Weekly Five: Google’s Newest Penalty and an Improved Mobile Video Ad Platform

Want to know what WebMechanix has been thinking about this week? Here are the top five stories our marketing team came across.

Penalty for Sites With Too Many DMCA Takedown Requests

Google is updating its algorithm to devalue sites that host pirated content in its search engine results. This action comes in response to a massive uptick in the number of Digitial Millenium Copyright Act (DMCA) complaints received by the company.

Creative industries are welcoming the move as an effort to reduce the amount of content stolen online. For businesses, this reinforces the importance of having original content on their site and the necessity to avoid exposing your business to both the legal and financial ramifications of duplicating content from other sites and sources.

Link: http://searchenginewatch.com/article/2198490/Google-Sites-With-More-DMCA-Takedown-Requests-Will-Rank-Lower-in-Search-Results

Will Google Crowdsource Website Recommendations?

This feature could be applied to a wide array of web content, including blog posts, images, advertisements, and more. Industry insiders will be carefully watching developments concerning this feature in the months ahead.

This feature could be applied to a wide array of web content, including blog posts, images, advertisements, and more. Industry insiders will be carefully watching developments concerning this feature in the months ahead.

Link: http://www.seobythesea.com/2012/08/google-crowdsource-recommendations/

Yellow Page Publishers Merge

Two of the biggest US yellow pages publishers-DexOne (dexone.com) and SuperMedia (superpages.com & localsearch.com)–are completing a merger in an all-stock transaction. Assuming the merger closes, Dex-SuperMedia will be one of three main yellow page publishers in the US–the other two being YP and Yellowbook.

The Dex-SuperMedia merger is further evidence of local businesses transitioning from print advertising to online advertising.

Link: http://searchengineland.com/us-yellow-pages-publishers-merge-to-form-entity-focused-on-local-digital-advertising-131138

AdWords Video Ads Now Target Mobile Devices

YouTube’s paid advertising model, TrueView, can now target mobile devices. At the moment the video ads will only target Android devices, but Google has plans to implement the ads on iOS and Windows Mobile devices soon.

“You can customize your ad campaigns so they reach a broad audience, or focus on a niche group, depending on your marketing goals,” writes Phil Farhi, group product manager of YouTube. As with the desktop version of TrueView, advertisers will only pay if users watch the entire ad or the first 30 seconds (whichever happens first).

Link: http://searchenginewatch.com/article/2200736/YouTube-Brings-TrueView-Ads-to-Mobile

How Google went from Search Engine to Content Destination

Google achieved its fame by providing the 10 most relevant links possible for user. Now, things are different. This last year has shown an aggressive departure in how Google offers users their content.

The company’s aggressive focus on becoming a creator and provider of content has caused many to raise an eyebrow. While the company still enjoys a very loyal fanbase, some of the recent decisions have caused them to exclude previous advocates–Apple fans, Facebook fans, and more. Read this article to learn more about the enemies Google has been making and how its going to need to walk a very careful line to stay out of trouble.

Link: http://marketingland.com/how-google-went-from-search-engine-to-content-destination-19272