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Misc. News Random Thoughts

Google Drops Plus sign from Search Operators

Back when Google announced Google Plus, I laughed that the search engine giant named their new social networking platform something that their users can’t even search for, since the plus sign [+] is used as a way to define a search string. This meant when you tried to search for [Google +] in Google, you might not actually find “Google Plus”.

Well, they announced that they will fix that problem, by actually dropping the use of the plus sign as a search operator.

Before, you could search for something like
relocation +missoula
and you’d get results that were about relocation, but only those with Missoula in the results.

Now, when I do that search it tells me:

The + operator has been replaced.
To search for an exact word or phrase, use double quotation marks: relocation “missoula”

I guess this works the same, but to me it seems slightly different. I always felt the plus sign meant “show me ONLY those results with that word in the results”, while Quotes meant “Show me these two words together, as in “firstname lastname”. While I suspect the latter still works the same way, which is good, since Google our own names is something I’m sure we all love to do. One guy even made it into a Documentary called “Google Me“.

I have a lot of Google Alerts set up that use the plus sign. But I guess I have to spend some time changing those now since Google had to change this core part of search… Do you think it’s because they want people to find Google Plus?

What if every time we use the plus sign in a search from here on out, they just show us Google Plus as the top result.

Well, they make the rules…
So if you’d like to get better results from your searches, I recommend you spend a few minutes studying up on the various tricks you can use in your search queries.

Enjoy…

-Andy

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Misc. News Online Marketing Pay Per Click Random Thoughts Search Engine Optimization Social Media

Small business workshop in Missoula Wednesday

Did you read hear about this? I’ll be there, and I would suggest you try to attend if you’re at all interested in the things I talk about here on my site.

Montana Senator John Tester will host a Small Business Opportunity Workshop in Missoula on Wednesday, February 23, 2011. The event focused on expanding small business opportunities, especially for young entrepreneurs.

The upcoming workshop will be held at the University Theater at the University Center on the campus of The University of Montana.

He’s bringing with him a top Microsoft executive who will deliver a keynote address on his experience working with the software giant, and several social media gurus who will give a presentation on how websites like Facebook and Google can help grow businesses.

The social media portion of the workshop will show attendees just how important a tool the medium can be for small businesses.

Sign up here http://tester.senate.gov/Resources/workshop.cfm

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Misc. News Random Thoughts

Ford Drops Superbowl Ad

Ford Motor Company sees spending their ad dollars on Online Ads as a better choice. The article below ends with a statement of “If sales continue to grow after the Super Bowl and the company continues its successful marketing online it will be interesting to see who else drops their Super Bowl ads.”

While Ford may be able to look back at the history of Superbowl ad performance and compare that to this year’s ad spend, there are a few problems with the idea that if Ford is successful online, others should follow. I’m not suggesting buying a Superbowl ad is or isn’t the right choice… but, like so many things, it depends on the situation. I’m a huge believer in online marketing, with the improve tracking, and demographics, and Geo-targeting… it’s a great place to look for effective advertising. But other avenues may work well to… often in combination. A great Superbowl ad, with a call to action to “like” the company on Facebook, and be entered to win….  You get the idea. Beware of thinking what’s good for the goose is good for the gander.

Here’s a link to the article about Ford, from Search Engine Watch:

Ford Drops Super Bowl Ads For Online Spends