A Smattering of SEO: 7/30/14

Hello my friends, and welcome to another week of SEO news. Much of this past week’s news was dominated by a new animal in the Google kingdom, and by that I mean an algorithm shift, so let’s take a look!

Google News:

• Google Launches “Pigeon” Local Search Algorithm – This is the big news, folks. A few days ago, Google launched a new algorithm specifically aimed at improving local search. According to Google, the update goes deeper into web search capabilities such as synonyms, the Knowledge Graph, and misspellings. These additions, along with improved distance and location ranking parameters, should help give users better local results. So far it’s already cleared up one problem Google was having with Yelp, in which the local search giant complained their results were being ignored in favor of Google’s. We’re still not sure as to how wide the impact of this new algorithm will be, but we’ll keep you updated as we learn more.

• Over 100,000 Links Removed In “Right To Be Forgotten” Purge – Google has reportedly removed over 100,000 links as a result of new “right to be forgotten” laws in the European Union (a number Google has yet to officially confirm). Other reports are coming in saying that Google has approved a little over half of the requests to be removed. Apparently around 91,000 individuals have asked for over 328,000 links to be removed, and most of the requests have apparently come from France, Germany, and the UK, in that order.
• Google Domains – Invites Begin Rolling Out – Search Engine Roundtable is reporting that webmasters are receiving invites into the beta program of Google’s new Domains service. This will allow users to register a domain directly through Google for $12. It’s unclear if having a Google-registered domain will help with SEO (we seriously doubt it), but the convenience of managing domains through a single Google account along with free private registration and 100 email addresses will be more than enticing enough for people to switch over their domains. I’m tempted to do it myself when I’m able to.

Other News:

• Yandex Has Stellar Q2 As Revenue, Queries, & Paid Clicks All Soar – Yandex, the Russian search engine, has had a stellar Q2. Revenue was, in USD, around $361.5 million, which is up 30% year over year. Income was up 13% year over year at $1.08 billion USD. The search engine also saw tremendous increases in paid clicks (up 36%), organic queries (up 21%), and now has nearly 62% of the Russian search market. Pretty snazzy.
• Bing Launches Site Safety Information In Search Results – Bing has launched a new feature called the Bing Site Safety Page. This will show relevant information in search results pages regarding links Bing finds dangerous. These links could include malware-infected sites, or sites with malicious JavaScript. Users can click on a link to get more detailed results as well, which should also be great for webmasters trying to diagnose their own site issues.

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