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Have you noticed ghost spam in Your Google Analytics data?

LinksFighting spam has always been a hard-fought, epic battle which has still yet to be conquered successfully. Google Analytics is one of the leading tools available for gathering and analysing data about your website but unfortunately, its data been compromised in the past through various hackers. This has left many website owners frustrated and confused about how to interpret their reports, since it was not known whether their statistics were not a true reflection of actual website traffic.

Back in 2014, several bots (website crawlers used by Search Engines) were hacked to visit websites and leave fake referral data within the Analytics reporting. Since then, there have been many similar instances from various sources including fake organic search terms or fake events being reported. Whilst Google’s spam defences are always improving, the fight is a tough one for  them. By not discussing their tactics and strategies to overcome this problem, they are keeping their security systems private, away from the hackers prying ears. Continue reading “Have you noticed ghost spam in Your Google Analytics data?”

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Net66 Would Like to Thank Our Client

Net66 like to be there for our clients and strive to go above and beyond what “traditional companies” would do. We never ask for anything in return other than a continued business relationship.

That’s why it’s always nice when we receive something back from our clients. The Space Collective have been working with Net66 for years now and enjoy a great relationship with ourselves. We’ve presided over the rebuild of two of their websites and successfully optimise both of them. Continue reading “Net66 Would Like to Thank Our Client”

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Net66: Typically Irish Google Doodle for St Patricks Day

As we all know Google LOVES making Doodles. None more so for special occasions and what a special occasion it is today.

Today, if you’re unaware, is St Patrick’s Day. St Patrick is the best know Patron Saint of Ireland and observations are held every year on the anniversary of his death to remember him. Or, if you’re a more modern observer of St Patrick’s Day, to make everything Green and drink Guiness until you’re…well, green.

Google are celebrating a bit more conservatively than the vast majority of people and has published an animated .gif of 6 little four leaf clovers having themselves a merry little jig. Continue reading “Net66: Typically Irish Google Doodle for St Patricks Day”

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Net66: Google Releases Annual “A Year In Search Video” Check Out These Trends

Google has taken a look at the past years search and put together a nifty little web page and video looking at all of the search trends in 2014.

One of the trends Google focused on was Sport. And what a year for sport it has been. There’s been the World Cup, the Sochi Games, La Decima and more.

In fact one of the questions that trended most in 2014 was “What is La Decima?”, which is, of course, the 10th European Cup/Uefa Champions League Cup for Real Madrid. They finally won their 10th trophy with the last one coming in the 2001/02 season over 10 years ago.

Off the topic of Sport there were the more serious trending topics such as ebola and the Malaysian Airlines plane that vanished into thin air.

Ebola caused the 5th highest spike in search traffic in October this year, despite initial reports of Ebola all the way back in March. This coincided with the virus’ first appearance in Spain and most likely had the whole of Europe searching on the topic. Continue reading “Net66: Google Releases Annual “A Year In Search Video” Check Out These Trends”

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Net66: Google Releases Festive Search Bars

Google LOVES a doodle, and this year it looks like they’re not letting the chance to throw one out there get away. They’ve already released a feature rich Santa Tracker, and now they’ve updated their search bars for queries relating to Christmas, Kwanzaa and Hanukkah (Chanukkah).

These bars are triggered when either of the seasons festivals are included in a search string. Check them out below of search for yourself. [Christmas] [Hanukkah] [Kwanzaa] Continue reading “Net66: Google Releases Festive Search Bars”

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Net66: Penguin Goes Panda, Moves to Continuous Updates

There’s been quite a bit or furore over the latest penguin algorithm. Initially it rolled out, and then continued to roll out even over Thanksgiving which Google usually tries to avoid doing.

It now seems that there will be no “end” to the algorithm rollout. A Google Spokesperson has today confirmed that the rollout of Penguin will be continuous.

Here’s what they had to say:

That last big update is still rolling out — though really there won’t be a particularly distinct end-point to the activity, since Penguin is shifting to more continuous updates. The idea is to keep optimising as we go now.

This means that we’re likely to stop getting updates from Google when they do update the algorithm. As we all know Google stopped confirming Panda updates some while ago. And now it looks like they’re set to do the same for Penguin. Continue reading “Net66: Penguin Goes Panda, Moves to Continuous Updates”

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Net66: Yahoo Search Share Jumps to Almost 30% on Firefox

We’ve announced previously that the default search engine for Firefox has switched from Google to Yahoo. The resulting traffic boost has been huge for Yahoo with a reported 29.4% increase of searches on their search engine from Firefox users.

This was rolled out with the automatic upgrade from Firefox 33 to Firefox 34 and analytics firm Statcounter have released the following information:

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They also added:

Yahoo search was used three times more on Firefox 34 than on Firefox 33.

Continue reading “Net66: Yahoo Search Share Jumps to Almost 30% on Firefox”

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Net66: Google Launches This Years Santa Tracker

Google has today launched they’re annual Santa Tracker. As if the excitement of getting to open your Advent Calendar for a whole two days now wasn’t enough, you can now count down the days to Christmas Eve and the start of Santa’s journey online.

Check out the video below:

There’s also a whole host of festive games to play, along with some educational sections too. Including one that looks at the different Christmas Traditions around the world.

Check out the images below of some of the great features of this years tracker:

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Blog Post by: Greg McVey

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Net66: Google Takes Action on Polish Link Network

Today Google announced that they have taken manual actions against a link network in Poland. You can see the Tweet confirming this below:

There was a lot of speculation about which link network was targeted but now it seems that Prolink.pl was the network penalised. They actually confirmed it via a post on Facebook later. Check out the post:

Blog Post by: Greg McVey

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Latest Google Doodle Celebrates the Life and Works of Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec

Henri Marie Raymond de Toulouse-Lautrec-Monfa, more commonly know as Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec, was a painter from the late 1800s who was celebrated for his colourful work in Paris.

Along with Vincent Van Gogh, Henri was one of the most famous artists from the post-impressionist era and is well know for his colourful works of the life of Parisians and the City itself. Check out the doodle below:

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Blog Post by: Greg McVey

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Net66: Yahoo! Usurps Google as the Default Search Provider for Firefox

Firefox has been very busy updating itself as a Web Browser recently. Not long ago it announced an update to itself and also added support for DuckDuckGo to be a default browser.

With the news that Yahoo were going to be the default browser, they’ve changed the layout of their search results and it’s eery how similar they are to Google’s own results. Check out the images below:

Yahoo Results

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Google Results

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Blog Post by: Greg McVey

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Net66: Google Finally Announce Launch of Mobile Friendly Labels in Listings

We all know that Google have been testing mobile friendly and none mobile friendly labels for search results. They initially tested out different formats such as icons and then written labels.

Well now, in an official blog post, they’ve confirmed the support is rolling out. They’ve added some best practices, an example mobile friendly listing and even a mobile friendly testing tool.

Check out the example image Google sent out:

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They also offered a bit of advice on what you can do to get these labels and advise that your website will get the mobile friendly label if it:

  • Avoids software that is not common on mobile devices, like Flash
  • Uses text that is readable without zooming
  • Sizes content to the screen so users don’t have to scroll horizontally or zoom
  • Places links far enough apart so that the correct one can be easily tapped

They’ve even released a tool that can use to test your mobile website friendliness.

Net66 Qualifies as Mobile friendly, does your site?

Blog Post by: Greg McVey

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New Google Easter Egg Responds to Hodor!

Hodor is a character from the ubiquitously popular book series A Song of Ice and Fire and TV series A Game Of Thrones. Hodor is a character who, much like a Pokemon, can only say Hodor. Everyone refers to Hodor as Hodor, even though his actual name is Walder.

In recognition of this character, Google have released a little Easter Egg celebrating the popularity of Hodor’s speech. Simply type or talk “Hodor” into your Google browser and you’ll get a response from the man himself. Check it out:

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Are you a fan of this new Easter Egg from Google? For all you web developers out there, here’s a bonus Hodor Ipsum Generator.

Blog Post by: Greg McVey

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Net66: Google Launches A New Google Doodle In Celebration of the Philae Satellite Probe

If you’ve ever sat in the office and managed to throw a piece of rubbish/balled up piece of paper 10 yards into the nearest bin and celebrated (we all have), then the achievement of the Rosetta Mission last night will have blown your mind.

I know it can be a difficult throw to make what with office distractions and the potential of fan heaters knocking it of course, but just listen to the shot the European Space Agency made last night.

In 2004, that’s 10 years ago now, the Rosetta mission was launched. It has since travelled 6.4 Billion kilometres, swinging round the Earth twice and round Mars once in the process, to land on an object that’s travelling at around 18 km/s. Shot!

In honour of this great achievement, Google launched an animated doodle today with a space themed font and an animation of the Philae lander too. Check it out below:

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Blog Post by: Greg McVey

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Net66: Surf Google Like a Boss! Do you Know These Hidden Commands? [Infographic]

We all know of certain Google Easter Eggs. Those rare phrases you get that, when typed into Google, have a funny affect on our favourite search engine. They have quite a few of these trigger phrases such as askew, Zerg Rush, Atari Breakout and Kerning.

You also get seasonal Easter Eggs that appear around certain holidays.

But what you may not know is that some of these hidden commands are actually very useful. Whilst not technically hidden, a lot of these commands aren’t widely know. For example, the use of two full stops between two different years or prices tells Google to search for results within this range. Perfect for if you need a new phone and have a set budget. You could search for “Latest Smartphones £200..£300” which would bring up results for the latest smartphones, but only those costing between £200 & £300.

Check out the full infographic below for more useful tips:

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Blog Post by Greg McVey

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Net66: Are Apple Launching a Google Search Competitor?

A developer recently found a bot crawling his website and found that that bot originated from Apples servers. Check out the below:

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Apple have most recently partnered with Bing who provides suggestions to users of Apple’s new OSX Yosemite version of Spotlight. Again, check out below:

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So do you think Apple will launch their own search engine in earnest?

Blog Post by: Greg McVey