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SEM and SEO: An Academic Discussion.

While search engine marketing (SEM) and search engine optimization (SEO) are frequently used interchangeably, aspects of marketing a website and optimizing how a search engine finds the site are distinctly different. SEM entails actively marketing a site though paid methods such as paid inclusion or standard advertisements such as those generated by Google’s search results (SEO and SEM: Two Names for the Same Thing?). In SEM, a site simply pays the search engine provider to list their results higher or purchases targeted ads to those searching for given keywords. This is a blunt instrument that requires funding but it can also save time as compared to other SEO strategies.

According to the Economist, SEO means with clever manipulation of the website, one can achieve a higher ranking in Google’s search results (2012). This manipulation can include something as simplistic as adding unrelated key words in the META fields of a webpage. Additionally, gaining many links into one’s page will move the site up in the PageRank algorithm of Google. Understanding how the search engine algorithm ranks pages and crafting a strategy to meet those objectives allows webmasters to “game the system” and create an artificially higher ranking than one can achieve organically. While genuine marketing of the site can result in increased traffic or link generation—in social media, for example—this is not SEM or SEO. SEO requires active steps to force a search engine to rank one’s site higher than would have normally happened. SEM accomplishes the same by trading cash for the technology of well-crafted SEO.

References
The Economist (2012, December 7). Search Engine Optimization: How to sell Botox to Panda. Retrieved April 22, 2013, from The Economist: http://www.economist.com/blogs/theworldin2013/2012/12/search-engine-optimisation SEO and SEM:

Two Names for the Same Thing? (n.d.). Retrieved April 22, 2013, from Raise My Rank: http://www.raisemyrank.com/articles/seo-sem.htm f.

A Second look at Bing

In comparing the three search engines: Google, Bing and Yahoo; one finds very similar results between the three. The landing page for Google and Bing are quite austere in their presentation—waiting for the user to search for content before populating the pages. Yahoo, by comparison appears as more a portal than search engine with current news topics including trending items, weather and stock information. Using a sample search of Allstate, all three sites offer a map of local Allstate agents and advertisements related to Allstate. Bing added more social media information to the results page by displaying mentions of Allstate from Facebook and Twitter. Bing does an impressive job of integrating social media. I searched on Toronto knowing I had a Facebook friend send me pictures of Toronto recently. With the linked account, the search results showed pictures of Toronto that my friend posted. That is a very nice feature! I did not see an equivalent feature on Google or Yahoo. I would maintain that Google is still a more complete search engine. 1000 engineers dedicated to the problem of searching data trump the late entry of Bing. Yahoo as a company still lacks focus and seems hard-pressed to know what it wants to be when it grows up. I will admit that the semantic search features of Bing deserve a second look at the site, but I will still retreat to Google for searching obscure information on the Internet.

Maps on a Spreadsheet

https://docs.google.com/spreadsheet/pub?key=0AphcIxrTPaDSdHAxOXV2OTFtZC1LLWtTcEhRZXJMdnc&single=true&gid=0&output=html

Reviewing Twitter's Terms of Service and Privacy Policy

Any content posted to Twitter is the sole responsibility of the person posting the data. The poster retains the rights to the work but grants Twitter an unlimited, royalty-free license to use the data. Twitter also retains the right to re-post the data, share it with partners and allow those partners to use the data.

The Twitter privacy policy is silent on what Twitter would do in the event of a data breach. One reading of the policy could be that since the user consents to this information being shared, Twitter would have limited liability or even a limited duty to inform in the event of a breach.

According to an article on securitywatch.pcmag.com, Twitter recently had a data breach where 250,000 user accounts were compromised. Speaking on the notice Twitter sent to users, the article said, "The notification email from Twitter is cryptic, to say the least. It doesn't mention the attack at all, nor does it link to the actual blog post. It just informs the user the password may have been compromised and offers the user a link to click on to reset the password. There are a[sic] other links to other parts of the site in the email" (Rashid, 2013). Based on the fact that the privacy policy does not specify how Twitter must inform and recent evidence, one could imagine the company does not have a formal policy for notification.

The policies used for this post are: https://twitter.com/tos and https://twitter.com/privacy

References

Rashid, F. Y. (2013, February 2). Twitter Breached, Attackers Stole 250,000 User Data. Retrieved from http://securitywatch.pcmag.com/none/307708-twitter-breached-attackers-stole-250-000-user-data

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