Google Now Cards Integrated With Third-Party Developer Apps

Google announced that Google Now on Android can integrate with some of your favorite Android Apps. For example, instead of just showing you traffic alerts from Google Maps, or weather, or your flight times – it can now show you rooms available for rental from Airbnb or news cards from The Guardian and much more.

Google has integrated Google Now with 30+ developer apps and plans on adding more over time. The list can be found here and includes popular apps like Shazam, Duolingo, TripAdvisor, Ford and many, many more.

Here is a picture of how the Airbnb data shows in a Google Now card:

You can check out how these cards work on this sample site.

If you have an app that you want to enable and integrate with Google Now cards, you can read the developer docs that has the technical details behind it. Currently only Event Reservation, Flight Reservation, Hotel Reservation and Restaurant Reservation schema is supported.

Google told us they are currently working with select app developers, specifically on the Android platform but the long term goal is to expand this to a wider set of developers and platforms.

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How To Combine Your PPC & SEO Strategies

Many companies are torn between a Search Engine Optimization (SEO) or pay-per-click (PPC) strategy for their business.

SEO

Since early 2012, there have been many questions surrounding the SEO world with Google algorithm updates, such as Penguin, threatening websites and instilling the fear of consequence for utilizing "risky" SEO tactics.

Looking at ranking in the Google organic search results today - everything is centralized around TRUST. You must be ready to show Google your website can be trusted, and that you are staying within their quality guidelines. And you, as a business, have to provide the user with quality products/services that are relevant to their search.

It's also important to recognize that in 2015, SEO services are not cheap. When you choose to hire an SEO company to work on your website, you are hiring knowledge not just a service! To ensure the best SEO strategy for your site, there may be a combination of audits, and optimizations that must be addressed, as well as ensure that the links built are of QUALITY to avoid a penalty by Google.

In short - the ranking process for SEO can be slow in the "new world".

PPC

Therefore, paid search is a great way to get immediate results.

When it comes to PPC campaigns, you have many option to be choose from to generate traffic and leads to your website/landing page, including:

Text Ads

Image Ads (Remarketing & Display)

Video Ads

Product Listing Ads

And more!

This can be an affordable way to see results. Many experts believe it is best to run PPC prior to your SEO efforts.

PPC + SEO

But, there are many things that you can learn and use from having both a PPC and SEO campaign running together.

Brand Awareness & Exposure

Running a paid campaign can put your brand name and product in front of consumers when they search.

The exposure you receive from a paid ad can be a trust signal for consumers.

Research shows that . .

Improve Loading Speed And Quality Scores

Quality score is rated on a 1-10 scale and determined by several factors, including click-through rates (CTRs) and page loading times.

So, if a page loads slowly, then your PPC ads cost more.

But in the same respect, one of the determining ranking factors for SEO is site speed - if your site is slow to load, your organic rankings will also suffer.

Optimize Landing Pages

There are cues that you can take from your PPC landing pages and apply to SEO.

It's simple to do testing between two versions of an ad in your PPC campaign: similar pages with different headlines, call to actions layouts and images that you may find one works more efficiently from the other. When you find this, you can apply that knowledge to your organic landing pages (eg. Home page, service pages).

Another great example: you can test title tags through PPC ads. A specialist can run two ads with different titles, but the same copy. By analyzing data such as bounce rates, time on site, and pages per session, you can determine which title/ad kept the user on the site longer.

Setting Up Site Search In Analytics

PPC and SEO strategists can analyze what users may be looking for in the site search box. By analyzing the site search section in Google Analytics, this can tell your PPC strategist that these terms can be showcased in a new campaign and drive these keywords to the page that these users are looking for.

It also opens an opportunity for the SEO strategist to make revisions to the website to assist users in finding what they are looking for.

(For more on setting up site search analytics, click here)

Test Geographic Markets & Demographics

A PPC campaign can help determine if business from a new market would be successful.

By creating a new campaign targeting a certain location, the click through rates, and cost per acquisitions can be analyzed to determine the success of targeting this new area. If successful, the SEO strategist can then make changes to the website on-page to target a new region and show customers coming to the website that the new area is serviced by the business.

Image via mommy peace

What Happens if Apple Drops Google From Its Browser?

Photo Apple has tried to strip Google services like Maps and YouTube out of its products over the last several years.Credit Fred Dufour/Agence France-Presse — Getty Images

When Google reports its fourth-quarter earnings on Thursday, one subject that is almost guaranteed to come up is the prospect that Apple could replace Google as the default search engine on Safari, the basic browser on all of its devices. The search contract between the companies is believed to be up for renewal this year.

Given that Apple has spent much of the past few years trying to strip Google services like Maps and YouTube out of its products, the natural question is whether Apple will extend that to Google's bread-and-butter search engine. Representatives from Google and Apple declined to comment on their search deal.

One person who is commenting is Marissa Mayer, Yahoo's chief executive. In a conference call with analysts on Tuesday, Ms. Mayer said Yahoo would seek to replace Google as the default search engine on Apple's Safari browser.

"Safari users are the most engaged and lucrative in the world," she said.

Ms. Mayer, who built her reputation overseeing Google's Internet search business, said that Yahoo remained committed to search. The company is discussing changes to its 10-year search partnership with Microsoft, which is at the midway mark.

So let's say that Apple dumps Google in favor of another search engine like Yahoo or Microsoft's Bing. How bad would that be for Google? According to various reports from analysts, the impact on Google's bottom line would be minimal. There's even an argument that it could come out ahead.

Central to these analyses are two questions that are difficult to answer. The first: How much does Google pay Apple to be the default search engine on iPhones, iPads and Macs? Estimates are all over the place, from 35 percent to 80 percent of the revenue made for searches that go through the Google search bar. The second: If Apple put a new search engine on Safari, how many people would just switch back to Google?

Normally, that second question would be nothing but a wild guess about the future. But, as it happens, Yahoo struck a deal in November to displace Google as the default search service on Mozilla's Firefox web browser, which accounts for 3 to 5 percent of searches. So there is some fresh data to at least consider.

Shortly after the change, Yahoo's share of the United States search market hit a five-year high, according to StatCounter.

But since then, it has started to erode. After the deal, Google's share of paid clicks from Firefox's updated browser –- the one with Yahoo as the default search engine –- fell to 49 percent from 61 percent, according to RKG, a digital marketing agency. However, within two weeks that share had increased to 53 percent as people either switched their default back to Google or went to Google's home page to search.

"They have a loyal user base that will find them if needed," said Mark Ballard, RKG's director of research. "The default search provider isn't a guarantee that you can own the marketplace."

Apple is more important than Firefox, of course. The iPhone has fewer users than phones running Google's Android software, but Apple customers are wealthier and spend more, something that is important to Google since it is really just an advertising company.

Despite that, analysts aren't very worried about the prospect of Safari dropping Google. Carlos Kirjner, a senior analyst at Bernstein Research, estimated that in the worst-case scenario Google's 2015 per-share earnings would be reduced by 6 percent from what they otherwise would have been.

Ross Sandler, an analyst at Deutsche Bank, believes Google could actually come out ahead. That's because while Google has to pay some unknown amount to Apple for many of the Google searches done through Safari, it would not have to share revenue from whatever "recaptured" searches it got after the deal expired.

So even if traffic fell, it might end up making more money per search.

How Google, TripAdvisor and Yelp can help your business

Jan 27, 2015, 12:00pm EST

Enlarge Photo

Wendy Taylor, an Internet marketing professional, is president of Strategic Online Marketing.

Wendy Taylor, Guest columnist

There's one key thing Google, TripAdvisor and Yelp all have in common that you need to know for your business: They can enhance your search engine optimization.

Online reviews often are overlooked by many companies for a variety of reasons. Usually the biggest hurdles to getting online reviews are simply:

Who in your organization will ask for them?

What most people miss is the fact that growing their online reviews will help them with their SEO. Online reviews can help you place ahead of your competition in organic search.

For example:

Google Map searches now feature reviews more prominently, this will offer you greater free exposure in organic search results.

According to BrightLocal, 85 percent of consumers read up to 10 reviews before they feel they can trust a business, and 72 percent of consumers say positive reviews make them trust a local business more.

Google continuously works to enhance the user experience, showing the best businesses first. Showing those businesses with the most reviews at the top of the search engine results page will continue to improve the user experience.

How many of us have had a terrific experience with a business? We all have had good experiences at one time or another and probably wouldn't mind writing a review if only we were asked to do so. Whether it's a tree trimmer, restaurant, hotel or lawn care service, all businesses are subject to review.

Positive reviews are like bonus points in the eyes of the search engines. The more reviews you get, the more bonus points you acquire, the higher you may climb in organic search — and this is the free, not the paid positioning.

Wendy Taylor, an Internet marketing professional, is president of Strategic Online Marketing. She can be reached at (407) 341-0582 or via www.strategiconlinemarketing.net.

SEO Weekly Roundup: Google Edges Towards New Algorithm, Predicts Disappearance of Internet

This week, Google has provided what may be its strongest signal yet that it plans to introduce a new mobile usability ranking algorithm, whilst its executive chairman Eric Schmidt predicts that the Internet is on the road to disappearing altogether. Tom Williams dives deeper into these stories, and shares three more pieces of exciting SEO news from the last seven days…

Do Google's Mobile UX Warnings Mean a New Algorithm is Inevitable?

Google has sent mass mobile usability warnings to webmasters, adding fuel to speculation that the search giant is preparing a new algorithm to tackle mobile-unfriendly websites.

The Webmaster Tools notifications, which were first noted last Monday, detail the number of pages found by Google to have "critical mobile usability errors", and warn that "these pages will not be seen as mobile-friendly by Google Search, and will therefore be displayed and ranked appropriately for smartphone users".

Google has already given plenty of warning that a new algorithm may be in the works. Most notably, it launched 'mobile-friendly' labels next to compliant sites in mobile search, and said it was "experimenting with using the mobile-friendly criteria as a ranking signal."

The warnings seem only to have been sent to sites that have notable mobile UX (user experience) issues across the board, rather than sites that have minor issues on certain pages.

Our opinion? We reckon a new algorithm is inevitable, since Google has given plenty of warning by focussing on the subject of mobile UX in talks, statements and actions – not to mention the fact it has admitted experimenting with rankings.

What's more, this behaviour – mass notifications sent to the worst-offending sites – mirrors Google's behaviour before other big algorithm updates.

For more evidence, read our news post covering this story.

The Internet is Going to Disappear, Predicts Google Boss Eric Schmidt

Google's Eric Schmidt reckons we're facing a future where the Internet will have 'disappeared', thanks to the profileration of always-on gadgets.

As reported by The Hollywood Reporter, Schmidt was fielding questions at the World Economic Forum in Switzerland, when he was asked for his predictions on the future of the web.

According to Schmidt, the dominance of connected devices will mean that the Internet will permeate our everyday lives to the point that we no longer notice it existing:

There will be so many IP addresses… so many devices, sensors, things that you are wearing, things that you are interacting with that you won't even sense it. It will be part of your presence all the time.

"Imagine you walk into a room, and the room is dynamic. And with your permission and all of that, you are interacting with the things going on in the room."

Despite his lofty ambitions for… let's call it the Internet of Everything… Schmidt was confident the new era of the web won't mean we'll have to sit back and watch while robots take over our jobs. Instead, he predicted a new wave of jobs will emerge – just as people found new careers after farming became machine-led.

Schmidt expected the changes would lead to "a highly personalised, highly interactive and very, very interesting world".

But what's going to happen to Google?

Right To Be Forgotten Won't Extend Beyond Europe, Google Says

Google has told European privacy regulators it won't remove links flagged up in Right To Be Forgotten (RTBF) requests outside of Europe, reports Reuters.

The controversial RTBF legislation, introduced in May last year, allow any individual in Europe to request removal of "inadequate, irrelevant or no longer relevant" links from Google's European index – typically because the linked content is embarrassing or defamatory.

Google has processed tens of thousands of requests since the ruling was put into force. EU privacy watchdogs, however, have pushed the search giant to extend the link removals to its global results, as users in Europe can still access the unaffected Google.com page.

Google's chief legal officer, David Drummond, told attendees at a Brussels event that the firm had stood by the ruling:

We've had a basic approach, we've followed it, on this question we've made removals Europe-wide but not beyond."

He continued:

It's our strong view that there needs to be some way of limiting the concept, because it is a European concept."

Bing Testing Revamped News Card, Google-Like Layout

Search sleuths have unearthed test versions of Bing's search interface, including an expandable news card, and a layout that mirrors Google's.

All Google Testing, a blog that shows users how to access test versions of Bing, Yahoo! and Google, published instructions to access the revamped news cards on Tuesday.

The experimental news box shows three stories, but when an arrow is clicked to expand it, two more are shown.

All Google Testing put together a video, so you can see the potential new feature in action:

The Google-aping interface test was uncovered on Thursday, days after Yahoo! was discovered to be running similar tests. Here's the video of the Google-Bing crossover in full swing:

White House Uses SEO to Ensure Users Are Switched On to Obama Speech

The White House dabbled in SEO to ensure users switched on to President Obama's State of The Union address on Tuesday.

As Danny Sullivan at Search Engine Land reported, the White House published a story titled 'What Time is the State of the Union?', presumably in order to appear for relevant high-value search terms.

The US Government was, it seems, aiming to give users access to the official, White House-approved timings, as well as advertise the interactive features it introduced this year.

If, however, the White House was aiming to secure better viewing figures for this year's address, then things didn't play out like they planned. According to International Business Times, quoting data from Nielsen Media, viewership was down 1.6 million on 2014.

Read last week's SEO news roundup: Google Knowledge Graph Now Appearing On 25% of Searches

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Is Google Fiber the Future of the Internet?

Google, the search engine giants, have ventured into providing internet access to consumer through their much acclaimed Google Fiber service. With gigabit internet speeds, the new connection speeds go beyond the range that other internet service providers are able to provide thus giving them a run for their money.

Google Fiber has gained a lot of popularity in recent times and as it continues to grow and expand their reach, the question that still linger in our minds remains. Could Google Fiber possibly be the future of the internet?

In order to gain a better understanding of Google Fiber, it is important to know about the company behind it. Google started out as a search engine and still remains to be one of the most popular search engine to this day. The tech giant has ventured into other areas such as mobile with their android devices, video through YouTube and even social networking via Google+. This is just a glimpse of the many services that are provided by Google.

Google was founded by engineers and technical type people who prefered efficiency of systems as well as their reliability. It would seem that this same mentality was a key factor in the design and implementation of the Google Fiber network. The network is capable of amazing download and upload speeds which places content virtually at the tips of your fingers. Let us break this down into numbers.

The average internet service provider gives the consumer between 20 and 100 Mbps connection speeds. By contrast, Google fiber has 1000 Mbps connection speeds. This is 10 times what any other ISP can offer at the moment hence placing Google Fiber way ahead of the curve in terms of speed. Another interesting fact about the speeds that are offered by Google Fiber is that they are bidirectional.

Typical internet service providers usually provide slower upload speeds as compared to download speeds. In fact, the speeds that are usually advertised are the download speeds. Google Fiber is different with the 1000 Mbps connection going both ways. At the same speed that you download files on the Google Fiber network, so can you upload your files to the cloud or some other server on the internet.

With increasing demand for fast and reliable connections to the internet, it is necessary to have a solution that can provide both speed and efficiency. As with all innovations, there are those who will be ahead of the competition and Google seems to have taken the lead with their Fiber solution.

Though not as widespread as other internet service providers, Google Fiber has a lot of promise. We hope to see a lot more innovation from other internet service providers in order to provider faster speeds to the internet on a reliable connection.

Google Fiber has shown up what is possible when it comes to internet connectivity. The amazing speeds provide a reliable access to all kinds of content on the internet regardless of their size. As applications become more resource intensive, we expect to have faster speeds such as the ones introduced by Google Fiber. This is the future of internet connections.

Automatic AdWords Currency Conversion Now Enabled In Google Analytics

Today, Google announced that Google Analtyics and AdWords will now be able to speak the same currency language. The change affects advertisers that happen to use a different currency for cost data in AdWords than Analytics.

With currency conversion, advertisers will be able to easily compare cost data from AdWords in Analytics. Google Analytics will automatically convert cost data from AdWords — cost, CPC and ROAS — in the currency that is set in the Analytics account.

Google uses the exchange rate at the midpoint of the date range selected in Analytics.

"For example, if you are viewing a time period from January 5th to 19th, we will use the rate from January 12th to convert your AdWords cost data to the currency of your GA account."

 

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About The Author As Third Door Media's paid media reporter, Ginny Marvin writes about paid online marketing topics including paid search, paid social, display and retargeting for Search Engine Land and Marketing Land. With more than 15 years of marketing experience, Ginny has held both in-house and agency management positions. She provides search marketing and demand generation advice for ecommerce companies and can be found on Twitter as @ginnymarvin. (Some images used under license from Shutterstock.com.)

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Google planning to sell wireless phone service: reports

SAN FRANCISCO — Google is planning to sell wireless phone service directly to consumers using the networks of Sprint and T-Mobile, according to reports published Wednesday.

If everything falls into place, Google Inc. could offer discounted wireless data plans that would pressure other major carriers to offer better deals and services or risk losing customers to a powerful rival.

More affordable plans, in turn, could bring more people online, something that Google is trying to do because it runs the Internet's dominant search engine and largest advertising network. The Mountain View, California, company would profit from a potentially larger audience for its services.

Google also implants its services in its Android mobile operating system, the mostly widely used software on smartphones.

Both the technology news site The Information and The Wall Street Journal reported Google's intention to become a wireless service provider. The reports cited unnamed people familiar with the matter.

Representatives from Google, Sprint Corp. and T-Mobile US Inc. declined to comment on the reports.

It's unclear how widely Google plans to sell wireless plans to smartphone owners or when the service would launch. The company already is selling an ultra-fast Internet and cable TV service directly to homes, but that Google Fiber product so far is only available in parts of Kansas City, Kansas; Kansas City, Missouri; Provo, Utah; and Austin, Texas.

Google's plans to make its entry into the wireless Internet market by buying access on the networks of Sprint and T-Mobile is known as a mobile virtual network operator, or MVNO, agreement. Google probably will still have to set up its own operations to handle customer service and billing, an area in which the company doesn't have much previous expertise.

Leasing space to Google represents a calculated risk by Sprint, the third largest wireless carrier, and T-Mobile, the four largest. While a deal with Google figures to boost their revenue, it also opens the door for a deep-pocketed company that could turn into a competitive threat.

T-Mobile already has been shaking up the industry during the past year by cutting prices and introducing new service plans that have prompted the two biggest carriers, Verizon Communications and AT&T Inc., to match some of the features.

Bing and Yahoo Test Google Search Engine Traits

All Google Testing released some new code for Bing users to display expanded search cards by inserting a specific set of code into the browser's Web developer tools.

How Does It Work?

Below are screenshots, which show Bing's functionality prior to loading the code into the browser and the results after it is installed.

Before

After

Below are the instructions as shown on All Google Testing:

Go to Bing and load your browser's developer console:

Related articles

Google Chrome: Tools, Developer Tools

Mozilla Firefox: Web Developer, Web Console

Internet Explorer: Developer Tools (F12), Console

Copy and paste the following code:

document.cookie="MUID=25232B19D7E560830A2C2C2DD602610E; path=/; domain=.bing.com";document.cookie="MUIDB=; path=/; domain=.bing.com";window.location.reload();

Press Enter and you'll see the experiment.

If doesn't work, try this other method:

Open Chrome and install this extension.

Go to Bing and select "Edit Cookies" option on the context menu:

Find the cookies named MUIDB and MUID, and replace the value with this cookie value: 25232B19D7E560830A2C2C2DD602610E

Click "Submit cookie changes" and refresh the page.

Yahoo Tries Google Interface

All Google Testing also released a code that overlays Google's search interface onto the Yahoo search engine. If you didn't see "Yahoo" in the top left corner, you'd assume that you were using Google. The image below shows what the search engine looks like once the code is installed.

Below are the instructions for inserting the code from All Google Testing:

Go to Yahoo.com and load your browser's developer console:

Google Chrome: Tools, Developer Tools

Mozilla Firefox: Web Developer, Web Console

Internet Explorer: Developer Tools (F12), Console

Copy and paste the following code:

document.cookie="B=c9nt1nla7kjhj&b=3&s=kr; path=/; domain=.yahoo.com";window.location.reload();

Press Enter, refresh the page, and you'll see the experiment.

If doesn't work, try this other method:

Open Chrome and install this extension.

Go to Yahoo.com and select "Edit Cookies" option on the context menu:

Find a cookie named B and replace the value with this cookie value:c9nt1nla7kjhj&b=3&s=kr

Click "Submit cookie changes" and refresh the page.

What was life like before Google? Original 'search engine' New York Public Library shows us

While Google is now the default research engine for most of us, be it students or adults working in an office, we all know there was a time before Google and the Internet became ubiquitous.

So what did people do when they wanted an answer to a question? For most people, public libraries were the answers. If you don't know what a public library is or have never seen the insides of one, it's likely you're a post-90's child.

Recently the New York Public Library has started running an campaign on social media where it is releasing the kind questions that librarians were asked before Google became the default destination for every question that was on your mind. The hashtag they've gone with is #Letmelibrarianthatforyou, a cute a pun on the oft-used phrase "Let me Google that for you".

As this report in the Guardian points out, the questions ranged from the "the practical ("A Swiss manufacturer of baby carriages wanted to know whether the NYPL didn't have a list of expectant mothers" – 1 January 1949), ... to the disturbing ("What is the nutritional value of human flesh?" – 6 June 1958)".

Other questions on the list according to the report were: "Why did 18th-century English paintings have so many squirrels in them and how did they train them so that they wouldn't bite the painter?," What kind of apple Eve ate and "Is there a full moon every night in Acapulco?"

According to this post on Hyperallegeric other questions included if the public library had a computer for the use of the public way back in 1966, how to put up wall paper and where exactly to put the paste that came with it.

The post also shows how one caller on the phone asked a variety of questions all within five minutes. The questions ranged from the name of Napoleon's Horse to a wig maker's name in Miami to a book on spontaneous human combustion.

Check out pictures of some of the notes:

The list of expectant mothers:

Image: NYPL Instagram page.

On party etiquette and who should kiss whom first and for how long

Image from NYPL Instagram account.

Pray exactly when does the bluebird sing (because the user wanted to write a lyrics based on the song)

Image from New York Public Library account

On gestation periods

Image from New York Public Library Instagram account

On angry elephants in dreams

Image: New York Public Library social media account.

On whether pine needles work

Image from New York Public Library

And finally the concerned citizen on whether the gun that killed Kennedy was returned to the rightful owner

Image from New York Public Library.

Based on the questions, it's safe to say that librarians all over the world are a happier lot since they don't have to put up with random and bizarre questions anymore.

Google Sending Mobile Usability Warnings To Huge Number Of Webmasters

Google is sending mass notifications to webmasters who has websites that are not mobile-friendly. These notifications contain the subject "fix mobile usability issues found on…" It then goes on to explain that these sites have critical mobile usability errors on 100% of the pages on the site and thus the pages will be "displayed and ranked appropriately for smartphone users."

These notifications are being sent via Google Webmaster Tools and via email. It is also being sent to sites that are simply not mobile friendly at all and typically, the webmasters know their sites are not mobile friendly. What we have here is Google reminding these webmasters their sites are not mobile-friendly and issuing a warning that the pages won't rank well in mobile search.

There are clear signs that a new mobile ranking algorithm is about to launch at Google. Google told us they are experimenting with it since November. They also launched a mobile friendly testing tool, mobile usability reports in Google Webmaster Tools, and mobile-friendly labels in the search results.

This seems to go beyond the broken mobile site penalty Google had in 2013. It also seems to go beyond having problems with your mobile-friendly site – where it is targeting this communication to sites that are knowingly not mobile-friendly.

Typically, these are all signs of something big to come on the algorithm side. But we have not been able to get a confirmation from Google on this as of yet.

Here is a copy of the email sent to webmasters:

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Can’t Rule Google? Focus on Yelp

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Go big or go home. It sounds like a mantra made just for sports, but it also applies to Google. That's because those websites who hit the top SERP spots tend to get more attention than those who appear down below.

Consider this study profiled on Marketing Land: A little more than 71 percent of searches ended with a page one click. Only about 6 percent of searches, on the other hand, landed clicks on pages two and three of results. It's clearly vital to get your company's name high up in search results.

But at the same time, many believe that Google has made it harder and harder for anyone to hit a SERP goal. As many bloggers have pointed out, Google is now skewing search results by including relational terms and popularity scores. As a result, companies with a great deal of traffic tend to get the clicks, even if they don't have the specific keywords you've so painfully worked to incorporate. As a little guy, it can be hard to get noticed.

This is why Yelp matters so much in 2015 and beyond. For smaller companies, it might be the only way to get even a little bit of page 1 Google attention. And if you do your Yelp homework, the attention you get could be positive enough that it could kick up your reputation score.

Yelp SERP Placement

If it's of vital importance to get as high up in a SERP as you possibly can, and since Google seems to put big companies with a lot of traffic up higher, Yelp seems like an obvious tool to use.

As ThinkSEM has pointed out, Yelp is often the very first thing people see when they run a search with any kind of place name included.

Additionally, Yelp has a very sophisticated search engine of its own. That means people might go right to Yelp when they're searching for information about local businesses. Capturing their attention could be a key to a better reputation.

Watching for Pitfalls

But really ruling Yelp isn't as easy as it might seem. As a Harvard study from 2013 uncovered, something like 25 percent of the reviews submitted to Yelp are never published or recommended to users. That means a whole lot of data that could be used to boost your reputation could simply be missing from the site.

There's one way to overcome this problem, and it's distressingly simple: You need to get more high-quality reviews.

If only 75 percent of your reviews appear on the site and influence your reputation, you need to ensure that you have a whole lot of data for the Yelp algorithm to find. That way, if the site filters out a bunch of reviews you'll still have a lot of good stuff to draw upon.

And if you want the site to stop filtering everything, you'll need to attempt to ensure that the reviews that appear won't be somehow offensive. According to a blog post from Entrepreneur, reviews that appear and/or are recommended have these characteristics:

They're detailed. Good reviews are long, and they hold nuanced views. Out-and-out raves and disses don't hold water. Content with a lot of information is rich enough to get noticed.

They come from real, verified reviewers. If the account is linked to a real person with other social media accounts that can be verified, that review seems more valuable to Yelp.

Writers have reviewed other places. Good reviews come from people who do this sort of reviewing a lot.

With a little homework, you can make sure these are the sorts of reviews you'll have on your site.

Getting the Best

You can't simply write reviews for your own company and load them up on Yelp. That sort of activity is strictly banned per the site's terms of service, and violating that agreement could get you in a lot of hot water. Similarly, you can't specifically solicit good reviews and/or give people a script to follow when they do choose to write about you. That activity is also forbidden per the site's rules.

But you can do a little investigating and find client contacts who might do a lot of work for you, without a whole lot of prompting.

For example, if you have happy, satisfied clients you've worked with on a regular basis who seem to be well-spoken or articulate, you could simply point out that you have an account on Yelp. Put a note about that on your receipts, place a Yelp sticker by the checkout desk and put a Yelp button on your business cards. When you see these clients, simply remind them that you're active on Yelp and would love their feedback. You could say something like this: "You've probably noticed these Yelp logos all over the place. We're building our reputation with that site. We'd love to hear your honest feedback there."

You can also do a little prompting on social media. If you have fans that consistently rave about you on your page, check them out a little further. Look for their Yelp profiles, and read their other reviews. If they do good work and they compliment you online, consider incorporating Yelp into your thank you. A sentence like this might do the trick: "Thanks for the compliment! We love hearing from our clients. In fact, check out our Yelp page to see what other people are saying about us. We'd love to see you there!"

The example sentences I've given here contain no threats. And they also don't tell your reviewers what to say or how to say it. But, by reaching out to clients you've vetted (who you know love you and who you know can write), you'll be going a long way toward getting great Yelp reviews.

How to Work It

Once you have a cadre of good Yelp reviews, you're bound to do better on a Google SERP. Here's why: Yelp shows up high in search results, and Yelp pushes organizations with good reviews. If you have those reviews, you can achieve a sort of Google SERP dominance, even if you do very little Google work at all.

Try it out! And please, if I've missed any tips you think are particularly helpful when it comes to Yelp, share them in the comments section.

Image Credits

Featured Image: jarmoluk via PixabayImage #1: Gil C via Shutterstock

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Jean Dion Senior Journalist at InternetReputation.com Jean Dion is a writer, editor, avid blogger and obsessed pet owner. She's a senior journalist with InternetReputation.com, and writes frequently on the intersection of private indiscretion and public embarrassment. Follow her on Google+ or Twitter.

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