Matt Cutts, SEOs Around The World Share Their #SEOHorrorStories On Twitter

Did you notice that SEO made its way to Twitter’s trends over the weekend?

It’s true. The #SEOHorrorStories hashtag, began on Friday by Aleyda Solis, hit Twitter trends later that night and was even seen trending over the weekend. SEOs from around the world followed Aleyda’s lead, sharing some of their worst SEO-related nightmares in just 140 characters.

Google’s App Interstitial Giant Ad Penalty Is Now Live

On September 1, Google told us that giant ads for apps may lead to ranking declinesstarting on November 1. Well, that algorithm, aka the “app install interstitial penalty,” went live a day late, on November 2.

Video Optimization: Do Not Underestimate The Power Of YouTube

Videos have risen to be an integral part of the online marketing mix; yet despite the increasingly widespread recognition of the power of videos, video optimization is not as commonly practiced as website and content optimization.

Taking the extra steps to make your videos easier to find and share will let you take advantage of all that YouTube and videos have to offer along the customer path to purchase.

The Qualifier: Brand Protector, Time Saver & Outreach Humanizer

Our imaginary link-building department is bustling with business: the Link Strategistcreated a campaign, the Content Designer bridged the gaps between brand and opportunity, and if the Prospector did her job right, most outreach targets should be right on topic.

The Surprise Discovery Wayfair Made About Organic Rankings And Conversions

After a recent Google algorithm update, Wayfair (where I’m an SEO manager) learned that traffic from a #1 organic ranking converts much better than traffic from lower rankings.

We’ve always worked under the assumption that organic visits were created equal. We assumed that whether we got 100 visits in ninth position or 100 in second, they would act more or less the same on-site. Based on some recent research, we were forced to rethink that perspective.

Google Search Is Testing Split-View Language Interface

Google is testing a new method of showing multiple languages in the mobile search results interface in India.

Abhijeet Mukherjee shared a screen shot of Google showing him two tabs, one for English results and one for Hindi results, in a single search results page on Google India.

BrightLocal Opens Its 2015 Local SEO Industry Survey

UK-based local search platform BrightLocal has opened its annual local SEO Industry survey, asking local SEO consultants and agency professionals to complete its 21-question poll.

Modern Marketing Essentials Guide: Content Marketing

Content marketing is driving the way marketing organizations are engaging their audiences. But in our consumer-empowered world, it’s become more difficult for marketers to cut through clutter and a lot more challenging to garner loyalty with their audiences. That’s why smart content delivered in context will make you stand out in the crowd.

Google Launches New Search Results Interface For Tablets

Google has launched a brand-new interface for searchers on tablet devices. The new interface is very different from the old tablet design, which was a combination of mobile and desktop design in one. This tablet view uses a form of card-like results, with a skinnier top bar navigation and a lot of white space on the left and right of the search results.

What Does Yahoo’s New Google Partnership Mean For SEO’s Future?

For the past 15 years or so, the search engine hierarchy has been pretty clear: Google is the dominating force in the search world, with all other platforms solidly behind.

Bing came onto the scene a little late but has grown steadily to reach a search market share of more than 20 percent, chipping away at Google’s still-dominant 66-percent position.

Yahoo Image Search Adds Personalized Photos From Your Flickr Collection

Yahoo announced they have integrated Flickr photos with Yahoo Search so that when you are logged into Yahoo, and you have Flickr photos in your account, Yahoo Search will personalize the image search results with your photos and photos from your friends.

Google: Next Penguin Update Should Happen By End Of 2015

We are all expecting the next Penguin update to happen soon, but now we know it will most likely be released within the next two months.

Gary Illyes, a Google Webmaster Trends Analyst, has posted on Twitter that he expects the release to be within 2015. Since only November and December remain in 2015, we have to assume this release will happen within the next two months.

How RankBrain Changes Entity Search

Earlier this week, news broke about Google’s RankBrain, a machine learning system that, along with other algorithm factors, helps to determine what the best results will be for a specific query set.

Specifically, RankBrain appears to be related to query processing and refinement, using pattern recognition to take complex and/or ambiguous search queries and connect them to specific topics.

This allows Google to serve better search results to users, especially in the case of thehundreds of millions of search queries per day that the search engine has never seen before.

Not to be taken lightly, Google has said that RankBrain is among the most important of the hundreds of ranking signals the algorithm takes into account.

The Most Important Thing SEOs Overlook: Internal Links

The best way to define an internal link is that it is a link from one page on a website to another page on the same website. If I could impart just one piece of wisdom to the current crop of SEOs, it would be this: Add internal links to related content where it makes sense.

I can imagine every reader just rolled their eyes or sighed because the last statement made too much sense, and, of course, you’re all already following best practices.

Think for a second, though — you may be frequently producing new pieces of content in which you add internal links, but are you remembering to go back to your older pieces of content and link to your new and related content?

SearchCap: Google Penguin, Mobile Redirects & SEO Visualized

Below is what happened in search today, as reported on Search Engine Land and from other places across the web.

From Search Engine Land:

• Google: Next Penguin Update Should Happen By End Of 2015
  Oct 29, 2015 by Barry Schwartz
  Google’s new real-time Penguin algorithm, version 4.0, will likely be released by the end of this year.
• Google Warns Webmasters Again: Do Not Use Sneaky, Mobile-Based Redirects
  Oct 29, 2015 by Barry Schwartz
  After warning webmasters in early 2014 about sneaky mobile redirects, Google now says it will issue manual actions, but also offers advice on how to clean up the unwanted redirects.
• The Most Important Thing SEOs Overlook: Internal Links

Last Chance to Enter the SocialPro Biggest Social Geek Contest

Enter the second annual SocialPro Biggest Social Geek Contest, sponsored by Marin Software. The contestant who can answer the most questions in the shortest amount of time will win the grand prize – a flight and hotel accommodations for two to Marketing Land’s SocialPro conference in Las Vegas, Nevada on November 18-19, 2015. The winner will also receive their choice of an Apple iPad Mini, Sony PlayStation 4, or an Xbox One.

Machine learning enters the SEO world

Image Credit: Willyam Bradberry/Shutterstock

For years, the search engine optimization industry has been dominated by Google’s algorithm update. Each time marketers would hear a term like Panda, Pigeon or “Mobilegeddon“, they knew exactly what it meant: a thorough audit of their current website along with a number of improvements necessary to prevent a precarious drop in ranking.

But increasingly, a sentiment is starting to grow that we’re entering a brave new world in SEO, one that may lead to search engine optimization in which the modus operandi looks nothing like it has before. Machine learning has entered the field, and it comes with the potential to overhaul everything we know about the importance of algorithm updates to SEO.

Machine Learning? As in, Robots Who Are Taking Over?

How To Increase Qualified B2B SEO Traffic In 2016 & Beyond

Many B2B marketers — particularly those selling to enterprise companies and targeting specific job titles — struggle with the task of generating SEO traffic that actually reaches their target audience.

There’s often a perception that these types of purchases (big ticket items bought by large companies) aren’t something that key stakeholders are likely to search for. The thought is that they buy based on experience with the product, recommendations or familiarity with the brand — not based upon a transactional search result.

This is complicated even further by a few additional factors that can be obstacles in generating the right kind of search traffic for your B2B business:

Why you can trust Page Traffic SEO: Review

SEO Service

Page Traffic

Rating:

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There are thousands of online SEO companies that claim to be the best companies. We know for a fact that it is not possible for every company to be the best company. In fact, some of the companies are only holding on to a website but have nothing to offer you in their portfolio. Today, we will talk about Page Traffic, which is probably one of the best and most reliable website on the internet providing complete SEO services. Why Page Traffic takes the cake is mentioned in a small list of points given below:

It’s A Google Partner

3 (Simple) Reasons Why E-Commerce Websites Need SEO

In the fairy tale, “Jack & the Beanstalk,” a magician gives the little boy three magic beans. His angry mother flings them out of the window. Overnight, a giant beanstalk springs up, helping Jack climb to a kingdom in the sky — from where he makes a fortune.

For your e-commerce website, Search Engine Optimization (SEO) is like the three magic beans. It will make you a fortune, too!

Why Do E-Commerce Websites Need SEO?

topseos.com Names Boostability as the Top Local SEO Service for October 2015

NAPLES, FL, Oct 28, 2015 (Marketwired via COMTEX) -- topseos.com has announced the rankings of the 100 best local SEO agencies for October 2015. Boostability has been named the best agency due to their strong performance during the topseos.com rigorous evaluation process. The recommendations are released each month to assist customers of search engine marketing services in selecting reputable agencies.

The process for analyzing and declaring the best services offering local SEO solutions involves a meticulous evaluation of their vital strengths. The five areas of evaluation associated with successful local SEO campaigns include needs analysis, keyword selection, localization, reporting, and optimization. The results of this process are used to establish which companies to include within the ratings each month. The ratings are updated monthly to account for the latest developments within the industry.

A complete guide to SEO for university websites

Digital marketing and SEO are becoming a higher priority now that universities are finding that they live in a much more competitive environment.

Historically universities haven’t prioritised ranking their courses highly in search engines.

Many are now starting to realise that, as students move from traditional methods of gaining course information to online, a high ranking in Google is crucial to be seen as a leading provider. 

In this article I’ll discuss the main areas of SEO that universities should be looking out for, and throw in a few hints and tips from my experience working with universities.

Let’s start with an overview of SEO:

The three pillars of SEO

Content marketing for SEO: Are social shares a red herring?

As of Q2 2015, there is still no convincing evidence that social shares affect Google rankings.

You might want to read that again. Be it tweets, re-tweets, Facebook shares, or Google+ posts, there is just no solid evidence that they affect improvements in ranking positions.

In recent years there's been a big shift in the SEO industry. Search agencies and others are pushing the merits of content marketing as an activity that can help drive SEO success.

Among the inevitable increase in content, something being widely misunderstood and purposely misrepresented by some is the idea that social shares drive SEO results. 

Here I explore how the misunderstanding came about, why it might be convenient for some providers to allow it to persist and what is required to achieve that which does move rankings - links.

Why links work - the thumbs up concept

Google: "Not Set" In Google Analytics SEO Report Isn't A Bug

Earlier this month, we reported an outcry by a large number of SEOs who noticed Google Analytics show not set as the top referrer in the Search Engine Optimization report. Google told us last night, this was not a bug but by design.