How to Rehabilitate Your Site After a Google Link Penalty

There may be few things more gratifying in the world of SEO than an incoming link from an authority site with stellar page rank and domain authority. Hopefully, all of your site’s incoming links are beyond reproach. But, as Google becomes more adept at spotting what it considers to be unnatural incoming links, you may be the recipient of an unnatural links message from Google.
If Google has taken a manual or automated spam action against you based on incoming unnatural links to your site, what, if anything, can you do?

First, ask yourself what you may have done to trigger this action. Google will not send you a complete list of the links it deems unnatural, but it will give you an example of your unnatural links via your Google webmaster console when they detect evidence of paid links, link exchanging and other unnatural linking schemes you may not even be aware of. Basically, anything that goes against Google’s quality guidelines is up for scrutiny. Google engineer and prolific blogger Matt Cutts suggests:
“One great place to start looking for bad links is the ‘Links to Your Site’ feature in Webmaster Tools. From the homepage, select the site you want, navigate to Traffic > Links to Your Site > Who Links the Most > More, then click one of the download buttons. This file lists pages that link to your site. If you click ‘Download Latest Links,’ you’ll see dates as well. This can be a great place to start your investigation, but be sure you don’t upload the entire list of links to your site — you don’t want to disavow all your links!”

Steps to Deal with a Google Link Penalty
If Google believes your site has been engaging in link spam over a period of time, they may consider it a severe case and will reduce the trust of your entire site. If specific links are a problem, Google may let you know about that as well. If this is the case, rather than taking trust away from your entire site, Google may just penalize those specific links. Your ranking may not fall, but you may be barred from ranking on some phrases.
There are actions you can take to get your site back into Google’s good graces, but you need to take a methodical approach.

1. Try to get the links taken down on your own. Attempt to contact the linking site and ask for the links to be taken down. You may have some luck here, but if you’ve been on a big linking campaign, there may be others you can’t get taken down.
2. Use Google’s disavow links tool to show which links you weren’t able to get taken down. Wait for the disavowed links to get into the system. You can’t just disavow the links without trying to get them down on your own, however. Google can compare which links were up when they took manual action, and which links are still up when you engage the disavow tool. If there’s no difference between the initial action and the disavow request, Google can tell you haven’t tried taking down any yourself. If you really want to get back into good graces with Google, you need to get as many links taken down as possible on your own before you try to have them disavowed.
3. Allow at least a day to pass and submit a reconsideration request. As Matt Cutts explained to Search Engine Land, “We want to reiterate that if you have a manual action on your site (if you got a message in Webmaster Tools for example), and you decide to disavow links, you do still need to do a reconsideration request.”

How Long Can it Take for Your Site to Recover?
Once you’ve followed these steps, the Google manual team will check your site to see if it now adheres to Google guidelines. They may then remove the manual actions penalty from your site, but there are no guarantees, and it could take several weeks or longer to see an improvement in your site rankings once you’ve followed the steps above.
“It can definitely take some time, and potentially months. There’s a time delay for data to be baked into the index. Then there can also be the time delay after that for data to be refreshed in various algorithms,” Cutts writes.

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Kristin Marino in SPN
How to Rehabilitate Your Site After a Google Link Penalty

How Your Visitors (Unknowingly) Send Quality Signals to Google

Since the initial launch of Google’s Panda update in 2011, the “Q” word has become commonplace in SEO, copywriting and content marketing circles. We should have been paying attention to quality from the beginning (who wants to be known for publishing junk?). Now, more than ever, it appears Google is looking to our visitors to judge whether our site’s pages are worthy of rankings.

In one of its first posts about the original Panda update, Google’s Official Blog stated, “This update is designed to reduce rankings for low-quality sites – sites which are low-value add for users, copy content from other websites or sites that are just not very useful.”

It goes on to talk about rewarding sites with quality content. Those two statements alone beg the question: how does Google judge quality?

Several months after Panda launched, Google provided a 23-point checklist with a bit of insight… questions they’ve been asking to determine which sites offer quality content/copy and which don’t.
Words like “trust,” “authority,” “value,” “share,” “expert” and “comfortable” appear numerous times on the list in relation to quality sites. On the other hand, we find repeated mentions of terms including “redundant,” “errors,” “mass-produced” and “excessive” when talking about low-quality sites.
Being a search engine, Google uses robots (bits of software) to travel around the ‘Net and gather information about billions of websites every day. While there is a human quality team at Google, they are only spot-checking sites – not evaluating every single one.

How Do You Train a Robot to Assess Quality?
By relying (at least partially) on quality signals from site visitors.
Wordtracker’s own Mark Nunney has done an excellent job with his Panda Update Survival Guide where (among other things) he points out several metrics Google may watch to determine the quality of a site’s content. Among these are:

• duplicate content in high quantities
• low amounts of original content
• page content not matching the Google snippet in the SERPs
• unnatural language (over-optimization) of copy/content (also a Penguin issue)
• boilerplate content

How do you, as a site visitor, behave when you click to a site that has one or more of the above? You might click away immediately. You might click from page to page quickly trying to find the content you want. You may leave and never come back.
And these signals are communicated to Google in the form of:

• high bounce rates
• low time on page
• low time on site
• how soon (if ever) you return.

Sure, there could be other reasons (besides the page’s copy) that you behaved the way you did. But it’s obvious to Google that something wasn’t right… the site/page lacked in quality somewhere. This is what SEO-pro Jill Whalen, of High Rankings, describes as the “merry-go-round effect.”

“It’s really hard to say for sure, but my feeling is that somehow Google is able to tell if a user gets to a page from search and then can’t easily find exactly what it was they were looking for (based on their Google search query) that it’s a negative signal to Google. They possibly can tell when a user clicks around a site a number of times and then comes back to the Google search results and tries another site. With the sheer number of sites using Google Analytics these days and Google’s Webmaster Tools, it seems that they can pretty easily gather this information.”

What else do you do, as a site visitor, when you find content that hits the nail on the head? Frequently, you might share it with others. This leads to social signals that Google could use to determine quality.
Video shares from YouTube, indicators from Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, Google+ and more show up in your Google Analytics account. This offers proof to Google that your content was well thought of and shared with others.

Take a look through your site’s copy and the content of your blog. Are they up to par? Measure your pages against the criteria in Google’s Panda checklist and Wordtracker’s Panda Survival Guide. Do you see any of the problems I mentioned above? Make a list of action steps you need to take in order to improve questionable areas.

The Panda update is a permanent part of Google for the foreseeable future. Taking some time now to fix issues can save you lots of headaches and rank reductions in the future.

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Karon Thackston in SPN
How Your Visitors (Unknowingly) Send Quality Signals to Google

How to Make Google Now Work for You

If you haven’t yet discovered the glorious world of virtual assistants, it’s time to meet Google Now. A bit like the more robust version of Apple’s Siri, Google Now acts like the quiet, informative personal assistant you’ve always wanted but couldn’t justify affording. Sure, it certainly pervades your privacy to figure out just what you need to know and when (just like the human variety!), but if you’re willing to take that risk, the rewards are plenty.

Google Now: A Definition
Google Now officially launched in the Jelly Bean Android operating system what seems like ages ago, and is now available in both Google Play and Apple app stores. It works on tablets, too. Because it needs to access all your personal data, it is necessary to first turn Google Now on, as the default is set to off (which is a good thing, or some of us would really get paranoid.) You’ll also need to enable Web history, location services, and other allowances, depending on the features you’re after.
Once triggered, Google Now will serve you a series of “cards” throughout the day, which aim to keep you informed about valuable time-saving tidbits. Examples include weather forecasts, flight information, meeting schedules, and sports updates. These will either show up as notifications, or will display when you launch Chrome via your enabled smartphone. Keep in mind that just like most apps, Google Now is a work in progress. What you currently see is likely a skeleton of what it will become.

An Upgrade from Siri
Google Now is like hiring a more efficient and reliable Siri, Apple’s own version of a virtual assistant. Although both have their strengths and weaknesses, Google Now seems much more robust and functional over the not-so-reliable Siri. Like its Apple counterpart, Google Now responds to voice commands for a host of functions. The good news is this aspect of the app works like a charm. Use it to verbally set appointments or alarms, ask what time a business opens or closes, find out where the nearest Starbucks is located, or inquire if you need to bring an umbrella out on the town this eve. Essentially, what Google Now excels at is providing little time savers throughout the day. These really add up over time, however, and you may find an extra chunk in your busy day to do something other than chase down pertinent information. Siri covers a few of these commands, but definitely not all of them.

A Sampling of Google Now Cards
Below is a list of some of the more functional Google Now cards, including a couple just added this month. If any of the recent additions are any indication, you’re going to want to offer your new virtual assistant a raise (good thing he’s free.)

Traffic – For those among us who endure small and large commutes, this card gives you a real-time snapshot of your loaded route. Google Now uses recent searches and common location patterns to determine the places you visit most, or you can set your home and work locations to take away the guess work.

Appointments – Synced with Google Calendar, this card works with the Traffic card to give you reminders and route suggestions. Just before you’re set to leave. Google Now will alert you to traffic complications too. And you don’t even have to ask.

Translation and Currency – These two cards are indispensable if you travel overseas. They offer instant conversions and suggestions in just about any international language and currency.

Weather – Each morning along with your friendly alarm, Google Now will give you a local forecast for both your home and work destinations. Immensely useful, for obvious reasons. (This card only works if you’ve set your location to “on.”)
Places – Also useful for the frequent traveler, this card suggests local restaurants, coffee shops, and points of interest, all based on what Google Now has learned about your habits thus far. Without even needing to inquire, you’ll receive great dinner suggestions, and even a cocktail hotspot too.

Books, TV Shows, Video Games, Music, Movies – Google Now also suggests various types of media tailored to your preferences. It’s a clever way to help drive Google Play sales too, in addition to being valuable to the end user. This is why we can hire a stellar virtual assistant for free; because the assistant does some heavy lifting for the real boss, Google. It’s a fair trade-off.

The Issue of Privacy
It’s painfully obvious that for Google Now to have the ability to suggest truly relevant content and updates for a given user, it needs to know a lot of personal information: GPS location, your travel plans, meeting times, etc. For many, the trade-off is well worth the privacy invasion. If you are wary, be comforted with the knowledge that you must trigger Google Now on for any of this data to be accessible. If the allure of a virtual assistant helping throughout your day is not enticing, even at the hourly rate of free, then don’t activate the service, and sleep well at night. It is admittedly creepy, and also admittedly really, really helpful.

The true allure of Google Now is not that it’s a genius new app, but that it’s quietly intelligent, and only grows more so as it learns all about the uniqueness that is you. There are no bells and whistles, no whiz-bang features, just a steady stream of valuable, customizable information, unsolicited, that often lands at the moment you need it. For busy professionals, this kind of repetitive time saving assistance is worth its weight in gold. The one thing we can never seem to have enough of is time. Google Now gifts back that precious commodity, a few moments at a time, which of course adds up in a hurry. Although it’s true that the tool is invasive, it has to be to provide this level of value. It all comes down to trust. Do you trust Google with this information, or not? If you do, get Google Now – now.

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SiteProNews
How to Make Google Now Work for You

Google Removes More Search Features

By now the masses are likely done mourning the upcoming demise of Google Reader (slated to swim with the fishes this summer), but some are noticing key Google toolbar features disappearing like a gaggle of phantoms too.

As always, there’s a method to Google’s madness (namely, they say these features just weren’t used enough), but this could very well be a case of quantity trumping quality. SEO experts, business owners, and search influencers alike are frustrated with Google’s willingness to yank once-touted top features, with little to no warning or fanfare.

While these folks undoubtedly represent the minority in terms of sheer numbers, many rank as top experts and consultants tasked with ensuring Google’s results are of the highest caliber. Furthermore, it seems many of Google’s rolled out features go unnoticed because people simply do not know to where to look for new releases, or to even expect they may arrive. Google is playing a numbers game, while many experts wish they would consider quality and communication first; and ultimately, stop taking away functionality that has helped make the web a better place, albeit in small doses.

They Give, They Take Away
Google released a fancy new sidebar in 2009 that came loaded with a slew of advanced search options, including sentiment analysis snippets, longer snippets, timeline, recent results, dictionary auto-linking, SearchWiki, Wonder Wheel, and related searches. Sadly, many of these features are no longer available.
The Wonder Wheel, along with related searches, were both considered top-tier tools, even if only a select few heavily used them. The Wonder Wheel showcased search terms in a visual format to let analysts and business owners discover keywords related to those currently targeted. You’d simply type in a keyword phrase – say, “London attractions,” and a circle pattern would appear connecting “London” to other related keywords, like “Big Ben,” “Picadilly Circus,” and “British Royals.” Handy, no? One year later, the feature was removed, and a chorus of cries commenced, without recourse (thankfully, other tools like the ‘Contextual Targeting Tool’ (http://www.google.com/ads/innovations/ctt.html) picked up the slack.)

Now, the frustrated growls are expressing the loss of the related features tool. Related features enabled users to efficiently eyeball search results for queries similar to the one selected. For example, if you typed in “gifts for mom,” the tool might suggest terms like “Mother’s Day presents” as good alternatives.

For SEO experts, this tool was a goldmine. You could start with a broader term like “gift ideas”, and use related searches to drill down into similar yet more effective key phrases. Why did Google remove related searches? “We weren’t seeing enough usage of this filter to maintain it in the toolbar,” they wrote recently, “but we do display related searches at the bottom of the page when they seem relevant enough.” When they seem relevant enough? That’s not exactly reliable nor overly usable.

Is Google Disregarding Their Heaviest Users?
There is a lot of frustration around Google’s sudden related searches axe. In a recent Google+ thread, SEO expert AJ Kohn stated, “Okay, so is Google then saying that Reading Level and Verbatim are therefore used more than Related Searches was?” Kohn is referring to a couple newer and lesser used options, and rightfully wonders why a tool heralded by Google’s top influencers is gone, when some features that hardly anyone sees value in still remain. Kohn also brilliantly shined a light on why this may be a major misstep for Google. “Just like the decision to terminate Google Reader, Google doesn’t seem to understand they need to address influencers.”

SEO professionals don’t just use their skills to help clients reach top rankings in Google and other search engines, they actually help Google maintain credibility and high user satisfaction too.
Google’s algorithms are built to favor high-quality sites with comprehensive information and intuitive layouts. SEO professionals, at heart, help clients create user-friendly websites and content. Helping these integral web marketers do the very best they can should therefore be one of Google’s top priorities.

Creating tools like Wonder Wheel and related searches goes a long way to achieve this synergy, but taking them away without warning obviously does just the opposite. While there are some new features added in recent times (verbatim, dictionary, and visited pages, to name a few), the list of deleted tools is just as long, if not more so. And with each eradication, Google risks inhibiting the success of people dedicated to helping them succeed. To add salt to the wound, just last year related searches was heralded as a top new feature from Google. Many internet marketers followed suit by loyally using the tool – an experience that was unfortunately short-lived.

Going Forward
Because Google still has a massive search engine market share, their antics are unlikely to improve any time soon. Some remain hopeful, however, that top executives will start to rethink their propensity to add and remove features at will, based solely on popularity, and instead consider weighting the voices of their top influencers. Webmasters and SEO professionals will never outnumber average web users, but if they celebrate a given search tool, Google would be wise to keep it in the mix. Without the tools they need to test and create top-notch sites and keywords, Google results could go back to endless lists of gobbledygook.
Until then, enjoy the tools Google offers, but don’t get too attached.

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SiteProNews, Tina Courtney-Brown
Google Removes More Search Features

How Google Looks at Backlinks Today to Rank Your Site

I talked about link value last year but I thought I’d go a few steps further and add to that, covering how Google values links nowadays when link building isn’t the center of attention or the entire game that it once was.

Total Number:
First and foremost, Google considers the total number of links which you have. This isn’t a particularly influential factor considering one good one from a high ranking, established, trustworthy site (more on this later) will be more valuable than thousands of spammy, low quality site links.

Number of Domains/Source:
If you have thousands of links from the same site then it’s not really going to be helping you. For instance, if the majority of your links were all coming from the same article directory, Google is going to discount the influence of most of those links. Some people argue that Google discounts influence after the first link from a particular site. Therefore, link diversity is extremely important, so you should be getting links from all types of sites from directories to blogs to video sites and so on.
Google can identify where your links are coming from not just from the sites themselves but through varied IP addresses, so you definitely want your links coming from different IP addresses around the globe as this suggests you’re getting links from different people.

Anchor Text:
I’ve talked a lot about anchor text lately in terms of how important it is to vary up the anchor text which you use when creating links to your site. This works to keep your link profile diverse and natural looking because you have to think that if someone was linking to your site from his site, he likely wouldn’t use the keyword you’re targeting on that page when pointing to your site.

Age:
While some people believe that older links – links you’ve had for years pointing to your site – are more valuable and powerful than newer links you receive, when I refer to “age” here I’m referring to the age of the sites you’re receiving links from. Older, more established site links will be more influential whereas links from newer sites won’t make as much of an impact. This goes with the idea that older sites have more authority and page rank and Google trusts them more.

Variation:
I’ll include “variation” here to once more drive home the point that diversity is important in terms of anchor text and source of links. It doesn’t stop there, however; variation is important in terms of image versus text, placement of them on the various sites linking to you (high up in the content is best as oppposed to sidebars or menu bars which are signs of link buying or exchanges), and dofollow versus nofollow links, as well.
Years ago, Google said that only DoFollow links would pass influence. After hearing that, everyone began concentrating entirely on DoFollow and discounting going after NoFollow links altogether. While a lot of webmasters still focus entirely on DoFollow, a lot of SEOers believe that NoFollow links pass more influence than before because Google will do what is necessary to diminish the success of those who are trying to game or play to Google’s algorithm and reward those who are not.

Quality:
Quality is still a factor as I mentioned in opening. Receiving one link from a highly ranked and trusted site is far more valuable than thousands of links from spammy blogs. If you are going to spend your time trying to get links, you want to focus on getting links from highly trusted and established sites which it’s difficult to receive links from because they’re more conservative in whom they link to. In this case, it’s less about “getting” links and more about “earning” links through techniques like creating and sharing link bait or guest blogging for them.
Another sign of quality is relevance, in that you want links from sites which are relevant to your site. If you’re getting one from a site about cars when your site is all about puppies, Google is likely going to discount the influence that it has as it is very likely that you created that link yourself because typically a webmaster of a car site would not link to your puppy themed site on their own. In keeping with the variation point, it’s all right to have a few links from irrelevant sites, but generally you’ll be staying in your niche.

Bad Links:
On the other hand, the opposite of quality links, bad links will detract from and have an adverse effect on your ranking, so do what you can to limit the number of bad links pointing to your site.

Velocity:
Link velocity refers to the rate and schedule at which you’re building links to your site. The key here is to make your link velocity look natural or, in other words, you shouldn’t get 10,000 links one month and 100 the next month. There shouldn’t be many curves in your velocity. You should continue to build more links each month than the one before it.

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Article by Paul M Ventura, in SPN
 How Google Looks at Backlinks Today to Rank Your Site

Google, SEO and Author Rank: It’s Getting Personal

In the competitive world of SEO, any edge up on the competition is a godsend. Here’s a word to the wise: If you’re looking to up your Search Engine Page Rankings (SERPs), you should start caring very deeply about author rank. A well charted content strategy consists of more than just well written, on target, audience-specific articles; nowadays it’s crucial to tie it all to a well-ranked author.

Consider this a similar notion to the spirit of link sharing; we now know it’s critical that we understand imperatively the reputation of everyone we link to, and those who link to us. In that same vein, it’s now a must that we equally consider author reputation. In a world of rampant social sharing, this is one of a few key ways search engines are cutting through the content clutter. And it’s your ticket to better SEO.
Consider this book excerpt from “The New Digital Age,” authored by Google Executive Chariman Eric Schmidt:
“Within search results, information tied to verified online profiles will be ranked higher than content without such verification, which will result in most users naturally clicking on the top (verified) results. The true cost of remaining anonymous, then, might be irrelevance.”

Irrelevance?!? That’s a very strong statement. And that alone is proof that author rank should be on your SEO radar.

How Author Rank Became an SEO Darling
Every day, a staggeringly high number of “social events” are triggered by web users. “Social events” are things like Facebook Likes, Google +1s, tweets, and content shares. To that end, search engines can conceivably sort the relevance of this mountain of data by considering each author’s reputation (a little like Klout, a site that lets authors track their own ranking prowess, aims to achieve.)

It used to be that the key to SEO was in massive link building, but as this transformed into a less than stellar user experience, search engines shifted their strategies. In order to maintain credibility and track the quality of content in a more cohesive manner, author rank has become a much stronger focus. This is an obvious evolution for the algorithms, especially considering the astronomically increasing amount of data that must be tracked in real-time. Gone are the days when link directories and volumes of anonymous posts reigned supreme. As people, we have long since preferred to interact with other people, not bots or nameless, invisible beings – it turns out Google feels the same way.

Quantifying Author Rankings
SEO is not an exact science, but it does support common sense in considering how the algorithms might dissect a concept like author rank. Here are some key social signals to consider as you’re building your own ranking (please note these are ideas, and not guarantees… yet):

1) Social Media Profiles: This one is a no-brainer. If you’re going to have any credibility to the masses these days, you clearly need to be on the big dogs: Facebook and Twitter at a minimum, but ideally other sites like Pinterest and LinkedIn. Likewise, a Google+ definitely feels like a must-have, because it’s obvious Google is paying hyper-close attention to their own social darling.

2) Quantity of Social Events: The volume of content you create is certainly applicable, but what’s more relevant these days is the number of tweets, shares, +1s and Likes a piece you authored generates. Bear in mind search engines are not looking at how many social events you trigger, but those of your content instead.

3) Frequency of Social Events: It’s not just about volume, but how often your content generates a Like, share, etc. Both Google and Bing have already admitted that they measure social velocity to help identify high-ranking news; it’s reasonable to assume they are tracking the same for author rankings too.

4) Publisher Credibility: Remembering that quality still trumps quantity, the authority of the site where the content appears is also integral to your success. We are therefore reminded to choose our publishing partners carefully while building SEO rank, because mass publication on sites with bad reputations – or none at all – can actually hurt your cause instead.

Ways to Improve Your Author Rank
So now that you’ve embraced the importance of author rank and have started understanding how it might be quantified, let’s talk about some real-world strategies to improve your results over the long term.
You obviously need a great social media and SEO strategy for the content on your actual website. Consider unifying your marketing efforts and having one cohesive voice write the majority of your content. This may go against the grain of large teams of marketers and writers propelling forward various styles, but given the increased importance of author rank, it’s advisable that you seek an authority to lead the charge – not just a snazzy copywriter. This means you should consider hiring an author with expertise in your field, so that you may utilize the social following and clout they’ve already established. By all means, leverage the audience these experts have already established. The more you personalize the messaging from your brand, the more likely you are to make a personal connection with your customers. (Seriously, who likes impersonal sales-y sounding social signals and marketing materials?). Likewise, it now seems SEO is gearing towards the personal too, so this is a win-win. Use sites like LinkDex to help identify the perfect candidate to author your content charge.

Next up is outreach – identify news sites, bloggers and related content hubs that feature information related to your business’s expertise. Once determined, don’t just go through the standard submission process for the site; seek out the authors you are most in tune with and ask them personally to consider featuring your business, content, inforgraphic or related media. See the personal trend here? It’s becoming as good as gold. (It always was for customers, now search engines are getting in on the action too.)
Finally, remember that diversity in content is also a key tactic. Don’t just focus on keyword-rich articles, have some fun and mix it up. Create compelling viral videos, interactive content, infographics and related visuals, and/or eBooks so that your offerings create a broad appeal. Above all, don’t forget to clearly delineate authorship on all the content you publish.

Author Rank’s Longevity
Considering all the current web trends, and Google’s most recent statements, banking on author rank as a growing SEO trend is a safe bet. Start utilizing the requested tactics straight away, and stick with them long term, as they are likely to become more and more critical to your rankings. As Google executive Schmidt clearly stated, staying anonymous may result in irrelevance. It’s clear Google can’t, and won’t, ignore the immense amount of social data out there, so make yours count as much as possible by tying content to credible authors. If Google wants to know all they can about who’s writing your content, you should clearly want the same.

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A Post by Tina Courtney-Brown in SPN
Google, SEO and Author Rank: It’s Getting Personal

Google Redeems Itself With Google Universal Analytics

Google Universal Analytics has been here for a while, but it was a limited beta launch, available to only a handful of specialists. However, it’s now available to the rest of us since last Friday and this post will be about why you should be roaring to implement it. The Universal Analytics platform is simply better than the old Analytics, especially if you’re a mobile company, or have a mobile version or app for your site.

The features include better tracking through a different code snippet, that will allow marketeers of all kinds to better understand a visitor’s behavior. As JiaJing Wang, Analytics Product Manager, wrote on the Analytics blog: “measurement today is evolving from technology that counts site traffic into a broader system that measures your effectiveness in advertising, sales, product usage, support, and retention.”
Problems with Google’s old Analytics led to competitors stealing a piece of the analytics pie from the ol’ monster. I think that’s about to change. Here’s why.

1. Mobile App Analytics

The Universal Analytics allows for mobile tracking for your apps, integrated directly into your analytics account. I think app development companies have been waiting for this for a while. Although solutions from other companies exist, they don’t have Google’s knowledge base. Google owns the biggest Android Market, Google Play, so they’re should be the first to offer this option to Android developers. Still, better late than never!

Important Metrics

Here are the metrics which the suite will take into consideration for the performance of your app:

• The number of installations
• Devices and networks used to access app
• Customized tracking of special content, like video
• The geographic location and languages spoken by visitors
• The order in which visitors move through these screens
• The number of screens seen per visit
• In-app purchase totals

Best thing about this would be the ability to check the movement and ‘flow’ of a user through different screens. The result: apps are bound to increase in quality.
So many app companies take no account of user interaction and that’s why app quality overall has hit a plateau, especially for medium-size companies who develop for Android. They just couldn’t afford the time or resources to correctly analyze user behavior. They have no excuse now.

2. Better Tracking

No more cookies for tracking! This has been long coming. Cookies are unreliable. Google will now use unique universal tracking IDs for each property. More reliable tracking simply means business owners will ideally be able to see a person’s behavior from the moment they’ve first visited to site until… well, forever.
Up until now, there were tons of people (including myself) who felt a bit uneasy when checking Google Analytics. The information seemed a bit off when compared to other tools – and just pure common sense. Hopefully, that was just because of the tracking system which if changed, could only lead to better-optimized sites, better-looking ones, and a happier planet.

3. Offline Analytics?

Google is a global force, so don’t doubt for a second that better services from them can’t have a positive offline impact. Yep, you heard me right. You can now upload offline data about your customers and impact the overall statics from your analytics. The new Measurement Protocol ties online with offline behavior. This is an innovative user interaction gadget. The drawback is that you willl need technical skills to use it.
You need to first aggregate the offline date (be it from a store launch, store visit, call log, etc), then upload it and figure out how that aggregates with the overall bigger picture. Sounds a bit too clumsy for your average Joe analytics manager. But then again, for those into optimization, this might just prove to be a valuable edge.

4. How Do I Get It?

If you’ll want to implement this new Analytics, you’ll need to login to your analytics account and create a new web property. You’ll want to select Universal Analytics beta to be given the new analytics javascript.

If you’re looking to set up analytics for an app, iOS or Android, just select App and you’ll be given access to the required SDK. There are a few golden rules for Mobile Analytics, which you should really, really read on the analytics blog. Once you’ve implemented it for an app, you’ll be able to see an aggregated report in the App Overview section.

Individual Report

Again, the Analytics blog informs us about how an Individual Report will look:

• Acquisitions: The number of downloads and other useful information
• Users: Information about your users – devices, location, how often and how long they used your app
• Engagement: You can set up your own triggers for Event Tracking to see how your users are interacting with the app.
• Outcomes: Set up targets, like form submissions, and see how many users go through with them.

A post from hongkiat.com
Google Redeems Itself With Google Universal Analytics

Google’s Latest Game-Changer: Field Trip

The next great game-changing app has landed, and it’s from — who else? — Google. Google’s Field Trip, available for several months now on Android, officially launched on iOS earlier this month, and it’s making quite a splash. Field Trip is a location-discovery app, which when downloaded, runs in the background of your smartphone, alerting you to fascinating nearby destinations. How many times have you passed that obscure museum down the road from your house and not realized it’s brimming with paintings from your favorite artist? What about that quirky café across town you’ve always figured had the best apple pie imaginable, but were never sure enough to try? Field Trip is in-the-know, and it wants you to be, too.

If you’re a brick and mortar business owner catering to a tourist crowd on any level, you absolutely want Field Trip to feature you. The app isn’t about showcasing chain restaurants and obvious go-to’s — instead, it highlights lesser known but equally awesome eateries, shopping destinations, architecture must-sees, museums, historical spots, movie theaters, and any place deemed cool and unique. If your business fits this bill, inclusion into Field Trip is a marketing no-brainer.

How it Works
Field Trip was developed by a segment of Google called Niantic Labs. Niantic is like a startup nestled within the dot com giant, fully dedicated to making new and innovative applications. With Field Trip, they’ve truly hit a home run.

Here’s how it works: Once you download the app from either the iTunes or Google Play stores, login to your Google account, and the application will automatically start running in the background of your smartphone. The moment you pass a location Field Trip feels you should know about, it will alert you via a ringtone or vibration. If you set your notifications as such, it will even read the title and description of the locale to you. Things of interest don’t just include physical destinations; Field Trip will also tell you about local events, nearby special offers and deals, and historical facts.

If you’re looking for something specific, Field Trip can help you there too. A list of the current categories includes: Architecture, Historic Places & Events, Lifestyle, Offers and Deals, Food, Drinks and Fun, Cool and Unique, and Art and Museums. The app is currently only covering the U.S. and the U.K., but you know Google — they won’t rest until it’s a global sensation.

What Businesses are Featured on Field Trip?
Google created partnerships with many reputable content aggregators and bloggers across the web to create the impressive collection of Field Trip posts, which is growing all the time. Examples include Zagat, the restaurant review experts (who obviously help alert users to exceptional dining in their vicinities) and The Worldwide Guide to Movie Locations, a site that tracks where any and every movie was physically filmed. The majority of partners are established blog sites, such as Eater (another foodie haven) and Thrillist (a site that highlights “thrilling” and unique products and destinations worldwide.) They have also joined forces with local bloggers in major cities that assist in keeping their fingers on the pulse of each metropolitan area’s hidden gems.

How to Get Your Business In On the Action
Business owners that operate applicable destinations can’t petition Field Trip directly for placement, but you can continue your efforts to connect with like-minded bloggers and content aggregators across the web. If your business makes a mean vegan donut, for example, you are likely already featured on sites like Eater and Urbanspoon — and if you’re not, you should start making that connection today. It’s these SEO and marketing-related partnerships that will land you a coveted spot in Field Trip as well. If you are featured on a relevant site, feel free to suggest it to Google instead. TheCultureist, a blog about travel, food and culture trends, recently became the first Field Trip partner recommended by users. Making friends with potential marketing partners is your way in.

Additionally, users can post newfound hot spots to Google+, Twitter and Facebook, and conceivably, if enough folks tag the same location, Google will add it to the service. So if you have a social media savvy customer base, get them on the job. This could conceivably echo FourSquare style business discounts, with merchants offering great deals to visitors who post them on Field Trip. The app is young, so we shall see how the landscape develops.

User Concerns and Feedback
Since launch, Field Trip has had its share of naysayers as well. Many echo privacy concerns, simply because it’s necessary that Google know where you are in order to send you relevant content. As such, some are feeling watched. The truth is, Field Trip isn’t responsible for bringing on a lack of privacy. If you carry a cellphone with GPS initiated, you can be traced. So complaints about Field Trip knowing too much just isn’t warranted — either one is into the benefits and convenience of GPS technology, or not. Those of us already addicted to Google Maps will easily see the benefits of Field Trip.

Worried that you’ll be inundated with constant alerts? So far, Google has been very smart about their content partners, and notifications are not in the least bit excessive. If you do end up feeling a bit overwhelmed, the notification controls allow you to turn updates on or off anytime, or to only receive content from your favorite individual sources. You can opt for frequent or occasional notifications too, so rest assured you have plenty of control over how often Field Trip has something to share.

Why Field Trip is Poised for Greatness
Besides being an obvious boon for featured merchants, Field Trip is a win for users too. While most of us can honestly say the last thing we really need is another app, Field Trip has the makings of a must-have. For starters, its diversity lends itself to constant usage. Sure, it’s obviously perfect for vacations, as it literally can act like a tour guide with audio read-outs about all nearby must-sees. But think about how much you could learn about your day-to-day surroundings that currently lie hidden in your awareness. Field Trip could make home feel like a new and exciting destination, and that’s pretty special. Anything that helps make our real world come alive in a more visceral and interactive fashion immediately has staying power, and Field Trip does this in spades.
Google’s Latest Game-Changer: Field Trip 
A Post from SPN

Google launches Evernote rival Keep for Android 4.0 and above

Google launches Evernote rival Keep for the Web, Android 4.0 and above


Google Keep, a note-taking service similar to Evernote, for both the Web and Android 4.0+ (Ice Cream Sandwich and Jelly Bean) devices. You can try the service out now for yourself at Drive.Google.com/Keep or download the Android app from the Google Play Store.
Google describes Keep as a service that lets you “save ideas and organize to-dos the moment they happen by creating notes, lists, photos and voice recordings right from your phone” (don’t worry, it also works on tablets). You can access, edit, and create new notes on the Web from the above website, and furthermore, Google says you’ll be able to do the same directly from your Google Drive account “in the coming weeks.”
Keep also lets you speak to it: the service transcribes voice memos for you automatically. Since we’re talking about Google here, there’s also a “super-fast search” function so you can find the note you wrote, read it, and then either archive or delete it.
Also in typical Google-fashion, here’s a YouTube video to explain the newly-launched service:
Just two days ago, news of Keep leaked out as Google apparently launched the service prematurely and then promptly took it down less than half an hour later. At the time of writing, Keep is having issues (likely due to the heavy load) but Google has announced it in multiple places, so we’re confident this isn’t another slip up.

Here’s what Keep looks like on the Web (if you’re lucky enough not to get the message “Oops! An error occurred. Please click here to reload the page.”):
Any changes you make save almost instantly. When you visit the site again, you start off exactly where you left off.

Here is Keep on Android (you can drag your notes around and choose the color for each):
As you can see above in the left screenshot, it’s a fairly clean and straightforward app. The right screenshot meanwhile shows that Google has integrated it with the Android lock screen (this widget is only available for devices running Android 4.2+).
Google says it is trying to solve the problem of not having your notes and reminders wherever you are. A mobile app launch on its own platform naturally makes sense:

With Keep you can quickly jot ideas down when you think of them and even include checklists and photos to keep track of what’s important to you. Your notes are safely stored in Google Drive and synced to all your devices so you can always have them at hand.
We expect Google to follow this launch with a Keep app for iOS. We’ll let you know when that happens.
Originally posted in http://thenextweb.com
Google launches Evernote rival Keep for the Web, Android 4.0 and above

Content Marketing Metrics Fun With Google Analytics

The phrase “content marketing” seems to be the latest buzzword in online marketing circles. Every SEO consultant and agency is talking about it and writing about it. The SMX West Conference being held this week in San Jose even has a whole day devoted to learning about content marketing. While it’s new to many, content marketing is how I built my own business since the turn of the century when I started writing my first newsletter. (Does that make me a dinosaur? More recently, I talked about what content marketing is and how it relates to SEO in this interview for ContentEqualsMoney.com.
Why SEOs Are Embracing Content Marketing
The bottom line is that when you add great content to your website on a regular basis and get the word out about it to your target audience, you’ll gain more rankings, traffic, conversions, leads and sales.
The key, of course, is that word “great.” Adding just any content won’t provide the results you’re looking for. But how do you know if your content is great? That’s where having some definitive content marketing metrics in place will help. And we’re lucky today to have gazillions of tools to help with this. You’ll know if your content is resonating with your target market by reviewing some very specific metrics on a regular basis.

Google Analytics to the Rescue!
You all know by now that I’m a Google Analytics junky. I’ve showed you in the past the bare minimum metrics you should be looking at when doing any sort of SEO for a website. Today I’m going to take you one step further by showing you the metrics you should be looking at for each individual piece of content that you publish on your website. (And if you stick with me, I’ll provide you with a bonus Content Marketing Metrics Dashboard that you can use for your own measurements.)
PageViews
I’m typically not a big fan of PageViews as a measure of success. But with content marketing, especially when any piece is newly published, it’s worth a look. Don’t be surprised if a lot of your PageView data for your content looks like this:

PageViews
It’s normal to get a spike in PageViews when the content is new and being promoted via various channels, and then for it to die down. It’s worth looking at because you want to find the content that continues to be viewed after the initial spike.

PageViews
When you see consistent PageViews month after month, you know you’re on to something! You can use that information when deciding on future content topics.
Organic Keywords and Rankings
Ha! I bet you’re surprised to see me mention rankings given that I recently wrote that running ranking reports is a fool’s errand. They still are, BUT…as I stated in that article, there’s an obvious correlation between rankings and getting organic search traffic to your site. So knowing which keywords bring traffic and where your content ranked when someone clicked on it in Google provides you with interesting and useful data. Unfortunately, there are no out-of-the-box ranking reports within Google Analytics. But if you can add a bit of code to the pages of your site, there is a new method of gaining this valuable insight within Google Analytics.
See GA Evangelist Justin Cutroni’s post on how to set the Rank Tracker up here.
I’ve had the Rank Tracker code on my site since the middle of January this year and am excited by the information it provides. To finally have a way to know the approximate rankings for phrases that actually bring traffic to my site is pretty amazing! For instance, I now know that the average ranking for ALL organic keyword traffic to my site is 5.34.
But even more exciting is to see the average ranking for any new (or old) piece of content:

Average Ranking
I now know that my Meta Description article (which is the most visited landing page of my site) is generally ranked between position 2 and 3 (2.65 average ranking) when it’s clicked on from Google. And if I want, I can see the average rankings for each of the 500+ different keyword phrases that brought traffic in for that article.

While not every piece of content on your site will (or should) bring organic traffic, it’s certainly something you want to look at.
Referring Traffic
Beyond search engines, you’ll definitely want to keep track of where each piece of content is getting referral traffic from. This will show you the important sites that are linking to it — that is, those that bring you visitors.

Referring Traffic
For purposes of seeing where your content is linked to, you’ll need to filter out all the referrals that come from web-based email programs, as well as social media referrals (which we’ll look at next).
Social Networks
Google Analytics has added a lot of social data over the past year. While you might get better information from your own social media tools, it’s still worth taking a look at what you’ll find in GA.
You can see which content is getting shared the most:

Social Networks
And you can click on the shared URLs to see which social networks bring the most visits and PageViews:

Conversions
Last but not least is the holy grail of your content marketing efforts — conversions. First, remember that you should have a variety of conversion points on your website. Also note that content marketing doesn’t always lead directly to conversions.

Measuring Conversions
That said, you can pretty much assume that if some of your content is leading directly to conversions, you’re on the right track (but it is going to depend on what you’re counting as a conversion).
Your Content Marketing Metrics Dashboard
While you can look up all of the above separately in your Google Analytics, I’ve found it most helpful to have a specific content dashboard for each URL. In other words, every time I publish something to my website, I create a dashboard which shows me all of the information I talked about above (and more) all in one place.

Content Marketing Metrics Dashboard
The above image shows only a portion of the dashboard, but you get the idea.
Want your own Content Marketing Metrics Dashboard? You’re welcome to use mine! Here’s how:
While logged into your Google Analytics, click this link, and then choose the profile you want to associate it with. The dashboard will automatically be created for you. But wait — it won’t work yet because you have to assign some content to it.
Here are the steps to make it work with each of your own articles:
1. Make a copy of the generic dashboard so that you can keep that one handy when you create new content.
2. Hover over the top right corner of each widget on the dashboard to find the Edit button.

3. Replace “/your-article-url” and “Your Article Name” with your own, and do this for every widget on the dashboard. While this sounds like a lot of work, it should take less than 5 minutes. Be careful not to change anything else unless you know what you’re doing. The filters should all be set to work with almost everyone’s content. (However, the RankTracking widgets will work only if you’ve installed the additional code on your site.)

That’s it! You can use the same dashboard template and change it accordingly for each piece of content. Unfortunately, you can only have 20 dashboards per profile. After you use yours up you can delete old dashboards that you no longer use or better yet, just create additional profiles.

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A post by Jill Whalen in http://www.sitepronews.com
Content Marketing Metrics Fun With Google Analytics

Google Offers Help to Webmasters Whose Sites Were Hacked

Google has launched a page and a set of tutorials aimed for webmasters whose site was hacked.
Specifically, Google explains webmasters how to deal with Google's search warning that a site is dangerous, which usually appears if a hacker has infected the site with harmful code.

"Every day, cybercriminals compromise thousands of websites. Hacks are often invisible to users, yet remain harmful to anyone viewing the page — including the site owner," claims Google on the site titled "Webmasters help for hacked sites."

Google starts with a video tutorial (above) which explains the basics of how and why sites get hacked, and then goes into more advanced territory with info on how to quarantine a site, identify its vulnerabilities and clean it up from harmful code.

How do you like Google's latest initiative? Do you think the material is too advanced or perhaps too simple for the average webmaster? Share your thoughts in the comments.
Image credit: Google
Google Offers Help to Webmasters Whose Sites Were Hacked

Google Opens Up About Manual WebSpam Removals

n the first of March, Google Product Manager Jake Hubert announced a new interactive infographic by Google called How Search Works. The infographic allows visitors to get insight into what happens between the request of a search query and the retrieval of results, which Google says happens “billions of times a day in the blink of an eye.” The graphic is broken into three sections, which briefly go into crawling and indexing, the algorithm, and Google’s measures against webspam, both automatic and manual.

The piece is a follow-up to one released last year, The Story of Send, which reveals the path of an email around the world. The new graphic is relatively simple and aesthetically pleasing; it would serve as a nice introduction to search but experienced webmasters are unlikely to glean anything new from the piece. The third section, Fighting Spam, however, has some interesting information about Google’s penalization process.

This section details the types of webspam Google most often takes action against, with a chart showing the prevalence of various techniques over time. They explain the process of notifying spammy site owners and receiving reconsideration requests, with timelines for these as well. Perhaps the most interesting feature of the new graphic, however, is a section with live webspam screenshots. When you click “See what we’ve removed lately” you can see a semi-live feed of sites that Google has manually removed from their index.

Usually the feed shows sites removed in the past hour, but only about 46 or so at a time – which is why RustyBrick created a webspam archive. Their archive has, at the time of writing, more than 3,000 screenshots pulled from the infographic. There is also a search to see if one of your own sites was included. (Remember, however, that the search only checks if your site is among the manual webspam examples given by Google, not if your site was automatically penalized or manually removed but not included.)

Also included with the How Search Works infographic is a 43-page guide detailing how Google manually evaluates quality. The Search Quality Rating Guidelines document, however, is actually a much-condensed version of an earlier one never released publicly, but leaked among webmasters. The earlier, 161-page list of guidelines was intended to be a handbook for quality raters to use when evaluating relevance of sites and whether or not they should be manually removed from Google’s search index.
Search Engine Land posted a very long list of all of the changes they found between the most recent leaked document and the one made public by Google with How Search Works. While some of the changes are to be expected (they removed details about how to use the rating interface), others are a little more interesting. They emphasize that quality raters “do not directly impact Google’s search result rankings or ranking algorithms,” and a number of actual URLs used as examples have been removed. Search Engine Land’s Matt McGee gives two possible explanations for the removal of the examples: that Google wants to stay vague about the actual examples and ranking system, or that they did not want to have to constantly maintain this list as the internet is an ever-changing place.

Despite the cutbacks to the document, it is not often that Google opens up like this and makes any element of the ranking process public. Though hopefully you are not creating spammy web content yourself, it can be very useful to have this peek into exactly what the search giant considers spammy or low-quality. This knowledge can take a site that’s on the edge of being potential webspam back into safety.

Though the whole guide is a useful read (and trimmed down to 43 pages it’s unlikely to be a very time-consuming read, either), the conclusion gives a good half-page summary of exactly what characteristics belong to webspam pages and which belong to good pages. In particular, if a rater is unsure of whether to mark the page spam or not, they are told to ask themselves the following questions:

* Does the page provide the user with a good search experience?
* Does the page contain original content that would be helpful to users?
* Do you think the page should be included in a set of search results?
* Is the page designed for users? Is there a human element to the page?
* If you removed the PPC ads and copied text from the page, is there useful content remaining?

At a bare minimum, these are good qualities to keep in mind anytime you build a website.

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A post by Adrienne Erin in SPN
Google Opens Up About Manual WebSpam Removals

12 Cool Things You Can Do With Google Glass

Here are 12 Cool Things You Can Do With Google Glass

Menu

Glass shows off what options users have available, ranging from taking pictures, engaging in a Google Hangout, recording a video, or sharing with others.

Reminders

Glass can pop up a reminder on your screen to, well, remind you of an upcoming appointment or other meeting that you have planned.

Weather

Like one of the cards that pops up in Android, Google Glass hopes to be able to deliver to you the current weather.

Dictate Texts

There's no reason why Glass can't be used to dictate texts or short messages to others, using the built-in microphone, Google's cloud-based speech recognition, and a wireless connection.

Travel Alerts

I've never seen an alert when a public transportation link has been severed or is inoperable, but I assume Google has the capability to do so. This would be a handy feature.

Maps

I'm not sure a "full-screen" overlay would be the most ideal rendering of map data, but this would certainly be a handy feature to have in most cases.

Turn-by-Turn Directions

One of the handiest features of Google Navigation is turn-by-turn directions. In this case, a visual direction mixed with a street name is a helpful feature.

Interior Maps

Another capability that Google has added to its mapping capabilities, although it depends on the merchant - Strand Books, in this case. But yes, Google users can navigate indoors, as long as the augmented GPS (GPS+Wi-Fi, to determine location) knows where you are.

Latitude/ Sharing Location

Using Google Latitude, Google users can share their location with one another. It's sort of a pain, and usually involves manually setting it up and then turning it off, to maintain some privacy. Perhaps in the case Glass automatically shares location, knowing that both of you want to meet up?

Photos

Naturally, Google Glass users can take photos. This is in Glass today, although the photos (unsurprisingly) seem to have rather poor quality compared to even a mobile phone camera.

Hangout (With Screen Sharing)

A nice touch. With Glass, there's every reason to believe that not only could you join a Google Hangout, you could share what you're seeing. In fact, with no self-facing camera, that might be the only way to communicate.

sources: pcmag.com
12 Cool Things You Can Do With Google Glass

What Google Wants From Your Website Right Now

Every time we turn around it seems as if Google is plotting and scheming and adding new ranking signals to its algorithm. Will it ever stop?
I doubt it. Not as long as Google has the market share and is making oodles of money.
We desperately want to throw in the towel and be done with all of this SEO nonsense, right? But, none of that matters. Why? Because our next customers and clients are searching Google and we want our websites to be found, front and center.
Sure, there are multiple strategies to acquiring traffic, but we want the “motherload,” the coveted first-page rankings; the chance to gloat and watch hordes of traffic pour into our site.
OK, so we’ve established that we all still want to rank in Google. Now that we are all on the same page, let’s take a closer look at what Google wants from our websites and some of the recent changes of which you should be aware.

Relevant Links
Page Rank is out…relevancy is in.
Remember when getting that PR6 from an irrelevant site was all the rage? It most likely won’t even count now; or it may hurt your rankings. Google associates natural links with relevant links. What do I mean by relevant?
If your website sells party supplies, relevant links should be on websites like party balloon shops, paper goods, party planning, event planning blogs, wedding sites, etc.
I would even be so bold to say that a PR2 relevant link is more important than a PR6 irrelevant link. That is how much Google is weighting relevancy. Think also in terms of the text and headers around your link. Google most likely looks at this content to determine the relevancy of your link as well.
Remember these tips when seeking out guest posting opportunities. Think about relevancy more than Page Rank and consider only reputable, high-quality sites on which to post.

Natural Links
Now that your links are relevant, how natural do they look? Is your exact match keyword in 75% of the links? If so, you may be in trouble.

Diversify those links and pay attention to keyword spamming. Use your keyword but concentrate on mixing up the phrases and topics. For example, if your keyword is “wedding planning tips”, consider phrases such as “wedding planning tips and tricks”, “plan your wedding in a snap”, “easy wedding planning for the bride and groom.”
As you can see from the examples ,your keyword doesn’t have to be in all of the links, but you can nod to your topic and other words that will still tell Google what your site is about but not look spammy.
Or you can just let your links come naturally and your link profile will be completely natural. (P.S. I think that’s what Google is really after.)

Good User Experience
Are people leaving your site faster than they came? Or are they willing to look around and take a closer look at what you are offering?
We now know that a users’ time on your site plays a role in the rankings of your site. And the way to keep visitors on your site longer is to keep the user happy.
How can you do this?

• Easy navigation
• Targeted content
• Fill an industry need
• Relevant graphics/theme
• Professionalism

Another trick is to have a related articles plugin or function where visitors can see article topics related to the one they are reading. By clicking on these links, they will stay on your site longer.
One of the ways Google also measures the quality of your content is by the number of social shares. People who value your site and its experience will most likely share your content and interact with it.

Authenticity
If you haven’t already, consider researching Google Authorship. By coming out of the “anonymous” closet and showing Google your content on the web, you are displaying authenticity. Spammers do not want to be found, so this is a way for Google to weed out the real content from the spam.
Consider adding a phone number and address to your site. This also contributes to your authenticity. And at a minimum, add a Privacy policy, terms, about and a contact page so visitors can connect with you.
By Jenna in http://site-reference.com
What Google Wants From Your Website Right Now

New App from Google+ ; Sign-In

Google+ launched a new application sign-in process Feb. 26, pushing the social service ever closer to an actual foothold in the digital space.
Although several years behind their main competitors, Google+ aims to learn from Facebook and Twitter’s haste, taking more care in preventing “social spam,” and holding the user experience ever sacred.
David Glazer, engineering director at Google+, calls this “…one of the most significant launches that has come out of the Google+ platform.”
The new sign-in process embraces simplicity, and it appears to grant users a lot more control in determining who sees what they post. So while the feature is long overdue and sounds quiet useful and efficient, the question that needs to be asked is: will it be enough to propel the sputtering Google+ forward in the social stratosphere?

Keep it Simple
First and foremost, Google stays true to form and ensures the new sign-in process is intuitive and simple for end users and developers alike. Sample sign-in screens released thus far show a process that looks very similar to Facebook Connect. Since the web world is inundated with many offerings from the Google family, account information and passwords are well known. It’s therefore far easier to login to your Google account than it is to register from scratch on any given site, so from that perspective, the feature is a no-brainer.
Adding the functionality to existing sites also looks to be fairly straightforward (which is far more than Facebook can say when they rolled out their Connect feature some years ago.) Of course, once the new sign-in is live, developers can monitor usage stats through Google Analytics as well.

Advanced Mobile Integration and Security Features
Making life easier on your handheld device is also at the forefront of the rollout. Once you login to your Google+ account via any participating website, you can immediately launch and install the relevant Mobile application with a single click (or decline the option just as easily). It’s important to note that only Android phones offer this flexibility since Apple’s restrictions prohibit the process for their iOS devices.
Additionally, any shared activity within a site allows your viewers to click through and interact with the app themselves. This is an attempt to make feeds more functional to those who are perusing, and to give better targeted exposure to featured applications.
As with everything Google tackles, they’ve put a lot of thought into keeping things secure. Once you add an app to your Google+ sign-in, for example, you access a permissions screen that delineates the data you’re willing to share, and the people that will be able to view related activity. The same 2-step account verification process available in Gmail is also carried over, providing added security in a world where passwords are becoming easier and easier to hack. Finally, Google+ offers an apps permission page for users to manage any and all settings.

No More Social Spam!
Google is nothing if not methodical about their rollouts (a great excuse for why this latest update is so behind the curve), and their insistence on not littering the digital landscape with more useless updates, shares, images and feeds (now known as “social spam”) is noble indeed. Google insists the new sign-in process greatly limits a great deal of this digital waste. For example, users are now prompted to indicate who in their Google+ Circles can see various content, and app activity only appears in feeds when relevant – in other words, when a user is actually searching for related info.

A Genius Move, or Too Little Too Late?
Google’s main issue with their social network is not the lack of whiz-bang features or clumsy developer tools, it’s something much more elusive – eyeballs. While most netizens definitely appreciate Google+’s war on social spam (the backlash against Facebook’s questionable policies is ever-increasing), the hard truth is that Google’s social darling still does not have rich profile content or a gaggle of regular daily sign-ins. This means that while Circles may be somewhat populated, in theory, the activity by such users is minimal, especially when compared to Facebook and Twitter.

The issue of eyeballs, however, may be the very reason the new sign-in process proves a smashing success, if in fact it helps to increase Google+ activity. This will all come down to how many developers and sites actually feature the new process. Currently, there are a handful of early adopters: FitBit, TheFancy.com, Flixster.com, USA Today and the UK Guardian newspaper have all launched updated login screens with Google+ sign-in. Most sites also obviously offer Facebook and Twitter sign-ins too, so one can’t help but wonder – will users prefer the Google+ option over the other social giants? The answer is a very strong maybe, because while Google+ may not have the flurry of daily users, Google’s suite of offerings most certainly does.

While the verdict is still out regarding the success of the new sign-in, the truth is, Google has little to lose with this release. The worst case scenario is that developers don’t add the process to their sites and apps, and Google+ is left in its current quiet state – a seriously unlikely scenario. If it does help them gain traction, it’s game-on with the Facebook showdown.

Google+ already wins the war on security – they have far more respect in this arena then Twitter and Facebook combined. And while developers often voice impatience at their slow releases and limited access, there is an understandable method to their madness. The head of the social network, Vic Gundotra, wrote last August that he took responsibility for third-party developers’ limited Google+ write access, expressing, “I’ve repeatedly stated the reason – I’m not interested in screwing over developers. When we open an API, we want developers to feel confident that the innovations they build are going to be long lasting. Releasing an API, and then later changing the rules of the game, isn’t fun for anyone, especially developers who’ve spent their life’s energies building on the platform.”

Are they late to the party? Most definitely. But let’s not forget, the turtle won the race, and Google+ is anything but out.

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Artikel by Tina Courtney-Brown in SPN
Google+ Lounches New App from Sign-In 

Google Warns Journalists in Myanmar

Google has sent alerts to certain journalists who cover Myanmar, warning them that their email accounts have possibly been compromised by government-backed hackers.

According to a story posted by Eleven Media this weekend, news editors at the organization - including chief editor Wai Phyo - received notifications from Google warning them about "state-sponsored attacks on their email accounts."

Reporters with the Voice Weekly Journal, the AP, and Kyodo News Agency also received warnings, Eleven Media said. Aye Aye Win with the AP said she immediately changed her password since her email account includes "many contacts."

Eleven Media said its website was hacked in January by the Red Army, a group of six different hacker groups. The Facebook pages for the Voice Weekly and Eleven Media were also hit on Feb. 4 and Feb. 6, respectively.

"Eleven Media Group sent a formal complaint to the President and Commander-in-Chief of the Defense Services via the Press Council over cyber attacks on legally established media," the organization said.

In June, Google announced that it would provide users with security warnings about state-sponsored attacks.
Google said at the time that the warnings would appear for a "subset" of users who Google believes "may be the target of state-sponsored attacks." When activated, a pink bar appears atop various Google services (see below) with a warning that reads: "We believe state-sponsored attackers may be attempting to compromise your account of computer. Protect yourself now." The "protect yourself" text links to a page with steps you can take to guard against unwanted intrusions.
Eleven Media included a screen shot of a journalist's email account, which included the alert atop of his or her messages.

According to the New York Times, the news media in Myanmar were censored for more than 50 years until President Thein Sein took over about two years ago.
ABC News reported that a presidential spokesman denied hacking the journalists' accounts and urged Google to be more specific. "The vague reference to state-sponsored attackers hurts the image of the government," a spokesman said.

In Nov. 2010, a massive distributed denial of service attack took Myanmar offline.
Recently, the New York Times revealed that it was the victim of a hack that seemed to originate in China. The hackers had access to the Times's network for about four months as the paper tried to weed them out; no sensitive information was stolen, the Times said.
For more from Chloe, follow her on Twitter @ChloeAlbanesius.
Original article in pcmag.com
Google Warns Journalists in Myanmar

Google Chairman Reveals a New Ranking Signal About to Launch

If you weren’t looking for it, you might have missed Google executive chairman, Eric Schmidt’s blurb in the Wall Street Journal article that came out this week.

Schmidt is releasing a book in June entitled, “The New Digital Age” where he discusses China and its involvement with internet censorship. According to the Wall Street Journal, Schmidt also covers some other interesting topics in his book—they describe the future of Google rankings.

Before we dive into what Schmidt said, let’s take a look at a topic we have covered before here at Site-Reference. It is Google Authorship.

Back in an article dated from October 2012, I mentioned the possibility of Google Authorship becoming a ranking signal. And when it was released, Google made a statement that led people to believe online verification could become part of its algorithm.

Authorship, as defined by Google, allows you to verify ownership of your online content. This is accomplished by creating a Google+ profile (big surprise) and adding markup to your site or submitting your email to Google.

What is the purpose of Google Authorship?

In my opinion, Google wants to “de-spam” the internet further and promote authenticity in its search engine. Verified authors who implement Google Authorship will see their image beside their content in the search results.

Though Google is probing people to become more authentic and reveal themselves to “the world,” if you don’t take advantage of Google Authorship, it doesn’t mean you are a spammer. But as you will find out soon…it may mean you will not rank as well as someone who has verified his/her online account.

The fact is…we all know that you won’t find any spammers trying to reveal their identities, so Authorship could be another attempt by Google to weed out spammers who are falsely trying to manipulate the search results.

Schmidt Lets The Cat Out of The Bag

Schmidt, in his new book, discusses how privacy will not have a place online and anonymity will cease to exist. He postulates that the government will also require some kind of online verification.
Regardless of whether or not Schmidt’s ideas will materialize into reality, it is important to note what he said regarding Google….

“Within search results, information tied to verified online profiles will be ranked higher than content without such verification, which will result in most users naturally clicking on the top (verified) results. The true cost of remaining anonymous, then, might be irrelevance.”

We touched on relevance before when discussing linking and content, but never in this context. For Schmidt to mention that remaining anonymous equates to irrelevance, we can surmise that Authorship could be more influential than we first assumed. We know that relevance is crucial in this post-Panda, -Penguin internet but we have never heard it tied to Authorship.

It’s obvious that Google is tying the hands of every person who is trying to manipulate the search results. You can’t get away with any questionable technique today, and if you do, it won’t last long. Google is rewarding authentic, quality businesses that work to please their audience with high-quality content that is shared and enjoyed by many.

So, there you have it…a new ranking signal is about to be birthed…
How do you feel about this?

Original article in site-reference.com
Google Chairman Reveals a New Ranking Signal About to Launch

Google – One Way or the Other, We’re Gonna Get YOU

I talk a lot of smack about Google, but I need to come clean with you guys about something. I simply adore the Google Chrome browser for general web surfing. It’s lightweight, highly intuitive, and a downright pleasure to use. However, I never sign into my Google account on Chrome. Google always gripes me out, chastising me by taunting, “You’re missing out!” as soon as I hit the homepage.
At first, I thought this was nothing more than a minor annoyance, but then I learned that Google recently placed a job ad with a description specifically aimed at driving up user sign-in rates. Brian Ussery discovered the listing and reported his findings on his personal blog. The most interesting part of the story, however, is Brian’s uuber-provocative write-up dissecting Big G’s motives.
Looking at the Listing
Brian was smart enough to grab the following screenshot before the Google listing disappeared into the Internet abyss:


It’s a little small, so here’s a close-up of the portion Brian highlighted above:
“The mission of the search growth marketing team is to make that information universally accessible by enabling and educating users around the world to search on Google, search more often, and search while signed-in. Research and analysis has shown that putting Google search access points at the fingertips of users is an effective way of achieving these goals. And the more users that are signed in to Google, the better we can tailor their search results and create a unified experience across all of the Google products that they use.”
Long story short, Google’s so hungry to get you signed in that the company’s willing to pay someone good money to figure out how to convince you. And do you blame ‘em? If you’re signed in, then Google gets the juicy insider info needed to provide super-personalized search results for you, and (as Brian points out) better target ads. Google+, he notes, is a major component of the search giant’s sign-in plan. However, much to the company’s chagrin, the social network has nowhere near the viral likability of rivals such as Facebook and Twitter. G+ is growing, yes, but most of the people who use the service do so for the business benefits alone.
Google’s Catch-22
As Brian pointed out in his post, Google has a serious setback hindering its growth: rival social networks block G from accessing their astronomical database of user-generated content. This lockout is detrimental to Big G’s bottom line. The majority of the blocked content contains valuable personal info that Google would love to use in order to serve relevant ads.
Hence, Google+ jumped to the top of G’s list of priorities. Although the company has a much greater audience reach than Facebook, Facebook has exponentially more personal data on each member. Google+ is a way for Big G to counteract this problem by harvesting more personal data from searchers than it could uncover otherwise.
But Google’s still waiting for that goldmine. James Whittaker, a former development director for Google, wrote about the company’s new direction in a blog post manifesto defending his decision to leave. James grew frustrated with G’s shift from innovator to relentless competitor, and he noted this about the company’s push to make G+ a success:
“A user exodus from Facebook never materialized. I couldn’t even get my own teenage daughter to look at Google+ twice, “social isn’t a product,” she told me after I gave her a demo, “social is people and the people are on Facebook.” Google was the rich kid who, after having discovered he wasn’t invited to the party, built his own party in retaliation. The fact that no one came to Google’s party became the elephant in the room.”
Obviously, Google needed to do something bold to make G+ catch on. The answer? Tie all Google’s offerings together under the umbrella of a verified Google account and focus on forcing sign-ins.
Google: Multiple Services, One Goal
Last January, ZDNet reported that Google was testing the idea of automatically creating a Gmail account and a Google+ profile for people who set up new Google accounts. The author updated the post in November, stating that Google began a full-scale (and very hush-hush) rollout of the new automatic signup feature. This is the statement G’s PR people issued when questioned about the quiet new change:

If you’ve signed up for a Google account any time during the last year or so, you have a Gmail account and a Google+ profile – whether or not you decide to use it. But Google’s not stopping there. According to Google Support, if you want to use Google Play on any of your mobile devices, you’ll need a Google account for that as well. Plus, you’ll need a Google Wallet account tied to your Google account if you want to buy apps or any other paid content.
See what they did there? Google is slowly filling in every possible escape hatch for users who want to avoid signing in. That’s their answer to their whole “lack of personal user data” conundrum. G’s given up on trying to entice you to use its services – the search titan has opted to pursue the easy route instead: leveraging its reach and Internet domination to penetrate every aspect of your online life and quite literally force your hand.

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Article by Nell Terry, a post in SPN
 Google – One Way or the Other, We’re Gonna Get YOU