Hitwise recently organized a seminar on their extensive UK market research. Hitwise analyzed the top five search engines for 1500 top searched terms in the last 12 weeks of 2008.

Some Figures
Every UK website receives 4 out of a total 10 visits from a search engine. The largest market share in the UK is garnered by Google.co.uk and Google.com. They command a whopping 86.8% market share whereas the rest of the search engines like Yahoo, Live Search and Ask have garnered the rest of the 8.3%. (more…)

Building links to your site has been one of the most important ways of increasing your page rank over the years. But it is also important to note that over the years the methods of acquiring links from various sites has undergone a sea change. There was a time when link building meant submitting our sites to hundreds of directories. So, what should your link building strategy consist of in the Web 2.0 age? (more…)

So, what do you mean by Social Media Marketing?

Social Media Marketing is to market using websites that use content user generated content and build communities online. These social media marketing websites like Orkut, Facebook, Myspace, etc. help create positive publicity and also help manage web based personalities. (more…)

Although it was launched only two years back, twitter is a red hot website on the internet these days. Some big companies have been fast to promote their websites on the Twitter, but local businesses have been lagging behind. Twitter doesn’t pass on “link juice”. This means that they don’t pass on PageRank value from Twitter to the sites that are linked to it. But it is also thought that citations sometimes do help to increase pagerank. So it is recommended to create a profile on Twitter and link back to your website. (more…)

Analytics are the eyes of SEOs. For a long time now, it has been very important for Search Engine Optimizations to measure and keep tabs on their traffic, usability, bounces and conversions. This has become more and more tough a task as there is no single tool that can measure all these parameters. (more…)

For any client looking out to hire a SEO firm, the moot question is whom to trust and how. There are so many Search Engine Optimization firms in the market that make tall claims about their work that it is tough to decide whom to believe and whom not to. There are a lot of things about which substantiated evidence cannot be given. But there are some indications and guarantees that clients should expect while looking for a good SEO. (more…)

Social proof, also called as social influence, is what happens when humans are not able to decide the proper mode of behavior. Human beings look for reasons to do what they want to. On the internet, what happens is that people rely heavily on the wisdom of crowds. This means that when a huge mass of people are engaged to one specific entity, it gives credibility to that entity. And soon more and more people subconsciously join into that mass of people. (more…)

Do you know people who have rejected you as a SEO firm just because they felt you lacked the experience required in their domain?

With Search Engine Optimization, the problem with being an industry expert is that it means that you have worked with and for others in the industry. It might also happen that you are already working for some big names in the industry and this in turn might lead to a conflict of interest. In spite of this, it is important to remember, that industry experience is important, especially to create the online infrastructure required to ramp up the rankings. (more…)

I thought of making a check list that will help me in my search engine optimization efforts. This check list basically depends on Google’s geo targeting patents. But there are some other elements too, that I felt were worth adding. Of course, it needs to be remembered that the list is just suggestive and not comprehensive and it should be used only when appropriate and possible. (more…)

Even after being on the internet for five years now, Google maps still keep floundering. This is primarily due to Google’s strategy of “launch early and iterate”. This policy creates a tool that is open to abuse by black-hat marketers. By putting a product that is not completely finished into the market, Google has played into the hands of these marketers. Pureshear was the locksmith who first blew the whistle over all these illicit methods that were employed by marketers.  He was the one who understood the problem and after understanding his precarious position, he attempted to change the mistakes as best as possible. When he failed, he put his career in danger and told everything to Google. Because of this, all of his listings have been banned from Google Maps. (more…)