Bing vs. Google for Breaking News Stories

I read an article this morning which made the claim that Bing does not produce results as fresh as Google and therefore favors aged pages or sites at the expense of fresh content. I decided to do a side by side comparison of the two engines to test this out myself, using 3 unrelated breaking news queries and the comparison tool Bingle. The queries I randomly chose were "Sonia Sotomayor", "Air France Crash", and "U.S. Unemployment Rate". Based on this limited scope test, Bing topped Google in freshness, presentation, and blended results, although Google edged out Bing in organic relevancy.



Search Query: "Sonia Sotomayor"



Bing Results:

Bing places the most recent news articles at the top of the search results, with the most recent news article being less than 1 hour old. It includes an image result at the top, to the right of the news results, so that the user can see a picture of Justice Sotomayor. Below the news results are organic web results beginning with Wikipedia then an article from a newspaper which was written on May 27, 2009.

Google Results:

Googlepedia includes its requisite first position Wikipedia listing, which is followed by a .gov link from the Federal Judicial Center that nobody will read, followed by a newspaper article dated May 1, 2009 (26 days older than the first organic newspaper article in Bing) which is provided both a main listing and an indented listing. Only after these four entries does Google provide its fresh news results, with the latest news article being 2 hours old (1 hour older than the freshest Bing news result). No other blended results, including images, are provided.

And the winner is:

Fresh Content: Bing
Blended Results: Bing
Organic Relevancy: Bing
Presentation: Bing

Search Query: "Air France Crash"



Bing Results:

The Bing results are beautiful - just look at them. At the very top the recent news results are provided, along with an image to the left of the results. The most recent news result is 3 hours old. Below the news results it provides 4 news videos, followed by 4 images. The organic web results then begin with a Wikipedia article on Air France Flight 358, which crashed in 2005 and is not the same Air France flight that recently experienced tragedy off of the coast of South America. As this entry is not relevant to what most people who typed this in would be searching for, I'm going to give relevancy to Google on this one (see below).

Google Results:

Google also lists the news results first for this query, the freshest being 1 hour old. However, this does not tell the whole story - as the 1 hour old piece of content is breaking the same news that Bing's 5 hour old news result covers (the discovery of additional bodies). Also, Google news results do not turn up the discovery of the tail section of the airliner, which is the most recent development, although Bing has a result 3 hours old regarding this. Therefore, the advantage here has to go to Bing, for providing not only the freshest content, but for producing breaking news results hours before Google provides them. Google then provides a couple of quality organic web results from CNN and Yahoo News, which is followed by image results and then video results.

And the winner is:

Fresh Content: Bing
Blended Results: Bing
Organic Relevancy: Google
Presentation: Bing

Search Query: "U.S. Unemployment Rate"



Bing:

For this query Bing provided no blended results. The first two organic web listings are .gov sites followed by Wikipedia and various articles, the most recent of which is the VOA News in position 6 dated June 7 (only 2 days ago), but also producing a 4 day old web result from theregister.co.uk.


Google:

Google provided a nice little graph from their Public Data database, which quickly and succinctly answers most questions one would have if entering the designated query, the data is from May 1, 2009. It then provides news results as recent as 3 days old followed by web results which begin with the same bls.gov results Bing produced followed by the same 2 day old VOA article Bing produced. As both Google and Bing produced the same VOA article as the freshest result, followed by the same bls.gov and VOA sites, freshness is a draw. As to relevancy, I'm going to give Google the edge in this one as it surprisingly did not include a Wikipedia entry in the top five results.

And the winner is:

Fresh Content: Tie
Blended Results: Google
Organic Relevancy: Google
Presentation: Google


Overall Results:

Bing: 7
Google: 4
Tie: 1

Results by Category:

Fresh Content: Bing 2, Google 0, Tie 1
Blended Results: Bing 2, Google 1
Organic Relevancy: Bing 1, Google 2
Presentation: Bing 2, Google 1

---

About the Author: Matt Foster is the CEO of ArteWorks SEO, one of the most recognized search engine optimization companies on the web.

Read more!

Search for "Ebay" Reveals Half Naked Woman in News Results

As part of my research for an article about Google site search, I typed in the search query "ebay" this morning. I was quite surprised when the news results on the first page of the SERPs yielded a scantily clad young woman appearing to be using a Wii with the caption "I Really Should Study". This is an actual screen shot of the search results which were provided on the first page of the Google results. Is this press release marketing genius or Google catastrophe? Full article on using shock in search engine marketing.

As this result appeared under the news results, it was clearly optimized for the term "ebay" and distributed as a press release by a vendor hoping to sell a Wii to every family (or at least every father) in the country. What is surprising is that such an image could be attached to a press release without being caught by either the press release distribution agency or the publisher of the press release. While it is a known fact that alluring content sells, this appears to have stepped over the line in terms of search engine marketing for a family friendly term such as "ebay".

It is a questionable practice at best - using shock value to market a product, especially when you are trying to reach a family friendly audience. In this case, it appears to have backfired against the vendor; when I repeated the search five minutes later the listing appeared to be removed from the results - even when clicking on the extended news results. Translation: no traffic. So while for the few minutes this result appeared in the index may have resulted in a higher click through rate than would normally be expected, a more conservative approach taken by the vendor would likely have resulted in more clicks over a longer period of time.

Moral of the story: if using shock value, be sure to think about your target audience. If it is likely to be deemed offensive and inappropriate, the increased buzz surrounding the shock will likely be outweighed by a negative reaction from your consumer base or the search engines.

Read more!

T-Mobile G1 with Google Android Operating System - Product Review

As a loyal customer of T-Mobile, and a daily user of Google, I just couldn't pass up on getting the new T-Mobile G1 with the Google Android operating system. After waiting in line for two hours, I was able to get my hands on one. The verdict? Read on...

After using the T-Mobile MDA with Windows Mobile for the last several years, I was excited to see this new product finally hit the market. I don't ever wait in line for new products - until today. What got me, I guess, was the combination of the touch screen features with a full QWERTY keypad (a necessity for us old schoolers who learned to type on a manual typewriter, and think that T9 is the newest model of Terminator).

Here's how she looks in my hand:

As you can see, she's very sleek and sexy. Everything a phone should be. It comes with one touch Google search, which is very useful if you're a Googlephile like myself. The operating system is very intuitive and easy to use. It took me all of ten minutes to figure everything out about this phone that I could ever want to know. Don't believe the haters - this phone is easy to use if you have half of a brain, and very stylish.

Here she is from the side. A tad bit thicker than an iPhone, but for me it's worth it to have the slide out QWERTY keypad. She's still very thin, maybe not a size 0, but definitely a size 2.

It comes with 3G capability and I have found browsing the internet quick and easy. For $35 a month, you get the 3G service plus unlimited texting. This is the same price as the additional features I had before: unlimited texting (which Lord knows I need) was previously $15 per month, and the slower GPRS service was $20 per month. So this upgrade costs nothing on a monthly basis more than what you have been paying, assuming you like to text and use the Internet.

The phone itself is only $179.00 if you don't mind signing a 2 year contract. I didn't mind. And that is not in the form of a rebate or online only. You walk into the store, pay the $179, sign the paper, and it's yours.

There is no stylus, because no stylus is needed. It uses the same touch screen technology that an iPhone uses - capacitance instead of pressure - so your finger is all you need to navigate the easy to understand menu sets. Here's a video I made of how easy it is to slide menus up, down and around:



The QWERTY keypad is easy to slide out, it actually doesn't slide straight out but rather makes a short rotation on a hinged arm, up and to the left, then back to the right. Check it out (ignore the chihuahua hair that made a temporary home on the G1 during filming):



It was easy to transfer all of my contact information to the new phone, the sims card plugged right in and everything was there waiting for me. Within minutes I was texting, making calls, and surfing the web. It is incredibly intuitive and the Android system is not foreign at all, even to someone like me who is used to Windows Mobile.

Downsides:

There is only one downside to this phone. It comes with a 1 Gig micro-SD card, without which the 3 Megapixel camera will not take pictures. I decided to upgrade to the 4 Gig card, which I bought at the T-Mobile store for an additional $59. The problem, however, is that the phone doesn't recognize the 4 Gig card, and I can't figure out if it needs to be formatted (and if it does, how to do so), or what the problem is. However, when I put the included 1 Gig card back in and removed the 4 Gig card, everything works fine. So I am going to have to go back to the T-Mobile store and see if they can shine some light on the subject.

The only other potential drawback for some people is that you do have to set up a GMail account if you don't already have one. This is a requirement for the phone to work. I already have one, so no problem there. Although I can see the conspiracy theorists up in arms about this.

Except for those two minor issues, I love it! I would highly recommend the phone if you are a T-Mobile customer considering an upgrade. Happy Googling!

Read more!

Debunking SEO Mythology

In Greek mythology, the Hydra was a creature who could not be defeated, as each time one of its heads was cut off, two more would sprout back in its place. It seems that SEO mythology is no different; every time one SEO myth is debunked, two more SEO myths crop back up in its place, only adding to the confusion about search engine optimization.
Hercules was able to defeat the Hydra by cutting off its heads and then burning the stumps before new heads could grow back. What SEO needs is a hero, an SEO Hercules, to come and save us from the Hydra of SEO Mythology. Let’s go through some of the more pervasive SEO myths and see if we can put a torch to them.

Myth: All I need to do is figure out the magic bullet, and I will be at the top of the search engines.

Fact: Search engines use over 200 factors to rank sites. No one factor will get you to the top. To get to the top, you must have a balanced search engine strategy encompassing many factors, both on page and off page. There is no magic bullet.

Myth: Search rankings are about link popularity. Get as many links as you can. Join web rings, “free for all” (FFA) link exchanges, and get as many sites as you can to link to you through reciprocal linking back to them.

Fact: While link popularity is important if done correctly, Google is placing links under increasing scrutiny, and sheer volumes of inbound linking without regard to the source of the link and other factors hasn’t worked in years. It is not the raw number of links that matter, but the type of links. Links from trusted sites, relevant to your industry, with proper anchor text and relevant surrounding text and page content, to original content on your site are the ones that will help you. FFA linking will most likely get you in trouble with the engines as they could interpret that as an attempt to spam the results. In addition to bleeding away all of your page rank to other sites, FFA linking will increase your chances of linking to a “bad neighborhood”, another thing which can get you into trouble. Never link to sites you do not know or with which you are not familiar. Remember, Google is smarter than you, you can’t fool them with unnatural linking schemes.

Myth: It’s all about “keyword density”. Be sure to repeat your keyword numerous times on your web site. Keyword repetition increases keyword density and inflates your search engine ranking.

Fact: Structuring your page around some magic formula for keyphrase density does nothing for you. Yes, your target keyphrases should be included at least once on the page, as well as in your title and meta description elements, and in an H1 or H2 tag if possible. Other than that, forget about keyphrase density. Create your web content for human readers and write it so it makes sense to them. Whatever you do, avoid keyphrase repetition, a known spamming technique sure to get you into trouble.

Myth: Repeated submissions to the search engines increase your rankings. It is a good idea to sign up for an automated submission service, which will regularly resubmit your site to 1,000 or more search engines each week.

Fact: Automated submissions are a violation of major search engines Terms of Inclusion and can get you into trouble. Search engines don’t need you to submit to them, set up a blog and get a few links to your site, and they will find you very quickly. Using blogger.com, which is owned by Google, usually can get a new site indexed within a week. Just be sure to put a link on the blog to your site.

Myth: The meta keywords tag must include your target keywords. Search engines place heavy weight on this tag and use it to determine which keywords for which to rank your site.

Fact: Search engines that matter, such as Google, place zero weight on the keywords meta element due to historical spam. Yahoo appears to give it some small weight. In any event, use of the keyword meta element is of so little use, many SEO’s ignore it altogether.

Myth: Because links are so important to search rankings, I should go out and purchase a large number of paid links and submit to hundreds or thousands of directories in order to get more links to my site.

Fact: Google especially has cracked down hard on paid links in the last few months. To put it succinctly, they don’t pass page rank. If you want to buy a link from a site, only do it if you believe the link itself will be a good source of traffic (in other words, only do it for legitimate advertising purposes). Do not do it if your purpose is for that link to transfer page rank or increase your ranking, as it likely will not. Additionally, hundreds of useless directories have been harshly penalized as well, so that links from within them are either not counted at all or given very little weight. Get links from a few well respected directories such as dmoz.org, Yahoo directory, Business.com, JoeAnt, and others which have a manual review process. Automated submission services which submit to hundreds of directories are a waste of money.

Myth: I should write articles and submit them to article directories, because links from article directories have high page rank and are given great weight by the engines.

Fact: Article directory links in and of themselves carry little to no weight. The engines are smart and know that people spam these directories with useless content just to get a link. If you want to get relevant, trusted links to your site that actually mean something, create useful, informative, or educational content that people will want to link to. Articles are one form of such content, but only if they are good enough to get picked up by other sites. Other content which can serve as link bait is video content, tools and widgets, product reviews, top 10 lists, and interesting or entertaining blogs.

About the Author:
Matt Foster is the CEO of ArteWorks SEO, a leading search engine optimization company. For more information on search engine optimization including a series of educational videos, please visit www.arteworks.biz.

Read more!

Paid Link Pain of Google's Iron Fist

Google has come down hard on paid links. Don't believe me? Just ask sites like washingtonpost.com, forbes.com, and many other high profile sites that have just had their page rank reduced by two to four points. Are you still considering hiring that SEO firm that offers "paid text links" or "paid ad buys" as part of their strategy? I hope not.

Google staff began talking about an upcoming shakedown on paid links several months ago. One of the reasons for the shakedown is that paid links are not true, natural links, and therefore shouldn't qualify as "voting" links for the purpose of transferring PageRank. Google prefers to have sites naturally linking to each other, as natural linking is the more reliable way to ascertain the relative importance of a site. In the past, Google has come down on FFA or "free for all" linking schemes, link exchange schemes, link farms, and appears to discount reciprocal linking (link trades or link swaps). Now their target is paid links.

Google is not against paid links per se. Conspiracy theorists aside (who believe Google is trying to end all advertising on the Internet except through their own AdWords service), Google is not stupid and they know that there are legitimate advertising reasons for purchasing links from quality sites that would be good sources of qualified traffic to your site. However, the problem is that people were (and still are) purchasing paid links not for advertising or traffic purposes, but rather to artificially inflate their link popularity.

Google came out this summer and said that all paid links should be identified as such or risk a penalty. Specifically, it has been suggested that paid links should utilize the nofollow attribute, which is an attribute in the linking code of a site which tells Google the link is not intended to transfer PageRank. Use of this attribute clearly identifies the link as "non-voting", and solves the problem.
However, many sites ignored Google's warning. Then, in the fourth week of October of 2007, Google slammed down its iron fist. Some very high profile sites, including many in the search engine optimization industry, were hit hard through reductions in PageRank of several points. These were sites such as washingtonpost.com, forbes.com, searchengineguide.com, suntimes.com, and seoroundtable.com. Additionally, many high profile blog sites were hit. The one thing that all of these sites have in common is that they sold text link ads, and did not employ the nofollow attribute.

This served a dual purpose - it served as disincentive for the site owners to continue selling paid links absent a nofollow attribute, as well as a disincentive for link buyers to buy links from these now low PageRank sites.

Rumors in the SEO industry are that the buyers of these paid links could be the next to be hit. So buyer beware. If you are shopping for SEO, avoid any firm or strategy which offers a "paid link buy", "text ad purchase", or anything similar. You do this for a few reasons: first, the links will likely be worth nothing (for SEO purposes), either through use of a nofollow attribute or low PageRank.

Additionally, you could be putting yourself at risk as the link buyer. Finally, any SEO firm offering this service obviously does not know anything about SEO, and as such any of their purported search engine optimization services are suspect.

How can you protect yourself? If you are a seller of links, use the nofollow attribute. If you are a buyer of links, don't do it for SEO purposes, or you will be sorely disappointed. If buying a link makes sense for your business (i.e. the link will be a good source of qualified traffic), then do it. If you expect it to improve your positioning in the engines, however, you are misguided in your efforts.

About the Author: Matt Foster is the President of ArteWorks SEO, a top 3 search engine optimization company in the world. For more information, please visit www.arteworks.com.

Read more!