Top SEO News: Week of April 9, 2012

Last Updated On March 14th, 2024Search Engine News, ,

Check out the top SEO, search engine and Internet marketing industry news stories from around the Web this week.

Facebook Buys Instagram for $1 Billion
Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg just announced that Facebook bought photo sharing application, Instagram, for $1 billion. The company plans to bring the 8-person staff of Instagram to Facebook so they can work together to keep improving on the photo sharing ability of both popular social networks.

Google Ads Adds Zip Code Targeting, Location Insertion; Updates Location Targeting
Google recently announced new features in Google Ads that will help users create ads that are more relevant to local customers.

Yahoo Confirms 2,000 Employees Getting the Axe
Yahoo recently stated that it plans to restructure and lay off 2,000 employees. The company currently has 14,000 employees and has not yet stated which departments the layoffs will occur.

Pinterest Now 3rd Most Popular Social Network
According to a recent study by Experian, Pinterest is now the 3rd most popular social network. The network attracted 21.5 million visits in one week in January, which is almost 30 times the total number of visits six months prior. This now gives Pinterest a larger audience than LinkedIn.

Google Analytics is Making its Way to Google+
According to Marketingland, slides from an official Google deck that show how to connect a Google+ page with Google Analytics have been leaked.

Google Warns Against Artificial or Unnatural Links

Last Updated On August 13th, 2014Search Engine News, , , ,

According to Search Engine Land, Google has been sending out warnings about having “artificial” or “unnatural” links pointing back to your website. Many people have been getting warning messages from Google about link violations. According to Google, although it may appear that Google is just beginning to put its foot down on bad link networks is nothing new. Google has been silently distrusting links for some time, however now it’s decided to be more vocal about the action it’s taking against these types of link networks.

Search Engine Land gave this example of one of the violation warning messages from the Google Webmaster Help forum:

Dear site owner or webmaster of _____,

We’ve detected that some of your site’s pages may be using techniques that are outside Google’s Webmaster Guidelines.

Specifically, look for possibly artificial or unnatural links pointing to your site that could be intended to manipulate PageRank. Examples of unnatural linking could include buying links to pass PageRank or participating in link schemes.

We encourage you to make changes to your site so that it meets our quality guidelines. Once you’ve made these changes, please submit your site for reconsideration in Google’s search results.
If you find unnatural links to your site that you are unable to control or remove, please provide the details in your reconsideration request.

If you have any questions about how to resolve this issue, please see our Webmaster Help Forum for support.
Sincerely,

Google Search Quality Team

If your website receives a warning similar to the one above, it is violating Google’s quality guidelines and is in danger of being permanently discluded from the search results! Make sure to take this kind of warning very seriously. Review the guidelines and make the necessary changes to your website so your customers will be able to find your website in the search results.

3 Pinterest Tools to Use for Brands

Last Updated On June 2nd, 2023Social Media Marketing, , , ,

pinterestlogoPinterest, the visual social network that allows users to “pin” images and videos they like onto their virtual boards has really blown up over the past few months. The site is becoming increasingly popular and brands are taking note and beginning to establish a presence on the network. However, Pinterest is a territory that many brands have never entered before, which means it can be difficult to measure whether your brand is succeeding. Here are some great tools to help measure your company’s Pinterest efforts provided by Mashable.

Pinerly: Although it is still in beta, Pinerly will be a comprehensive Pinterest analytics dashboard to help measure your company’s success on the social network. According to Mashable, it will graphically measure clickthroughs, likes and repins.

Pinstamatic: This new application allows you to add your Twitter profile links, “Sticky Notes” and websites to your boards on Pinterest. According to the site it will be supporting other forms of content soon, so keep an eye on this useful tool.

Pinpuff: Pinpuff allows you to “calculate your pinfluence.” It gives you a score based on your reach and activity and gives you an idea of the value of your pins and traffic so you can figure out which types of pins are working in order to concentrate your efforts on those.

Remember, Pinterest is a new social network, so be prepared to change techniques often in order to find the right groove so your company can find success on the site.