The Week in Search & Social for August 10…and oops, August 3

• YouTube’s Promoted Videos Hits 1 Billion Video Views – And adds a couple new placement opportunities: Google Video search results (US only), YouTube Mobile and TrueView video ads.
• The July 2011 Microsoft Advertising adCenter Upgrade is Here! – Recent enhancements to adCenter include a Bid by Position option (Best Position, Mainline, 1st page), new Budget Management options (daily/monthly changes discussed previously), and improved Account Management section.
• AdWords Top-vs-Side Segmentation Insights – Following up on the addition of this new Segment view within AdWords, this article goes into more depth on how to put the data to use.
• Google Announces Click-to-Call Enhancements in AdWords Ads – Google emailed AdWords account holders last week announcing an update to how advertisers will be charged for the phone numbers placed in their ad text.  All non-clickable numbers displayed in your ads will be converted to a click-to-call number (and charged for clicks).

SEO

• Universal Search: Which Formats Dominate in Google’s Results? [Study] – Google’s current “standard” SERP model mixes links, images, news stories, videos, and more. But what appears most often? A recent SearchMetrics study has the answers.
• Google’s New Way to Submit URLs & Updated Pages – This new method for submitting URLs to Google is limited, so you should use it when it’s important that certain pages be crawled right away.
• Google’s 12 Sitelink Experiment– just as it reads, Google is testing a stronger prevalence of sitelinks in search results, mainly for branded terms & URLs.
• Yahoo UK & Others Switching to Bing Results – The organic search on Yahoo UK, France, Germany, Spain and Italy will begin transitioning over to Bing powered results August 3rd. The US transition happened back in August 2010.
• Google Introduces Page Speed Service – Google loves fast websites. So to help websites speed up, Google has launched Page Speed Service which will automatically help your website load faster. All webmasters have to do is point your site’s DNS entry to Google.
• That Bing You Do – have you submitted your XML sitemap to Bing?

Analytics

• 2011 Web Analytics Review – If you are looking for “average” site usage, this is the chart for you! Average site metrics from sites using Google Analytics and opted-in to anonymous data sharing.
• Sign up for GA Multi-Chanel Funnels beta
• Guide to setting up advanced segments in GA for complicated brand names– The example here is for a hotel chain and filtering out all variations. Good step by step instructions that would work well for specific product names as well as a brand name.
• Unconvertional Opportunities for Conversion Optimization – Think about your 404-error pages, testing flash elements, thank you pages & support pages. Do these pages on your site keep people on your site or usher them out?
• Google Analytics Changes How Image Search Traffic is Reported – Now showed as Google organic rather than referral traffic.

• Let’s Skin This Social Media Link Building Cat – Learn some new ways to use Social Media for link building, including building your Twitter authority, Google +, and Google Trends, which can help you see what hot topics that you should tackle with new content.
• Link Building For E-Commerce Sites: Targeting the Right Anchor Text– Use Google Analytics to gather traffic and conversion data that can help you pick the anchor text that will provide you with the highest ROI.
• Using Twitter and Backlinks to Build Links – Using the combination of Twitter followers and backlink profile can provide a hotbed of potential inbound linking opportunities.

Social Media

• Google+ Poised To Become Number Two Network In 12 Months According To Survey –  Survey of 1,003 online adults found that Google+ is on a trajectory to surpass other social networks, including Twitter, LinkedIn and MySpace.
• Facebook Launches Facebook Messenger App For Android, iPhone – Facebook has launched Facebook Messenger, which lets you message individual friends, message groups of friends, send photos, and privately share your location. Already #1 downloaded free app for iPhone.
• Facebook Now Groups Newsfeed Items by Topic – When multiple people post about the same topic, those posts are now grouped together and include a link back to that topic’s Page.
• 4 Reasons Why Google+ Brand Pages Will Be Better than Facebook’s– Google+ brand pages will have better search opportunity, customization, analytics, and can learn from Facebook’s mistakes.  But Google is still behind Facebook in terms of users.
• How to Keep You LinkedIn Profile From Hurting Your Image – It’s hard to overlook the importance of LinkedIn with over 100 million members many from the Fortune 500. One of the biggest errors LinkedIn users make is leaving their profile incomplete. Here are some tips to complete your profile with style.
• Now You Can Easily Create a Foursquare Business Page – You can now create and manage your business page on Foursquare. In the prior 18 months you had to work with the Foursquare team, which only released a total of 3,000 pages. This new self serve model lets you share and promote tips and gives Foursquare users the ability to follow your business.

Local Search Engine Optimization

• Hit By Competitor Spam Review – How To Respond? – Competitor spam reviews on the rise – what should you do if you get hit? Make sure to read the blog comments to get additional thoughts. Follow Up Post.
• Google Launches Hotel Finder, Steps Up Travel Search Game – With Google’s recent trend to cut away all the unnecessary extra projects, releasing a new experiment means one of two things: an exception to the “only serious projects” rule, or that this is, in fact, a serious project. Certainly, Google has loaded their hotel finder with enough features that it can’t be taken lightly. Hotel Finder pulls in Google Places info.
• 3 Pillars of Local Search Reviews – Google may have changed Place Pages, but not the algorithm. Diversity is still key when it comes to review and citations, so follow these tips to continue getting great reviews.

B2C

• RetailMeNot Counpon Infographic – Breakdown of a “year of coupon use” on RetailMeNot.com, here are the interesting stats: 1) AOV = $108.15 2.) Highest Volume of Coupon Use: Cyber Monday 3.) Coupon Use by Time of Day: 10:00am most coupons used 4.) Avg Time Users Spend Searching for Coupons: 1:29
• Tommy Hilfiger Tags Mobile Bar Codes to Bolster Online Sales – Combining mobile bar codes with static ads using SpyderLynk.com to offer customers exclusive deals.
• 5 Best Practices for Abandoned Shopping Carts – If you’re losing customers during your shopping cart, follow these 5 ecommerce tips to get them back.
• The Latest Groupon Killer: Amazon – Amazon has launched daily deals as part of AmazonLocal in Chicago, directly competing with daily deal sites.
• Is Back-to-School Shopping Already Doomed? – NRF predicts school spending will be down 0.50% this year compared to 2010 for families with kids in kindergarten to 12th grade.

B2B

• Track B2B Customer Lifetime Value to Boost Results – Based on latest MarketingSherpa reports, B2B marketers are not tracking lifetime customer value. This article makes the case for utilizing this metric as the most important when making decisions.
• Top 5 Deal Breakers for LinkedIn Cold Contacting – A list of best practices for reaching out successfully to potential leads on LinkedIn. Being sure to remember that your message is an interruption and failing to make it worth contacts’ while (i.e. giving them something for free) are some of the suggestions.
• 7 Marketing Management Problems That Tech Can Solve – Outline of the top benefits of implementing a full marketing automation system for large marketing and sales departments. Better cross-channel data is one of the multiple benefits.
• Optimizing B2B Landing Pages – Why Testing is Critical – Overview of important landing page tests specifically for B2B marketers.
• How B2B Marketers are Optimizing Their Funnel – Based on MarketingSherpa data, this outlines how top marketing departments are optimizing the sales funnel.
• 9 Steps to Smarter Lead Generation – Great overview of lead generation best practices, like focusing on less, but more qualified leads, focusing on content creation and utilizing a multi-touch, multi-media nurturing process.
• Multiple Touches Raises Lead Generation Stakes – Excellent article on the importance of content creation and regularly engaging leads in the sales funnel. Great cost/benefit analysis of outsourcing content creation as well.
• 4 Tips to Launch Your B2B Marketing in Social Media – General, top-level review of why B2B companies should be utilizing social media.

Web Design

• In the U.S. Android is top mobile OS, Apple is top manufacturer – Android now has more than a 10% lead in market share, but Apple still is the largest single manufacturer of smartphones.
• Amazon Circumvents Apple With HTML5 iPad App– This morning, Amazon launched the Kindle Cloud Reader, an HTML5 based reader app for Safari on iPad. Because it’s not on the App Store, Amazon doesn’t have to give Apple a cut of in-app purchases. Expect this to roll out to other iOS devices as well.
• Defer Secondary Content When Writing for Mobile Users – Mobile devices require a tight focus in content presentation, with the first screen limited to only the most essential information.
• SimpleGeo and Urban Airship Team Up – The company’s goal is to provide developers with the ability to send out geo-targeted, geo-fenced, personalized push notifications.
• Email Led to Most Mobile Purchase – eMarketer reports that 56% of mobile purchases were a result of email use in June 2011.  But 43% of shoppers still shop on their computer as a result of mobile messaging.

Conversion Optimization

• Conversion Optimization in the New Marketing Landscape – Today’s technology landscape is vast, and can make conversion optimization simpler, if you know what you’re looking for.
• When to be a Conversion Optimization Rebel – Best practices for landing page testing and optimization by Anvil’s own Kim Toomey.