Tad Chef talks about  10 ways to use Google Buzz for SEO and SMO. He covers everything from indexing to keyword research to link building to personal branding.

For example, while most people compare Buzz to Twitter and Facebook, it’s in reality a rival to Tumblr and Posterous, Chef writes. It’s good for content you want to “drop quick and dirty without much fuss” into a social network. He calls Tumblr and Posterous better for doing this — but Google is bigger.

Read the whole story at SEOptimise.

Being that I am a domain name addict, I had to check to see what was happening with haiti-related domain names given the recent tragedy…

I first checked HaitiEarthquake.com which was regsitered on 1/12/10 and redirects to a google page talking about donating money for relief…This is a GOOD use of the domain name.

HaitiEarthquakes.com is a parked site (which means they make money from serving ads) and was created on 1/13/10…hopefully this domain will be used with good intentions since it was just procured!

HaitiEarthquakeDisaster.com was created on 1/13/10 and looks to be taking paypal donations…..doesn’t say what organization it is and when you click on the paypal button to “donate” the paypal page shows “Gift Baskets N Gifts”….certainly suspect – BE CAREFUL!!

HaitiEarthquake.org was regsitered today 1/15/10 and appears to be parked at the moment…..

Makes you think; doesn’t it!

Have a great weekend……

To help grease the wheels for new advertisers, Yahoo will announce today that paid search players will soon be able to import their Google AdWords files to run similar campaigns on Yahoo’s platform. The feature will be available to its business customers in less than two weeks, according to David Pann, VP of Yahoo’s search advertising division.

Clickz has some good coverage on this which you can read here

Google Vs. Omniture Vs. Coremetrics Vs. Unica, blah, blah, blah. We’ve all heard and read the arguments and read the Forrester Research and numerous white papers espousing the competitive advantages of each of the leading web analytics solution.

We all know who the industry leaders are, we know that Omniture owns the most market share, flexible reporting, and is great at tracking mobile devices but also forces you to dig deeper into your pocket than anyone else. We know that Coremetrics provides lifetime profiles of visitors as well as benchmarking against your competition. Google Analytics is constantly being improved upon by a company that has deeper pockets than, well, everyone.

What do you tell a client who asks you “What Web Analytics solution do you recommend?” I tell my clients it is worth the money to implement one of the industry-leading solutions that provide robust reporting, deep-dive visitor-pathing analysis, and unlimited site goal creation. But I also tell them to also implement Google Analytics.

Cue the client “Why do I need two web analytics solutions?”

Two primary reasons, number one, we all know web analytics data tends to overlap and never seems to add up, and it shouldn’t, so why not use a free web analytics solution to compare and contrast the data points you are getting from your paid solution? The numbers from both solutions will be different, you know that even before you get started, but the general trending of the numbers should be similar, if they are not, it’s time to roll up your sleeves and dig deeper than visits and top content.

The second reason I give clients, is to be able to leverage the multitude of fantastically free Google tools that provide seamless integration with Google Analytics. Of course, Google AdWords is the most obvious tool that jumps out at you. It makes sense to have access to the Keyword Tool from the most dominant search engine on the planet. This alone is reason enough to implement Google Analytics additionally. But there are many more Google tools to take advantage, there’s Google Insights for Search which is a powerful tool that allows you to research search trends by industry category, seasonality, geo-targeting, and other search variables. I could go on and on with examples like Google Docs, Google Trends for Websites, etc., etc., but I’m sure you get the point.

We used to say two is better than one, but you don’t hear that too much in the current ultra-competitive world we live in. Maybe we should.

Please leave a comment, especially if you disagree!

Think about what happens when you drive down the highway – Your eye (and your dollars, most likely!) gravitate to the stores and establishments that have the most convenient location, without you having to go out of your way. Life on the internet is the same – Users will click over to the websites that are easiest for them to find on the search engines. 97% of Internet users won’t go beyond page 1 of the engines, and with 10 listings per page, having prime real estate is key. Wouldn’t it be nice if you had not just one listing, but 2, 3, 4, or more? Owning the SERP is actually quite realistic. Here are a few techniques to increase your digital footprint:

1. Leverage subdomains – The major engines will show no more than two results per SERP page, per domain. Subdomains (the part before the .com in your URL) are considered another domain, so if you are using optimized subdomains, you can actually get up to another 2 listings per SERP per subdomain. The subdomain must have real, unique content, and should be keyword-enriched. It’s OK to optimize the subdomain for some of the same keywords as your main domain

2. Add videos to YouTube – With the advent of Universal Search, the SERPs are no longer just a simple collection of HTML links. Images, news stories, and videos are now part of the mix. Just as you can optimize a website, you can also optimize a YouTube video for prime exposure on YouTube.com, as well as on SERP pages. Be sure to include your keywords in the title of the video, in the description, and in the video’s tags.

3. Create keyword-enriched microsites – Having a microsite with 5-15 pages on a keyword-enriched domain gives you another opportunity to get 2 more listings on the SERP. The microsite must have unique, compelling, and link-worthy content, and should be tightly focused around a single keyword theme. Be sure to create unique titles and metadata for each page on the microsite, and submit to directories, social media sites, and article sites to generate backlinks. Contrary to popular belief, microsites aren’t just for service sites anymore. With the right multi-store E-Commerce platform, you can create multiple online stores with unique content from one product database.

4. Get your Social Media profiles up to snuff – LinkedIn profiles, Facebook pages, Wiki articles, and even Twitter accounts are now being indexed by the search engines. Build up your accounts with fresh content, and be sure to include your primary keywords in your posts and submissions.

Increasing the amount of digital real estate that you own on the search engine takes time and work – But if you’re diligent about capitalizing on the opportunities mentioned above, you’ll not only start to “own” the page, you’ll see your traffic and revenues increase as well

The new Google AdWords interface continues to see improvement in features and usability.  One of the new features is the tab called Opportunities.  Google reviews the current budget, keyword list and campaign performance for each campaign and automatically generates ideas for each ad group.  Google identifies related keywords, showing the additional estimated monthly searches that can be generated with these new keywords.

While reviewing each new set of keywords, you have the ability to select which additional keywords you would like added to your ad group.   You are able to preview your ad text while reviewing the keyword list to make sure that the new keywords fit logically into this ad group.  Please be aware, that this is an automated process and you should not select to add all of the keywords without reviewing carefully first.

I haven’t actually been presented with a budget or campaign setting idea yet, but I’m sure this will provide very helpful optimization suggestions.  As always, Google is trying to help advertisers be more successful in their marketing campaigns.  True, Google benefits as well, but it is a win-win situation.