This year marks Google’s 11th annual look back at the searches that compose the year’s Zeitgeist—the spirit of the time. With Zeitgeist, Google look at both the popular and the  fastest rising terms around the world.

If you want to get your geek on and compare terms across categories, countries or just throw yourself into data, go to Google’s 2011 Zeitgeist site.

The video below shows what captivated people this year:

What got me most were the poigniant images that Google used throughout this video, they certainly gave my heart strings a good old tug. The two sections that tipped me over the edge were images of 9/11 anniversary and images of the troops (arriving home, being remembered and a father’s grief).

On that note, a very special shout out to all the men and women serving over this Christmas and New Years. Thank you for all you do.

If you would to leave a message for our troops you can via the Defence Department (Messages to the Troops) or Telstra’s Messages of Support (which was started on Anzac day and is still going strong).

Good old Google, always trying to simplify things, and in the process, confusing all the people who knew the old way. This is definitely the case for the Search Query Report, or what’s now just “See Search Terms”. In the days of old, you’d have to go into the Reporting section of Google AdWords and choose to run the Search Query Report, or “SQR” as the cool kids would call it. In October of 2010, Google made it easier. And it actually is easier! A lot easier! Some people still reminisce about the days of old and call it the SQR, but it’s been over a year now, so say it with me now, “I see search terms!”

Why use the “See Search Terms” report?

If you have an AdWords account, it’s not that you should use this report, you have to use this report. When you have any keywords in your account on either phrase or broad match (which you really should have), you need a See Search Terms to see what the real queries are that are bringing people to your site. If you have “monster truck” on phrase match, you might get people searching “buy monster truck”, “monster truck rally”, and “monster truck porn” (c’mon, it’s the Internet, don’t act so surprised). Now that you have a list of the actual queries, you can go in and add the terms that you want on exact match and be sure to add negatives so that you stop getting the searches that you don’t want.

How often should you use it?

See Search Terms is your friend. Use it early and use it often. Use it for a specific ad group, use it for a whole campaign, use it as much as you can use it and then use it some more. OK, so running it daily probably won’t show you anything new, but run it frequently and see how often you see new queries coming through. In some industries, it might be monthly. In others, maybe quarterly is OK. Make sure that you’re running it often enough that you feel comfortable that you’re not missing anything.

How do you access it?

You can access this report any time you’re looking at keywords within the AdWords interface. So you can look at any date range, any campaign, any ad group, etc. When you’re in the Keywords tab, you’ll see a small grey button that says “See Search Terms”. It’s located in the middle, right under the graph.

Click on it and you can just look at the keywords selected or at all of the keywords in that view. Then, you can sort by impressions, clicks, conversions, all the usual metrics. Sometimes it will say, “Not enough data to display particular queries”. If that happens, you’ll need to expand your date range or the keyword set you’re looking at.

Happy Reporting!

Thanksgiving is probably the best American holiday there is. I’ve never had a bad Thanksgiving.

Even that time where my brother’s girlfriend added water chestnuts to the stuffing (the best Thanksgiving food, hands down), it wasn’t bad. And the time where I was vegetarian and alone in a new country wandering around looking for football to watch, finally finding it in a casino with a smattering of homeless people napping; it still wasn’t bad. Because it was Thanksgiving. And on that day more than any other in the whole year, you’re forced to think about how good you have it (even if you don’t), and say thanks for all the good stuff. And when you’re thinking about the good stuff, and when you’re stuffing your face with wayyy too much food, it really can’t be bad.

Aussie Thanksgiving

So, this Thanksgiving, I’ll share a list of search-related things that I’m thankful for. Feel free to add one of your own!

• Google Remarketing- it makes using the Google Content Network so much easier, you can target people who have actually been to your site so are already qualified as the kind of user you want to be in front of.
• Google Site Links- it’s great to be able to send people to different pages depending on what they’re interested in. Site links are cheap and effective.
• Yahoo RAIS- this is a new ad type from Yahoo, and I’ve got to admit it’s pretty cool. Getting a video as your ad in addition to the text is a new way for customers to interact with your brand.
• Microsoft Excel- OK, so it’s not totally search-related, but it’s tough for me to imagine being able to do my job without it.
• Click-Path Analysis- finding links between SEO & SEM is a lot easier when we can see full paths that customers are taking and being able to optimise based on first click, last click, and equal attribution models equates to more sales for our customers.
• ClickTale.com- these guys allow you to watch where users are going on your site and see how they interact with your pages. When you pay a bit more for a subscription (it’s still quite cheap), you get lots of heat maps and other added value goodies.
• USAFoods.com.au- OK, these don’t have anything to do with the search industry, but I searched for them to find them, and I was overwhelmed with awesomeness. My pumpkin pie and green bean casserole are all thanks to you!

American or not, it’s always good to take some time out to think about the good stuff. Thanks for reading this blog!

Welcome back, friends! Today’s edition of Google’s Not So Scary will go back to creating your Google AdWords campaigns, and specifically, what to do when your ad doesn’t come up how you thought it was going to.

So, you’ve made your brand new Google AdWords ad. You’ve drafted a beautiful headline, your description line 1 is eloquent and sends the perfect message, and your description line 2 just knocks it out of the park. This ad is pure bliss. Customers will come in droves. You set it live.

And then, ummm, it doesn’t look like you thought it was going to. What happened? Well, how the hell would I know?!

Hehe, I’ll try to help. It’s probably one of two things: you made a mistake, or Google’s testing something.

You Can Fix It!

First, it’s possible that you made a mistake. OK, maybe not a full-on the-world-is-gonna-end mistake, but there’s something you can do. If you’re seeing an ad come up for a keyword that you don’t think it should come up for, check your campaign. Is there any broad match in there? If so, do you have phrase and exact match negatives so that your campaigns aren’t competing against each other? Let’s say you have broad match for “Minnesota Vikings” in Campaign #1 and exact match for “Minnesota Vikings” in Campaign #2. When someone types in “Minnesota Vikings”, your ads will compete against each other. Maybe one of the ads in Campaign #1 has a really high click-through rate. It can beat your exact match and be shown, unless you have it as an exact match negative in Campaign #1.

Adding negatives to your campaigns, especially when you have broad match terms, is vital to making sure that the ad you want comes up when you want it to. There’s enough competition out there, don’t add to it by competing with yourself.

Gratuitous cute puppy pic, I realise that this is irrelevant within the context. But c’mon!

You Can’t Fix It

On the other hand, this ad coming up all wonky could have nothing to do with you at all, and could just be our good friends at Google testing something.

Google tests lots of stuff, like, all the time. They’re always tweaking and changing things; and they hardly ever make a big announcement about the change. So one day, you might see your ads do something funny, like have the URL move up to the top line with the headline. You shouldn’t be alarmed. Google’s just having some fun and seeing if your brand will draw in more clicks than your ad copy can. There’s nothing you can do to opt out, so just roll with it. The good news is that the same thing is happening to all of your competition, too. And there’s always something you can do, even if you can’t exactly fix it.

Tests in Ad Layout

• The URL of your site appears on the top of your ad, right after your headline
• Your first description line appears on top, along with your headline
• Your 2 description lines appear together

Here’s what to do: Take a look at your ads in lots of different formats to make sure that the punctuation makes sense. Sometimes the end of one line and the beginning of the next (without punctuation to separate) can have a very different meaning than what you had intended.

Site Links

• Site links are appearing in a different order
• The site link you want to show isn’t showing

Here’s what to do: Google is going to rotate your site links. If you want to make sure that 1 or 2 of them will always show, the best thing to do is delete the others. Once you’ve built up some history of good click-thru-rates with the ones you want, you can add some new ones in for testing.

Other

• Places, products, videos, and all kinds of stuff showing up for your competitors!

Here’s what to do: Talk to Google! If you see something new that you want to be a part of, go to your Google rep (or your agency) and tell them you want in! Most new things that Google does start out in beta tests, which means you have to ask or be asked to participate. If you see something and you want it, ask for it!

The other week I summarised the People edition of Google’s Think Quarterly. Whilst doing this, I realised we missed summarising their Q3 edition. So here it is!

It was all about Innovation for Google’s previous edition of Think Quarterly.

Introduction

In 2003, a total of five exabytes of data existed. Now we generate that every two days. We are, literally, more creative than ever.

Where to begin? Right here. We’ve curated big ideas from heads of industry, leading experts and our homegrown visionaries — all to help guide your own thinking. In our inaugural US issue, we focus on Innovation. Where can you break molds and shape the future? We hope this gives you inspiration, insight, and some new ideas of your own.

The Eight Pillars of Innovation

As Google’s employee #16, Susan Wojcicki has learned a thing or two about innovation. This article covers off what she’s learned, what she continues to work on and how to stay creative.

Insights with Sir Martin Sorrell

WPP Chief Executive Sir Martin Sorrell talks innovation in a time of anarchy, and why he can’t work in a garage

Route to 2015

Google’s Senior Vice President of Americas Sales peers into the future of advertising.

“You could be dull in another era.

Not in this one”

The Science Fiction Behind Search

Exploring the innovations that are making Star Trek dreams come true – Amit Singhal dives into where Search is going. His article breaks looks at Search beyond just text and language.

“Your Google is different to my Google, which is different…”

Sci-Fi That Foretold The Future

They seemed far-fetched on screen, but these movie moments fast became non-fiction. Allison Mooney looks at 6 key moments covering movies from iRobot to Harry Potter.

Practical Magic

Russell Davies may be Head of Planning at Ogilvy & Mather, but in this idiosyncratic guide to the Internet of Things, he argues that the innovation driving it springs from ‘mucking about’ rather than thinking hard. Russell’s article starts with artificial intelligence and moves to pill bottles which glow, beep and eventually call you if you forget to take them (yes these are real – check them out here – GlowCaps)

Quantify – Innovation

More ammo for your next cocktail party! 10 more facts & figures for innovation in 2011. Two facts that stood out for me:

Source: rww

Source: Marissa Mayer @ DDL

Next Gen Innovators

Meet five thought leaders whose world has been fundamentally shaped by the digital revolution. Wired, ambitious and truly global, they are breaking down old barriers and reshaping the worlds of business, media, art and activism with their passion and creative innovation.

Matt Bochenski & Andrea Kurland speak to Roman Beranek from Projektil, Dennis Crowley from Foursquare, Sara Öhrvall from Bonnier R&D, Bright Simons from Mpedigree and Esra’a Al Shafei a Digital activist.

Missions that Matter

From Haiti to Hyderabad, Googlers are innovating with good reason. This articles covers off the Person Finder that was developed after Japan’s devastating earthquakes & Tsunami, the Speak2Tweet initiative developed when internet was blacked out in Egypt and DotOrg Google’s philanthropic program.

Favorite Innovations

Industry leaders share the innovations they’re most excited about – short snappy article which has range of innovations including cancer vaccines and ‘phones that don’t suck’ .

The Knowledge

Hannah Jones, VP of Sustainable Business and Innovation at Nike, picks  her top 10 people, products, trends and ideas that embody the meaning of disruptive innovation.

Time for Change with Peter Sachse

Peter Sachse, CMO of Macy’s and CEO of macys.com, explains how the retail giant is developing a profile of Customer 2.0 while preparing to tame the mobile frontier.

“The ultimate holy grail is real-time location-based marketing that is relevant and personal.”

The Pursuit of APIness

From dogfood to transit data, APIs are considered an online marketer’s new best friend. APIs let third-party developers tap into the functionality of an existing web service, and so give everyone the ability to build upon the web’s good ideas. Allison Mooney walks us through the benefits of APIs as well as 5  projects built on open APIs.

Room to Think

Innovation consultant Kursty Groves offers a practical guide to transforming your office space into a place that wears its heart on the wall.

Innovation Spaces

Building on the article above, Innovation Spaces see three creative companies: Mother (London), Terreform One (NY, USA) and Davison International (PA, USA) share their workplace innovation secrets.

Transgressive Man

Prophet, futurist, or catalyst of chaos? Ray Kurzweil believes that innovations in biogenetics and nanotechnology are creating a new future for humanity, but could they just as easily destroy us all?

Final Thoughts

What I liked about this edition was the breadth of articles Google included. This was the Innovation edition and as I read through all the articles, I was certainly inspired. Creative thoughts started sparking and I felt the need to grab my notebook to document them (yes, I am old-school, sometimes nothing beats paper & pen to scribble your thoughts down furiously while trying to keep up as your brain sprints away).

Grab yourself a cuppa or a coffee and check it out – you never know what it might spark in you!

A perk of working at Outrider is that we get to visit the cool Google head office in Pyrmont for various educational and networking events. Conveniently, their offices are located directly across the road from the Star City Casino! This week, myself and a colleague had the pleasure of attending the casino… I mean, Google’s head office, for an event aimed at assisting advertisers in increasing the effectiveness of their ads.

The hosts for the day consisted of Google’s senior management team: Nick Leeder, Managing Director Google Australia & NZ and Aliza Knox, Director of Sales & Operations APAC. Speakers for the day were keynote Mel Silva, Google Industry Lead, talking about “The Perfect Ad for Everyone” and Brendan Forster, Google Product Specialist, who went through some of the “New Innovations in Search”.

The Perfect Ad for Everyone

Mel Silva believes that there are four elements that make a perfect ad:

• Personal – Ads that connect to your audience on a personal basis have increased effectiveness. A case study used for this was the “Hunter Shoots a Bear” TippEx Youtube video, which allowed the audience to personalise the ad by telling the hunter what to do. TippEx saw sales in Europe increase by 30% as a result of this personal ad.
• Social – Ads that make the audience feel they are “part of something” are more effective in engaging customers. To demonstrate this case, Mel used the example of MINI’s CountryMan Competition. This social campaign utilised smartphones with built-in GPS to allow players to home in on a virtual MINI on their iPhone, catch it and then run as fast as they could out of its orbit to prevent other potential takers from swiping it. The player with the virtual mini at the end of the campaign won a real MINI car. In a week of this being live, MINI had 11,000 participants and massive brand exposure due to following of the competition which literally “stopped traffic” in areas where the virtual car visited.



• Relevant – The more relevant an ad is to a user, the better the reaction. Mel used Travelocity’s customised retargeting ads to demonstrate the impact of increasing relevancy of ads. Last year, the travel site changed their online display ad strategy and ditched generic messages like “Find low fares on Travelocity. Book now.” Instead, Travelocity display ads incorporated new remarketing technology to serve custom ads based searches done on the Travelocity website. For example, a customer interested in flights from Chicago to Las Vegas were served display ads that contained “Find low fares on Travelocity. Book Chicago to Las Vegas flights now!” The results drove Travelocity’s cost-per-transaction down 79%. It also saw a 230% increase in bookings; click-through rates jumped 651%.
• Speed: Mel highlighted that an intriguing ad that’s rapidly distributed can have positive results. Examples included VW’s superbowl ad that received 41.7 million views across the world and the Old Spice Ad, both of which went viral as a result of effective online channels.

Innovation & the Future of Search

Brendan Forster is the Product Specialist at Google and is renowned for always wowing the audience with something new from Google. This day was no different when Brendan demonstrated the latest developments in the Google search engine.

• Google Instant: A new built-in feature that enhances user experience of the search engine by pre-loading websites that are included in the Google search results. This new feature slashes 2-5 seconds off each search process.
• +1: You can now +1 any search engine result or sponsored ad of Google. You can also +1 any webpage that has the plug-in installed. These +1 buttons allow Google to further enhance the relevance of search engine results. Studies show 90% of online consumers trust recommendations of peers when searching and 71% say reviews help in deciding online purchases. The key takeaway from this – install the +1 plugin on your website!
• Google Voice Search: Google technology allows for searches to be performed by speech. This feature again enhances user experience through making it easier and faster to search. Importantly, this will result in searches becoming “longer” as less effort is exerted to obtain better results.
• Google Image Search: Ever been on vacation and taken a pic of a landmark only to forget what the name of the landmark when you get home? Google image search solves issues like these by allowing images to be uploaded to the Google search engine as a search query.

It’s obvious that Google is doing a great job at continually enhancing the organisation of information on the web. Attending this event, it’s clear to see that Google is still the “black jack” of the industry.

A few of the team here at Outrider had the opportunity to attend Think Auto with Google Australia last week. The purpose of this blog post is to highlight some of the key points of interest from the session.

For those that couldn’t make the event, here are the presentations, speaker videos and photos.

General:

• Many of the speakers revisited the same concept about the growth in consumer power online, particularly with the growth in social media and review sites

• A large proportion of auto-based search queries are review/comparison based (“There are no dud cars, only dud decisions!”). Think of the BBQ conversation with your mates – you want them to feel you have made a smart decision on your car purchase, based on your needs

• We all know about the acceleration of online video consumption, which applies to automotive as much as (if not more than) other verticals. 2 years ago, one-third of new car buyers were watching video during their research period, this has risen to half

• Auto-related mobile searches are growing fast – 180% month-on-month growth in Sept ’11 compared to Sept ’10. The growth in desktop auto-related search volume is slowing

• On that same point, it was estimated that last year 1 in 15 auto related Google searches were done on mobiles, This year, that number has risen to 1 in 7, while next year it’s predicted to be 1 in 3

• Car brands are starting to sell new inventory online in Europe, and online sales are growing(eg. eSeat and Ford UK). Consumers can reserve the car of their choosing for a small fee(For Seat, it’s 100 euro). It was claimed that Australia is a few years behind, but that this is an imminent development here too

Branding:

• Brand intimacy is the holy grail – if your consumers feel a “personal, close or warm friendship, relationship or understanding” with your brand, then you’re in a very strong position

• Why is brand intimacy so important? According to ‘The Australian Report’ from STW Group:
  • 92% say big companies need to get in touch with ordinary people
  • 80% believe there are few big businesses with the human touch
  • 75% say big business is cold & impersonal

Brand intimacy process:

1. Build communities (for shared ideals, ideas, interests and passions)
2. Create value – people will talk about a brand if its meaningful (meaningful brands give people tools, products, services and experiences to facilitate their needs and aspirations and make them feel totally awesome eg. Liquid Mountaineering – The Infinity Run
3. Make it personal (send the right message, to the right person, at the right time, in the right way – ‘High Tech, High Touch’, John Naisbitt)

Brand quotes:

“People only really want one thing: an experience that makes them feel better about themselves”

Hugh Mackay

(The Mackay Report, What Do Customers Really Want?, March ’04)

“Your brand is a value provider, NOT a content provider”

Steve Jobs

SOLOMO (Social, Mobile, Local):

• 90% of consumers online trust recommendations from people they know

• 77% of YouTube, Twitter and Facebook listings are not controlled by the brand => you don’t own your brand!

• Both professional and consumer reviews are considered helpful – strive for both!

Netpop Research Aug ‘11 – ‘The Role of Internet in New Auto Purchases’:

1. 77% say friends, family & colleagues are an important source
2. 79% say Consumer Ratings/Review sites are important
3. 48% watch online auto videos during research
4. 65% of those watch online version of commercial produced by manufacturer

Key social take-aways:

1. Social is not a destination, it’s part of the consumer’s buying process
2. Be brave with your brand
3. Listen, and let your consumers speak (facilitate with the +1 button)

• New car buyers are looking for more local info, from both manufacturer and dealer sites. Recent data suggests 1 in 4  buyers access/locate dealer sites via a mobile

• 53% say auto information is hard to access on mobile devices – mobile optimised ‘destination’ is key (ie. app, mobile site)

• Mobiles should have NFC within 2 years, which could potentially make them even more powerful tools to consumers when researching new cars in person

• The Toyota Shopping tool app was forward thinking – allows you to take a photo of the window VIN number, and pulls in the car info

So there were definitely some interesting ideas raised, and good to see so many familiar faces at Think Auto – if you were there, please share your thoughts with us in the comments below, or on the Twitter hashtag #thinkauto!

What do you know, we have our own little Trilogy here on the Outrider blog. Part 3, I’m such a  proud momma!

Today’s Google’s Not So Scary focus is targeting.

We’ve discussed keyword match types and quality scores (go ahead, catch up if you need to, I can wait), so today we’ll be talking about another way to make sure that your ads get seen by the people you want them to be seen by. Three specific ways to target are: by geography, by language, and by device.

By Geography

Do you want your ads to be seen by every person in every country in the world? If you do, that’s great, but is the same ad just as relevant for people in Australia as it is for people in Kyrgyzstan? Google AdWords allows you to choose exactly which countries you want to target. If you’d like to show different messages to different countries, you can just set up different campaigns within your account to do that. Even if you only have one message, it’s a good idea to separate different countries in order to effectively manage your bids and budgets. While the competition for “Kim Kardashian Wedding” is high in Australia, you might be able to get that Kyrgyz traffic cheap as chips!

You can also get even more specific than just countries. If you’re a local plumbing supplies seller in Long Island, New York, you have a VERY small geographical area that you can look for customers. If someone is 20 miles east of you, you’ve got a shot, but if they’re 20 miles west, you’re into New York City and you don’t have much hope of attracting them. And if they’re just 10 miles north, you don’t have a prayer! Nobody’s taking 2 bridges and going through New York City for a boiler, no matter how good your prices are. Google lets you set specific postal codes that you want to target, or even to draw lines on a map to show exactly who you want to see your ad and who you don’t.

Geo-targeting to the post-code and map level isn’t nearly as accurate as it is at the state or country level, (and it’s even less accurate in Australia than in the States), but it can be a very useful tool

By Language

You’re reading this in English right now, so I’ll assume you speak that. Hablas español? Si tienes una pagina en español, debes tener anuncios en español tambien. Oh, you don’t speak Spanish? Well, if you have a webpage in Spanish, you should have ads in Spanish too. If you have pages in lots of languages, you should have separate campaigns with keywords and ads in those languages.

This is a common sense thing. If people are searching in Swahili, they want to see an ad in Swahili, and they want to go to a webpage in Swahili. If you’re writing ads in Swahili, make sure that you select in your AdWords campaign to target the Swahili language. (Did I set the record for most uses of “Swahili” in one paragraph? I sure hope so! *crosses fingers*) Swahili.

By Device

Thanks to the creativity of Steve Jobs (and some other smart folk), we don’t just view the web on computers (I mean, duh! Have you read the Outrider blog lately? We talk about mobiles, like, a lot). We have mobile phones and tablets with fully-functioning browsers, and fully-functioning Google. Since we use these devices differently, you should target these devices differently.

There are some functions that only work on a particular device (like Click-to-Call on mobiles or Media Ads on desktops/laptops), and there’s different competition on different devices. By keeping devices in their own campaigns, you’ll be able to figure out which ad text, which keywords, and which bids work best. You might be surprised to find that what works on a desktop doesn’t necessarily work on a mobile (and vice versa).  You can often get cheaper traffic from a mobile, so don’t miss out by keeping it lumped into another campaign!

The latest issue of Think Quarterly is all about people.

“… Information is inseparable from the people who are creating it… “

Introduction

Think back to the first time that you went online. Browsers were clunky. Having enough bandwidth to watch video was a pipe dream. Connecting online with people you knew was hard. How things have changed.

There are two billion of us connected to the internet across the globe. By 2020, there will be five billion people accessing the internet on over 50 billion devices – phones, tablets, TVs, even refrigerators. The internet is information, but information is inseparable from the people who are creating, consuming, and sharing it. And the web is no longer anonymous – it’s built on real people and their connections, opinions, and ideas.

Project: People

Google Vice President of Product Bradley Horowitz offers his perspective on the launch of Google+ and the potential of the ‘people web’ to make our lives better.

“The rise of social networks, and the rich set of information they contain about people, their connections, and their preferences, has the potential to make the entire web better.”

Executive Insight: Richard Branson

People matter. That’s the view of Virgin Group founder Sir Richard Branson, whose unique approach to business has put him on top of the world. But don’t think he’s stopping there!

Power to the People

Meg Pickard turned her background as a social anthropologist into a role as the Head of Digital Engagement at the UK’s Guardian News and Media. And the really weird thing? It’s not as big a shift as you might think. This article sees Meg reveals the secrets behind the way online communities work – and can work for you.

The Mobile Metamorphosis

From communication device to our most personal computer – mobile technology now connects us not just to each other, but to ourselves. But where is the evolution of the smartphone taking us?

From Cash to Contentment

Is well-being about to take the place of GDP as the arbiter of economic health? Those in the know – including godfather of well-being Joseph Stiglitz – offer their expert insights.

Quantify – People

Facts & Figures to impress at your next cocktail party!  I’ve chosen my 3 favourites to share with you:

(All figures are Google Internal 2011)

The People’s Revolution

At the start of the year, the Arab Spring saw protests sweep through the Middle East and North Africa. In Egypt, the ‘Facebook revolution’ was powered by a unique coming-together of people and technology. Matthew Lee traveled to Cairo to meet one of those people caught up in the protests – Google’s Wael Ghonim.

The Knowlegde: Ron Conway

Ever heard of lolcats? Or the Rickroll?

Investor Ron Conway of SV Angel, long regarded as one of Silicon Valley’s wisest, picks 10 people, ideas, and technologies that are spicing up the ways we connect and communicate. His 10 include thoughts on collaborative consumption, social commerce and online / offline.

Passion, Not Perks

Nurturing the people in your organization doesn’t require expensive perks or touchy-feely gimmicks. It’s about motivating, engaging and listening – and it can work for anybody. Laszlo Bock, Google’s SVP of People Operations, explains how.

On the Make

Being a digital citizen doesn’t mean sacrificing your interest in the world of real stuff. Welcome to the maker movement that’s turning virtual ‘bits’ into physical ‘its.’

Predicting the Present

Hal Varian, Google’s in-house economist, teaches us how to extract marketing insights from Google searches.

Kickstarting Innovation

In a world that’s moving faster and faster, Kickstarter founder Yancey Strickler’s advice to the industry is to slow down, dig deep, and craft a story about what truly matters.

“We’re not interested in people selling a product on Kickstarter. What’s interesting is how you got to it and how you’re going to make it.”

Following Generation Z

Ed Chi, a member of Google’s in-house research team, reveals how the behaviors of the next generation of web users are going to look vastly different from today’s.

Final Thoughts

All in all it makes for an interesting read and certainly worth a visit in my eyes.

The articles that stood out for me personally were Kickstarting Innovation and Richard Branson’s Executive insight. Branson’s a hero of mine, so yes am a wee bit biased, but he sums it up well. People Matter.

We have all seen it, organic results for simple searches, returning domain names we never heard of before, all including keywords within the domain name, in order to get more clicks and traffic from being on page 1 of Google.

As with most search engine relevance indicators, the domain name has become a place to put keywords in, forgetting the essentials around marketing a business, namely building a brand.

It is important to know that no matter how high a website ranks, most people would rather buy from a brand they know and trust. This is proven in the research Outrider commissioned recently with Global Reviews;How Australians are shopping online.

This didn’t stop the domain name spamming from being abused to the extent where it became difficult to find a known brand to appear for certain search queries. This has had an impact on how relevant the results were for the user, meaning Google had to evolve.

The good news is that recently, we have seen interesting evolutions in how reputable brands have been gradually getting back some of their rankings, and how SEO has become more valuable than ever for them to provide the right keyword context around their brand.

Overall improvement in rankings from brand sites

The brand search engine visibility appears to have improved in the past few months, over a wide range of different brands and markets.

We would like to think it is thanks to how good we are at helping clients improve their SEO but it is on a larger scale than that.

Where a year ago, the search for “car insurance Australia” would have returned a website such as www.carinsurance.com.au, we now see AAMI, GIO, Bingle, Youi, Allianz etc. Even ISelect (price comparison site) doesn’t appear on page 1, when it used to only a few months back.

We would have many other examples but it would be more interesting if any of our readers have any examples relevant to this, so feel free to share in the comments!

Drop in rankings of websites with no brand

We have seen examples where websites with no actual clear brand or name have dropped significantly in the results, being perceived as less relevant, even for the most legitimate of websites.

For example, legitimate tourism websites have had a hard time if they were using the region as the domain name, as a region cannot be perceived as a brand. The result is that Google has allocated more value towards government TLD sites (.gov.au), thus increasing the page 1 competition.

Again, if this is something you have noticed in your sector, feel free to share any relevant examples!

Google SERP updates

An important change which happened recently was the brand site links, mentioned in an earlier blog post. For most brand search terms, Google now displays up to 12 site links to help the user find the most relevant page to him.
This gives brands more valuable exposure on the page with the aim of increasing click through rates.

This alone is a strong signal that Google is giving the love back to brands.

Is giving more importance to big brands more relevant?

The challenge is where to draw the line between what a brand is and what is simply an SEO over optimized website.

We would like to think that Google is clever enough to understand what a brand is based on search patterns leading to websites. For example, if I am searching for the latest news on gadgets, my search for “Engadget latest reviews” will lead to Google understanding I want to find Engadget for my information, thus considering “Engadget” a brand.

In any case, we would like to think this is an improvement in the way search engines allocate value to websites, and should help clear out any 2 month old website whose sole purpose is to outrank all brands by abusing search engine algorithms.

But this question is more open to all of you out there. Is Google on the right track? Should brands you know from TV, stores, magazines, newspapers be better results than the others?
Share your opinion in the comments box!