Google Launches International Targeting via Search Console

Google had confirmed that within Search Console, they released their International Targeting report.

This report is specifically designed to help Webmasters with the implementation of href-lang attributes. It can help show errors in peoples code which, once fixed, will help Google attribute the correct regional pages to the regional searches.

Here’s an example of the International Targeting report:

This will help in the two main areas of Missing Return Links and incorrect href-lang values.

Have you used the new international targeting reports?

Net66: Matt Cutts Going On Leave for Several Months

Matt Cutts, Head of Webspam at Google and perennial pain in the neck for SEO companies up and down the country and the outright BANE of black hat SEOs, has announced he’s to take a few months off to spend with his wife.

When I joined Google, my wife and I agreed that I would work for 4-5 years, and then she’d get to see more of me… And now, almost fifteen years later I’d like to be there for my wife more. I know she’d like me to be around more too, and not just physically present while my mind is still on work.

He’ll be completely out of the loop too. No sneaky checking of emails as they’re all re-routed to his WebSpam team who will be checking them on his behalf, but not replied to.

Although he did have this to say on the matter of contact:

There’s still tons of ways, from our webmaster forums to Office Hours Hangouts where you can ask questions to experts. On the social side, instead of sending SEO-related comments to me on Twitter, you can ping the Google Webmaster Central account. Likewise, make sure you follow Google Webmasters on Google+. A bunch of different Googlers will continue to speak and answer questions at search conferences too.

Do you think we’ll start to see more Black Hat Results in the search engines?

Blog Post by: Greg McVey

Net66: Matt Cutts on How Google Judges and Ranks Content That Has Little to No Backlinks

In Google’s latest Webmaster Video, head of Webspam and selfie extraordinaire Matt Cutts reveals how Google ranks content that doesn’t have a lot of backlinks to it.

The lack of backlinks to a page takes Google back to when they were a search engine who didn’t really count links that much. So, they have to rely on the words on the page. Basically when then come across the first instance of a word on the page, they give a bit of weight to that word.

When they come across the second instance of the same word or phrases on the page, then it still give some weight to it. From then on it notes each use of the word they’re counting without necessarily giving it any more weight.

They monitor the use of the same word or phrase and if they believe it’s used too much, it will then think that the page is keyword stuffing. So somewhere after the first and second mention of your keyword there is the perfect balance of keywords and regular words.

The second way they do this is to inspect the domain and decide whether the domain itself is trustworthy/reputable:

Net66: Matt Cutts Selfie

Never one to take himself too seriously, Matt Cutts has recently uploaded a “Selfie” of himself on a toilet at the Google Developer conference.

Take a look at it below:

Blog Post by: Greg McVey

Net66 Video Blog: OK Google – Google’s Voice Search

Voice search and voice commands have long been a “thing” on devices, but ever since Apple’s Siri, they’ve been thrown into the limelight and there are more and more companies releasing apps and devices controlled by voice.

Take Google’s OK Google for instance. Simply by speaking “OK Google” you can then get your device to play music, call contacts or simply run an internet search.

View our full transcript below:

[expand title=”Transcript”]

Today, we’re going to be talking about OK Google. Or, non-text search. Google already has a desktop and Android app enabling you to upload images, and search matching images and documents. Now, Google also has a new and improved voice search capability.

From now on, all Android Kit Kat powered devices will respond to the hotword OK Google.

You can also call it from other applications. If you’re reading your email, browsing the web or using any app that doesn’t actively use the microphone, saying “Ok Google” will quickly power Google search and get you answers quickly.

You can also take other actions like setting an alarm, or calling someone in your phonebook.
In fact, you can even operate OK Google from the lock screen. This marks Google’s foray into more holistic search.

Voice control/search will soon be the primary way that users interact with Android devices, especially as the operating system expands into cars, onto wrists and on TV sets.
For more information about search engines and how to optimise for them, keep watching Net66.

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Net66: Google to Do Away with Authorship Photos In SERPs

You spent weeks perfecting that picture of yourself and now Google plans to get rid of it. According to Google they’ve spend a lot of time redesigning their search results to provide the cleanest and most effective results they can.

This involves removing the picture of yourself in the SERPs and also removing the number of +1s you’ve got and how many Circles you’re in. See the statement below:

We’ve been doing lots of work to clean up the visual design of our search results… As a part of this, we’re simplifying the way authorship is shown in mobile and desktop search results, removing the profile photo and circle count.

One of the reported benefits to having the picture including along with everything you’ve written is that it increased Click Through Rates on your listing.

That doesn’t look to have been affected with Google also saying:

Our experiments indicate that click-through behaviour on this new less-cluttered design is similar to the previous one.

What do you think to this news?

Blog Post by: Greg McVey

Net66: Google Launch New “Google My Business” App To Get Businesses Online

Google have long been trying to promote businesses by way of Google Maps and now Google+ Pages but now they’ve gone one step further and released an app that controls all aspects of your “Google Business”.

Your “Google Business” is a way of controlling every aspect of your websites presence on Google. The fact that they’ve now condensed this functionality into an app shows how serious Google are in trying to help small businesses online.

With this new app, available for both Android and iOS you can now:

> Edit your business listings’ description, opening hours and more.
> Create and publish posts on Google+
> View the managers who have access to your page.
> Update profile & cover photos as well as uploading pictures.
> Check analytics and local insights for the page.
> Update and change business accounts and pages.

Download the App and see what it’s like.

Blog Post by: Greg McVey

Net66: Google’s Knowledge Graph Now Comes with Step-by-Step Instructions

Google’s Knowledge Graph has been the subject of countless updates and advancements. This latest one though is set to help out a lot of people.

The knowledge graph is there to help you solve your queries in an instant. For example, if you were to search for “What is my IP”, Google’s knowledge graph would understand that you’re after the IP address of your computer. As well as producing a list of websites where you can find out your IP, it lists your IP for you too.

Try it out.

It has started going one step further though. Rather than answering you with one word/item answers, Google are now providing you with a step by step instruction of how to carry out certain tasks. Take a look below at some we’ve found:

How to make french onion soup

How to Reset an iPhone

Blog Post by: Greg McVey

Local SEO For Your Business

If you own a business which offers services/products across a certain area, then Local SEO is a MUST! Why should I do local SEO you might ask…

Here’s why:

• 30% of Google search queries per month have local intent. This is roughly more than 12 billion searches a month which are local.

This stat alone should be enough to convince you that your local business needs specific area targeted SEO.

What is the difference between local SEO and organic SEO?

This is one of the most common questions I get asked and the best way I can explain it is to show you.

The Google search results page is divided into 3 sections:

Paid Ads (CPC)

Organic Listings

Local Listings

These are the results for the different approaches to how we do SEO. Statistics also show that conversion rate is dramatically increased if you are listed on the map listing.

That Sounds Great… How do I get listed on the maps?

Local SEO is not entirely different to organic SEO, you still have to make sure your onsite optimisation is perfect and you have high quality authoritative links pointing to your sites. You just need to add a few extra processes…

You must have a Google+ page for your business or as it has recently been renamed “Google My Business”.

Here you will create your map listing with all the relevant details and you will need to verify it with Google, but there are 3 things you should fill out as accurately as possible.

Name

Address

Phone Number

This abbreviates as N.A.P and we will use these to build local citations or N.A.P listings as many local SEOs like to pronounce it.

Local Citations are basically sites like Yell.com, Scoot.co.uk and Yelp.co.uk. Sites where you can list your business details and where your customers can leave reviews! (Reviews are crucial for performing well on the maps and increase your conversion rate).

It is extremely important that these local citations remain consistent with your map listing.

This is just the start of a local SEO campaign and these are becoming increasingly popular due to the increased search volume of local queries.

For more information or whether you would like to try out local SEO for your business then contact us on 0161 820 5471.

Blog Post by Jordan Whitehead

Net66: Twitter Has Launched Support for Animated Gifs

Animated gifs have come a long way since their annoyingly sparkly presence on Myspace. Seriously, every profile you went on had either flames or a sparkling horse/wand/unicorn. It’s one of the reasons Facebook have refused to support Gifs on their website.

But the gifs we’re more likely to see won’t be little emoticons next to our name (hopefully). They’ll be a bit richer than that. Take a look at the gif Twitter Support uploaded to announce the development.

Starting today, you can share and view animated GIFs on http://t.co/wJD8Fp317i, Android and iPhone. http://t.co/XBrAbOm4Ya

— Twitter Support (@Support) June 18, 2014

I’m thinking that this move by Twitter is a move to make their website more Vine like. Although Twitter do own Vine and it is a very popular website, Vine is for Videos, not Gifs.

The users they’ll be trying to attract will be from Tumblr. Tumblr is well known for people posting and discussing various gifs. In fact, Mashable recently featured the best blogs that offer up Gifs on the platform.

What do you think of Twitter’s new move?

Blog Post by: Greg McVey

Net66: Facebook Launches New Snapchat Competitor With a Twist

Everyone has heard of SnapChat. It’s the fun app that lets you send temporary images to your friends and others. In fact, it go so popular that it was subject to a $3bn takeover bid from Facebook.

Snapchat politely declined.

With this snub, Facebook decided to release their own app with similar functions. I say similar and not the same because they’ve introduced some different features. Here are the main points from the release:

Screen Shot 2014-06-18 at 17.25.52 > You can “Sling” your image or video to one friend or multiple friends at once.
> Your friends have to “Sling” something back to you before they can see yours.
> If they don’t want to send anything back, they can simply swipe your “Sling” away.

In an app clearly designed to improve connections between users, Slingshot’s blog post of the day said that every user already feels closer.

Do you think this has the potential to be better? Or have Facebook made it worse by adding the “have to sling back” action?

Blog Post by: Greg McVey

Net66: Google Celebrates The Life and Times of Paul The Octopus

Paul The Octopus is a creature of lore when it comes to the world cup. At the 2010 World Cup, Paul the Octopus correctly predicted the result of all 7 of Germany’s World Cup Games.

Sadly Paul passed away in 2010, presumably from all the excitement. Take a look at Google’s homage to Paul below:

Blog Post by: Greg McVey

Net66: Googles Updates Reconsideration Request with “Note From Your Reviewer” [Image]

Reconsideration requests have long been a chagrin of SEOs who have had to submit them. You can spend hours, days or weeks (depending on how badly the site was penalised) trying to find out why and then going through the tedious process of link removing (if it’s Penguin) or a content audit (if it’s Panda). You could also be left banging your head against a brick wall if you’ve no idea why you’ve been penalised and Google’s reconsideration requests aren’t likely to help you.

… Until now.

In the past you received a notice that your site was in violation of the Webmaster Guidelines. Not much help at all. They then decided to help more with the identification and removal of bad links.

Then Google decided to help out a bit more by pointing out some example links that were causing a penalty.

Now, however, Google have allowed for a text box where the actual person, a real human being, can evaluate your site and then offer personalised advice on how you can recover from the penalties your site is under.

You can read what they have to say in the “A note from your reviewer” box that comes with the new responses. Take a look at the screenshot below to see how useful these new reconsiderations will be:

google-reconsideration-request-rejection-note-1402921143

Blog Post by: Greg McVey

Net66: Google Doodles Keepy Uppying with the World Cup

Google often releases Doodles and with the world cup arriving yesterday it didn’t disappoint. Not only did it release one for the start of the World Cup, but it’s released a new one today and an even newer one with the kick off of Mexico Vs Cameroon. Take a look at them below:

Screen Shot 2014-06-13 at 17.12.50

Are you celebrating the world cup?

Blog Post by: Greg McVey

Net66: Google Launches New Payday Loan Algorithm

Ever since the rise of Payday loan companies, there has been a war raged on Google to get to the top for the phrase “payday loans”. The reason? Payday loans are short term loans and as such, have an unusually high APR. Basically, a HUGE interest rate.

As there is a huge interest rate, there is a chance for huge profit. Hence the amount of companies trying to get onto the first page for this phrase. This orgy or competition has gone on unchecked in the Black Hat world of SEO as more and more people are seeking a “quick buck” on Payday Loans as people try to get there and try to get there quickly.

As with all things SEO, the faster you do something, the more likely you are to get penalised. So much so that Google have had to release an new specific algorithm to tackle this.

Indeed, they’re already on their 3rd version of the algorithm. Last week Google updated it to identify and penalise spammy websites. This new version of the algorithm is to detect and combat very spammy queries that aren’t just related to the Payday Loans industry.

For example, queries such as Payday Loans, Casinos, Viagra, Porn. Basically, anything to do with the spammy emails you’ll find in your junk folder of your emails.

Have you noticed any changes on these search terms?

Blog Post by: Greg McVey

Net66: Google Could Disclose When Search Results Have Been Removed Due To “Right To Be Forgotten”

This is an issue that has been in the news this week. Google now have a “Right To Be Forgotten” form you can fill in if your name or business is being associated with old and detrimental search results.

For example if your company was sued for defamation and these results started showing up, once you’ve won the case (because you wouldn’t defame anyone or anything) your website/company/name could still be associated with that case.

What makes it worse is Google Autocomplete. For example, If you start typing in “company name”, Google could suggest “Company name gets sued”, “Company name defamation case”. Not the best for your business if you’ve successfully won your case and your name doesn’t deserve to be associated with those searches.

To combat these results you can fill out a “Right to Forget” form and Google could remove results associated with these bad results if they deem it’s in the public’s interest.

If they do indeed honour your request and remove those results, they could still mark that they’ve removed results from the SERPs. News of this comes from The Guardian that says they understand that this will be the case.

What do you think?

Blog Post by: Greg McVey