An online marketing expert said today that businesses seeking the maximum exposure through search engine optimisation should consider looking “beyond Google.”

Search strategist Bas van den Beld said that there were other important search tools which were more focused on specialised content and niche interests, in an article for Search Engine Watch.

He said that there were video sites – such as the mighty YouTube – which attracted some two billion viewers every day. He argued that while online marketing executives may well be aware of YouTube as an area of opportunity, few businesses are using this opportunity to its full advantage.

Mr Van Den Beld said: “Many people are surprised to learn that YouTube is the second largest search engine,” going on to stress that there are more searches made every week on YouTube than on more mainstream search engines such as Yahoo or Bing – if not Google itself.

He insisted that YouTube is “the place to be” thanks to its 1.5 million-plus business-based searches every week and the immense diversity of its users.

Furthermore, YouTube videos tended to show up in the Google results anyway, giving online marketing campaigns a second bite of the apple when it came to getting their brand noticed on the world’s largest and most successful search engine.

As many before him have also noted, Mr Van Den Beld went on to point out that social networking sites like Facebook and Twitter also had excellent potential for broadening the search engine optimisation activities of businesses.

Search engine giant Google announced this week that it has launched a version of its Ad Sitelinks feature suitable for mobile devices such as iPads and smartphones.

The feature enables brands to provide many different landing page options with their online advertising.

The desktop version of the online marketing tool was first made available in November 2009, and since then has increased the clickthrough rates of advertisers by more than 30 per cent.

Now this feature is available for mobile devices – writing on the official Google AdWords blog, the company’s associate product marketing manager Gordon Zhu said that Ad Sitelinks was now available across the world for all pay per click online marketing campaigns using high-end mobile devices.

Currently, one or two-line Sitelinks will appear on these devices, each with the ability to direct customers to different areas of the brand’s website.

“Because websites may not yet be optimized for viewing on mobile devices, navigating them to find information can be more difficult,” Mr Zhu said.

“Mobile Ad Sitelinks help by taking users directly to the specific content they’re looking for, enabling them to find information and complete transactions more quickly.”

Google revealed recently that higher revenues from its online advertising on partner websites and increasing numbers of aggregate paid clicks had helped it boost its third quarter profits by 32 per cent.

Google’s net income stood at a hefty $2.17 billion between July and September this year, up from $1.64 billion during the same period in 2009.

Revenue from pay per click services for Google sites and AdSense partners rose by 16 per cent year-on-year and was four per cent higher compared with the second quarter.

Google chief executive Eric Schmidt commented: “Our core business grew very well and our newer businesses – particularly display and mobile – continued to show significant momentum.”

Social networking site Facebook is such a dominant force today that the days when the importance of your google natural listings were the paramount for companies online are gone. People will not just ask Where are you ranked on google but how many followers do you have on your facebook fan page. As analysis has been made between the old foes of CPC and SEO over the years and there shorter term and longer terms gains available in each instance. Research into the longerterm benifits of Facebook pages in terms of traffic generation are there to be seen and its easy to see why this constant ever evolving source of traffic is so worthwhile looking into for the longer term gains.

Facebooks fundamental difference in comparison with Google is the roles are reversed in many circumstances. Using Google the user searches for there particular item where as on facebook the item finds them via news and shared links on there profile feeds. On Facebook the news and products find the individuals a major shift and it is this shift that once recognised can mean a massive increase in your traffic via facebook.

In a comparison lets take the value of 9000 followers on your facebook fan page the value of these followers is almost impossible to list because you have the advantage of the next 50 years to contact these people via facebook . Many smaller companies are taking advantage of this new source and it enables many smaller companies in industries to take a leap ahead of there larger competitors.

Facebook really is here to stay !

Social media are going to play a large part in online marketing campaigns this Christmas, according to new research.

Research by internet marketing affiliate network LinkShare found that at least 43 per cent of companies involved in some form of online advertising campaign over the holiday period this year will be taking advantage of the unprecedented opportunities offered by Facebook, Twitter and other social networking websites.

Another 37 per cent of online marketing respondents said that they would be hoping to tempt customers over Christmas with online vouchers and special offers, while 17 per cent would be creating videos to promote their online advertising.

Just 18 per cent of companies surveyed believed that next year’s rise in VAT would have a deleterious effect on their online marketing budgets – with 30 per cent sure that the increase would spur companies on to make more effectively targeted campaigns than ever before.

The network’s managing director Liane Dietrich commented: “A call for more targeted and measured campaigns is certainly in line with what we are seeing from our own customers who are looking to increase their efficiency, and after the Christmas sales boom this will remain important.”

With the growing popularity of iPads and smartphones, many companies that use internet advertising believe that video campaigns are set to become more important than ever next year.

Nearly 30 per cent of respondents surveyed agreed that online videos, which can be searched for using Google or other engines, would be the largest digital advertising format, although another 28 per cent were sure that the likes of Twitter and Facebook would continue to reign supreme in 2011, dominating the online marketing world.

Facebook as we all know has become the latest Internet Phenomenon and its easy to see why. One of the initial problems for early facebook users were the introduction of there own business’s on Facebook and the introduction of the Facebook fan page which can be used to promote anything from a local business, band or even a celebrity. The pages have the functionality that comes with the original person page but provide people the ability to click the like button and become a follower of there news feeds.

We have been using a combination of both Facebook like pages and personal profiles to promote several different industries online and if you are looking for a way of generating interest and traffic we can fully reccomend a Facebook fan page. The main advantages of your own fan page is the ability to suggest your existing stock of friends plus integrate and promote the page via Facebook cost per click and the integration of a Fan box on your site so people can see your are on facebook.

If you are a company looking to be listed on Facebook a fan page would be ideal and is always being improved by the development of a wide selection of plugins so keeping up to date is essential. Increasing the numbers of friends and followers is not an easy task and there are no short cuts which is reminiscent of SEO in many ways. Social networking is something you have to hang in for the long haul but once you put that effort in you will be rewarded by a self serving in many circumstances community online where you can update and promote your company for free so it is well worth the effort.

Consider becoming a news source social networking is unique no longer do people go out looking for the news the news reaches them. This principal once understood can be used to your advantage take advantage of statue updates, Tagging Photos and news feeds to constantly engage with your audience and you wont go far wrong.

A new feature being trialled by search engine giant Google stands to improve the way that online marketing campaigns reach out to potential customers.

The new full page preview feature shows Google users an image of the website in a special pane on the right hand side of the screen when they hover over the search result with their mouse cursor, which becomes highlighted in blue.

The preview pane itself displays not only the website, but the specific text on that site which is relevant to the user’s original Google search. This text may be very different from the meta-description of the site in the list of search results itself.

If this new feature is adopted as a permanent part of Google’s features, it will significantly affect the way in which both online marketing and the subset of search engine optimisation is carried out.

Marketers will have to think about which areas of text are most likely to be highlighted by the preview feature and will also have to ensure that the design of a page lends itself well to a smaller preview image.

If the feature becomes part of Google’s results, it will have an impact on both search engine optimisation and online marketing, to help determine which pieces of text are highlighted and optimising a page for being previewed in a smaller format, respectively.

Whatever the potential advantages to online marketing experts, the chances of the preview feature ever reaching Google users en masse are still in the balance. The feature raises fresh concerns about unacceptable keywords – at present Google cuts out certain words in its new instant search results – and publishers could also protest about “unacceptable” content.

For its part, Google is keeping the online marketing world guessing, insisting that the preview function is just one of between 50 and 200 experimental features operating on the system at any given time.