Google Tests Different User Interface Designs on Search Results

Google, after launching the algorithm updates namely the Penguin and the Panda updates and rolling out several versions every so often, still continues to conduct activities that aim to improve user experience. And now, it has been found to have tested having bigger URLS, moving the cache link drop down, and indicating the product quantities in search results. 

The bigger URLs are evident when you search for topics as these are seen under the search snippet. If you have done a search recently, you will see that the URLs of the search results are way bigger than they used to be. From the old size of 13px, it is now up to 16px. Depending on the user, this may prove to be helpful as these are easier to see and it shows lesser clutter in the results.

The cache and similar links have also been moved and are used as a drop down option. And this occurs now within every search result returned by Google. For some it may be ideal and convenient, but for some others, it may look annoying and displaced in the search results pages. 

The product quantities, which is the third test conducted by Google, show the number of products that are listed on a page. At one look, you will be able to see how many products are listed under that URL. 

These are just tests that Google is running to see how it can even improve its services to internet users. Rest assured that Google will make sure every aspect of the issue is covered. 

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Getting to Know more about News Keywords Tag

Search Engine Optimization is definitely becoming more popular as more and more businesses are also seeing the advantages of making use of such SEO Services. However, going with this is also the increasing complexity of the nature of the jobs and other things to consider by webmasters. 

For one, Google just launched the new keywords meta tag for news publishers. Launched in September by the largest search engine, Google, it is a way for news publishers to address the fact that much of the keywords that they hope their stories would fall under or be found in don’t necessarily make it to the story headlines. 

According to Google, there are two reasons why this is happening. 

• It is not ideal to make your headline lengthy and too wordy just to include all the relevant terms you think your reader will be looking for. 

• Journalists fail to differentiate how they are to write for digital media wherein their descriptive headlines are important. Many of them stick to writing headlines that are sensible only when the whole text has been written which is a style that is only good for the printed page. 

That is why news publishers, webmasters and SEO experts are called to observe these facts so that their news articles will be included in the results pages of Google. 

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Twitter Tests “Star” and “Like” Buttons to Replace “Favorite”

Been seeing the words “like” and “star” within tweets?

It was first reported last week by Next Web that Twitter had rolled out a split test of alternatives to the favorite button, with some profiles and some users already seeing tweets showing stars and likes next to the “reply” and “retweet” buttons in place of the word “Favorite” in the current format, which Twitter has been employing for a few years now to enable users to save tweets.

Twitter’s favorite button is the equivalent to the Facebook ‘Like’ button and it also could be used as a means of showing appreciation to a good tweet or a tweeted link or any tweet without replying or retweeting.

Now, it is finally confirmed by Twitter CEO Dick Costolo that the company has been testing a change in its user interface, replacing the Favorite button, which is said to be “heavyweight” with a much “lightweight” options such as “Star” or “Like.”

Costolo stated during the Internet Advertising Bureau’s Engage conference that the change of terminology is hoped to increase engagement with the feature.

“We’re testing some alternative terms for favourite. We feel that Favourite is a little bit too heavy weight so we’re testing some lighter weight terms. Engagement begets engagement. The lighter weight and more frictionless you make it to engage, the more engagement you’ll get,” Costolo said.

According to some SEO experts and webmasters, Google’s Gmail is already using the star feature, while the ‘Like’ button is, as what is well-known, now being heavily uses by Facebook, making both concepts not original.

However, like most online services, Twitter tends to run a number of tests at any given time and it is not guaranteed that a test will ever see the light of day across the site.

Nevertheless, if the word change does eventually go live, this could be used as another useful metric for brands, marketers and search engine optimization Australia experts in their attempt in measuring engagement with Twitter users.

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Majestic SEO Fresh Index Now Updated Within Hours

Majestic SEO, one of the advanced SEO third party link reporting services, has once again made another milestone in its Majestic SEO offerings. 

Just recently, it was announced by Majestic SEO that their linkage data have now been updated to be as fresh as within hours or minutes. 

This is good news to SEO professionals and webmasters as this will really be great with their link building campaign. 

Although the Historic Index, which is said to have 4 trillion URLs, give or take, will still be updated every month. The Fresh Index, which is said to have 191 billion URLs, give or take and have been used to be updated daily, will now be getting new data every hour.

So, now rather than waiting for the entire 24 hours for the link reports to be updated, linkage data updates will be pushed by Majestic SEO throughout the day. And what’s more, it’s done almost hourly, so webmasters and experts in Search Engine Optimization running their link building campaign can see new links to their content sooner. 

It was explained by Majestic SEO that this is important especially in instances when you want to keep track of the progress of acquired links to new viral content or other content that may have a seasonal appeal. 

For now, these updated numbers are said to be introduced into the site explorer. 

Over time, this new technology will be integrated by Majestic SEO across to the rest of their services in incremental phases. So you can expect to see the newest links to be available in the API very soon and in their Reports soon after in the future. 

According to Majestic SEO, this incremental nature of the update is said to be due to the need for balancing the demands of a large number of agencies, professionals and resellers who rely on their data, and those who need the most up to date data 24/7. So, the dumping of their database and starting again isn’t an option for them. 

In addition, it was warned by Majestic SEO that their Trust Flow and Citation Flow Metrics might not be as accurate as possible on the URLs and Domains until a snapshot has been taken, which is still carried out daily. 

The Flow Metrics relies on every other URL that influences it over much iterations of links away that’s why it is impossible to make an accurate assessment of one URL’s Flow Metrics without understanding the entire universe.

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Twitter Launched a User Profile Directory

Twitter has a new user profile directory!

For the past few days, several SEO experts have noticed a link in the footer of Twitter’s home page if you’re signed out, named as “Directory.”

This is said to be a link to Twitter’s unannounced new user profile directory which is hoped to bring more search engine traffic.

Twitter’s new user profile directory is a collection of all Twitter account holders sorted alphabetically from A to Z by what’s indicated in the “Name” field of Twitter profiles, not in the “Username” field that also includes profiles with non-Latin character names, which will enable you to browse through Twitter users in alphabetical order.

According to some social media experts, though the user profile directory page says you can “browse public Twitter profiles,” but it also includes profiles that are protected, too. However, clicking through from the directory to a protected account does not show the person’s tweets; they’re still remained private.

This user profile directory has quietly been rolled out by Twitter to make its profiles more discoverable by Google, Bing and other search engines. However, when asked why Twitter launched the user directory, it was stated by a company spokesperson that it’s “to help people find the accounts they’re looking for with various search engines.”

According to Matt McGee in his recent article for Marketing Land, “Twitter launched the user directory a few weeks ago, but hasn’t made a formal announcement about it. That’s likely because it exists more for search engines than for Twitter users.”

This seems to be true as many professional SEOs and webmasters have observed that from an SEO perspective, Twitter’s user directory seems to follow best SEO practices by showing no more than 100 profile links per page.

Amit Agarwal at Labnol.org via Matt McGee explained that though human visitors don’t find people directories, likes the ones now available on Twitter and Facebook, as being useful (unless when trying to research particular names or surnames), these “are like sitemaps that help search engines bots discover every single profile that exists on the social network.”

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Google's Remarketing in Search Program

Google has rolled out a beta program called Remarketing in Search, which is intended to take the benefits of remarketing and leverage them within the SERP environment.

Remarketing has now become a proven strategy used by many digital marketers in order to maximize conversion activity.

With Google’s Remarketing program, you will be able to display ads to users who have previously visited your website as they browsed the Web.

When using remarketing, you’ll be able to tag pages of your site that correspond to certain categories you want to promote, creating a remarketing list. Then from this, you can create an AdWords campaign where you can display highly relevant messages to search users who have visited these pages as they browse sites across the Google Display Network. Thereby, you are leveraging this customer knowledge in making an impact on your messaging and bidding strategy within your SEM campaigns to improve performance.

Why Leverage Remarketing Within Search?

•    You will be maximizing relevant ad copy. If you know what your users are looking for and applying this knowledge to top your competition in the SERP to other users, then you will be able to likely increase your Clicks-Through Rate and get more visits, while improving your quality score.

•    It can also increase value of the customer and associated click value. This is because users who are familiar with your brand have an increased chance of converting to become a buyer and as such, by being able to reach known users within the SERP, you should be able to have an impact on your bidding strategy, increasing your CPCs on known customers to maximize potential.

•    You will be able to know the content the user has visited, thereby impacting the landing page your search ads link to. By knowing what the user is interested in your ad copy, you will be able to create a personalized landing page relevancy based on the user’s history; thus, enabling you to keep the user back to your landing page.

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Facebook Includes Search History in User's Activity Logs

Facebook has recently added search history to its activity log. 

It was announced recently by Facebook that a personal search history will now be included in users’ Activity Logs.

To be rolled out to all users in the next few weeks, this new feature will enable users to view and delete all or some of their past searches. Currently, there is no way for users to share their search history with friends in the same way that Bing offers. 

But now, Facebook users are given full access and control to what they share with their friends with their own Activity Log, with the option of being able to delete certain queries they make. 

Basically, this search history feature is a drop-down recap of who or what you’ve been searching for when you type things into that search box at the top of your news feed. By clicking the button on your activity log, you will be able to see everything organized by date and query term, via both desktop and mobile sites. And, you will also be able to delete your search terms at any time, just like you can with the stuff you’ve shared through Timeline. 

It seems that this new feature hints at Facebook’s plans entering the search realm, as what was promised by founder Mark Zuckerberg earlier this month. 

Facebook’s moves into the world of web search have long been awaited by analysts and the search engine optimization expert community since Google had announced their own social platform. This is because both are in the position to collect massive amounts of social data as well as employ it in personalized web searches.

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SEMPO Survey: The Most Impactful Trends for Search Marketers

A new study shows that Google’s recent updates as well as the rising trend of the internet and local search have significantly impacted search marketers.

According to the new SEMPO State of Search Marketing Report 2012, there are about nine out of 10 search marketers that have been significantly impacted by Google’s recent algorithm changes, and about the same amount have also been significantly impacted by the rise of the mobile internet and local search. 

The data from the State of Search Marketing Report 2012 was gathered by SEMPO, the world's largest nonprofit organization serving the search and digital marketing industry and marketing professionals, and was based on a global online survey of nearly 900 search marketers from 36 different countries, with about 64 percent being in the US, which was conducted online between March 12 and May 15, 2012. The complete 72 page research report was published by Econsultancy. 

In the survey findings, it was revealed that 47% of in-house/company respondents considered the rise of mobile internet use as highly significant for their search marketing strategies and additional 41% of them considered mobile as significant, with a total of 87% overall.

For In-House/ Company Respondents

There were also 87% who also felt that Google algorithm updates were significant to their search marketing strategy, with 39% saying highly so.

On the agency side, the numbers are similar, though they are more concerned with the rise of local search than Google algorithm changes.

For Agency Respondents

There are 95% of agency respondents said that the rising use of mobile internet has significantly affected their search marketing strategies, 87% for local search and 85% for Google algorithm updates

It was also revealed by the survey that 86 percent of all respondents are expecting their digital marketing budgets to grow and only four percent expecting a decline.

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The New Google’s Page Quality Rating Guidelines

There’s a new Google “Page Quality Rating Guidelines”!

A new version, version 3.27, of Google’s General Guidelines handbook for search quality raters, which was dated June 22, 2012, has finally hit the web, which had caused some apprehensions among the SEO community.

The new General Guidelines handbook, which is now 161 pages long, has now a new “Page Quality Rating Guidelines” section, which is 32 pages long, that instructs human raters how to rate page quality.

Google has posted as an explanation of the concept of Page Quality to its raters, stating, “You have probably noticed that webpages vary in quality. There are high quality pages: pages that are well written, trustworthy, organized, entertaining, enjoyable, beautiful, compelling, etc. You have probably also found pages that seem poorly written, unreliable, poorly organized, unhelpful, shallow, or even deceptive or malicious. We would like to capture these observations in Page Quality rating”

According to Google’s Distinguished Engineer Matt Cutts, he, however, insisted that Google’s search engine results are not directly affected by these ratings. But, without doubt, the feedbacks gotten from Google's human raters do play some part in the roughly 500 algorithmic tweaks that occur every year.

Regardless, in the new rating guideline, a high-level view of what Google is looking for in a high-quality website is provided.

The new handbook now breaks down the aspects of a page into three main areas: the Main Content, which could be in the form of a news article or a blog post, information about a product, a video, a tool, a search box, or a log-in; Supplementary Content, which could be internal navigation or links to related products or videos; and the Advertisements, which may also be referred to as ads, sponsored links, sponsored listings, or sponsored results.

In the new handbook, the existing section on “URL Rating Tasks with User Locations” has also been revised and expanded to 16 pages from the previous 12 pages.

There are also no pages, whether its news, forum, shopping, encyclopedia, or other, that are considered automatically high or low quality. Now, Google essentially views content as having high-quality if it is “very satisfying, useful, or helpful for its purpose,” of which the purpose could be, according to the handbook, to share objective, personal, or social information; share an opinion; entertain; share pictures, videos, or other media; sell a product or service; post questions and answers; and provide file-sharing or downloads.

Also, ratings aren’t now assigned based on a query as well as reviews are now strictly being done based on page quality.

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Leveraging Your Infographic to Get Quality Backlinks

Nowadays, infographics are used by providers of search engine optimisation services to specifically generate or increase natural links to a target website.

A great infographic on a webpage will get people talking and hopefully linking to you as well as other websites. Such can also then send a link back to you (as most infographic terms of use insist of having a text link within a description, usually below them). Nowadays, even Australia SEO experts use infographics in their articles as well as on the latest social media buzzword, Pinterest.

So with this in mind, professional SEOs should leverage infographics, making the most out of your infographic in terms of building and gaining the most links.

Here are some TIPS on how to build links from Infographic:

1. Make your Infographic Shareable

Allow your readers to share your infographic easier by adding social media sharing buttons that are distinctly visible on the post and including a clear call to action at the end of your blog post to encourage them to share your infographic with their friends.

Likewise, make sure also that reposting of your infographic and linking back to you would also be easy as possible. The best way to do this is to add a HTML embed code as this code will not only make it easy for people to re-publish your infographic, but it will also ensure that they link back to you (via an image link) and allow you to control the anchor text.

You can also add your brand name to your infographic by adding your company logo and your site's URL at the footer of your infographic. This will ensure that people know where the content came from as there are some people where they will repost your infographic without crediting you as the original source and giving you a backlink.

2. Build Quality Links for your Infographic

Encouraging your readers to share your inforgraphic with their friends is not enough, you also need to build links for it. One easy way is to submit it to some infographic directories such as Visual.ly, Cool Infographics, Infographics Showcase, and Amazing Infographics. Almost all of these sites will allow a credit link back to the original designer or publisher.

Also, another great way to build links is by guest blogging. Since an infographic is an image, it doesn't count as duplicate content, so you can continue to post them even if it's been published on your site or blog. However, make sure that you write a unique content for your infographic. Then look for some authority sites that are in a relevant niche and start sending out some emails request. So for each site that accepts your request, make sure to write a brand new description or post to accompany the infographic. So as long as you're not making duplications of that copy, you can repeat this process multiple times, gaining more and more links each time you do so.

3. Reformat Your Infographic For Other Channels

To ensure that you can get the most out of your infographic in terms of inbound links and referred traffic, you can reformat your infographic for other channels.

You can do this by animating your infographic. This will enable you to target video distribution platforms in addition to infographic submission sites. You can make use of Adobe After Effects (or a similar program) if you know how. Or hire a Web Design Company in Australia to do this on your behalf. Make sure to supply them with the working file, which will most likely be in Illustrator or Photoshop format).

Another way to reformat, particularly if you have a long infographic with lots of different stats, is by chopping it up into slides and turning it into a slideshow, using either PowerPoint or PDF format, which can then be uploaded to platforms such as SlideShare or Scribd.

4. Promote your Inforgaphic on Social Media Sites

Also promote your infographic via social media and bookmarking platforms. You can promote the infographic via your own and your company's Twitter, Facebook, Digg, Reddit, and StumbledUpon accounts, particularly if you have fairly strong profiles on those platforms.

Also, remember to include relevant hashtags with your Tweets. This can help to widen your reach beyond your normal friends and followers, giving you a better chance of retweet and referred traffic.

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Google+ Custom URLs Now Available For Limited Verified Accounts

Google+ has finally had custom URLs for pages, profiles.

Just recently, Google has announced that Google+ users will eventually be able to create a vanity or custom URL for their Google+ profile, enabling them to personalize their URLs.

The custom URLs are said to be short, easy-to-remember web addresses that will be linking directly to a member’s profile or page on Google+.

This is good news to people providing on search engine optimization services.

However, Google says, this is, for the time being, available to large brands and verified celebrities thus far. This includes, for now, Toyota, Britney Spears, Ubisoft, David Beckham and Delta.

Still, according to Google, it will soon roll out the new feature to all Google+ users, enabling them to personalize, and shorten, their URLs on Google+, Google's social network.

Google posted, “At first, we’re introducing custom URLs to a limited number of verified profiles and pages. But over time we plan to offer custom URLs to many more brands and individuals, so please stay tuned!”

In the new feature, the user's name and a '+' sign will be displayed directly behind the Google.com domain. So, for example, as David Beckham has registered the +DavidBeckham address, his Google+ URL will now be shown as google.com/+DavidBeckham.

These custom URLs, according to Google, are intended to help users find people with shared interests, as well as simplify the Google+ profile search process.

From a branding perspective, it is a great help to a search engine optimization expert in getting more users to their clients’ Google+ business page and then onto their site.

To make your custom URL, login to your Google+ account, then click on your name. Next is copy the long string of numbers in the URL (which is your Google+ userID), then go to gplus.to. From there, select a short name, then enter your Google+ userID and click on . That’s it.

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Google Handwrite: A New Way for Web Search on Mobiles and Tablets

A new mobile browser beta feature that works with smartphones and tablets has just been recently rolled out by Google.

Called Handwrite, this new feature is said to enable mobile and tablet users to actually “write” their search query into the browser by using their pointer fingers, instead of typing on the keyboard when they’re on the go.

To enable the Handwrite feature, go to Google.com on your phone, then tap the Settings link at the bottom of the page or if you’re using a tablet, just click the gear icon in the upper right corner of your browser. Then, enable the new Handwrite setting.

Once the feature is enabled, according to Google, you can “Tap the Handwrite icon on the bottom right corner of your screen to activate the writing surface.”

Also, Google says that autocomplete works with Handwrite. So, after writing a few letters, you’ll be able to see autocomplete options, which are suggested search terms, that appear below the search box. To choose the option that you are looking for, just tap it to search.

Google also stated that users can also write anywhere on the screen; so there is no need for them to stay within the search box. The Handwrite feature also allows users to write multiple lines of text.

Currently, only the printing style of writing, not cursive, is what the Handwrite feature recognizes, though it also recognizes both lower and uppercase letters.

Also, Handwrite will only accept characters in the language based in your search language setting.

Handwrite is also said to work in both landscape and portrait view, with the landscape (horizontal) allowing more space for longer queries.

Google had advised, “For longer queries, you can continue writing and use the arrows next to the autocompletions to move the right one into the search box.”

According to an Official Google Blog post written by software engineer Rui Ueyama about the new setting, “We designed Handwrite to complement rather than replace typing: with the feature enabled, you can still use the keyboard at any time by tapping on the search box. Handwrite is experimental, and works better in some browsers than others—on Android devices, it works best in Chrome. For now, we’ve enabled Handwrite for iOS5+ devices, Android 2.3+ phones and Android 4.0+ tablets—in 27 languages.”

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Google Issues Unnatural Link Warnings to Webmasters

Just recently, new unnatural link warnings were sent by Google to webmasters.

Since July 19 this year, alerts were sent out by Google’s Search Quality team via Webmaster Tools, informing site owners, SEO Experts and webmasters of the presence of artificial or unnatural links pointing to their site that could be intended to manipulate PageRank.

The alert had also encouraged them to make changes to their site, making their site comply with Google’s existing quality guidelines.

Of course these new batch of unnatural link warnings have once again freaked out the SEO world. Fearing penalties or reduction in search result’s rankings, many SEOs were catapulted to do assessment of their link profiles, which is no easy task for sites with thousands of links.

Just recently, after successfully putting the fear of getting ranking demotions to many businesses, Google’s Distinguished Engineer then told everyone, via a Google+ post, that there is no need to panic and then gave assurance to everyone that the recent batch of unnatural link warnings were just a case of Google trying to be more transparent and not necessarily a warning that a penalty is coming.

As posted on Google+ by Google's Matt Cutts, “If you received a message yesterday about unnatural links to your site, don't panic. In the past, these messages were sent when we took action on a site as a whole. Yesterday, we took another step towards more transparency and began sending messages when we distrust some individual links to a site. While it's possible for this to indicate potential spammy activity by the site, it can also have innocent reasons.”

So, Google is also sending these notification warnings to webmasters, notifying them of unnatural links pointing to their site even if the links will not hurt them.

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Bing Launched a Disavow Link Tool on its Webmaster Tools

Bing has a new disavow link tool, beating Google to the punch!

Microsoft’s Bing had recently announced that you can now disavow links within Bing Webmaster Tools. This is great news for SEO community. 

Now, webmasters or providers of search engine optimization services will be able to mark any links coming into your site that you “disavow” within Bing Webmaster Tools.

This new Bing disavow link tool, according to Microsoft, will “tell the engine you just don’t want to associate your content with “that” site”.

When asked why Bing’s new disavow link tool was launched and why a site owner would be motivated to spend reviewing links and determining if they should be disavowed, Microsoft says in its post that they have been hearing over the months some webmasters wanting to gain more control over links pointed at their content. They would want the ability to inform that they do not trust such particular links. That is why this latest redesign answers this concern.

Microsoft also posted that the input from this new tool will send signals to them indicating that the webmasters want to distance themselves from certain links for whatever reason. Though this tool does not really have any direct impact on the site’s ranking, it will make Bing understand more clearly what webmasters feel towards links pointing at their sites.

No idea what that means tactically?

Duane Forrester explains it better when Microsoft was asked why someone would want to use this tool and what the result would be.

Forrester explained that this new tool will basically give webmasters a way to alert Bing. He said, “A signal if you will – to the fact they don’t support a particular link (or group of links) pointing to their site. Whether from negative SEO, an old paid link effort they’d like to distance themselves from, or whatever, the tools allows them to tell us how they see the link, essentially.”

Forrester further explains that the tool will especially be helpful especially during instances when the webmasters are first able to see something related to their website even before Bing is able to crawl them. Therefore, the spikes seen will signal them to investigate. In a nutshell, the tool will enable Bing to understand what the webmaster is feeling towards certain links.

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Webmaster Tools Added New Crawl Error Alerts

Google has just recently announced via a blog post in its Webmaster Central Blog that is has rolled out new Crawl Error alerts. 

“Since Googlebot regularly visits your site, we know when your site exhibits connectivity issues or suddenly spikes in pages returning HTTP error response codes (e.g. 404 File Not Found, 403 Forbidden, 503 Service Unavailable, etc). If your site is timing out or is exhibiting systemic errors when accessed by Googlebot, other visitors to your site might be having the same problem!” Google posted.

So, according to Google, they will send alerts to webmasters or site owners when they see such errors. These alerts will be in the form of messages in the Webmaster Tools Message Center that will let you know what they have detected.

Previously, you can only receive alerts via Webmaster Tools when your site is experiencing some serious issues. Now, with this latest update, crawl Error alerts will be sent by Google via Webmaster Tools as well as to your email (if you set it up to forward to email) when you get crawl errors.

“Hopefully, given this increased communication, you can fix potential issues that may otherwise impact your site’s visitors or your site’s presence in search,” Google further posted.

Google will now send you alerts for both site wide and page specific issues.

Site Error Alerts for Major Site-Wide Problems

• DNS server is down or misconfigured

• web server itself is firewalled off

• web server is declining connections from Googlebot

• web server is overloaded or down

• robots.txt file of your site is inaccessible

URL Error Alerts for Less Critical Issues

• Server error

• Soft 404

• Access denied

• Not found

• Not followed

This latest update on Google Webmaster Tools is another great way for webmasters or SEO Experts to keep them more informed about the state of their site.

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Google Says Spam Emails not Sent by Android Botnet

Google had denied claims made by Microsoft engineer Terry Zink that Android devices were discovered to being used to send spam as part of an international Android spam botnet. 

In reaction to Microsoft’s Android botnet reports, Google claimed there is no evidence to support Zink’s warning that a new botnet is forcing infected Android phones to churn out spam.

Google said in a statement, "The evidence does not support the Android botnet claim.”

Search giant Google said that its own internal research indicated these spam messages were stemming from PCs, as opposed to smartphones.

"Our analysis suggests that spammers are using infected computers and a fake mobile signature to try to bypass anti-spam mechanisms in the email platform they're using," Google said.

The Android botnet reports is said to have initially stemmed from Zink, when it was claimed that he had discovered evidence that the Android ecosystem had been successfully infiltrated by a botnet.

In his post, Zink gave a warning that there is a new form of the malware that he found to be accessing Yahoo Mail accounts on Android devices to send spam messages.

It was also reported that he had tracked the originating IP addresses to Asia, Eastern Europe, South America, and the Middle East.

If true, this botnet would be the first ever discovered successfully targeting the Android ecosystem.

However, since Google's attack, a second blog post was issued by Zink, admitting of the possibility that the spam headers could have been spoofed to make it look like they came from Android devices instead of a PC.

Zink wrote, "Yes, it's entirely possible that bot on a compromised PC connected to Yahoo Mail, inserted the message-ID thus overriding Yahoo's own Message-IDs and added the 'Yahoo Mail for Android' tagline at the bottom of the message all in an elaborate deception to make it look like the spam was coming from Android devices.”

"The other possibility is that Android malware has become much more prevalent and because of its ubiquity, there is sufficient motivation for spammers to abuse the platform. The reason these messages appear to come from Android devices is because they did come from Android devices."

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Matt Cutts' Opinion About Links Versus Social Signals

Matt Cutts, Google's head of search spam, had discussed his opinion about links versus social signals.

Last month, topics like the possibility of social signals already replacing links as a primary SEO signal affecting Google’s rankings came up during the keynote conversation with Google’s Matt Cutts at SMX Advanced conference by Danny Sullivan in Seattle.

Danny Sullivan, Search Engine Land’s Editor-In-Chief, interviewed Cutts, asking a series of link-related questions that led the discussion through SEO topics like no-followed links, affiliate links, paid links as well as links versus social signals among others.

For a few years now, there are some webmasters that have made suggestions that links are being replaced by social signals as a quality signal for Google’s ranking algorithm.

One of those debates in the SEO world that is heating up right now (more so in the wake of the Panda and Penguin updates) is links versus social signals.

But, according to Cutts, he explained that it’s much too soon to say that links are dead.

Sullivan asked, “Do links still work, or are social signals gonna replace them?”

Cutts admits they’re “not necessarily the best quality signal right now.”

Links do matter but not site-wide links.

“We’ve done a good job of ignoring boilerplate, site wide links. In the last few months, we’ve been trying to make the point that not only is link buying like that not doing any good, we’re turning the dial up to let people know that certain link spam techniques are a waste of money.”

What Matt Cutts seems to say is most of the time when you buy a link, it tends to end up in a footer or sidebar and that this has little to no worth compared to editorial links, which is said to generally appear on a single page in the main body of the content.

Matt Cutts did say links are still going to be a more powerful signal for search rankings than social signals for the foreseeable future. However, Cutts also said that in ten years that may change but right now, links are indeed more important.

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What's the New Strategy for Mobile SEO?

According to Google’s CEO in his keynote at the Internet Advertising Bureau’s Annual Leadership meeting, the growth of mobile search is much faster than desktop search.

Nowadays, it has become crucial for businesses to shift their focus to mobile as an important piece of their overall marketing campaigns that can drive substantial traffic and increase revenue.

Mobile search is one form of SE querying technique that makes use of a wireless/mobile platform or handheld device with an Internet connection, such as a smartphone or tablet. It enables search users to find mobile content on sites that are available to mobile devices on mobile networks.

With these, Google has come out and supported a mobile strategy, with free specific SEO friendly recommendations.

Google uses 3 ways to provide mobile content to users and has provided distinct recommendations for each. This includes, when a mobile user requests a particular URL, Google will serve the same HTML as the desktop version of the page and make use of CSS3 media queries in changing the look of the site (ideal); or serve HTML and CSS that is different from the desktop version of the page; or redirect a user to a different URL utilizing mobile optimized content.

Making use of the starting point of a mobile user requesting a desktop URL, it is said that the usage of same URL, same HTML has become the industry standard. Generally, this is because of the SEO benefit gained in consolidating all ranking metrics to one URL and it is easy and simple to implement (simplicity of implementation).

When serving different HTML for mobile users, Google suggests that a Vary HTTP header may be added to the server response. This is done to make sure that Google knows about and crawls both the desktop and the mobile version of the URL.

There are instances that a search engine optimization expert will commonly use special site/URLs for mobile content. This is normally use and seen in the form of a subdomain m.example.com.

Google recommends that when using alternative URLs for mobile, you should make use of the link canonical tag on mobile pages pointing to the desktop version of the URL as well as use the link alternate tag on desktop pages pointing to the mobile version of the URL

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Google Received Search Censorship Requests

In the last six months of 2011, Google has received almost 12,000 items requests from government authorities to remove political content from its search index. According to them, they were alarmed by government requests, fearing that this may place free expression at risk.

Google’s Senior Policy Analyst, Dorothy Chou, revealed that the requests received aren’t always from the usual suspects either. There are Western democracies not typically associated with censorship who were found participating in the requested removal of political content.

During its twice-yearly Transparency Report, which is done every six months and contains in part information about government requests to remove content or access private user data, the world's largest web search engine released data for the period of July to December 2011, showing that there were a total of 467 court orders and 561 other requests (by executives, police, etc.) to remove almost 12,000 pieces of content from their search index, about a quarter more than during the first half of last year.

Chou said, "Unfortunately, what we've seen over the past couple years has been troubling, and today is no different."

"We hoped this was an aberration. But now we know it's not."

In addition, there were over 18,000 requests sent by governments for access to the personal data of 28,562 users worldwide. There are also some cases, such as those user data requests by the governments of Russia and Turkey, where Google refused to comply with a single request.

However, with regards to the United States and Brazil, Google’s compliance with user data requests is said to have exceeded 90 percent.

In the second half of last year, Google said it had complied with around 65 percent of court orders and 47 percent of informal requests to remove content.

Leading all countries once again in the number of user data requests is the United States, as they did in the first half of 2011.

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Qwiki-pedia on Bing Search Results

Bing’s search results are now featuring Qwikis.

Just a few weeks after launching its revamped interactive video and multimedia format, Qwiki is in partnership with Microsoft’s Bing search engine in bringing Qwiki results right on Bing search result pages.

Now, Qwiki-pedia is added by Bing in their search results, where Bing searchers can see short, captioned videos that turn text on Wikipedia pages into words that are spoken by a robotic female voice, as they’re treated to a scrolling slideshow of related images, videos, and maps.

For instance, if you conduct a search, let’s say for the term “Steve Ballmer” on Bing now, along with the regular blue links, a Qwiki’s entry on the search term you type will be displayed, embedded right in the search results. Specifically, below the Wikipedia entry, you will be able to see a play button next to a link to “ Steve Ballmer - Watch the Qwiki”. Click on this play button, and you will be able to play the Qwiki interactive presentation inline on the page.

According to Qwiki founder and CEO Doug Imbruce, “Qwiki’s integration into Bing combines search and video – two of the biggest trends in Internet history – into a powerful platform that for the first time ever, turns search results into interactive, playable experiences.”

Close to 3 million Qwikis are being integrated by Qwiki into Bing’s search engine. But the new format that was launched in May, which ABC News has begun to use on its own site is not included in those Qwikis.

The Qwiki being integrated into the Bing results is said to be machine-generated and features a robotic, computer-based narrator. The newer format is also planned to be integrated soon by Qwiki.

Imbruce said, “Eventually, any web site owner will be able to leverage this experience to generate higher engagement within their search results.”

Though, Bing’s deal with the startup company will be initially limited to appearing beneath millions of Wikipedia results, a plan of “deeper integration” was promised by Bing in coming months.

If you want more details, you can watch the video demonstrating Qwiki on Bing, featuring Bing Director Stefan Weitz, released by the company.

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