Anheuser-Busch InBev, the largest brewer in the world, is set to grow its global leadership in beer even more through its acquisition of SABMiller, reported earnings that were lower than had been expected during its first quarter after 10% less beer was sold in Brazil, its second biggest market. Shares of AB InBev fell by […]
Corporate News – The Cerbat Gem
Showing posts with label 2016. Show all posts
Showing posts with label 2016. Show all posts
Monday, February 20, 2017
AB InBev Starts 2016 Weak Due to Slump in Beer Across Brazil
Friday, February 10, 2017
Google’s Biggest Search Algorithm Updates of 2016 [Gifographic]
All digital marketers and SEO professionals look forward to the yearly changes Google makes to its search algorithm.
While Google announces some upgrades from the rooftops, others are low-key affairs that don’t garner much attention. Yet whether large or small, Google’s changes don’t impact marketers as drastically as they have in the past.
Major Google Search Engine Algorithm Updates 2016
Among the major updates Google rolled out in 2016 were Panda, Penguin and Possum. Needless to say, Google implements all of its modifications with the aim of making it easy for users to find the information they’re looking for in minimal time. Google also has aimed to integrate paid and organic search results with both local and mobile SEO.
Beginning of the year surprises
Some people expected Google’s Penguin update at the very beginning of 2016. Instead, Google updated its core ranking algorithm, which caused some fluctuations in search rankings.
A significant change at the end of February that impacted click-through rates (CTR) was Google’s update to AdWords. Instead of featuring ads on the right-hand side of the screen, Google moved them to the top of the results page. Consequently, no organic results were above the fold on any type of screen, even desktop computers.
Another update at the end of February was when Google added an Accelerated Mobile Pages (AMP) news carousel to the top of mobile search results. This was a significant step for the company to improve the user-friendliness of the web.
There was an unconfirmed update in the middle of May, and then Google made another mobile-friendly decision a couple of days later. The company decided to make mobile optimization a more influential ranking factor for search results.
Google Possum
At the beginning of September, Google rolled out Possum, an update with a significant impact. The Possum update affects local listings in particular and is designed to make local searches more effective.
There are several ramifications of the Possum update. Possum filters companies using the same address, broadens city limits, and gives more weight to the actual locations of users.
For example, before the update, businesses that were near a city but were right outside the city limits had difficulty ranking in search results. But their results improved noticeably following Possum.
On the other hand, the Possum update also means that if multiple businesses use the same address (e.g., work in the same office complex), all but one of them will be filtered out of the results. In fact, the update is apparently so specific that it can impact your search results even if you’re simply the owner of multiple companies.
In one case, there was a dentist who had two different practices with different addresses, employees, websites, network access points (NAP), and Google accounts. Before, his practices had simultaneously ranked in the 3-pack. But after the Possum update, they only ranked in the 3-pack one at a time and never together.
Another consequence of the Possum update is that there is a lot more variety in the search results depending on the exact keywords you enter. Also, since Possum, the organic filter and the local filter seem to be operating separately.
Google Penguin
An unexpected shakeup happened in September that caused half of the images in the search results to disappear. Not surprisingly, this disappearance significantly impacted organic rankings. Some speculate this incident occurred because of the Penguin update that came shortly afterward, but Google never confirmed that was the case.
Then the long-awaited Penguin 4 update finally arrived. Google has now merged Penguin with its core algorithm, meaning that Penguin will quickly consider website changes because of real-time refreshes.
The update is granular and will only impact spammy pages. One difference, though, is that rather than penalizing sites for spammy pages, Penguin now devalues their links.
The only other noteworthy event from 2016 was a shift in rankings in November. Some believe this to have been caused by Google testing the mobile-first index. Once again, however, this hypothesis is unconfirmed.
Takeaway
This information should be helpful to SEO experts when planning their strategies this year. The intent of Google updates is clear: websites should follow clean SEO practices and create valuable content. The following gifographic encapsulates every prominent Google search algorithm update rolled out in 2016.
Google’s Biggest Search Algorithm Updates Of 2016, a visual representation by E2M.
The post Google’s Biggest Search Algorithm Updates of 2016 [Gifographic] appeared first on Growmap.
Google’s Biggest Search Algorithm Updates of 2016 [Gifographic]Tuesday, February 7, 2017
Amazon Prime Day 2016 Launches At Midnight Tonight
The second annual Amazon Prime Day begins at midnight tonight for the millions of Amazon Prime members around the world. In addition to the U.S., shoppers in Spain, Japan, France, Canada and the U.K. can participate. The company said the sale will be the “biggest global Amazon event ever.” Amazon (NASDAQ:AMZN) is promising more than […]
Corporate News – The Cerbat Gem
Wednesday, January 11, 2017
Election 2016: When “Data” In Isolation Steers Us Wrong
Instincts vs. Insights
Like many of you, I was wrong about who I thought would win the US election. But it wasn’t always that way — I had changed my opinion based on the “data” I was seeing and that’s where many of us are scratching our heads. My first gut instinct was formed around the time of both party conventions. Having followed both, sensing the momentum and enthusiasm of the unconventional GOP convention, I remember thinking to myself, Trump really has a chance — he’s going to tap millions of people displaced by a global economy. He’s speaking directly to the working class disenfranchised — people holding down multiple jobs in some cases and feeling like they can never get ahead. He’s giving a voice to those who feel like they have been ignored or are underrepresented. And above it all, I was picking up something in the air that felt like a change agent was wanted, even if that agent was more rough around the edges than many would have preferred…
I grew up in working class Long Island. I intuitively grasped how he could win and I was hesitant to rush to judgement over how or why millions of Americans were supporting him. Over the course of weeks and months, being the news addict that I am, I began to change my outlook on Trump’s chances.
Why? Because the polling data and news media sentiment.
The Limitations of Polling & Media Influence
Day after day, I would pour over polls and read headlines that would point to trends making the case that while both candidates were unpopular, Hillary seemed to always come out on top. The media painted a picture of a Trump campaign in disarray and the tone of the majority of the coverage I could see from multiple media outlets was largely negative. Polls while far from perfect are data points. Media sentiment is also a set of data points. When you pour over this information, it begins to inform your opinions. And that’s what happened to me. My informed view shifted from Trump has a chance to Hillary is a definite win.
And I think there’s an important lesson in all of this. Was the data bad? I don’t think it’s that simple. Like some analysts have stated, it’s likely that the polling data was incomplete. Which means this data cannot be fully trusted. If a significant portion of voters didn’t feel comfortable polling but instead voiced their opinions with their votes, then the data is meaningless.
Sampling is an art that becomes harder and harder to deliver well against. All research methodologies for polling have inherent biases and it becomes clear that relying on a sample of people willing to speak to an interviewer or take a survey online is becoming more difficult to pull off accurately. Political polling is disrupted and old models don’t work. But they are still very valuable if cross analyzed through other intelligence methodologies that focus on “harder data”.
The lesson reminds me of similar learnings I’ve seen in marketing focus groups. People aren’t always honest or clearly articulate their beliefs and/or needs.
Reading Between The Lines
You have to read between the lines. This is something that ethnographers often do. They immerse themselves in the lives of the people they seek to derive insights from. They go deep in place of skimming vast quantities of data points both quantitative and qualitative. They go heavy on empathy but also possess the right amount of analytical rigor to translate observations into insights.
And what about the media sentiment? Did I misread it? No, I read it accurately but like many others, I underestimated the impact that media sentiment would have on potential Trump supporters. In retrospect the negative media sentiment for Trump likely mobilized his base and even some who were on the fence. Edelman (my employer) has been producing data for years which shows that trust in media is on the decline and urging us to pay close attention to social signals when forming opinions and strategies.
Search & Social Signals Provide Additional Clues
And let’s not forget about search. As far as data goes — Google may have presented a more accurate representation of how voters were inclined to act. Trump related searches showed dominance over Hillary inquiries in the final days of the election and higher volume in states such as Pennsylvania where polls projected Clinton to win. The search volume from Google presented signals that were largely missed by both pundits and the media — yet they aligned with voter behavior.
Insights, Instinct AND Data — But Never In Isolation
This political season more than ever demonstrated the shortcomings of looking at data and information sources in isolation, such as polling. A lesson that I’ll take away is to not only have more faith in my instincts but also to be a better student of the impact the media has on public sentiment and how that sentiment is reflected online in the forms of social and search data. For those of us who work in marketing and communications, we’re going to need a better appreciation for the balance between instinct and insights, gut and analysis, and how deep we need to go to accurately interpret signals and multiple data points so we can better inform our thoughts and actions.
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