Back to Main

July 6, 2006

July 6, 2006

Smarter.com Updates Site

Smarter.com made 4 major changes to its website. The company introduced a new design, new ranking methodology, clustering beta, and limited crawling.

While Smarter is one of the little guys in the shopping comparison engine industry (Shopping.com and Shopzilla being the leaders according to comScore data), these are bold moves which show how serious the company is about becoming a major player.

The clustering Smarter is working on isn’t revolutionary, but it’s a pretty significant leap forward for the company. And if it’s true that some other shopping comparison engines do this type of work through cheap manual labor in other countries, then it’s a big deal.

Check out this search for 'women's sunglasses' as an example.

As opposed to just Brand, Store, and Price Range, you can now filter by Frame Color, Frame Material, Lens Color, Lens Material, Lens Shape, Sunglasses Shape, and Sunglasses Type. This is an incredible improvement that makes searching for sunglasses online pretty much like searching for sunglasses at your local Sunglass Hut.

Read more, including an interview with Smarter.com Co-founder Harry Tsao, at ComparisonEngines.com.

Posted by Brian Smith at 5:29 PM | Permalink

Search Headlines & Links: July 6, 2006

Below, a recap of stories posted today to the Search Engine Watch Blog, along with other items we've spotted but not blogged separately:

From The SEW Blog...

  • Daily SearchCast, July 6, 2006: $800 Million In Click Fraud Or Not?; Does Google Need An Ombudsman?; Google Jockeying In The Classroom & More!
    Today's search podcast covers a report of $800 million lost to click fraud last year -- or was it?; should Google and other search engines have ombudsmen to resolve disputes and concerns?; what's with Yahoo being suggested as alternative search results for "therapy products" on Google; Google Jockeying is coming to a classroom near you and more! Tune-in by listening to this MP3 file, listening via WebmasterRadio at 11:30am Eastern and repeated at 2pm Eastern Tuesday through Friday, via our Odeo channel or through iTunes via this link (or use alternative iTunes instructions explained here) or though our Yahoo Podcasts...
  • Search Engine Optimization in an Hour a Day
    If you're just getting started with search marketing, it can be tough to know where to start or which sources of information to trust. Things change quickly, and what worked yesterday doesn't always work today. Fortunately, there are some fundamental approaches and techniques that always seem to work, and a new book does a great job of laying a foundation for search engine success. Even better, the book avoids jargon and stays away from the countless hotly debated "tactics" that often cause more harm than good. I've got a review of this new book in today's SearchDay article, A Beginner's...
  • Google In Another Dictionary: Merriam-Webster
    The LA Times reports that the term 'Google' has been added to the Merriam-Webster, the dictionary I grew up on. The other day we reported that Google was added to the Oxford English Dictionary, the most authoritative dictionary of the English language....
  • Myanmar Enables Access To Google After Blocking Gmail & GTalk
    Mizzima News reports that Myanmar (also known as Burma) has opened up access to Google again, after blocking it about a week ago. Reportedly Myanmar blocked Google and Gmail/GTalk because they want to control the revenues earned from the state-controlled telephone companies. Myanmar has been known to block web-based email accounts because they want to only allow state-controlled email usage....
  • eBay Disallows Google Checkout
    Andy Beal reports that eBay has officially banned Google Checkout as a payment solution on eBay. Here is a list of payment solutions not allowed on eBay, including Google Checkout....
  • Search For "Therapy Products" On Google Suggests Yahoo As Alternative Results
    SEO Speedwagon posts notes that a query on Google for [therapy products] displays a See Results For box listing pages from Yahoo. These mid-page results are supposed to help people find pages somehow related to their original query -- but Yahoo really has nothing to do with therapy products. How weird, how strange? I had to take a screen capture myself, just in case the others get lost....
  • Kinderstart Transcript Available
    Eric Goldman posted the Kinderstart transcript and other case documents on his site. Recently, Kinderstart's case was heard in court and the judge requested Kinderstart to provide some more information. The full, 45 page, transcript of the June 30th hearing can be downloaded here....
  • Google Posts First Quarter '06 Quarterly Report 10-Q
    For those of you who own Google stock or track Google's revenues, Google has just posted their quarterly statement. You can find the update on the Google investors page with a link to a PDF document for Google's March 31, 2006 10-Q....
  • Google Jockeying
    Another phrase to join 'surfing' and 'browsing' - we now have 'jockeying' or Google jockeying, to be precise, according to the article from Pandia. Briefly put, Google jockeying (though it can be any search engine, it just seems that in order to gain attention Google has to be mentioned somewhere) is a situation where a teacher or presenter is giving a lecture and someone (the jockey) sits in the background running searches or using the search engine to demonstrate something that the presenter is talking about. There's an interesting presentation on it provided by the Educause Learning Initiative....
  • Google Fixes XSS Security Holes
    A security vulnerability in Google, discovered and posted at ha.ckers.org was patched quickly by Google. Both Philipp Lenssen and JasonD posted about the XSS hole that enables hackers to deploy phishing scams, cookie stealing, and creation of worms. Matt Cutts of Google was quick to reply to the Threadwatch post stating that the hole has "either fixed or the fix is going out."...
  • Google's Ranking Algorithm Too Dependent On Trust Factors?
    Todd Malicoat went off on a bit of a rant which he named The Trust Knob is WAY too High - Google Trustbox. Todd, as do many SEOs, believe that Google places too much weight on "trust factors" when determining if a page should rank well or not. Todd quotes some well-known SEOs saying that trust factors are weighted at 85%, whereas copy is only given 15%. Why does this upset SEOs like Todd? As Todd explains, One of the extremely big problems with trust filters is that they don’t seem to be retroactive…meaning that sites that were around and...
  • Wi-Fi Comes to New York Parks
    The New York Times today is reporting on the progress of a project to unwire New York City parks, which was announced three years ago. Reportedly by early August of this year 10 of New York's "most prominent parks" will have Wi-Fi access. The project is being implemented by a small company called WiFi Salon. Mobile handset maker Nokia is now underwriting the project as a sponsor....
  • Google Ombudsman? Search Ombudsman? Great Idea -- Bring Them On!
    Back in 2004, Gary Stein suggested that Yahoo hire an ombudsman, a sort of impartial referee to handle disputes involving advertising programs. I thought it was a great idea. Today, Steve Bryant over at eWeek's Google Watch calls for Google to do the same thing. Again, great idea -- let's see the search engines all start hiring ombudsmen, in the way that many newspapers and others have done....
  • Incroyable! 'Le Tour' Uses Google Earth Not GeoPortail
    WebProNews points to the Google Earth Blog in explaining that The Tour de France has integrated Google Earth into its site and functionality. In particular, the site offers complete 3-D rendering of all tour stages. But we must ask, why wasn't this done on France's homegrown Google Earth challenger GeoPortail?...

Other Things We Read, Didn't Blog But You Might Want To Read...

Posted by Danny Sullivan at 4:35 PM | Permalink

Daily SearchCast, July 6, 2006: $800 Million In Click Fraud Or Not?; Does Google Need An Ombudsman?; Google Jockeying In The Classroom & More! (Corrected MP3 File)

Today's search podcast covers a report of $800 million lost to click fraud last year -- or was it?; should Google and other search engines have ombudsmen to resolve disputes and concerns?; what's with Yahoo being suggested as alternative search results for "therapy products" on Google; Google Jockeying is coming to a classroom near you and more!

Tune-in by listening to this MP3 file, listening via WebmasterRadio at 11:30am Eastern and repeated at 2pm Eastern Tuesday through Friday, via our Odeo channel or through iTunes via this link (or use alternative iTunes instructions explained here) or though our Yahoo Podcasts channel. Need more help tuning in live or finding the chat room? See the Daily SearchCast FAQ.

Below are links to items discussed:

  • SES Latino Edition - Miami: July 10-11, 2006
  • Report: Advertisers Lost $800 Million To Click Fraud Last Year
    The San Francisco Chronicle reports on a click fraud study that claims 14.6 percent of all clicks and $800 million worth of fraudulent clicks were charged to advertisers....
  • Google's Ranking Algorithm Too Dependent On Trust Factors?
    Todd Malicoat went off on a bit of a rant which he named The Trust Knob is WAY too High - Google Trustbox. Todd, as do many SEOs, believe that Google places too much weight on "trust factors" when determining if a page should rank well or not. Todd quotes some well-known SEOs saying that trust factors are weighted at 85%, whereas copy is only given 15%. Why does this upset SEOs like Todd? As Todd explains, One of the extremely big problems with trust filters is that they don’t seem to be retroactive…meaning that sites that were around and...
  • Techmeme's Front Pages: What's Really A Big Story & How To Go Back In Time
  • Kinderstart Transcript Available
    Eric Goldman posted the Kinderstart transcript and other case documents on his site. Recently, Kinderstart's case was heard in court and the judge requested Kinderstart to provide some more information. The full, 45 page, transcript of the June 30th hearing can be downloaded here....
  • Google Ombudsman? Search Ombudsman? Great Idea -- Bring Them On!
    Back in 2004, Gary Stein suggested that Yahoo hire an ombudsman, a sort of impartial referee to handle disputes involving advertising programs. I thought it was a great idea. Today, Steve Bryant over at eWeek's Google Watch calls for Google to do the same thing. Again, great idea -- let's see the search engines all start hiring ombudsmen, in the way that many newspapers and others have done....
  • Myanmar Enables Access To Google After Blocking Gmail & GTalk
    Mizzima News reports that Myanmar (also known as Burma) has opened up access to Google again, after blocking it about a week ago. Reportedly Myanmar blocked Google and Gmail/GTalk because they want to control the revenues earned from the state-controlled telephone companies. Myanmar has been known to block web-based email accounts because they want to only allow state-controlled email usage....
  • Google Fixes XSS Security Holes
    A security vulnerability in Google, discovered and posted at ha.ckers.org was patched quickly by Google. Both Philipp Lenssen and JasonD posted about the XSS hole that enables hackers to deploy phishing scams, cookie stealing, and creation of worms. Matt Cutts of Google was quick to reply to the Threadwatch post stating that the hole has "either fixed or the fix is going out."...
  • Search For "Therapy Products" On Google Suggests Yahoo As Alternative Results
    SEO Speedwagon posts notes that a query on Google for [therapy products] displays a See Results For box listing pages from Yahoo. These mid-page results are supposed to help people find pages somehow related to their original query -- but Yahoo really has nothing to do with therapy products. How weird, how strange? I had to take a screen capture myself, just in case the others get lost....
  • Google Posts First Quarter '06 Quarterly Report 10-Q
    For those of you who own Google stock or track Google's revenues, Google has just posted their quarterly statement. You can find the update on the Google investors page with a link to a PDF document for Google's March 31, 2006 10-Q....
  • eBay Disallows Google Checkout
    Andy Beal reports that eBay has officially banned Google Checkout as a payment solution on eBay. Here is a list of payment solutions not allowed on eBay, including Google Checkout....
  • New Search Patent Applications: July 5, 2006 - Google Coming to a Shopping Mall Near You
    Google files patents for shopping offline with online assistance, a secondary map in Google Maps, and an updated review aggregator. Yahoo adds a patent application for search results PPC advertising, and managing blog content. Microsoft looks to anchor text to help train a machine learning classification system when user behavior data isn't available. AOL details a method of filtering search results using ontologies and expert domains for queries. IBM explains differences in how images can be indexed, and presents a method based upon the semantic meanings of pictures. Become, Inc., describes how different links can be assigned different values while...
  • Google Jockeying
    Another phrase to join 'surfing' and 'browsing' - we now have 'jockeying' or Google jockeying, to be precise, according to the article from Pandia. Briefly put, Google jockeying (though it can be any search engine, it just seems that in order to gain attention Google has to be mentioned somewhere) is a situation where a teacher or presenter is giving a lecture and someone (the jockey) sits in the background running searches or using the search engine to demonstrate something that the presenter is talking about. There's an interesting presentation on it provided by the Educause Learning Initiative....
  • Wi-Fi Comes to New York Parks
    The New York Times today is reporting on the progress of a project to unwire New York City parks, which was announced three years ago. Reportedly by early August of this year 10 of New York's "most prominent parks" will have Wi-Fi access. The project is being implemented by a small company called WiFi Salon. Mobile handset maker Nokia is now underwriting the project as a sponsor....
  • Incroyable! 'Le Tour' Uses Google Earth Not GeoPortail
    WebProNews points to the Google Earth Blog in explaining that The Tour de France has integrated Google Earth into its site and functionality. In particular, the site offers complete 3-D rendering of all tour stages. But we must ask, why wasn't this done on France's homegrown Google Earth challenger GeoPortail?...

Posted by Danny Sullivan at 4:16 PM | Permalink

The Congdon Affair

Some personal media brands build slowly and steadily, both in terms of audience and ad revenue, and eventually, after years of toil, wake up to find they're legitimate businesses. Others rise rapidly and then, owing to money or interpersonal tensions, explode gloriously in shards of broken glass. Such is the case with Rocketboom, whose anchorwoman and production head have parted ways in a mutual huff.

The very public falling out has gotten attention in the blogosphere disproportionate to its significance in the digital media landscape -- at least in terms of traffic and audience. But all the chatter is not totally without merit. I've never been a huge fan of Amanda Congdon, the site's public face, but she's clearly notable for being the first video blog star in history.

The split seems to have been precipitated by Congdon's desire to move to L.A. and find sidework. This fact, combined with the fact she's now living with her parents while looking for a new gig, give us the only possible salient insight for ClickZ's audience: Video blogging, evidently, still can't bring down the ad revenue.

Posted by Zachary Rodgers at 1:00 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Search Engine Optimization in an Hour a Day

If you're just getting started with search marketing, it can be tough to know where to start or which sources of information to trust. Things change quickly, and what worked yesterday doesn't always work today. Fortunately, there are some fundamental approaches and techniques that always seem to work, and a new book does a great job of laying a foundation for search engine success. Even better, the book avoids jargon and stays away from the countless hotly debated "tactics" that often cause more harm than good. I've got a review of this new book in today's SearchDay article, A Beginner's Guide to Search Engine Optimization.

Posted by Chris Sherman at 12:37 PM | Permalink

Google In Another Dictionary: Merriam-Webster

The LA Times reports that the term 'Google' has been added to the Merriam-Webster, the dictionary I grew up on. The other day we reported that Google was added to the Oxford English Dictionary, the most authoritative dictionary of the English language.

Posted by Barry Schwartz at 12:20 PM | Permalink

Myanmar Enables Access To Google After Blocking Gmail & GTalk

Mizzima News reports that Myanmar (also known as Burma) has opened up access to Google again, after blocking it about a week ago. Reportedly Myanmar blocked Google and Gmail/GTalk because they want to control the revenues earned from the state-controlled telephone companies. Myanmar has been known to block web-based email accounts because they want to only allow state-controlled email usage.

Posted by Barry Schwartz at 11:18 AM | Permalink

Inside Google's New-Product Process

Marissa Meyer (VP of Google's search products and user experience) is interviewed over at Business Week in the article 'Inside Google's new-product process'. It's not the newest article out there, but if you haven't taken a look at it, it's worth doing so, if only to get a handle on what Google is thinking with regards new products. The spin would appear to be 'lets try lots of different things; some of them will work and will be really useful'. A company like Google can certainly take that sort of approach, given their reputation and bank balance. By the law of averages this will indeed create some excellent products, but what happens to all those products that don't make it, and more importantly, the people who use them? I have a slightly different and less charitable view over in my own weblog.

Posted by Phil Bradley at 11:16 AM | Permalink

eBay Disallows Google Checkout

Andy Beal reports that eBay has officially banned Google Checkout as a payment solution on eBay. Here is a list of payment solutions not allowed on eBay, including Google Checkout.

Payment Services not permitted on eBay: AlertPay.com, anypay.com, AuctionChex.com, AuctionPix.com, BillPay.ie, ecount.com, cardserviceinternational.com, CCAvenue, ecount, e-gold, eHotPay.com, ePassporte.com, EuroGiro, FastCash.com, Google Checkout, gcash, GearPay, Goldmoney.com, graphcard.com, greenzap.com, ikobo.com, Liberty Dollars, Moneygram.com, neteller.com, Netpay.com, Nochex.com, paychest.com, payingfast.com, paypay, Postepay, Qchex.com, rupay.com, scripophily.com, sendmoneyorder.com, stamps, Stormpay, wmtransfer.com, xcoin.com

Posted by Barry Schwartz at 11:06 AM | Permalink

Search For "Therapy Products" On Google Suggests Yahoo As Alternative Results

SEO Speedwagon posts notes that a query on Google for [therapy products] displays a See Results For box listing pages from Yahoo. These mid-page results are supposed to help people find pages somehow related to their original query -- but Yahoo really has nothing to do with therapy products. How weird, how strange? I had to take a screen capture myself, just in case the others get lost.

Posted by Barry Schwartz at 9:26 AM | Permalink

Kinderstart Transcript Available

Eric Goldman posted the Kinderstart transcript and other case documents on his site. Recently, Kinderstart's case was heard in court and the judge requested Kinderstart to provide some more information. The full, 45 page, transcript of the June 30th hearing can be downloaded here.

Posted by Barry Schwartz at 9:15 AM | Permalink

Google Posts First Quarter '06 Quarterly Report 10-Q

For those of you who own Google stock or track Google's revenues, Google has just posted their quarterly statement. You can find the update on the Google investors page with a link to a PDF document for Google's March 31, 2006 10-Q.

Posted by Barry Schwartz at 9:10 AM | Permalink

Google Jockeying

Another phrase to join 'surfing' and 'browsing' - we now have 'jockeying' or Google jockeying, to be precise, according to the article from Pandia. Briefly put, Google jockeying (though it can be any search engine, it just seems that in order to gain attention Google has to be mentioned somewhere) is a situation where a teacher or presenter is giving a lecture and someone (the jockey) sits in the background running searches or using the search engine to demonstrate something that the presenter is talking about. There's an interesting presentation on it provided by the Educause Learning Initiative.

It's a great idea, if the presenter can get it to work. It would require a lot of work between them and the 'jockey' to ensure that the correct type of search was being run at the right time in a presentation. Alternatively the jockey could just have a list of 'do this search at this point' prompts, which would be rather dull I think.

Apparently Google jockeying doesn't appear to impede students learning, which surprises me slightly; I know that if I was in the audience I'd be agog to see if a search turned up something that was unexpected, and I'd be paying more attention to that than the presentation itself. While it's a tempting idea I suspect that I'll stick to my tried and trusted method of asking delegates what they'd like to search for, and working with their input to create a more inclusive learning experience. However, in the right circumstances I think this approach could overcome the hurdles and end up a winner.

Posted by Phil Bradley at 9:09 AM | Permalink

Google Fixes XSS Security Holes

A security vulnerability in Google, discovered and posted at ha.ckers.org was patched quickly by Google. Both Philipp Lenssen and JasonD posted about the XSS hole that enables hackers to deploy phishing scams, cookie stealing, and creation of worms. Matt Cutts of Google was quick to reply to the Threadwatch post stating that the hole has "either fixed or the fix is going out."

Posted by Barry Schwartz at 9:00 AM | Permalink

Google's Ranking Algorithm Too Dependent On Trust Factors?

Todd Malicoat went off on a bit of a rant which he named The Trust Knob is WAY too High - Google Trustbox. Todd, as do many SEOs, believe that Google places too much weight on "trust factors" when determining if a page should rank well or not. Todd quotes some well-known SEOs saying that trust factors are weighted at 85%, whereas copy is only given 15%. Why does this upset SEOs like Todd? As Todd explains,

One of the extremely big problems with trust filters is that they don’t seem to be retroactive…meaning that sites that were around and trusted BEFORE a particular filter was established can basically get away with murder (and they do).

Todd explains the trust factors as follows; web site age, total number of backlinks and the overall age of those links and total “trustscore” of other backlinks (i.e. the number of .edu's, .gov's, and high pagerank links). Ok, so those are some of the trust factors involved in the algorithm.

In the past, SEOs were trained not to talk about a site ranking, but rather a page ranking. Each page of a site was independent, and was able to rank well on its own. The old optimization for Google was "Content + high PR links," today it is "Crusty trusted domain + content." The word "crusty" implies the age of the domain, but also shows you how much dislike Todd has towards the "age" component. Pages aren't old - sites are old.

This is the same complaint as we had a year ago. New sites are not given a "fair shot."

Why not give Joe's ultra amazing toothpaste (the company with very little marketing budget because they spend their money making an amazing product) a chance to rank high for "toothpaste" for just a little bit longer instead of HELPING companies who've been spending millions of dollars on their "brand" instead of their product for the last decade or more?

Todd's post makes for a good read and may give some of you additional tips on how Google works today. One aspect I believe Todd left out was the factor of creating buzz for a new site. Yes, they are dependent on "trusted sources" linking to the new site, but it can happen. New sites, I believe, need to think in terms of generating real "reputation" and real "buzz" so that trusted sources provide some "crusty" trusted links.

Posted by Barry Schwartz at 8:37 AM | Permalink

Wi-Fi Comes to New York Parks

The New York Times today is reporting on the progress of a project to unwire New York City parks, which was announced three years ago. Reportedly by early August of this year 10 of New York's "most prominent parks" will have Wi-Fi access. The project is being implemented by a small company called WiFi Salon. Mobile handset maker Nokia is now underwriting the project as a sponsor.

Nokia has taken an exceptionally strong interest in mobile-local search and has partnered with yellow pages publishers in several countries to offer local business and entertainment information though its content portal on its handsets.

And though this New York park Wi-Fi offering isn't mobile-local search per se, it does present the possibility of location-based content and advertising. According to the article, "at each hot spot, users will encounter an initial Web portal with information about the park and local history and advertisements for Nokia and other sponsors, which could include retail kiosks that do business in the parks."

Posted by Greg Sterling at 7:55 AM | Permalink

Google Ombudsman? Search Ombudsman? Great Idea -- Bring Them On!

Back in 2004, Gary Stein suggested that Yahoo hire an ombudsman, a sort of impartial referee to handle disputes involving advertising programs. I thought it was a great idea. Today, Steve Bryant over at eWeek's Google Watch calls for Google to do the same thing. Again, great idea -- let's see the search engines all start hiring ombudsmen, in the way that many newspapers and others have done.

At a newspaper, the ombudsman is someone who the readers can appeal to if they feel a paper has been unfair or had a problem with coverage. The ombudsman investigates the complaint and reports back to the readers. As an insider, they have more access than an external investigator. But as the ombudsman, their responsibility is to represent the readers, not the organization.

Google's had a series of problems recently, as Bryant points out. Was Amazon accidentally knocked out on a search for its own domain name, or was it a glitch? Is Wikipedia Watch being deliberately downranked for a search on its own name, as founder Daniel Brandt feels, or is it another glitch?

An ombudsman is the sort of person who could investigate these things and report back. In fact, Google probably would need to employ a team of ombudsmen, given the many charges people point at it, often unfounded but still which need to be addressed.

Nor is Google the only one that should consider this. I don't agree with Bryant that Google is the closest thing we have to a Pope on the internet. But the idea of it being a paper of record is more true. But Google's not the only paper of record. Yahoo, MSN and Ask are all important papers, as well. I'd like to see them all establish ombudsmen.

At the very least, it will help take the pressure off the informal ombudsmen we already have -- Matt Cutts, Jeremy Zawodny and other search employees that often step up to do informal public relations and examinations of concerns. I don't want those bloggers to go away, but it would be nice to have an official person that searchers and publishers could feel are supposed to be looking into concerns.

Postscript: Google must temper its power or law makers will over at The Guardian has Jack Schofield talking about the idea of an ombudsman, as well.

Posted by Danny Sullivan at 7:52 AM | Permalink

Incroyable! 'Le Tour' Uses Google Earth Not GeoPortail

WebProNews points to the Google Earth Blog in explaining that The Tour de France has integrated Google Earth into its site and functionality. In particular, the site offers complete 3-D rendering of all tour stages. But we must ask, why wasn't this done on France's homegrown Google Earth challenger GeoPortail?

Posted by Greg Sterling at 7:34 AM | Permalink

See More Posts From:

This Week | This Month