Digital Marketing by Patrick LaJuett

Restaurant Menus Appearing in Google Search Google search now shows menus for restaurants directly in search results pages. Some listings also include tabs for different parts of the menu and pricing.  Menus current appear in the US only. Google Announcement on G+: https://plus.google.com/+google/posts/6oM6nXzfhJS The menus do not appear for all restaurants. Initial tests show that the menu information does appear on the related restaurant's website (in either HTML or PDF format). Side by side view of Google menu results, and PDF version on restaurant website Patrick LaJuett manages a website design agency : + LaJuett.com , where he supports clients as a Web technology consultant and search marketing strategy adviser.

Google Snippets in Search Results Snippet Discovery I recently discovered a unique occurrence of Google snippets that appeared in a Google search engine results page (SERP).  It happens to be one of my portfolio pages, so naturally, it peaked my interest. A Google snippet is a description of or an excerpt from the webpage.  A snippet refers to the description portion of a Google search listing. Take a look at the SERP snippet below: Note, the snippet is made up of an element count (40+ items), the meta description, and four excerpts from the page. Page Rendering in Browser Here's what the portfolio page looks like when rendered in the browser: Underlying Page Code In this case, it appears as though the Google bot has gone into the page code, and parsed out the top four image descriptions.  What's interesting is that the page contains an html table with alternating rows.  Images, followed by the company name and location. ...

I recently received this question from a client needing SEO help: "I have a website for my company XYZ...the site is a Google Site. For some reason, my site is not indexed at all. Can you help?" Diagnosing the Problem Using Google Webmaster Tools, it became quickly apparent that Google was aware of the website (site was verified and an XML sitemap was uploaded).  But for some reason the search engine was not indexing it. The first thing I looked at was the robots.txt file to make sure no-follow wasn't blocking the Google bot.  Seemed OK.  Next I took a look at the page's source code...here's what I found: Page Source (Before):   HTTP/1.1 200 OK Content-Type: text/html; charset=utf-8 X-Robots-Tag: noindex, nofollow, nosnippet Last-Modified: Wed, 06 Nov 2013 19:27:23 GMT ... This is a problem!  Digging deeper...when I looked at the Google Sites Sharing and Permissions settings, it was set to " Anyone who has link can view ". This was ...

An updated warning and explanation from the Google Content Guidelines. My take away...play by the rules or be penalized. In summary: "The best way to get other sites to create relevant links to yours is to create unique, relevant content that can quickly gain popularity in the Internet community. The more useful content you have, the greater the chances someone else will find that content valuable to their readers and link to it." Read full article: Updated 10/02/2012   http://support.google.com/webmasters/bin/answer.py?hl=en&answer=66356

Another great resource from the GetListed.org Learning Center... Numerous articles in the learning center will help give you a better understanding of how the local search engines work, and how to use them to promote your business effectively. Local Search Glossary – Jargon Definitions and Explanations SEO   Trying to understand how the search engines work can be tough--especially if some of the terminology is new to you. We hope this alphabetized glossary helps you sort through Local Search jargon.   http://getlisted.org/resources/glossary.aspx

If I had to recommend one thing regarding SEO/inbound marketing...embrace the social media tools like blogging, Twitter , Facebook, YouTube, etc. Google is transforming the way it ranks content: http://www.wired.com/magazine/2010/02/ff_google_algorithm/ You can already get a hint at what's on the horizon with universal or blended search (Websites, video, images, local maps, and even social "mentions"). According to Google, "The ultimate goal of universal search is to break down the silos of information that exist on the web and provide the very best answer every time a user enters a query." If a potential customer has a question...it makes sense to provide Google with your "very best answer".