Wednesday, October 31, 2007

Retrospect Tech Rally - SEO and Tech Daily

I suppose we should have pointed out in the last post that Google's high stock price and their preference not to split the stock to date would normally result in lower volume than a less expensive stock such as Microsoft. Regardless, MSFT did trade intensely today.

We'll get back to other topics after this post but I think it's very important at this stage to take a look at Market Cap, and put things in perspective.

I think most of us remember what happened when AOL's market cap got so high, they were able to acquire Time-Warner. Many of us found it incredible (and unthinkable just a few years earlier).

If we look at Microsoft, their market cap has been running around 300 billion dollars US consistently (and this week climbed to over 340 billion in just a few days) making it a HUGE company.

Google's ongoing run-up since going public currently places it at about 220 billion. Also, a huge company by any measure.

As Google challenges others, innovates and grows, it's important to watch the competition, see if they (Google) leverage, and/or issue new shares, etc.

Regardless, right now, they are in an excellent position. Can they continue to dominate search? Continue to monetize adsense and all of the 'newer offerings'?!

It'll be a fun ride. (Definitely fun for those who grew with the company and exercised a few options along the way!).

Blogs scream Google but Microsoft is volume leader today

The markets rallied (in general) today on the Fed discount rate cut ... despite the fact that the cut had been widely anticipated.

It was straight up for most indexes just after the Fed's announcement.

In 'our world', (search stocks) Google DID climb over the 700 mark (an over 50 per cent increase on the year for GOOG), and Microsoft ( MSFT ) was the volume leader also hitting a new multi-year high as of this post (3:19 PM eastern) of 36.95.

Yahoo (YHOO) held generally steady trading at about 31.07.
IAC (parent of Ask.com) also released 'healthy' earnings today.

Search sector alive and well going into the holidays? Well see :)

Google 700 ? Stock Watch October 31

Google shares climbed 15.54 yesterday to yet another all-time high closing at 694.77.
After hours trading on Tuesday saw GOOG reach 698.39

It wasn't that long ago we were looking at Google 600.

Could it be Google 700 today ?

Take a peek at Google on Google here.

Tuesday, October 30, 2007

Your photos could be in a magazine article on Yahoo

In an earlier post, I mentioned how Yahoo was using Flickr photos (with the Creative Commons Attribition license) in their travel section.

I have to admit I came cross this latest chapter totally by surprise. A relative sent me an e-mail ... "Nice photo in Budget Travel Magazine". Huh?

I picked up the magazine. No photos. Looked at the online version ... Still no photo in the cited article.

Then I found this.

No complaints here. The attribution is fully intact. Numerous e-mails followed.

Some marketing food for thought ....

Google cell phone before Christmas ?

Fox News this morning is citing a Wall Street Journal article
indicating that the rumored Google phone could be just a few weeks away.

The Wall Street Journal piece is here

Note: After this original post, we noticed Greg's Sterling's excellent take on the latest Gphone rumors at Search Engine Land here

Monday, October 29, 2007

Microsoft launches new recruiting website

Viewmyworld.com is the latest in a recent series of career recruiting websites launched by Microsoft. It's also a new portal to some interesting Microsoft employee blogs.
Check it out here

Geo-Target Canada and Real Estate continued ....

Well all of you have written enough about changes in Page Rank and paid links over the past few days for me (It almost read like a soap opera! :). No doubt the latest chapter has yet to play out.

If any of our (very cool) readers want to know more about why their PR may be going up and down (or in and out), try one of the blogs in our updated blogroll at left.

Back to 'original' stuff ...

Here's another way you can monitize the exchange rate with Canada now (and it works!).

Let say you're selling a house (Not our house, I promised I wasn't going to talk about that any more here, so I'm not ....) so let's say, this awesome house in Microsoft's backyard!

You've got a lot of junk laying around. Think E-Bay.

If you haven't gone there lately, sell some of your stuff NOW, but BE SURE TO MARK THE SHIP TO CANADA BOX!

Right now, Canadians are getting an automatic discount on everything they buy from the US, and they're all over it. Not just stuff, but shopping for the holidays too. Just ask the gang at the Mill Creek Mall in Erie PA.

There may never be a better time to clean out the attic?

Disclaimer: The above link is NOT PAID (Just in case anyone was wondering ...). It IS a unsolicited and very timely reciprocal link and part a 'bi-coastal real estate search experiment!' ??

Geo-Targeting the Financial Markets

Some have caught on to our post about this a few weeks ago, others haven't.

As of this morning, OIL is at a RECORD HIGH (time to lose the Hummer??) ...
GOLD is heading for $800 and the US dollar in overseas trading Monday is
hitting all-time LOWS.

What does this mean for Search Engine Management and SEO?

Canadians are coming down to do their Christmas shopping in droves. No sales tax (in PA) on clothing and the best exchange rate in 33 years ?? Geo-target Canada! The US is a lot closer than Alberta.

Help your customers find CHEAP GAS in your area. Do an article on hybrids?

You get the idea ... Food for Search Engine thought ..

Sunday, October 28, 2007

Yahoo concedes bug in SiteExplorer - Fix on the way

Many SEO sites reported an unusual trend last week in Yahoo's listing of backlinks in their SiteExplorer webmaster submission site.

On Friday, Priyank Garg made a post to Yahoo's Search Blog advising the community to
"disregard counts from October 11 through next week" (and that a fix is on the way).

Yahoo's organic results have been ailing in the spaces we monitor for quite some time.
By contrast, Microsoft's Live.com made an improvement with their new roll-out a few weeks ago, significantly improving relevance while apparently quadrupling the size of their index. According to Microsoft, there is now a dedicated team of over 100 at MS working on relevance. We'll see how that pans out ....

Google's 'dynamic indexing', both on the organic index and blog search side has been really interesting to watch. A blog pointing here (to this blog) was indexed the same day yesterday on Google's blog search. That simply blew us away ..... :)

Google still needs to do some more (difficult) work on the blog search side as numerous 'automated and random text' are still showing up in the results.

Saturday, October 27, 2007

Microsoft free virtual meeting tool - SharedView Beta 2

Microsoft has released Beta 2 of 'SharedView'.

The program enables up to 15 users to share desktop views and collaborate over broadband connections.

The download can be found in the MS Download Center here

Friday, October 26, 2007

Google posts California Wildfire Relief page

Google has put up a webpage help support those effected by the recent California Wildfires, through your choice of one or two charities.

The page can be found here

Thursday, October 25, 2007

Microsoft's big news isn't about Facebook

After the close of trading today, Microsoft (NASDAQ: MSFT) released quarterly earnings ...
and surprised the street in a big way.

Microsoft exceeded expections (and their own guidance) in every major operating unit, causing the stock to rise almost 10% in after hours trading today.

Friday will tell the story as analysts digest the data and portfolio managers make some important decisions.

Could MSFT (as a stock) be beginning to show some life?

If the 'after hours' trading price holds (or climbs), it will be a 52 week (longer actually)
high for Microsoft.

Wednesday, October 24, 2007

Facebook deal done ... with Microsoft.

In recent weeks, the buzz became louder and louder.

Google and Microsoft were both angling for an equity stake in Facebook, the social network that has taken the Net by storm in the past year.

Independent Facebook applications, features and tools had been appearing on the scene almost daily for the past few months gaining recognition not only from users, but software developers , and others as well.

The news apparently broke on 'Beyond Binary', Ina Fried's blog on CNET's News.com .

The deal was confirmed later in the day, with Microsoft landing an apparent 1.6 % state in Facebook for $240 million. The deal quickly made headlines throughout the almost all of the Tech and Financial websites (and blogs) just a couple of hours ago ...

Facebook is said to be in the top-10 visited websites.
The company is a little less than 3 years old.

Microsoft has been posturing to counter competition from Google (on numerous fronts).
Analysts and user reactions were very mixed on the deal today.
Microsoft stock ended the session at 31.25 (up 1.13 per cent).
Google closed the day at 675.82 (up .01 percent), just shy of it's all-time high of 677.60.

Integration and or advertising details were not available as of this post.

New York and Bellevue grow tech centers

A few decades ago, tech was defined as 'Big Blue' (IBM) most often associated with Tarrytown, New York in suburban Westchester County. Many remember when IBM was considered a leading indicator for the entire New York Stock Exchange.

Times change but history repeats itself.

Once again, Tech seems to be one of the major driving forces behind the markets.

For the past decade or so, you had to be in Silicon Valley to be considered 'in the loop' and many tech companies moved there for just that reason. I can remember being nixed for an contributor spot in the early days of CNET because "they hire almost exclusively from the Silicon Valley area". At the time, I was in a Long Island NY suburb.

Perhaps to lurk in the shadows of Microsoft (or maybe for the fabulous ski slopes and mountain views?), most major players in 'tech' have opened offices or launched start-ups the Bellevue Washington area, mainly in the past 2 years.

Tech returns. New York's tech centers dubbed 'Silicon Alley', despite some of the highest NYC rental prices (and hotel prices) in recent history, is growing exponentially. As the web and mainstream media converge on an ongoing basis, technology's presence among the mainstream players and major advertising companies (not to mention financial centers) has become more important than ever.

Techies on the east coast who have mostly worked from Boston, now have a growing haven in New York.

Tuesday, October 23, 2007

Yahoo does Star Wars ?

We've seen a number of new 'channels' appearing lately on Yahoo, such as OMG and Bix.

A reader brought this to our attention today. Hmmm. Draw your own conclusions .... :)

Star Wars on Yahoo !

Monday, October 22, 2007

Ping your sitemap to Live, Ask, Yahoo, Google in one shot

We've posted numerous methods of letting the search engines know that you've changed your xml sitemap.

There are several software and web-based tools that to let Google Webmaster Central and Yahoo SiteExplorer know you've made a modification, create sitemaps as well as custom scripts.

You can even ping them from your browser bar as we noted in an earlier post.

We've found that manually editing your sitemap, where possible, really makes a difference over time. The 'Priority' number should be YOUR priority.

Our tests also conclude that pinging daily is not necessary, just when you make a change to your sitemap.

One of the commercial program providers has a webpage where you can ping Google, Yahoo, Ask and Moreover with your new sitemap.

Take a look at this page from Sitemapwriter (It works!), and use it when you need it. It's free.

Microsoft launches Popfly in open Beta

On Friday, Microsoft opened the previous private online Beta of Popfly to the public.

Using Microsoft's Silverlight technology, Popfly can interface with Flickr, Facebook and more and offers webpage on-line development, mash-ups (with an easy-to-use interface) and more.

There are some caveats in the FAQ's but Microsoft does make mention of Firefox compatibility. We had no difficulties creating a quick Flickr mashup using Firefox.

We found it a little buggy at first, but then outright fun once the components loaded to our test box. The webpage designer is similar to Office Live but smoother with much better WYSIWYG editing.

User will have to have MS Silverlight installed to try it.

Google offer grants and seed money

Google is offering $5000 grants (and possibly $100,000 in seed funding!) to qualifying developers that write popular applications using the Google Gadget Platform.

More information can be found at Google Gadget Ventures

Sunday, October 21, 2007

800 CALL 411 now live from MS

It was just a few days ago when we posted Google's Toll-Free talking directory assistance had come out of beta. ( 800-GOOG-411 ).

Late Friday, Microsoft went live with 800-CALL-411

(The service was facilitated by Microsoft's acquisition of TellMe in March of this year).

Some toll free ways to get a phone number and (much) more.

IE7 begins rollout in Microsoft automatic update

Several readers (we were already using it) have noted that the anticipated delivery of Internet Explorer 7 via Microsoft's automatic update has begun, at least in the Northeast US.

Computers that haven't been disabled for the update (MS supplies a tool) have been receiving the update along with the usual automatic updates beginning earlier this week.

More tools added to Google Webmaster Central

OK, I admit it. I didn't look at Webmaster Central for a whole two days.

So I'm wandering around a few blogs and noticed ex-Googler (now Zillow er?) Vanessa Fox has a post on some cool new features. (Fox founded Webmaster Central while at Google and with continuing posts and lots of links to Search Engine Land, it appears she's still in very much in 'search' .... and not out selling real estate in Seattle ? )

The new tool we liked the most was the timeline, or as Google calls it, "historical information for query stats" but, as Fox noted, the neat little smileys are gone so I couldn't vote .... bummer.

More on Zillow (and a little shameless self promotion). Recently, we set out to sell our little Pocono house in trendy Milford PA. One of the first things I did was to see if the broker had put it on Zillow. To my surprise, it WAS on Trulia, but NOT on Zillow ... so I put it there (or here :).

Playing with more Googley stuff, I put up a back page on our flagship server and tried a Picasaweb slideshow, along with a static Flickr image to showcase the home.
Updated sitemap .... a few pings ....

The page ranked extremely well on Google in just days and even copped a few pretty good search terms then later it's rightful place among the numerous real estate brokers up here. Yahoo .... indexed but not ranked. Live ... It's there now. Ask ... Yep. Hmmm.

No sneaky tricks. Just messing around a little and trying to sell a house!

So here's the deal. Buy the place ... and get an hour of SEO and PPC consultation free?

Can't say I didn't try.

Saturday, October 20, 2007

Mozilla on the move

In addition to the Firefox upgrade (previous post), according to a post on Mashable
, Mozilla just introduced an instant messaging client in Beta that can 'talk to' various
IM service including AIM, Yahoo, MSN and others.

The beta of InstantBird is available here.
(Note: We had some difficulties reaching the server as of this post, but it is there!)

Firefox Security Update 2.0.0.8

Firefox released a new version via automatic upgrade today addressing several security flaws.

The cross-platform open source browser has been gaining market share, particularly in recent weeks, with some web developers reporting up to 11 per cent of visitors now using the web client.

Friday, October 19, 2007

Google earnings up 46 per cent in third quarter

Google continues to deliver profits and once again exceeded expectations announcing earnings after the close of trading on Thursday.

Google's stock (Nasdaq: GOOG) climbed to over $650 per share in after hours trading on Thursday.

Thursday, October 18, 2007

Fox Business Channel launches slick website (and is hiring)

Fresh from a successful purchase of Dow Jones, Rupert Murdoch's new Fox Business channel launched on cable and satellite earlier this week.

While the preview wasn't too impressive on the web, the new website is.

Slick design, easy to navigate, and with some probing questions that actually make sense ... The one we saw today was "Should Google split their stock?". (If GOOG keeps going the way it has, been it could be a 4-1 split!?)

We couldn't help but notice (down at the bottom), the career listings link. Always a good indicator. Some key positions, as well as forward-looking positions (New York based) were still there as of this post.

While some may not like the tactics Murdoch uses (or politics) to achieve his goals, and yes I've said it before, there's simply no doubting that the News Corp 'Fox empire' (that many once doubted would ever get off the ground), is doing one of the best jobs in converging today's technologies.

CNBC (and Bloomberg?) could have some tough competition in short order.

Note: The News Corp / Dow Jones merger is still subject to shareholder approval but is expected to close in the 4th quater of this year.

Wednesday, October 17, 2007

New Virtual Earth API released today

Microsoft today released Version 6 of the API for Virtual Earth. ....
sporting a host of new features and improved performance.

Details on the release (and links to the download) can be found at Keith Kinnan's Weblog at MSDN.

Tuesday, October 16, 2007

Never too late - Blog Action Day is TODAY

Well, it's not totally too late ... so here's a BIG reminder!

Today is Blog Action Day. An Eco-happy day for bloggers.

Read more about Blog Action Day here... what YOU can do and .... spread the word!

Apple to deliver Mac OS Leopard this month

Apple has announced the delivery date for their much anticipated OS X Leopard operating system. Priced at a suggested $129, the operating system will begin to ship on October 26 and
pre-orders are currently being taken on-line at apple.com.

Over 300 new features are anticipated in the new release, which was delayed due to Apple's concentration on the IPhone launch.

Monday, October 15, 2007

YouTube copyright tool launches today

In an attempt to protect the copyrights of uploaded videos on YouTube, the video sharing website today launched their "Video Identification Beta" content management tool.

Touted as a proprietary system still undergoing some fine-tuning (hence, the 'Beta' designation), YouTube is saying the new system goes "beyond their legal responsibilities" with three primary goals, "accurate identification, choice for copyright holders, and a greater user experience".

Since YouTube's acquisition by Google, the site has been targeted by numerous large (and small) media companies, some suing for copyright infringment, and others setting up similar websites to attempt to compete with YouTube.

A full explanation from YouTube, just posted to the web, can be found here.

Google's 411 launches website and integrates YouTube

Goog 411 - The free directory assistance service from Google has launched a new webpage with update and integration with YouTube.

Sunday, October 14, 2007

Growing and Thanks - SEO and Tech Daily responds

When we launched this blog, the idea was to deliver brief daily updates of news and tips of interest to the SEO and Tech communities.

While there are hundreds of blogs delivering this information (some of the best in our new blogroll at left) ... We felt very simply, that since we spend hours each day reading this stuff ... our modest blog could filter some of the more important stories.

It was an experiment, like so many others, and it appears you like it.

We're seeing more inbound links to individual stories each day, many from blogs we never heard of ! It's really interesting (fun?) to watch.

It's proof that the blogosphere can make a difference for many people and companies with aspirations for start-ups and more.

As time permits, a fresh interface will be in place. In the meantime, we will continue the blog in it's current format. It's refreshing that we are beginning to accomplish what we set out to.

Yesterday, we added a widget (see below). It's fully customizable and yours to grab (free of course) if you wish.

Thanks to all!

Charlie Anzman and crew

Saturday, October 13, 2007

Quigo scores Time Inc ads - Could targeted ads threaten Adsense?

Targeted ads have been growing with industry specific companies such as aQuantive (recently acquired by Microsoft), ValueClick Media, DoubleClick (which Google is awaiting regulatory approval to acquire), Quigo, and numerous other platform providers.

Some websites and blogs have moved to these services, some completely abandoning the most popular website revenue service .. yes, Google's Adsense.

This week came news that Quigo scored the coveted Time Inc. contract (People Magazine, CNN Money and others), coming somewhat as a surprise to industry insiders.

As print media (finally) is recognizing that they CAN (and ultimately may have to) make money on the Internet, it'll be interesting to see who the stars are in this space.

In other Adsense news, Google this week made video from YouTube channels available to Adsense publishers. Videos with embedded Adsense ads began appearing on websites on October 9. There's no doubting that Video is growing exponentially on the web. It remains to be seen how relevant, sticky (or annoying?) these new Adsense ads become.

Mapquest trying new Beta online - Maps Online

In a piece posted to TechCrunch it appears Mapquest, and AOL company and still the 'brand-leader' in Internet maps, has a live Beta that adds 'some' of the features already being touted by numerous competitors....

Google maps, with the first open API and a host of new features added over the past year, have been appearing on individual websites almost as fast as Adsense.
Yahoo maps maintains an active discussion group and a loyal following.
Live (MSN) maps (or 'Mappoint') recently added a 3-D version (using Microsoft Virtual Earth).
and even cellphone manufacturer Nokia got in the game last week acquiring Navteq,
as competition begins in the cellphone navigation space.
RandMcNally, one of the older map names (in print and on the web) is still delivering maps as well.

Friday, October 12, 2007

Impressive BOD - We re-visit Associated Content

It's been a while since we visited the 'citizen journalist / publisher' website Associated Content. The interface has been improved, it appears they're getting some advertisers (along with adsense) ... and we were pretty impressed with the current Board of Directors.

Lots of neat stuff can be found here. While we doubt too many of the bloggers are making big bucks, it is a way to get your name out there. There is a lot of 'interesting' reading, although when visiting topics that we are highly familiar with, we found some outright errors and highly opinionated (bias) articles.

Certainly still worth checking out with some real great ongoing potential.

http://www.associatedcontent.com/

Wednesday, October 10, 2007

Google's latest acquisition Jaiku pages already showing up in Google search

On Monday, Google announced the acquisition of Jaiku. Late this evening we are noticing Jaiku pages already showing up in the Google SERPS, in some cases, in the top-10!

Instant fame for Jaiku? Not a bad move by Google :)

Tuesday, October 9, 2007

BlogRush cleans up act and adds features with 'Phase 2'

Income.com's BlogRush, a blog promotion and category sharing service which appeared with a on the scene with a bang about a month ago, is already making some major changes.

BlogRush was immediately controversial with apparently few filters for 'spam' blogs and others questioning whether the service, as introduced, would violate Google's Adsense terms of service (a primary income source for MANY bloggers).

Late Monday, John Reese addressed the community in an e-mail and Blogrush Phase 2 blog entry .

Promising a host of new features, the BlogRush Phase 2 update will include a new dashboard, better security and a "100% Manual Review and New Quality Guidelines".

Sunday, October 7, 2007

MSNBC 2.0 ? - MSNBC.com acquires Newsvine

More and more news networks have been courting 'citizen reporters' in the past year with the widespread availability of video and broadband.

That was capped off today by reports that MSNBC has purchased Newsvine.

Terms of the deal were not disclosed.

Details were posted earlier today to Newsvine here.

Firefox increases market share - Internet Explorer released to all Windows users

According the the analytics we monitor for numerous websites, the Firefox browser has increased market share yet again, to a little over 8 per cent in September.

Not to be outdone by Linux or Firefox, Microsoft posted a new release of Internet Explorer 7 late last week, removing the 'validation requirement' thereby making it available to tens of thousands of users that for 'one reason or another 'were unable to load it previously. Microsoft also announced that IE7 will be introduced automatically to computers via Windows Update over the next few months.

Apple remains in the game with about 2.5 % for their browser Safari, after release of their Beta 3 for Windows.

Saturday, October 6, 2007

If you're really serious about organic search and tech trends

We managed to grab a few moments Saturday to list what we'll call the 'first edition' of our SEO and Tech Daily blogroll. Lower left where it says "We're reading".

While we actually pull about three times these feeds daily, some of the best stuff is already right there. Be sure and check some of them out.

There some EXCELLENT reading, updated frequently.

If you REALLY want to know how to hit the top-10, or just what's happening in this ultra dynamic atmosphere, keep it here (and try some of the new links we've provided).

At the very least, you'll impress the boss on Monday :)

Friday, October 5, 2007

Microsoft launches Health Website HealthVault launches in Beta

Microsoft has launched a new health website in Beta at HealthVault.

Once again, it's a little hard to tell what the gang in Redmond is thinking, as
HealthVault is not carrying the MSN or Live banner. The version we looked at earlier today
(which was interesting and a good start) is flying under the flagship Microsoft Corp banner.

Health-related searches have climbed dramatically on the web in the last
year as more and more people get more involved with their own health care,
something that many doctors are having a difficult time with, and others are welcoming.

Tuesday, October 2, 2007

Live Search shuffles the deck

Readers today are reporting significant changes in MSN's Live portal search results.

"Serps are all over the place" commented one SEO.

Whether or not this change is permanent remains to be seen .... but we are
seeing the same 'phenomenon' (in numerous market segments) right here in Pennsylvania.

"It appears to be the first MAJOR shuffle in numerous markets in some time on Live.com".

Releveancy of the re-alignment (assuming it's not temporary), remains to be seen.

Last week, Microsoft's Live home page changed the look and feel and added new features. Other changes have continued throughout the past few days.

Stay tuned .....

How 'Cuill' is this? Goggle defectors lay plans for competitor

The rumors were around last month. Several ex-Google employees were starting what appeared to be a Google search competitor. No small task.

Now a small website has appeared with a few bios at Cuill (I guess it's supposed to be cool?).

While it remains to be seen what these search gurus are really up to, a better name might be in order? There are just too many mis-spells of Cuill ... But of course, they know that ....

Monday, October 1, 2007

DMOZ alive and well

It all but disappeared from searches for a few days, a rumors ran rampant on the web that the 'human-edited' DMOZ directory was 'dying'.

In fact, DMOZ has a brand-new blog and, of course, one of the first posts explains the so-called 'outage'.

Check it out here