Sillicon Alley Insider just released this insightful set of charts illustrating the “horrendous” drop in user engagement MySpace has experienced in the last 12 months.
Average Stay per Visit (in minutes, rounded up)
Average Visits per Person:
So much of what I discover on a given day in the search marketing industry is via Twitter. When I find interesting and occasionally hot stories I note them on our @stepforth account and/or my @rossdunn account. Since our blog often suffers from my Twitter distractions I felt I had better provide a summary on the busy days. Thus, welcome to our very first Tweet Update for June 5th, 2009: Read more…
I was just reading more about the IIS SEO Toolkit when I came across the following interesting tutorial on how to block competitors from running the IIS SEO Toolkit on your servers. If you have an asp-based website then this is a mandatory update in my opinion unless you want your competitors to have easy access to your site’s information. That said, a lot of the information that the IIS SEO Toolkit provides is likely available through other tools but at least if you block the Toolkit you will make it that much harder on the competition.
Here is the tutorial: Read more…
In my discussion with Rajesh Srivastava today on day 1 of SMX Advanced he mentioned there will be a plugin released (no mention of how soon) for IIS that will interface directly with Bing’s Webmaster Center. The plugin will allow IIS webmasters to submit sitemaps to Bing from within their systems and utilize other webmaster center tools.
UPDATE: It has been 9 hours since I posted this article at an ungodly hour and apparently the IIS plugin has just been released. It is called the IIS SEO Toolkit and it is now in Beta and was officially announced today. Read more…
I am at SMX Advanced in Seattle this week and I was fortunate to have a one-on-one lunch with Rajesh Srivastava, the Group Program Manager for Portal Search Experience. After complimenting him and his team for finally pulling off what looks like a search engine that can compete I asked a few burning questions.
Why did Kumo (Now Bing) take so long to come out? There had been rumors of a rebranding for a while now. Read more…
Bing is online a full 3 days before the scheduled launch date; a surprise leap of faith very uncharacteristic of Microsoft. That said, the search engine is “in Preview” mode at www.Bing.com and Live.com continues towards its inevitable demise on June 3rd when I expect the address will be redirected to Bing.com.
I spent a little time on Bing.com and I challenge you not to be at least a little impressed! Might Microsoft have actually pulled off a good product?
It is late and I haven’t done a lot of searching but so far I am very impressed at how accurate the search engine appears to be. I am especially impressed with the image search options. In particular the ability to show only images with faces – nice touch! They also cleverly made the image results never ending… they just load and load and load on demand as you scroll down the page – no more clicking to additional pages.
Anyway, I hope to have a better review of Bing soon. For now please check it out and let me know what you think. Perhaps Bing will earn Microsoft a more significant percentage of the US search market (Live.com sits at only 10%).
Yesterday Google Wave was announced at Google I/O 2009 and a preview of the collaborative concept was provided to developers. The following is the full 1h 20 min live video from the developer preview.
Here is a link to the video on YouTube if it does not render for you here.
In a rush? For non techies I recommend watching 50 min starting at around the 8 min mark; after the intro’s are complete. That will give you a very good idea of the mind-blowing implications of Google Wave. For techies with an interest in the convergence of web technologies the full video is really a must watch.
Google Wave is on the lips of countless Google watchers today as the search monopoly announced a unique concept for online interaction. 
Created by the two brothers that brought Google Maps to our desktops; Lars and Jens Rasmussen. So what is a Google “Wave” and how does it work? In Lars’s own words:
A “wave” is equal parts conversation and document, where people can communicate and work together with richly formatted text, photos, videos, maps, and more. Read more…
Bing, as announced today, is Microsoft’s latest variation of its search platform. 
The search engine is supposed to marry a myriad of search verticals to create a one-stop-shop for netizens. For example, according to this official introductory video the search engine will incorporate price comparisons and reviews for everything from flights, to hotels and electronics. It also appears to include a hefty dose of local content for anyone trying to choose a restaurant in their area or needing directions.
Screenshots of the major functions of Bing are available in this extensive virtual presskit Microsoft has kindly made available. Read more…
Congratulations to my friend Joost de Valk and his new business ally Brian Gardner of StudioPress Development. The two WordPress gurus have joined forces to build WordPress themes with SEO essentials built right in.
Why is this News? I know from experience working with WordPress sites there is a lot of optimization that can be built in from the get-go if the proper template is used which saves time and money so this news is very good news for the web marketing community and WordPress users alike.
If you would like to learn more about optimizing your WordPress website check out this interview I did with Joost de Valk on SEO 101 on WebmasterRadio.fm about WordPress search engine optimization.
