Online Traffic Crisis?
SEL: Are you in danger of an online traffic crisis? http://j.mp/HEnRw8 #Search #WebAnalytics http://eicker.at/GoogleSearch
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Gerrit Eicker
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Gerrit Eicker
Google Search Plus
Google Search goes Plus Your World: personal search adds Google Plus, global doesn’t; http://eicker.at/GoogleSearchPlus
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Gerrit Eicker
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webwerkstatt
Google ist still no.1 and they will keep their position for years. Twitter is only a short message service and an integration would be great for them
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Gerrit Eicker
Well, I suppose Twitter wouldn’t be Twitter if it’d be “only a short message service”, but that’s just my 2 cents. – But I’m with you regarding the question who’s got to deliver: it’s Twitter, not Google. Twitter will have to decide if they want money or attention…
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Gerrit Eicker
Local Business
Pew: The Internet is the source that people most rely on for material about local businesses; http://eicker.at/LocalBusiness
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Gerrit Eicker
Pew: “Where people get information about restaurants and other local businesses – The internet is the source that people most rely on for material about the local business scene and search engines are particularly valued. Newspapers and word of mouth also rank high as sources. … The results in this report are based on data from telephone interviews conducted by Princeton Survey Research Associates International from January 12 to 25, 2011, among a sample of 2,251 adults, age 18 and older.”
Pew: “People looking for information about local restaurants and other businesses say they rely on the internet, especially search engines, ahead of any other source. – Newspapers, both printed copies and the websites of newspaper companies, run second behind the internet as the source that people rely on for news and information about local businesses, including restaurants and bars. – And word of mouth, particularly among non-internet users, is also an important source of information about local businesses. … 51% turn to the internet, including: search engines (38% rely on them), specialty websites (17% rely on them), social media (3% rely on social networking sites or Twitter) … People who seek out information and news about local businesses and restaurants are a diverse and somewhat upscale group. As distinct populations, they are more likely to live in relatively well-off households – those earning $75,000 or more – and have college educations. – In addition, the 55% of adults who get information about restaurants, bars, and clubs are more likely to be women, young adults, urban, and technology adopters. – The 60% of adults who get information about other local businesses are also more likely to be tech users.”
Pew: “The 55% of all adults who get information about restaurants, bars, and clubs are disproportionately young, female, tech adaptive and upscale in educational attainment, urban. … Those who get news and information about local restaurants, bars, and clubs are also likely to be avid local news consumers who enjoy following the local scene, pay for local news in some form, and use multiple platforms to get the local information. … Those who are heavy local news junkies are considerably more likely than others to get material about local restaurants. We asked people about their use of 14 different kinds of sources to get local news and their frequency of using those platforms. When it comes to restaurant information, 71% of those who used at least six platforms monthly got news and information about local restaurants, compared with 34% of those who relied on just one or two sources.”
Pew: “Those who get information about local businesses that are not tied to eating or socializing are a diverse and somewhat upscale group. Those who get this information are more likely to have college or advanced degrees, live in relatively high-earning households, use the internet and own cell phones. They are not distinct by gender or race and ethnicity. … They are also likely to be local news and information junkies. Those who get news and information from at least six different local news platforms monthly are considerably more likely than others to get material about local businesses. … Those mobile consumers were also more likely than others to get material about local businesses: 65% of mobile local news consumers got information about local businesses, compared with 55% of others.”
Gerrit Eicker
Easy Marketing is a Myth
Easy marketing is: spam, with no entry barriers, temporary, an escalation of force – expensive; http://eicker.at/EasyMarketing
Gerrit Eicker
Google Plus Direct Connect
Merging social and search: Google Plus Direct Connect might change Google fundamentally; http://eicker.at/GoogleDirectConnect
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Gerrit Eicker
Google: “Google+ Direct Connect lets you quickly navigate to a Google+ page (and even add that page to your circles) when using Google Search. For example, if you searched for the query ‘+youtube’ or ‘+pepsi,’ you could be immediately taken to the YouTube Google+ page, or the Pepsi Google+ page, and given the option to add the page to your circles. … When searching for a major brand, company, or cultural entity, try placing a ‘+’ in front of your query. When you use the ‘+’ operator before your search query, it lets us know that you want to find a Google+ page. … A page’s eligibility for Google+ Direct Connect is determined algorithmically, based on certain signals we use to help understand your page’s relevancy and popularity. In addition to this analysis, we look for a link between your Google+ page and your website. To help Google associate this content, be sure to connect your Google+ page and your website using the Google+ badge, or by adding a snippet of code to your site, in addition to adding your website link to your page.”
SEL: “Postscript From Danny Sullivan: Direct Connect seems yet another clever bribe where Google is leveraging everything it can to win support for Google Plus. … Google’s made changes over the years that help big brands see far less negative references to themselves in search results than in the past, mainly by allowing more than one page from a site to help ‘push’ other content ‘down.’ But that’s not foolproof, especially when negative news is happening. – Consider the searches for Toyota that were bringing up negative news stories during the safety recalls of last year. If Toyota is pushing that people to find them by searching for +Toyota, they would see none of that on Google. – Interestingly, Bing offered a similar solution that didn’t depend on having to take part in a social network. Bing’s ‘Best Match’ results showed only one site when there was great confidence in the query. But Bing quietly dropped this feature since it launched, a sign that consumers didn’t like it.”
Wired: “But more importantly, Google integrates Plus into its web-dominating search engine. With Google+ Direct Connect, searchers can insert a ‘+’ before their query and jump directly to a business’s Google+ page. Type ‘+YouTube’ into a Google search box, for instance, and Google will take you straight to YouTube’s Plus page. – This is where Google will have an advantage over Facebook: With a broad array of services like search and Gmail and Chrome and Android, Google offers tools that are fundamental to the online lives of so many people – and these can be tied to Google+. As Google+ evolves, Google will have the means to promote its social network – and the branded Pages within it – in ways that Facebook or Twitter cannot.”
ZDNet: “But with Google shortcut called Direct Connect, all I have to do is type a ‘+’ in front of the company name – such as ‘+Amazon’ – and the Google+ Page comes up. Better yet, just by typing ‘+A’ into the search box, I get a listing of Google+ Pages for Amazon, ATundT, Angry Birds and ABC News. And surely, there will soon be more in that list. – In that sense, a Google+ Page becomes a must-have for any company looking to establish a presence on the Internet, just as a Web site itself was the must-have a decade ago and Twitter and Facebooks accounts have been in recent years. The difference is that Facebook and Twitter have largely been closed-wall gardens, a members-only type of environment. … You see, this is no longer just about ‘social.’ This is the face of the new interactive Internet, a one-up over the traditional Web site. These Google+ pages are powered by search, share and followers. This isn’t a static place where companies host their corporate blogs or post their news releases. This is a dynamic environment where companies host live video ‘hangout’ sessions and engage in discussions with their followers.”
Gerrit Eicker
Google Plus Pages
Google launches Google Plus Pages: Google Plus for local businesses and global brands; http://eicker.at/GooglePlusPages
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Gerrit Eicker
Google: “So far Google+ has focused on connecting people with other people. But we want to make sure you can build relationships with all the things you care about – from local businesses to global brands-so today we’re rolling out Google+ Pages worldwide. … Google+ has always been a place for real-life sharing, and Google+ Pages is no exception. After all: behind every page (or storefront, or four-door sedan) is a passionate group of individuals, and we think you should able to connect with them too. … For businesses and brands, Google+ pages help you connect with the customers and fans who love you. Not only can they recommend you with a +1, or add you to a circle to listen long-term. They can actually spend time with your team, face-to-face-to-face. All you need to do is start sharing, and you’ll soon find the super fans and loyal customers that want to say hello. – A number of pages are already available…, but any organization will soon be able to join the community… People search on Google billions of times a day, and very often, they’re looking for businesses and brands. Today’s launch of Google+ Pages can help people transform their queries into meaningful connections, so we’re rolling out two ways to add pages to circles from Google search. The first is by including Google+ pages in search results, and the second is a new feature called Direct Connect. … Direct Connect works for a limited number of pages today (like +Google, +Pepsi, and +Toyota), but many more are coming. In the meantime, organizations can learn more about Direct Connect in our Help Center: Google+ Direct Connect lets you quickly navigate to a Google+ page (and even add that page to your circles) when using Google Search. For example, if you searched for the query ‘+youtube’ or ‘+pepsi,’ you could be immediately taken to the YouTube Google+ page, or the Pepsi Google+ page, and given the option to add the page to your circles.”
Google: “A Google+ page is your organization’s identity on Google+. Your business, school or nonprofit can post updates and news, send tailored messages to specific groups of people, and engage in conversations with customers and followers. … Circles allow you to group followers of your page into smaller audiences. This lets you share specific messages with specific groups. … To help customers find your page and follow you, we have two buttons you can add to your website by visiting our Google+ badge configuration tool: The Google+ icon is a small icon that directly links to your page. – In the coming days, we’re introducing the Google+ badge, which lets people add your page to their circles, without leaving your site.”
Google: “To get your site on Google+, you first need to create a Google+ Page. On your page, you can engage in conversations with your visitors, direct readers back to your site for the latest updates, send tailored messages to specific groups of people, and see how many +1’s you have across the web. Google+ Pages will help you build relationships with your users, encouraging them to spend more time engaging with your content. … You can also link your site to your Google+ page so that all your +1s – from your Page, your website, and search results – will get tallied together and appear as a single total. … We want to help you get your site on Google+ as soon as possible, so we’re opening the field trial for Google+ Pages to everyone today. Creating a Google+ Page only takes a few minutes. To get started, you’ll need a personal Google+ profile. … To learn more about how Google+ works for your site, check out the Google+ Your Business site. We’re just getting started, and have many more features planned for the coming weeks and months.”
RWW: “Brand pages are one of the most anticipated Google+ features, and Google has been pulling down branded profiles in the meantime. Today’s launch initially only added pages for select partners, in addition to the major Google properties. … Google continues its pattern of rolling out features slowly and incrementally. As SVP of Engineering Vic Gundotra told the audience at Web 2.0 last month, ‘We’re going to take a cautious approach. We don’t want to make the mistakes of others.‘”
SEL: “Finally, Google is now allowing businesses, brands and any non-human entity to participate in its Google+ social network, through new Google+ Pages that are launching today, promised to be available to everyone within the next two days. … Local Is Different – If you’re creating a page for a local business, you have special options including the ability to enter a phone number. From Google’s help page on the topic: ‘Local Google+ pages are unique from other categories of pages because they have features that allow customers to easily connect with that business’s physical location. For example, local pages include a map of the business’s location and feature its address, phone number, and hours of operation.’ – Of course, many local businesses have already claimed their pages in the completely separate Google Places. Much of the information that Google+ Pages for local businesses wants – and more – are on those pages. But they remain unconnected. Google tells me: ‘Currently, Place pages and Google+ Pages must be managed separately. A Place page provides information about a business and makes it easy for customers to find local businesses on Google Maps and local search; while a Google+ page provides business owners with additional ways to engage, build relationships and interact directly with customers.’ … Another difference from personal accounts is that it’s perfectly fine for a business to have multiple Google+ pages. From the help page: ‘Pages can be made for a variety of different entities whereas profiles can only be made for people.’ … Anyone can make a business page for any URL without providing proof that they somehow ‘own’ or are associated with that URL. Potentially, that means pages can pretend to be representing a site they’re not connected with. Verification for big brands (see below) is one way Google aims to combat any problems this might cause.”
SEW: “At first glance, Google+ Pages and Profiles appear almost identical. However, in this help page, Google lays out the differences between Pages and Profiles…: Pages can’t add people to circles unless someone adds a Google+ Page to their circles or mentions (using the + or @ before the name) the page. – Pages are for entities; profiles are for people. – Pages are public by default. – Pages have a +1 button. – Pages can’t +1 other pages, play games, share to extended circles, receive notifications via email, text, or Google+ bar, or hangout on mobile devices. … Soon, advertisers will be able to link their Google+ Page to AdWords campaigns. This will provide a grand total of +1’s, taken by adding up +1’s from your Google+ Page, website, ads, and search results. Google noted that ‘your +1’s will be shown with your brand wherever it appears, including search, ads, Google+ and your website.'”
TC: “Google has made some key tweaks. The first is that a Page cannot add someone to a circle until that user has already added the page to one of their circles. In other words, a Page can’t start sending you messages until you’ve elected to add them to one of your circles. Another key change: the content on a Page defaults to public (as opposed to ‘My Circles’ for personal profiles) and Pages can’t share with extended circles. … Apparently only some users can create Google Pages for the time being – you can see if your account is enabled right here.”
ATD: “Google+ today launches a much-anticipated feature for brands, companies and other organizations to create accounts. … Direct Connect is different: Google is establishing approved relationships with brands to drive traffic to their pages and establish lasting relationships with users of its social network. It’s like a powerful shortcut version of the old AOL keywords or the increasingly ubiquitous ‘Like us on Facebook/Follow us on Twitter.’ … It’s possible that very few people will want to treat the search field as a command line interface, but it’s still highly significant that Google will be actively promoting approved Google+ pages out front of its hotly contested search results pages. … Also coming soon for Pages: Support for multiple administrators, analytics and better Circle functionality to manage millions of people.”
TNW: “How to help Direct Connect find your Google+ Page – According to Google, here’s a few steps you can follow to help the algorithm associate your website and your Page: 1. Connect your Google+ page and your website using the Google+ badge… 2. Add a snippet of code to your site… 3. Adding your website link to your Page… All these methods will help Google’s algorithm to associate content when it rolls out Direct Connect more widely.”
AdAge: “It’s official: Google’s answer to Facebook is finally here with the launch of Google+ Brand Profiles. … This may be hard to believe. Google+ has been billed as a Facebook killer, its user homepage layout borrows heavily from Facebook, and now there are free self-service branded pages for marketers similar conceptually to what Facebook introduced in November 2007 – almost four years ago to the day. … Every link shared through Google+ has media implications as well. Those +1’s appearing on natural search engine results can also wind up appearing on advertisers’ paid search ads and display ads running on Google. If Google+ achieves enough scale, and if ads with +1’s garner higher CTRs as expected, then Google+ powered ads will wind up as the most successful form of social advertising online. … To that end, a brand doesn’t need a Google+ Brand Profile to add +1’s to ads, but having a vibrant community connected to the Brand Profile could be a major driver of those +1’s. … Despite all the reasons to treat Google+ has a unique offering, marketers that decide to create and manage Brand Profiles will need to allocate resources somehow. … Realistically, in the short term, marketers who are already at capacity for social programs will shift their existing staff’s time from Facebook, Twitter, and other communities…”
TNW: “Did Google+ just bury Twitter with its Pages launch? – I’ve said it a few times, and I’ll say it again, Email is still the #1 social network in the world. Everyone uses it, it works cross-platform, and it drives businesses and personal lives. With Google+ integrated into Gmail, it makes sharing information and getting updates simple. Will people get tired of visiting yet another site like Twitter or downloading yet another app? It’s too early to tell, but at the end of the day, everyone likes things to be easy.”
FC: “Business Won’t Like +1 – Google+’s fundamental consumer action model is far more limited than Facebook’s, too. – For the everyday consumer to interact with a brand on Facebook, the only point of entry is the ‘Like’ button. It’s as simple to contract and as long lasting as any parasite. – ‘Like’ a page, and you’ll not only be marked as part of their fan base, but you’ll be subscribed to see their updates. – Google+ rips the ‘Like’ button into two devastatingly separate entities.”
TC: “How Google+ Could One-Up Facebook’s Brand Pages – Google has a chance to make Page applications more accessible to all businesses by creating official templates that can be customized with the images, copy, and functionality desired by brands. Rather than forcing admins to choose between apps built by unknown third-parties, it could give them free templates they can trust to work. This would also allow Google+ to offer Page apps without first having to create a robust set of APIs to support them. – Facebook has forged a functional model for brand presences on social networks. Unfortunately, its focus on app developers and its desire to get brands advertising in order to target specific demographics has left Google some big opportunities to create a friendlier platform for brands.”
RWW: “Day 1 of Google+ Pages: The Muppets Fall Flat, But Brands Are Trying to Engage – It is very early days for Pages with brands. Already though you get the sense that the best way for brands to use Google+ will be to truly interact with their followers. Whether by posts that solicit comments or by video hangouts, Google+ is best used to engage in conversation with other people.”
TNW: “Google’s Bradley Horowitz has fired back at Mark Zuckerberg’s claim that the company is ‘building its own little Facebook’ saying that Google is ‘delighted to be underestimated’ by its rival. … Horowitz rejected comparisons between Google, Facebook and other social networks as being little more than fodder to give the media advertising and click throughs, with the Google man insisting that the company is focused in making its services better and not watching the competition.”
Gerrit Eicker
Google: “Google+ Pages have already provided brands and businesses a new means of connecting to and deeply engaging with consumers. In the weeks since launching pages, we’ve been listening to your feedback and we’re pleased to make some of the most oft-requested features available. – You can now delegate up to 50 named managers as administrators for a page. – A new notification flow will ensure that these managers stay in the loop on all the activity that takes place on a page, giving managers the ability to stay involved in page conversations. – We’ll now show an aggregated count of users that have engaged with your page, either by +1’ing it or by adding it to a circle. This way, both you and your page’s visitors can get an at-a-glance summary of who is interacting with your page.”
Gerrit Eicker
Keyword (Not Provided)
Google SSL leads to not provided keywords for search traffic: more than 10% already; http://eicker.at/KeywordNotProvided
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Gerrit Eicker
SEL: “Google’s new encrypted search for logged in users now appears to be blocking a much higher percentage of search terms than when it initially rolled out two weeks ago. In some cases, it might even be higher than the 10% or less figure that the company initially predicted might be impacted. … Google predicted that the change would impact 10% or less of searches… However, as of October 31, we have seen a very significant increase on the Not Provided figure here on Search Engine Land. It’s not just us, either. Looking at data from several websites across industries, we see a range of 7% to 14% of total organic keywords now being blocked. … The figure is even more dramatic, however, when you consider it as a percentage of Google-driven keywords. In other words, the 12.87% figure above means that for ALL keywords from ANY search engine to Search Engine Land, 12.87% of them were blocked. … The rollout was supposed to take place over the course of several weeks. The process is still happening, and it seems as if it was suddenly enabled for more users on October 31.”
LM: “It’s not just Google Analytics that will be denied this data. By ‘enhancing’ their default user experience for signed in users, Google will be redirecting signed in users to https://www.google.com, thus encrypting the search results page. In analytics, you’ll still be able to see that these signed in users came from the organic search results, but instead of being able to see the actual keywords that they used, you’ll see all that data aggregated under (Not Provided.) … So far [October 20th], since this change launched, LunaMetrics has seen 1% of our keywords clumped into (Not Provided.) A client with substantially larger organic search volume has already seen almost 2% of their organic keywords represented as Not Provided. We shall see how far-reaching these changes actually are in a few weeks when they’re rolled out completely.”
Naylor: “The online SEO community was up in arms after Google announced that signed-in users would get the encrypted search results as standard on google.com, meaning that all the referring keyword data would be lost in any analytic package. – Short term, this is unlikely to cause a too much of an upset and most people are saying they are only seeing 2-3% of all searches coming through with the (not provided) keywords.”
Mark8t: “As the change gets rolled out worldwide, you will start to see an increasing number of ‘Keyword Not Provided’, so you will need to become more creative. I would strongly recommend if you have not already to get a Google Webmaster Account, as Google notes: You ‘can also receive an aggregated list of the top 1,000 search queries that drove traffic to their site for each of the past 30 days through Google Webmaster Tools (GWT). This information helps webmasters keep more accurate statistics about their user traffic’. … In my view, although it may take more time, if you focus on content data, trends with keywords [as opposed to exact data] and other tools available, the impact will be somewhat lessened. The reality is, there is no point in crying over split milk, it’s done. Now it’s time to come up with creative solutions to keep moving forward.“
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Gerrit Eicker
LM: “Google SSL Search: Update on (not provided) keywords – Matt Cutts’ estimation that SSL search would only affect single-digit percentages of searchers is still holding true (in aggregate). But as you can see from the numbers above, the number of signed-in Google users that reach your site will vary greatly depending on your industry. The silver lining in this is at least we’re able to easily measure the effects of SSL search using Google Analytics and a couple of advanced segments.“
Gerrit Eicker
Google Search and the Price of Privacy
Google goes SSL for its search; http://eicker.at/GoogleSSL – Sullivan: Puts A Price On Privacy; http://eicker.at/PriceOfPrivacy
Gerrit Eicker
Google SSL
Google is making search more secure: starts encrypting search (and referrals!) via SSL; http://eicker.at/GoogleSSL
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Gerrit Eicker
Google: “We’ve worked hard over the past few years to increase our services’ use of an encryption protocol called SSL, as well as encouraging the industry to adopt stronger security standards. For example, we made SSL the default setting in Gmail in January 2010 and introduced an encrypted search service located at https://encrypted.google.com four months later. Other prominent web companies have also added SSL support in recent months. – As search becomes an increasingly customized experience, we recognize the growing importance of protecting the personalized search results we deliver. As a result, we’re enhancing our default search experience for signed-in users. Over the next few weeks, many of you will find yourselves redirected to https://www.google.com [note the extra ‘s’] when you’re signed in to your Google Account. This change encrypts your search queries and Google’s results page. … [W]ebsites you visit from our organic search listings will still know that you came from Google, but won’t receive information about each individual query. They can also receive an aggregated list of the top 1,000 search queries that drove traffic to their site for each of the past 30 days through Google Webmaster Tools. … As we continue to add more support for SSL across our products and services, we hope to see similar action from other websites. That’s why our researchers publish information about SSL and provide advice to help facilitate broader use of the protocol.”
ATD: “Google said today it will soon use SSL encryption by default to improve security for signed-in search users, following SSL usage across the industry in Gmail, and on Twitter and Facebook. (You can see when a company is using SSL when a URL starts with ‘https.’) When SSL is used, Web site owners will get less information about what search terms visitors used to find them. Google said the move is a recognition of the increasingly customized and personalized nature of search.”
LM: “Now, if you were training at an SEO event like I was on the 17th and then was out of the office [and largely offline] on the 18th or if you live under a rock somewhere, you might not have heard Google’s official announcement that they will no longer be providing keyword data for organic search results if the user is signed into their Google account. – It’s not just Google Analytics that will be denied this data. … If you’re an SEO who uses the keywords report to prove the validity and efficacy of your work, you’re screaming and gnashing your teeth by this point. If you’re a causal analytics user, you may be asking the question ‘why do this?‘ … You can still see every single keyword that sent traffic through paid search, whether the user is signed in or not – just not organic search. Are users who click on paid search results less safe than users that click on organic results? … So far, since this change launched, LunaMetrics has seen 1% of our keywords clumped into (Not Provided.) A client with substantially larger organic search volume has already seen almost 2% of their organic keywords represented as Not Provided. We shall see how far-reaching these changes actually are in a few weeks when they’re rolled out completely.”
Gerrit Eicker
Metered Paywalls
Newspapers can tailor their pricing structure rather than use a one size fits all-approach; http://eicker.at/MeteredPaywalls
Google: “Search, plus Your World – Google Search has always been about finding the best results for you. Sometimes that means results from the public web, but sometimes it means your personal content or things shared with you by people you care about. … We’re transforming Google into a search engine that understands not only content, but also people and relationships. We began this transformation with Social Search, and today we’re taking another big step in this direction by introducing three new features: Personal Results, which enable you to find information just for you, such as Google+ photos and posts-both your own and those shared specifically with you, that only you will be able to see on your results page; Profiles in Search, both in autocomplete and results, which enable you to immediately find people you’re close to or might be interested in following; and, People and Pages, which help you find people profiles and Google+ pages related to a specific topic or area of interest, and enable you to follow them with just a few clicks. Because behind most every query is a community. – Together, these features combine to create Search plus Your World. Search is simply better with your world in it, and we’re just getting started. … When it comes to security and privacy, we set a high bar for Search plus Your World. Since some of the information you’ll now find in search results, including Google+ posts and private photos, is already secured by SSL encryption on Google+, we have decided that the results page should also have the same level of security and privacy protection. That’s part of why we were the first major search engine to turn on search via SSL by default for signed-in users last year. … We named our company after the mathematical number googol as an aspiration toward indexing the countless answers on webpages, but that’s only part of the picture. The other part is people, and that’s what Search plus Your World is all about.”
SEL: “Google’s search results are undergoing their most radical transformation ever, as a new ‘Search Plus Your World’ format begins rolling out today. It finds both content that’s been shared with you privately along with matches from the public web, all mixed into a single set of listings. … The new system will perhaps make life much easier for some people, allowing them to find both privately shared content from friends and family plus material from across the web through a single search, rather than having to search twice using two different systems. – However, Search Plus Your World may cause some privacy worries, as private content may appear as if it is exposed publicly [it is not]. It might also cause concern by making private content more visible to friends and family than those sharing may have initially intended. … ‘The social search algorithm, and the personal search algorithm, and the personalized search algorithm are actually one algorithm now, and we are merging it in a way that is very pleasant and useful,’ said Amit Singhal, who oversees Google’s ranking algorithms, when I talked with him about the new features. … Search Plus Your World doesn’t cover content on Facebook. Or Twitter. Or Flickr. Or any social network or place where content might be shared to a more limited audience. Currently, ‘Search Plus Your World’ would be better described as ‘Search Plus Google+’ … As said, the ability to search for private content on Google+ isn’t new. However, I wonder if having it integrated into Google’s search results itself might cause some surprises and issues for both Google and its users. … Don’t like the idea of personalized search? Disappointingly, Google didn’t go the opt-in route. Instead, you have to deliberately opt-out. … Personalized Is The New ‘Normal’ … Overall, I like the integration that allows for searching through private and public material. As I’ve said, I think many people will find it useful. – I do think there are some additional privacy controls that could be added, in particular, the ability for people to opt their content out of being found through search, if they want. … Yes, there are things that Facebook or Twitter might not allow, not without Google cutting deals or agreeing to terms it may not want to.”
RWW: “If you’re like me, you’ve dreaded this day. Just last week, I wrote that Google+ was going to mess up the Internet by turning Web search into a popularity contest. But the new Google unveiled today leaves the user in control. ‘Search, plus Your World,’ Google has called it. It’s two kinds of search, and they’re separate. If you don’t want Google+-flavored results, just switch to global mode. You can even turn off personalized search altogether. … Even when you search in personal mode, Google wants to show you the most relevant result at the top, even if its not from Google+. Prior to today’s update, this wasn’t happening reliably. The source of my concerns about Google+ was the prominence of Google+ results in search when outside Web results were more relevant. … Of course, this mode will still privilege content posted to Google+ ahead of other social networks. … But today’s ‘Search, plus Your World’ update actually softens the impact of Google+ on search. Google+ content is better integrated with outside stuff now, and, of course, it’s optional, even for logged-in users. There are still problems with the state of Google search, but none of them are as dire as they were a week ago. – Now that Google users have control over the level of personalization, I don’t think Google+ will mess up the Internet anymore. Social SEO will not take over, because natural search results still matter. My fear last week was that anyone who wanted to use Google would be forced to use Google+. Today’s update shows good faith. Google has given its users control.”
GigaOM: “Google+ just got a new killer app: search – Google has begun to integrate Google+ posts, pages and profiles into its Google.com search results. The move is meant to personalize search, and offers some interesting opportunities for content discovery – but first and foremost, it’s gonna be a big boost for Google+ itself. … The new Google+ search integration comes with a kind of on-off switch, making it possible to switch back and forth between the classic Google view of the world and a more personalized version. Users who opt for the personal approach will get to see relevant posts from the people they have added to their circles as well as pages from brands and celebrities relevant to their search results. … I’ve long argued that Hangouts are a kind of killer app for Google+. With the launch of personalized search, the service just got a new killer app.”
TC: “What most alarms me about today’s ‘Google Search Plus Your World’ announcement is how it will distort name searches. When I Google someone’s name, I’m typically looking for a Wikipedia entry, their Twitter account, a personal website, or an author page on their blog. … I know getting people to sign up for Google+ is crucial to tying people’s behavior across Google products to their identity to power ad targeting. But seriously Google, best-in-class search is why we love you. Is it really worth sacrificing your integrity to drive signups?”
VB: “Twitter is not happy with Google’s new social search features. So unhappy, in fact, that the company is calling it a ‘bad day for the Internet’ and media overall. ‘We’re concerned that as a result of Google’s changes, finding this information will be much harder for everyone,’ the company said in a statement. ‘We think that’s bad for people, publishers, news organizations and Twitter users.’ … One Google spokesperson told VentureBeat: ‘For years now we’ve been working with our social search features to help you find the most relevant information from your friends and social connections, no matter what site that content is on. However, Google does not have access to crawl all the information on some sites, so it’s not possible for us to surface all that content. Google also doesn’t have access to the social graph information from some sites, so it’s not possible to help you find information from those people you’re connected to.'”
GigaOM: “Is adding Google+ to search a red flag for regulators? – Neither side has said why the arrangement with Twitter came to an end (sources say the company wanted a lot more money in return for its data), but today’s note about unfair competition suggests the two won’t be working together any time soon – and the odds of Facebook suddenly wanting to make its data available seem equally remote. But as others have pointed out, Google is being somewhat disingenuous when it says it can’t get information from Twitter, since all tweets and profile info (unless explicitly hidden by a user) is available to be crawled and indexed by anyone, including Google.”
TC: “But Twitter does have a point: people trust Google to serve up the most timely, relevant information possible. And without Twitter’s data, it’s going to have a hard time doing that. Of course, Google probably already has its own answer to this drafted, and I suspect it reads something like, ‘if Twitter wants people to find tweets in Google, they can open up their API.’ I’m reaching out to them for their official response now. – Update: Google just posted this response to its official Google+ Page: ‘We are a bit surprised by Twitter’s comments about Search plus Your World, because they chose not to renew their agreement with us last summer, and since then we have observed their rel=nofollow instructions.’”
RWW: “Sure they’re concerned. Is it true, though? It’s not like Twitter’s own search tools are that helpful; Google is still the best Twitter search tool there is. It recently acquired Julpan, a social search company, so maybe Twitter has a better idea. But if you search for content that’s on Twitter, Google will find it. If Twitter wants full-featured integration into Google search, that’s up to them. I’m sure Google would be delighted to oblige. – Nothing about today’s update makes things worse for Google’s competitors in Google results. If anything, it just means they have more work to do.“