Welcome to the ineedhits Search Engine Marketing blog, where we share the latest search engine and online marketing news, releases, industry trends and great DIY tips and advise.

Google’s $700 million search deal with AOL is expiring soon and rumour has it that AOL is looking to take its money elsewhere.
Speaking at the recent Fortune Brainstorm Tech conference, AOL CEO Tim Armstrong said that the companies next search deal will not be limited to Google and Microsoft. “Search is heating up from a multi-partner space—we are not talking to two companies.”
There’s no doubt…

A few changes of the last couple of months have aroused our suspicions that Google wants to become more like Bing.
First there was the new design for the Google results page. Next was the ability to add a background to the Google homepage and now we see a newly designed Google Image Search that looks suspiciously familiar.
Let’s take a look at each of these separately.

Due to the increasing popularity of mobile marketing, Google has launched a new service which allows advertisers to track their click numbers on mobile devices.
Mobile ValueTrack is an extension of Google’s ValueTrack parameter. Rather than just being able to track the clicks you get from search and the Google Display Network, now you can see the clicks you get from mobile ads separately.
Miles Johnson from the…

We all know that Google’s ranking algorithm uses hundreds of different factors to determine the position of search results – but is your mouse pointer one of them?
According to a recent post on Seo By The Sea, the answer is Yes, after Google was recently granted a patent for determining search relevancy using pointer activity monitoring.
The patent discusses how Google may use information about where searchers…

Taking on Google in the search market is always going to be tough, but new search engine Blekko thinks they have what it takes.
After seeing other competitors like Cuil and Wikia fail, are they mad, or do they have a something special?
Blekko’s Background
Blekko has been in development for over 2 and a half years, raising over $20 million from investors in silicon valley. Still in private beta,…
Google Readies Hong Kong-Based Q&A Site
Google’s efforts around the Chinese market continue with the launch of a Hong Kong based Q&A website. This will replace several products which Google was working on in conjunction with Chinese partners.
Google Revamps Image Search, Debuts Expanded Image Search Ads
Google has given its image service a facelift. In a somewhat Bing-esque style redesign, the service will display more images on the…

Just last week, we told you about Google’s efforts to give its Place Pages more prominence in the SERP’s. Now they want local business owners to try Google Places for free.
If you sign-up before 23rd July, then Google will give you a free 30-day trial of it’s tag advertising program within Google Places.
Tags offer local businesses an opportunity to enhance their Google Maps listings with a note…

Redirects can be used for a variety of reasons, but it’s important to consider which type of redirect works best from an SEO point of view. Implementing the wrong type of redirect can have a negative impact on your rankings and prevent old pages from passing on their full link value.
Two main types of redirect
301 Redirect
Permanent redirects are commonly used when redesigning websites and when pages…

Yahoo has sent out an email to advertisers which confirms they will be testing Bing powered organic results on live Yahoo! traffic for the first time this month. This puts the search merger on schedule for a rollout in August which we mentioned last month.
Here’s what they had to say in the email:
To help us deliver on our goal of transition with quality, we are conducting…

A recent study outlines the top 10 factors that influence whether a customers buys from your site or not.
It’s not surprising that clearly stated information comes in at number one. Here is a rundown of the results:
Let’s take a look at each factor in more depth…
It all comes down the trust, the less information you include in the ordering process/shopping cart…