This Week’s Industry News

Compiled By Rocket Clicks Staff

Google B2B Shopping Program Hits Beta

It was only a matter of time before Google made a move into the B2B sales space. This week, the search engine rolled out the beta version of Shopping for Suppliers, a Google B2C Shopping-like program that exclusively serves business-to-business suppliers and buyers.

Right now, it’s only open to the electrical industry in the United States only. Many features have not transferred from standard Google Shopping (such as Pricing, Payments, Shipping, etc.). The early version features a pay-in Google Verified Supplier program, and has a fair share of bugs, including shoddy query results. Then again, it’s in beta, so let’s wait and see.

Source: Search Engine Land

AdWords Video Reporting Is Beefier

Google recently announced a tri-fecta of additions to its measurements within the AdWords for video program. The goal is to better align reporting with campaign goals, and make comparing performance easier. The new measurements include Reach and Frequency, Geographic Visualization, and Column Sets Tailored to Marketing Goals.

Source: Search Engine Land

Google ‘Blocks’ Blocked Site Tool For Good

You may remember, in the before time, the long long ago, before Search Plus Your World, a nifty option within Google’s search results that allowed you to block website from showing up. That feature was unshackled from beta in 2011, but quickly found itself back on the Island of Misfit Google Tests after SPYWorld went live last January.

After some hemming and hawing, Google has officially said it will be tabling this feature for the indefinite future. You are still able to block sites using a Google Chrome tool, but finding it has become harder than modifying Facebook’s privacy settings.

Source: Search Engine Land

Google+ Surpasses Twitter In Monthly Active Users

Global Web Index’s December 2012 study of Active Social Platform usage revealed that Google Plus has surpassed Twitter in number of active monthly users. In December, Google+ increased to 343 million users globally-about 25% of global internet users. Twitter came in fourth after YouTube, with just over 20% of global internet users actively engaged. Facebook, not surprisingly, retained its top position with over 50% of global internet users actively engaged each month.

Source: Search Engine Journal

Yahoo Records First Revenue Increase In Four Years

Yahoo recorded its first annual revenue increase in four years, hitting $4.99 billion in revenue in 2012 compared to $4.98 billion in 2011. Profits were up from $1.06 billion a year ago to $3.95 billion in 2012. Year over year, quarterly search revenues increased by 4 percent, while paid clicks climbed by 11 percent. Still Yahoo’s display ad revenue and total number of ads sold were down compared to 2011.

Source: Search Engine Watch

Google Details How It Handles Information Requests From The Government

Google recently released a blog post detailing how they deal with government requests for user and search data. Google posts transparency reports for each request. In the U.S, they also document if requests are subpoenas, court orders or warrants. Monday, Google added a new section to the Transparency Report portal detailing the legal process they follow when handling such request and how they have tried to narrow their scope in the past.

Source: Search Engine Land

Matt Cutts Talks About Negative SEO

Matt Cutts offers up an interesting video chat on negative SEO and how to address it, specifically for small businesses.

Source: Search Engine Journal

Twitter Vine App Is Really New, Really Cool, And Really Popular

Twitter has just released the Vine video app, which allows people to record videos up to six seconds in length and post them to social networks within the interface. The app itself is already proving to be very popular, but from a business perspective, there are a lot of opportunities to be just a clever and creative with teaser videos as the average user.

Source: Small Business Trends

School Turns Baby-Stealing Eagle Video Into Scholarship Opportunity

Pretty much everyone not named David Attenborough was duped by the video of a golden eagle grabbing a baby only to drop him shortly thereafter. It has since received 41 million views, but because of software restrictions, the video cannot be personally monetized by the school or students. However, using an AdSense account, Montreal’s Centre NAD will be raising money from the video to go towards an annual scholarship for a deserving student.

Source: Mother Nature Network

Notable Commentary

In Six Seconds Or Less

Big Data Will Be Usurped In Popularity By Big Testing

Just as fear leads to anger, anger leads to hate, and hate leads to suffering, so will big data morph into big testing for its biggest users. That’s the argument (minus the Star Wars reference) laid out by Scott Brinker, who reasons that marketers have never had access to so much user data before. As such, we will start utilizing those huge swaths of behavior in experiments that go far beyond A/B testing.

Analysis By: Scott Brinker, Search Engine Land

Enough Local Search Information To Blow Your Mind

Over 6,000 words in length, this SEOmoz post from local search guru Mike Ramsey answered 40 burning questions on where local search is, how to prepare for where it’s going, and many, many other useful things

Analysis By: Mike Ramsey, SEOmoz

Defining Responsive Web Design And Why It’s Important To SEO

Not every mobile smartphone or tablet has the same screen dimensions, so why create just one layout option for your website? That’s the idea behind responsive web design, which reads and automatically caters its layout to the user’s screen dimensions. SEOmoz has a great article explaining the practice and why it is almost guaranteed to lead to more conversions and a better user experience.

Analysis By: Kristina Kledzik, SEOmoz

Social Media, The New York Public Library, And Increased Sign-Ups

Marketing Sherpa has an excellent blog post on how social media marketing, when done properly, can be an incredibly successful endeavor. In this case, the New York Public Library lacked sufficient funds for a PR campaign. Instead, they devoted their attention to social networks. The end result was a 35% increase in card sign-ups.

Analysis By: Courtney Eckerle, Marketing Sherpa

Is Super Bowl Advertising Worth The Cost?

According to an analysis by the Adobe Digital Index team, advertising during the Super Bowl does have an impact on business’s online presence. By analyzing 10 large sports events in 2012, they found mobile video viewing doubles during special sporting events. They also found that Super Bowl advertisers see their traffic increase by 20% on the day of the game and see increased traffic in the week that follows it before leveling out again.

Analysis by: Greg Jarboe, Search Engine Watch