Posts Tagged ‘google’

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Google Launches New Search Features

Thursday, June 16th, 2011

At the “Inside Search” media event held in San Francisco on Tuesday, Google announced a few new innovations that are aimed at helping users save time when searching online.  The first was a complete revamp of its mobile search interface which will now give users easier access to restaurants, bars and coffee shops in their local area. The new mobile version of Google.com which has a new set of icons at the bottom of the mobile site will gives users instant access to local search results. Google Goggles also has a new translate feature which will allow users to point their phone at any foreign text and then receive instant translation to their native language.

 
Next was Google desktop which will have a few new features, this includes voice search similar to mobile voice search.  Users will be given a microphone icon next to the search bar which you can speak your query to find what you are looking for. Mike Cohen, the manager of speech technology at Google, said: “I want people to be able to speak [their query] to find what they want…We want to change users’ mental model, he also revealed that there is two years’ worth of mobile speech put into Google’s system every day and added that the voice team were working hard to improve the tool’s accuracy. You will also now be able to drag or upload images directly in to the search bar, Google will then take your image and break down the components and provide you with any relevant information that it has stored on that image. Both of these new features will be rolling out over the next few days

Finally, Google Instant Pages which is designed to prerender search results in the background which Google is confident that you will click. This will save users between two and five seconds on typical searches giving near instant page display.

Amit Singhal, who leads Google’s search and development, said

“Instant Pages is the next big leap for Google,” “It will break down big barriers in users’ quest for information. At the end of the day our job is to get the information and knowledge people need in a blink of an eye.”

The beta of Instant Pages will roll out the week; however will only be available to Google Chrome users for now.

Something that was missing from the event was the mention of the new social features that Google have introduced, maybe these will be announced at a later date when Google finally decides what its going to do in the social media space.

 

Matthew Marley – 360innovate

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Google Launches Business Photos

Friday, May 6th, 2011

Google announced yesterday they will be releasing a new feature for Google Places called “Google Business Photos”. The new photo offering will be integrated in to the already popular pages service which Google provides for free to online businesses and is aimed at enhancing current places pages that it shows in organic search results.

The type of business’s Google are interested in speaking with are restaurants, hotels, retail shops, and other storefront businesses. Visitors who then search for your business online will have a unique opportunity to view panoramic views of the interior of your business premises. The new service which is aimed at small business owners will give brick and water company’s the opportunity to promote their business visually online and will be a great way to show potential customers what your business is really like.

According to Google’s head of local search Marisa Mayer who was speaking yesterday at the “Social Loco” conference in San Francisco. Google Places now has over 5 million reviews and ratings and continues to grow as Google maintain their focus on local search. Google is inviting local businesses from a few city’s in the US, Australia and Japan to apply initially, Google will then send a sponsored photographer who will take interior shots of your business.

If you would like to find out more information on Google Business Photos or apply just follow this link

If you are a business and would like to find out more about Google Places and Local SEO, and how this can benefit your business online then please feel free to give us a call on 0141 241 6190

Matthew Marley

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Google Launches + 1

Thursday, March 31st, 2011

Yesterday Google launched its new “+ 1” service which is designed to enhance the social functionality within its search engine. The new service which is Google’s version of the Facebook “like” or the “retweet” button will add a “ + 1 button” to search results within Google and allow users to publicly share recommendations with friends.

To recommend something all you have to do is click on the “+1 button” on any webpage, this will then share the information within you Google Profile and social circle, which will mainly be your contacts from other Google services including Gmail, Google Reader, Google Buzz and Google Chat , although Google has confirmed that It would be interested in using data from other services including Flickr, Quora and Twitter which Google considers “open web apps”.

According to Google Product Manager Rob Spiro “The beauty of “+1′s” is their relevance – you get the right recommendations (because they come from people who matter to you), at the right time (when you are actually looking for information about that topic) and in the right format (your search results),”.

One of the main concerns of many people in theonline marketingworld is how will this effect organic search and SEO ?, Google rep Jim Prosser confirmed that +1 would not have any effect, however this is something that Google is very interested in and may look at incorporating in the future.

Will this be another failure like Buzz and Wave or has Google finally managed to put together a social product that the users will actually find useful ! what’s your thoughts ?

If you are in the US and would like to experiment with “+ 1″ then you can check it out here Google.com/experimental

 

Matthew Marley
360innovate

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Is Bing Coming To Facebook ?

Friday, March 25th, 2011

Last night AllFacebook.com – The Unofficial blog of all things Facebook, reported the company could be testing a new web search feature at the top of their pages. The search box which would more than likely direct traffic to Bing due to Microsoft’s relationship with Facebook could be a game changer in the search industry which is dominated by Google. However I can imagine this wouldn’t come cheap; Bing would have to pay a substantial amount to have its search engine on such a valuable property like Facebook. This isn’t new to Social Networking; Google was willing to spend millions per year on MySpace allowing its users to have access to search within the site when it was in its peak.

Could Facebook be looking at another revenue stream, before its IPO next year? According to the Search Engine Land who Facebook contacted last night, they have not been testing this feature and have said that they user who posted this screenshot could in-fact been infected with malware.

See the full statement below

“We are not testing the placement of a separate web search field and have no plans to do so. We believe the second search field or “Search the Web” box appeared on peoples’ accounts as the result of unknown actions by a third party targeting the browser (potentially a browser plugin or malware) unrelated to Facebook. If people think their browser may have been affected by malware, we offer a remediation process which includes a free browser-based virus scanning tool built by McAfee. Users are required to run this Scan and Repair tool and clean their machines of malware before accessing their account.”

This could be true, however I’m not sure if I’m buying it. Bing will continue to be a major player in the search industry and a deal like this could have a significant impact especially with Facebook’s continued growth. I wouldn’t count them out just yet, many people focus primarily on Google when implementing a SEO or Online Marketing strategy, and this is not recommended, something as small as the addition of a search feature in Facebook could shake up the industry over night !

Matthew Marley
360innovate

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How Social Media Connected Japan !

Wednesday, March 16th, 2011

It’s been almost a week since the devastating scenes in Japan which left most of us in shock, and it’s during times like these we don’t realize how powerful Social Media can be in a time of crisis. Following its influence in political events in places such as Egypt, Tunisia and Libya over the past few weeks, social media was once again used to connect people in a time of need.

With many of Japans communication systems being down since the tragedy the internet has seemed to remain untouched, allowing the people of Japan to communicate with family and loved ones who may have been affected by the earthquake.  One of the first tools to appear on the web was the Google People Finder which acts as a directory and message board so people with friends and family who are missing can look for lost loved ones and post notes saying they are safe.

Not only is Social Media being used to help people communicate it’s also being utilized to help gather support for the country, many aid organization are using Twitter to reach a wider audience including the Red Cross who have launched also launched a similar service to Google and a “Text REDCROSS” campaign, which quickly became a trending topic on Twitter following the rush of people willing to donate to help the victims.

We have also seen most of the main stream media outlets use videos, pictures and updates that have been shared across sites such as Twitter, Facebook, YouTube and Flickr in there breaking reports from all around the world.

Following the earthquake on Friday the U.S. embassy in Japan encouraged any of its U.S. citizens in the country to use text messages and social media sites such and Twitter and Facebook as a means to communicate and connect with family overseas.

A lot has been said about Social Media over the past few months, some of it bad, some of it good but there is no denying that in a time of need and crisis this is one of our most important assets.

Matthew Marley
360innovate

 

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Google Launches New “Personal Profiles”

Thursday, March 3rd, 2011

Google announced last night that they have begun to roll out a redesign of its Google Profile pages, this is the profile that allows Google account users to add pictures and information about them. If you pick to have you Google Profile set as public then there is a very good chance when someone searches for you this will be the first thing that they will come across, which could be very important should you be looking to create a personal brand online.

One of the things that you will notice straight away is the similarities to Facebook. The profile page also allows you to enter detailed information including age, occupation, photos, social media sites and your location . Making it look a lot more professional compared to its predecessor.

In a blog post which announced the new profiles Google reiterates that Google Profiles are designed for individuals, not businesses; Google claims it’s working on “new ways for businesses to engage with their customers,” and hopefully we can expect some updates there in the near future.

Could all these recent updates to the various Google services be the beginning of the much rumoured “Google Me” or “Google + 1” which is said to be the backbone of Google’s next attempt at social media.

 

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Google Officially Takes The Fight To Content Farms !

Friday, February 25th, 2011

Yesterday Google launched a pretty big change to their algorithm that will impact 11.8% of all its search queries. The update has been rolled out in the US only for now and will reduce the rankings of many low quality sites – sites which don’t provide value add for the users and scrape content from other sites which are not very useful, mainly being content farms. Once the algorithm change has been complete sites with original relevant content will be rewarded encouraging a healthier web ecosystem. Google has also noted that this update does not use the data that they have received since the launch of the new Personal Blocklist Chrome extension which we blogged about here, however they have compared the data with the sites that the algorithm change has identified. If Google does manage to stop these black hat SEO techniques then it will be a considerable achievement as this has somewhat plagued the search industry for some time now. So how will this affect you ? If your company provides good quality, relevant and original content and you update your site regularly, then this latest algorithm update will have very little or no effect on site.

Matthew Marley 360innovate

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Google Social Search Update !

Thursday, February 17th, 2011

Google Social Search Update

Google has rolled out some pretty exciting updates to its social search today.

They have announced that they will now be integrating social media results with regular listings which will see annotations from your friends and the people that you care about should you be logged in to your Google account. Previously these results showed at the bottom of the page, however with this update they will be in direct view of the user.

This could be massive for Google in their war with Facebook who has an alliance with Bing. By connecting with everyone else in the social world Google has shown its more than capable of creating its own social graph !

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The Death Of The Content Farms !!

Tuesday, February 15th, 2011

RIP Content Farms!!

Could this finally be the end of the dreaded content farms?

With the rise of SEO in recent years content farms have become all too familiar when searching on Google. However, yesterday Google launched an experimental Chrome extension which will allows users to block sites from their web search results which they feel are not relevant to the search query.  Once you have installed the extension and blocked a site the information will then be sent to Google, who have said that they will study the resulting feedback and explore using it as a potential ranking signal for search results.

Content Farms

This is an early release however Google hopes this extension will improve the users search experience. The extension is available in English, French, German, Italian, Portuguese, Russian, can be downloaded here.

Matthew Marley 360innovate

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Twitter in talks with Google & Facebook !!

Thursday, February 10th, 2011

Social Media Marketing

This is some pretty big news in the world of Social Media this morning, if true. According to reports in The Guardian today Twitter has been in talks with potential suitors, which include both Facebook and Google.  The report has indicated that the deal could be valued at $10 billion, however according to a few sources the talks haven’t progressed very far as of yet.  The Wall Street Journal has reported that the micro blogging service which had estimated revenues at $45 million last year is now valued at a whopping $8 – 10 billion dollars. Both companies are are believed to have bid for Twitter in the past when Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg is believed to have offered Twitter $500m in stock for the company in 2008, however the deal collapsed. Google were also rumoured to have has a deal rejected recently before the search giant made an offer for Groupon which also collapsed.

Who would you like to see buy Twitter ????

Matthew Marley – 360innovate

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