Welcome to another edition of ‘7 Days of Search and Social‘ – It was a somewhat quiet world out there last week. Sure, we had Google changing the way Brits spell (or did they) and also news of using Twitter follower counts as a metric. But other than that, I didn’t come across a whole lot. We really do seem to start the year slow in the search world. Oh, and if you need a good laugh, see ‘the Google Toilet‘ in the Video section :0)
None the less, there is plenty of reading for the obsessed search geek… Enjoy!
Lead Story
Google wants to change UK laungage; NOT
This story was easily my personal fav last week. For those that missed it, Google was offering to supplant the ‘z’ version of ‘search engine optimization’ for the traditional (and more appropriate) ‘s’ in the spelling. More here;
- Americanize This! Google Changing My Search Spelling By Default (my personal Fav) – SEO Chicks
- Is Google Changing The Queen’s English? – Media Post
- Google Now Corrupting Lingual Identity – Search Engine Journal
- Google is trying to change the English language – Blogstorm
- Showing Results For Search Engine Optimization? But I Searched For Search Engine Optimisation – Hobo SEO
Now, why is it so titillating? You see there is every reason to believe that this was no more than a result of the weighting of a few processes. Right away I went and searched the data from Google Insights (here) and Trends (here). As you can see, around last September there was actually a shift in which was being searched more.
If I had to guess, the geo/language systems that rank (and do NLP) were mucked up and the actual query data (of ‘z’ seemingly being more common) produced the effect. This would certainly be an unforeseen situation.
At the end of the day, Google stated it was all a bug in the system where they were suggesting American English spelling refinements. In a statement they said, “We have temporarily rolled back the change while we fix the problem.”
Me? Looks like a query analysis weight took the raw data and was over-riding the geo-signals… Which means spell correct/recommendations are likely query driven. But we may never know for certain.
| Quick Nav Links – Talk of the Town – Geek Central – Social Search – Local SEO – Videos – Tools – Patents – |
Talk of the town
| Lord of the SEO Friendly CMS – Jon was highlighting some of the issues with, and his thoughts on the perfect, content management system. This is a huge consideration as it can handcuff one into working from behind. A good addition to this week’s edition. |
| Handling Blank Review Pages for Better Traffic and Conversion – I enjoyed this one as it is one of the little tactics that can maximize the granular elements of an SEO program. We want to have every advantage possible, so keep this one in the arsenal. |
| The Great Grandma Content Caper – ok, the title alone as enough to get this one into the newsletter, but the content delivers as well. Michael’s advice for content publishers dealing with scrapers/crap-hatters, is spot on as always. |
| Cleaning up the SEO Cesspool – while I appreciate Allan’s ‘rant-ish’ title, he’s fighting the age old battle of search ‘standards/ethics’ which history has proven to be a losing one. But, that doesn’t mean it isn’t worth putting out there again… (the comments are great as well). |
| Tracking Your SEO Success With Charts – Aaron dropped into SEL with some pretty pictures and good ideas. As a data geek, I am always drawn to the precioussss… I mean, purdy graphs and such. |
| After The Hack, Should I Still Trust Google & The Cloud With My Data? – After Google was attacked Danny gave pause to muse over the security of ‘the cloud’. I particularly enjoyed this one and it is a fairly important editorial. Read it if ye haven’t already. |
| Build Links with Better Answers – as we’re always looking for new angles for link building, it was nice to see this post on SEJ from Jennifer. It’s actually an old tactic (answering a burning question as link bait) but she does a great job of laying out the process. Nice work Jen. |
| 2010: The Year of the Little Guy – Julie Joyce was on a road tour this week (from the SEO chicas) and stopped into Search Cowboys… I personally work a lot with SMEs which made this anthem to the little guy ever so enjoyable! Kickin’ arse and takin’ ranks! |
| Getting Links for a Poker site is easier than you think – We also had a Lyndon alert last week (don’t hear much from him anymore). I’d read this one if you’re having problems with the creative process in content development. There’s always more than one way to skin a cat! |
| 2010 Marketing Predictions & Resolutions – this is a round up on Search Engine Land of the many predictions/resolutions made by search bloggers going into 2k10. Some interesting theories abound, that’s for sure. |
| Detecting and dealing with duplicate content – we had a guest poster on the Trail last week, (Mark Thompson) and he put out a pretty good post. He looks at methods and tools for dealing with dupes and even scrapers. While I wouldn’t worry about every page, pillar content and target pages are best to keep clean. Give it a read! |
| Quick Nav Links – Talk of the Town – Geek Central – Social Search – Local SEO – Videos – Tools – Patents – |
Search Geek Central
| Quick Nav Links – Talk of the Town – Geek Central – Social Search – Local SEO – Videos – Tools – Patents – |
Search Patents
| Yahoo Predictions of a degree of relevance between query re-writes and a search query System and method for indexing web content using click-through features |
/end SOSG session
| Quick Nav Links – Talk of the Town – Geek Central – Social Search – Local SEO – Videos – Tools – Patents – |
‘7 Days of Search and Social’ is a joint effort from Search Engine Journal and the SEO Training Dojo to bring you the latest in SEO and Social Search news. Each week (on Tuesdays) we’ll be posting the highlights of the most recent (SEO Geeks) newsletter here on Search Engine Journal.
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