Tag Archives: webmaster
Quoted content isn’t duplicate content: Links, citations tell Google you’re clean
Bloggers and content writers responsibly quoting from third-party sources are not in danger of issues related to duplicate content, according to a recent Webmaster Help video from Matt Cutts. In the video, Cutts cites the case of a writer including a linked excerpt from an article as a method of adding insight and value for readers. Using this and other ethical techniques will never be an issue, he said. “You’re just a regular blogger, and you want to include an excerpt (from) some author you like or some other blogger who has a good insight. Just put that in a blockquote, include a link to the original source and you’re in pretty good shape,” Cutts said. “If that’s the sort of thing you’re doing, I would never worry about getting dinged for duplicate content.” “You’re just a regular blogger, and you want to include an excerpt (from) some author you like or some other blogger who has a good insight Continue reading
Internet marketing news roundup, August 3
While users of social media management tool Wildfire may not have noticed any changes, a pretty big shift came for the company earlier this week. Google acquired the platform for a reported $350 million in a move likely to bolster its social media arsenal. Wildfire serves more than 16,000 companies using social as part of a broader new media marketing campaign. Brafton reported that Wildfire uses are widespread, as many turn to the service to host social contests and develop apps for various social presences. With the rollout of Facebook Timeline, apps have become an increasingly useful part of social marketing strategies, as businesses can use them to help fans populate their own Timelines. Moreover, social contests help marketers drive engagement and increase visibility for their brands. Both Google and Wildfire said nothing would change in the early stages of the acquisition with respect to the app’s integration on Facebook and other social networks, but the search giant’s ongoing investment in Google+ could mean some form of exclusive integration between the platforms moving forward. Google also released a pair of changes on the back end with SEO tools and content testing capability for Webmaster Tools users. On Wednesday, Google detailed its release of a Structured Data Dashboard that will help companies monitor their rich snippets and make adjustments to ensure Google properly analyzes different site elements. While the feature is likely to help site developers more so than marketers, comments on the Webmaster Central blog show site owners are especially happy with the rollout. In general, the move is indicative of Google’s efforts to give companies greater control and understanding of their presence in Google Search. On Friday, Brafton detailed the new capability, reporting that the three elements of the Structured Data Dashboard – Site-level view, Itemtype view and Page-level view – show marketers how Google interprets the content on their sites. Using this data can help companies make any adjustments to their site’s code and development that can ensure SEO campaigns are as successful as possible. On the prospect-facing side of web development, Google announced the complete availability of Content Experiments. Marketers can now develop a series of different looks for their landing and other pages to show to different users. From there, the pages that perform the best in terms of driving engagement and increasing time on site can be rolled out for all users. Testing different layouts, site content and language can help marketers find the right mix to achieve the best results with content marketing campaigns and other efforts. Focusing on the user is critical with web marketing, as consumers and B2B buyers alike are more likely to work with businesses that offer good content and a seamless experience. Brafton reported that Content Experiments will help businesses ensure their websites offer the best possible user experience. While some conversions will come solely because a site visitor was looking for that exact product or service, others will occur when a site stands out from others offering similar options. With Content Experiments, marketers can develop a better understanding of the experiences resonating best with their target audiences. Bing stole some headlines this week as well, with a strong addition to its social sidebar tool. Users who opt to share their searches with friends on Facebook can now tag their friends on SERPs. Sharing search results pages was an interesting, if unclear, addition at the time of the sidebar’s initial rollout. However, tagging friends in searches can make event planning and other tasks easier. It will also boost visibility among social users for companies with good Bing SEO standing. Brafton reported that despite Bing’s struggles to attract more users, its aggressive integration of social data into search results could attract an audience that uses social more frequently than other web communication channels. On top of new features and tools, Bing offered marketers some guidance for furthering their SEO campaigns this week. Bing product manager Duane Forrester wrote a blog urging marketers to focus on content creation and social media marketing to drive a linkbuilding initiative. Like Google’s insistence on the user experience, Bing’s words indicate a stance on thought leadership and trust that will lead to natural, merit-based links. “If all the time that was spent seeking [SEO] shortcuts was invested into producing quality, engaging content, more websites would find success.” – Duane Forrester, Bing Webmaster senior product manager Brafton highlighted the report on Tuesday, endorsing the idea that a content marketing strategy paired with active presences in other web channels will help build links. Focusing too heavily on this single element of SEO can prevent the campaign from achieving maximum results. One channel that can aid an SEO strategy is social media, which a report from Awareness Networks shows has evolved past the adoption phase for many. Seventy-six percent of responding companies are actively looking to build brand awareness with a focus on fan and follower counts, while 67 percent want social efforts to contribute more traffic. On Thursday, Brafton detailed the goals companies hope to accomplish through social marketing this year. While lead generation and conversions are high on the list for most, marketers have adjusted their focus to the entire conversion funnel – not just the last interaction. Boosting website traffic and brand awareness will guide prospects toward conversion, and social media marketing content, whether shared headlines or engaging posts, can help companies achieve these goals. Most goals of web marketing campaigns involve improving the percption of a brand among its target audience. Driving traffic with content and increasing visibility with a social presence helps foster trust among prospects. According to a poll from About.com, trust is a key factor for consumers when buying online. Brafton has frequently touted the ability of content marketing campaigns to improve the reputation of a company with their web audience. With 84 percent of consumers saying they will not buy from companies they don’t trust, building a rapport with site visitors and prospects is key to turning a website into an engine for conversion. As the summer winds down, one of the most frequently discussed topics throughout the U.S. will be the start of a new school year. Earlier this week, Brafton reported that many plan to shop online for their back-to-school needs. Developing content marketing that highlights the topic and demonstrates a brand’s ability to provide quality products and services from those heading back to classrooms can help any business boost their business during the seasonal shopping period. Continue reading
Internet marketing news roundup, July 13
When a Friday the 13th rolls around, it can bring about panic in people, as they wonder if their superstitions will result in any unfortunate events. Earlier this week, market research firm comScore delivered some less-than-favorable news to former search giant Yahoo, reporting that the company has lost ground in the market for the 10th-consecutive month. In its monthly analysis of the search market, comScore found that Yahoo dropped 0.4 percent to an even 13 percent of all search queries fielded in the month. This puts the company in an even more ominous position than it had been. Now trailing Bing by 2.6 percent, Yahoo is struggling to stay entirely relevant. While Bing and industry leader Google continue to innovate and bring users new features and capability, Yahoo moves forward without a CEO and nothing but questions arising from marketers and the general population wondering if the company’s services are worth using. SEO campaigns are increasingly focused on Google and Bing. While Bing powers Yahoo’s results, an increasingly small percentage of the market is using Yahoo for search. Meanwhile, Bing grew 0.2 percentage points in June, maintaining its successful year. Adding 0.1 percentage points to its share of the market, Google ended the month fielding 66.8 percent of all searches. Even as Bing continues to add to its market share, Google’s massive lead demonstrates its place in the mind of users. Brafton highlighted a series of improvements Bing has made to its marketing tools recently aimed at helping companies inform their campaigns. These features, such as link disavowing and SEO analysis, will likely attract some to Bing for web marketing help. However, Bing will need to do a lot more if it hopes to become as much of a resource to marketers as Google. This week, the search giant offered new insights, advising marketers on best practices for successful campaigns. Stone Temple Consulting released an interview with Matt Cutts detailing Google’s most recent efforts at rewarding high-quality website content. According to Cutts, Google has found issues within some infographics. Embedding links within infographics, whether intentionally deceptive or not, may result in the discounting of infrographic links from Google. Cutts and Google believe some organizations may be embedding these links in their visuals unethically to trick people who share the graphics themselves into generating inbound links. This should remind marketers to be transparent about links and create visuals focused on informing and entertaining users so they will willingly share links to the publisher. Brafton has highlighted a number of the benefits of using infographics, reporting that the use of visual content can help companies drive traffic and demonstrate their position as an authority within their industryies. Infographics, like any other content designed to improve user experience, can be a great compliment to a website. However, unethical SEO practices will always be targeted by Google’s search algorithm updates. More or less, embedding links within infographics is a shortcut to trying to win links. In his interview with Stone Temple, Cutts also advised marketers to avoid taking any shortcuts in SEO. As Google’s algorithms evolves, the company will snuff out unethical practices to reduce the rankings of webspam sites, as it has with Panda and Penguin. For companies admirably and wisely following SEO best practices, Google released a new feature in its Webmaster tools aimed at helping companies fix issues that may be hurting their search rankings. Thursday, in its Webmaster Central blog, the company announced crawl error alerts, which detail problem pages. Brafton reported that the feature could be invaluable for smaller companies using SEO, since they may not have the internal support required to assess every error on their sites. Google alerts to frequent 404 messages, slow-loading pages or problems also come with tips for fixing these issues. With web marketing, any site errors can result in lost leads or frustrated customers. Given the increased focus on website content, addressing errors quickly is critical to the success of marketing campaigns. Moreover, competition is being increased on the web, with organizations across industries making steady investments in their web presence. RSW/US reported this week that more than half of companies will invest at least 30 percent of their marketing budget to the web. Brafton reported that increased use of different web marketing channels across most demographics has necessitated the shift to the web. Among the most popular campaigns being rolled out are social and search marketing. For those relying on social media marketing, the benefits of a strong presence in the channel stretch beyond greater website traffic and an expanded prospect base. A report from Market Publishers found that marketers have been able to save money within their budgets by using social, as well as develop a better understanding of their target audiences. Brafton reported that social has also helped companies develop more direct lines of communication with prospects and customers. However, a report from Social Bakers found that many are missing the mark when it comes to serving their customers on social networks. Using Facebook as an example, Social Bakers found that just two of the industries it measured respond to more than half of the Facebook correspondence sent by fans. Missing these opportunities to address concerns or answer questions can negatively impact a brand’s web presence. As Brafton has reported in the past, simply having accounts on these platforms isn’t enough to ensure success. Social’s emergence as the web’s version of word-of-mouth marketing makes its imperative that customer feedback is given response. Moreover, managing a social marketing strategy has become an increasingly complex task. 33Across reported that 70 percent of companies spend 80 percent of their time on social with platforms other than Facebook. Brafton reported that Google+’s user base has grown to more than 250 million active users, while Twitter counts 140 million users that regularly interact with the site. Managing presences on each of these sites is important, since more prospects and existing customers are using different social platforms. In general, the web demands a well-rounded presence. Increased use of different social platforms is one thing, but developing a search strategy and ensuring a website is optimized for all users are equally important. Missing a chance to attract prospects through the conversion funnel from any of these touchpoints makes it more difficult to compete. This week, there was guidance from Google and several other companies on effective web marketing. Failing to do so is simply unacceptable for marketers, and it can make any day feel like Friday the 13th. Continue reading
Google gives SEO health checks: Rolls out crawl error alerts for webmasters
In its Webmaster Central blog, Google announced the rollout of crawl error alerts that will help marketers make adjustments to their sites when Googlebot detects excessive error messages or other problems with pages. According to the release, other issues Google will alert webmasters to include frequent timing out of pages or slow-than-usual load times. Providing marketers with up-to-date information regarding the health and performance of their websites is the latest step in Google attempting to help companies succeed with SEO. On top of the alerts, Google will provide users with advice and suggestions designed to guide webmasters in addressing these issues. While many will have their own teams capable of improving problems, some may not have the technical capability to improve the errors. Continue reading
Google Panda 3.8 rolls out on Monday, less than 1 percent of queries impacted
Google rolled out yet another minor Panda update on Monday, confirming the algorithm tweak on Monday afternoon via its official Twitter account. Like previous updates in 2012, Panda 3.8 seems to have little impact on SEO campaigns and overall search rankings, but marketers should still focus on creating high-quality website content to engage their audiences and, subsequently, boost their visibility in Google search. As part of the Tweet, Google included a link to a Webmaster Central blog post from more than a year ago. The post discusses creating quality content and a series of best practices and guidelines for marketers to follow when building a site. Google’s Amit Singhal advised marketers who took a hit from Panda that “improving the content of individual shallow pages into more useful pages, or moving low quality pages to a different domain could eventually help the rankings of your higher-quality content.” In general, SEO campaigns driven by content marketing will help businesses avoid a lot of the SEO pitfalls and bad practices Google advises against. In terms of building trust with readers, avoiding duplicate content, writing to quality editorial standards and using qualified content writers to populate a site with engaging articles can drive traffic and improve a brand’s visibility on the web. Businesses hoping to see their website content power SEO should develop strategies sooner rather than later, as content marketing is becoming increasingly competitive. Brafton recently reported that 87 percent marketers said they will invest in website content in 2012. Continue reading
