Technical SEO, search intelligence, and the code behind it — notes from 20+ years of making websites work harder.
Google, Bing and Yahoo! finally agreed on a common vocabulary for semantic mark-up. Why schema.org is worth implementing even if richer SERP snippets are never guaranteed.
Three small Google moves worth noticing: descriptive terms in local search, a test that swaps URLs for site names in the snippets, and Matt Cutts on why Amazon outranks brand sites.
Looking back on two years in London agencies: SEO is not a discipline in isolation. Bureaucracy kills projects as surely as a bad backlink profile, and the ROI follows the flexibility.
Once you've decided a mobile version of the site is worth it, the real work starts. A practical checklist — page size, sitemap, navigation, images, XHTML Mobile and a separate subdomain.
Notes from a Google London training on mobile: smartphone sales already past the PC, 15% of queries from mobile, and the figures that should convince anyone still on the fence.
Hover on the magnifying glass, see the page before clicking — Instant Preview changes what searchers judge. The impact on design, copy, rank, PPC, and Flash-heavy sites.
Import some data from a CSV, try to sort it, and Excel starts protesting about the blank rows. A very simple trick in five steps to wipe them out — same on Mac and Windows.
From October, no SSL certificate means no more Facebook app. An economic hit for hobbyist developers — and, frankly, no great loss for the pile of useless apps already around.
If a 'Sorry, your account has been disabled' appears, the troubles are only beginning — Gmail, Reader, Docs, AdWords, all gone at once. A few things you should already have backed up.