Social Traffic Mislabeled "Direct" A new study by SparkToro concludes that a considerable percentage of website traffic coming from social media sites is often mischaracterized as "direct&

Search + AI Drive Google, MSFT Earnings Both Google and Microsoft reported positive earnings yesterday. Microsoft beat expectations with ~$53B, while Google posted $69.8B in total revenue. For Microsoft, overall

Amazon F(ai)ke Reviews One of the primary use cases for Amazon has been product reviews. This is well established by consumer surveys. And reviews are obviously a major

Peak SMB for GBP? Like other large tech companies publishing "economic impact" reports, Google's is mostly PR. Published annually since 2009, it argues the company'

SanFranciscoGPT At Near Media, we don't equally agree on how disruptive AI will be to local search. I'm probably the most bullish of the three of

'Panicked' Google Readies Magi By now you've read or read coverage of the NY Times article yesterday that says Google is "panicking" over AI

Google Throttling Local Packs? What's happening with the Local Pack? Last year, Moz and LocalSEOGuide noticed a drop Local Pack frequency, from 40% and 42% of SERPs to

Bargle Uses Yelp for Local Results Miriam Ellis at Moz compares local results from Google and Bard and finds Bard wanting. Beyond critiquing the quality of results, her article is

Google's Post-Cookie Manifesto Victor Wong is sincere when he says that Google's Privacy Sandbox initiative is trying to solve the cookie problem for publishers, consumers and

Just Bargle It Google + Bard = Bargle. Google will be integrating Bard into the SERP. That's according to an interview of CEO Sundar Pichai in the WSJ, part of

Search Movement Afoot There's some evidence that Bing has grown usage modestly since the introduction of BingGPT. However its share vs. Google appears largely unchanged according to other

Bard, Google Assistant to Merge Google's tentative rollout of Bard hurt the perception of Google's technology leadership. So CEO Sundar Pichai is now doing PR interviews.

Google: 20% More Fake Reviews in 2022 Earlier this week we discussed how review attacks are becoming more creative. Jason Brown is documenting many of these cases, including how hotels

Fake Positive Review Attacks? Ever heard of a "5-star review attack"? A hostile party posts obviously fake 5-star reviews -- in order to make a business look bad?

Google 'Online Conversion Local Ads' Michel Van Luijtelaar of GMBapi.com brought our attention to what he/Google is calling "online-conversion Local Ads." These units can

Local Ranking Factors 2023 Whitespark just published the 2023 version of the Local Search Ranking Factors study (LSRF). There's a lot there to digest. We'll discuss

AI Everywhere All at Once   Microsoft is all-in on AI. Seemingly, it's everywhere, all at once. This week Adobe introduced Firefly, a set of generative AI tools for

Whither the Local Pack? After the EU's Digital Markets Act (DMA) passed a year ago, we began to speculate about the impact it could have on Google local

TikTok Ban: What Happens Now? Roughly two years of negotiations between the US government and TikTok have come to an impasse. The US is (again) demanding divestiture but China is

ChatGPT-4 Est Arrivé Yesterday OpenAI released ChatGPT-4, which represents a leap ahead compared to version 3.5. It's multimodal, meaning it can understand and produce images and video

GoWalla Take Two Local social networking (or social cityguide) app GoWalla is back. GoWalla was originally Foursquare's primary competitor. Both launched in 2009. Foursquare survives today, albeit in

MSFT: BingGPT Is Working It's been roughly a month since the introduction of BingGPT. And this week Microsoft's Yusuf Mehdi announced that the search engine had

Her Is Here An Israeli start-up Chat.D-ID has combined ChatGPT with an AI avatar that you can actually talk to and who will talk back. Pictured below, it is

Ask Jeeves, Gist & Phind The "conversational search" model embodied by Ask Jeeves in its early days may represent the future of search/discovery. Rather than indexing documents,

How AI Changes Local Listings & Rep Management Every major listings and reputation management company is now adding or will add AI capabilities. At the risk of leaving someone out,

BingGPT Not a 'Google Killer'   You've seen the conjecture that ChatGPT will render Google obsolete within two years. After finally gaining access and testing out BingGPT,

ChatGPT: They Like Me! There's been an abundance of "insider" debate about ChatGPT. But what do consumers think? The first survey we've seen comes

Beyond Search Engines User behavior is changing. Here are three macro-trends: 1) AI-assisted discovery, 2) searching beyond search, 3) shifting social media engagement. As we all know, AI is potentially

Why Apple Holds Back in Search Most of the discussion this past week in search has again been about BingGPT, its alter-ego Syndey and how Microsoft is trying to minimize

Will GPT-Search Get Sued?   We've written before about the upcoming SCOTUS case Gonzalez v. Google. The central question is whether algorithmic recommendations are entitled to protection under Section

GPT: Shiny Object Syndrome Exactly one week ago was Google's Paris event, followed by a $100 billion investor sell-off. That was attributed to a factual error in Google&

Do Super Bowl Ads Matter? It was a great game, but what about the ads? This year they cost ~$7 million for 30 seconds. Do they deliver value? That'

BingGPT: Will People Care? The BingGPT vs. Google Bard story is everywhere. I understand why; it's the first really exciting thing to happen in search for a long

Google Underwhelms in Paris Google is arguably the most powerful AI company in the world. However that wasn't really on display in today's "Live from

Google Teases Bard This Wednesday in Paris, Google will preview its answer to ChatGPT (Bard) at an event entitled "Search, Maps and Beyond." In many ways this has

AI-Generated (Fake) Reviews TripAdvisor's top-rated restaurant in Montreal doesn't actually exist. Its creation was a prank by a Canadian comedian to prove that review platforms don&

Yahoo Ready to Climb 'Search Mountain' Yahoo really is going to reinvest in search. The company has been teasing this on Twitter over the past couple of weeks.

Yandex & Google Ranking Factors Since Russian search engine Yandex's ranking algorithm was "leaked" or hacked last week, SEOs have been pouring over it for insights

Subsidize Local Ads to Save News A new coalition of groups called Rebuild Local News has proposed a dramatic tax-based solution to the problem of collapsing local journalism, which is

DOJ: Break Up Google Ad Manager The US Justice Department (DOJ) has now filed two antitrust lawsuits against Google. The first, in 2020, covers search and paid search. That will

Google's AI Store Inventory Google recently announced several new AI-based tools for retailers. Some are focused on e-commerce, offering improved personalization and recommendations for retailer websites. More interesting

Will AI Deliver for SMBs? While there's been considerable discussion about how AI will revolutionize digital marketing for brands and agencies, I haven't seen much on

AI Content: Proceed with Caution AI is the industry's shiny new object, which has undeniable momentum. Google's DeepMind appears poised to introduce a ChatGPT competitor. One

The Death of Recommendations? Most people aren't following the forthcoming SCOTUS case Gonzalez v. Google. Arguments will be heard in February. To recap the facts: US citizen Nohemi

Apple Means Business Connect Don't call it "Apple My Business." Today the company announced Apple Business Connect (not Apple Maps Connect). Not unlike GBP, it'

Apple XR Headset the New Google Glass? Following CES, there are reports that Apple will announce its long-awaited mixed-reality headset at the WWDC conference this year. The company is reportedly

Search: AI-Results a Giant Snippet Neeva and You.com have started showing AI-generated results in their SERPs. This follows news that Microsoft is planning to add AI-chat to Bing to

Can Bing Beat Google with AI Chat? There's already been enormous coverage and speculation about the potential impact of AI chat on search and Google in particular. You

Our most popular articles and podcasts of 2022.

Musk Looking for Way Out To say that Elon Musk's short tenure as Twitter CEO has been disastrous is an understatement. We could recount the "parade of

Anti-Google Maps Coalition Amazon (AWS), Meta, Microsoft and TomTom have joined forces with The Linux Foundation to form the Overture Maps Foundation. The project is very similar in principle to

Local Guide Reviews Favored Sterling Sky recently published a case study examining the impact of different review features and characteristics on what we might call "review longevity" – how

ChatGPT: Google's 'Innovator's Dilemma' ChatGPT explainer videos are all over TikTok. And this morning, ChatGPT servers were crashing under the weight of all the

AI Content Threat to Google Looking back, 2022 will be remembered as a breakthrough year for AI. Between AI-image generators such as DALL-E and Lensa and ChatGPT, marketers and the

Google 'Getting Worse' – Again Months ago a popular discussion topic was: Google ain't what it used to be. The Freakonomics radio show last week revisited the

ChatGPT and Local Search Like a lot of people, I've been playing with OpenAI's ChatGPT chatbot. It's "early days" and it makes

Users Want Review Transparency The state of reviews is fraught. Reviews remain highly influential but consumers are more skeptical and generating fewer of them now. In addition, Google is using

Due to a technical issue, many subscribers did not receive our newsletter yesterday. Apologies if this is a duplicate in your inbox. Survey: 74% Buying Links A recent survey of

Cyber Weekend Boom Going into "cyber weekend" retail prognosticators were unsure whether consumers would open their wallets. But according to Adobe data, online sales were up between 2%

We will be taking the remainder of the week off for the US Thanksgiving holiday. Amid the problems and challenges we all face, there's still a lot to

Google 'Search On' Features Roll Out Google is now introducing the many visual search, shopping and Maps features announced in September at its Search On event. Among them

Holiday: Big Retailers Sweat, SMBs Cocky Holiday shopping this year is shaping up to be pretty unpredictable. Driven by early promotions, data show many consumers have already started, which could

Google's $392M Location Privacy Settlement Google has agreed to pay almost $400 million to settle a location-tracking lawsuit brought by 40 state attorneys general. Being called "the

Local Reviews Have Peaked This week I received a review-solicitation from Tripadvisor. It asked me to write reviews, not review a specific businesses. The headline was "one review does

Local Packs: 36.2% of Queries Local Packs aren't exactly disappearing but they're not showing up as often either. A week ago a number of reports

AirBnB: Brand Not SEM Most internet companies pay lip service to brand building but continue to favor short-term performance marketing. That typically means paid-search and paid social. AirBnB offers an

TikTok's SMB Opportunity TikTok is getting more local. Beyond isolated but dramatic SMB success stories (e.g., Nerdy Nuts) or experimental features (e.g., TikTok Nearby), I'

Rewind: A 'Backward' Search Engine Inspired by founder Dan Siroker's experiences with hearing loss, Rewind is a new Mac OS search engine that captures every piece

Twitter Purge Begins If you're still on Twitter, you probably fall into one of three camps: the boosters, the haters or those who want to wait and see.

Google Local Pack Decline There's evidence that Google is reducing the frequency of Local Packs. Barry Schwartz has compiled data from Moz, Rank Ranger and Semrush that show

Study: Zero-Clicks Only 25% A much-cited, 2020 study from Rand Fishkin's SparkToro and SimilarWeb argued that 65% of searches on Google were "zero-click." In other words,

More In-Store Shopping than Pre-COVID Despite hand-wringing over inflation, consumer spending has remained relatively strong. We'll have to see how that plays out during holiday shopping. But retailers

Google MAC Rollout Announced this year at Google I/O, My Ad Center (MAC) is starting to roll out. The new controls will give users the ability to influence ads

Meta Forced to Divest Giphy Facebook parent Meta said yesterday that it would sell Giphy. This is the first time Meta has been forced to divest a completed acquisition and

Fake Reviews: New Rules Coming The Federal Trade Commission (FTC) has been focusing more energy and resources on online review and endorsement fraud. Early this year the agency killed review

Google's New Ad-Favicons Google is seeking to boost brand visibility in mobile search ads. Provided marketers qualify, the business name and logo will be shown on the ad

Meta Wants to Own the Next Platform Meta held its now annual VR event yesterday, featuring the announcement of a $1,500 Meta Quest Pro mixed-reality headset. It's

AI Assistant Super App If the Twitter deal happens, Elon Musk suggested he wants to turn it into an "everything app" or "super app" à la

Google: Review Gating Verboten   Google recently updated its review content guidelines to clarify the following are disallowed: "Discouraging or prohibiting negative reviews, or selectively soliciting positive reviews from customers.

Twitter Moderation Headache So Elon Musk is buying Twitter after all. One theory holds that Musk thought he would lose at trial. Assuming the deal actually happens, Musk will inherent

Gen Z: Google > TikTok Much in the same way that Google's fixation and fear of Facebook resulted in the ill-fated Google+, Google now seems to be similarly

Have We Reached 'Peak Reviews'? Consumer reviews are a major local ranking factor, with intense industry focus on review management. At the same time we may have reached

Google: 'Age of Visual Search' Is Here   Google just concluded its "Search On" event, showcasing search innovations. It was mostly a review or update of things

Instacart Goes After Amazon As consumers returned to grocery stores and restaurants, delivery companies have scrambled for continued revenue growth. Instacart has very imaginatively sought to transform itself into an

Google Kills 'Consumer Surveys' Google is in cost-cutting mode. The company will stop making laptops and discontinued half its "Area 120" projects. And just yesterday it

Paid Search Doubles in Three Years   Almost since its inception, paid search marketing has been the leading category of digital advertising. It has maintained that position even as other formats

Where's the (Local) Innovation? A few years ago I wrote an article entitled "Why is there so little innovation in local?" It decried the lack of

Search: Apple and Andi This week Apple finally released iOS 16. Among other changes and upgrades, Apple put its search box on the iPhone's homescreen. Before Apple'

Instacart's Platform Strategy Food Delivery services may be holding their own but they face intensifying pressures from investors, labor shortages, weakening consumer demand and regulatory scrutiny. Diversification and

Apple Ads Gain on 'Triopoly' The big Apple news this week surrounds its new devices. But an equally important story is Apple's ad business. Apple'

Is a Yahoo Comeback Possible? This week Yahoo acquired a company called The Factual. It's essentially a news-ranking algorithm that rates the credibility of sources. In my brief

We will not publish on Monday in honor of the US Labor Day holiday. We'll be back next Wednesday. Enjoy the weekend. Google 'Quick Read' Label

Kochava, Roomster Targeted by FTC   Reflecting a massive shift in attitudes toward data collection, Oracle was sued last week over its ID Graph with non-consensual profiles of "hundreds of

Google Takes Digital Ads 'Offline' Many years ago Google aspired to be a unified platform for all forms of advertising – digital and traditional, including radio and TV. To

Nextdoor Needs to Become More 'Useful' This past week Nextdoor announced the outcome of its 2022 "Neighborhood Favorites" contest. The winners, who receive badges on their

TikTok Testing 'Nearby' Feed TikTok confirmed it's testing a new "Nearby" feed (in Asia), intended to showcase locally relevant content to users. Another feature

Google's HCU to Make Landfall   Last week Google announced it would be rolling out a Panda-like algorithm update rewarding "content made by, and for, people." It&

Google to Punish 'SEO-first' Content Most B2B content today is for lead-gen purposes or designed to rank. So many B2B SERPs are a wasteland of thin content, pitches

Product Inventory = Local Visibility At one time, there were multiple startups chasing real-time product inventory. The methodologies were varied but almost all of them are now gone, just as Google

Ads Coming to Apple Maps More ads are coming to your iPhone. That's according to Bloomberg's Mark Gurman. Apple's ad revenue is nearly $4

TikTok, BlenderBot and Search TikTok isn't going to replace Google. But among Gen Z users, it does appear to be gaining traction as a search alternative in selected

Nextdoor: Daily Users ~19 Million Nextdoor posted Q2 revenue yesterday of $55M, representing 19% year-over-year revenue growth. This was generally considered a slight miss. The company also lowered its full-year

Cox Buys Axios for Local News Axios, the digital news site delivering journalism via bulleted lists has sold itself to Cox Enterprises for $525 million. Axios' 2022 revenues are

Twitter 'Location Spotlight' Rolls Out Last April Twitter launched what amounts to a GMB/GBP profile on its platform for selected businesses with physical locations. Called "Location

Brand Beats Performance Marketing Whether or not we're in a recession, many marketers are acting like it. Tech companies are laying people off and marketing budgets are tightening.

The End of 'Location Intelligence'?   The era of precise mobile-location data, which spawned numerous "location intelligence" vendors (e.g., Foursquare) may be coming to a close.

Apple and Amazon Defy Gravity After two quarters of negative growth the US may be in a recession, although that's disputed. Whether or not it's technically

Earnings: Digital vs. E-Commerce Snap, Twitter, Microsoft and Google revenues have all disappointed Wall Street recently. (Meta reports today, Apple tomorrow.) Yesterday, Google missed on both the top and bottom

LSAs, 'Verified Reviews' and Liability A week ago Robin Dirksen discovered that Google was testing a "not verified" label for local reviews (see below). I assumed

Facebook Splits the Baby Facebook has broken its Feed in two. There will now be Home and Feeds tabs in the app. Feeds will feature "recent posts from your

Some Action on Fake Reviews Facebook groups are among the major sources of fake reviews across the internet. However, the company has shown little interest in shutting down the fraud

'TikTok Is My Search Engine' Last week's story about 40% of younger users abandoning Google Maps/Local for social media (triggered by a TechCrunch report) continues

Amazon: Prime Day 'Biggest Ever' In the weeks before Prime Day there was speculation that this year's event would disappoint. Amazon has now put out a

Google: 40% of Zoomers Shun Search, Maps Speaking at a recent conference, Google SVP Prabhakar Raghavan made a casual remark. "In our studies, something like almost 40% of young

What Will Happen to Twitter Now? Back in April, a lifetime ago, Elon Musk made his shock $44 billion offer for Twitter. He filed it formally on April 13. In

Review Extortion, Libel & Liability Review fraud is illegal and it's flourishing. Despite rising awareness of fake reviews, usage is up. An undisputed ranking signal, reviews are also

Google to Auto-Delete Location We keep writing about privacy because it's an issue that isn't going away and only becoming more important in the wake of

In observance of the US July 4th holiday we will not publish on Monday. We'll be back next Wednesday. Apple's Local Car Play Apple will soon

Google's Commerce Boss Heads to Pinterest Pinterest's co-founder and CEO, Ben Silbermann, is stepping down and will become executive chairman. Google Commerce boss Bill Ready will

Dobbs Creates Personal-Data Minefield   Following the demise of Roe, many companies announced they would pay for abortion-related employee travel: Apple, Google, Facebook, Salesforce, Yelp, Dicks Sporting Goods, Neflix and others.

Post-Roe: Data Privacy Now More Urgent Now that Roe v. Wade has been overturned, data privacy becomes even more urgent for millions of women. Multiple states, perhaps even a majority,

Google Is Full of 'SEO Chum' There's a growing perception that Google is in decline or dying. This is happening even as its "back end&

Two-Factor Fake Review Fix Review bombing is becoming a bigger problem. It shows up with games and, more often, movies and TV. Typically, it's a loosely organized effort

1K Keywords: 34% Are Local Earlier this week we discussed the top 1,000 search keywords (desktop). Two things jumped out: the list is dominated by brand and local queries.

Brands, Local Dominate Top Searches Food near me and restaurants near me are the leading local queries in the top 1,000 keywords according to a recent analysis (using Ahrefs

Debating the Outlook for Facebook A number of speculative articles have recently appeared, some undoubtedly driven by schadenfreude, about whether Facebook/Meta is merely pivoting or foundering. For example, the

Amazon Eyeing 'Local Ads' Opportunity Earlier this week job listings for an Amazon Local Ads "startup business within Amazon Ads" appeared. One listing for a senior

Apple's WWDC Highlights Apple's developer conference, WWDC, happened this week. With the exception of a new MacBook Air, the announcements focused on software. We were struck

Yep It, Says Ahrefs Last week we discovered Yep, a new search engine from Ahrefs (that's right). It reportedly cost $60 million to build and has its own

Sheryl Sandberg Leaves the Building In the roughly 48 hours since Meta COO Sheryl Sandberg said she was leaving the company, there's been an outpouring of commentary about