veezy, Author at marketing champlu

Comparing Yelp Visibility for Explicit vs Implicit Queries After the Recent Google Local Algo Update (aka Pigeon)

July 30, 2014 by veezy

The data, analysis and anecdotal evidence after the recent Google Local Algo update (aka Pigeon) is all over the map (no pun intended). It would appear that the results and changes will vary quite a bit by niche, but here’s a little more kindling to add to the fire…

In this limited set of data, Yelp saw a noticeable increase in visibility for implicitly local queries, and potentially a break-even or slight decline in visibility for explicitly local queries:

Implicit Queries

~30+ implicit queries, location set to Los Angeles, CA

implicit-local-yelp-LA_2014-07-30

~100 implicit queries, location set to Chicago, IL

implicit-local-yelp-Chicago_2014-07-30

Explicit Queries

~100+ explicit queries, location set to Los Angeles, CA

explicit-local-yelp-LA_2014-07-30

~100 explicit queries, location set to Chicago, IL

explicit-local-yelp-Chicago_2014-07-30

Expedia Penalized by Google Around January 14 or 15, 2014

January 20, 2014 by veezy

Looks like Expedia took a slight hit in their organic visibility around January 14/15, 2014 – likely after the recent outing (which I won’t link to).

Weekly organic visibility via SearchMetrics:
expedia organic visibility 2014-01-20

Last 30 days estimated organic traffic via SEMrush:
estimated organic traffic for expedia 2014-01-20

Pages that appear to be most penalized

Keywords that appear to be most penalized

As for specific keywords, it looks like they’ve dropped in rankings for a variety of keywords related to cheap, hotels, flights and cars. Here are some examples: cheap flights, airline tickets, hotels, rental cars, vacation. Here’s a quick look at the most recurring words from SearchMetrics’ top 100 losers last week:
expedia top 100 organic keyword losers

Expedia’s loss is competitors’ gain:

Now that Google is breeding a culture of outing others and opened the door to negative SEO wide open, where will it stop?

Kayak.com +7% visibility
Orbitz.com +6% visibility
Travelocity.com +4% visibility

comparison between expedia, kayak, orbitz, travelocity

Keyword Stuffing + Domain Authority = Success in Bing, Yahoo!

January 19, 2014 by veezy

This made me chuckle: If you do a search on Bing for test you get a keyword-stuffed page on the first page. This is likely unintentional as it looks Bleacher Report was actually doing a test of some sort. Freshness could be playing a role too, but still funny to see, especially since it’s outranking Wikipedia:

Google Testing Branded Knowledge Graph Cards Next to URLs in SERPs

January 19, 2014 by veezy

1/22 Update #2

Google has announced it’s formal launch and provided a feedback form specifically for these knowledge graph cards. From Google software engineer, Bart Niechwiej:

“You’ll see this extra information when a site is widely recognized as notable online, when there is enough information to show or when the content may be handy for you.”

Images in Knowledge Graph aren’t always from Google+

As of now, the little image that appears in the top left of the branded KG card looks for an image from Google+ first. If that’s available, it’s pulling the image from the first image result for that brand or site.

Original article:
This is the first time I’ve seen this, but it looks like G is testing knowledge graph cards next to URLs in the SERPs. They’ve added the brand/site name to the right of the URL and if you click on this it brings up the following:

MTV’s Knowledge Graph SERP Card:

Vevo’s Knowledge Graph SERP Card:

1/22 Update #1

I’ve been seeing a lot more of this today…it looks like they may have expanded the test recently. It also appears that Google doesn’t always show the branded knowledge graph card and therefore may depend on the query and perceived relevance.

For example, a search for [nba] shows a variety of knowledge graph cards in the SERPs, but doesn’t show them for twitter and YouTube:
knowledge graph serp card doesn't show for all

But then a search for [twitter] does show it’s branded SERP card:

More examples

yahoo-knowledge-graph-serp-card

sew-knowledge-graph-serp-card

bankrate-knowledge-graph-serp-card

boa-knowledge-graph-serp-card

google-knowledge-graph-serp-card

Yahoo Providing More Secure Search, Not Providing as Many Keywords

January 15, 2014 by veezy

As expected, say goodbye to a little more keyword data. But this time Yahoo! is making the switch to https. While there has been chatter about Bing providing the https option, Yahoo has made a significant move. Currently, if you go to yahoo.com it will throw you into https land. If you then do a search from yahoo.com, it will send you to https://search.yahoo.com.

However, if you go directly to search.yahoo.com, you’re in an https-free zone (for now), though they ask you to try the “full” Yahoo! experience at the core domain.

This was originally noticed after seeing Yahoo traffic decline by approximately 50% and a subsequent spike in direct traffic. It appears Yahoo! may have started testing the switch earlier but it became very clear around January 11th that they had made a partial switch:

Organic Yahoo! Traffic:

Direct Traffic:

Jan 2014 Direct Traffic