SEO, Website Content Optimization
& Software Development

Yahoo has rolled out a discount scheme for its UK pay-per-click (PPC) advertisers based on the quality of traffic they receive.

The new search marketing pricing model, launched in the US earlier in the year, recognises the quality of click-through traffic coming to advertisers’ sites  from each website carrying their adverts and adjusts prices accordingly.

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US presidential hopeful Barack Obama gave a talk at Google’s headquarters yesterday, in which he outlined policies for a more open, innovative Internet.

Speaking to an audience of Google employees at the company’s Googleplex base in Mountain View, California, Obama praised the ambition and invention of the technology company that has become the world’s best-known Internet company in a little under a decade.

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Ask.com’s recent revamp of its search service is increasing their US market share, according to the latest figures from Internet metrics firm Compete.

Their share of the search market in October ‘07 was 3.9%, up from 3.6% in the previous month, hinting that the new Ask 3D service and its accompanying ‘Can your search engine do this?’ advertising campaign is paying dividends.

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According to new research, a quarter of the 11 million British users of social networking sites like Facebook and MySpace may be vulnerable to online identity fraud.

The UK government backed campaign group, Get Safe Online, has issued a fresh warning against people posting their personal details online. Although many users feel comfortable listing their name, address, date of birth and even personal telephone numbers on pages that can be easily viewed by strangers.

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Google are facing a lawsuit from an American University over claims that their search system is based on their patented technology.

Northeastern University claim that the search giant is using technology for information search and retrieval from large, distributed databases which they patented in 1997 - the year before Google was established - to underpin their service.

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Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer, in Japan to launch new Windows Live services, has signalled his company are prepared to lose money online to compete with Google.

According to an article in the International Herald Tribune,  Ballmer accepted that Google were currently in a strong position in the search market but added, “We’re in an investment mode [in online business].”

Microsoft is no stranger to using its considerable resources to prop up new or struggling divisions; it’s reported that they made a loss of $6 billion on their original Xbox games console. The launch of its successor, the Xbox 360, was largely responsible for Microsoft’s home entertainment division posting a loss of $1.26 billion in 2006. Then again, it’s not like they can’t stand it; the company recently posted quarterly profits of $4.29 billion.

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The importance of using stats when measuring a website’s performance is nothing new.

However, the ‘hit counters’ of old have now been superceded by much more sophisticated monitoring tools. Modern web stats software is capable of giving us incredibly detailed analysis of our website traffic and user behaviour, allowing us to continually improve the performance of our sites.

So why isn’t everyone using these new tools?

It amazes me how many webmasters are still reliant on basic stats tools (often those provided as part of their hosting package), or worse still, no stats at all when making decisions on their website. Trying to make good judgements without the information to base it on is like driving a car with your eyes shut - if you’re lucky you might manage to head in the right direction (though you won’t know it) but it’s more likely you’ll end up hitting a brick wall.

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