Posts on State of Search about ‘Google’

Search Trends according to Matt Cutts and Danny Sullivan

We are all familiar with the Google Webmaster Videos Matt Cutts is making. We actually talked about one of them yesterday. And today we see another one. And this is kind of a special one, one with a twist. And one with an extra person in there. In this video Cutts answered the question “what are some search trends on your radar?”, posed by Danny Sullivan. And guess who walks into the screen… The talk is about several issues: Hacked Sites, social signals and more.

It’s a nice video with actual information in it so be sure to watch it, but Danny, next time, look more into the camera!

via Searchengineland

Matt Cutts confirms: social signals do matter, also looking at author reputation

A few weeks ago Danny Sullivan wrote a very interesting article on Searchengineland in which he discussed the use of social signals in the rankings of both Google and Bing. He had approached representatives of both search engines who both said they were using Twitter and Facebook links as a ranking signal.

In his webmaster help videos Matt Cutts last week confirmed this. And not only that, he added some more information to it. He said that they are also “trying to figure out a little bit about the reputation of an author” on Twitter or Facebook, something he said they didn’t do in May this year. They changed that since May. See the video here:

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Google’s 2010 acquisitions tell us its all about Mobile and Social

You can tell a lot about what a person is like by what he or she buys. That is one of the things Blippy for example believes. That goes for persons, but that also goes for companies.

In the beginning of this year Google announced that it would getting back onto the buyers market. They were aiming to buy one company every month. Being it now December that would mean Google would by now have acquired 12 companies. Well, Google may have been underestimating their own spending pattern. Up until this day Google has made 26, and that doesn’t include the investments they made.

A list of all the acquisitions in 2010 you can find below, but as said, You can tell a lot about what a person is like by what he or she buys, so what does this tell about Google? Let’s take a look (more…)

More complaints about Google putting their own content first, but is that bad?

It’s a well known discussion: does Google favor their own sites above others in their rankings? And do they change these results manually instead of letting the algorithm decide? That kind of discussion has been around ever since Google is dominant in search, so almost for the entire last decade.

In the last couple of weeks however there seem to have been an increase in these kind of ‘rumors’. More and more competitors are complaining about Google changing the results in favor of their own. There is the law suit in Europe where the EU is looking into anti-trust matters (which by the way is instigated by a competitor which is owned by Microsoft) but that case has been going on for years already. Then there was the Harvard study which seemed to prove Google was putting their own links on top.

And last week there was the issue with Tripadvisor who’s reviews were not showing anymore on Maps, but it was unclear whether or not Tripadvisor had pulled these temselves. Now again, Tripadvisor comes forward. As one of the ‘competitors’ complaining about Google’s rankings. Together with amongst others health site WebMD.com and local-business reviews sites Yelp.com and Citysearch.com they are complaining that their links are being pushed lower on the results page in favor of Google sites.
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Google Zeitgeist 2010

Google is letting us know what we’ve searched for again. Every country gets their own “Zeitgeist”. And off course there’s also a world wide one:

Tripadvisor blocks Google Places, but Google doesn’t know…?

Google has got a high local focus at the moment, if any prediction has to be made Google will most probably focus on social, personal, mobile and local. However, Google is not the first to go local. There were many verticals before Google who figured local was the best way to go. With Google focussing more on the local front these verticals might just not like what the search giant is doing.

It now seems as if the first signals of that are emerging. Tripadvisor, one of the biggest sites when it comes to reviews for local: hotels, restaurants but also flights and trip ideas, seems to have blocked Google from showing their results in Google Places. The strange thing is that Tripadvisor says it has blocked Google where Google said it was a bug and the reviews would return shortly. (more…)

Marissa Mayer and Michael Arrington at Le Web 2010

Marissa Mayer and Mike Arrington are making a yearly show out of appearing on stage at Le Web in Paris. Today they were there for the third time.

In other years Marissa didn’t really let much go about what Google was up to, at least nothing really new came out. To be honest, this year was no different. The talk was again very orchestrated and ended with a demo of the new Maps features on Google. Still it’s always interesting to hear Marissa talk.

Here’s the coverage of what came out of the talk: (more…)

Is this the new “Google +1″? Leaked screenshot might indicate more

We’ve been talking about “Google Me” several times before here on State of Search and almost always it has been ‘guessing’ about what it would be. Sure, we’ve seen some of the new social layers popping up, like social sitelinks, hotpot and “shared by“. But we’ve never seen the real “Google Me”, which is expected in spring 2011.

Last week it became clear that the internal name used for the project was no longer Google Me but “Google +1″. But still we didn’t have a clear idea of what it would be. But today Techcrunch received a screenshot which very well might be what we can expect from “Google +1″. (more…)

Google Maps Mobile goes 3D on new Nexus S

So Google did decide to make a follow up on their Nexus One phone. This week Google presented the Google Nexus S, manufactured by Samsung, with the new Android 2.3 “Gingerbread” operating system. Mobile is as important as ever for Google. That clearly shows. But the phone business itself doesn’t seem to be something which Google is really very interested in being in. However, that what’s ON the phone is where Google’s focus lies.

It is therefore interesting to see what Google does when it comes to mobile search, Android and mobile applications. One of them being for example Google Maps on Android. Today and yesterday the D Mobile conference takes place in San Francisco. There Android chief Andy Rubin gave a sneak peak of the new Maps application. And guess what: Google is going 3D. (more…)

Google enters E-books market, launches E-Bookstore and becomes an affiliate network

Today Google announced that it has opened its very own bookstore. Not one where you can get a cup of coffee, sit down and read through paper books, but an online bookstore. No, not like Amazon either. You can’t get books delivered to your house. It’s a store for e-books. And we are not just talking scanned books by Google here.

With over 3 million titles in store and with 4,000 publishers as partners Google has really made an effort here. Amongst the partners there are major industry names like Simon & Schuster and Penguin and the Oxford University Press and Reed Elsevier. (more…)

Google gets social layer by layer, next step: social sitelinks

The actual “Google Me” in its full potential apparently will not be there until spring 2011 but in the meanwhile it does look as if Google is pasting the new social layers onto their search results step by step. After the “shared by” layer which was spotted in October and Hotpot in November, this time its Google itself revealing another one: Social sitelinks.

Do a search for “Twitter” or “YouTube” and you will see a friends name, combined with, if they have it, a profile photo. (Be aware, it doesn’t seem to be happening on every search, try several times if you don’t see it or update your Google Profile) The link goes to the friends’ content on the specific website. In my case when I search for Twitter I get Danny Sullivan and Zee, chief editor of The Next Web. The weird thing is that Google also returns Bing and Yahoo as my friends… (more…)

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