SERPs | Internet Marketing Blog

SEO is dead. Again

It seems like every few months, somebody declares SEO dead. Its latest funeral was held yesterday.

This time around, its eulogy was written by Ben Elowitz, co-founder of web publisher Wetpaint. According to Elowitz, it's all about social.

by Patricio Robles 28 October 2010 09:27am 24 comments

Does your SEO understand Google's Webmaster Guidelines?

Many SEOs make a lot of claims. Some, of course, are entirely legitimate. And others fall under the snake oil category.

But here's a claim you probably haven't yet come across: "I have read and understand Google's Webmaster Guidelines." Interestingly, however, this basic claim might be something you should look for.

by Patricio Robles 14 October 2010 08:45am 4 comments

Is Instant a distraction from Google's flaws?

Google Instant certainly ranks as one of the biggest user experience changes Google has implemented since it launched Google search more than a decade ago. And for that reason, it has attracted a lot of press attention, and sparked a significant amount of conversation among search experts.

But is Google Instant really little more than a convenient distraction that masks Google's flaws? Some are essentially arguing just that.

by Patricio Robles 13 September 2010 08:57am 17 comments

What will Google announce today?

The "boisterous doodle" on the Google homepage is excited about the week ahead, and the week ahead starts with a Google search event at the Museum of Modern Art in San Francisco later today.

What's on the agenda? Google isn't saying much. The company has told invitees that it's an event "you won’t want to miss" and indicated that it will be sharing its "latest technological innovation" and an "inside look at the evolution of search."

by Patricio Robles 08 September 2010 08:17am 1 comment

Is 'mafia sourcing' really a bad thing?

Social media and Web 2.0 (a term that, incidentally, we don't hear much of anymore) were supposed to make the internet a more democratic place. On today's internet, just about everybody has a printing press, and the little guy has equal opportunity to distribute a message. The best, we're often told, will rise to the top.

Of course, anyone who is involved with user-generated content and the popular web services through which user-generated content is shared and promoted, eventually learns that the internet isn't as democratic as it's supposed to be.

by Patricio Robles 03 September 2010 09:28am 1 comment

Google's new real-time search is as bad as Bing's

The data collected on Twitter may create interesting new opportunities for search engines, and that's why the major search engines, including Google, Yahoo and Bing, have done deals to gain access to Twitter's firehose.

But applying Twitter data to search in a meaningful way has proven to be a bit tough. Although there's the potential to use Twitter data as a signal for traditional SERPs, or to display 'real-time' results within the SERPS, search engines are also interested in providing consumers with search experiences explicitly built around real-time information.

by Patricio Robles 27 August 2010 10:38am 4 comments

Bing launches social search, but will anybody use it?

Many expect that search engines will eventually incorporate signals from the realm of social media into the SERPs. There's good reason to believe this: both Google and Microsoft have, for instance, already signed deals with Twitter to access the company's firehose.

But if Bing Social, "the first search experience" based on both the Twitter and Facebook firehoses, is any indication, social search is going to have an uphill battle.

by Patricio Robles 10 June 2010 12:01pm 2 comments

Google Caffeine: the most refreshing Google update ever for SEOs?

Need a Caffeine boost? After much anticipation and discussion, Google's latest 'big update' is officially here.

Unlike many major Google updates, which include alterations to the factors Google uses to rank pages, Caffeine instead represents an update to Google's web indexing system. The result: Google says Caffeine "provides 50 percent fresher results for web searches than our last index."

by Patricio Robles 09 June 2010 10:42am 14 comments

Gilt Groupe and Groupon avoid SEO, but maybe they shouldn't

Private sales and group buying are two of the hottest trends in ecommerce today, and two of the hottest companies in these markets are Gilt Groupe and Groupon.

Yesterday, my colleague Meghan Keane wrote about how companies like Gilt Groupe and Groupon were largely avoiding SEO. Somewhat interestingly, however, they're not avoiding paid search.

by Patricio Robles 18 May 2010 13:15pm 5 comments

It's official: Google incorporates website speed into your ranking

Most online publishers already know instinctively that a slow-loading website isn't a good thing. After all, who has the time to browse around a website on which pages take forever to load? Not a lot of people in today's fast-paced world.

Google knows that, and after it dropped a hint late last year, has followed through on its plans to incorporate website speed into its ranking algorithm.

by Patricio Robles 12 April 2010 12:00pm 9 comments