Google testing list format for AdWords enhanced sitelinks

Over the past month or so, Google has been testing how sitelinks show up on brand queries on desktop search results.

The test is on enhanced sitelinks, which include a line of description copy with each link and appear only on brand queries on desktop. Typically, these appear in two columns below the ad as shown in this “Patagonia” example.

Google is now testing a list format for enhanced sitelinks. The link font is smaller, but taken together, the list of four enhanced sitelinks takes up more real estate than the column format.

Erik Hamilton, search supervisor at Good Apple Digital spotted this example of the test on a search for “Home Depot” last month.

This week, Frederik Hyldig, head of PPC at s360, spotted the same treatment on a search for “Nike” in Denmark.

The list brings the desktop format more in line with mobile, where sitelinks on brand results typically show in a list, though without the enhanced description copy.

I find the list format easier to scan than the two columns. If other users respond the same way and click-through rates improve over the columns, we can expect to see this test roll out.

The post Google testing list format for AdWords enhanced sitelinks appeared first on Search Engine Land.

from SEO Rank Video Blog http://ift.tt/2h6NUH7
via IFTTT

2017 Webinar Benchmarks Report

For this report, ON24 looked at more than 16,000 webinars delivered by over 1,000 organizations from around the world to detail the entire lifecycle of a webinar, including webinar promotion and registration metrics, webinar interactivity metrics, audience viewing habits, and both live and on-demand attendance and conversion metrics.

Inside this report from ON24 you will discover:

• the best time for a webinar.
• when to send promotional emails.
• average webinar conversion rates.
• average viewing time for live and on-demand webinars and more!

Visit Digital Marketing Depot to download the “2017 Webinar Benchmarks Report.”

The post 2017 Webinar Benchmarks Report appeared first on Search Engine Land.

from SEO Rank Video Blog http://ift.tt/2v26iqB
via IFTTT

How to tell whether a site is adaptive or responsive

As most SEOs are aware by now, there are three main techniques for serving mobile website content: responsive design, adaptive design (also called dynamic serving), and separate mobile URLs.

While it’s easy to identify separate mobile URLs just by looking at your browser’s address bar, telling responsive and adaptive sites apart can take a little more digging around.

In my mobile workshops with Shari Thurow at SMX West and SMX Advanced earlier this year, many of the participants were confused as to how to tell responsive and adaptive mobile configurations apart. So, I went through the exercise that I’m going to describe today. Hopefully, it will help some of you make the distinction.

If you’re not sure if the site you’re looking at is responsive or adaptive, ask yourself these questions:

Does it change shape when you resize your browser from a desktop computer?

Responsive sites are meant to change layout based on browser window size (regardless of device), while adaptive sites detect when you are on a mobile device and present different HTML accordingly. Thus, if you know that a site doesn’t use separate URLs for their mobile configuration, you can often tell responsive and adaptive apart by visiting the site on desktop and seeing what happens when you resize your browser window.

Want to test this out? Take the following steps:

1. Open WebMD.com or m-w.com in the browser of your choice (the videos below use Chrome). Ensure that your browser window is not full screen — in other words, you should be able to see the desktop behind it.
2. Position your cursor along the right edge of the browser window, and resize the window down to the size of a mobile phone display.

3. As you can see, the layout changes based on your browser window size, even on a desktop. That means these sites are responsive.
4. For contrast, if you do the same thing with Amazon.com on a desktop, which is adaptive, the content on the right side of the screen is simply hidden rather than resized or moved elsewhere.

Can you find the word “responsive” or “@media” in the home page source code?

Responsive sites have specific elements within their HTML source code that adaptive sites do not. To check for these elements, take the following steps:

1. Open WebMD.com in Chrome, on mobile or desktop.
2. If on a desktop, you can press CTRL+U (Windows) or Option+⌘+U (Mac) to view the page’s source code. For mobile users, you can go to the address bar and add view-source: before the root domain (e.g., view-source:www.webmd.com) and hit enter to open source code.
3. Search the page for the word “responsive,” which exists on the page to call out responsive templates and stylesheets. Click on the responsive stylesheet, which should be a clickable link.

4. On the CSS page, search for “@media” — the presence of these indicates that are CSS Media Queries, which power responsive sites.

Does the site display different content or a different layout on a mobile device (or when you use a mobile user-agent like Googlebot smartphone)?

Adaptive sites generate different HTML for a page based on the user’s device, regardless of screen size. That means that if you are looking at an adaptive site on a mobile device — even one with a large screen — you’ll still be served specific mobile content.

We can check for adaptive mobile pages via desktop browser. This is achieved by using a browser extension that allows you to view a site as though you are using a mobile device.

Here’s how to test an adaptive page with a user-agent switcher extension on Chrome:

1. Open Chrome on desktop, then download and install a user-agent switcher extension. I recommend User-Agent Switcher for Google Chrome.
2. Once the extension has been installed, navigate to www.amazon.com.
3. Click the icon for the extension in the upper right-hand corner, then use the drop-down menu to change the user-agent to a popular mobile user-agent, such as Chrome on Android Mobile.

4. Notice the navigation has changed once you switched the user-agent, and the header image decreased in size. When you resize the browser window — even when you make it very large — it doesn’t change in a fluid way but creates more white space around the same image. This is an adaptive site that changes its layout based on user-agent.
5. Keep in mind that many sites store cookies to remember your device type, so it is a best practice when using user agents to clear your browser history after switching user agents.

Additional questions

Here are a few related questions I’ve gotten on the subject that may also be of interest:

Can you use Chrome Developer Tools to tell adaptive from responsive sites?

Yes, but be sure to clear your browsing history before toggling device type from Desktop to Mobile and vice-versa. Then, follow this procedure:

1. Open amazon.com in Chrome on a desktop.
2. Open Chrome Developer Tools by clicking on the three vertical dots in the upper top right corner of the browser, then scrolling down to More Tools > Developer Tools.
3. Once in Developer Tools, click on the three vertical dots just below the ones you clicked in Step 2, and select Add device type.

4. Set the Device to “Responsive” and the Device Type to “Desktop.” This allows you to resize the browser within by pulling the slider to the right, mimicking exercise one above. You can also change the device type from desktop to mobile, which allows you to mimic exercise three above without installing a separate user-agent switcher. As above, if the layout looks different on desktop and mobile user agents, it’s adaptive, and if the site resizes to fit the screen when you pull the corner of the window, it’s also responsive.

Can a site be adaptive and responsive at the same time?

Yes. Sometimes this is called RESS or REsponsive with Server Side Elements. In these cases, the layout is fluid, but server side elements may be used to serve smart banners for app downloads or change the text on the page.

Zillow.com is currently like this. If you use a desktop agent to access the site you can resize the browser and the site is responsive, just like merriam-webster.com. But if you access the site from a smartphone user agent detection is used to provide additional device-specific elements like smart banners to encourage app downloads.

Access Zillow.com from a smartphone or with a mobile user agent and you’ll see a smart banner that doesn’t exist on desktop. This site is responsive with adaptive elements.

Likewise, at Vivid Seats our desktop site doesn’t resize, but if you access the adaptive site from a mobile user agent it does. So, our adaptive site is also responsive.

You can also have adaptive and responsive pages on the same site. At Vivid Seats, we use responsive pages for event pages, as search behavior doesn’t vary much across devices, but adaptive for certain category pages where we noticed a difference in search behavior that we want to address on the page.

The post How to tell whether a site is adaptive or responsive appeared first on Search Engine Land.

from SEO Rank Video Blog http://ift.tt/2vbuZkH
via IFTTT

Bing now supports ClaimReview markup for fact labels in search

Nine months after Google began supporting the ClaimReview markup, designed for fact-checking review of claims made or reported on on webpages, now Bing has added support in their markup documentation.

The new section for Bing’s ClaimReview says “ClaimReview annotations should be used to convey that the page contains fact check information. This may be used to display enhanced captions on Bing that help convey this information to users.”

Bing said that when you use this tag for your articles and content, it is important that the underlying page meets the following characteristics of fact-checking sites:

• Contains claims and fact checks that are easily identifiable. Readers should be able to understand what information was checked and what conclusions were reached.
• Citations and references should be present and transparent, including references to primary data sources.
• The tag must be representative of the fact checking done within the article.

Aaron Bradley first spotted this change and said he thinks “Bing will start to annotate search results with fact check information.” Bing has not yet announced anything but that is the logical next step.

The post Bing now supports ClaimReview markup for fact labels in search appeared first on Search Engine Land.

from SEO Rank Video Blog http://ift.tt/2v0RE2L
via IFTTT

Google’s big, new tech launch had lots of SEO #fails

Hot on the heels of Google’s announcement that it has built a job search engine comes Hire, Google’s new recruiting management tool.

Available to SMBs, Hire adds an organizational layer into G Suite applications, allowing hiring managers and HR professionals across an organization to manage candidate communications, access historical applicant data, and schedule interviews from one central platform.

Many interesting things have been said about Hire in the days since its official launch. Some say Google is taking on LinkedIn and recruiting software providers. Others believe Hire may be the foundation for an invasion of many other verticals (and they’re probably right).

While these are all important topics, the most interesting thing about Hire may be its hilariously atrocious technical SEO…

8 ways Google Hire fails at basic SEO

Hire is a lovely site. The design is clean, landing page text is clear and benefit-driven, the site is mobile-friendly, and it loads quickly.

Hire provides a great initial user experience. But if you look just a little deeper, there are serious issues.

1. Six of Hire’s seven indexed pages all have the same page title. Evidently, Google is not concerned about crafting engaging SERP snippets to increase organic click-through rates… or, they’re really confident in the power of their brand recognition and authority.

2. One meta description is “TODO add description.” While it’s good to know Google hasn’t completely abandoned meta descriptions, page code might not be the best place for a to-do list. Or did the new intern get in a copy-and-paste routine plugging in meta descriptions and not notice? #happenstothebestofus

3. Another meta description is 11 characters long. It just says, “Latest news.” Meta descriptions — when not to-do lists — should be… well, descriptive.

Perhaps Google is experimenting with super short meta descriptions? Let’s hope not.

4. The homepage meta description, on the other hand, is 358 characters long. Google managed to make this one descriptive, but it went a little overboard. Meta descriptions should be descriptive, but succinct — 160 characters or less.

And while I wouldn’t necessarily put it past Google to make an exception for its own site — they don’t. This one gets truncated in the SERP like every other overzealous meta description.

5. No site pages have canonicals. Canonical tags that point to the same page that the tag is on aren’t absolutely required, but they’re considered SEO best practice. Canonicals on every page ensure any scraped or dynamically duplicated content is attributed back to the original source.

.

6. Some of the code is stressful to look at. Google — always the advocate for clean code — may need to have someone do a code review on Hire.

7. There’s no robots.txt file. From Google’s Webmaster Guidelines: “Use the robots.txt file on your web server to manage your crawling budget by preventing crawling of infinite spaces such as search result pages.” Fail.

8. The 404 page is not customized and not helpful. Google’s best practices clearly state that 404 pages should help users find what they’re looking for and provide ways to keep visitors on the site. Hire’s 404 page doesn’t even use the site’s branding.

Why is Hire’s SEO so awful?

One of Google’s catchphrases is, “Make pages primarily for users, not search engines.” Maybe this is the principle the company held to when building Hire? But the reality is that generic 404 pages and nondescript page titles/meta descriptions don’t provide the best user experience.

It’s also possible that this version of Hire is just a minimum viable product release. But Hire’s announcement said Google has been testing the product for a year—which seems like an ample amount of time to check “TODO add description” off a task list.

In the end, most of these issues come across as just lazy. Modern SEO is hard, Google, but these things have easy fixes, but it seems no one cared enough to take an hour to perform a few basic tasks.

The post Google’s big, new tech launch had lots of SEO #fails appeared first on Search Engine Land.

from SEO Rank Video Blog http://ift.tt/2v2l4wP
via IFTTT

Last call for submissions in the 2017 Search Engine Land Awards

There are just a few days left to be recognized as one of the best in search! 

We’re looking for the most impressive SEO and/or SEM campaigns from around the globe, delivered in-house or by agencies for brand name clients and small businesses alike.

We’re ready to discover who deserves the coveted Agency and In-House Team of the Year awards, and who will take individual top honors among the most respected names in digital marketing.

The only question is – will you make the short list? Start an entry here now if you haven’t already!

What our judges are looking for:

1. Quantifiable, meaningful results. Not made made up, feel-good metrics — but true performance indicators that result in a measurable impact on the bottom line.
2. Return on investment. Both organic SEO and paid search demand respect in today’s marketing mix. Whether you have a modest or massive budget, limited or seemingly endless resources, we want to see that you are maximizing your overall investment in search marketing. That includes the investment in tools, talent and related KPIs such as ROAS or LTV, for example.
3. Meets or exceeds current best practices. We’ve always advocated for SEO & SEM tactics that are on the up-and-up. Shady or outright spammy campaigns have no place here.
4. Demonstrates creativity and/or innovation. We have been involved with search for a very long time, so we’ve seen it all; what we really want is to see fresh and exciting new approaches, not just campaigns coasting along on average performance. All of our judges have significant experience in the industry, and those participating from leading platforms such as Bing and Google in particular have seen some of the world’s most impressive campaigns. The bar is high.
5. Degree of difficulty from a technical or competitive standpoint. Just about anyone can drop in meta tags or bid a small amount on low volume keywords, so we take into consideration how challenging the undertaking is and weigh the outcome with that in mind.
6. Communication, collaboration & contributions. Primarily applicable to the individual, agency and team awards, we also want to reward those that continue to support the search community at large. How you educate and communicate success to clients and colleagues, share research and contribute to thought leadership, while continually building institutional knowledge and individual skills, all factor into the awards process.

If you can check most of those boxes, then complete your submission now. Amaze the panel of judges with your best work and you’ll earn a spot among the finalists in this year’s competition. 

Then get ready to celebrate in style at the epic Landy Awards gala on October 25, 2017 to celebrate your collective achievements. It’s the biggest night of the year in search marketing — with flowing drinks, fabulous food, dancing and entertainment all on the menu, as search takes center stage during the annual SMX East week in NYC.

We hope to see you there.

The post Last call for submissions in the 2017 Search Engine Land Awards appeared first on Search Engine Land.

from SEO Rank Video Blog http://ift.tt/2tFXnaq
via IFTTT

NPR survey: Americans love their smart speakers, 42% call them ‘essential’

Americans love their “smart speakers” and they plan to buy more of them. That’s according to a recent, in-depth consumer study from NPR and Edison Research.

The survey polled more than 1,600 respondents (equally divided between device owners and non-owners) and found that 76 percent of owners had Amazon Echo devices, while 16 percent had Google Homes; another 8 percent said they owned both.

Just under 60 percent of respondents (58 percent) reported owning one device. However 24 percent had two and, interestingly, 18 percent had “three or more” smart speakers in their homes (this question goes to sheer number of devices vs. brand). However, 45 percent of the audience said they planned to buy another smart speaker.

Smart speaker market share breakdown

The report extrapolated smart speaker ownership to the US population as a whole (12+ years old) and asserts that 7 percent of Americans own at least one smart speaker. That suggests about 20 million smart speakers in American households today, which is consistent with some of the forecasts.

One of the most interesting findings involves where in the home the smart speaker is located:

• Family room/living room/den: 52 percent
• Kitchen: 24 percent
• Bedroom: 12 percent
• Other room: 7 percent

Another striking finding is that satisfaction levels are very high: 65 percent of owners said “they would not want to go back to their lives before getting one of these devices” and 42 percent said they were now “essential” to daily life.

The survey found the primary motivations for buying a smart speaker were:

1. To listen to music
2. To “ask a question without needing to type”
3. Because it’s a “fun new gadget”
4. Listen to news and information

Further down on the motivations list were, “control smart home devices,” “entertain children” and “replace old stereo,” among others. The graphic below shows the hierarchy of actual use cases — how owners are using the devices day-to-day.

Smart Speakers and Search

Perhaps the most interesting finding here is “general question” in the third position. This is a function that would otherwise be fulfilled by search on a laptop or smartphone. It suggests significant potential for smart speakers as search devices accordingly.

Percent regularly using smart speaker for the following activities

Of the 28 tasks on the list above, nearly 8 were used “regularly” according to the survey — demonstrating the level of engagement people have with these devices.

Among those who did not own a smart speaker, cost was cited as the top reason. Not knowing enough about the product was second. However, among non-owners, 54 percent said that it was somewhat or very likely that they would buy one in the next six months.

Another very interesting — and telling — stat from the report is that 82 percent of owners were also Amazon Prime members. Amazon has been very successful (obviously) marketing these devices to its most loyal customers, which represents a “built-in advantage” for the company vs its competitors.

Indeed, there are roughly 85 million Amazon Prime members, which suggests the company still has a great deal of headroom to grow.

The post NPR survey: Americans love their smart speakers, 42% call them ‘essential’ appeared first on Search Engine Land.

from SEO Rank Video Blog http://ift.tt/2h5IUCB
via IFTTT