Introduction
I have long been a fan of ClickTracks and it’s professional line of analytics software. In my experience ClickTracks is leaps and bounds above its competition both for quality of software and quality of service. In the interests of full disclosure StepForth has been an advocate of ClickTracks since we bought our first copy in 2003 (or thereabouts) and I (Ross Dunn) recently completed my Professional ClickTracks Certification.

The following video interview was recorded at the ClickTracks presentation booth at the New York Search Engine Strategies Conference, yesterday, April 11th, 2007. To view the videos just click on the question and you will be taken to the appropriate YouTube page to view it. I hope you enjoy StepForth’s first round of video journalism. Read more…

The following is coverage of the Search Engine Strategies (SES) New York presentation called “Mobile Search Optimization” by Cindy Krum of Blue Moon Works, Gregory Markel, President of Infuse Creative LLC and Rachel Pasqua, Director of Mobile Marketing at iCrossing.

This presentation provided a fascinating glimpse into the young realm of mobile site creation, compliance and optimization. I have a lot of information to work with here so to make this article a little more digestible I have broken it into two parts; one is the site creation and the second is the site optimization. Read more…

It has been a long day. I got into New York early this morning and had to get up bright and early to attend the most interesting presentations. Between making contacts at my first Search Engine Strategies conference and attending two advanced presentations I had a long day indeed. That said, I met some great people and at least one new friend in the industry – always invaluable for networking and bouncing ideas off (especially tough questions from you guys!). Read more…

My apologies to my readers for such a quiet week on the StepForth SEO Blog and for the nonexistent newsletter. I have been very busy trying to catch up on open contracts and prepare for my adventure to New York next week for the Search Engine Strategies conference.

I promise I will make it up to you next week with coverage from the conference. Read more…

Thursday evening the Yahoo Blog gave warning of changes to their algorithm.

“We are in the process of rolling out some changes to our search results. As usual, you may see some changes in ranking as well as some shuffling of the pages that are included in the index throughout this process. This update will roll out this evening and will be complete very soon.”

Remember, do not react rashly to any short term changes. Updates tend to take a little time to stabilize so keep that in mind. All the best in the coming weather!

Today Yahoo posted news that its search engine spider, Slurp will now resolve from a different domain: crawl.yahoo.net.

So what does this mean to you? Likely nothing unless you have some custom access filters setup for spiders. Priyank Garg of Yahoo noted that “if you do any reverse DNS checks for the crawler identity or have any network access rules to allow inktomisearch.com, please also update them to allow for crawl.yahoo.net.”

The change will be incremental so it is important to provide access to both domains until the transition is complete.

From the 9th to the 13th of April I will be attending Search Engine Strategies New York covering the festivities and breaking news on the StepForth SEO Blog.

If you happen to be at SES NY as well I hope you will come by and introduce yourself (if I don’t do so first). I am excited to finally meet many of my SEO industry brethren and put some faces to the names and prior discussions from years past. Unfortunately I will not be a speaker at this SES due to significant cutbacks in programs this year but I am there representing StepForth’s SEO Blog for which I am looking to setup interviews.

Read more…

DoubleClick Inc. announced recently it was available for purchase and undoubtedly many a suitor has made offers, not least of which are Microsoft and Google. The question now is, how much will DoubleClick sell for with these two giants gearing up for a bidding war? The word on the street is the bidding will go above a lofty 2 billion greenbacks.

So what is it about DoubleClick that has the big guys so hot and bothered? Read more…

I just love April Fools Day! The foolishness really seems to come alive online and this year I take my hat off to Google – they really had fun with it this year with TiSP; Google’s new Toilet WiFi service.

“Google TiSP (BETA) is a fully functional, end-to-end system that provides in-home wireless access by connecting your commode-based TiSP wireless router to one of thousands of TiSP Access Nodes via fiber-optic cable strung through your local municipal sewage lines.”

Remember! “Please wash your hands before surfing.”

And yes, I felt strongly this great new technology merited a position under the SEO Blog’s “New Tech” label.

For a hilarious walk through of some of the best April Fools hoaxes of all time check out this great hoax site – it is well worth it for the painful grin your bound to enjoy.