Alexander Calder logo for Pi day

Me being in the uk is Pi day for me. I know its not for you guys out in the USA because you write dates the wrong way  around but today is Pi day here!

So what have google done, well nothing bar a very cool Alexander Calder logo/doodle..

Its Alexander Calder Birthday, well 113th famed artist for making sculptures with the mobile being the most famous.

So what my loose link to pi? well You can rotate the logo.. how cool is that.

 

How to rotate the Alexander Calder sculpture logo ?

Look out for the move cross arrows shown below and use the left button to rotate the 3 sections of the sculpture.

Posted in google, google logos | 11 Comments

google+1 blackout 5th and 6th July 2011

I’ve been watching the new google +1 metrics in google webmaster tools as added the button to one of my sites to test and see what the pros and cons are.

The button has had 20 +1 which isn’t to bad… Its not loads but hey it’s a new thing and the site in question goes out to the general public and not a  load of SEO’s or social media types 😉

As you can see on the 5th of July google dropped a load of the +1’s and on the 6th had a total blackout of +1’s

The funny thing is at last I’ve got data the the impact page for the 6th of July..

Ah well I’m sure the data will return soon..

Posted in google+1 | 16 Comments

Missing Unique Product Identifiers Effects on google shopping

I love being an seo and I do love how different all my clients are…

One client hasn’t yet given me the go ahead to fix the Missing Unique Product Identifiers for the google merchant feed after months of suggesting it.

Now what’s good about this (not for the client) is I can see the difference and effect of the Missing Unique Product Identifiers on traffic from google shopping.

Below is the graph which is showing a drop in half the referrals from google shopping.

The number of items hasn’t changed nor anything else so what has changed is that the competitors have added Missing Unique Product Identifiers to all/most items which now out rank this account.

We will be gradually enforcing this policy over the next few weeks, with full enforcement in effect on June 20th. During this time, products that do not have correct unique identifiers may not appear in our product listings. If you have products that do not have correct unique identifiers, we recommend that you make the necessary changes as soon as possible.

Please note that in the weeks after June 20th, we will begin disapproving the feeds of merchants who have a significant percentage of items that do not include the correct unique identifiers.

From http://googlemerchantblog.blogspot.com/2011/05/enforcement-of-our-unique-identifier_03.html

And here is the effect:

Note the Error type and that Missing Unique Product Identifiers is at 90% so will this feed be disapproved?

I’ve spent many hours since the announcement in May working with many clients feeds to fix this issue and all other have been affected positively.

Best of luck to those who aren’t updating 😉

Posted in google, Google analytics, Google base, google tips | 14 Comments

Follow up on missing from twitter search impacts

On the 8th June (this month) some 13days ago I posted about Missing from twitter search and the potential impacts.

I now have more data which proves my post so you can really see the difference being in and out makes.

Here is the graph up to the point of being removed in which you can clearly see the decline in followers and then a Plateau of basically no or little movement.

Now take a look at the new trend lines almost 2 weeks after being added back in the search and its syndications.

You can clearly see the grow is the same from before and after and as it one of me accounts I know that no promotion has gone on with this account like newsletters, press or the alike so its a pure followers difference between being in search and not.

For how I got back in and the check list please see the post Missing from twitter search

Posted in internet trends, twitter | 6 Comments

Search by image Search Google with an image instead of text.

I’ve just spotted this when searching for no other than a “ray gun” of course 🙂

So brand new feature for me…

google now allows you to search with an image. You have a choice of uploading OR a url..

google will match the image and suggest its “best guess” along with “visually similar images” and “pages that include matching images”

It’s cool idea and of course you can see a simple way it will be used with products and mobile phones…

Here are the screen shots:

See the camera above..

When clicked on you see the following:

I then pasted the url of the google logo to see what came up, see below:

[click image to enlarge]

Posted in google, Google images, google UI tests | 8 Comments

Missing from twitter search – the impacts

On the 8th April 2011 one of my twitter accounts got flagged and removed from twitter search and of course stopped feeding google.

I had a pretty good idea about what had flagged it but twitter do not disclose the reason which is fair enough to stop spammers..

In my case I “think” is was due to the tweets being spiky as in many one minute and not so many for 1hr in other words flooding people timelines..

The diagram below taken from tweetcounter shows the point in which the tweets stopped showing in search, #tags and on google. The numbers on tweetcounter are off but you can clearly see a loss of followers the day after the search block and a continued drop off.

The green lines below show the potential growth / loss of followers in this case it was 1,000’s

How to get back in to twitter search?

Firstly I’m assuming your not a spammer…

If it’s a auto block and you have just noticed it then I’d wait a fews days as from all my readings on the subject its likely to be temporary.

If it’s not temporary you need to work out what has changed. Check www.twittercounter.com and see the loss and date on the graphs. Once you know the date have a look at your timeline or what you have changed in your tweeting habits.

Are you tweeting to much per min / hr / day?

Have you followed/unfollowed to many people?

Are you only tweeting links to one site?

From twitter itself:

Repeatedly posting duplicate or near-duplicate content (links or tweets)
Abusing trending topics or hashtags (topic words with a # sign)
Sending automated tweets or replies
Using bots or applications to post similar messages based on keywords
Posting similar messages over multiple accounts
Aggressively following and un-following people

Checkout twitter advice here:
http://support.twitter.com/entries/42646

Once you have fixed your account you need to submit a support ticket here https://support.twitter.com/forms/general explian why you think you have been removed from twitter search and how you have changed your tweets to be inline(more inline) with twitter advice.

Automatic tweets may be flagged but many accounts use them like bbc and other news outlets and blogs. I’ve checked loads of auto tweet accounts that only link to one site and haven’t been flagged.

I hope that helps.

Posted in twitter | 11 Comments

Google bug for blocked URLs

I run a large forum and had a “Defamation Complaint: UK” as a member had posted about how they felt they had been scammed.

I’m not going to quote as don’t want to url removed for the search results but here is the gist..

Said member had paid for an ad in a publication which was sold with a mediapack explaining the circulation which seemed off the scale for the location of this publication.. For the member it was to late when he/she had worked it out and tried to stop the ad and not pay.. The publication sent threats for late payment..

The member then wanted to warm other members of my forum and did so by posting a thread.. The thread got a lot of traction as other members including me had been approached by this hard selling publication. All members who’d turned down the offer did for the same reason as me, I couldn’t see who would read this mag and at the prices it was just crazy!

On chillingeffects I’m 1 on 100’s of sites outing said publication.

Anyway.. To the point…

Yes google removed the content from google.co.uk which is fine and I’m not going to fight it..

BUT.. (point of the post)

I constantly get emails from google webmaster tools warming me about the removal of 1 URL..

The URL is non public now and I’ve even used the URL removal to manually remove the url BUT I still get emails. If it was monthly reports etc that would be fine but its not..

Here is the screen shot from webmaster tools:

As you can see the dates are a little crazy for 1 url being block..

Here is the gmail screen shot for the emails I get:

As you can see if you know gmail the “show quoted text” as this email is a duplication .. All 4 email are identical.

I’ve read in forum that this is common.

I hope google will fix it..

Posted in google, google sitemaps / webmaster tools | 14 Comments

Google celebrate 76th Birthday of Roger Hargreaves Author of Mr men

Today google are celebrating the birthday of one of the most famous authors in the world.

Roger Hargreaves is the creator, author and illustrator of children’s books Mr Men and Little miss.

Like me you probably grow up with the Mr Men book.. I have a lot of respect for Roger Hargreaves for such a simple but great idea.

google have 16 images that rotate on refresh show below:

Image1 Little Miss Chatter box:

Image 2 Little Miss Curious:

Image 3 Little Miss Magic (seems to of lost some weight – that’s magic):

Image 4 not sure about these ??? :

Image 5 a party of Mr men and little miss:

Image 6 everyone know this one.. Little Miss Sunshine:

Image 7 not sure about this either :

Image 8 another easy one Mr Bump:

Image 9 not sure??:

Image 10 Mr forgetful:

Image 11 A thinnish Mr Funny:

Image 12 Of course who else but Mr Happy:

Image 13 Mr Jelly (very cool dude):

Image 14 Mr Rush:

Image 15 Mr Slow:

Image 16 Mr Tickle:

I’ve missed a few so please feel free to comment below any additions and corrections.

Last but not least a massive 76th happy birthday to Roger Hargreaves

Posted in Misc | 5 Comments

Google shopping now in many countries

Google today have launch it’s famous shopping engine to many countries around the world.

Before today 3 May 2011 google shopping feed only would work in the UK , Germany and USA.

This is a massive change and I’m not sure why it wasn’t done before?? Legal issues maybe ??

Anyway .. Google now allow feeds for:

  • Australia
  • China
  • France
  • Germany
  • Italy
  • Japan
  • Netherlands
  • Spain
  • United Kingdom
  • United States

Here is a screen shop of google merchant centre:

Posted in google, Google base | 11 Comments

Google Adwords UK support phone number

I was just searching on good old google.co.uk and came across this ad for adwords:

My first thought was it some seo company pretending to be google slipping under the URL radar and redirecting to some crappy site..

But no it is google UK!!! Google are now giving “support” to adwords users via phone..

Yes you can say google have always given adwords support in google forums and if you phone google you might be lucky to get hold of someone who can help with a problem OR of course you have large enough accounts (spend) to get an account manager.

But…

This is different.. I clicked on the ad and ended up here: http://www.google.co.uk/intl/en/adwords/jumpstart/09Q3-new.html#sourceid=awo&subid=uk-en-ha-aw_bk&medium=ha&term=search%20engine%20optimization

You can also open an account here http://www.google.co.uk/intl/en/landing/phone-signup/flow1.html

So if you are looking for help then UK google adwords phone number is 0844 338 0343

What interesting is all the “contact us” links in the nav still go to the old adword help page that asks question and suggest you use the forum OR email them…

Posted in google, Google Adwords | 8 Comments