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Archive for the ‘Zeitgeist & Trends’ Category
Meet the Stars of Search Marketing
Friday, September 2, 2011
SEO.com recently came out with a stellar infographic featuring the Stars of Search Marketing. You may or may not yet be familiar with these names but in the world of Search Engine Optimization, you should definitely know their work. This fun infographic also showcases the future of search according to these SEO experts.
For more information about these Search Stars visit their websites:
- Bruce Clay – BruceClay.com
- Matt Cutts – MattCutts.com/blog
- Danny Sullivan – SearchEngineLand.com
- Rand Fishkin – SEOmoz.org
Stephen Colbert to Bing, you got “hiybbprqag!”
Thursday, February 3, 2011
“For the first time ever, someone’s search history has been busted for something other than porn.” – Stephen Colbert
Earlier this week, Danny Sullivan from Search Engine Land, reported that Google has proof of Bing copying their search results. Bing fervently denied this accusation and instead accused Google of click fraud involving “honeypot” search results.
Well apparently, the SEO community were not the only folks who had an opinion on the matter. Comedian Stephen Colbert, despite being sponsored by Bing, poked fun at the search giant.
He briefly described Google’s sting operation and how they made nonexistent words like “hiybbprqag” to turn up in search results, only for the same results to show up on Bing a month later.
Colbert goes on to say, “Evidently, ‘hiybbprqag’ is a word meaning, you got served.”
The video is pretty hilarious, so be sure to check it out.
| The Colbert Report | Mon – Thurs 11:30pm / 10:30c | |||
| Bing Gets Served | ||||
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Also, what do you think about Google calling out Bing? Or Bing’s defense regarding Google’s accusation of copying their search results? Let us know in the comments.
iPad, iPed, iPid, iPod, iPud
Tuesday, February 2, 2010
Previously only one of those words was an Apple product. After January 26th, however, Apple now sells iPads along with iPods. What may be a silly name or a great name briefly caused a bit of confusion with the search engines.
IPED and IPEDS are acronyms that have quite a few results in Google, Yahoo, and Bing. But, the other spelling brethren to the iPod do not have much meaning. Because of this, all three search engines show spelling corrections for those words and typically include “iPod” search results as well. Today, we still see this for iPud and iPid. And, immediately after the Apple announcement, we saw it for iPad, too.
This was soon corrected, whether naturally or through intervention, in Yahoo and Google. Bing is still showing results for iPod when you search for the new iPad. This instance appears to show a small flaw in the search engine algorithms. How do you quickly add a new term when it had been written off as a typo?
The iPad announcement is the most recent example of this, but many web 2.0 companies experienced the same problem. When companies began to emulate Flickr’s naming convention of adding an ‘r’ to the end of their name, it also confused search engines. Is Snappr a service, or is someone looking for a lawn mower. This is especially apparent when services first launch, which is exactly what we witnessed with the launch of the iPad.
What does that mean for Search Engine Marketers? It means that Google may have a bit more to say about brand names then we would like to think. Is the new product you are launching or marketing a typo for something else? Then you may want to think about a name change. Of course, a strong product can overtake the ‘typo’ designation as they iPad has done in Google and Yahoo, but you may not have the marketing gusto and hype power that Apple carries. If you have flexibility in the name, then do your homework.
It may be time to add “Googleability” to the traditional product naming guidelines. Not only do you need to distinguish your brand from others, but you need to have a brand that isn’t even a close spelling of another product. If I sold a product called a “pespi,” I would be in a world of pain trying to market it online.
We would like to keep the search engines out of these types of processes, and they want to stay out of them as well. Google’s vision is to “organize the world’s information.” No part of that says anything about governing or changing that information. The unfortunate truth is that online marketing is growing rapidly, and to keep up you need to capitalize on the traffic that Google and the others can drive. So, pick your product names carefully, and market the heck out of them.
Google Website Trends in an Election Year
Thursday, August 14, 2008
2008 is proving to be a fruitful year for Web 2.0 and the election. Barack Obama, the current saviour du jour, is leading the way in embracing the web and us the ‘prosumers.’
Searching Google Trends on site stats for both McCain and Obama show the Obama site seems to have that gooey factor that websites strive for.
The graph below shows the amount of searches for each site. As you can see Obama peaked near the beginning of the year and McCain has been pretty stagnant although his peaks do match Obama but on a lower scale.
Similarly if we look at site traffic to both candidates Obama is again outshining the McCain camp. Looking at Compete stats the peaks are the same but Obama is getting more visitors
| Date: 07/2008 | People | Month | Year |
|---|---|---|---|
| barackobama.com | 1,851,649 | -28.5% |
645.2% |
| johnmccain.com | 831,338 | 2.9% |
1991.3% |
What is Obama doing right that McCain isn’t?
There are obvious factors as to why this is and one is the message: no matter where your political allegiance lies the Obama camp is reaching out to people with what they want to hear. The current administration has polarized a lot of voters and with a war in Iraq and Afghanistan voters are looking for change and it appears that Obama is promising that.
At least that’s what his site header says
McCain’s site is message is a ‘Country First’ promise that speaks to the heart of a lot of people in the US but as a marketer I’m not dissecting these sites based on message or whom I am going to vote for(I’m a Canadian so I can’t) I want to point out WHY one site is better than the other
Embracing Web 2.0
Obama’s site and Web 2.0 campaign is simply more effective. Oh sure there is more that they could be doing but as the first ‘Candidate 2.0’ or the ‘Facebook President’ Obama’s marketing campaign is very effective.
Say what you want about the design of each site, McCain’s is busy and colour conflicting where Obama’s is soft and uses negative space but I want to talk about the use of spreading the word.
McCain uses a lot of calls to action but no direct link to make it easy for people to get involved in Web 2.0. Oh sure the argument could be made that if you simply click on the image that says ‘Spread the Word’ you could probably find some options there but NO you can’t. It leads you to the McCain ‘Action Center’
In contrast on the lower right of Obama’s page there are links to *16* social media or network sites making access to him seem easy enough.
Looking to connect to Obama on Facebook? No problem http://presby.facebook.com/barackobama. McCain is there too http://presby.facebook.com/johnmccain but where do you find that on the home page?
What about Flickr? Obama is here http://www.flickr.com/photos/barackobamadotcom. John McCain? Can’t find him
Twitter? Sure Obama is right here http://twitter.com/barackobama. McCain? Can’t find him but then again this is a guy who has trouble using email
Breaking Down the Wall
It’s this type of access that sites for politicians but also companies and individuals need to embrace. Obama’s site makes it easy to find out information about him and connect to him. In this political climate most young people want to feel that someone or some company is accessible. Being from Canada where our Prime Minister is held accountable by his peers and media everyday that government is in session, it is nice to see that the ‘wall’ to the American presidency is becoming more and more transparent.
The question now becomes – will it remain transparent with the almost certain election of Obama?
For more information please contact the Search Engine Marketing Team at Schipul – sem@schipul.com
