Bing Upgrade Search with Windows 8.1 31st May 2013 This week Bing has released an official statement, alongside screenshots, of what they see as being the future of search. It seems that they feel the users are no longer content with just the standard list format displayed on a fairly static vertical page, and have started to reinvent the search page through Windows 8.1. By taking concepts used in recent technological advances across Windows 8 and tablet innovations, Bing look to make a more visual and striking impact within the search space. Official Statement below: "In Windows 8.1, the Search charm will provide global search results powered by Bing in a rich, simple-to-read, aggregated view of many content sources (the web, apps, files, SkyDrive, actions you can take) to provide the best 'answer' for your query." As users expect more from search engines, Bing are looking to provide users with “the best ‘answer’ for your query”, pulling in results from multiple sources such as videos, songs and images to fully cater for a searchers growing needs. What impact will this release have on the search market with the power and scalability of Bing and Windows combing, and how will this impact paid search marketers going forwards?
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Kevin Ting
Read more about the new features set to be released with Windows 8.1: http://mashable.com/2013/05/30/windows-8-1-features/ http://www.wired.com/gadgetlab/2013/05/windows-8-1/ http://searchenginewatch.com/article/2271763/New-Bing-IntegratedSearch-App-Coming-With-Windows-8.1
Google Release Bulk Uploads & Report Scheduling Updates - 31st May 2013 In the past week Google have announced 2 updates to Adwords that will make managing accounts even easier. The first of these releases is an update to the report scheduling functionality found within the client reporting section of Google Adwords, and allows reports set to run weekly to now be delivered on any day of the week. Previously this was not possible as they were historically set to default on Monday and the advertiser could not change this day. This update will definitely benefit advertisers may for example run by a Saturday to Sunday weekly schedule.
The second release this week was an update to the bulk upload functionality within Google Adwords. While Google have recently allowed advertisers to make bulk changes to keywords via an upload in the UI, advertisers can now use the same bulk uploads feature for ad group and ad copy changes. (Availability may vary by country. Please check with your agency or Google representative for official release dates)
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Kevin Ting
See more details about these releases: Report Scheduling Update – http://searchengineland.com/new-adwordsreport-scheduling-for-any-day-of-the-week-161210 Bulk Upload Update - http://www.seroundtable.com/adwords-bulk-uploads16856.html
Bing Ads' Keyword Distribution Graph - Coming Soon! 29th May 2013 Bing will soon be releasing a nifty tool called ‘Keyword Distribution Graph’ that will give advertisers to visualise key performance indicators (KPIs) across multiple keywords in an account. These distribution graphs will enable advertisers to see, at a glance, the number of keywords, represented by bar length, at each KPI level, such as CPC, CTR or clicks, across an account.
(Availability may vary by country. Please check with your agency or Bing representative for official release dates)
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Kevin Ting
Read more on the latest update for Bing Ads: http://searchenginewatch.com/article/2270681/A-Preview-of-Bing-AdsKeyword-Distribution-Graph http://community.bingads.microsoft.com/ads/en/bingads/b/blog/archive/2 013/04/26/bing-ads-and-you-keyword-distribution-graph-coming-soon.aspx
DoubleClick Launched a Display Benchmarks Tool - 29th May 2013 DoubleClick has launched a display benchmark tool to help advertisers compare how display campaigns perform compared with industry averages. There will be 3 options initially available: Snapshot Report, Trends and Map View. Here is an example of the new tool being used to explore the CTR trends of a finance image ad in the UK.
(Availability may vary by country. Please check with your agency or Doubleclick representative for official release dates)
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Blair Liu
The new tool can be found here: http://www.richmediagallery.com/resources/benchmarks/ http://adwords.blogspot.co.uk/2013/05/the-new-display-benchmarks-toolput.html
Publishers can now modify Google AdSense Ad Code 24th May Our online world is becoming increasingly a cross device multi-screen reality and responsive web design is becoming more and more of a necessity rather than just an added feature.
However, Google has been reluctant to adapt to this change for quite a while now (as far as AdSense goes) and has been frustrating publishers ever since. Going forward, publishers will now be allowed to make modifications to AdSense ad code, which in turn will allow the following: Responsive design: Enabling publishers to create a single webpage that will adapt to the device on which it’s being viewed, whether it’s a laptop, smartphone or tablet, to maximize user experience. A/B testing: Running a test by creating multiple versions of a page, comparing user behaviour to see which page is the most effective. Setting custom channels dynamically: Tracking performance of segments of users, sections of your site, or other behaviour to maximize ad and user experience. Ad tag minimisation: Enabling your site pages to load faster by reducing the amount of data to be transferred. I am probably most excited about A/B testing and ad tag minimisations because suddenly it is will not be Google who ultimately decide where the AdSense ads go, but the publishers who are responsible for improving user experience and ad revenue. While people have previously always found a work around for this, they were considered a violation of Google Terms and Conditions. Now that the doors are wide open, Search Engine Optimization is becoming more like Search Experience Optimization. This brings us to the other end of the cane, which is with these new abilities publishers are not exempt from ads not appearing correctly due to some types of code modification resulting in negative ad revenue.
Although it is against Google Terms and Conditions, publishers are now able to manipulate ad targeting, hide ad units and even artificially inflate ad performance amongst other forms of exploitation with these new AdSense features. So while there are now more things to look out for, the ecosystem just got a lot more complicated. Having said that, now there are also more opportunities to make search experience and monetization processes even better.
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Vaidas Mykolaitis
More Details: http://www.seroundtable.com/google-adsense-modify-code-16836.html https://support.google.com/adsense/answer/1354736?hl=en&topic=1271508 # http://adsense.blogspot.co.uk/2013/05/updates-to-our-modifying-ad-codepolicy.html
The Impact of Penguin 2.0 - 24th May 2013 Google’s 4th Penguin update, penguin 2.0, went live on May 23rd. The penguin algorithm is designed to penalise websites that use manipulative link building techniques in order to improve their search result rankings and visibility. Penguin 2.0 update is aimed at decreasing SERP rankings of websites using SEO tactics that violate the Google Webmaster Guidelines. Google announced that Penguin 2.0 would impact around 2.3% of English language queries, a decrease in comparison to the first generation of web spam (3.1%). The update not only affects English speaking sites but has also been rolled out globally. According to SearchMetrics, German sites have been hit worst since launch. SearchMetrics founder Marcus Tober says the impact from this latest Penguin update is smaller than expected. The industries which have been primarily affected by the update include porn sites and gaming sites, but some big brands like the Salvation Army (31.89% decrease in SEO visibility) and CheapOair (28.66% decrease in SEO visibility) have also seen a negative impact. Initial analysis shows that thin sites, sites with thin links and especially untrusted links face the problem. In addition, some small business sites were hit because they have not taken SEO seriously enough in the past. Overall the impact wasn’t as strong as what we were expecting in the SEO community. Google will though be rolling out updates more frequently in order to improve their search results, so ensuring that sites are well structured and have good quality content is more important than ever.
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Emma Jackson
More Details: http://blog.searchmetrics.com/us/2013/05/23/google-penguin-update-2-0loser-analysis/