Posts on State of Search about ‘Google’

Marissa Mayer’s Move: What the Experts Think

Yesterday Marissa Mayer made one of the most surprising moves in this young industry ever. Her move from Google to become CEO of Yahoo is unprecedented and it will be interesting to see what she will make of it over at the former search giant.

The sudden move also triggered a lot of questions: why did she move? Why did Google let her go so easily? What else is going on? And even the question of who is going to replace her when she is getting her first baby in October showed up.

We decided to ask some industry experts on their thoughts about Marissa Mayers move. Fresh into the news they responded: (more…)

Official: Marissa Mayer Named as New Yahoo CEO

It is coming as a shock on Twitter, Facebook and Google+ at the moment and when Barry Schwartz just tweeted it I first thought it was a joke but The New York Times just announced that Marissa Mayer is supposedly the new CEO of Yahoo. This is a stunning move from one of Google’s top names and oldest employees and food for a lot of discussion as well.

Ms Mayer will be appointed as the president and chief executive of Yahoo, making her one of the most powerful women in Silicon Valley. Mayer moved from search to local in 2010 and has been very active in that area since, with the launch of Google+ Local recently as her high point.

Mayer has been very ‘quiet’ over the past few weeks, not tweeting or updating her Google Profile for two weeks. We now know why.

The move is a very surprising move from Mayers side with Yahoo not being in the best position possible at the moment and will feed rumors about the future of Yahoo as well. Apparently she resigned today and will be starting tomorrow. (more…)

Google Adds Crawl Error Alerts to Webmastertools

Webmastertools is a very convenient tool for site owners because it is a place where you can see how Google perceives your website and which changes should be in order. Its information which Google provides you with.

Usually Google informs web masters through an alert in Webmastertools. Now they will also start sending you e-mail alerts if something is up. (more…)

The New Google+ iPad App

The new Google+ app for the iPad went live earlier this week. Until now, users had to be content with the limited functionality of the iPhone version, (which has also been updated in time with the iPad release).

First-off the app is designed for the tablet device, therefore the look and feel is by that token more “tabular”. The update stream appears in a grid format, with each update given a visual block of real estate on the screen. (more…)

What has Google Been Up to Lately?

Google put on a pretty impressive show at the I/O conference in San Francisco recently. The aim was to introduce its latest software products and to announce the exciting news that the search giant is now becoming a hardware company. Looks like Apple’s getting some competition then. Time for a bit of an overview. Here’s what’s been happening at Google lately. (more…)

Search By Image With Knowledge Graph

Google recently introduced the Knowledge Graph, a big database filled with information about persons, places and more. Currently the Knowledge Graph is only implemented within Google.com, if it’s relevant the search engine will show more information related to the query.

For some time now Google Image Search has got a functionality to search by uploading an image. After you upload an image Google will try to recognize the image and gives back the best guess for the image and visually similar images plus search results related to the best guess.

These two things, Knowledge Graph and Search by Image are now combined. When Google recognizes the uploaded image the Knowledge Graph will kick in if relevant next to the search results. You can see this below in the screenshot, I uploaded a picture of Chuck Norris and immediately Google show more information about the world-famous actor from the Nineties. (more…)

Chuck Norris Easter Egg in Knowledge Graph

After the Lionel Richie Easter Egg in the Knowledge Graph a few weeks ago there is another one hidden within the biggest search engine of the world. After searching for Lionel Richie on Google.com more information will show next to the search results with in this case the title ‘Hello, is it me you’re looking for’ referring to the line from the song “Hello” from 1983. This time it’s Chuck Norris who is subject of the Easter Egg.

After Lionel Richie you could expect more “Eggs” being hidden in the Knowledge Graph and the next Egg is related to Chuck Norris (Carlos Ray Norris) known for his role in the television show Walker, Texas Ranger from the Nineties. When searching for Chuck Norris on Google.com the search engine will show more information on the right but this time the Knowledge Graph will present you some interesting facts like ‘Chuck Norris doesn’t sleep. He waits’. (more…)

Google Shuts Down iGoogle, Google Video and More

Ever since Larry Page took his reign back from Eric Schmidt at Google one trend has been prominent: saying goodbye to products which are of no use anymore to Google. We’ve seen many products being closed in the past year or so and now we can add several more to them, amongst which iGoogle and Google Video. (more…)

Chrome Search Giving Blank Results? Here’s The Workaround

Having issues with searching through your Chrome browser? You’re not alone. The browser seems to be playing up.

One of the reasons browsers became important for search engines was the new found option to search from the URL bar. Just start typing, hit enter and the search engine you’ve set as your default search engine will show the results. Handy.

Ever since a few years Google has got Chrome as their own browser. Next to the URL function Chrome gives Google a lot of information on the searcher. Many people using Chrome however use it because of the speed: it is a fast browser. A lot of people using Chrome have been having issues using the search through URL bar functionality. They are getting a blank page after a search. (more…)

What Google is All About Now?

“It is all about the money!” you are probably thinking. Yes, that is true, but not really the correct answer, or the only answer.

Hi, I am Gianluca and this my first post on State of Search, and I do not consider myself an anti-Google or a pro-Google SEO. I am more an anti-dumb SEO.

And one of the dumbest things we as SEO professionals may do is to get fixated with the last events, toys, and shining objects hitting the Search industry. The cause of this dumb vision of Search is in our dependency to contingency, somehow justified by more than 500 updates Google implements along the year, a Search industry churning out new products almost every week and with new platforms which can be used to market our sites on. (more…)