Internet Giants Yahoo Inc. and Google are going closer to forge a partnership for search marketing - this has become evident from a recent press release by Yahoo Press Room. According to this press release, Yahoo is going to test Google’s AdSense along with its own search products specially in the United States for two weeks and see how it goes. Of course it will be done exclusively for U.S traffic and will not include all extended products that Yahoo  has around the globe. Its affiliate products will also be free of this experiment.

It should be noted that Yahoo’s board of directors have been looking for alternative avenue after Microsoft’s unsolicited bid for the internet major. Just last week Yahoo has rejected Microsoft’s second attempt of take over citing that the software major is grossly undervaluing its worthiness. Microsoft is also getting hostile and has threatened Yahoo directors to come to an amicable understanding between the two parties or put their jobs under firing line. Microsoft says if Yahoo board do not approve its take over bid, then it will buy Yahoo shares from the open market and thus take control.

Yahoo directors have considered lots of options including inviting rival bids. But nobody is coming forward and challenge the financial might of Microsoft. As alternative, Yahoo has offered to partner Google about search marketing. The recent press release is just the beginning. Google is also interested to work with its biggest rival as it also feels uneasy with the thought of fighting two major companies alone when and if Microsoft takes over Yahoo. Because Microsoft is after Yahoo to compete with Google on all fronts including online. Just to remind readers, Google is also trying to enter into Microsoft’s territory which is evident from its launch of new software products like Android.

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Posted on April 10th, 2008 by John
Filed under: Google News, Search Engine News | No Comments »

The other day I was reading my favorite newspaper “The Telegraph”. I usually don’t have time to read weekly extras but often check those pages if there is something interesting! One such extra featured page is “Jobs” that has advertisements for all the openings around the country and sometimes international advertisements too. While I don’t look for all those vacancy advertisements as I am really content with my current position- I like to check on the featured profiles of those who made it big in their respective fields. And I found the profiles of Anurag Dod and Gaurav Mishra – co-founders of guruji.com the very own Indian search engine.

Both of them hail from typical middle class families and are products of the famed Indian education machine – the Indian Institute of Technology (IIT). They met at the IIT, Delhi from where both of them got their BTech degrees. Afterwards both of them went on to work in the dreamland (USA) as software professionals and worked in companies like Synopsys, Microsoft, eBay, Nokia. But now both of them are back to India and running a popular local search engine.

So what made them leave their lucrative jobs and venture out in a competitive world dominated by giants like Google and Yahoo?

“During late 2005, I began evaluating search engines available for India and their strength and weaknesses, I realized that Indian Internet penetration was growing exponentially and there was no focused search product at that time. The idea of India focused search engine hit me. I shared this with Gaurav whom I knew from my IIT, Delhi days. We had long discussions till we were both convinced that an India focused search engine was needed and it would give us a huge opportunity to serve the Indian market. Once we were convinced, we took the plunge”

Says Dod.

But with portals like Yahoo and Google around is there any need for a desi (indigenous) version?

“Yes there is” says Dod. Explaining he says

“Various search intents need to be better served whether it is information related, movie timing or city related-searches. Search results need to be put I the Indian context- an Indian user searching for “Prime Minister” is more likely to be looking for Prime Minister of India. We were pioneers in this field (of customization) and now big players like Google, Yahoo and MSN are doing it”.

Indeed, these two young entrepreneurs have done great things with Guruji. After lots of search test, I found that Guruji has more customized search features than the big players. One can easily search the movie times in a particular city, where to book tickets, college information =the list goes endless. It also offers multilingual search feature where surfers can search in their own language. Both Anurag and Gaurav have one dream – “To see Guruji becoming the best and the most popular search engine in India”.

Well, all my best wishes with you guys.

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Posted on February 13th, 2008 by John
Filed under: All Other Search Engines | No Comments »

Due to my pre-occupation with a regular job and commercial interests on the web, I find very little time for blogging. Sorry for that But I promise to turn to a serious blogger gradually.

As I was checking into my RSS feeds, I noticed that Matt Cutts wrote about the born of a new search engine - the Wikia. I immediately got negative feeling about it more because I am in the opinion that the Niche is the way for the future. What I mean is, the general search engine industry is already saturated and success lies in search engines that would serve specific niche industry.

Already, there are cries on the web about businesses going broke with Google AdWords simply because search marketing have become so competitive that - AdWords clicks are not getting the desired results - conversion.

I have more reservation about Wikia and this comes from my personal experiences while using their services. I tried to search few words and they were giving me errors.

While its early days for them, I believe they could have done better if they launched it after full development. My first experience have left me in bad taste.

Anyway, best of luck to the Wikia team as I have another topic to blog about.

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Posted on January 13th, 2008 by John
Filed under: Uncategorized | No Comments »

One member of Digital Point Forums reported yesterday that his site got new Google Page Rank. Within minuites, another member reported exactly which data centres where showing new Page Rank.

While many search engine marketing and optimization experts don’t give too much importance on seemingly laughable PR algorithm now, many still take pride when their sites get good or decent toolbar PR.

Myself too follow every page rank update reiligiously simply because its fascinating to see the Ohhsss, aaaahhs and yesss by webmasters during all updates.

I also checked PR update of my new sites and its not too encouraging for me as 2 of my major sites became PR0 ( due to Google penalization caused by web-spammers who linked my sites to adult sites. This also makes me suspects the new Google algorithm of allowing competitors to sabotage your site by linking it to bad neighborhood). Some sites stayed on same level and some new sites got PR way bellow my expectations.

But as I said its all still speculation and not confirmed at all. It might just be that Gogle is testing a new algorithm on some DCs and checking if everything is correct.

There are two (2) strange things that I noticed during recent Google activities that defies conventional logic.

1) Normally, Google firstly updates backlinks with link: command and then goes on to update the page rank. Bu, there has been no backlinks update this time. Its direct page rank update. If Google does not count the links I built– how can it assign me the correct Page Rank?

2) Second point of concern is that, webmasters have been reporting change of page rank of their sites all the time. Indeed, Google has been changing PR of individual sites from time to time.

So, the obvious question is– ” is Google trying to show real time PR on the toolbar?

Most probably, we will have to wait few more weeks to know exactly what Google is upto with its Page Rank that has separated it from other search engines and made itself the darling to all webmasters.

My guess is as good as yours.

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Posted on January 11th, 2008 by John
Filed under: Uncategorized | No Comments »

The search engine world is really hotting up these days. AOL - the ever so lazy boy in search engine universe is gearing up to give a run for their money to big boys by announcing to acquire Quigo- a content targeted advertising major with two major products viz. AdSonar (much like AdSense) and FeedPoint- a search engine marketing solution product.

The search engine world has seen much activity during the year 2007 with MSN revamping its search wing by introducing MSNLive and Yahoo buying the Facebook and Google launching and expanding its operations.

Read more on this story at Webmaster World 

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Posted on November 6th, 2007 by John
Filed under: Uncategorized | No Comments »

Usually, I hardly get the opportunity to be in front of the idiot’s-box . But I did find myself watching a news item at a friend’s house while sipping some beer and was naturally attracted to it once I heard three words Google and MySpace.

After some time, I was wiser as I came to know that Google and MySpace have formed a tie-up in order to enhance the profile of OpenSocial platform - that would make social networking much more easier. Thus MySpace, the biggest and most popular social networking site becomes one of the founding members of the platform along with other social networking sites like LinkedIn and Frienster. This would allow outsiders to write programs for social websites.

It seems an online social networking war is brewing up with Yahoo recently acquiring Facebook.

Read More on PCMAG

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Posted on November 6th, 2007 by John
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Today, I am proud to announce the launch of my new online venture the Search Engine Matrix (SEM) .

Little bit of background-

It has been more than one year sine I started my real journey into the internet world. It has always been my passion to know the unknown and take up new challenges. But my real-life job of teaching Politics & Economics to school children (15-17 years old) got me bored.  So I decided to pass my time on the net.

Initially, I played only games -but soon the internet bills ( I don’t have access to DSL or Broadband connection, only dial-up) - was draining away my salary. Hence I started looking for income from the virtual world.

Initially, I started as a normal directory submitte, link-builder, article and press release writer and submitter. Slowly, I graduated to webmaster and I chose the niche industry of directories as my field of work which was a natural progression since I always got fascinated with directories during my formative period.

My education background has been of great help too since I am a habituated reader. The only difference is that, instead of reading books, I was roaming around the vast internet universe reading forums and blogs on varied topics. I must say that it is the Search Engines and how they work that attracted me most.

So, after almost one and half years in the search engine field- I  decided that it is time to have a blog of my own on the topic that interests me most.

About SEL- the name and objectives :-

The name Search Engine Matrix was conceived to reflect the sand ever evolutionary environment surrounding the numerous  search engines out there on the net.One can study months after months and still find that there are so many things still to learn about them!

So here we are, SEL will bring to you all the interesting updates, news, buzz ……….on this platform from the world of Search Engines. From now on, search engine enthusiasts like me won’t have to do a virtual globe-circling as SEL will bring in all the latest developments here.

That is the essence of SEL- gather the news and informations and share them with its visitors.

So wish be best of luck