Tuesday, March 9, 2010
Latest search engine traffic rankings reviewed
The latest search engine traffic has been released by comScore for January 2010 U.S. Search Engine Rankings
In January 2010, Americans conducted 15.2 billion core searches, with Google Sites accounting for 65.4 percent search market share. Microsoft Sites grabbed 11.3 percent market share, up 0.6 percentage points versus December.
January 2010 U.S. Core Search Rankings
Google Sites led the U.S. core search market in January with 65.4 percent of the searches conducted, followed by Yahoo! Sites (17.0 percent), and Microsoft Sites (11.3 percent). Ask Network captured 3.8 percent of the search market, followed by AOL LLC with 2.5 percent.
| comScore Core Search Report* January 2010 vs. December 2009 Total U.S. – Home/Work/University Locations Source: comScore qSearch | |||
| Core Search Entity | Share of Searches (%) | ||
| Dec-09 | Jan-10 | Point Change Jan-10 vs. Dec-09 | |
| Total Core Search | 100.0% | 100.% | N/A |
| Google Sites | 65.7% | 65.4% | -0.3 |
| Yahoo! Sites | 17.3% | 17.0% | -0.3 |
| Microsoft Sites | 10.7% | 11.3% | 0.6 |
| Ask Network | 3.7% | 3.8% | 0.1 |
| AOL LLC Network | 2.6% | 2.5% | -0.1 |
* Based on the five major search engines including partner searches and cross-channel searches. Searches for mapping, local directory, and user-generated video sites that are not on the core domain of the five search engines are not included in the core search numbers.
Americans conducted 15.2 billion searches in January, up 3 percent from December. Google Sites accounted for 9.9 billion searches, followed by Yahoo! Sites (2.6 billion), Microsoft Sites (1.7 billion), Ask Network (574 million) and AOL LLC (375 million).
| comScore Core Search Report* January 2010 vs. December 2009 Total U.S. – Home/Work/University Locations Source: comScore qSearch | |||
| Core Search Entity | Search Queries (MM) | ||
| Dec-09 | Jan-10 | Percent Change Jan-10 vs. Dec-09 | |
| Total Core Search | 14,737 | 15,167 | 3% |
| Google Sites | 9,688 | 9,920 | 2% |
| Yahoo! Sites | 2,544 | 2,583 | 2% |
| Microsoft Sites | 1,576 | 1,715 | 9% |
| Ask Network | 545 | 574 | 5% |
| AOL LLC | 383 | 375 | -2% |
* Based on the five major search engines including partner searches and cross-channel searches. Searches for mapping, local directory, and user-generated video sites that are not on the core domain of the five search engines are not included in the core search numbers.
January 2010 U.S. Expanded Search Rankings
In the January analysis of the top properties where search activity is observed, Google Sites led the search market with more than 14 billion search queries, followed by Yahoo! Sites with 2.7 billion queries and Microsoft Sites with 1.8 billion searches. Bing experienced large growth during the month with an 11-percent increase in query volume to reach more than 1.5 billion searches. Craigslist jumped one position to #6 with 636 million searches, while Facebook grew to 395 million searches, representing a 13-percent increase from the previous month.
| comScore Expanded Search Query Report January 2010 vs. December 2009 Total U.S. – Home/Work/University Locations Source: comScore qSearch | |||
| Expanded Search Entity | Search Queries (MM) | ||
| Dec-09 | Jan-10 | Percent Change Jan-10 vs. Dec-09 | |
| Total Internet | 22,741 | 23,163 | 2% |
| Google Sites | 14,019 | 14,045 | 0% |
| 10,101 | 10,378 | 3% | |
| YouTube/All Other | 3,918 | 3,667 | -6% |
| Yahoo! Sites | 2,629 | 2,670 | 2% |
| Yahoo! | 2,605 | 2,647 | 2% |
| All Other | 24 | 23 | -4% |
| Microsoft Sites | 1,620 | 1,772 | 9% |
| Bing | 1,399 | 1,549 | 11% |
| Microsoft/All Other | 221 | 223 | 1% |
| Ask Network | 696 | 736 | 6% |
| ASK.COM | 332 | 336 | 1% |
| MyWebSearch.com/ All Other | 364 | 400 | 10% |
| eBay | 680 | 659 | -3% |
| craigslist, inc. | 583 | 636 | 9% |
| AOL LLC | 588 | 576 | -2% |
| AOL Search Network | 325 | 317 | -2% |
| MapQuest/All Other | 263 | 259 | -2% |
| Fox Interactive Media | 424 | 403 | -5% |
| MySpace Sites | 416 | 398 | -4% |
| All Other | 8 | 5 | -38% |
| Facebook.com | 351 | 395 | 13% |
| Amazon Sites | 302 | 238 | -21% |
The key points are that Facebook traffic is still growing with the other largest moves being a surpring drop of traffic to YouTube- down 3% and the amazon group of sites which may be showing the post Christmas blues as they suffered a 21% fall.
Labels: Facebook, Google, search engine marketing, search engines, Yahoo, YouTube
# posted by Dr Search- Principal Consultant at the Search Clinic : Tuesday, March 09, 2010
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Monday, March 8, 2010
Social gaming is the new battlefield in the battle for internet supremacy
A Facebook fans page has attracted a huge online following- and is making money for it's owners.
Today, tens of millions of people around the world will log in to Facebook playing Farmville, a cute, colourful game where players take on the role of a farmer — a game whose extraordinary success is forcing many to rethink the future of the internet and social media.
Farmville is a fairly mundane idea, but one that draws heavily on the traditional world of board games for inspiration. Given the task of caring for and expanding their land and livestock, players have a certain number of action points each day, which they can spend on tending the farm. They can even trade with “neighbours” — Facebook friends who also play the game.
The numbers behind this simple concept are huge. More than 80 million people play every month with almost 30 million logging in every day to check the status of their virtual allotment. It is free to play, but consumers can spend real money on virtual goods to use on their farms.
Combined with advertising revenue — including some controversial revenue from advertising deals, which users complain are little more than marketing scams — this makes Farmville into a business worth hundreds of millions of dollars.
For years, games have lain on the periphery of the internet. Playing games online has been popular among young men for more than a decade — but this was never seen as a commercial activity that could have a significant impact on services such as Facebook or MySpace, let alone Google or Apple.
The success of Farmville, to which more than a quarter of Facebook users have signed up, challenges that assumption. Furthermore, it is leading a new wave of online games that are rewriting our most basic ideas about what videogames are, and who plays them.
The most extraordinary statistic to emerge from the research into this fast-growing phenomenon is the profile of the “average” player of social videogames — namely, 43 years old and female. Young men barely get a look in — more than 60 per cent of people playing social games on Facebook are aged between 30 and 60.
What has attracted this surprising new audience to online games? In part, it’s the subject matter of the games themselves — which ranges from Farmville’s focus on nurturing and growing to the addictive puzzles of games such as Bejeweled.
Equally important is the social aspect of Facebook. No longer is playing games a solitary pursuit — instead, it’s something you do with friends, challenging them to beat your scores or collaborating to help each other out.
Half of those who play social games such as Farmville claim that they visit Facebook each day specifically to play. Suddenly, Facebook isn’t just a tool for staying in touch with friends — it’s also a platform for games and entertainment.
While Facebook’s owners are undoubtedly delighted at the success of Farmville, there must also be a sense of unease. After all, with a game this successful now providing so much of Facebook’s traffic, to what extent, exactly, are Farmville’s creators, Zynga, beholden to Facebook — and vice versa?
It’s a sentiment that resonates across the industry. Apple, for years an online gaming ostrich whose Mac computers provided little support for game developers, was forced to publicly embrace gaming last year as it became clear that social gaming was by far the most commercially successful products on the iPhone’s App Store. Microsoft and Sony, meanwhile, have had a foot in the door of the videogames market for years.
This is the new battleground in the war for hearts, minds and wallets being fought between the world’s technology giants. The millions of acres of virtual land being ploughed by Farmville’s players each day are breathing new life into an old adage — where there’s muck, there’s brass.
Labels: Facebook, online marketing, online marketing uk, social media websites, social web marketing
# posted by Dr Search- Principal Consultant at the Search Clinic : Monday, March 08, 2010
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Monday, March 1, 2010
Out of date social networks sites are harming brands
Eight out of ten multinationals may be using social media, but only twenty per cent are employing the multiple tools necessary to deliver a truly effective communications strategy.
Furthermore, abandoned social networking initiatives can also be damaging - with idle, out of date accounts having a detrimental impact on the brand.
These are the findings of a survey undertaken by PR and communications company Burson-Marsteller, which looked at the use of social networking sites Twitter, Facebook, YouTube and corporate blogging among the world’s largest companies.
The study called the 'Fortune Global 100 Social Media Check-up', found that most companies had dipped their toe in the water, "some with a big splash and others with a timid ripple".
But while 79% were using at least one social media platform, only 20% were using all four to try and engage with stakeholders. The report warned, however: "No single social media tool can stand on its own. For a company that wants a truly effective communications strategy, leveraging multiple social media tools for their individual strengths is required."
Another problem was that many organisations had multiple accounts, which included not only the main one controlled by corporate headquarters, but also others handled by local offices and divisions as well as accounts set up for one-off corporate events.
Of those surveyed, some 65% had Twitter accounts, 54% had Facebook fan pages, 50% had YouTube video channels and 33% corporate blogs. But of the companies that were actively engaged in communicating with customers via such channels, each had 4.2 Twitter accounts, 2.1 Facebook pages, 1.6 YouTube channels and 4.2 blogs.
Again the report warned, however, that the situation was generating challenges by "creating mixed messages and tones and by leaving abandoned Twitter accounts and Facebook fan pages, which may be detrimental to the brand".
These are the findings of a survey undertaken by PR and communications company Burson-Marsteller, which looked at the use of social networking sites Twitter, Facebook, YouTube and corporate blogging among the world’s largest companies.
The study called the 'Fortune Global 100 Social Media Check-up', found that most companies had dipped their toe in the water, "some with a big splash and others with a timid ripple".
But while 79% were using at least one social media platform, only 20% were using all four to try and engage with stakeholders. The report warned, however: "No single social media tool can stand on its own. For a company that wants a truly effective communications strategy, leveraging multiple social media tools for their individual strengths is required."
Another problem was that many organisations had multiple accounts, which included not only the main one controlled by corporate headquarters, but also others handled by local offices and divisions as well as accounts set up for one-off corporate events.
Of those surveyed, some 65% had Twitter accounts, 54% had Facebook fan pages, 50% had YouTube video channels and 33% corporate blogs. But of the companies that were actively engaged in communicating with customers via such channels, each had 4.2 Twitter accounts, 2.1 Facebook pages, 1.6 YouTube channels and 4.2 blogs.
Again the report warned, however, that the situation was generating challenges by "creating mixed messages and tones and by leaving abandoned Twitter accounts and Facebook fan pages, which may be detrimental to the brand".
Labels: blogs, Facebook, social media websites, social web marketing, Twitter, YouTube
# posted by Dr Search- Principal Consultant at the Search Clinic : Monday, March 01, 2010
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Thursday, February 25, 2010
Buzz causes a storm on privacy fears II
Further to my last post on the botched launch of Buzz the fiasco, it has intensified a feeling that has been growing as Google has sought to extend its reach: that it is deliberately using its dominance in one area to gain a stronger foothold in new markets, much as arch-rival Microsoft did before it.
Antitrust regulators have already rebuffed Google’s attempt to forge a deal with Yahoo in search and are investigating its plans to extend its advertising reach into the mobile arena through the acquisition of Admob.
Antitrust regulators have already rebuffed Google’s attempt to forge a deal with Yahoo in search and are investigating its plans to extend its advertising reach into the mobile arena through the acquisition of Admob.
This week, in clearing a rival Microsoft search alliance with Yahoo, the US Department of Justice highlighted the arrangement’s importance in countering Google’s “dominance” of internet search and the advertising that accompanies it.
In any other industry, Google’s conduct would be considered good corporate practice. In the technology world, however, where start-ups with disruptive new products are romanticised and companies such as Apple and Google have built their brands largely on their ability to out-innovate rather than outmanoeuvre their competitors, it is often seen as unimaginative.
For ordinary internet users, there are clear potential benefits from Google’s strategy of extending its influence into more and more corners of the internet – as well as some obvious dangers.
Yet as the Buzz privacy debacle has shown, internet users have different expectations of the different services they use. Trying to merge them can lead to confusion and distrust.
Facebook has learnt this to its cost. In its pursuit of Twitter, where most communication takes place in public, it recently reset some of the default settings for its users so that more of their information appears publicly. As with Buzz, that brought an outcry from privacy interest groups.
In any other industry, Google’s conduct would be considered good corporate practice. In the technology world, however, where start-ups with disruptive new products are romanticised and companies such as Apple and Google have built their brands largely on their ability to out-innovate rather than outmanoeuvre their competitors, it is often seen as unimaginative.
For ordinary internet users, there are clear potential benefits from Google’s strategy of extending its influence into more and more corners of the internet – as well as some obvious dangers.
Yet as the Buzz privacy debacle has shown, internet users have different expectations of the different services they use. Trying to merge them can lead to confusion and distrust.
Facebook has learnt this to its cost. In its pursuit of Twitter, where most communication takes place in public, it recently reset some of the default settings for its users so that more of their information appears publicly. As with Buzz, that brought an outcry from privacy interest groups.
Labels: Buzz, Facebook, Google, Microsoft, Twitter, Yahoo
# posted by Dr Search- Principal Consultant at the Search Clinic : Thursday, February 25, 2010
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Wednesday, February 24, 2010
Buzz caused a storm on privacy fears
Google has caused a lot of anger since the catch up launch of Buzz it's social networking service.
Launched on February 10 2010, it is meant to give Google a stronger foothold in the booming social networking business, where it is rapidly losing ground to Facebook and Twitter.
Its main effect in the short term, however, has been to stir up an outcry over privacy that the internet giant could have done without.
It has also served to reinforce a bigger narrative about Google that has surfaced in other ways this week. This holds that the company is prepared to use its growing market power as a blunt instrument to muscle its way into new markets – and is not too concerned about whose feet it treads on in the process.
In one sign of these growing fears, even Vittorio Colao, chief executive of Vodafone – nominally one of Google’s business partners – raised a red flag over the potential spread of its search dominance into the mobile world. Regulators should take a close look at Google’s massive market share in search, he said, “before it is too late”.
The outcry included an official complaint to US regulators and left Google scrambling to stem the anger, with a public apology and two changes to the service announced within its first four days. In the aftermath of its recent decision to abandon censorship of its search results in China, this looked like another case of testing the limits of the “Don’t be evil” motto, only to later back down.
At the root of the problem is Google’s decision to use Gmail, with its 175m active users, as a launchpad for its latest push into social networking. All users were enrolled as soon as they clicked a link to look at the service, and many found the names of those they corresponded with most frequently by e-mail – usually a private list – became the basis for a public “social network” of contacts on Buzz.
It has also served to reinforce a bigger narrative about Google that has surfaced in other ways this week. This holds that the company is prepared to use its growing market power as a blunt instrument to muscle its way into new markets – and is not too concerned about whose feet it treads on in the process.
In one sign of these growing fears, even Vittorio Colao, chief executive of Vodafone – nominally one of Google’s business partners – raised a red flag over the potential spread of its search dominance into the mobile world. Regulators should take a close look at Google’s massive market share in search, he said, “before it is too late”.
The outcry included an official complaint to US regulators and left Google scrambling to stem the anger, with a public apology and two changes to the service announced within its first four days. In the aftermath of its recent decision to abandon censorship of its search results in China, this looked like another case of testing the limits of the “Don’t be evil” motto, only to later back down.
At the root of the problem is Google’s decision to use Gmail, with its 175m active users, as a launchpad for its latest push into social networking. All users were enrolled as soon as they clicked a link to look at the service, and many found the names of those they corresponded with most frequently by e-mail – usually a private list – became the basis for a public “social network” of contacts on Buzz.
That risked exposing the details of “estranged spouses, current lovers, attorneys and doctors”, according to the complaint to the US Federal Trade Commission from the Electronic Privacy Information Center (Epic), a privacy advocacy group in Washington.
Google executives concede that they did not do enough to warn users that their private contacts would be disclosed publicly. But they put this down to a mistake made in good faith and characterise it as one of the inevitable teething problems of a new online service.
“You can’t incubate these kinds of products in a Petri dish and pull back the covers on a fully baked opus,” says Bradley Horowitz, vice-president of product management for Google’s applications business. “If you look at any company that’s been successful in this space it’s because they have been able to iterate, refine, listen, stumble, dust themselves off, get up.”
However, Marc Rotenberg, executive director of Epic, says that Buzz’s privacy settings were in fact the product of a deep corporate agenda. “The way they could compete was to enlist all their Gmail subscribers. That’s a very clear corporate decision.”
Google executives concede that they did not do enough to warn users that their private contacts would be disclosed publicly. But they put this down to a mistake made in good faith and characterise it as one of the inevitable teething problems of a new online service.
“You can’t incubate these kinds of products in a Petri dish and pull back the covers on a fully baked opus,” says Bradley Horowitz, vice-president of product management for Google’s applications business. “If you look at any company that’s been successful in this space it’s because they have been able to iterate, refine, listen, stumble, dust themselves off, get up.”
However, Marc Rotenberg, executive director of Epic, says that Buzz’s privacy settings were in fact the product of a deep corporate agenda. “The way they could compete was to enlist all their Gmail subscribers. That’s a very clear corporate decision.”
Dr Search will continue my review of Buzz in my next blog posting.
Labels: Buzz, Facebook, Google, social media websites, social web marketing, Twitter
# posted by Dr Search- Principal Consultant at the Search Clinic : Wednesday, February 24, 2010
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Tuesday, February 23, 2010
Evil let loose after Google's buzz breaches email privacy
Once again Google has breached millions of peoples' personal privacy- this time with the launch of it's new social networking site Buzz.
The launch of the Buzz networking site has backfired badly
On Tuesday Feb 16th Eva Hibnick, a Harvard law student, opened her Gmail account and saw an offer for Buzz, a new service from Gmail’s owner, Google. She wasn’t interested. “I just clicked ‘No, go to my inbox’,” she said. Within hours she and millions of others realised that sometimes no means yes.
Now Hibnick is taking Google to court, and the search giant is left fighting a rearguard action in the latest skirmish over privacy on the internet.
Hibnick, 24, is the lead plaintiff in a class-action lawsuit filed against Google over the launch of Buzz, a social networking service that lets people bring their online connections together to share status updates, videos and photos.
With 146m users, the sheer size of Gmail instantly catapulted Buzz into the top ranks of social networking sites alongside Facebook and Twitter.
As Gmail users were quick to point out, though, they chose to join those networks, while Buzz’s new army was conscripted. The service raided a Gmail user’s contacts book to set up the social network.
The people we contact most frequently are not necessarily those with whom we have the closest relationship. Within hours of the Buzz launch, angry tales were being told of people’s contact details and other information being passed on to the “psychotic” and “abusive ex-husbands”.
Actress Felicia Day, Vi in Buffy the Vampire Slayer, found herself deluged with messages from strangers after posting one message on Buzz. “Buzz things turn up as a message in your inbox? Disabling now. Heart attack,” she wrote. Before Google changed Buzz, some fans would also have been able to see who Day emailed most frequently.
Hibnick and her lawyer claim that information she had a right to consider private had been shared among her Gmail contacts. “I signed up for a private email account, not for a social networking site. They can’t just opt you in,” she said.
“Basically all my email contacts were accessible. Everyone is so shocked that Google would do this.”
Fellow Harvard law student Benjamin Osborn, who is assisting on the case, said the initial problem was that it was not clear what information was being shared and with whom.
Hibnick’s lawyer said Google could face statutory damages of $1,000 per occurrence — a potentially huge sum given Gmail’s size. But he added that the real aim was to force Google to put better checks and balances in place over privacy.
The Electronic Privacy Information Center, the watchdog based in Washington DC, has now asked the Federal Trade Commission to investigate whether consumers were harmed and has asked the commission to demand that Google ask Gmail users to sign up for Buzz instead of enrolling them automatically.
Google moved swiftly to contain the crisis last week, dropping the automatic sign-up and offering clearer instructions on how to opt out of the service and keep messages private.
“We made some mistakes and we accept that,” said Peter Barron, Google’s head of communications. “But if you look at the way we responded, I hope people will see that we reacted quickly to those criticisms and made significant improvements.
“These days everyone leaves a data trail, whether it’s from shopping online, using your mobile phone or doing a search. When you use a credit card you are exposing far more about yourself than in an online search but people generally trust credit-card companies not to misuse their data. At Google, users’ trust is all we have. We take privacy very seriously and build privacy features into all our products based on the principles of transparency, choice and user control.
“Those features were and are present in Buzz, but we accept they could have been clearer. Buzz is not about making private information public unless you choose to.”
Don Cruse, a Houston based lawyer, said that what disturbed him most about Buzz was that it was automatic. In a blog he warned clients, and journalists, that they could end up sharing confidential contacts if they used the service. He said Google was “repurposing old data in a way that flouts our expectations of privacy”.
“People have an expectation of privacy with email. There are lots of famous examples of emails making it to people they shouldn’t have reached. But this was not an accident, it was a deliberate change in structure,” he said.
“The big story is that they wanted to set up a social network, something they have failed to do well in the past. The downside is that they have hurt the Gmail brand.”
The Buzz controversy is unlikely to end in epic fines for Google. Last year Facebook paid $9.5m (£6.2m) to settle a similar class-action lawsuit over Beacon, an advertising system that tracked Facebook users’ online activity outside the site and told other users what they had been up to.
Perhaps more damaging is the damage Buzz has done to Google’s image. John Quelch, a Harvard Business School professor, said it faces two problems in any new venture. “First, Google is a hostage to its publicly stated aim to ‘Do no evil’. That definition of evil is open to considerable interpretation. They have to be very careful that this aim isn’t viewed with cynicism rather than respect.”
Second, Quelch said the execution of Google’s search business is so far ahead of its rivals that people had high expectations of any new service. “They rather missed it on Buzz,” he said.
Dr Search suggests that if the financial penalty is a grand apiece that equates to a worst case scenario of a whopping $146,000,000,000 fine. That's equivalent to roughly it's entire shareholder value.
However even greater reputational damage has been done by reminding everyone that despite it's "does no bad" stance Google has past form on the rough and ready treatment of people's data privacy.
And a wake up call to those of you thinking of joining the GoogleWave- where all of your documents and files sit on their servers. Not just your emails.
Interview with Eva Hibnick on Times Online at:
http://business.timesonline.co.uk/tol/business/industry_sectors/technology/article7034912.eceLabels: Buzz, Dr Search, Facebook, Google, Google Wave, Search Clinic, social media websites, social web marketing, Twitter
# posted by Dr Search- Principal Consultant at the Search Clinic : Tuesday, February 23, 2010
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Friday, February 19, 2010
HootSuite adds social media CRM functionality
Social media dashboard HootSuite has released an upgraded version boasting social CRM tools for marketers and customer support teams.
Already popular for enabling users to distribute messages across multiple social networks, including Twitter and Facebook, the latest iteration features tools to gather intelligence, manage audiences and track campaigns.
Designed to appeal to marketing departments and customer support teams, HootSuite has announced it will enable users to:
* Know your audience by learning who follows you, and who they are via a ‘Friends and Followers’ chart, and by viewing profiles, influence and activity levels.
* Gather intelligence and discover what outreach tactics work best with customer URL parameters which allow deep analysis in Google Analytics and Omniture
* Answer efficiently by building an archive of stock responses to common customer support queries
* Track success by examining click-through rates on messages, examining time and region breakdowns and reporting as CSV for custom reports or PDF for printing
"In the last update, we added Wordpress, URL previews, and trending topic details, but we didn't rest in the nest," said HootSuite President Ryan Holmes. "With the new version, marketers can hone tactics with deep campaign tracking and reporting tools.
Further, the friends and followers charting features will help everyone build the relationships which make social networking tools so useful."
Dr Search handles a growing number of Twitter, Facebook as well as Google accounts. So the growing idea of one contrilling panel appeals to us.
Labels: Dr Search, Facebook, Search Clinic, social media websites, social web marketing, Twitter
# posted by Dr Search- Principal Consultant at the Search Clinic : Friday, February 19, 2010
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Thursday, February 18, 2010
Social web marketing suggestions
On Tuesday Dr Search posted- Few online shops have social networks media, but the majority of UK shoppers buy from them.
More than two thirds of all UK online shoppers use social media, with Facebook being by far the most popular but half of top online retailers have a minimal or non existent presence social media presence.
When we reported on the findings of a poll among 10,000 visitors to the UK’s top 40 e-commerce websites undertaken by ForeSee Results, an organisation that measures online customer satisfaction.
The main conclusion was get a Facebook page Now!
With follow up suggestions of:
- Make sure you have someone to monitor it and post good, timely information.
- Promote it to your most loyal customers through your regular communications venues (emails, ads,
stores, coupons, etc.).
- Use your Facebook page to post promotions and product information.
Easier said than done admittedly. There are a lot of ins and outs to social media strategy and the right formula will differ for each company. But for those retailers who have a poor to middling presence on Facebook, it’s a good place to start while you figure out how social media plays into your global brand strategy.
However here’s a truly revolutionary idea: DON'T listen to all of these ideas and opinions about what your customers and prospects want based on over 10,000 online shoppers of 40 of the biggest online retailers in the United Kingdom.
Instead ask your own customers what they want.
- Find out what social media sites they frequent.
- Find out whether they want sales or coupons or technical support or product information.
- Find out how satisfied they are with your current social media efforts and
- How likely they are to purchase, return, and recommend your business as a result of your interactions.
There’s a lot about social media and online marketing initiatives that is really hard to work out, but asking customers what they want from you is a truely great marketing initiative.
Labels: Dr Search, Facebook, online marketing, online marketing uk, Search Clinic
# posted by Dr Search- Principal Consultant at the Search Clinic : Thursday, February 18, 2010
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Wednesday, February 17, 2010
Few online shops have social networks media, but the majority of UK shoppers buy from them
More than two thirds of all UK online shoppers use social media, with Facebook being by far the most popular but half of top online retailers have a minimal or non existent presence social media presence.
These are the findings of a poll among 10,000 visitors to the UK’s top 40 e-commerce undertaken by ForeSee Results, an organisation that measures online customer satisfaction.
The study indicated that of the 69% of online consumers who use social networking sites, about 37% opted to ‘friend’, ‘follow’ or ‘subscribe’ to retailers, with more than half of such respondents doing so in order to learn about their products.
A further 40% did so to learn about special deals, while only 6% used social media primarily to obtain customer support.
About 56% of all online shoppers used Facebook, however, with the figure jumping to a huge 80% if the focus was narrowed to regular social media users.
This would appear to imply that the site is the best place to reach shoppers in both categories, not only because they are there already, but also because it appears that many are keen to hear from chosen brands.
Despite such findings, an unofficial look at the Facebook pages of the top 100 online retailers indicated that a quarter had no official presence and a further quarter had less than 10,000 followers.
In a further note of caution, nearly three quarters of social media fans chose to ‘friend’ or ‘follow’ less than five organisations, with only 4% interacting with more than 20. This means that the majority of online shoppers give very few retailers any air time.
Kevin Entell, vice president of retail strategy at ForSee, said: "Site visitors who also interact with a company on a social media site are more satisfied, more committed to the brand, and more likely to make future purchases from that company."
But there was a chicken and egg situation taking place, he added. "It is likely that customers who are more satisfied and loyal to begin with are the ones who will friend us on Facebook or subscribe to our YouTube channels," Entell said. "However, research shows that when retailers provide rewarding social media experiences, our customers become even more satisfied and loyal."
The results were backed up by another poll from digital marketing agency dotCommerce among 100 UK retailers. It indicated that a mere 42% of UK retailers had a social media presence, with only 12% using more than one site.
Of the retailers using such sites, only 24% had a Facebook presence, while 26% preferred Twitter. They preferred to employ the latter to keep consumers aware of product updates (73%), push out marketing messages (63%) and company news (58%).
Dr Search asks if you one of the three quarters being left behind by the social web marketing growth? If so and you would like some help- please just ask here now!
Labels: Dr Search, Facebook, online marketing, online marketing uk, Search Clinic, social media websites, social web marketing, Twitter, YouTube
# posted by Dr Search- Principal Consultant at the Search Clinic : Wednesday, February 17, 2010
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Wednesday, February 10, 2010
Facebook is the new threat to Google
Facebook is now sending more traffic to US news sites than Google- as the proportion of traffic from Facebook has tripled while that of Google News stayed static.
More people are coming to US news sites via Facebook and other social networking sites such as Twitter – supplanting Google News, which had been one of the primary sources of readers, according to research by the metrics company Hitwise.
During the past year, the proportion of traffic that Facebook sends to US media sites has tripled from around 1.2% to 3.52%, while that sent by Google News has remained roughly static, at around 1.4%, says Heather Hopkins, North America analyst for Hitwise.
The growing power of Facebook also means that publishers which want to demand money from – or alternatively to lock out – Google News because of claims that it "leeches" on their content could do so without fearing a dramatic impact on their reader figures.
With more than 400m users, Facebook forms the newest – and most unexpected – threat to Google, say some analysts.
Last weekend the search engine spent $5m on a TV advert during the Superbowl, puzzling many who do not see a threat from rival search engines such as Microsoft's Bing, which has less than half of its proportion of search queries.
But Hopkins notes in a blogpost for Hitwise that: "Facebook could be a major disruptor to the News and Media category. And with the Wall Street Journal already publishing content to Facebook, perhaps the social network can avoid the run-ins that Google has suffered recently with Rupert Murdoch. We will continue to watch this space."
Murdoch's editors and executives have repeatedly criticised aggregators such Google News, claiming it is leeching off their content by displaying snippets of their work. In the UK, the Murdoch-owned titles have gone as far as blocking access to their sites by Newsnow, a smaller news aggregator.
Eric Schmidt, chief executive of Google, has argued that publishers should take advantage of the traffic that it sends them – pointing out that it sends about 4bn such links per year.
But Facebook provides the perfect counterweight, where publishers can choose how much of their content they display and view how well it is followed. Sites such as Facebook and increasingly Twitter contribute hundreds of thousands of visits every month to UK sites, according to analysis by the Guardian.
John Minnihan, the founder of the software code respository Freepository, warns that Facebook poses one of the biggest threats to Google on the web. "With recent data showing a large uptick in 'Facebook as home page', [Google] may well indeed need to remind emerging generation who/what it is."
"In that case, the [Superbowl] ad makes some business sense. Whatever the real reason, it has nothing to do with 'sharing video more widely'. If FB dev'ed an integrated web-wide search engine, think about how much traffic would evaporate [from Google] overnite. That's nightmare stuff."
Tellingly, Minnihan's comments were made on Twitter — which Google is rumoured to be trying to compete with in a "social version" of its Gmail webmail product.
Google has already tried – and failed – to create a world-scale social network with its Orkut product, but been obliged instead to purchase access to Twitter's search results to provide real-time insight into what people are talking about.
Facebook's content however lies beyond its reach – and that could be crucial in the forthcoming months as news publishers in the US and UK consider putting up higher paywalls or demanding money from aggregators.
Dr Search found the social media news story on the Guardian's website at:
Labels: bing, Dr Search, Facebook, Google, Search Clinic, social media websites, social web marketing, Twitter
# posted by Dr Search- Principal Consultant at the Search Clinic : Wednesday, February 10, 2010
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Tuesday, February 9, 2010
Return On Investment (ROI) for social media marketing
Only 22% of UK organisations use social media marketing as a core part of their communications strategy because they are unsure how to prove return on investment cases, measure value or even how to use it.
These are the findings of a survey among 80 UK senior marketers undertaken by researchers Opinion Matters on behalf of the Internet Advertising Bureau’s (IAB) Social Media Council (SCM).
The study found that social media played a key role in the marketing campaigns of a mere 22% of companies, although a further 20% indicated that it currently played some role in most of their activities. Another 23.5% said that they tended to use such services on an ad hoc basis, while 27% of respondents had undertaken trials.
Although about a third planned to allocate between six and 20% of their digital marketing budgets to social media over the year compared with only 14% last year, 7% said that they had not touched such technology at all.
The main challenge in the social media context, according to almost three quarters of respondents, was in proving that it could generate a ROI. Another 64% said that measuring value was a problem, while 57% felt that they needed more education on how best to use such offerings.
These are the findings of a survey among 80 UK senior marketers undertaken by researchers Opinion Matters on behalf of the Internet Advertising Bureau’s (IAB) Social Media Council (SCM).
The study found that social media played a key role in the marketing campaigns of a mere 22% of companies, although a further 20% indicated that it currently played some role in most of their activities. Another 23.5% said that they tended to use such services on an ad hoc basis, while 27% of respondents had undertaken trials.
Although about a third planned to allocate between six and 20% of their digital marketing budgets to social media over the year compared with only 14% last year, 7% said that they had not touched such technology at all.
The main challenge in the social media context, according to almost three quarters of respondents, was in proving that it could generate a ROI. Another 64% said that measuring value was a problem, while 57% felt that they needed more education on how best to use such offerings.
There was also uncertainty as to where social media activity should sit within the business. While three quarters of those questioned felt it should reside within the marketing department, a third felt it fitted best within the PR function. Some 12% felt that researchers should have responsibility for it, 16% customer services and 7%, IT.
It would differ from organisation to organisation as to whether they should set up a new dedicated team or re-skill staff but keep them in individual departments. But it was important to clarify current strengths wherever they were located and map them to requirements, not least in order to establish skills gaps so that expertise could be hired in from outside, he added.
Among those organisations currently using social media, meanwhile, the most popular application was as a tool to help boost brand awareness (77%). Three quarters had used such services to drive engagement or for advocacy purposes, while 60% had employed them to undertake market research. About half had also used the technology to try and increase product sales.
Twitter and social media monitoring tools were the most popular offerings, however, with just over half of brands citing them as very important. Other appealing services included Facebook (47%) and own branded communities (39%), but 27% of respondents were unaware of what such terms as crowd sourcing actually meant.
It would differ from organisation to organisation as to whether they should set up a new dedicated team or re-skill staff but keep them in individual departments. But it was important to clarify current strengths wherever they were located and map them to requirements, not least in order to establish skills gaps so that expertise could be hired in from outside, he added.
Among those organisations currently using social media, meanwhile, the most popular application was as a tool to help boost brand awareness (77%). Three quarters had used such services to drive engagement or for advocacy purposes, while 60% had employed them to undertake market research. About half had also used the technology to try and increase product sales.
Twitter and social media monitoring tools were the most popular offerings, however, with just over half of brands citing them as very important. Other appealing services included Facebook (47%) and own branded communities (39%), but 27% of respondents were unaware of what such terms as crowd sourcing actually meant.
Labels: Facebook, ROI, social media websites, social web marketing, Twitter
# posted by Dr Search- Principal Consultant at the Search Clinic : Tuesday, February 09, 2010
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Wednesday, February 3, 2010
Search engines ranking- latest global results 2010
comScore has published a report on the global search market which shows more than 131 billion searches were conducted across the web in December 2009.
The top 5 leading countries in the search market are the United States, China, Japan, UK and Germany:
One of the interesting things to note from the report is the relatively slow growth rate of searches from China.
Whilst they are sitting second in terms of overall volume, their growth rate is by far the lowest amongst the top ten countries.
When you compare this to the high volume and growth rate from Japan, it is foreseeable that the Japanese, British and the Germans may claim second spot in the not to distant future.
Google continues to lead the way as the dominant search engine, followed by Yahoo! and Baidu claiming the number three spot.
If Google follows through on their threat to pull out of China, it’s possible that Baidu could pickup their lost market share and claim the number two spot above Yahoo. Which would be an interesting situation if you work at Yahoo.
Another two thoughts are these figues do not include Twitter, nor do they include the searches on google's You Tube.
Labels: bing, Facebook, Google, search engine marketing, search engines, Search Marketing, Twitter, Yahoo
# posted by Dr Search- Principal Consultant at the Search Clinic : Wednesday, February 03, 2010
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Monday, January 25, 2010
Facebook campaign puts the boot into First Capital Connect
Disaffected commuters on the Bedford to Brighton train line have started employing Facebook social media to apply pressure on government transport chiefs to strip the operator of its franchise.
First Capital Connect (FCC) has come under criticism since last year, but anger has mounted over the last two months following severe timetable disruption, cancelled and delayed trains and customer misinformation on the Thameslink line.
The problems have been blamed on drivers working to rule and the cold snap. However it is the management which is supposed to be in charge of the system.
But increasing levels of frustration among commuters have led them to set up a grassroots campaign that appears to be gaining political weight. An ‘I hate FCC’ group has been set up on Facebook, which now numbers over 2,000 members.
An online Downing Street petition has also been signed by 4,758 people, while a spoof website has been created - First Crapital Connect - "We've Got You Over A Barrel" - leading thousands of commuters to register their fury at the company. Local newspapers along the route have also been inundated with letters of complaint.
As a result, Paul Burstow, Liberal Democrat MP for Sutton and Cheam, lodged an early day motion last week calling for FCC’s franchise to be withdrawn. If the move were to come to pass, it would be the second route to be taken back into public ownership, following the nationalisation of National Express’ East Coast route in November last year.
Labels: Facebook, social media websites, social web marketing
# posted by Dr Search- Principal Consultant at the Search Clinic : Monday, January 25, 2010
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Friday, January 15, 2010
Poor customer service- the true cost of lost sales
Poor customer service is costing UK plc about £15.3 billion in lost business per annum- with younger consumers less likely to put up with poor treatment than older ones.
According to a survey undertaken by Greenfield Online among 514 consumers, 73% had terminated a relationship in the past because of bad experiences, with the average value of lost sales being £248 per year.
But the report entitled ‘The Cost of Poor Customer Service: The Economic Impact of the Customer Experience’ also found that younger customers aged between 27 and 43 were 60% more likely to go elsewhere than older ones if dissatisfied with the level of service they received.
It is becoming increasingly crucial for organisations, particularly in service industries such as finance, to ensure they retained customers by providing "exceptional" customer service.
As to what poor customer service actually meant to respondents, the study found that problems could be broken down into several categories: customers having to repeat information; feeling trapped in automated self service systems and being forced to wait too long to receive a service.
Other bugbears included speaking to company representatives who were unaware of their service history and not being able to switch easily between communications channels. Some 41% of those questioned said they were most unhappy with having to use voice-based self-service systems, while 39% said they felt it critical to integrate such systems more intelligently with human interaction.
A huge 83% also said they would welcome proactive help when they became stuck trying to undertake a web transaction or some other form of self-service activity.
According to a survey undertaken by Greenfield Online among 514 consumers, 73% had terminated a relationship in the past because of bad experiences, with the average value of lost sales being £248 per year.
But the report entitled ‘The Cost of Poor Customer Service: The Economic Impact of the Customer Experience’ also found that younger customers aged between 27 and 43 were 60% more likely to go elsewhere than older ones if dissatisfied with the level of service they received.
It is becoming increasingly crucial for organisations, particularly in service industries such as finance, to ensure they retained customers by providing "exceptional" customer service.
As to what poor customer service actually meant to respondents, the study found that problems could be broken down into several categories: customers having to repeat information; feeling trapped in automated self service systems and being forced to wait too long to receive a service.
Other bugbears included speaking to company representatives who were unaware of their service history and not being able to switch easily between communications channels. Some 41% of those questioned said they were most unhappy with having to use voice-based self-service systems, while 39% said they felt it critical to integrate such systems more intelligently with human interaction.
A huge 83% also said they would welcome proactive help when they became stuck trying to undertake a web transaction or some other form of self-service activity.
With the rise of social media and increased consumer awareness, the cost of customer frustration continues to grow. Dr Search is advising enterprise businesses in the UK to develop cohesive strategies that straddle all channels of customer communication including Twitter and Facebook."
Labels: Dr Search, Facebook, online marketing, online marketing uk, Search Clinic, Twitter
# posted by Dr Search- Principal Consultant at the Search Clinic : Friday, January 15, 2010
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Monday, January 11, 2010
France considers extra tax on Google, Yahoo and Facebook
Google, Yahoo, Facebook and other online companies could be taxed extra under plans being considered by the French government.
A report, commissioned by the government, suggests firms such as Google, Yahoo and Facebook should pay a new tax on their online ad revenues.
The money could be used to fund legal alternatives for buying books, films and music on the internet.
But critics say the tax would be difficult to implement and Google says it could slow down innovation.
President Nicolas Sarkozy has taken a tough line on the increasing dominance of digital content.
France has just introduced tough new legislation aimed at removing those who persistently download illegal content from the net.
It has also gone head to head with Google over its plans to digitise the world's books, with a project to set up its own digital library financed by the government to the tune of £700m.
Additionally it is considering a law which would give net users the option to have old data about themselves deleted.
The proposals for a tax on content is still very much in the early stages and there are few details of how it would exactly work.
Patrick Zelnik, who contributed to the report and is also the founder of the French president's wife's record label, hopes the idea will be taken on board across the EU.
But Google is among those to have voiced opposition to the plan.
"We don't think introducing an additional tax on internet advertising is the right way forward as it could slow down innovation," said Olivier Esper, senior policy manager for Google France.
The better way to support content creation is to find new business models that help consumers find great content and rewards artists and publishers for their work."
A report, commissioned by the government, suggests firms such as Google, Yahoo and Facebook should pay a new tax on their online ad revenues.
The money could be used to fund legal alternatives for buying books, films and music on the internet.
But critics say the tax would be difficult to implement and Google says it could slow down innovation.
President Nicolas Sarkozy has taken a tough line on the increasing dominance of digital content.
France has just introduced tough new legislation aimed at removing those who persistently download illegal content from the net.
It has also gone head to head with Google over its plans to digitise the world's books, with a project to set up its own digital library financed by the government to the tune of £700m.
Additionally it is considering a law which would give net users the option to have old data about themselves deleted.
The proposals for a tax on content is still very much in the early stages and there are few details of how it would exactly work.
Patrick Zelnik, who contributed to the report and is also the founder of the French president's wife's record label, hopes the idea will be taken on board across the EU.
But Google is among those to have voiced opposition to the plan.
"We don't think introducing an additional tax on internet advertising is the right way forward as it could slow down innovation," said Olivier Esper, senior policy manager for Google France.
The better way to support content creation is to find new business models that help consumers find great content and rewards artists and publishers for their work."
Labels: Facebook, Google, online marketing, Twitter, Yahoo
# posted by Dr Search- Principal Consultant at the Search Clinic : Monday, January 11, 2010
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Friday, January 8, 2010
More small businesses move online to reduce costs
The recession is prompting small and medium sized enterprises (SMEs) to increase their online presence as they seek to cut running costs and use marketing budgets more efficiently, a new survey has revealed.
According to the Kleinwort Benson UK Entrepreneurs Survey 2009, 76 per cent of approximately 100 respondents said they intended to increase the use of e-marketing in 2010 and 53 per cent said an online presence was critical.
“When making choices to cut costs and determine future strategies, businesses are focusing on online channels,” said Joe White, chief operating officer of Gandi.net, an online service provider.
“It is cheaper to set up and distribute via the internet, so companies may well choose to close the shop. The recession has bought forward some of those decisions to focus on online channels.”
Social media are also being used more extensively, the survey revealed. Forty two per cent said LinkedIn and Twitter, two forms of online networking, would be used to expand their businesses in 2010. Thirty eight per cent and 36 per cent, respectively, said they would employ Facebook and YouTube.
Dominic Davenport, chief executive of Escape Studios, which trains computer graphic artists, said: “We have found that social media deliver very quick, tangible returns in terms of building awareness of our brand, and also identifying new customers.”
Glyn Heath, chief executive of Centiq, an IT consulting and services company, said the interest in social media and web marketing was striking.
“However, smaller businesses are still getting to grips with tools such as Twitter and LinkedIn,” added Heath. “Executives recognise that the web offers exciting engagement possibilities, but they are finding that social media are resource-heavy marketing channels, so increased spending will have lasting implications for workload.”
Julie Hall, founder of Women Unlimited, an online community for female entrepreneurs, said she was surprised that only 53 per cent of respondents thought an online presence was critical.
“The 47 per cent that don’t believe an online presence is critical to their business, don’t get it,” she said. “If they aren’t online, positioning themselves as the ‘go-to company’ in their field, one of their competitors will be.”
The Search Clinic is amazed that more than half of entrepreneurs are still not recognising the benefits of online marketing. Agreed online marketing can waste huge amounts of time and money- but if you get it right, you can acheive up to 500% ROI.
Labels: Dr Search, Facebook, online marketing, online marketing uk, Search Clinic, social media websites, social web marketing, Twitter
# posted by Dr Search- Principal Consultant at the Search Clinic : Friday, January 08, 2010
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Tuesday, December 29, 2009
Economist fans social network boost
The Economist plans to add 500,000 fans on Facebook and 750,000 followers on Twitter within six months, in another sign that traditional publishers are looking to social media as a substantial source of new web traffic and readers.
Readers of The Economist’s website will soon be able to log in and make comments using their Facebook identity, through Facebook Connect. The Economist.com will also take on features similar to social networks itself, allowing readers to create profile pages and earn a reputation through other users’ recommendations of their comments on the site.
Ben Edwards, publisher of Economist.com, hopes that Facebook will help his site acquire new readers and develop a “deeper level of engagement” with existing ones.
“We have a mission online of being the foremost destination for global discussion and debate, which is a social proposition,” Mr Edwards told the Financial Times. Making Economist.com more social is “the core of our strategy”, he said.
Broadcasters such as Sky and ITV, as well as publishers such as Guardian and the New York Times, are finding that mingling with the huge audiences gathering on Twitter and Facebook can be a source of traffic to rival that of search engines. The Economist, in which the Financial Times owns a 50 per cent stake, currently has more than 90,000 Twitter followers.
About 180,000 people have joined its official “fan page” on Facebook. A marketing budget of “tens of thousands of pounds” will be allocated to help boost those figures to meet its targets.
Both sites publish links to Economist.com, which has 4m monthly unique visitors, 3m of whom have registered their details with the site. Mr Edwards said the number of paying subscribers was “fairly small, but growing healthily”.
Profile pages for registered users will be expanded to include additional details such as where they have studied and worked.
But more people are expected to use their Facebook profile details than registering with Economist.com directly. Although advertisers might find that data valuable if shared with The Economist rather than Facebook, Mr Edwards is betting that using Facebook Connect will ultimately bring more comment makers to Economist.com.
Reader comments on The Economist’s Facebook page are shorter than the lengthy notes on its own site. So a new Economist.com reputation system will make sure the most popular comments more prominent, whether from Facebookers or long-time readers.
The Economist will also be “a lot more active” on Twitter, which will be a “full-time job”, Mr Edwards said. “That shows the importance we place on it as a source of traffic,” he said.
The changes are expected to be introduced within three to four months, alongside improvements to its subscriber-only features.
But The Economist’s discussion forums will remain free.
“People aren’t accustomed to being charged for conversation,” Mr Edwards said.
Readers of The Economist’s website will soon be able to log in and make comments using their Facebook identity, through Facebook Connect. The Economist.com will also take on features similar to social networks itself, allowing readers to create profile pages and earn a reputation through other users’ recommendations of their comments on the site.
Ben Edwards, publisher of Economist.com, hopes that Facebook will help his site acquire new readers and develop a “deeper level of engagement” with existing ones.
“We have a mission online of being the foremost destination for global discussion and debate, which is a social proposition,” Mr Edwards told the Financial Times. Making Economist.com more social is “the core of our strategy”, he said.
Broadcasters such as Sky and ITV, as well as publishers such as Guardian and the New York Times, are finding that mingling with the huge audiences gathering on Twitter and Facebook can be a source of traffic to rival that of search engines. The Economist, in which the Financial Times owns a 50 per cent stake, currently has more than 90,000 Twitter followers.
About 180,000 people have joined its official “fan page” on Facebook. A marketing budget of “tens of thousands of pounds” will be allocated to help boost those figures to meet its targets.
Both sites publish links to Economist.com, which has 4m monthly unique visitors, 3m of whom have registered their details with the site. Mr Edwards said the number of paying subscribers was “fairly small, but growing healthily”.
Profile pages for registered users will be expanded to include additional details such as where they have studied and worked.
But more people are expected to use their Facebook profile details than registering with Economist.com directly. Although advertisers might find that data valuable if shared with The Economist rather than Facebook, Mr Edwards is betting that using Facebook Connect will ultimately bring more comment makers to Economist.com.
Reader comments on The Economist’s Facebook page are shorter than the lengthy notes on its own site. So a new Economist.com reputation system will make sure the most popular comments more prominent, whether from Facebookers or long-time readers.
The Economist will also be “a lot more active” on Twitter, which will be a “full-time job”, Mr Edwards said. “That shows the importance we place on it as a source of traffic,” he said.
The changes are expected to be introduced within three to four months, alongside improvements to its subscriber-only features.
But The Economist’s discussion forums will remain free.
“People aren’t accustomed to being charged for conversation,” Mr Edwards said.
Dr Search notes that the future for 2010 is social networking. Are you making the most of your opprotunities?
Labels: Facebook, social media websites, social web marketing, Twitter
# posted by Dr Search- Principal Consultant at the Search Clinic : Tuesday, December 29, 2009
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Wednesday, December 16, 2009
Google and Facebook launch URL link shorteners
Google and Facebook have launched their own URL link shorteners, tools that transform a long internet address in to a much shorter string of characters.
Google's new URL shortener, goo.gl, will be available through Google's Toolbar and its Feedburner RSS feed, but is not yet available as a stand-alone service for "broader consumer use". Facebook's shortener, fb. me, is predominantly designed for use on mobile device, and it's unclear whether fb. me will be rolled out across the whole platform.
URL shorteners have grown in popularity over the last 18 months, with an increasing number of web users using services such as TinyURL and bit.ly to condense links so that they can be shared more easily on social networking sites such as Twitter, which imposes a limit on the number of characters that can be contained within a single message.
Google and Facebook's foray in to link shortening could be a disaster for rival service bit.ly, which has rapidly become the de facto URL-condensing tool. It is the URL shortener of choice for many third party Twitter clients, and bit.ly short links currently account for around 75 per cent of all shortened URLs circulated on the microblogging platform. Last month, bit.ly shortened more than two billion links, up from just 11.8 million the previous year.
Much of bit.ly's popularity stems from the metrics that can be gathered from every clicked link, enabling website owners to see where their traffic comes from. At present, neither Google nor Facebook has announced any plans to add analytics to their URL shortening services, but some industry experts believe Google could leverage its existing web trends and analytics tools and apply them to its goo.gl service if the tool is made generally available to businesses and consumers.
Within hours of Google's and Facebook's announcements, Betaworks Studios, which helped to develop
bit.ly, said that the company was launching a new service that would allow websites to create their own custom URLs built on the bit.ly platform.
Some industry experts have warned that the sheer volume of short links that could be generated by Facebook's and Google's URL shorteners could "overwhelm" the number of bit.ly links circulating on the internet.
URL shorteners have grown in popularity over the last 18 months, with an increasing number of web users using services such as TinyURL and bit.ly to condense links so that they can be shared more easily on social networking sites such as Twitter, which imposes a limit on the number of characters that can be contained within a single message.
Google and Facebook's foray in to link shortening could be a disaster for rival service bit.ly, which has rapidly become the de facto URL-condensing tool. It is the URL shortener of choice for many third party Twitter clients, and bit.ly short links currently account for around 75 per cent of all shortened URLs circulated on the microblogging platform. Last month, bit.ly shortened more than two billion links, up from just 11.8 million the previous year.
Much of bit.ly's popularity stems from the metrics that can be gathered from every clicked link, enabling website owners to see where their traffic comes from. At present, neither Google nor Facebook has announced any plans to add analytics to their URL shortening services, but some industry experts believe Google could leverage its existing web trends and analytics tools and apply them to its goo.gl service if the tool is made generally available to businesses and consumers.
Within hours of Google's and Facebook's announcements, Betaworks Studios, which helped to develop
bit.ly, said that the company was launching a new service that would allow websites to create their own custom URLs built on the bit.ly platform.
Some industry experts have warned that the sheer volume of short links that could be generated by Facebook's and Google's URL shorteners could "overwhelm" the number of bit.ly links circulating on the internet.
Labels: Facebook, Google, online marketing, online marketing uk, social media websites, social web marketing, Twitter
# posted by Dr Search- Principal Consultant at the Search Clinic : Wednesday, December 16, 2009
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Monday, December 14, 2009
Now it's Google's turn to blow your personal data
Aftre Facebook did a major overhaul of its privacy settings to open your data to all members, there was an immediate outcry from some quarters as the site was a bit aggressive in setting users’ defaults to “everyone.”
In addition, Yahoo got called out for trying to suppress its surveillance menu for law enforcement. And Asa Dotzler of Firefox railed against Google and urged users to switch to Bing in response to comments from Google CEO Eric Schmidt that made the latter seem indifferent to consumer privacy.
So what exactly did Schmidt say about privacy?
He told CNBC Anchor Maria Bartiromo, on the cable network’s recent special “Inside the Mind of Google,” that people who have something to hide shouldn’t be doing things online that might potentially expose them if law enforcement seeks access to their search histories.
“If you have something that you don’t want anyone to know, maybe you shouldn’t be doing it in the first place,” said Schmidt.
The Electronic Frontier Foundation and others have decried that position, especially as others within Google, such as Google VP Marissa Mayer, seek to assure consumers that their privacy is “protected” at Google.
In fairness to Schmidt he was saying that Google (and others) are subject to US law (the “patriot act”) and that law enforcement and government authorities can, as a practical matter, get access to search records because they’re retained “for some time.”
That then — the period of data retention — becomes the practical privacy battleground.
In addition, Yahoo got called out for trying to suppress its surveillance menu for law enforcement. And Asa Dotzler of Firefox railed against Google and urged users to switch to Bing in response to comments from Google CEO Eric Schmidt that made the latter seem indifferent to consumer privacy.
So what exactly did Schmidt say about privacy?
He told CNBC Anchor Maria Bartiromo, on the cable network’s recent special “Inside the Mind of Google,” that people who have something to hide shouldn’t be doing things online that might potentially expose them if law enforcement seeks access to their search histories.
“If you have something that you don’t want anyone to know, maybe you shouldn’t be doing it in the first place,” said Schmidt.
The Electronic Frontier Foundation and others have decried that position, especially as others within Google, such as Google VP Marissa Mayer, seek to assure consumers that their privacy is “protected” at Google.
In fairness to Schmidt he was saying that Google (and others) are subject to US law (the “patriot act”) and that law enforcement and government authorities can, as a practical matter, get access to search records because they’re retained “for some time.”
That then — the period of data retention — becomes the practical privacy battleground.
Google’s new personalized approach to search results generally seeks to retain user data indefinitely, in cases where users don’t actively delete their histories. Danny explains how it works:
In Signed-Out Web History, Google knows that it has seen someone using a particular browser before. Behind the scenes, it has tracked all the searches that have been done by that browser. It also logs all the things people have clicked on from Google’s search results, when using that browser.
In Signed-Out Web History, Google knows that it has seen someone using a particular browser before. Behind the scenes, it has tracked all the searches that have been done by that browser. It also logs all the things people have clicked on from Google’s search results, when using that browser.
There’s no way to see this information, but it is used to customize the results that are shown. It only remembers things for 180 days. Information older than that is forgotten. Google doesn’t know your name. If you use a different browser, Google doesn’t know your past history. In fact, you can’t even see your past history.
In Signed-In Web History, Google knows that a particular Google user is using Google. Behind the scenes, it has kept a record of all the things that person has done when signed-in, regardless of what computer or browser they’ve used. If they’re using the Google Toolbar with the page tracking feature enabled, then it has also kept a record of all the pages they’ve viewed over time. This information can be viewed by the user at any time, and the user can selectively delete info. They can also delete everything, if they want. If they don’t, then Google forgets nothing.
For those not signed in data is retained for 180 days and is associated with a particular browser. For those with a Google account who are signed in, data and web search history are, as mentioned, retained indefinitely until actively deleted.
The Google Chrome browser has a private “incognito” mode where no web history is captured. (Microsoft’s IE8 offers comparable functionality, called inPrivate browsing.) However if you’re signed in to a Google account while in incognito mode Google will still capture your search history:
if you sign into your Google Account while in incognito mode, your subsequent web searches are recorded in your Google Web History. In this case, to prevent your searches from being stored in your Google Account, you’ll need to pause your Google Web History tracking.
All this is not unlike the Facebook default “everyone” settings. Google will capture your search history and behavior unless you take affirmative action to prevent or block it.
In Signed-In Web History, Google knows that a particular Google user is using Google. Behind the scenes, it has kept a record of all the things that person has done when signed-in, regardless of what computer or browser they’ve used. If they’re using the Google Toolbar with the page tracking feature enabled, then it has also kept a record of all the pages they’ve viewed over time. This information can be viewed by the user at any time, and the user can selectively delete info. They can also delete everything, if they want. If they don’t, then Google forgets nothing.
For those not signed in data is retained for 180 days and is associated with a particular browser. For those with a Google account who are signed in, data and web search history are, as mentioned, retained indefinitely until actively deleted.
The Google Chrome browser has a private “incognito” mode where no web history is captured. (Microsoft’s IE8 offers comparable functionality, called inPrivate browsing.) However if you’re signed in to a Google account while in incognito mode Google will still capture your search history:
if you sign into your Google Account while in incognito mode, your subsequent web searches are recorded in your Google Web History. In this case, to prevent your searches from being stored in your Google Account, you’ll need to pause your Google Web History tracking.
All this is not unlike the Facebook default “everyone” settings. Google will capture your search history and behavior unless you take affirmative action to prevent or block it.
You too can opt out of the use of the DART cookie by visiting the Google Opt Out ad and content network privacy policy and click on the OPT OUT button.
Save your opt-out preference permanently- With this browser plugin you can permanently opt out of the DoubleClick
Labels: bing, Facebook, Google, Yahoo
# posted by Dr Search- Principal Consultant at the Search Clinic : Monday, December 14, 2009
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