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Dec, 2009Honest job ads – THANK YOU Google
A big thanks to the Google team for cleaning house. Do a Google search for jobs, and you will see a remarkable difference compared with results from two years ago. This helps everyone doing honest work in the job search business! Thanks to CollegeRecruiter.com for catching this.
27
Apr, 2009Is offering false hope to the jobless evil?
More than a year ago, I wrote about the high level (as much as 50%) of deceptive advertising in Google’s sponsored search results (AdWords) for the search keyword ‘jobs’. I hoped Google would clean up the spam… And why should I care about this? First, Google is slowly teaching everyone that uses the Internet not [...]
25
Mar, 2009Changes to Google results pages
As many job board people know, big changes have been occurring in the Google search results over the past couple of months. Yesterday Google announced improved search refinements - "Starting today, we’re deploying a new technology that can better understand associations and concepts related to your search, and one of its first applications lets us [...]
26
Dec, 2008The .US domain handicap
At one point, I thought .us domains did not perform as well as other extensions. But the information in this post was outdated so I have deleted it. I’d still love to see the USA’s country code become a more popular extension like .com, .org and .net. Although few have realized it at this point, [...]
6
Nov, 2008'jobs' search up significantly in 2008
Google Trends is showing keyword searches with the keyword ‘jobs’ are up significantly this year starting midway through the year when typically they should be declining based on historical patterns. News reference volume is also up significantly. See for yourself.
15
May, 2008Search drives the sale — branding just validates it
In a fascinating article about branding versus SEO, search engine watch put into words very nicely a feeling that has been tugging at me for a long time: Before- In 1991, if you wanted to buy a portable compact disc player, you had to know: 1. What you wanted to buy (portable compact disc player) [...]
12
May, 2008Battling seo hackers
Earlier this year I commented on Matt Cutts SEO hacker prediction: "Would you notice if a strange link appeared somewhere inside your website? How long would it take you to see it? Hacking is a reality for everyone in our industry at one time or another but this is one that could be difficult to [...]
23
Apr, 2008Matt Cutts on exact match domains, parking, purchasing, sandbox etc.
Matt Cutts at Domain Roundtable talks about exact match domains as reported by randfish: Owning a keyword match domain name is going to carry some weight in Google for the foreseeable future. It is something they want to reward. And more detailed notes on Matt’s speech and Q&A session from Johnon.com: Domain names are the [...]
14
Apr, 2008Is it legal to use your competitors name in meta tags? In CPC advertising?
Search engine watch is reporting a new ruling that would make it illegal to use hotjobs, careerbuilder, or your direct competitor’s name in the meta tags of your job board. The 11th Circuit Court of Georgia ruled the use of others’ trademarks in meta tags infringes trademark laws, according to North American Medical Corp. v. [...]
15
Mar, 2008Yahoo opens up to developers with semantic web
The 'semantic web' news has great significance for job boards – the LinkedIn example says it all. Of course the potential for spammers is tremendous too… The Yahoo! Search Open Ecosystem A few weeks ago, we began talking about the new Yahoo! Search open platform. Today, we're releasing more details about two important components [...]
5
Mar, 2008SEO Hacker Prediction
Interesting SEO prediction made by Matt Cutts: 2008 will be the year that hacking and search engine optimization (SEO) collide in a major way. By the end of the year, a nontrivial fraction of blackhat SEO will involve illegally hacking sites for links or landing pages. One webhost will get a significant black eye as [...]
19
Jan, 2008AdWords Pollution in Jobs Results
This morning a google search for ‘jobs’ revealed an astonishing amount of deceptive advertising. Of 8 visible ads, 4 of them were garbage ads like this one: Here’s the catch, there are no jobs, it’s just a ploy to trick visitors into filling out fraudulent education information requests: If google doesn’t clamp down on [...]
5
Jul, 2007How high quality domain traffic gets penalized
This was originally a post about how Google inadvertently penalizes some of the highest quality domain traffic as a side effect of fighting click-fraud and poor quality traffic. I experienced a textbook example. Over time, I believe this incentive structure will cause new specialized entities that sell advertising directly to end users to flourish — [...]
4
Jul, 2007Will the Exact Match Domain Bonus Decay?
Aaron Wall discusses the interaction between domain names and seo in a post titled "Synergy Between Domain Names & Keyword Based Search Engine Optimization Strategies". He thinks the exact match domain bonus can't last. His post is full of important stuff and these are the key points: This post is about the current market, and [...]
5
Jun, 2007Evidence That Domain Ads Convert Better
Which advertising converts better – a search engine ad (Google AdWords for example shown to the right of organic search results) or the same ad displayed on a parked domain? In the domain industry, the latter is referred to as "the domain channel". But in Google AdWords, you won't find any mention of domains at [...]
3
Feb, 2007Firefox Powered By CPC Ad Revenue
I'm a fanatic Inc Magazine reader and really enjoyed this colorful story about the rise of Mozilla's Firefox. And there's an intriguing CPC connection. Did you know Firefox's secret economic engine is Google AdWords? But the way Mozilla really strains the conventional open-source model is that it makes money–pretty good money. Baker won't reveal the [...]
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Nov, 2006Google ban!
Imagine one day you wake up and find your website is no longer indexed by Google — that means not a single visitor is coming to your website from Google organic search results! Further, imagine you didn’t violate any of Google’s rules. That’s exactly what happened to one of our more valuable websites. How? Our [...]
1
Nov, 2006Forget About Click Fraud
Click fraud is in the news again lately. It's easy to be scared by it since the fraud is so apparently simple to carry out. But, on closer examination, it's probably not hurting most online advertisors significantly. Here's the argument for forgetting about click fraud. Ever consider who benefits from click fraud? If the [...]
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Sep, 2006Can You Legally Bid on Your Competitor's Name With CPC Advertising?
Yes, you can with Google AdWords. But, should you? If you receive a cease and desist letter, you may decide it’s not worthwhile, BUT look at this — a federal court just dismissed a lawsuit against Google over the practice of allowing companies to buy cpc ads that are displayed when people type in the [...]
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