This is the third and final installment of our assessment of the new Ask.com. As the resident linguist here, I will discuss some of the natural language technologies that have been foregrounded in the new interface. And, as a member of the paid search team, I will discuss the impact of the new [...]
Author Archives: Ehren
What does ‘Meaning’ Mean to a Search Engine?
May 30, 2007 – 1:15 pm
Outside of the government and universities, no one hires more people with PhDs in linguistics than search engines. One major reason for this is that a search engine needs to deliver results that are not based on the string of characters you type into the search box, but instead based on what your string [...]
Google Universal Search makes integrated SEM essential
May 30, 2007 – 10:38 am
What is Google’s Universal Search
Google’s introduction of Universal Search essentially brings together the various types of searchable internet content sources into one, allowing results to range across all silos of the Google landscape, including categories that were previously segregated. These silos include book search, blog search, image search, local search, video search, web search, [...]
Top 5 Worst of Search For May
May 18, 2007 – 12:59 pm
This is the first in a monthly series of posts highlighting the humorous, ridiculous and absurd in the world of search engine listings. In an age of automated keyword research and campaign management, with rich internet technologies evolving faster than the people who use them, some weird, funny stuff is bound to happen. [...]
Exploiting Site-Internal Search Systems for SEM
April 24, 2007 – 10:05 am
Many of our clients’ sites have internal search features, which allow visitors to the site to search for information within the site, such as a “Find a {Doctor/Center/Office/Event/Course/Dealership/etc.} Near You†feature. This type of internal search is powered by a searchable database, and the URLs of search results pages in this system are dynamically [...]
Best Practices for Integrated Search Engine Marketing (SEM)
October 22, 2006 – 5:21 pm
As advertisers increasingly seek to synchronize their pay-per-click and organic search engine marketing campaigns, a new strategic discipline is emerging-integrated search engine marketing. The goal of an integrated SEM campaign is to deliver better overall ROI than search engine optimization and pay-per-click campaigns would have yielded independently. This article outlines the opportunities that are unique [...]
Evaluating Visitor Quality without Transactions
September 2, 2006 – 4:10 pm
For transaction-based e-commerce websites, search engine marketing offers an unprecedented level of ROI measurement and accountability. E-commerce vendors can track their ROI on a keyword-by-keyword basis right down to the very last cent. But for other types of sites, evaluating the success of the campaign is more of a challenge. Consider, for example, [...]
Who is clicking on your paid search ads, and what were they actually searching for?
July 22, 2006 – 5:36 pm
Paid search is often touted as the perfect advertising medium, in which ads appear only for those individuals who are actually searching for the advertiser’s product right at that moment. However, while clever search engine technology goes a long way towards achieving this ideal, the “match made in heaven” of paid search depends on [...]
