Real time search results. Recently we’ve seen both Google and Bing attempt to include Tweets in their SERPs however it was apparent from the out-set that they weren’t quite ready. From a ranking perspective it simply didn’t seem fair that people could get a number one result just because they were the last person to tweet a certain search term. So this year hopefully Google (and the other search engines) can develop a fair and effective way of integrating real time search.

Conversion rate optimisation. One of the most important reasons for a business to improve its online presence through SEO is because it wants more people to find its website and to make more money. However often the conversion rate isn’t as high as it should be.  We’re now into the realms of conversion rate optimisation and this year I think it’s going to be important for more agencies to introduce CRO as part of their standard SEO process. It’s very measurable, normally with a good ROI when done well and therefore should be an added string to any SEO bow.

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Microsoft Corp. registered a 0.4% increase in their search market share in June at the slight expense of Yahoo! not Google, said comScore.

The bigger picture of the worldwide search market now looks like this (figures updated on July 9th):

• Google 90.85%
• Yahoo: 4.26%
• Bing: 3.04%

32% of Bing visitors come from the US, taking BING’s search market share in the US to 8.45% (StatCounter, June 2009), an additional 0.4%, whilst Google remains stable at 65%. However in the UK Bing only represents 2.56% of the search market.

What’s in it for users?

Microsoft presented Bing not as a search engine, but as a decision search engine, offering more contextual, relevant results to help decision making. (more…)

Recently we have had Wolfram Alpha offering a comprehensive “computational” knowledge engine and Google Squared promising a simple way of pulling organised data from websites into a spreadsheet style format.

Now last week we have seen Microsoft’s Live Search engine evolve into what they are now calling their decision engine. Originally code-named Kumo and supported by Microsoft’s hefty marketing muscle, Bing has been launched. (more…)

So Bing it is, not Kumo, Hook or even Sift. Microsoft’s new search engine will be called Bing, whether that is after the “Friends” character Chandler Bing or the noise you hear on cartoons when someone has an idea is up to you.

Microsoft claims that Bing is going to be not only a search engine, but “a decision engine and consumer brand.” They are expecting the service will enable its users the opportunity to make better decisions and get easier access to the information they are searching for when using a search engine. (more…)