This Week’s Industry News

Compiled By Rocket Clicks Staff

Google Is Cracking Down On Duplicate Sitelink Landing Pages

Google has noticed a growing trend in sitelink structures, and is doing something about it. Some AdWords users are linking to the same landing page from multiple sitelinks, despite Google’s stated policy against such a practice. In response, Google will start taking a more proactive role in weeding out these violators, so expect this tactic to die out as quickly as it started.

Source: Google Inside AdWords Blog

Google Webmaster Tools Revamps Rich Snippets Tool

Google has upgraded three notable aspects of its Webmaster Tools Structured Data Testing Tool:

Rich snippet displays better aligned with their actual appearance in search results.
Better visual design for communicating how Google displays the data in its SERPs.
Multilingual options to cater to international SEOs.

Source: Search Engine Watch

Authorship Tagging Reaps Additional Search Links

Tagging your posts with the authorship tag has some interesting benefits. As confirmed by Google this week, three additional “related articles by author” show up in search results if a user clicks the “back” button after spending time on an author-tagged article. In a compelling twist, AJ Kohn at Blind Five Year Old explores how Google is finding related content from mediums and authors, tagged or untagged.

Source: Search Engine Land

Twitter Exposes More Of Itself To Indexing (In A Very Meta Way)

Twitter has updated its robots.txt file to allow search engines to crawl its own search results. The move is most interesting from a potential revenue standpoint, as Twitter’s Promoted Tweets could easily show up in Google’s results for product/service-related searches.

Source: Search Engine Watch

Kayak CEO Claims Google’s Travel Offerings Aren’t Hurting Business One Bit

Travel site and FairSearch.org member, Kayak, claims Google’s addition of flight search and hotel search to their offerings hasn’t impacted business. The claim directly contradicts the very premise of FairSearch, a lobbying group that believes Google is using its monopoly in search to snuff out competition. FairSearch argues that Google’s ability to send searchers to their own properties gives them an unfair advantage. While theoretically that seems very be true, earnings reports from member companies and KayaK CEO Steve Hafner’s own admissions paint a different picture.

Source: Search Engine Land

Google Street View Adds Underwater Component

Google’s Street View is now allowing users to channel their inner Jacque Cousteau.Google Maps, with some help from The Catlin Seaview Survey, now includes underwater views from six coral reefs including the Great Barrier Reef in Australia. The underwater imagery is available at maps.google.com/ocean.

Source: Search Engine Land

Google Still Has Feelings For Yahoo

Google’s Eric Schmidt reportedly made his desire to partner with Yahoo known while speaking at an event in Tokyo Tuesday. It comes as no surprise that Google would want to be Yahoo’s seacrh partner. The two companies were close to partnership in 2008, until Google’s fear that the government would declare them a monopoly derailed the deal. Yahoo ended up pairing with Microsoft, a deal that’s still on the books, but Yahoo can cancel that agreement as soon as March 31^,2013, when Microsoft’s revenue guarantees expire.

Source: Search Engine Land

Apple Dropping Google Maps Caught Google Off Guard

Apparently, Google didn’t expect Google Maps to be dropped by Apple as a mapping data provider. The supposed oversight has left Google scrambling to create its own app. Google renewed its deal with Apple last year, seemingly leading the search giant into a false sense of security. Apple announcement in April that it would be using its own data for Maps thus caught them off guard.

Source: Search Engine Land

Apple Apologizes For An Inferior Product? Apple ‘App’ologizes For An Inferior Product

This week, Apple CEO Tim Cook admitted the Corporal Joe Bauers-quality of Apple Maps, and recommended iOS users switch to Bing, MapQuest, or Waze. He even reluctantly said Google Maps would be a better alternative, and gave directions on how to download it onto your Apple device. It’s not often we get a public admission of mediocrity from Apple and its pretentiousness.

Source: Search Engine Land

Myspace Still Exists, And It Looks Different

Yes, someone still owns the Myspace.com domain, and they’re attempting another comeback. The website released an intro video, outlining their clear shift towards a Pinterest/Windows 8 Metro-UI look with a touch of Spotify.

Source: Digital Trends

Watch Movie Trailers Directly In Google’s Search Results

Google’s latest push towards reducing click-throughs on informational searches involves allowing users to watch movie trailers without leaving their search results. Searches for recent movie titles or [Movies + location] queries now produce a list and “Trailer” button to the right of each movie.

Source: Search Engine Land

Replacement Google’ Returns Incorrect Search Results

Everyone is having fun at the expense of the NFL’s ugly replacement officiating; search engines included. Just click, have fun, and eventually get frustrated.

Source: Replacement Google

Ever Wondered How The World’s Top Tech Companies Make Their Bones?

Fret no more; SEER Interactive has a really, really cool interactive infographic that simply shows the revenue avenues of choice for companies such as Adobe, Amazon, and craigslist.

Source: SEER Interactive

Google Has Internal Memes And They Are Pretty Funny

Someone is in trouble at Google. BuzzFeed has unearthed screen shots of memes created by Google employees, most of which poke fun at “competitors” (Facebook) and company policies. We always knew Google would be a fun place to work, and this only confirms our assumptions.

Source: BuzzFeed

The Robots Are Learning…

In yet another sign of the impending robotic self-awareness revolution, Gizmodo has an incredible video of robot “quadrocopters” working in unison to catch and throw a ball up, and later through a hoop. The scary part: none of this ability and coordination was programmed – they learned how to work together in real-time.

Source: Gizmodo

LivingSocial Helps Keep D.C. Metro Trains Open For Post-MLB Playoff Traffic

In honor of MLB playoff baseball hitting the city of Washington D.C. for the first time in 79 years, LivingSocial and the Washington Metropolitan Area Transit Authority have joined together to help fans soak in the whole experience. The companies announced a joint agreement that will keep the Metro trains running into the night, so fans have one less thing to worry about after games finish.

Source: wmata.com

Notable Commentary

Not Google Dancing With Itself

Danny Sullivan Hears ‘The Google Dance’ Getting Louder

In the early days of Google, SEOs were constantly bracing themselves for monthly search result oscillations stemming from regular algorithm updates. Danny Sullivan explains why we’re already waltzing to “The Google Dance, Part 2,” and why SEOs can expect it to continue for a while.

Analysis By: Danny Sullivan, Marketing Land

Digging Into Facebook Advertising

As much as tech people love to joke about Facebook and its lack of financial solvency, its pay-per-click advertising platform ranks as one of the top three most successful digital ad programs in the world. Search Engine Watch pulls back the curtain on the platform, looking into user and advertiser trends and how it compares to Bing and Google’s PPC programs.

Analysis By: Suren Terk-Saakov, Search Engine Watch

Screen Size, User Location Have An Effect On Mobile Interactions

It’s common knowledge that location has a heavy influence over a smartphone user’s search intent and behavior. However, a device’s screen size can have a similar impact on these factors. Understanding how these two relate to each other can have a profound impact on your mobile traffic/conversions.

Analysis By: Paras Chopra, Search Engine Land

‘Linkifying’ Your E-Commerce Website

E-commerce link building can be frustrating and time consuming, but ultimately rewarding when done right. Julie Joyce explains how you can leverage the website itself independently link worthy, and uses examples to add to the discussion.

Analysis By: Julie Joyce, Search Engine Watch

Dear FTC: Google Doesn’t Just Exist To Make A Profit

The Federal Trade Commission has followed Google in its crosshairs for some time, for a myriad of reasons. However, Mike Grehan argues that the search engine is used more like a library than a retailer, and should be treated as such.

Analysis By: Mike Grehan, Search Engine Watch