Last week, Google was granted a patent that describes how Google might segment the content of a web page. Depending on the location of the content, a web page will get higher or lower rankings. [+]

Links from high authority websites have the biggest impact on the position of your web pages in Google search results. If high authority websites link to your site with your keywords in the anchor text, the chances that your site will be listed in the top 10 results for that keyword increase dramatically. [+]

Google's Panda update caused a ranking drop for many websites. Google has a very long official discussion thread about this topic. The discussion reveals things that you can do to make sure that your website gets its rankings back. [+]

If you're reading this blog, chances are very high that you value data, and chances are also high that you appreciate the presentation of data. Going beyond a spreadsheet of rows and columns and creating a visualization is not only pleasing to the eye, but it can also help put meaning and context to the data and help surface important meanings. As practical as rows and columns of numbers are, sometimes a lot more can be divined a lot faster from a simple pie chart. Or a bar graph. Or an animated motion chart :-) Data visualization is becoming an art and a discipline. There are blogs and books devoted to it. And we're obviously believers in visualizing data, and so is Google. That's why we're [+]

This week, we are beginning a new way of providing benchmarking data to Google Analytics users. For almost three years, Google Analytics has provided a Benchmarking report for users who opt in for anonymous data sharing. In a few days, however, we will be removing the Benchmarking report from the Google Analytics interface, and replacing it with an expanded report that will be emailed directly to you.In the coming few weeks, we’ll be delivering the new benchmarking report to all account administrators for accounts that are opted-in to anonymous data sharing. The report will expand on the type of data delivered to include broader trends, such as geographic or traffic source differences in visitor engagement. If you are interested in receiving the new benchmarking report, you can opt-in to anonymous data sharing.Sign into your Google Analytics accountSelect the account you [+]

Seven ways to encourage social media contributions.

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On Wednesday March 9th we’ll be holding a live and interactive tutorial all about Ad Extensions in AdWords. Ad Extensions allow you to expand a standard text ad with one or more lines that provide additional information such as an address and phone number, additional page links and product images. While the standard text ad format can often provide enough information for users to find what they’re looking for, including a picture, for example, could make the message more relevant and valuable. Similarly, having a map can help someone find your location more easily. During this live course we’ll discuss the benefits and implementation of Sitelinks as well as Location, Product and Mobile Extensions. This live course will be presented by AdWords Specialists as part of the AdWords Online Classroom (UK) and is appropriate for advertisers who want to make their ads [+]

We’re pleased to announce the launch of AdWords API v201101, which allow you to more efficiently run reports, as well as implement campaign experiments and other recently released advertising features at scale. Through the AdWords API forum and developer events we’ve heard frequent requests for the newly available services. We’ve highlighted some of the new features below. A complete list of changes is available in the v201101 release notes.v201101 highlights:Easily run reports across clients: ReportDefinitionService now supports My Client Center (MCC) cross-client reports, which are fetched asynchronously. The ReportDefinition type has two new fields with which you specify retrieval of a cross-client report, and all report types have new fields for use in cross-client reporting. In addition, the following new reports have been added: Geo Performance, Demographic Performance, Ad Extensions Performance, Destination URL and Creative Conversion. See Report Types [+]

Google's Amit Singhal and Matt Cutts commented on Google's latest ranking algorithm update. Their comments reveal why Google released the update which was named "Panda". [+]

As experts gather to discuss search at SMX West 2011 this week, we took a peek at what Yahoo! users are searching for, and it looks like Spring Break is top of mind.

The anticipation is already brewing as searches for “spring break” on Yahoo! are up 34% this month and searches for “spring break packages” are buzzing. It seems the guys are looking more forward to the break as males make up 70% of searches. Partying is already top of mind for some as searches for “wildest spring break” are off the charts this month on Yahoo!.

Most searches on Yahoo! this month for “spring break” are coming from the metropolitan areas, namely New York, Washington DC, Chicago and Los Angeles. The top states searching this month are Texas, Michigan, and Ohio. It seems that spring breakers turn to the Web for [+]