Highlights from the SEW Blog: April 21-25, 2008

By Kevin Newcomb, Search Engine Watch, Apr 28, 2008

We've collected all the search marketing news from selected posts to the Search Engine Watch blog in the past week.

From the SEW blog:

Organic Search

• Microsoft Goes Deep with Search Results, Competes with Google's Sitelinks
  The team at Live Search as announced the addition of a deep links feature to its search results. Similar to Google's Sitelinks, the feature lists prominent internal links for the #1 result on certain searches.
• Yahoo Updates Search Algorithm, Fixes Delete URL Bug
  Recently, search marketers have been noticing changes to Yahoo rankings. And now, Yahoo has plans to roll out updates to its crawling, indexing and ranking algorithms.

Search Advertising

• Q1 2008 Click Fraud Down from Last Quarter, Up from Last Year
  Click Forensics has released data showing a decline in click fraud rates in the first quarter of 2008.
• Yahoo's Adwords Test Continues, Raises Justice Dept's Eyebrows
  While some advertisers are reporting great success with Yahoo's test of Google Adwords, it's making a few people in Washington just a little bit nervous.
• New Yahoo Feature Reports Number of Discarded Clicks
  Yahoo has been throwing out bad clicks on search ad campaigns, but now a new feature will give further insight into those clicks. The new 'Click Filter Report' will show how many bad clicks Yahoo is discarding.
• Google Sued for Ad Fraud; Another Class Action Settlement?
  Today Google was slapped with a lawsuit alleging advertising fraud, which will be fascinating -- and important -- for AdWords advertisers to watch.
• Survey Finds Search Engine Marketing Budgets in UK to Increase
  The industry is thriving in the UK with 63% of companies planning to increase their paid search (PPC) budget and 61% planning to increase their search engine optimization (SEO) budget.

Linking Issues & Social Media

• Twitter Expands to Japan, Includes Ads
  Popular social media network, Twitter, has announced its expansion to Japan. But this time, ads will be rolled out with the launch of the service.
• Turning Sensationalized Content into a Resource
  After the initial burst of traffic to Sensationalized/Entertainment pieces via social media, traffic typically declines to very low levels, while Resource/Educational based content tends to maintain much more stamina over prolonged periods of time.
• MySpace Launches Beta Version of New Advertising Platform
  Social media networks have struggled to produce confidence in their advertising options, but MySpace is hoping to change that with the beta launch of Community Builder, the social networks' new advertising platform.

Analytics & ROI

• Study: Search Plays Key Role in Brand Loyalty, Customer Care Research
  A new study about social media customer care had some interesting finds about how search factors into brand loyalty.
• Coremetrics Announces Advanced Attribution Management
  Now you can associate the revenue with the last click, the first click, average it across all clicks, or setup a custom allocation across the various clicks. This allows advertisers to balance the allocation of revenue in the manner that best fits their business.

Local & Mobile Search

• Yahoo! Local Adds Dynamic Radius Circle to Maps
  Yahoo Local has added a nifty little feature that lets you interact with their maps. Their new dynamic radius circle helps you narrow down the area that you are searching in.
• Google Launches Mobile Image Ads
  Google has announced the addition of images to their mobile ad service, running on the mobile content network.
• Marchex Develops Partnerships with Several Local Content Providers
  Local online advertising and content publishing company Marchex has announced local content partnerships with several content providers, including Yelp and Avvo.

Vertical & Specialty Search

• We Still Don't Rely on Video Search
  While video content continues to skyrocket, people still don't rely on video search. Over half of people, in a recent ClipBlast! survey, said they find videos through their own exploration (53%) or recommendations from others (52%).
• Dogpile.com Updates Search Algorithm, Design and Content
  Dogpile.com has been doing a little spring cleaning and has come out the other end with an updated search algorithm, design and new partner content.
• Google Xooglers Launch Social Search Engine Mechanical Zoo
  The first true social search engine may have already escaped the innovation machine at the Googleplex.

In-House & Outsourcing

• Top 10 Toughest Jobs to Fill? The Top 3 Are In Search Engine Marketing
  We asked John Skroly, VP of business development for Onward Search, what jobs Fortune 500 companies and top search marketing firms can't easily fill.

SEM Industry Issues

• T-minus 1 Day: Last Minute Rhetoric from Microsoft and Yahoo
  During Microsoft's earnings call, CFO Chris Liddell suggested that an alternative to Yahoo's 'no' is to withdraw the proposal. Meanwhile, Yahoo remained consistent in what they've been saying all along -- that they're worth more than Microsoft's original offer.
• Microsoft Earnings Key Takeaways: Where's the Search?
  The biggest acquisition news yesterday wasn't Microsoft-Yahoo but Arby's-Wendy's. In both cases, search marketers are asking, "Where's the beef?" Better yet, analysts on the Microsoft conference call should have asked, "Where's the search?"
• ComScore CEO Fires Back at Google, Wall St, and Bloggers
  Google CEO Eric Schmidt took an indirect shot at comScore paid click data during Google's (stellar) Q1 earnings call this week. This afternoon, comScore CEO Dr. Magid Abraham fired back, defending the validity and accuracy of comScore aggregation of Google paid click data.
• Ballmer Wears Poker Face in Advance of Ultimatum Deadline
  Ballmer wants Yahoo at $31 a share and that's that. He's talking tough, saying he'll go forward without a merger. But almost no one believes him.
• Yahoo Earnings Beat Estimates
  It's probably the most important earnings report Yahoo has ever had to make, since a weak showing would almost certainly lead investors to agree to a speedy acquisition by Microsoft at its current $31 per share offer.
• Nielsen Releases March 2008 U.S. Search Data
  We've already seen the numbers from Hitwise, Compete, and comScore. Now it's Nielsen's turn to serve up its March 2008 data for top U.S. search providers.

Searching/Search Technologies

• So You Wanna Be a SearchMonkey?
  Yahoo is creating some wide open spaces for web developers. This is no API playground, people. It's a zoo.
• Google Pursues the Baidu-Dominated Chinese Search Market
  In an effort to catch Baidu, the dominate search engine in China, Google has plans to add 200 employees to the 600 it already has dedicated to efforts in the world's largest country.
• Forget Google's 20% Jump, Baidu UP 78% In Month
  The strength of Chinese search engine Baidu in the Asian market - beating Google in the valued China market - has been reflected in investor confidence, it seems.

More from the SEW Blog

• Londoners faceoff online in support of their candidates for the Mayoral Election
  f the popularity of Facebook fansites was an indicator of how Londoners will vote on May 1st then Boris would be a clear winner with 7466 supporters whilst Ken and Brian trail behind with 2152 and 2130 respectively.
• Google Retains Top Brand, Microsoft Third
  For the third straight year, Google has topped Millward Brown's annual ranking of top international brands, with Microsoft coming in third behind GE.