If you have something that you don’t want anyone to know, maybe you shouldn’t be doing it in the first place.

That’s what Google CEO Eric Schmidt said when responding to concerns raised about internet privacy and recent updates to the search engine.  The comment created a mini firestorm, with internet industry blogs and forums lighting up in discussion…  And this is just the tip of the iceberg.

Over the last couple of weeks Google has made quite a few announcements that are rapidly changing the game for users and search marketers alike – and they are doing so pretty much under the radar.

The most noticeable change for the average user was Google’s inclusion of Real-time Search, currently in the form of “relevant” tweets.  You can read Google’s official announcement for the basics, the general idea being that users can now get an idea of what is happening right this second in regard to any given subject.  Seems like a good idea in theory, but check out this post from Rae Hoffman of Outspoken Media for a surprisingly scary look into how Google’s solution could go very very wrong.

The second change was the universal roll out of personalized search.  Until very recently, Google returned pretty much the same results for everyone. Meaning, if user A ran a query and user B ran the same query, they would get back the same results. This simply isn’t the case anymore. Again, I’ll point to Google’s official announcement of this to explain how it works. In a nutshell, Google now keeps track of your search history (for 180 days) and uses that to customize your results, whether you are logged in or not.  Sort of makes you view Eric Schmidt’s glib comment about internet privacy in a whole new light.

Now, personalized search results are not new. They were available previously as an opt-in service for those users with a Google account, this change makes personalized results the norm for every user, or, opt-out.  The problem with this is that the only mention of this change was a blog post, the one I pointed to above…that’s it. No space on the search pages announcing the change, no easily identifiable opt-out button, nothing.  A user would have to spot the ‘View Customizations’ link, or the ‘Web History’ link up at the top to realize that tracking is being used to customize – neither are particularly visible, and the average user won’t be that clued in. To me, and to many others in the industry blogging about these changes, it seems a little too ‘Big Brother’.

So what does all this mean for your SEO campaigns?

Rest assured, the ‘normal’ search results are dead.  For better or worse, the way Google handled this announcement ensures that very few users will opt-out of personalized results. However, the reality of the situation is that ‘normal’ results have been dying for a while now, and many of us saw these changes coming in one form or another.

The main strategies of your SEO campaigns won’t drastically change. At least in the beginning, there will still be tons of queries that return ‘normal’ results – until Google gathers enough data for users to personalize them.  Even when results are personalized, Google will still use their algorithm to rank those sites, and you’ll want to optimize so you have a chance of getting that top spot for any user.  First impressions are now more critical than ever, as the more a user clicks on your site from their results, the more likely it is you’ll jump to the top of that list.

There’s a lot of debate right now about whether these changes have Google moving down a dangerous path. In response to the privacy issue Mozilla’s Director of Community Development put up a blog post inviting users to switch to Bing.  It’s a big deal.  But it can be (and has been) argued that Google has a monopoly on the search industry, and as such I don’t see many users jumping ship because of these changes – especially when you consider the fact many won’t know about them.

comScore, Inc. has released their monthly comScore qSearch analysis of the United States search marketplace. In August 2009, Americans conducted more than 13.9 billion core searches, with Google accounting for 64.6 percent search market share. Microsoft Sites grabbed 9.3 percent market share, a 0.4-percentage point gain versus July 2009.

Google led the U.S. core search market in August 2009 with 64.6 percent of the searches conducted, followed by Yahoo! (19.3 percent), and Microsoft (9.3 percent). Ask Network captured 3.9 percent of the search market, followed by AOL LLC with 3.0 percent.

Aug-09 vs.
Core Search Entity           Jul-09        Aug-09          Jul-09
——————           ——        ——          ——
Total Core Search             100.0%        100.0%        N/A
—————–            —–          —–            —-
Google Sites                         64.7%            64.6%         -0.1
————                  —-           —-            —-
Yahoo! Sites                          19.3%          19.3%            0.0
————                  —-           —-             —
Microsoft Sites                      8.9%             9.3%             0.4
—————                —            —             —
Ask Network                          3.9%             3.9%            0.0
———–                    —            —             —
AOL LLC Network                3.1%           3.0%              -0.1
—————                —            —            —-

* Based on the five major search engines including partner searches and
cross-channel searches. Searches for mapping, local directory, and
user-generated video sites that are not on the core domain of the five
search engines are not included in the core search numbers.

You can read the full release here.

Yahoo announced the launch of their new and improved search format yesterday, you can read the official release here.   These changes were no doubt sparked by the recent partnership with MSN and Bing.

The previous changes introduced by Yahoo included a new Yahoo! homepage, improved Yahoo! Mail, high-quality video calling in Yahoo! Messenger, and a suite of new Yahoo! Mobile experiences.

Here are some key features of the new Yahoo Search page design:

• Feature-Rich Experience – This is meant for having a quick access to search features such as Search Scan/SafeSearch that help the users protect you from viruses, spyware and spam. Hence, it will be easier for people to the research documents that they have created during searching.

• Search Assist Expansion – This new design of the page will help the visitors use query assistance that is available directly below the search box. It has also been given on the left-hand column for quick access lower on the page, even when the Search Assist layer is hidden. For further assistance, Yahoo has added Search Assist to the search box on every Yahoo! page in the U.S. with the launch of a new universal header.

• Intelligent Search Results – This feature allows the users to explore results from sites and narrow results using different types of SearchMonkey structured data. In the past few months, it has been seen that some more enhanced results for product, local, entertainment, reference, social, and tech sites have been displayed automatically. With this new search page design, Yahoo claims that they have made it easier for the users to experience rich results from an increasing number of sites.

The new Yahoo Search page design not only makes search easier but also has an improved Page load and Perceived load times with a better inline data URI Images.

See the video below for in-depth info on the features.

Courtesy Yahoo Search Blog

Google made historic news yesterday by declaring they do not use the meta keywords tag. Okay, I am being sarcastic.  Google hasn’t used the meta keywords tag for a long time and any “SEO” should know that.   So why did Google blog about this, on the record?  At least two reasons, (1) people continue to sue over it by claiming copyright infringement and people confuse the meta keywords with the meta description, which Google does recommend to use.

So there are official posts from Matt Cutts, the Google Blog and Search Engine Land trying to erase any confusion from people who are new to this space.

If you want to know which meta tags Google does pay attention to, see this FAQ. Plus, Google’s JohnMu tweeted that Google also does “not adhere to the “revisit-after” meta tag,” if you wanted to know.

Finally, here is a video if you don’t want to read any of this:

Search Engine Strategies San Jose just wrapped up last week, and the SES Conference Channel on You Tube has over 20 videos posted from the event.  Great stuff for all marketers.  One segment I really enjoyed was Brian Fetherstonhaugh, Chairman and CEO of Ogilvy One, discussion with John Mulligan of SEO-PR how external marketing agencies and in-house marketers have to be their own advocates to sell a search marketing strategy.  Those of us in the interactive agency world know all about the challenges that Brian mentions in hte interview.  Check it out:

There are numerous coding errors or omissions that can adversely affect the way the bot collects information about a site.   We will review a couple coding errors  in this post.  First, the meta data:

• Missing, empty, or duplicate <title> tag
• Missing, empty, or duplicate <meta> description tag
• Missing, empty, or duplicate <h1> tag

These tags are key locations in the page for using keywords and key phrases to associate for relevance with your content. The <title> tag is required in HTML and XHTML documents, and the other two might as well be (all of them are very strategic for SEO). Each one is to be used only once per page, and all must have text (no images or just blank spaces!) between the tags. That text in those locations is considered important keyword text by the bot (for it defines the content of the page), so make the most of it. Don’t duplicate text strings between these tags, either. That’s a wasted opportunity for defining more keywords.

What about 302 redirects?  We talked about 301 redirects in previous posts, and how to strategically use them. 302s are only temporary redirects, and unlike with 301s, no link juice credit is passed to the redirected page. Using a 302 redirect is not a coding error per se, but much of the time it is a strategic error from the perspective of SEO. Unless you have a genuinely temporary need to redirect a page, stick with 301s as an SEO best practice.

Watch for more tips in future posts.

Its official.  Yahoo and Microsoft are now dating, joining forces to battle the evil empire Google, Inc.   Whether the combination will ultimately take market share from Google is a subject of debate in the Search industry this morning.

Under the deal, Yahoo will make Microsoft’s Bing search engine the search provider on its Web sites, licensing its own search technology to Microsoft to integrate if it chooses. Yahoo will handle sales of search ads for both companies, using Microsoft’s search-advertising technology.  Yahoo! search results will be provided and branded with Bing, “powered by Bing” will appear.

The agreement is a revenue-sharing pact, with Microsoft paying Yahoo 88% of the search revenue generated from its sites in the first year.

The key terms of the agreement are as follows (from the official news release):

• The term of the agreement is 10 years
• Microsoft will acquire an exclusive 10 year license to Yahoo!’s core search technologies, and Microsoft will have the ability to integrate Yahoo! search technologies into its existing web search platforms;
• Microsoft’s Bing will be the exclusive algorithmic search and paid search platform for Yahoo! sites. Yahoo! will continue to use its technology and data in other areas of its business such as enhancing display advertising technology.
• Yahoo! will become the exclusive worldwide relationship sales force for both companies’ premium search advertisers. Self-serve advertising for both companies will be fulfilled by Microsoft’s AdCenter platform, and prices for all search ads will continue to be set by AdCenter’s automated auction process.
• Each company will maintain its own separate display advertising business and sales force.
• Yahoo! will innovate and “own” the user experience on Yahoo! properties, including the user experience for search, even though it will be powered by Microsoft technology
• Microsoft will compensate Yahoo! through a revenue sharing agreement on traffic generated on Yahoo!’s network of both owned and operated (O&O) and affiliate sites.
• Microsoft will pay traffic acquisition costs (TAC) to Yahoo! at an initial rate of 88% of search revenue generated on Yahoo!’s O&O sites during the first 5 years of the agreement.
• Yahoo! will continue to syndicate its existing search affiliate partnerships.
• Microsoft will guarantee Yahoo!’s O&O revenue per search (RPS) in each country for the first 18 months following initial implementation in that country.
• At full implementation (expected to occur within 24 months following regulatory approval), Yahoo! estimates, based on current levels of revenue and current operating expenses, that this agreement will provide a benefit to annual GAAP operating income of approximately $500 million and capital expenditure savings of approximately $200 million. Yahoo! also estimates that this agreement will provide a benefit to annual operating cash flow of approximately $275 million.
• The agreement protects consumer privacy by limiting the data shared between the companies to the minimum necessary to operate and improve the combined search platform, and restricts the use of search data shared between the companies. The agreement maintains the industry-leading privacy practices that each company follows today.

The agreement does not cover products such as email, instant messaging, display advertising, or any other aspect of the companies’ businesses.   It’s strictly search.

Microsoft has confirmed that the deal with not close until 2010.  Users will not see a change until 3 to 6 months after that.   For now Yahoo! search will be the same until the deal is approved and complete.

One of the world’s largest marketers just doesn’t get it.   American Express continues to not follow basic SEO best practices.  Your home page URL shouldn’t look anything like this: https://home.americanexpress.com/home/mt_personal.shtml .

You should always strive to have your home page resolve to either http://www.example.com or http://example.com.

Avoid having your home page resolve to http://www.example.com/index or any other extension if at all possible.

I just finished reading the  June/July 2009 issue of Streaming Media Magazine.  Contributing writer Nico McLane wrote an excellent in-depth article titled, “In Search of Video SEO that Works”.     Like me,  McLane is frustrated with the hassles and inconsistencies of Video SEO or VSEO as he calls it.   He recommends using Yahoo! Video, YouTube or Hulu.com for a straightforward video search rather than relying on major search engines.   Although, he does note that the major search engines are working to integrate online video into their native search results working with native technology and third-party aggregators.

All of this comes on the heels of  PermissionTV’s video marketing survey posted recently to eMarketer.com.  The survey queried 400 senior marketing and media executives with some very interesting results.  For example:

• 67% identified online video as a primary focus of their 2009 digital marketing campaigns and budgets.
• 50% of the respondents are planning the launch of an online video project by the second quarter of 2009.

The survey also found that the foremost value of online video was as follows:

• Brand awareness (71%)
• Lead generation (47%)
• Customer retention (44%)
• Customer conversion (41%)

In addition, 33% of respondents expected that their 2009 digital marketing efforts will be least affected by cuts to budgets,  much less so than traditional marketing (24%), trade shows (21%), and guerrilla marketing (14%) efforts.
Obviously, interactive video is a high priority for marketers this year.

Any marketer, big or small, producing any type of video content needs to have a VSEO strategy as part of their overall marketing mix.    The article goes on to recommend some VSEO best practices:

• Use either social sites or search engines to promote your video, or  create your own portal—or you may be better off doing both.
• The best practice for YouTube VSEO is to use channel pages to take advantage of the searchability of YouTube content, as the site’s pages get better positioning because of its size. This is also true for MySpace, Facebook, and other large community sites that allow video to be uploaded to their pages, have a vast collection of pages, and are viral.
• Host your own video and syndicate that content to get the best metrics.
• Use Google Analytics with any open source CMS, including WordPress, Drupal, or Joomla, all of which offer free plug-ins to upload video and track usage.

The article concludes with some basic steps every marketer should take for VSEO:

• Choose where to promote your video.
• Narrow down your audience by demographic.
• Select your keywords.
• Define the naming schema for best search performance.
• Include RSS feeds with relevant metadata.
• Produce amazing video content (or syndicate it from other sources such as Truveo or blinkx).

You can read the full article here.