Excuse Me, But Where Did Google's Organic Search Results Go?
In the past many SEOs have called organic search results the results on the left side of the page and the pay-per-click / AdWords results as the results on the right side of the page. As Google has grown more aggressive witht promoting vertical/universal search I think a better way of defining the portions of the search result page are ABOVE THE FOLD and BELOW THE FOLD. As recently as yesterday Google stripped the phone numbers off of non-sponsored map listings, even if you were doing a navigational search! And that shows that the primary goal of the maps is as filler content (rather than utility).

More Ways for Google to Embed Themselves in Your Conversion Stream
The Free Credit Report ads have caused such user confusion in the marketplace that the government has felt the need to create a spoof site with $100,000 worth of amateur video to mock Free Credit Report.com. And yet even if you search for the official website [Annual Credit Report] to this very day Google is cashing in showing 3 PPC ads ABOVE the organic search results for that NAVIGATIONAL search query...sorta like how they were cashing in on eBay's brand recen

Borrowing From PPC
Search marketers know that if the title of the ad matches the searchers keyword query, they stand a good chance of getting the click. This mirroring strategy works for obvious reasons. The visitor already has a psychological attachment to the phrase - after all, they typed it in! Making Sure You Get The Click A lot of SEO strategy talks about how to achieve rankings. Whilst important, the SEO pro knows ranking is only half the battle won. While it's true to say most searchers will click on the top results in preference to results lower down the page, they will also scan across the various tit

Jeremy Shoemaker (aka Shoemoney) Interview
I have been meaning to interview Shoemoney for a while now, and after the most recent Elite Retreat we decided to do just that. I read a recent newsletter you put out about hitting rock bottom and remembering that as a key piece of 1.) what helped you grow 2.) what helped you sustain that growth. How many successful internet marketers do you know who have similar stories? How many do you know who became successful without first having hit rock bottom? There was a couple key things in helpin

Google's Conflicting Push to Move Beyond Search
As Google has looked to increase revenues and move beyond being "just a search engine" they have put themselves at the top of the food chain in multiple categories. Power corrupts and absolute power corrupts absolutely, etc. ;) If you search for books their book search is the result in natural search and when you search for movies they push their iGoogle application in paid search. Every holiday season Google tries to make further inroads in ecommerce by doing things like offering free Checkout services (at launch of Google Checkout), integrating Google Checkout with AdWords ads (and claiming this increases ad CTR by ~ 10%), and promoting Google Base / Google Product Search more a