Newsflash

Yesterday Microsoft announced a number of content upgrades and changes to its local search for mobile devices, which include reviews, one-click directions, interactive maps, photos, and so on. There's more specific detail on the Virtual Earth blog. All the major search engines are now offering blended search results on their mobile-friendly sites.

Yahoo's oneSearch WAP site was the clear leader when it launched, but Google quickly modified its mobile search results to respond to the "blended" presentation of multiple content types (local, Web, news, images). AOL's mobile/WAP site has also improved considerably. But now Microsoft's Live Search for mobile, perhaps by a nose, has become the most feature-rich of the mobile search sites.

Jill Whalen, the Founder and CEO of HighRankings,  at PubCon 2007 in Las Vegas. Whalen gives us some tips on how to approach copy writing for search engines. She says the search engines want real copy, copy that answer’s the searcher’s question. Whalen also discusses the amount of keyword phrases that are needed for copy and when to hold back. For more details of the interview with Whalen or for more information from PubCon 2007, keep watching New-Loong newsflash.

On Wednesday, December 12, 2007,  Kushal Dave(,Google Notebook's Tech Lead) on his blog said: "As Notebook evolves, we're staying up to speed on your thoughts by reading your blog posts. Now, we're pleased to introduce a blog of our own so that you can keep up with news and tips about Notebook."

In July, Beijing-based computer maker Lenovo introduced a rebranding campaign in the U.S. "The sweet spot of the campaign is really the SMB [small-and-midsize business] market," said Glen Gilbert, VP-integrated marketing communications at Lenovo. The integrated campaign, developed by Ogilvy North America, New York, has the theme "Best engineered" and uses Lenovo's continuing tagline, "New world. New thinking."

On December 13, 2007, Google's Webmaster Tools have been updated with new diagnostic features that alert site owners to problems Google may have extracting content from pages. In addition, they've added Video Sitemaps. They've also added Hungarian and Czech to the 20 languages already supported.

Now Google has developed the "Google Online Marketing Challenge." According to the site, "student groups will receive US$200 of free online advertising and then work with local businesses to devise effective online marketing campaigns."

Google's Navigational Bar Goes International reports Google has launched the navigational links interface that was launched in the US in mid-May, worldwide. Each country may have the navigational links in a different order and different options. For example, while one country may have a link for Orkut, another country maynot list that link at all. Google is constantly changing the links in the navigational menu to test what works best in that country. You can view all of Google's international search sites at this page and by scrolling down to "Visit Google's Site in Your Local Domain."

Local online ads will reach $12.6 billion in 2008, local search will bring in $5 billion of that total. Local online advertising  is worth $8.5 billion today. That number consists of local search, "local banners," and local video. Banners is the biggest spending category and video the smallest. But local search to grow substantially to become almost 50% of the total local online spend next year, which is projected to reach $12.6 billion.

Matt Cutts of Google said at PubCon that Google will be treating sub domains similar to how they treat folders on a site.

Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg apologized  for a notorious advertising feature that made the online purchases of its members public. Facebook said it will allow members to permanently shut off Beacon, the feature that informs your network of friends about your shopping habits at dozens of websites. Facebook members griped that Beacon compromised their privacy.