In order to help you stay up to date with changes to our AdWords policies, we’ve launched the AdWords Policy Change Log. This new site makes it easier to stay informed about upcoming AdWords policy changes by posting a short summary, including the affected region, for each policy change going into effect.While the AdWords Policy Change log will have the most comprehensive listing of changes to AdWords policies, if we anticipate that your account will be directly affected by an upcoming policy change, we’ll still email you a service announcement, as necessary, to make sure you’re aware of the change…

Below is what happened in search today, as reported on Search Engine Land and from other places across the web.

From Search Engine Land:

• Facebook Questions Opens To Limited Public Release

  Long expected, Facebook’s new Facebook Questions service is now being offered. It allows Facebook users to specifically ask question to and get answers from others in Facebook’s now 500 million strong community…

(Cross-posted from the Lat Long Blog)What do Alex Trebek, teachers and Googlers have in common? Last week, these individuals and groups all came together at the Googleplex in Mountain View, CA to celebrate exploration and learning.Google hosted its first Geo Teachers Institute, an intensive two-day workshop in which 150 educators received hands-on training and experience with Google Maps, Google SketchUp and Google Earth, including features like Mars, Moon and SkyMaps…

Over the last two years, the AdSense team has offered the powerful Google Custom Search Engine (CSE) product as an improvement over the original AdSense for search. After some recent improvements, we’re now ready to retire the older version of AdSense for search. If the Google logo on your search results page reads “Powered by Google” instead of the newer “Google Custom Search” then you haven’t yet upgraded to the newer version…

As many of you know, we started the Go Mobile! series of posts on the Inside AdWords blog to give you an easy way to keep up with the world of mobile advertising.
The mobile industry has really evolved since the start of the series: mobile is becoming a core part of many marketing campaigns and publishers are developing mobile-specific content across the web and in applications across mobile operating systems…

Below is what happened in search today, as reported on Search Engine Land and from other places across the web.

From Search Engine Land:

• Report: Bing Generates More Clicks Than Google

  Chitika, a veritable fountain of data lately, has generated some new interesting findings from activity on its search-based advertising network. The company compared ad click behavior on Google and Bing and found that Bing generated about 50% more clicks:
  Across the sample of nearly 15 million impressions used for this study, Google users clicked on […

In order to provide the best online marketing experience, we want to make sure that you understand how each dollar you invest in AdWords is performing.Today, we’re announcing some upcoming changes to the way our third party partners provide reports and information about AdWords to their clients. If you work with another company to manage your AdWords campaigns, you should be able to find out how much of your advertising budget (cost) was spent on AdWords, how many times your ads appeared (impressions) and how many times users clicked on your ads (clicks)…

 Well folks, this may be the biggest tool introduction since Ryan Seacrest started hosting American Idol. Today we are launching our SEO toolbar for Google’s Chrome browser. This sexy beast is full to the brim with SEO insight and time-saving SEO goodness. This free add-on is ripe for picking and available for download right this second.

  Ask and Ye Shall Receive

Whether it’s from Twitter, Facebook, email or comments here on the blog, almost every day we get some sort of request for a Chrome Toolbar…

Perhaps part of the “interesting data” Richard Rosenblatt was talking about was link anchor text on expired domains & cybersquatting efforts that he could redirect in bulk at high earning eHow pages.

Not to fear, Demand Media is a trusted Google partner, so the algorithm and engineers are prohibited to take action against the same activity which would get your website removed from the search results…

Last November, we added legal opinions to Google Scholar. Legal opinions consider serious issues and help refine the laws that govern our country—but they can also be surprisingly entertaining. We’ve shared some of these for your summer reading pleasure on the Google Scholar blog.Rimes v. Curb Records, Inc., 2001 the opinion is written as a series of songs to be sung to tunes by LeAnn Rimes. It starts:LeAnn RimesA very rich and famous starWasn’t so rich in times afarBut what a talent she had!Read the rest on the Google Scholar blog…

Below is what happened in search today, as reported on Search Engine Land and from other places across the web.

From Search Engine Land:

• Google Mobilizes Place Pages for Android Devices

  Today Google announced upgraded Maps for Android, with the addition of a new mobile version of Places (not to be confused with the Android app Places Directory). It enables users to browse for categories of businesses nearby…

Today we’re excited to announce a new edition of Google Apps. Designed with guidance from customers like the federal government, the City of Los Angeles and the City of Orlando, Google Apps for Government includes the same great Google applications that people know and love, with specific measures to address the policy and security needs of the public sector.We’re also pleased to announce that Google Apps is the first suite of cloud computing applications to receive Federal Information Security Management Act (FISMA) certification and accreditation from the U…

In the last video of this series, Evanne, a member of the Partner Development team, talks about her favorite Google perk, her obsession with music, and an important tip she’d like to share with all of you.We hope you’ve enjoyed learning more about what goes on behind the scenes in AdSense. If you have feedback on this series, or ideas for future series, we’d love to hear them so please leave us a comment!http://www…

[Cross-posted on Google Public Policy Blog] 

Bending, walking, breathing, hearing, seeing and sleeping are simple things that are often taken for granted, as are thinking, learning, and communicating.

Twenty years ago today, the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) was signed into law. This milestone legislation bans persons or companies from discriminating against anyone with limited abilities…

At a small or medium sized company, you might be part of a very small team with responsibility for SEO, or you may the only person – and it might not even be your full time job.

In these cases, people often tell me that the greatest struggle is finding time and resources to do link building for their site. Rather than pitching your boss to hire a new team member to assist with SEO and link building, you may have more success (and get more value out of) asking for a little time with members of different teams from different disciplines…

We get so many inquires seeking referrals for vendors that we decided to begin a master list of online marketing must-considers and invite our friends to contribute. We needed to start somewhere, so we decided to kick off our industry biz directory with a seed list of companies.  So where to start? We noticed that Search Engine Strategies generously qualifies vendors for in the exposition hall roster…

Below is what happened in search today, as reported on Search Engine Land and from other places across the web.

From Search Engine Land:

• French Newspapers Partner To Sidestep Google News

  A group of six French newspapers is partnering to create an online news site that they hope will be an alternative to Google News. France’s National Daily Press Union announced the plan yesterday and said the virtual newsstand will be launched in September…

Cross posted from the Google Agency Ad Solutions Blog
We recently introduced a new umbrella name for our online display media offerings, the Google Display Network (GDN), to make our advertising solutions clear. You also heard from us about the investments we’re making in display advertising and the promise it holds to drive great marketing results. In this series of posts, we’ll cover what you can do today on the GDN…

This year we held the third edition of the Google Online Marketing Challenge — a global university competition that gives students hands-on exposure to online marketing. Each team receives the equivalent of $200 to work with a local company and create an online marketing campaign. Teams have three weeks to mastermind a strategy before submitting a campaign report to an international judging panel of professors…

“Paid links from off topic sites get devalued and flagged.” A common claim by otherwise savvy SEOs such as Ross Hudgens.

Ross, would you take three links from the Wall Street Journal if its reporters write about internet marketing?

Would you buy those links?

I would.

Both for the direct traffic (duh) and the SEO boost (duh).

The page is relevant, the readers are interested in the field… what more do you want?

Guys like Ross seem to think that if a site isn’t on your topic, then you don’t get any value…

This is the second in a series of posts based on the material covered in our latest webinar: Taking Your Site Performance to The Next Level With Optimization Testing. The on-demand version will be available shortly.

According to Jupiter Research, 73% of marketers aren’t doing any testing whatsoever, with 49% having no plans to do so. Before I share 4 compelling reasons why you should be testing, let’s look at some of the reasons why marketers aren’t testing:

• Lack of resources (in-house talent, budget for tool or consultants)
• Lack of tool (now with Google Website Optimizer this is less of an issue)
• Lack of buy-in from upper management
• Lack of ownership of the testing process
• IT bottlenecks
• Lack of understanding of the value of testing / don’t think it’s important
• Not sure what to test, how to prioritize testing opportunities or how to take action on results
• Lack of understanding of tools or testing methods

Despite these challenges, serious Web marketers should push to overcome them and get testing capabilities because testing is the only way to truly know what works and what doesn’t for your site based on the combination of your industry, customers and product mix…

Below is what happened in search today, as reported on Search Engine Land and from other places across the web.

From Search Engine Land:

• Check Out Bing On A Windows Phone 7 Device

  The Bing Search Blog just posted pictures of how Bing looks and acts on a Windows Phone 7 device. As you know, Bing will have prime real estate on the new Windows 7 devices. So making sure Bing acts and feels smooth and functional is extremely important to Microsoft…

 Guess who’s back. Back again. Danny’s back. Tell a friend. (My co-workers hate me ;-p) This week’s Whiteboard Friday is about how to get an SEO job. In it, I divulge the secret of how I suckered my way into how I earned this job. I also do the worst impression of my life and finish with a shocking twist that I guarantee you won’t see coming!

See my stats for this video

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Back in June, our Zurich engineering headquarters welcomed 100 of EMEA’s brightest computer science students to our annual Europe, Middle East and Africa Scholars’ Retreat. Recipients of the Google Europe Scholarship for Students with Disabilities joined Anita Borg Memorial Scholars and Finalists for three days of workshops, technical talks, poster sessions, networking events and, of course, lots of fun! Check out our video below to hear from scholars and speakers in their own words:Our academic scholarships are designed to support a new generation of talented, diverse computer scientists from all backgrounds…

There’s lots of misinformation floating around the web about the way AdWords works, and our AdWords support teams get to hear most of it. Since many of the same issues seem to keep popping up again and again, we thought we’d run a blog series to help you separate the myths from the facts. We’ve tried to capture the most persistent of them here, but remember, if you ever have any AdWords questions, you can always pop over to the AdWords Help Center or AdWords Help Forum for an answer…

This is the first in a series of posts based on the material covered in our latest webinar: Taking Your Site Performance to The Next Level With Optimization Testing. The on-demand version will be available shortly.

Part 1 provides brief overview of what site testing is and describes the differences between usability testing, A/B split testing and multivariate methods.

What is optimization testing?

First let’s talk about what it’s not…

Straight from the horse’s mouth:

We’ve started testing organic (also referred to as algorithmic) and paid search listings from Microsoft for up to 25 percent of Yahoo! Search traffic in the U.S. The primary change for these tests is that the listings are coming from Microsoft. However, the overall page should look the same as the Yahoo! Search you’re used to – with rich content and unique tools and features from Yahoo!…

This Wednesday, July 21st, we’ll be hosting a live online course on remarketing. This interactive presentation will be delivered by a Display Network specialist and will take place from 15:00 to 16:00 GMT, including time for Q&A.

During this session we’ll take you through the benefits of using remarketing, who it’s best for and how to set it up in your account. If you advertise with AdWords and get a large number of visitors to your website, then we encourage you to attend…

Another great post from Jason Cohen popped onto my radar yesterday entitled "Startup Competitive Advantages the Work."

As a passionate (OK, maybe obsessed is the right word) startup guy and someone who loves SEO, I couldn’t help but want to jump into the fray with some thoughts on how the field we’re in – domination of the organic search results – can be an unfair, competitive advantage for businesses that know how to wield it…

Below is what happened in search today, as reported on Search Engine Land and from other places across the web.

From Search Engine Land:

• Yahoo Q2 Revenues Flat, Display & Net Income Up

  Yahoo announced generally flat Q2 revenues of $1.6 billion but improved net income today. That compares with revenues of $1.57 billion in Q2 2009. Accordingly overall revenue growth vs…