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SearchReturn Discussion List
"Understanding Internet Search Technology"
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Moderator: Published by:
Disa Johnson SearchReturn
http://www.searchreturn.com
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April 27, 2006 SearchReturn Issue #058
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.....IN THIS DIGEST.....
// -- FEATURED POST -- //
"Overly Broad Use Of The Term Spam"
~ Mike Moran
// -- ESSENTIAL NEWS -- //
"AdWords Quality Affect"
"Google Sitemaps Notice"
"Yahoo Resurrects Babel Fish"
"SideStep Launches Activity Search"
"Microsoft Live UI"
"IE7 Includes Questionable Addons"
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// -- FEATURED POST -- //
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Topic ==> Overly Broad Use Of The Term Spam
From: Mike Moran
I was at The Search Engine Meeting this week, which attracted
about 150 people to discuss search technology. I was talking
about Web site search and gave advice about sprucing up your
content to improve your results, mentioning that this would help
you with Google and other Internet search engines as well.
Well. The next day, Steve Arnold mentioned my speech a half dozen
times, saying that I was advocating spamming. He is talking as
though anything any search marketer does to attract search
traffic is spam. I wrote a blog entry on this incident:
http://www.searchreturn.com/digest/refs058.shtml
I am wondering if there is a larger problem brewing here. Should
we be taking steps in our professional organizations to protect
the reputations of ethical search marketers? If people start
using the term spam as broadly as Steve does, it ceases to have
any meaning and it gets harder to draw ethical lines.
What do you think?
Mike
Distinguished Engineer and Manager of Web Experience
ibm.com, Sales & Distribution
Co-author of IBM Press book, "Search Engine Marketing, Inc."
http://www.mikemoran.com
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// -- ESSENTIAL NEWS -- //
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==> AdWords Quality Affect
http://adwords.blogspot.com/2006/04/ads-quality-and-you.html
Essentials: Starting today, Google will be implementing an
expanded and contracted ad publishing quality affect designed to
show fewer ads on queries for which users might prefer not to see
them. Google will show a wide selection of ads for queries such
as [car insurance] or [flowers] when possible. For queries
detected as having more information gathering intent, Google will
show fewer ads.
If you watch your keyword performance closely, you should notice
changes over the next few weeks. The impact of this change will
vary from advertiser to advertiser. A reduction of impressions on
information gathering queries may increase CTR and your AdRank
would improve in that case. The opposite can be true if you
experience fewer clicks when your impressions decline in number.
Tip provided: If you notice a decline in impressions or clicks on
keywords, ensure that your most important terms are specifically
entered as keywords rather than relying on broad or phrase match.
If you notice an unwanted increase in impressions or clicks for
keywords, negative keywords can finely tune your targeting.
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==> Google Sitemaps Notice
http://www.mattcutts.com/blog/notifying-webmasters-of-penalties/
Essentials: Matt Cutts and his team that ensure Google Search
quality have been working closely with the Sitemaps team over the
last several weeks. Matt has become a familiar name to webmasters
which is part of his desire to better interact with the webmaster
community. In partnership with Sitemaps, additional information
is available to Sitemaps users regarding the status of their site
(specifically if there is an indexing problem).
Sitemaps has been improved in a variety of ways, but in keeping
with Google having already started to notify webmasters when they
have a spam problem, notification is now available via Sitemaps
with links to the Reinclusion Request form. Only sites that
violate the quality guidelines (and have a site Google otherwise
would want in the index) qualify for being notified. Matt details
how it works in his post.
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==> Yahoo Resurrects Babel Fish
http://www.ysearchblog.com/archives/000295.html
Essentials: An old friend, formerly available through Altavista,
has returned with additional capabilities. You can translate a
block of text up to 150 words, and conduct search based on
translated text. By entering URLs, you can translate Web page
text. Thirty-eight language pair choices are available. In the
past, Babel Fish has been used to expose cloaking including the
famed outting of Green Flash by Greg Boser.
Babel Fish can be added to the Yahoo! Toolbar, and enhancements
include translations back and forth between simplified Chinese to
traditional Chinese and a French and German Search Translator
feature that searches queries across the entire Web in multiple
languages returning results with one multi-lingual page.
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==> SideStep Launches Activity Search
http://blog.searchenginewatch.com/blog/060427-035308
Essentials: Activity Search provides real-time search for local
activities, giving users a scoop on what events might interest
them during idle or travel time. With filtering options for
duration and city, you can narrow the result set to suit your
schedule. Activity Search is an obviously useful companion with
flight and hotel search offered by SideStep.
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==> Microsoft Live UI
http://www.live.com/#q=SearchReturn
Essentials: Microsoft's Live.com is testing interesting results
display. You can only find the features discussed here after a
query, and we've included one in the link above. Perhaps best
viewed by the software maker's IE browser, a slider on the top
right toggles between three positions that change the result
display to show:
- Only titles and site URLs
- Titles, site URLs and descriptions
- Titles, site URLs, descriptions and site-search field links.
Using Live.com features may feel a bit clunky at times. For
example, scrolling the result set doesn't snap tightly as it
auto-advances through listings. The features are interesting to
note, as we watch Microsoft trying to differentiate itself from
competition by innovating the way results are displayed to
search users.
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==> IE7 Includes Questionable Addons
http://www.ieaddons.com/default.aspx?cid=2&scid=70
Essentials: The IE7 Beta "Tools" menu provides access to "Addons"
for extending the browser. You can locate and manage various
Addons (which are akin to FireFox extensions and Opera widgets).
Although Microsoft is supposed to have carefully screened Addons
before making them widely available, two questionable ones are
for sale through the interface. In the Developer Tools category
you will currently find: Alexa Booster and Doorway Page Wizard
Professional.
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