Archive for April, 2010
How to Get Your Videos Indexed
This latest posting from Google is more about how you can help them to help you. The Webmaster Central Blog is calling on you to let Google know which videos you have on your website by maintaining a video sitemap. By following the information in this blog post you will be able to include the URLs for pages where your videos can be found, including the titles, keywords, thumbnail images, duration and other information which will assist your sites indexing. Once Google has indexed a video, it may appear in the Web search results in what is now called Video Onebox where the result will be easily recognisable by its thumbnail and description.
Google Comes to the Rescue With More Data
Google has announced that it will be providing more detailed data for individual search queries. The top search queries feature in Google’s Webmasters Tools is where you will be able to find the latest addition to the already expanded suite of tools. The information will include things like, a breakdown of the number of impressions and the amount of click through for each position. If your site ranks for more than 100 queries you will be able to view a larger sampling that returned your site in search results. The comments following this blog posting will also give you some insight into what other Webmasters are thinking.
The Best Social Media Monitoring Tools
There are many reasons Webmasters should be tracking social media. For starters you need to be aware of how your reputation is being managed, as well as measuring the success of your various campaigns. Add to that the capacity to spy on your competitors, track industry news and improve your press or blogger relations and you have some very good reasons to stay in touch. This article links to a video presentation where these reasons are discussed, but more importantly, point you towards five valuable tools you can use. Some common tools like Google Alerts and Blogger are mentioned, but the others are not quite so well known so this post is well worth your time.
Twitter Introduces Promoted Tweets
Twitter’s popularity has continued to rise over the past few years, so it is no surprise that they have finally turned their attention to monetisation. In a recent announcement, Twitter has enthusiastically unveiled a service called Promoted Tweets, which appears to have some similarities to Google’s AdSense. At this early stage Twitter hopes to learn from its experience and develop the product over time, gradually increasing exposure to a broader range of advertisers. If you want to contribute to this product’s development, you should go to the website and share your comments. It would also appear to be a good idea to stay in touch with this ongoing development, as opportunities may eventually open to the broader business community.
The Next SEO Challenge – Augmented Reality
No, it’s not the latest science fiction fad. Augmented reality is a challenge awaiting Webmasters who want to come to grips with locality based search engine rankings. In this article the author describes the latest Google transition to new technology.The author likens the situation to a person walking down the street and having information streamed into their glasses giving them information about businesses in the area. Strangely enough, Google has introduced this information in its streets overlays on Google maps, and it’s a challenge that Webmasters will have to rise to, or be left behind.
Site Speed Affects Rankings – It’s Official!
It has been suspected for some time that the time it takes for your site to load affects your site ranking. Well, it is now official, Google that it will include a new element to its algorithm making site speed an important element of page rank. Whilst content is still the primary determining factor, Google points out that users have a better browsing experience when pages are readily accessible and fast to load, a fact which is backed up by their own internal research. In this post, Google explains its reasoning and points to a number of free tools you can use to make your site satisfy this latest change.
How to Add Images to your Sitemap
All Webmasters are aware of the value of sitemaps when it comes to search engine rankings and SEO in general. In an important announcement, Google has advised that it is now possible to add images to your site map to make it easier for the search engine to understand the nature of your content and to alert it as to which images you consider important to your site. There is no need to create a whole new sitemap, the Webmaster Tools Help Centre will give you detailed instructions on how to implement the changes in your existing sitemap.
Stop Your Site From Being Hacked
In a recent post at the it’s Webmaster Central blog, Google discloses that it detects thousands of sites every day they have been hacked and had content compromised, and it isn’t just large companies are bearing the brunt of these spam attacks. Small business sites and even personal sites are also being targeted, so Google is coming to the rescue with new software versions aimed at helping Web masters protect their sites. From now on Google will be alerting Webmasters of potential threats and reported hacks. Simply go to the Webmaster help forum at Google to obtain more details.
Yahoo Revenue Increases
Now that the deal between Yahoo and Google has been finally approved, it looks like advertisers and investors have jumped on the bandwagon. The release of trading figures shows a modest growth in income mainly from the sale of assets, but Yahoo!’s earnings per share increased substantially on the back of the deal. Large advertisers appear to have returned to the market contributing substantially to the improved figures. There is still room for improvement however as other figures show that Yahoo! is losing substantially in the search market share.
Is Google’s Growth an Illusion?
Questions are being raised about Google’s market growth. In this recent posting the author argues that recent statements issued by Google describing strong growth in Windows 7 and Bing, are not reflected in the figures which were released at the same time. The online services division actually shows a $300 million decline over the last 12 months. accountants will have a better understanding of the figures released by Google but the comments that follow this post also offer some interesting explanations. Company figures don’t usually lie but sometimes companies do exaggerate certain elements of their performance to encourage investors.
