P E S A K

Here is a recap of what happened in the search forums today, through the eyes of the Search Engine Roundtable and other search forums on the web.

Search Engine Roundtable Stories:

• How Do Big Brands Do Link Building?
  The small folk wonder how the bigger brands succeed at their link building efforts. In a big corporation, it would take jumping through a lot of hoops to get the correct managers to sign off on link building approval, especially as they may want to verify that every site that they link build upon is kosher. But do big brands really do link building? Not so much. They are already known so well within the
• My Domain Expired and Another Company is Using It!
  A High Rankings Forums member accidentally let his domain expire, and some company snatched it. The company stole all of the old content. Is there anything he can do besides tell them to take it down? Well, in this case, yes. Since the new company is using the old content, it is likely to be a DMCA violation since the forum member likely holds all copyrights to the content that is currently being used by
• Can Google's Lively Improve Search Results Rankings?
  Google's Lively project, announced yesterday and is somewhat of a Second Life clone (a virtual world within a web page), has gained a lot of momentum with a lot of Techmeme discussion. But can Lively help your search rankings? Probably not -- unless your Lively page is, well, lively. As Tedster puts it, your backlink profile is still the strongest indicator of your search rankings. When it comes to PR, that only comes from your
• Do Meta Descriptions Help You Rank Higher in Google?
  A WebmasterWorld thread has discussion around the META description. There is no doubt that most search engines look and use the META description on some level. Google and Yahoo and Live Search may use it for your search results snippet, the text under your site's listing in the search results (illustrated here). But does that META description actually have an impact on how well your page will rank in Google for a specific keyword phrase?
• The Tide Has Shifted: Microsoft adCenter Begins to Outpace Yahoo Search Marketing
  First there was Goto.com (aka Overture.com) as the leader in PPC by advertiser spend. Then Google outpaced Overture. Overture was bought by Yahoo and Yahoo's Overture (now Panama) secured the second place in advertiser spend. Well, now, it seems like a couple advertisers are beginning to report a major milestone for Microsoft adCenter. Two very well respected and seasoned PPC specialists have announced that Microsoft adCenter has accounted for more spend then Yahoo. Is this
• Google AdWords Tests Flipping Background Colors
  The iCrossing blog captured screen shots of Google testing flipping the standard blue background line to the AdWords yellow background color. Typically, the line that contains "X results of ..." contains a blue background and typically, the AdWords ads at the top, above the organic listings has a yellow background. Here is what the Google user interface typically looks like: But as iCrossing found, Google flipped them and it looks like this: iCrossing must be

Other Great Search Forum Threads:

• Have you checked your DNS lately?, WebmasterWorld
• How Matt Cutts Got Ranked for "Cheap Viagra" (Again!), Sphinn
• The Definition of Social Media Marketing: How to Find the Best Social Media Consultant, Sphinn
• AdWords Downtime: July 12, 10am-2pm PST, Google Groups
• Google Snubs XML: Invents Its Own Data Exchange Format: Protocol Buffers, WebmasterWorld
• Microsofts Backs Icahn's Bid to Boot Yahoo Board, WebmasterWorld
• Multiple Product Pages Versus One Product Page, Cre8asite Forums
• Serious flaw found in Domain Name System, WebmasterWorld
• The Six SEOs I Would Want to Be Stuck in an Elevator With, Sphinn
• Top 10 URL Design Failures of Famous Websites, Sphinn
• Top 5 Reasons To Attend SMX Local , Sphinn