customers are created equal, nor should you deal with all customers equally. Testing different versions of your page or funnel is powerful. Testing different versions based on the type of visitors is even more powerful. There are different ways of doing this, but we recommend starting with BTBuckets or with these instructions.
Mute posts so they don’t get sent to your inbox. Comments on your posts and comments after your comments send buzz directly to your inbox. If you don’t want a lively conversation to keep appearing in your inbox as people reply to it, you can mute it. Click the arrow in the corner of a buzz post and select “Mute this post.”
Just a couple things to keep you reading…
According to breaking news from the Wall Street Journal, Google will be resuming talks with China after the Chinese New Year holiday over the future of the company’s search engine in the heavily censored country.
Why is Google Considering Leaving? A Basic Timeline of Events
If you have missed the boat on this story then here is an timeline overview:
1) 2005: Google opens in China and censors its content heavily to ‘respect’ the Chinese legal system. Many scuffles over free speech occured over the next few years but Google ultimately buckled to Chinese law. (more on Google China at Wikipedia)
2) Mid-December 2009, Google gets hacked by cyber-terrorists and after some research, deduces that China was the source of the attack.
Here are some excerpts from Google’s extensive media release about the cyber attacks:
More of the Google China timeline
On February 14th, Danny Sullivan posted a frustrated Buzz about Google Buzz that lured me into making a few comments. Well, low and behold, but a man by the name of Josh Wills who is involved behind the scenes in Google Buzz jumped into the fray and listened. Yes, listened! I was so impressed, I thought I would share with you the conversation.
To set the tone, this all started when Danny Sullivan shared his frustration about how badly the reply system is designed within Google Buzz and that spawned a bit of a hackfest from other frustrated users.
Ross Dunn - Yes the whole thing is a confusing mess. I just don’t get what is going wrong over at Google. Have they lost perspective entirely? I am very disappointed; I actually had high hopes for them. I guess I have been taking it for granted that their products are well thought out. I won’t make that mistake again…
Josh Wills - @Alex is right, there is alot to fix. @Ross, I am sorry you’re disappointed. …
Josh went on to discuss spam issues on Buzz. I will just show you the parts where we interacted from here on in. More Insight into the future of Google Buzz
Just a few hours ago Google announced an enhancement to Gmail called Google Buzz that will be rolled out over the next couple of days. What is Google Buzz? Essentially, it is the incorporation of an important part of what made Google Wave so sexy for many people (me included) – the ability to manage conversations on other platforms (like Twitter) from a central location that we already frequent – GMAIL.
So how does Google Buzz work? Below is a video outlining the cool new capabilities but if you can’t access that at the moment, here is much of the key video transcribed to text:
“Buzz goes beyond status messages. It automatically pulls images from links, shows videos in line, and lets you flip through photos the way they were meant to be seen – big and fast. You can connect to other sites you use; like Picasa, Flickr, Google Reader, and Twitter. So your friends can keep up on what you are doing on the web, all in one place.
“Buzz makes sure you see what matters most. The best part about sharing is getting responses to your post; Buzz sends these comments to your inbox to make sure you don’t miss them. You can respond right from there to keep the conversation going. If you want to make sure you friends see something, you can send it right to their inbox by adding them with an “@” reply.
“You’ll sometimes see recommended Buzz from someone you are not directly following. Buzz identifies posts that may interest you or are popular among your friends and recommends them to you so you don’t miss out. And it works on your phone, so you can keep up with what your friends, or people near you, are Buzzing about.”
Here is the official Google Buzz video followed by why Google Buzz could help Google advertisers and those with high Google rankings: More Buzzz on Google Buzz
Victoria SEO specialist, Ross Dunn ( CEO of StepForth Web Marketing Inc. ) will be teaching two web marketing courses at Victoria’s Camosun College Interurban campus this February and March. The first course in February is focused on teaching business owners how to improve their search engine rankings under local search results. The second course in March will delve into the world of advanced search engine optimization (SEO) and is designed for web marketers with prior experience in search engine optimization (SEO).
For more details please see the content below and sign up information from the Camosun College Continuing Education website (link: computer training courses). Read more about the upcoming Victoria SEO courses »
Google Webmaster Tools is very useful for a number of things, but this article will focus on improving your inbound links and on site Page Rank.
Even the best webmasters sometimes have broken links on their site. Even the best webmasters sometimes move or delete a page without properly 301 redirecting the old URL to a new replacement. It happens all the time, but if the 404 error created by these mistakes is not addressed the website may not be living up to its full potential. Read more on Increasing your Links with Webmaster Tools
On Thursday, Jan 21st, Google will be releasing its fourth-quarter earnings and stockholders are likely to be very happy with the results. That said, what will happen in 2010?
Google’s 4th Quarter Results Expected to be Great
In this Reuters article Kaufman Brothers analyst Aaron Kessler is quoted as saying, “the unofficial ‘whisper’ numbers among investors have Google’s fourth-quarter net revenue growing between 13 percent and 15 percent from the third quarter’s $4.38 billion.”
So just how well is Google doing in comparison to the markets? Read More on Google's Finances and 2010 Speculation
