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.

After launching Buzz last week, Google have continued on the social track by now acquiring social search service Aardvark.
The deal, rumoured to be worth around $50 million, could see Google use the social search engine as an answer to, well, Yahoo! Answers. Through IM, Twitter and e-mail, Aardvark lets you ask full-text questions and then takes your social connections and attempts to identify the best person within…
I recently read Dennis Yu’s blog article Evolve or Die: 2010 Local Ad Agency Fiscal Models. Having met Dennis (2009 Search Marketing Expo in Sydney Australia), I have great respect for him as an individual and also for what his company does.
Many of the points that Dennis has made, are right on the money. Others, I feel, miss the mark.
At the centre of Dennis’s article, is…

If you ever wanted to create and launch your own search engine, then Google might now how the power to stop you.
It took the attorney’s 5 years to get it approved, but Google now officially holds a patent for its homepage.
Below is the official patent document from the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office. You will see in the image some bolded elements; these are the areas…

For the past few months it’s been a case of Bing Search this, Google Search that, but not much on the Yahoo! front.
It seems Yahoo! have been busy tinkering under the bonnet of their search engine and in the last week, some of the enhancements have gone live on the search engine.
It’s a well known fact that Yahoo! will be/is using Bing to power their organic…

Not to be outdone by the recent Bing/Yahoo! partnership and Facebook acquisition of FriendFeed, Google have gone one step further announcing a new project: a new version of Google Search.
Big news? Definitely! This isn’t just a simple update to their current search engine, but a complete overhaul and replacement.
The official word from Mr Google, Matt Cutts, is that they have been working on this project in order…

After years of poor performances and publicity turmoil, the powers that be at Yahoo! are embarking on one of the company’s most import brand overhauls.
Yahoo! already has a homepage redesign looming, which is scheduled for launch in Fall this year. The redesign was delayed by Carol Bartz back January when she took over the reigns. Perhaps she knew then what we’re starting to see unfold.
Kara Swisher, author…

The industry is readying for the grand unveiling of Microsoft’s hotly anticipated new search engine next week.
If the grapevine has its speculation right – the new search engine will get its first moment in the spotlight at next week’s D: All Things Digital event.
Microsoft has been less than subtle about the development of the new search engine with several interface and functionality tests deliberately accidentally made public,…
Last week saw the official launch of a new search engine, sorry a computational knowledge engine, named Wolfram Alpha.
This new engine had no gimmick Search Mistress spokeswoman (think the former msdewey.com), or ex- Google employees at the helm (cuil.com) – just the promise of being:
the first step in an ambitious, long-term project to make all systematic knowledge immediately computable by anyone.
Wow – now that’s some serious…

Blogs have been buzzing today with leaked screenshots of Microsoft’s new search engine, Kumo. We speculated that Microsoft might be rebranding their search engine to Kumo back in November 2008, and now internal screenshots have been leaked and an update posted on the Live Search blog.
According to a Microsoft memo, the Kumo.com URL is for internal testing purposes only and will not be available to the general…

In a move to secure their advertising revenue in tough economic times, Google have introduced AdWords ads across another web property, Google News. While Google earns most of its revenue from search advertising, placing ads across additional sites helps to boost revenue from other areas which may be falling in the current economic climate.
Since around November 2008, Google started experimenting with their AdWords listings by placing…