This Week’s Industry News
Compiled By Rocket Clicks Staff
Google AdWords Editor 9.9 Are Go!
Here’s a short list of the most recent updates to the AdWords editor:
Enhanced Display Network options – The new “Flexible reach” panel makes adjusting these settings in your ad group easier, and campaign-level settings have been simplified.
Smoother importer/exporter features – It’s easier to handle and import duplicate ads sent to different URLs and import CSVs to the campaign-level settings.
Updated campaign settings – You can now target BlackBerry devices, and use a “rotate indefinitely” feature in the ad rotation settings.
Source: Google Inside AdWords Blog
Google Predictably Improves Targeting For Local Search Campaigns
Local search from mobile devices is on the rise. The holidays are around the corner. By the transitive property, a lot of people are going to be using Google Local search before heading to the stores. As such, Google is enhancing its location targeting in AdWords to help marketers better reach their ideal customer.
These new features include airport targeting, location extensions and sitelinks joined together in the ad display, and generally improved location matching that will reach people in close proximity to your business’ zip code location.
Source: Search Engine Land
(Not Provided) Has Spread To 39% Of Googlers
According to a recent study, that pesky (not provided) keyword grouping in your Google Analytics is growing at a solid rate. Optify found that the presence of (not provided) is trending upwards, currently engulfing 39% of all organic searches. This shouldn’t come as much of a surprise to any SEO, as Google has worked tirelessly over the past few years to integrate all their products into one account and build a base of new users at the same time.
Source: Search Engine Land
Google Adds More Granular Options To E-Commerce Schema.Org Data
As part of their GoodRelations project, Google has announced they will be adding many more e-commerce-based classes and properties to schema.org. This allows e-commerce businesses to go even more granular with their structured data markings on each page. New categories include product physical properties, product relationships, product numbers, specific product types, offer conditions, offer availability, offer business function, and much more.
Source: Search Engine Land
Online Reputation Management Survey Sheds Light On Consumer Trust In Reviews
McKremie has released their 2012 Online Reputation Management Survey, intended to unearth trends among online shoppers and reviewers. Among the highlights:
87% of consumers research companies online before purchasing anything, and 88% of those consumers trust the reviews they find.
57% of consumers will scroll through page three of Google’s search results during this research process.
68% of people have left a positive review online, 23% neutral, and 38% negative.
55% of users trust Google reviews, 17% trust Yelp, 16% trust Angie’s List, and 10% trust Yahoo.
Source: Search Engine Journal
McAfee Antivirus Founder Wanted For Murder
The founder of McAfee antivirus software, John McAfee, is on the lam from police after they charged him with the murder of an American expatriate. It appears that McAfee has gotten a little Colonel Kurtz over the past few years, wading into the murky waters of Belizian gangsters, psychoactive drugs, and general craziness. Insert your own joke about how his security software can’t secure his own freedom.
Source: Gizmodo
AdWords Remarketing Code Simpler, Easier To Implement
Google AdWords now allows you to hone your remarketing efforts on a select group of people based on URL rules. The example used in this brief forum comment is someone coming to your pet shop site interested in dogs; in this case, you would target them based on the URL’s inclusion of the word “dog.”
Source: Google AdWords Community
NBC Universal, American Express Combine to Attempt ‘Television Commerce’
NBC Universal and American Express are combining to make it possible for television viewers to buy directly from their television. The app, called Zeebox, is a social TV app in which the Comcast Corp (NBC’s parent company) took a stake in earlier this year. The app would run through a tablet or smartphone and would allow viewers to follow Twitter and Facebook feeds related to the show they are watching. It would also give users information about how they can purchase show-related items. This is another attempt at being able to better gauge the direct effectiveness of television advertising (as internet marketing can) and take advantage of impulse buyers.
Source: Ad Age
Pinterest Debuts Long Overdue Business Pages
In the least surprising news since the New York Times’ epic critique of Guy Fieri’s new Times Square restaurant, Pinterest is opening a section for business pages. The only differences between Pinterest business and personal pages are website verifications, new buttons, and new features that are likely analytic in nature.
Source: Portent Interactive
Priceline Buys Kayak
Priceline is adding leading travel search engine, Kayak.com, to the stable of other travel brands already under its ownership. The company announced that it is in the process of buying Kayak for $1.8 billion (in cash and stock). Pricelone already owns Booking.com, Agoda.com, Cheaptickets.com, Rentalcars.com and a couple other travel sites. Kayak should be a nice addition to the already strong William Shatner-approved travel site. The sale is interesting in that Kayak is currently part of anti-Google lobby group FairSearch and Priceline is not. It will be interesting to see if Priceline joins group or pulls Kayak out.
Source: Search Engine Land
More Bad News For The Print industry
Google’s ad revenue has now surpassed that of all U.S. print publications combined. Over the first six months of 2012, Google generated 10.9 billion in ad revenue compared compared to newspaper and magazine’s 10.5 billion. It’s not an entirely fair comparison in that Google’s ad revenue factors in global revenue not just that generated in the U.S. Still, the trend points to both the growing dominance of Google and the web and the continued scaling back of the print industry.
Source: Mashable
Google Loses Defamation Suit In Australia
Google was ordered to fork over $200,000 in damages to man who argued the search engine linked him with gangsters. The defamation suit was filed by Melbourne, Australia resident Michael Trkulja who found his name was associated with local gangsters in search results even though his only involvement with those parties was being shot in the back by them while dining at a restaurant. He won after Google failed to remove the links between him and the men.
Source: The Inquirer
Rumor: Google in Discussion With Dish to Plan New Wireless Service
The Wall Street Journal is reporting that Google is in talks with satellite-TV provider Dish Network, with the intention of joining forces to create a “new wireless service that would rival the networks of wireless carriers such as AT&T and Verizon”.
Source: Gizmodo
Notable Commentary
Never Goes Out Of Season
Read This Before Jumping Head First Into Google’s Disavow Tool Pool
Webmasters everywhere rejoiced, while Google engineers rued the day the search engine announced the widespread release of its link disavow tool. However, Sujan Patel thinks we should pump the breaks and fully understand the risks of using such a powerful method for cleansing your backlink profile.
Analysis By: Sujan Patel, Search Engine Journal
Using Google+ Local To Boost Your Small Businesses Bottom Line
With 20 percent of all Google searches and 40 percent of Google Mobile searches having local intent, local search continues to grow as a powerful tool for small business to tap into their market. Jay Taylor of Search Engine Watch breaks down two key ways for small businesses to maximize their return-use Google+ to increase local search visibility and positive reviews to convert clicks into customers.
Analysis by: Jay Taylor, Search Engine Watch
Conversion Optimization Tips For The Holiday Season
The Super Bowl for retailers is right around the corner with Black Friday and Cyber Monday fast approaching. Garry Przyklenk of Search Engine Watch guides readers through six essential tips for conversion optimization before the holiday rush.
Analysis by: Garry Przyklenk, Search Engine Watch
Cookies And The Google Analytics Test
PPC Hero and SEO boy have joined forces to help readers prepare for Google Analytics Test. In this installment of the series, the two cover one of the most important concepts on the test: cookies. The article guides readers through the four first-party cookies Google Analytics establishes and what kind of questions about them to expect on the exam.
Analysis by: PPC Hero
The Truth Behind Landing Page Quality Score
About a year ago Google announced a change to how its Quality Score was calculated. One aspect of that change was the increased role landing page quality and relevance would play in the ad auction. Martin Roettgerding believes Google didn’t do a job of communicating the actual impetus behind the change and, as a result, advertisers got the wrong idea about how they should deal with landing page quality. He also sheds light on what landing page quality score is really all about.
Analysis by: Martin Roettgerding, PPC Epiphany
