Welcome to Think2010 Series
Google Broadening Wave Access With GMail-Like Rollout
As we previously reported, starting tomorrow Google will widen access to its innovative communications platform Wave, offering 100,000 new invitations to use the service. Many of these people in turn will be allowed to invite others to join as well, reminiscent of how GMail propagated. (It’s wise for Google to allow these new users to invite friends and family because you effectively can’t use Wave without contacts on the system.) Those who will gain full access tomorrow will apparently be developers, early users who provided feedback and some Google Apps customers.
Shashi Seth, Another Ex-Googler, Lands At AOL
AOL announced today that it’s hired former Google employee Shashi Seth as its Senior VP of Global Advertising Products. While with Google, Seth was head of monetization for YouTube. Most recently he was the Chief Revenue Officer for Cooliris.
AOL’s addition of Seth is the latest in a series of hirings from the search industry — and Google in particular — going back to March when Tim Armstrong left Google to become AOL’s Chairman and CEO. Armstrong was one of Google’s longest serving executives, and AOL credited him for helping to “build one of the most successful media teams in the history of the Internet” at Google.
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Question Box Aids Search in Developing Areas Without Web
If you’ll join me in crawling out of our connected lives for just a second, let’s remember that there are still parts of the world that still don’t have the internet. These areas more than any other are in dire need of answers that search can provide. Answers related to farming and entrepreneurship. Answers that could transform a community, improving its economics and health.
The New York Times featured a nonprofit organization called Question Box is determined to bring those answers to such communities. Founded by Rose Shuman, Question Box staffs calling centers who receive questions, via cell phone, from developing villages in Uganda. Though the internet remains slow and elusive, cell phones have taken hold in Africa.
Microsoft Windows 7 House Party: Public Relations Disaster or Video Marketing Triumph
If you create something so bad that it goes viral, is it a public relations disaster or a video marketing triumph?
That’s the question that journalists and bloggers are asking after watching HostingYourParty, which tells you how to host a Microsoft Windows 7 House Party.
Microsoft is putting a Tupperware-style twist on the upcoming Windows 7 rollout — launching a new initiative to encourage thousands of employees, partners and technology enthusiasts to throw parties in their homes and communities to demonstrate and help spread the word about its new operating system.
SEO Horror Stories
Well, with Halloween right around the corner, I thought I’d write something a little fun today. Although “fun” is hardly the word many people would use to describe their experiences with certain SEO companies.
Our industry has made so many strides in gaining a more credible reputation, and — truth told — many SEO companies have become much better at what they do. Yet we still suffer from many people and companies who claim to do SEO, but that really don’t know anything beyond how to write a title tag. Scratch that, there are some who can’t even manage to get that right.
Small Business Guide to Tools that Help Your SEM
All of us in SEM use certain tools and Web sites to track, analyze, and collect data — it’s not a secret. The fact that we use sites to help us is another reason why anyone can learn SEM — but it takes time, commitment, and a certain aptitude.
There are plenty of tools that a small business can and should use to make their limited time most productive in online marketing. We use these tools while optimizing our clients’ sites at Blizzard, and recommend them to our clients to track our progress and compare baseline data to gains we’ve made for them throughout the year.
Google SERPs Analysis: Which Factors to Take into Account?
Google algorithm is a mystery but we do know there are plenty of factors and signals taken into account. Thus, one thing is for sure: you can’t take SERPs analysis lightly: there are plenty of things to consider to make some judgments as to how easy it will be to achieve top ten rankings.
So how do you evaluate your future SERPs neighbors and competitors? Here’s a list of various factors to pay attention to:
- Average toolbar PR (while most people prefer to ignore this completely, I still think it is important when taken NOT in isolation). Tool: SEOquake FireFox addon
Shopping Engine Wize Relaunches To Align Product Research With Word Of Mouth
What amazes me is that in more than a decade no “brand” has really emerged in shopping search. What do I mean by “brand”? I mean a site that’s top-of-mind for consumers, trusted and that they navigate to directly for products and product information. One could say that the exceptions to this are Amazon, eBay (probably) and CNET in the consumer electronics category. But there are literally dozens and dozens of shopping sites that have been playing the search arbitrage game or trying their best to rank for product-related searches. But they’re not really building any “brand equity” or long-term value.
Google Launches Merchant Center For Google Base Users
The Google Base blog announced the launch of the new Google Merchant Center. This is the location for you to “upload your feeds, check on the status of your items, and get information on the performance of your listings.”
The Merchant Center is replacing Google Base for those who submit products to Google. This new portal is designed around product listings and submitting data for product listings. Transitioning between Google Base and Merchant Center should be very easy, Google said they would automatically show your existing data feeds, items, FTP settings and other data in the new Merchant Center, based on your login.
Google Broadening Wave Access With GMail-Like Rollout
As we previously reported, starting tomorrow Google will widen access to its innovative communications platform Wave, offering 100,000 new invitations to use the service. Many of these people in turn will be allowed to invite others to join as well, reminiscent of how GMail propagated. (It’s wise for Google to allow these new users to invite friends and family because you effectively can’t use Wave without contacts on the system.) Those who will gain full access tomorrow will apparently be developers, early users who provided feedback and some Google Apps customers.
CitySquares Offers Local Feeds for Online Publishers
Local search site CitySquares has rolled out new local feeds for online publishers. This is a great feature to place on your site if you have a local blog, newspaper or community site.
With the local feed, you can do things like list local restaurants on your website. The feed is free. Here’s how to do it:
1. Go to CitySquares.com and type in your city.
2. Look for the categories listed on the results page.
3. Click on a category you’re interested in
4. Click “Get this feed” at the top right corner in the results column.
5. Plug the feed into any widget platform (or build something yourself, web developer).
120.5 million viewers watched nearly 10 billion videos on YouTube in August 2009
comScore has just released August 2009 data from the comScore Video Metrix service, showing that 161 million U.S. Internet users watched online video during the month, the largest audience ever recorded. Online video reached another all-time high in August with more than 25 billion videos viewed during the month, with YouTube accounting for nearly 10 billion.
6 Ways to Make Google Image Search Better
Google image search is something I’ve been playing more and more recently. It is a visual, more simplistic, less smart variation of general Google search and for many queries it does work better for me.
Here are 6 ways to make it better (and chances are, you will love it too!).
1. How to Add Direct Image Links to Google Image SERPs
Note: while both the tools listed allow you to quicker click through to the image itself, don’t forget to link to the image source if you are going to re-publish it.
Google Celebrates Confucius’ Birthday

Google is celebrating Confucius’ birthday with a new logo that has the Chinese philosopher standing in place of the “l” in Google’s regular logo. September 28, 551 BC, is traditionally recognized as Confucius’ birthday.
Somewhat oddly, however, the Confucius doodle isn’t showing up on Google.com or on Google France. “We don’t always show every doodle on every domain,” a Google spokesperson tells us. “As you can imagine, it’s sometimes tough to make these decisions but we aim to pick doodles that are most relevant to most users in any given country.” The Confucius doodle can be found on Google’s country-specific search engines in the UK, Germany, Spain, Austria, Russia, Serbia, and elsewhere. It was also shown on Google Australia and Google New Zealand (where it’s already September 29 as I write this).
By the way, if you’re into following Google’s doodles (and we know some of you are), you may want to check out a new site called Doodle Source, which tracks and archives new Google doodles appearing worldwide. Right now the site only has Google’s most recent doodles, but they plan to add all of the company’s logos going back to 1999.




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