Merry Christmas Tweet

I am dreaming of white Christmas,
with every Christmas card i write,
May your days be merry and bright,
and May all your Christmases be white.
Happy Christmas.

Free Tools for Online Reputation Management (ORM) Tweet

Online Reputation Management (ORM) is the process of online references to a brand, company, person or service while having a plan in place to deal with any negative feedback. ORM is typically considered to be a mix of marketing (including SEO and Internet Marketing) and public relations. There are numerous firms offering ORM services, although it’s something you can do on your own for free.

Here we are discussing few free tools which are available for monitoring your reputation online.

1. Google Alerts – This tool is very helpful to manage your brand. Your keyword search results are sent via e-mail for keyword mentions in news, web, blogs, video and groups categories.

2. BoardTracker – This tool searches forum threads and discussion boards for your specified keywords.

3. MonitorThis – It is feed based tool. MonitorThis is a search aggregator for up to 26 search engine feeds.

4. Naymz – A social network focused on reputation, personal branding, and identity verification. It's basic version is free.

5. Purewire Trust – An online portal that helps people verify reputation information about themselves and those with whom they interact online.

6. Yasni – This is a search engine dedicated to finding people on the web through publicly available information, including images, videos, social networking profiles and posts.

7. Google Blog Search – This is a Google search engine only for blogs. Here you can search your theme related blogs.

8. Technorati – Technorati is the leading blog search engine indexing millions of blog posts in real time. It also tracks the authority, influence and popularity of blogs.

Yahoo Releases Major Changes to Search Interface for Users Tweet

Yahoo Releases Major Changes to Search Interface for Users

Yahoo has just released a pretty major update to their own search engine. And I figure we'd better take a look and see what's new. 
Yahoo has about 17% of the search engine market share.  And while many in our industry find it easy and fun to use that statistic to suggest that Yahoo Search doesn't matter, the fact is that Yahoo Search definitely matters.  If 17% sounds like a small portion of the customer base, try and remember that it works out to over 2.5 Billion searches per month.  I, for one, don't want to miss out on those potential customers, so I try to keep Yahoo Search in mind instead of just putting on the Google blinders.


Big Change With Yahoo Search UI
So what are these changes?  We'll the main one is some kind of results box that contains vertical tabs.  These tabs are pretty much the same things as Google's left-sidebar "verticals," acting as filters you can use to further specify the kinds of content you're looking for. 


The "Overview" box itself has a single news story  and then a selection of photos.  And at the top, there's a horizontal list of suggested "similar" searches--for this sample search, that list contains the names of other musical artists.  And on the far left sidebar, you have a list of "related" people you can search for by clicking.


Notice also the vertical tabs on the right, allowing you to narrow your search by "Videos," "Albums," or "Twitter."  That's the big new "wow" factor, and it's actually pretty slick.  Click on any vertical tab, and it slides out over the Overview, with the quick-options in the box changing to match the newly-focused search.
Here's something kind of neat--if you click the Twitter tab--you have two options for viewing Tweets about Jack White, "Everyone" and "Hollywood Insiders."  So you can see what famous people are saying about him, or focus on the thoughts of the general public.


The vertical tabs can vary, both in number and in actual topic, depending on your search.  A search for "Obama" returns only three tabs:  Stories, Images, & Twitter.  "Brad Pitt" brings you Stories, Videos, & Twitter.  I'm not sure how many different filter options we'll see for the vertical tabs, and it might take some trial and error to discover them all.


Other New Features With Yahoo Search
Mobile search got an overhaul of the HTML5 variety.  I actually sometimes use Yahoo mobile search--despite my Android phone's allegiance to Google--and I have to say, the update is a vast improvement.  Vast.  I have pretty vivid memories from just a year ago of Yahoo's mobile search experience making me want to stab myself in the eyes. Now... it's more intuitive, prettier, and much more useful.


They're going to be releasing something called Quick Apps that will integrate with the Yahoo experience.  For example, Netflix users will be able to single click within search results to add a particular movie to their Netflix queue.  Sweet!
They're going to be doing a lot with photo slideshows in the search results--culling photos from a multitude of sources, including Flickr.
If you connect your Facebook and Yahoo accounts, you can see your friends' Facebook photos and albums in the search results. Which is... cool... I guess?


Impact Of Changes to Yahoo Search UI


This could impact video marketers in a big way, since search users are now going to be encouraged to discover videos through the new vertical filter tab instead of just inside the results or by clicking to go to a video-only search.  So the question immediately becomes... how do I get my videos included in that box?  Are they going by how current the video is?  How many views it has?  Standard SEO factors of relevance to the query?  These are the questions most of us will be asking over the next few weeks as we test the new Yahoo.


And there are only four videos on that tab when it slides out, so it's going to be very competitive indeed. (I also find it funny that for most of the searches I'm trying this morning, there is a conspicuously low amount of YouTube clips in the results--not representative at all of their dominance in online video.  Not that I can fault Yahoo for giving preference to some video sites that aren't owned by their biggest competitor). 


As for general SEO concerns:  pay attention to what this new vertical-tabs box does to the top organic and sponsored listings--they're pushed down considerably.  Which should make some advertisers and SEO professionals nervous.


As with Google Instant, this is going to change the way Yahoo Search users search.  I think.  I guess it's possible that it will bomb and disappear within a few weeks.  But I doubt it.  Yahoo's Shashi Seth--the VP of Search and Marketplaces--said this about the new interface:


"Our goal is to understand what people care about and to make it fun for them to explore the most personally relevant, interesting, and informative content so that they can get things done faster and stay in the know. Yahoo's new immersive Search is a cornerstone of the overall Yahoo experience, creating more ways to connect people with whatever and whoever interests them."


It sounds like it's here to stay.  Which is fine by me because, at first glance, it looks like an improvement.  And heck, any major change like this at Yahoo is a sign of life, which itself is a good omen for those of us that value competition in the search engine industry.
Have you played around with the new Yahoo Search yet?   If so, what do you think?  Better?  Worse?  More of the same?  Share your thoughts in the comments below.


Source: Yahoo Releases Major Changes To Search Interface, Calling It "Immersive Search" http://www.reelseo.com/yahoo-search-changes-interface/

Confirmed Google Page Rank Update in 7 November' 2011 Tweet

Confirmed Google Page Rank Update in 7 November' 2011

Google released page rank update on Monday, November 7th, 2011.  It looked to be the largest toolbar page rank update in this year.  So for all you webmasters out their that have been waiting for a major pageank update, now is the time to go check your websites.

I just checked my websites and it appears that Google made a toolbar pagerank update with many of my websites going up in pagerank today.

Google Map Optimization - Google Places Optimization Tweet

When websites come to local search optimization and, in particular, the Google Maps, you are likely to get many answers, but your query will not resolved. You will think that What are the most important local search ranking factors? The answer to that question is, It depends on many things. It depends on your location, the industry you are in, the keywords you’re targeting, and many other things which will be related your website theme.

As per my experience with many local clients, that what matters the most today for ranking in Google Maps. Consider some factors as follows:

1. Your Business Address: If you want to rank for your main keywords related to a particular city or location, you better be located in that city/location.

2. Category of Your Business: I think it is very important to have your business be categorized correctly than to have the right keyword in your business name. That means you have to submit your website in the right and relevant category.

3. Using Keyword in Business Name: If your business name has the main keyword then it is very helpful to rank your business in the Google Maps.

4. Complete Your Business Profile Page: I think, "completing your profile" is very important thing to rank your listing in Google Maps. I have seen that 85% listing have incomplete profiles.There must be mentioned working hours, payment options, complete business description and adding photos / videos to your business.

5. Business Data Consistency: It is very important that your business name, its address, and phone number need to be consistent across the many sources of local business information.

All above factors are described as per my knowledge and my experience. If I am wrong on some points then please share your thoughts.

Google is not showing Search volume for Viagra Tweet

Today when I checked the search volume in Google Keyword External Tool, then it is not giving the search volume for the keyword Viagra, Buy Viagra...etc. These keywords are very competitive but it is not showing any results. How it is possible??

Just check the above snap-shot. If you have any information about this change, please share us.

Google’s New Approach to Synonyms of the Keywords Tweet

Google is taking a different approach to tackling synonyms in the search results. If you run a search on Google for say 'Promotional products' you'll notice an interesting thing that it is also showing the results for "Promotional Items".

Together with 'products' Google also highlights 'items' in the search results. This is the new way Google handles synonyms of the keywords. In cases when the search engine thinks that the keyword in your query and the one in the search results are practically one and the same thing, it will highlight the synonym in the search results.

The attractive thing is that the keyword 'items' is highlighted in the URL also. That suggests that Google can go beyond just highlighting keywords. As the technology progresses this approach should be applied to treating synonyms in anchor texts, alt texts, URLs, etc. So a link with “auto repair” in the anchor should affect a site’s ranking for “automobile repair” as well. This is a very logical way for Google to go, because if a site is relevant to those who search for “cell phones, it's no less relevant for those of us looking for “mobile phones”.

This is an enormous step forward for the search engine technology. Because the better search engine recognizes your objective as a searcher, the better results it will give out. And it should certainly make our lives as SEOs much easier. We won’t need to grasp all the synonyms and variations of our keywords. And of course if and when anchor texts in incoming links become effectual for their synonyms, link building will get easier as well.

On the other hand, it maybe a good approach to keep an eye at what synonyms Google acknowledges in your place and make use of it.