Comscore have released some interesting stats regarding the different types of universal results in the Google search results page (SERP).

source: http://www.comscore.com

James Lamberti draws the conclusion that the popularity of video is mostly driven by a combination of consumers and Google itself. However I’d disagree, and argue that Google is not responsible at all, simply Google is responding to what the consumer market is naturally demanding.

It would make sense that this would lead to a greatly increased volume in entertainment traffic as the nature of web usage changes, and thus an increasing popularity of video and YouTube in universal search results. Looking at the popularity of YouTube beyond Google this also matches our research into social bookmarking service DIGG.com which showed that YouTube was by far the website that reached the homepage of DIGG most frequently.

Definitely this will be an ongoing trend, and would not be surprised to see YouTube taking an even more prominent place on Google in the future.

Search Engine Optimizer Aaron Wall put up an extensive, multi-angled analysis of the worth of a top Google ranking.

Google Ranking and Pagerank are probably the most important algorithms ever developed for the Web. With billions of existing pages and millions of pages generated every day, the search issue in the Web is more complex than you probably think it is. PageRank, only one of hundreds of factors used by Google to determine best search results, helps to keep our search clean and efficient.

In an effort to differentiate themselves from competitors, many SEO/SEM firms come up with interesting unique selling propositions (USPs). Some SEO/SEM firms emphasize search engine ranking and advertising to create quite useful tools to help manage PPC campaigns. Some SEO firms specialize in training, again creating tools that help newbie and experienced SEO professionals optimize existing web pages.

However, do SEO professionals really “get” website usability, and is it a benefit for website owners to hire such firms to promote their company or organization sites in the commercial web search engines? Below are the opinions from a well-known SEO’s about “What should SEO professionals know about usability?”

Usability testing and SEO

“The word usability serves as a boundary object that invites diverse communities of practice to share experiences and negotiate solutions,” said Peter Morville, President of Semantic Studios and author of the renowned books, Information Architecture for the WWW and Ambient Findability. “For instance, as an information architect who consults with major corporations, it’s vital for me to understand usability heuristics and perform usability tests, but it’s equally essential that I go beyond usability.”

Heuristic analysis and SEO

The goal of a heuristic evaluation is to usability problems early in the design of a Web site so that improvements can be made as part of the iterative design process (Source: http://www.usability.gov/methods/heuristiceval.html). Though Jakob Nielsen and Rolf Molich came up with some outstanding guidelines in the early 90s, their research and others’ continues to evolve, as web site usability is an iterative process.

Conclusion

Both website usability and SEO/SEM are iterative processes, meaning that methodology based on a cyclic process of prototyping, testing, analyzing, and refining a work in progress (Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iterative_design). At the heart of iterative design is the objective observation of interaction between users and an interface: not focus groups, not web analytics, and not an SEO professionals’ personal opinion about website usability.

[via Searchengineland] Shari Thurow is the Founder and SEO Director at Omni Marketing Interactive and the author of the book Search Engine Visibility.

Once you have launched your own business blog, how can you use it as an effective marketing tool to promote your company? All it takes is a few carefully honed strategies and ideas. It is becoming more and more important for corporations - as well as businesses of all sizes like Keyphrasesearchmarketing.com, to have a blog in today’s world where so many people own computers.

I’ve read a blog from a Search Engine Marketing Consultant, Jennifer Sleg and she listed the reasons why people should really be blogging, and how it can be advantageous to their overall business marketing strategy. Here are some advantages if you’re using your blog as a marketing tool;

Controlling the message
Public Relations tends to want to run far, far away from blogs. But now, more are embracing blogs as a way to control the company’s message and how they release it. You can now have a fireside chat with your company’s CEO in the format of a blog interview, where responses can be monitored.

Excitement and anticipation
Companies can easily use a blog to give hints and tidbits about new product releases or services well before the actual launch so you can get people excited about what you are going to announce before you did it.

Fresh content
Having a blog adds new fresh original content to your site every time the blog is updated. And since this is something many corporate sites struggle with, it means you can add quality content as often as you like.

Reminding
When you have people subscribed to your company blog, those are all people who will think of your company as a household name or brand everytime you post a new blog entry.

In the business world, company owners and employees use them to develop deeper relationships with customers and prospects. For all these reasons, corporate blogs are becoming more and more popular for companies, as long as you are approaching your blog in the right way, it can be an invaluable marketing tool. If you are strategizing and getting ready to launch a corporate blog, 20 Best Practices for Launching a Corporate Blog is a must read. And if you already have a company blog, you might find Why Your Company or Corporate Blog is Failing useful.

[via a welsh view] Ecocho: A new search engine trying to make a difference for climate change. For every 1000 searches users make on Ecocho we’ll counter balances or ‘offset’ up to a ton of greenhouse gases. They do this by sponsoring two trees via advertising on the site.

It uses Yahoo and Google results and for every 1,000 searches made on the site they will donate 2 trees. So far they’ve planted 3,241 trees and offset 1.6KG of CO2.

Search now and grow trees!

There are many SEO services firm out there that are knowledgeable and skilled in this kind of niche. These companies are highly professional in providing a wide array in Search Engine Optimization and Internet Marketing. SEO and SEM experts surrounded a huge amount of skills and services including; link building, on page optimization, PPC, monitoring site rank, submissions and maintenance.

Keyphrase Search Engine Marketing.com will create the current initiation in SEO and SEM. For clients who wish to have a good website promotions and to rank high in all major search engines and directories. They specialize in website analysis including keyword customization to define the best key phrases, creation of targeted and optimized meta tags, template page for search engines and search engine sitemap. To work is to create a quality corporate in search engine optimization not only to maximize online advertising but also considerable profit. They will assist your site to establish itself and help you to achieve high rankings in all major search engines. They’ll keep you informed and learned about all the process in optimizing your site all the time. They will render complete time and attention in helping small and starting businesses get the top leads.

In the end hiring an SEO Services company definitely help you. So, what are you waiting for? Choose an SEO Services provider that you can trust, now!

If you want to be updated on your search engine ranking, there’s only one place to look. Keyphrase Search Engine Marketing.com looks at the changes in regular keyphrase ranking reports at the search engines targeted for your market. First and foremost, you have to know what exactly we do. Keyphrase Search Engine Marketing.com is a SEM or Search Engine Marketing company that monitors search engine ranking in order to understand the SERPs (Search Engine Result Pages) as well as current Search marketing techniques.

Like most SEMs, Keyphrasesearchmarketing.com has methods which include SEO or Search Engine Optimization, Paid Placement and Paid Inclusion. SEM is also defined as the practice of buying paid search listings. Its main goal is to obtain better free search listings.

Don’t worry. Keyphrase Search Engine Marketing.com has not been involved in any kind of controversial issues regarding search engines that are present in advertising. The search results are often set to guide the studies and reports that help people looking for products, services, and businesses they need.

Yahoo ranking has been one of the main concerns of sites over the years. Webmasters all over the world swapped tips with other webmasters on how to get listed in the Yahoo directory. Reporters have also reported that some of these companies go through ups and downs - they would either succeed or they would experience trouble. General advice on search engine optimization are available everywhere on the internet. However, only few webmasters tried to explain how Yahoo ranking really works. If they did, then the other webmasters would fully comprehend why it is so important.

The Yahoo ranking is determined by the Yahoo ranking algorithm. Yahoo is a directory, it is not a search engine. It does however, have a search feature, which visitors use. A site with a bad ranking misses out on internet traffic. In a nutshell, the Yahoo directory cannot produce this properly. Some wonder whether the Yahoo ranking uses the same application as that of the MSN search engine results page.

The latest theory surrounding the discussion regarding Yahoo ranking and MSN search engine results page is that the Google PageRank influences the ranking at searches performed in Yahoo and MSN. Google provides the secondary results of the web pages. Investigating these effects, one can click on the popularity and see that the ranking is different from those of in Yahoo and MSN. Take note, though, that MSN and Yahoo are different. They provide the same service but the crawler-based MSN search engine results page has been developed the past year and is about to be launched. The MSN Search sites is redesigned in order to compete with Yahoo.

UK Webmaster World Forum launches a new SEO contest starting Feb 1until April 1, 2008, 1 PM, United Kingdom time. Prize at stake is $1000, not too big for the pocket but the glory will be tasteful for sure as there are numerous SEM and SEO specialists competing for this contest.”SEO Contest 2008″ is the targeted keyword and a lot of Filipino SEM/SEO specialists joined. “SEO World Champion” Benj Ariolla is one of them. Lets see how these guys play the Search Engine Results. IMO, Google can’t control the results anymore. LOL.

What is the purpose of this post? I want to monitor how these guys manipulate the Search Engine Results. I will use that contest to learn more and to discuss my knowledge on Search Engine Results. This is not the last time I’ll be discussing Search Engine Results. This is only the beginning. Lets all find out How Search Engines Rank Web Pages.

Last week a client mentioned; “What is happening with my Yahoo Search Results? I don’t seem to be listed anymore?”

After close inspection of our clients Search Engine Ranking Report it seems Yahoo was fine, in fact all keywords were not only listed in Yahoo but were going up and going up fast…

It’s not a Google Dance, this is just a Weather fluctuation.

Yahoo! Search Team announced a change in the algorithm.

A couple days later I saw this blog post by Yahoo’s Search Blog.
“Weather Report: Yahoo! Search Index Update”.

Yahoo’s last Weather Report was October 31, 2007. I hope they update there search results more often!! Yahoo’s SERP reaction time is very slow compared to Google’s.