CMS Watch, which evaluates and reports on content-related technologies, has issued a report saying that Yahoo Web Analytics (formerly IndexTools) is better than Google Analytics in a number of key areas.
comScore Gives Google Maps January Win
Don’t be surprised if members of the Google Maps team start to favor comScore over competing traffic-monitoring companies. comScore may have just helped them secure some bonuses by putting Google Maps ahead of MapQuest in terms of unique visitors.
Google Penalizes Itself
Go ahead and laugh, because it is funny. Google Japan’s probably too embarrassed to laugh, though, and someone somewhere is likely to resemble the spittle-drenched apologist from the movie Gung Ho.
Google Japan, according to its apology, was apparently unaware of the company’s own terms of service. Paying a Japanese pay-per-post promotion company to pimp its new Hot Keywords blog widget caused the website to be busted down from PR 9 to PR 5.
Top Ranking in Google Isn’t Top Rank Anymore
“The top position is no longer winner-take-all,” Bryan Horling, a Google software engineer in charge of Personalized Search, told the SMX West audience in Santa Clara California. After a decade of trying to claim that prize, that may or may not be good news to some.
(Coverage of SMX West continues at Murdok Videos. Keep an eye on Murdok for more notes and videos from the event this week.)
Keyword List Expansion Tips From Google
Using the right keywords in your search engine marketing campaigns will obviously yield the best results. Unfortunately, we don’t always know what those best keywords are. And even if we do have the best ones nailed, there might be others that would potentially perform just as well or close. On the Google Analytics Blog, Google offers a few tips for expanding your keyword lists to potentially get the most out of your campaign.
Google Welcomes Priced Apps To Android Market
Get ready for Android to become a lot more popular with developers. In a move that may have several other interesting ramifications, as well, Android Market has finally made room for applications that aren’t free.
Google Makes Mobile Spreadsheets More Accessible
Today Google announced an improvement to the mobile version of Google Docs. That is list view for spreadsheets, which allows you to view, edit, sort, and filter your spreadsheets from your mobile device.
Previously, you could only view your spreadsheets on mobile devices. Now, they basically have full functionality.
Google Axes Radio Ads
Google is now shutting down its radio advertising business. This comes about a month after Google announced the shut down of its print advertising business, not to mention Google Notebook, Jaiku, Google Catalog Search, Mashup Editor, Dodgeball, and uploading to Google Video.
Google Introduces Social Bar
The Google Friend Connect Team has introduced a new feature to the service – a social bar. You can set the bar to appear at the top or bottom of you page.
Google To Pay Copyright Holders $60 Per Scanned Book
Google has started paying authors of out-of-print books under a $125 million copyright settlement agreement reached in October concerning Google Book Search.
Authors and publishers around the world are receiving detailed information about their legal rights and options by email and postal mail. Class members can visit this Web site for complete information about the settlement.