This Week’s Industry News
Compiled by the Rocket Clicks Team
Top Stories
New Shopping Ad Hybrid with Expandable Knowledge Panel Tested By Bing
Following Google’s release of a knowledge panel & shopping ad hybrid, Bing has been testing a similar feature that is smaller and is able to expand to display more details. Rather than listing sellers within the knowledge panel, Bing’s version lists product reviews in the same area instead. Some argue that Bing’s version may be more noticeable, but at the same time they may appear more ad-like compared to Google. Source: The SEM Post
Underground Link Network ‘SAPE’ Appears to Have Been Penalized by Google
Some black hat SEOs have recently reported on various internet forums that their website’s rankings have seen a significant and swift drop. It is being speculated that this drop in ranking is likely due to these SEOs utilizing an underground link network called SAPE. While there is no confirmation from Google that SAPE has been penalized, it would not be the first time they’ve received punishment from Google as they were penalized back in 2013. Source: Search Engine Land
Remarketing Now Available for Search and Shopping Campaigns in Bing
Bing Ads has recently announced the launch of remarketing for both Search and Shopping campaigns. Remarketing in Bing will allow users to serve ads in Bing and Yahoo SERPs to users to have previously visited your website. While similar to RLSA in AdWords, Bing’s remarketing also extends to product ads in Shopping campaigns. You can create a remarketing list in your shared library once you have Universal Event Tracking tags set up on your site. Source: Search Engine Land
Google Accidentally Blows Out Wix Web Pages from its SERPs
Over the last couple of weeks there have been reports of websites built on Wix completely dropping out of the search results. Earlier this week, Google confirmed that this is happening and that they are working on fixing the issue. Google’s John Mueller revealed that they will be “recrawling these sites a bit faster to get the dropped pages back into the index a bit faster.” Source: Search Engine Land
Bing Ads Partnering with AdMarketplace and Gumtree.com
Bing Ads has recently announced a syndication deal with both adMarketplace and Gumtree.com. This will allow Bing Ads advertisers distribute ads across adMarketplaces’ network. Bing Ads will also serve keyword-based ads for mobile and tablet searches on Gumtree.com, a UK classifieds website that is a part of eBay’s classifieds group. A Bing Ads spokesperson stated that they are continuing to evaluate partnership opportunities with other publishers to deliver more customer opportunities. Source: Search Engine Land
New Interface Launched for Google Maps
After months of testing, it appears Google has finally launched the new Google Maps interface. The new interface displays the map along with a column on the left-hand side that is reminiscent of the old 7-packs we used to see in local results. Additionally, when a user selects a specific result, a full knowledge card style listing for that result will show up. There hasn’t been any official statement from Google on this change, but it appears that the new layout is here to stay. Source: Search Engine Land
Additional Commentary
The Factors That Influence Your Conversion Rate
Ally Sabrowsky wants to ask and answer one simple question: what is a good conversion rate? Sabrowsky notes that there are several different factors to determine this. These factors range from which device you’re targeting, which network you’re showing on, and which industry you’re currently advertising in. The author also states that once these factors are understood, a good conversion rate will depend on the types of goals you set and the influence of conversion rate optimizer. Analysis: Ally Sabrowsky, PPC Hero
Do You Have to Come First in Search Anymore?
Although the first overall result in Google’s SERPs garners a 31% click-through rate, Christopher Ratliff of Search Engine Watch argues that ranking first overall isn’t the end all, be all. Ratliff explains that when armed with Schema and good content, websites can work their way into the rich media that Google has been adding to the search results. He then concludes by saying “markup should not take the place of the SEO techniques you’ve already been practicing, but rather used as a way to signpost your page’s content to help search engines understand it more clearly.” Analysis: Christopher Ratcliff, Search Engine Watch
