Google have added a new feature in Google Webmaster Tools. From now on, webmasters will be able to see just when Google discovered links to their site when downloading link data from Webmaster Tools.

Google have added a “Download latest links” button in the “Links to Your Site” in Webmaster Tools.



When you use this feature, you will see there are a list of the links in the left hand column and the date of when Google discovered these links on the right column in the report.



I’m sure many Google will be commended for this extra data. It will help to see how long it actually takes Google to index certain links as well as several other advantages.
The Search Engine community has overseen a lot of change in the last year or so with Google introducing algorithm updates such as Panda and Penguin and penalties for over optimisation and bad link building techniques in dodgy neighbourhoods.

That’s why those clever folks at SEOmoz have overhauled their Beginner’s Guide to SEO. They have updated it to lead potential SEO-ers from bad habits that were effective pre Panda and Penguin. I read the original Beginner’s Guide to SEO when I first got into learning about search engine optimisation at Equator.

There was so much stuff in it, I had to go back and read it a couple of times to take it all in. If you are looking for a detailed guide to give to someone starting out in the industry or just wanting to test yourself to see if you really are on the right track, the SEOmoz guide is worth a read.

You can find the Beginner’s Guide to SEO here

Yahoo's troubles continue!

Yahoo’s troubles in the search engine business continue to run. Yahoo’s share of the U.S search engine market has continued to decrease in April.

This is a continuation of a now 8 month slide, starting in September 2011 for the company. Yahoo has also been blighted by CEO changes and employee redundancies of late as well as co-founder Jerry Yang’s departure.

Yahoo’s search share fell 0.2 percent in April to just 13.5 percent according to comScore. This is significant drop on Yahoo’s share in last April which stood at 15.9 percent.

Both of Yahoo’s main rivals, Google and Bing, seen slight gains in the market share with Google recording 66.5 percent of the share while Bing recorded a 15.4 percent of the share according to comScore.

So what is next in store for Yahoo?

How Google search actually works

Have you ever wondered just how Google search actually works?

Here is Google's Head of Web Spam, Matt Cutts to tell us:

Google have announced that they plan to introduce a ranking penalty that will punish websites that seem to have purposely been over optimised or over SEO’d.

Google say they have been working on this over optimisation penalty for a few months now and are getting ready to launch it probably sometime this month.

The over optimisation penalty is going to “level the playing field” according to Google. This means that once the update has been rolled out, websites that have great relevant content has a better chance to rank well in the SERPs.

Websites that have poorer quality content, rely on keyword stuffing techniques or exchanging too many links could suffer in the rankings in the near future.

Many will say "well this isn't new, Google have been doing this for a while now" however it is they way they are going to tackle it from now on that is the real change.

Google intend to use notifications through their own Webmaster Tools to inform webmasters whether their site has been over optimised. This is all part of Google's attempts to be more transparent.

We'll see how this affects the SEO world once it kicks in.

More bad news for Yahoo!


It's not been that long since we brought you news of Jerry Yang, co-founder of Yahoo and his decision to leave the company. 

In yet another blow for the company, Yahoo’s new CEO, Scott Thompson has announced the company’s plans to lay off 2,000 of their current staff. The company employs around 15,000 people around the world. The loss of jobs is around 15 per cent of Yahoo’s total staff. At the end of 2010, then CEO, Carol Bartz trimmed the staff by 4%

Scott Thompson explained:

“Today's actions are an important next step toward a bold, new Yahoo! — smaller, nimbler, more profitable and better equipped to innovate as fast as our customers and our industry require. We are intensifying our efforts on our core businesses and redeploying resources to our most urgent priorities. Our goal is to get back to our core purpose — putting our users and advertisers first — and we are moving aggressively to achieve that goal. Unfortunately, reaching that goal requires the tough decision to eliminate positions. We deeply value our people and all they've contributed to Yahoo!”

It is estimated the job cuts will save Yahoo about $375 million a year. 

Simple SEO tip



Most people work really hard on their website or blog to get it to represent themselves or their brand well on the internet. This can be especially vital for people who deal in ecommerce. The thing is, you can work really hard, get great content out there and represent yourself or brand really well but no one is taking notice. This happens to many great web pages or blogs. You don’t have to worry; search engine optimisation (SEO) can help you.

In its simplest form, SEO is a tactic you can use to enhance your website or blog’s appearance in search engine result pages (SERPs) such as Google, Bing and Yahoo. This improved appearance in result pages is a great way to get more visitors to your site or blog.

When the search engines crawl all internet websites, they look at many factors on the webpage to decide how relevant the web page is to the search engine user’s search query. The better the relevancy, the higher it will place your web page in their search results. The first thing a webmaster should do is to make sure their website or blog is optimised for these key factors that the search engines use to determine relevancy.

Although it isn’t 100% known just what these search engines look for, research and tests done by the many SEO-ers out there manages to give us a good idea of some things that do make a difference. Keywords help determine how relevant a website or blog is to any particular search query. Where these keywords are placed is crucial. So first you have to decide on the best keywords that will describe your website and then place them in your website or blog in a correct manner.

The main areas where search engines look for relevancy seems to be in page titles, meta descriptions, and any written content. It may be tempting just to cram your keywords into these places but search engines can penalise websites and blogs that use this kind of ‘keyword stuffing’. So finding the right balance is always important.

If it is your own blog, you may be able to read up on a few basic SEO techniques and optimise it yourself but if you have an ecommerce site where the visitors and conversion is really important, it may be beneficial to contact a digital marketing agency or SEO specialist.

In the digital marketing agency where I work, they offer a wide range of opportunities for businesses such as Web Design, Web Development, PPC, Affiliate Marketing and of course their very own SEO.

The Search Engine Optimisation services they offer are done by a dedicated team with many years of experience, working on many different clients from various business sectors.