Organic Search Party: Our Top SEO Columns of 2016

Each year brings a plethora of changes to search engine optimization, and 2016 was no different. From the rollout of Accelerated Mobile Pages to the long-awaited real-time Penguin update, the SEO world had a lot of exciting news to digest this year. With the help of our All Things SEO and Link Week columnists, readers were able to stay informed and adapt to these changes as needed.

As the SEO industry matures, the skills needed to remain on the cutting edge have become increasingly complex. This was evident in the fact that two of our top ten SEO columns were primers on more technical topics like implementing Accelerated Mobile Pages and making the switch to HTTPS. Search optimizers are clearly looking to up their game by learning about more advanced topics.

Or are they? Also popular this year were pieces targeting those who are new to the industry, such as Stephan Spencer’s “7 quick SEO hacks for the SEO newbie” and John Lincoln’s “6 Big Mistakes That SEO Rookies Make.” It seems there’s room for SEOs of all levels here on Search Engine Land!

And in case you don’t know where you fall on the spectrum from rookie to guru, columnist Eric Enge put together a handy quiz to test your knowledge of SEO. It’s not too late to take it!

For these stories and more, check out Search Engine Land’s top ten SEO columns of 2016:

1. How To Get Started With Accelerated Mobile Pages (AMP) by Paul Shapiro, published on 2/24/2016.
   Social activity: Facebook 632, Google+ 194, LinkedIn 524
2. Infographic: 11 amazing hacks that will boost your organic click-through rates by Larry Kim, published on 10/5/2016. Social activity: Facebook 1086, Google+ 0, LinkedIn 821
3. Test Your Knowledge Of SEO by Eric Enge, published on 1/5/2016.
   Social activity: Facebook 900, Google+ 189, LinkedIn 594
4. HTTP to HTTPS: An SEO’s guide to securing a website by Patrick Stox, published on 4/14/2016.
   Social activity: Facebook 962, Google+ 219, LinkedIn 619
5. KPIs for SEO: measuring SEO success by Marcus Miller, published on 8/5/2016.
   Social activity: Facebook 894, Google+ 0, LinkedIn 929
6. 7 quick SEO hacks for the SEO newbie by Stephan Spencer, published on 8/25/2016.
   Social activity: Facebook 970, Google+ 0, LinkedIn 733
7. SEO is as dirty as ever by Patrick Stox, published on 7/7/2016.
   Social activity: Facebook 991, Google+ 0, LinkedIn 885
8. The real impact of Google’s new paid search ad layout on organic search by Winston Burton, published on 3/29/2016.
   Social activity: Facebook 953, Google+ 224, LinkedIn 1271
9. 6 Big Mistakes That SEO Rookies Make by John E Lincoln, published on 1/15/2016.
   Social activity: Facebook 744, Google+ 0, LinkedIn 532
10. 7 e-commerce SEO trends we’re seeing in 2016 by Jayson DeMers, published on 6/14/2016.
    Social activity: Facebook 1096, Google+ 0, LinkedIn 1201

Methodology: Columns published in 2016 are ranked in order of pageviews measured by Google Analytics. Data includes all columns published through November 30, 2016. Social data provided by SharedCount. 

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Why Google shutting down Map Maker should terrify SMBs

Google’s Map Maker has often received bad press due to the amount of spam that originates from users of the product. In May of 2015, Map Maker was actually shut down to help prevent disasters like this one. So Google’s announcement that they’re shutting down Map Maker entirely in March of 2017 made a lot of people really happy.

It’s the end of spam, right? We should all be celebrating, right?

Nothing could be further from the truth.

Allowing spammers to hide rather than vanquishing them

The truth is that users — some with less-than-virtuous motives — will still be able to make edits to business listings, just like before. Instead of doing it on Map Maker, however, they will do it through Google Maps by pressing “suggest an edit” on the listing.

Spammers know this, of course, and have already shifted the majority of their edits to Google Maps because it hides their activity from the general public.

Currently, when a user makes an edit to a listing on Map Maker, the edit history on the listing shows their username, and you can see what other edits they’ve made.

This feature of Map Maker makes it much easier for power Maps users and marketing companies to chase down spammers and report them to Google (there is an option to report the user, as well).

With Google Maps, however, the users are completely anonymous, and there is no way for anyone, other than Google, to see what types of edits they have made in the past and who else they may have sabotaged.

Why this is a serious problem

Here are a few recent examples.

1. In case you didn’t hear, Maps users recently were able to successfully change a bunch of listings for Trump hotels and cafes to list them as “Dump Tower” and “Dump Cafe.”

At one point, the category for the hotel was also changed from luxury hotel to a garbage collection service. The edits were made by users through Google Maps, and the only way to see them was while they were pending on the Google Maps app.

I took several screen shots after I saw the article on Twitter, and as you can see, the edits show absolutely no details about the user who made them.

There is no way for the person looking at the edit to tell what else that user is doing or what their intentions might be.

2. The insurance industry is one that gets a lot of spam edits. Because these edits are now going through Google Maps, the mapping community is completely blind to them, and apparently, Google isn’t taking much note of them, either.

Back in Mid-November, someone managed to update over 59 listings for various insurance companies to change the listed phone number to this one: 800-701-5909. When you call it, this phone number goes to a lead provider so that they can capture the user’s information and then turn around and sell that lead to an insurance office.

Here is a screen shot showing some of the various listings that still had that phone number on them three weeks later (December 8).

The business owners were not alerted of this change, so most of them are completely unaware that all their customers and potential customers are now calling someone else. Who made this change? There is no way for anyone (other than Google) to know. Google Maps shows no edit history log whatsoever, and Map Maker is classifying this user as “Google” (edits via Google Maps on desktop show up this way in Map Maker).

Although I can tell the business owner to change the information back via the Google My Business dashboard, there is nothing stopping it from happening again, and unless the business wants to check their information daily, there is currently no way that they will know about changes.

I have already contacted a few of these businesses to make them aware, but the problem is still that the Maps user is out there unpunished and most likely making more edits, since there is no way for businesses to identify him or her and alert Google about the username.

Long-time spammers have shifted their efforts from creating dozens of fake listings (which is becoming harder to do) to reporting legitimate businesses as spam and having them removed.

Here is a recent example of a legitimate locksmith in Florida who had his listing removed from Google because a user (most likely a competitor) reported him as spam. Neither the locksmith nor I have any clue who did it or what will prevent them from doing it again. His listing was down for about a week while he was waiting for Google to reinstate it.

So, while I wish I could look forward to the prospect that spam on Google will diminish with the removal of Map Maker, I’m actually seeing the exact opposite occur.

The number of threads on the Google My Business forum related to legit listings being changed or taken down is on the rise and will most likely continue to increase until there is more transparency. After all, what would spammers like better than to be able to hide all their activity? My current advice to SMBs is to keep a close eye on their Google listing to make sure no one is trying to sabotage it.

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Google launches a new look for recipes in the mobile search results

Google has launched a new look and feel for the recipe search results done over a smartphone device. Alex Chitu first noticed the change that shows richer images and content for recipe related queries.

The results show various recipe cards, with a link to “view all.” When you click on that link, it takes you into a deeper view of recipes that you can then filter more based on these bubble filters at the top of the search results.

Here is a screen shot showing the main results page on mobile:

Here is what happens after you click on “view all”.

And here is what happens when you activate the filters at the top:

To compare, here is a screen shot I took back earlier this month showing the old recipe results:

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What you’re missing with SEO that will make a world of difference

There are two approaches to take when it comes to developing new digital marketing or online reputation strategies.

The first approach sees marketers and SEO strategists creating proactive campaigns that push content to consumers with the intention of soliciting immediate reactions.

The second method is considered to be responsive, where marketers create content that capitalizes on a particular concept or event to improve consumer awareness of their brand and its offering.

An example of responsive marketing is when solar energy companies distribute branded press releases when new tax incentives are approved by federal or state governments.

Proactive and reactive approaches to SEO

The vast majority of SEO strategists’ efforts are going to fall into the active position since they are always reviewing upcoming trends to determine how to maximize opportunities months in advance.

However, there are particular opportunities that allow strategists to combine both marketing approaches to improve brand awareness and solicit consumer reaction.

Consider these opportunities when creating a new SEO initiative.

1. Capitalize on internal events

If your company is on the verge of releasing a new product or service, you’re about to hire a well-known executive from a competing brand, or you’re expanding into new emerging markets, make sure you let the world know about it!

Smaller to mid-size businesses tend to keep these pivotal points of their history quiet, not realizing they are missing out on the opportunity to increase brand awareness, which would generate more traffic on their website.

Notable internal events are excellent opportunities to submit optimized press releases that have the potential to spark stories by local or national news outlets. (Keep in mind that Google considers some press release distribution methods to be link schemes, which are grounds for a penalty or removal from search results.)

When this happens, your company’s online presence is awarded more traffic from new potential customers/clients, a spike in new backlinks that come from reputable sources and an influx of consumer citations.

2. Turn internal events into guest author opportunities

If one or more of your internal events are capturing significant attention, you may be able to use this as a means of improving your brand’s credibility within your industry.

This type of positioning creates opportunities to author content for notable brands and publications that cater to similar audiences. Every piece of content your company executives contribute to industry publications can help build your organic authority, as it gives you a chance to improve referral traffic from relevant third-party sources, while also adding more links to your portfolio.

If you choose to follow through with this opportunity, make sure that you are only working with other industry authorities who have significant organic equity in the markets where your business operates. Working with low-authority sources or social media influencers who cater to foreign audiences will not lead to any organic or transactional growth.

3. Get in front of a new, interesting subject

A quick search for any concept on the internet will show you how hard it is to create original content.

There are millions of content creators throughout the world who are developing lists, how-to guides, buyer guides, white papers and other forms of content that ultimately offer duplicative information on a particular topic.

Coming up with unique ways to present information or being the first to expose new concepts can be extremely beneficial for improving your organic authority, as you will have a chance to:

• Improve brand awareness.
• Attract new potential customers.
• Increase your organic visibility.
• Improve your online reputation and industry authority.
• Acquire new, meaningful backlinks.

4. Build content around keywords that your competitors are missing

Keyword research continues to change based on the ongoing development of search algorithms. However, there are opportunities for brands to capitalize on emerging keywords that their competitors are missing out on.

Use tools like Soovle and Google Keyword Planner to continuously research new keywords that your consumers are using when searching for products or services your brand offers.

Ideally, you can uncover keywords that have significant search volume and little competition, then create meaningful content around them. When you can accomplish this, you are likely to improve your backlink profile, increase site traffic and earn more social connections.

5. Monitor your competitor’s social interactions

If one or more of your competitors use their social media profiles to manage customer engagement, make sure to keep your eyes open for opportunities that allow you to offer their audience a better experience.

When you see customers complaining about their services on Facebook or Twitter, send the user a sympathetic direct message that includes an incentive for working with your brand, such as a coupon or rewards membership.

Capitalizing on these opportunities requires a measured approach that sees you actively monitoring competitive and consumer environments to get in front of upcoming trends.

When such opportunities do arise, it is important that you act swiftly, as your competitors are likely to provide a response at some point.

While following through with one of these concepts will not position your brand as an absolute industry authority, strategically fulfilling all of these recommendations over time will improve your organic search presence to a point where you can notice significant growth.

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Google logo for Charles Macintosh, the Scottish chemist who invented waterproof fabric

Google has an animated Google logo, aka Doodle, for the 250th birthday of Charles Macintosh. Charles Macintosh invented waterproof fabric, which is why Google has the man in a raincoat, to recognize his Mackintosh raincoat. In fact, the first raincoat sold in 1824 but was patented in 1823.

Charles Macintosh was born on December 29, 1766 in Glasgow, United Kingdom and died at the age of 76 on July 25, 1843.

Google wrote:

It’s a wonder how the weatherbeaten Brits coped before Scottish chemist Charles Macintosh invented his eponymous waterproof coat. His invention, patented in 1823, came about as he experimented with coal-tar naphtha and rubber and realised they could be fused together with fabric to create a waterproof surface. These days in the U.K., it’s common to call any type of raincoat a “Mac.”

Today’s Doodle shows Macintosh enjoying a Scottish rain shower whilst testing his ingenious invention.

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2016: The year in paid search (A year of massive change!)

Aloha, here we are again — coming down from the high of holiday e-commerce, the Q4 scurry of lead gen, and the calm before year-end reporting starts churning. Let’s take a breather and look back on all of the changes in PPC that came flying at us in 2016.

First, let’s get one thing out of the way. In last year’s year-end round up, I said Yahoo might be worth paying attention to in 2016 due to the renegotiated search deal with Microsoft and CEO Marissa Mayer’s stated commitment to mobile search. So long ago. It did seem like Yahoo might just be able to gain steam back then. Now, that steam is gone like the data of over a billion user accounts.

The final adieu to the Yahoo Bing Network came in February, and for many advertisers that was the last time Yahoo entered their campaign heads. Sure, if you advertise with Bing and/or Google, your ads typically show up on Yahoo, too, but other than the water cooler talk about who was going to buy Yahoo that developed into, “Will Verizon still buy it and at what discount,” Yahoo held little relevance for search marketers in 2016.

So, moving on to all the stuff that made 2016 a giant year in PPC! We’ll start with the biggies that impact most everyone and move to more specialized updates.

Major, major changes this year

There are always changes in paid search, but 2016 were not your garden variety year. There were fundamental updates that will continue to have repercussions in the years ahead. The was a lot less frustration, however, in 2016 than in the last year of major changes — when Google unleashed Enhanced Campaigns in 2013. 2016 can be seen as the year mobile truly took hold as the primary focal point in paid search, with some reports showing mobile now accounts for 60 percent of searches in the US. Desktop results were changed to reflect mobile. That Mobile preferred check box for ads went away and mobile bids can now be used as a foundation for campaign bidding. Enhanced campaigns did its job.

Google upped its PR finesse in 2016. It announced advertisers would have to rewrite all of their ads at the same time it announced device bidding is coming back. Desktop and tablet were re-separated for bidding, and it’s now possible to have mobile be the base bid. Maybe you’re not even doing anything differently yet, but knowing you can set a tablet bid adjustment or make a campaign mobile-first whenever you want feels so empowering, right? Well played, Google. Bing, which was never as restrictive with device bidding as Google to begin with, is currently piloting new bid adjustment ranges, but still makes desktop the base bid.

We first reported the biggest change of the year — Expanded Text Ads — was being tested in April. ETAs went live for everyone at the end of July. The new ad format upends how advertisers have written text ads since the inception of AdWords, more than 15 years ago. The transition hasn’t been without its bumps or teeth pulling — Google pushed the cut off for being able to edit and add standard text ads until January 31, 2017 after seeing slower-than-expected adoption of the new longer text ad format. There was the headline truncation kerfuffle, but that mostly seems to have been remedied with a narrower font, but for the most part, advertisers have taken the changes in stride, on the promise of better CTRs.

2017 will be the year we really see how ETAs perform. Early results have been mixed with some advertisers seeing dramatic bumps in click-through rates and others seeing, well, meh. Bing added support for ETAs as well, and rolled them out globally in October for much welcomed parity between the two platforms in this area.

The ushering in of ETAs was made possible, of course, by the removal of text ads in the right rail on desktop, which also made desktop echo the layout mobile results. It was quickly pointed out that longer titles and description copy in ETAs also have a way of making text ads look even more like organic listings. And speaking of making ads blend in with their organic surroundings, let’s not forget 2016 was the year of the green ad label. Green replaced the yellow in the ad labels next to the display URLs in text ads, which also happen to be green like their organic counterparts. (Want to see how Google’s color treatment of text ads has changed over the years? Here it is.)

Now, for two  announcements that generated a ton of interest, but essentially had zero impact this year. First, the Google AdWords redesign. Some advertisers do have alpha access, but there are still a lot of elements missing before the new look is ready for prime time. Still, that didn’t tamper interest in some of the very handy visualizations in the new design. We’ll have to wait until 2017 to get the full Material Design treatment that Google Merchant Center and AdSense got this year. Second, Microsoft is buying LinkedIn. The deal hasn’t closed yet, but Microsoft’s Lynne Kjolso told the audience at SMX Advance this year that discussions of advertsiing scenarios were already happening shortly after the announcement.

Shopping & Retail

With Amazon being Amazon, and Facebook’s Dynamic Product Ads and even Pinterest’s Promoted Pins gaining adoption, Google is under pressure to squeeze everything it can from product search and its product listing ads. And squeeze it did this year. Carousels of product listing ads (PLAS) are now showing up in Google Image Search, YouTube, in addition to third-party retailer sites.

Google also opened Shopping campaigns up to Customer Match, allowing advertisers to retarget customers with product listing ads with bids tailored to those audiences or exclude those audiences from Shopping campaigns.

Google started looking at ways to get more from all those broad product searches like “cocktail attire” this year. The most innovative, but perhaps least likely to succeed of these is the shop the look format for apparel and home products that pull images from partners such as Curalate and Polyvore (owned by Yahoo, so there you go) and link to a set of product ads based on the looks. The other broad query PLA format called Showcase Ads initially showed off retailer collections (shown below). But one recent variation on this featured new and used clothing on outlet-related searches.

Oh, and Purchases on Google — AKA the buy button-like feature that lets consumers shop from a PLA on their phones—is ticking along in pilot mode. Ralph Lauren, .Ugg, and Staples are among the brands that continued to test it this year.

Google took a big step in standardizing product data in Google Shopping by requiring GTINs for brand name products that are sold by multiple retailers in product feeds.

Another big change for sellers was Google’s announcement that retailers and brands must have at least 150 ratings in the past 12-months for seller ratings to appear in their ads. That was up from just 30.

Also, for manufacturers, it’s worth pointing out that Manufacturer Center is still alive. Introduced last year, but flying far under the radar, Google’s Manufacturer Center is where brands and original manufacturers can provide a primary source for their product data used in Google Shopping. Manufacturers that use it can get some pretty nifty insights into how their products perform across Google in the analytics dashboard, such as clicks made on their products versus competing products. This year, Google reduced the amount of data its requesting in Manufacturer Center, apparently because most weren’t providing complete information anyway.

Local And Maps

Local got a shake up this year with the introduction of ads in the local pack, Promoted Places pins in Maps, exposure for local inventory ads in Maps and Knowledge panels, developments in store visits metrics, and pulling Google Maps out of the Search Partners network.

Ads started showing up in the Local Finder, the listings that appear next to the Map after a user clicks on “More places” from the search results, in April, around the same time Maps was moved into general search ad inventory. Later that month, Google started testing a purple “Ad” label on Local Finder ads and a corresponding purple pin on the map on Android and desktop. That didn’t last in the local finder, but the purple labels and pins did roll out in Google Maps.

And the big development in Maps, Promoted Places, has been in testing for a good part of the year. Retailers such as Walgreens, MAC Cosmetics and Starbucks have been testing the ads on Android that feature the brand logo in the pin and can include promotions.

Though still limited to a handful of metro markets in California, another area to keep an eye on in the local space is Google’s Home Services Ads program. This year, HSA opened up to HVAC services and electricians and the whole program finally rolled out to mobile.

Google’s efforts to connect online campaigns with offline impact continued in 2016. Its store transactions measurement is still in beta and there weren’t really any announcements around that this year, but Store Visits continued to gain traction in AdWords. Google announced it had measured more than 1 billion store visits from AdWords in eleven countries as of May (it’s now available in 14 countries). Store Visits also expanded to Display Network campaigns. Finally, Store Visits data became available in distance and location reports in Adwords. (The distance report is an unsung resource for advertisers with physical locations).

Audience Targeting

Google has been steadily shifting from a focus on intent targeting to audience + intent targeting, thanks to market pressure from social networks Facebook. 2015’s Customer Match was the first big step in this area.

Big news in audience targeting is demographic targeting — age and gender — rolling out, and the ability to target similar audiences in search coming out in beta.

This fall, Google announced it would at last start to support cross-device retargeting. Google’s head of search ads, Jerry Dischler, made several announcements on audience targeting for search at SMX East in October: Cross-device retargeting extended to Retargeting Lists for Search ads (RSLA), demographic targeting for age and gender in search ads was rolling out of beta, and similar audiences for search is now in open beta. These all add up to big possibilities for refining the way we execute search campaigs in 2017 and beyond.

Analytics & Reporting

This year, Google unveiled the Analytics 360 Suite in May. The a la carte premium suite includes the rebranded versions of Google Analytics Premium, tag manager, and Adometry attribution tools, as well as a new data management platform, a testing and optimization tool, and a reporting and data visualization service. The nice thing is, the freeloaders got gifts, too. A free version of the reporting and visualization platform, Google Data Studio, rolled out early this summer. This fall, a free version of Google Optimize for landing page testing and optimization went into beta (sign up here).

Ad Extensions

A quick rundown of what happened in extension land this year:

• Bing launched a Social Extensions test in March that seems to have faded away.
• Sitelinks started showing up in swipable carousels. The new Price extensions started off as a list and then shifted to swipable carousels.
• Affiliate extensions didn’t get much fanfare when they rolled out, but I’m hoping to see some case studies on how these are working for manufacturers in 2017.
• Message extensions came out of beta. There is a lot of promise in this extension, and it will be interesting to see the kind of support Message extensions receive next year.
• A Visual Sitelinks test started running in late fall. On mobile, each sitelinks displays with an image in a swipeable carousel card. (No, it’s not just you, the swipable card carousel showed up all over the place this year.)  I’m not so sure about these, but we’ll see.
• The Promotions extension beta launched ahead of Black Friday. From what I’ve heard so far this, too, holds lots of promise.

Honorable Mentions in no order particular order

Google added native inventory to the Display Network and introduced a responsive ad format to fill it. The responsive ads can run across the GDN, including in the newly available native ad inventory. Advertisers can convert text ads to responsive ads in Editor now. It looks more may be in store for responsive ads soon.

Conversions became the king of measurement in AdWords as Converted Clicks went off to into the sunset this fall.

Salesforce users can now import their lead data right into AdWords.

A whole bunch of weird stuff happened in AdWords Keyword Planner, presumably thanks to bots. And Google added forecasting and trend data for those with active AdWords campaigns.

Google banned payday loan ads, kinda sorta.

Here’s something I was excited about when it was first announced, but have yet to do anything with and am jealous of those who have: AdWords Campaign Groups

Google started shutting down it’s Compare products in the US and UK in early in the year — a big deal to the industries affected (credit cards, auto insurance, mortgages and travel insurance).

Google updated automated bidding in AdWords and introduced Portfolio bid strategies to make it possible to set distinct CPA targets at the ad group level.

In the US, those giant car ads, Model Automotive Ads (just rolls off the tongue), came out of beta on mobile along with nearby dealer ads.

Christmas came early for Mac users with the release of Bing Ads Editor in June.

And that’s a wrap on 2016. Expect to see the trends we say this year — audiences; attribution, including online-to-offline; mobile; automation — continuing to influence change in the year ahead.

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Amazon begins testing Product Listing Ads on AdWords

In 2012, Google’s Product Search was transformed from an organic product search tool into a pay-to-play shopping destination. Since the removal of Product Search Amazon has not participated with Google’s Product Listing Ads. Until now. Merkle discovered Amazon testing PLAs in the wild – something completely new for world’s largest online retailer.

According to Merkle’s Mark Ballard Amazon appears to be testing (and increasing) it’s PLA presence. We were able to replicate these Amazon Product Listing Ads on both mobile and desktop environments. Mr. Ballard’s anecdotal research is showing that Amazon is currently more apt to appear for home goods retailers and they are trending up to a 25% impression share.

If this does become more than just a test, it could be a huge hit to other (and smaller) retailers that can’t compete with the budget of this shopping behemoth. Advertisers can compare their efforts to what Amazon is doing by researching with the Auction Insights tool.

Head on over to Merkle to read the full story and see all of the PLA data.

 

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