What About Bing?

I'll save you from all the cheesy post titles out there like, "Bada Bing", "It don't mean a thing if you ain't got that Bing..." and so on. There is a lot of hype, including commercials, about how Microsoft's new search engine Bing can help cut through the search clutter to help us make better decisions. While I do like the enhanced image search I still feel like the search engine has not done enough to pull me from the grasp of Google. The universal search features are impressive and I do enjoy the image of the day.

What will become of Bing?

Microsoft has come a long way from their early days of search. Yahoo's #2 status in the search engine space may be in trouble with the release of Bing. Yahoo's role as a web portal may be enough for them to hold off Bing for a while, but that value is slowly decreasing over time.

What Google has to offer over Bing are all the value added web based programs, such as Google Docs. These services are the difference maker for many search engine users. I use search engines to do research, but spend more time using Gmail and Google Docs. Until Bing offers some truly unique web based services, I will still be "Googling" and not "Binging".

SEO Tech Blog

A colleague of mine, Craig Geis, at Rosetta writes a good technical SEO blog for keeping your website search engine friendly. He provides some great insight into what search engine spiders see when they crawl your website and how to fix errors that could prevent Google, Yahoo and others from accessing your sites content. He also has some good thoughts on usability, web analytics and general search marketing. Check out his blog for some helpful tips!

SearchWiki: Search Engine Paradigm Shift

After my initial knee jerk reaction to Google SearchWiki, I have had some time to digest the change to user assisted search results. It appears as though this may be a signal from the world's most popular search engine that a major change is afoot. SearchWiki provides proof there is major change in the way we interact with the web, a search engine paradigm shift.

Could Google's attempt at a SearchWiki be a realization of the limits to an open search engine? Will search results in the future become more like results you see on social media sites like Digg.com where users vote on the best article? Will it force companies to focus more on brand building and user experience?

Most social media sites tend to fit a niche community and produce niche results for that community. It could be a huge gamble by Google to try to be all things to all people, not staying focused and damaging their brand. Personally, I would have rather seen Google spin off a version of their index with new experimental features rather than make it part of their general results.

Why SEO Tools and Plugins Rock

A few posts back I mentioned an SEO tool called Website Grader. This tool allows you to grade your website on a scale from 1-100, with 100 being the best SEO score. There has been a lot of talk about "cloud computing" and the like in the last couple years. Looking beyond the hype, cloud computing is really all about using collective knowledge to solve problems efficiently. Plugins, predefined web reports and tools help teams gain valuable knowledge. This process would otherwise take teams hours of trial and error to gather on their own. I'm very big web based helpers, they create efficiencies and gather collective knowledge from "the cloud".

What's your search engine rank eh'?

Rather than making the click across the border into Google Canada, or calling up your buddy in the UK to find out where your site ranks across the pond, you can switch search sites within the same search results using a handy Firefox global extension. I find it very useful when tracking sites or doing link research for any international search market. This tool works great with SEO for Firefox as well.

Google Chrome's Coolest New Features

After having almost a full 24 hours to review the new Google Chrome browser, I've come up with a handful of what I think are the coolest new features. Enjoy!

Find in Page Search - Allows you to find specific key phrases within the body of a web page.

Application Shortcuts - Adds shortcut icons to your desktop or start menu.

Bookmark Popup - Quick popup for adding bookmarks of your favorite sites.

Report a Bug - Allows you to report broken sites or "spam sites" to Google.



Incognito Browser Pages - Allow you to search the web freely without Google Chrome backing up your search history / activity for reference.




A Word on Toolbars

One feature I thought was great is the simplified tool bar that comes with Chrome. I've provided a side by side comparison to Microsoft's IE 8 tool bar and Google Chrome's tool bar as an example.

Google Chrome




Internet Explorer 8 beta

Powerset Semantic Search

Powerset recently released a "natural language" search engine for Wikipedia. The goal of Powerset's technology is to make search more intelligent. Over the next few weeks, I will be testing out this new technology just to see how accurate the results appear compared to other search technologies.

SEO Benefits of Blogs - EvanCarmichael.com

Posted an article recently at EvanCarmichael.com on the benefits of blogging as it applies to Search Engine Optimization. This article provides a high-level summary of blogging, how to get started and how to leverage blogs to gain search engine visibility.

I'm a new author to EvanCarmichael.com and hope to post more articles here in the future. The site is a great resource for small to medium size business owners looking for advice directly from industry professionals.

Powerset aims to make search results more powerful...

Powerset is a search engine currently under development and due to launch some time in September.

The goal of this search engine technology is to make search "more natural and intuitive... Powerset is fundamentally changing how we search the web, and delivering higher quality results" claims Powerset.com's web site.

It will be interesting to see how different Powerset's approach to search results differ from those on Yahoo and Google. Sure, there are plenty of issues with the major engine results, but what will make Powerset's technology far superior to the status quo?

For many Google users the value is in more than just search. (features such as gmail, maps, analytics, etc.) The search portal is the gateway to a world of services that help build a relationship and build trust. Are web surfers satisfied with "good enough" in Google and Yahoo, or will they demand something more advanced?

Read more about Powerset on their blog:

http://blog.powerset.com