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Yahoo! has recently introduced an inline video play feature that shows videos directly on the video search results page. Now, searchers can view videos directly on the search results page without entering the site where a particular video is hosted.

The inline viewing feature happens to be a bit controversial feature since the sites boasting videos will definitely want the traffic to the sites. With the large number of embeddable videos and the new feature, searchers will end up viewing videos off-site.

Anyway, if searchers wish to use the inline viewing feature they can click “Play Now” under the thumbnail of the video search result. This will open a large overlay window and play the video on the results page.

Interestingly enough, Yahoo search engineers have been doing a great work to give you an enhanced Yahoo search experience. This is an interesting news coming when the Yahoo-Microsoft deal is just few months from materializing. The most prominent of the search enhancements is the new Yahoo search page design which according to a post on the Yahoo Search Blog “will make search more personally relevant and helps people explore things that matter most to them.” Here are some new things that have been rolled out on Yahoo Search:

• A unique search page design realigning with the new Yahoo Home Page.
• Easy access to various Yahoo search features including Search Pad, Search Scan and Safe Search have been made more easy.
• Addition of “Related searches” in the search assist layer.
• Enhanced search results from more sites such as Wikipedia

The enhancements made by Yahoo are being tested out to a selected percentage of U.S users, but might take some more time for you to see it live.

Click here to subscribe to our RSS feed to get a daily digest of news around search engine industry. PageTraffic SEO Blog is updated four times a day and is ranked as one of the best search engine resources blog by Pandia!

Post from: PageTraffic SEO Blog Now updated thrice a day!

Yahoo- Rolling Out Search Product Enhancements

I recently caught wind of the ability to grow perfect white (or clear) diamonds in a lab. They have been able to create colored diamonds in labs for some time now, but the white diamond idea intrigued me so I started doing some research. I searched on “white man-made diamonds”, “cultured white diamonds”, “synthetic white diamonds”, “lab grown diamonds” etc. and the site that consistently showed up (at least on the PPC side) was DiamondNexusLabs.com.

I spent some time on the site and the more I read, the more it sounded like this company had accomplished creating the perfect white diamond. And the best part was they were incredibly inexpensive! Paying hundreds of dollars in comparison to thousands of dollars made me think I could upgrade my wife’s wedding ring for our anniversary without breaking the bank. I was ecstatic! I did a quick search on the company name to double check its legitimacy and a scan of the first page of results only gave me more confidence. It even looked like they were doing some SEO because their Facebook and Twitter pages were on the first page. Good for them!

Because I was in a consumer mindset (and it was very late at night), I felt like I had done enough research on the industry and the company and I started to seriously consider purchasing. Luckily, something inside of me forced me to sleep on it. The next morning a thought occurred to me: If this company was doing SEO or having someone do it for them, they may have been doing some reputation management on their company name. I checked on it, this time doing a more thorough search on the company name, and lo and behold, every SERP but page 1 made it very apparent that reputation management was being performed for this company. I found hundreds of comments about the company being deceptive, fraudulent, and even illegal in their claims. According to most, the company was simply a reseller of CZ diamonds that can be found for $10-20 regularly. Now, if you want to sell CZ diamonds for exhorbitant prices to uneducated shoppers, that’s one thing, but when your site appears to claim that you’re selling something very different than what you actually are, that’s a big problem in my book.

In addition, every time I found a negative comment about the company, the very next post was someone who was extremely pleased with their purchase and took the diamond to jewelers who couldn’t tell the difference between it and a real diamond. Odd? I thought so.

What really hurt me most about this experience was that with the exception of the last practice, the marketing that had been done seemed to be fairly white hat. Someone was using good for evil. I know this isn’t the first time this has happened in the SEO industry, but it was definitely the closest I have been to it.

This experience brings up a very difficult question that SEO companies have to face. Even though you may perform transparent white hat techniques for clients, the business model of the client may be “black” or even “grey”. Do you still perform the work? Do you make a company successful in Google who doesn’t deserve it?

Hopefully it’s obvious where I stand.

It was in March that Google had updated its mobile search image just for the sake of iPhone and Android gadgets. But now the good news is that they have rolled out images updated image search to other additional phones as well in about 38 languages. The update will include both larger thumbnail images as well as search filters.

To search images, click “images” that will take you to Google image search page in place of the page where the actual image is hosted.

To view Google image on your handset, you need to start with Google.com in the mobile browser and select “Images”. A number of pictures will appear, select your desired image.

-phones/6893/”>Google announces Updated Image Search to Additional Phones

I know all of you SEO.com fans out there are wondering “what are the most important plugins that I can use on my WordPress blog for SEO”? Well, I’ve decided to unveil our secret stash of the best WordPress plugins for SEO because this is the year of sharing. And also I’d like to see if anyone else can think of any better ones. These are not listed in order of importance, Platinum SEO Pack is the best for overall search engine optimization though, so start there.

Plugin #1: FeedBurner FeedSmith

This probably won’t directly affect your seo on site, but the better reach your blog posts have, the more chance someone has to read it, and link to it if they were inspired by what you say. So you have to write good content first, and then this plugin becomes 100% more effective at building links.

Plugin #2: Dagon Design Sitemap Generator

A must have for every website, XML sitemaps should be generated on the fly and updated whenever you add a new page or write a new post. This is not just another XML sitemap plugin, but rather a true sitemap generator which is highly customizable from its own options page in the WordPress admin panel. Some of its features include: support for multi-level categories and pages, category/page exclusion, multiple-page generation with navigation, permalink support, choose what to display, what order to list items in, show comment counts and/or post dates, and much more.

Plugin #3: Friend Connect Commenting Plugin

You can now allow visitors to log in with their FriendConnect ID, and leave a comment with that same ID. This means that your visitors can log in with their Google, Yahoo!, AIM or OpenID account, by just clicking a button

Plugin #4: Google Analytics

The interfaces are fancy, and the fine grained stats and AdSense integration make it a particularly powerful tool when you’re seeking to push a product online using AdSense.

Plugin #5: Platinum SEO Pack

If you are already using All In One SEO Pack, this plugin will automatically import all the settings, that you have defined using All in one SEO plugin. You just need to verify the options, through Setting->Platinum SEO page of your wordpress blog. Platinum SEO Pack is also compatible with earlier versions of wordpress, though I recommend you to upgrade to the latest version of wordpress.

Plugin #6: Search Excerpt

It extracts out the search keywords, scans the content of matched post entries, and displays document snippets around the keyword, with that specific keyword highlighted. It adds a filter in get_the_excerpt() function so no modification needs to be done to WordPress’ 1.5/2.x theme. For other themes, make sure during “the loop” in search.php, it calls the_excerpt() to display the post entries.

Plugin #7: SRG Clean Archives

This plugin is designed to display your archive listings in a clean and uniform fashion that’s search engine friendly on a dedicated page or in your sidebar.

Plugin Features: It lists the Month / Year, shows total post count for the month (enabled by default), the day of the month the article was published, the title of the article (permalink to article) and the number of comments (enabled by default) that have been made on each article.

Plugin #8: WordPress Database Backup

WordPress database backup creates backups of your core WordPress tables as well as other tables of your choice in the same database.

E Mare Libertas, “From the Sea, Freedom” is the motto of the tiny water fortress and country of Sealand. You may never have heard of this micro-nation before, but locked within the history of this principality we may find parallels on how to stake a claim on the virtual seas of the Web.

The British developed a series of these fortresses to deflect German air raids in World War II. They hosted more than 200 soldiers, had radar and were equipped with enough firepower to defend the islands. These metal beasts successfully prevented any invasion.

After the war, all the fortresses were dismembered except for the one known as Roughs Tower located seven miles off shore in international waters.

Can anyone say free real estate?

British military abandoned it; Roughs Tower stood in solitude until ex-Major Roy Bates came along. Bates claimed it for himself and his family; he declared himself, “Prince Roy of the Principality of Sealand.”

As you read the following history, compare these:

• Your Competitors = Sealand’s Opposition
• Real Estate = The top spot on page 1 of the Search Engine Results Page (SERPS)

Britain Returns for Her Baby

If you are a business owner trying to defend your position on the Web, you need your site recognized, and you are aware of the fight to get pages indexed and acknowledged for the authority they really are. To do that, follow Prince Roy’s example. He’s been there. He knows how to stake a claim.

In 1968, one year after Prince Roy declared his sovereignty, Britain wanted the fort back. As British Naval Forces approached Sealand’s territory, Prince Roy buckled in to defend his keep. With arsenal at his disposal, he fired warning shots at the encroaching vessels. Bold? Yes.

Similarly, how many of us are prepared when the competition comes back to claim the top spot we took,  after our competitors let their guard down and stopped optimizing? How many of us are so well optimized that regardless of the SEO efforts of our competitor, we are one step ahead? Keep the following items in mind when attempting to be prepared:

• Keyword Research – For each new page, are you finding the appropriate keywords for that page to claim as real estate?
• Optimization – Are you showing the search engines through page optimization that you are the sovereign authority for your keywords?
• Link Building – Is your dominion expanding across the Web? Are your allies and friends endorsing your sovereignty through links? Are your loyal subjects spreading their appreciation of you throughout the Web? Are you forming new alliances constantly?
• Competitive Analysis – Are your Scouts watching the movement and expansion of your enemies?

There is no easy way to say that we are prepared, and Roy has experienced the blows of being caught less prepared than he thought he was.

A Hostile Takeover and the First War in Sealand

I will use an excerpt from the History of Sealand to describe the horrific scene:

In August of 1978, a number of Dutch men came to Sealand … to discuss business dealings with Sealand. While Roy was away in Britain, these men kidnapped Prince Roy’s son Michael, and took Sealand by force. Soon after, Roy recaptured the island with a group of his own men and held the attackers as prisoners of war.

The Governments of the Netherlands and Germany petitioned for their release. First they asked England to intervene … but the British government… made no claim to the territory of Sealand … Germany sent a diplomat directly to Sealand to negotiate.

Roy first released the Dutch citizens, as the war was over, and the Geneva Convention requires the release of all prisoners. The German was held longer, as he had accepted a Sealand Passport, and therefore was guilty of treason. Prince Roy, who was grateful that the incident had not resulted in a loss of life, and did not want to bloody the reputation of Sealand, eventually released him as well.

Roy discovered, just as we have all witnessed, that some of our enemies are willing to go to great lengths to sabotage our operations and our rankings. There are companies who would promote black hat SEO techniques and would use them against you. Those tactics are in no way appropriate in the world of legitimate SEO. If those tactics are used, search engines have the right to take those sites as prisoners of war (aka: ban them).

We should think of how Roy handled the situation. Yes, he was caught off guard and his opponents used unethical tactics, but he doubled his efforts and followed the rules of engagement when recovering his claim.

As algorithms change, there are times when your rankings will slip and you will lose your real estate. But you should never give up if you feel that your site is worthy of having sovereignty over that keyword.

One last lesson from Sealand: Britain made one last attempt to retake Sealand. Since it is located just seven miles off the coast, the United Kingdom decided to expand its border to a 12 mile perimeter instead of three. Luckily, Roy caught wind of this (competitive analysis) and expanded his own borders to 12 miles off his own “shores” one day prior.

What is my spin on this? He expanded the keywords that his site was optimizing for. You can only gather a portfolio of real estate in the search engines if you are attempting to rank for a well designed, targeted list of keywords. Expand that list to niche keywords and gather as much territory as you can before the competition tries to suffocate your traffic.

Today, Roy’s son Michael governs as Prince Regent of Sealand because of the valiant efforts of his father. For our own sites, I hope we are all willing to leave the type of legacy and example that Prince Roy has given to us. Happy Optimizing!

Over the past few months, discussions have been going on in the Webmaster Center Blog regarding how to optimize a site! Recently, Kristin Meldahl of Bing highlighted some of the recent information that the Webmaster Center team has published on optimizing site architecture in their SEM 101 column. The information appears to be useful to webmasters and web publishers. There are four recent posts that focuses on various aspects of site architecture optimization, such as file/page issues, links, content and page meta information. The posts are:

Site Architecture and SEO – file/page issues (SEM 101)

Making links work for you (SEM 101)

Architecting content for SEO (SEM 101)

Head’s up on tag optimization (SEM 101)

The series of posts is indeed very helpful and useful for webmasters. For more information on site optimization, keep visiting the Webmaster Center blog .

A few months ago, we reported the launch of Google Services for Websites. Well, to remind you, Google Services for Websites is a program designed to help web hosters and access providers offer useful and powerful tools to their customers or webmasters to enhance and improve their websites. Tools provided by the services such as Webmaster Tools, Custom Search, Site Search and AdSense help website owners understand:

• Search performance
• Improve user retention and
• Monetize their content

Ever since the introduction of the program, many hosting platforms have reported that it helped them enhance their offerings by integrating with the appropriate APIs. With the services program, webmasters can configure accounts, submit Sitemaps with Webmaster Tools, create Custom Search Boxes for their sites and monetize their content with AdSense. Google recently rolled out more new tools to the program. They are:

• Web Elements: With Web Elements, webmasters can enhance their websites with the ease of cut-and-paste. They can also provide maps, real-time news, calendars, presentations, spreadsheets and YouTube videos on their sites. Further, the Conversation Element allows websites to create more engagement with their communities. The Custom Search Element provides inline search within a site and it does not require you to write any code. The Custom Search Element also provides various options to customize further.
• Page Speed: Page Speed enables webmasters to evaluate the performance of their web pages. Webmasters can also use this tool to get suggestions on how to improve their websites.
• The Tips for Hosters page: With a set of tips, it assists hosters help their customers creating richer websites for their visitors. The set of tips includes the use of analytics tools such as Google Analytics to help webmasters understand their traffic and linguistic tools such as Google Translate to help websites reach a broader audience.

Web hosting companies or web hosters who would like to participate in the Google Services for Websites program can apply here. As a web hoster, your integration with the service APIs will be required before you could make the services available to your customers!

A Google expert team has been working on a secret project of “next generation architecture" for Google's web search (read Caffeine index), which is yet to be finished. According to Google, the new architecture focuses on dimensions like indexing, crawling and ranking changes. Google is not incorporating these changes into their existing infrastructure. The new infrastructure lies underneath Google's search engine.

Google says that most searchers will not notice the difference in search results, however, web developers and power searchers might be able to notice a few changes. Therefore, the search giant has recently opened up a web developer preview of the new Caffeine update and urging web developers and power searchers to try out the new system and give feedback on the differences between Google's current search results and the new system. To give feedback, all you need to do a search at http://www2.sandbox.google.com/. Then look on the search results page for a link at the bottom of the page that says “Dissatisfied? Help us improve.” Just click on that link and type your feedback in the text box. Remember to include the word caffeine somewhere in your feedback.

Matt Cutts of Google recently came up with some more understanding of the Caffeine update. Let's go through the following questions and answers that he has compiled:

Q: How do I check out the Caffeine update?

A: If you search on http://www2.sandbox.google.com you can get a preview of how the search results will change over the next few weeks and months.

Q: It doesn’t look any different to me?

A: The Caffeine update isn't about making some UI changes here or there. Currently, even power users won’t notice much of a difference at all. This update is primarily under the hood: we’re rewriting the foundation of some of our infrastructure. But some of the search results do change, so we wanted to open up a preview so that power searchers and web developers could give us feedback.

Q: Is this Caffeine Update because of Company X or Y is doing Z?

A: Nope. I love competition in search and want lots of it, but this change has been in the works for months. I think the best way for Google to do well in search is to continue what we’ve done for the last decade or so: focus relentlessly on pushing our search quality forward. Nobody cares more about search than Google, and I don’t think we’ll ever stop trying to improve.

Q: The url http://www2.sandbox.google.com doesn’t seem to work for mobile phones? I can only test on google.com, not google.co.uk? A: That’s right. For now this is a only a preview, so we didn’t hook up a mobile version or an international version at this point. You’ll have to search on google.com to see the results right now.

Q: How do I give Google feedback?

A: If you want to give us feedback on how the search results are different, look on the search results page for a link at the bottom of the page that says “Dissatisfied? Help us improve.” Click on that link and type your feedback in the text box. Make sure to include the word caffeine somewhere in the feedback.

Q: Is there a way to give feedback in person?

A: Yes! If you want to give me feedback in person, I’ll be at Search Engine Strategies San Jose this week. I’m doing a site review panel on Thursday, or just walk up and say hello!

To read more about the new search index, visit Techmeme.