The Stukent company picnic was a blast this year. About 160 folks joined us for games, horse riding, and delicious food.
Stu Draper, Stukent co-founder, said, “Super cool to see all of the families that are contributing to our mission: to help educators help students help the world. Next year I think it would be fun to take everyone to Lagoon.”
Yeah, Stu! Now you’re talking.
In this issue of Stukent’s News You Can Use, we’ll cover stories like:
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- Mercola says Google’s reliance on Wikipedia for ranking signals tanked their longstanding first-page SERP results for health-related searches
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- LinkedIn updates provide more ways to efficiently build a community
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- Facebook and Google say some of their features will soon disappear
Get the scoop on these stories and more, right here on NYCU.
NEARLY HALF OF ALL GOOGLE SEARCHES DON’T DRAW A CLICK
Topic: SEO | Ecommerce
Key Point: It’s no secret that Google has been gobbling up real estate on Google Search for its own interests. Organic results are getting tougher and tougher to grab.
Based off of data gathered by Rand Fishkin from Jumpshot, George Nguyen says the situation is even worse than you might imagine – and it’s a bad omen for small businesses. On the (maybe) bright side, the Department of Justice may step in to reinforce the ebbing tide.
The Jumpshot study says there’s been a 20 percent decline in available organic clicks over the past three years. Click-through rates from the for organic searches from the same period are down 13 percent, but click-throughs on ads are up by 75 percent.
Check the Jumpshot and Search Engine Land articles for the full story.
LINKEDIN GETS PERSONAL BY TWEAKING ITS ALGORITHM
Topic: Online Advertising | Social Media Marketing
Key Point: If you want to geek-out on distributed index nodes, the FollowFeed, and Quasar, then check out this post from LinkedIn’s Engineering Blog.
But if you want the scoop in plain language, check this SEJ article covering the new LinkedIn algorithm that favors personalized content.
Whichever route you take, don’t miss the six suggestions SEJ provides on optimizing your posts for the update. Here are two of them:
- Post about niche topics
- Use hashtags, but no more than three
The bottom line: LinkedIn wants you to build relationships on the platform, not just fire off marketing messages. What a concept … right?
ALSO SEE: LinkedIn lifts the hood on its news feed algorithm to show how it ranks posts
FACEBOOK PAGE INFO WILL SOON DISAPPEAR
Topic: Social Media Marketing
Key Point: Just in case you didn’t get the memo, go to your Facebook Page(s), choose Settings, then Page Info, and scroll down to the bottom of the right sidebar.
Here’s what you’ll see.
It turns out that Facebook is doing away with a number of content boxes. Matt Navarra says the soon-to-depart boxes include company overview, biography, affiliation, personal interests, and maybe more.
You can stay up-to-date with this change via Marketing Land. Their team requested a complete rundown from Facebook … but hasn’t received a response yet.
SOCIAL PROFILES ARE NO LONGER PART OF KNOWLEDGE PANELS
Topic: SEO
Key Point: Google says you no longer need to provide social media profile markup for knowledge panel inclusion. Google bots can pull it for themselves, and if you don’t like what you see, you can suggest a change.
This serves as a reminder for all businesses to claim their knowledge panel. To do that, search for your business, then click on “Claim this knowledge panel” at the bottom of the listing.
It’s amazing how many companies still haven’t taken advantage of this feature. Get your profile on board.
See Google’s advice for making changes and take a look at this SEJ article to learn more.
THE PREFERRED DOMAINS SETTING IN GOOGLE SEARCH CONSOLE IS NO MORE
Topic: Analytics
Key Point: Google Search Console has been on the move for more than a year, and this month, the forward march continued. Perhaps the biggest change is that the “preferred domain” setting is leaving. Google says, it’s because of the migration to the “new Search Console experience.”
Other recent changes include the addition of three new sets of Googlebot crawling data and two new features for several of the testing tools in Search Console. Okay, one more … the new Search Console experience features 90 days of search and discover data.
ALSO SEE: Google Search Console adds search within markup and copy with tweaking
FACEBOOK VIDEO CREATION KIT UPDATES
Topic: Social Media Marketing
Key Point: Facebook Business announced an addition to the Facebook Video Creation Kit that allows you to automagically transform a video into multiple copies with different aspect ratios to fit differing requirements for ad placements.
Marketing Land says there are also new templates in the Kit (seasonal templates are on the way) and a new “Save” feature. This is all good news for small business marketers who are getting a big boost in production of high-quality videos.
ALSO SEE: Create a Video Ad Using a Template
NEW WAYS TO ENGAGE THE LINKEDIN COMMUNITY
Topic: Social Media Marketing | Ecommerce
Key Point: LinkedIn says we can expect new capabilities on a quarterly basis, and to prove it, the company unleashed “Custom Call-to-Action (CTA) Button and Analytics – A new way to drive leads and measure impact.”
You no longer need to rely on the standard “Follow” button to attract fans to your LinkedIn page. Five new options are available:
- Contact Us
- Learn More
- Register
- Sign Up
- Visit Website
You’ll find these options on your Page Admin home and at the top of the Visitor Analytics tab.
Other announcements include Communities Hashtags and Mobile Admin Editing. Get the entire scoop from LinkedIn Marketing Solutions here: What’s new with LinkedIn pages
ALSO SEE: LinkedIn Pages get new CTA buttons
MERCOLA SAYS WIKIPEDIA KILLED THEIR SEARCH RANKING
Topic: SEO
Business presentation on a laptop screen
Key Point: Mercola says they’ve lost almost all organic traffic since Google pushed the Broad Core update in June. Why? The company says it’s because Google is heavily factoring in Wikipedia user sentiment – meaning competitors can hurt your company severely by swamping Wikipedia with negative remarks.
Can it be true?
SEJ says Mercola gets this idea from components of Google’s Search Quality Rating Guidelines, but it’s a mistake to assume that this document accurately describes the algorithm.
Check the SEJ write-up for an interesting discussion on how search engine ranking works. Mercola says their site has been at the top of health-related searches for more than 15 years. Understandably, they’re spitting fire now. Here’s the story: Google Buries Mercola.
ALSO SEE: Google Doesn’t Give Your Site an Authority Score
SUMMERTIME IS GET-AHEAD TIME
There’s an old saying:
“You can have what other people will never have, if you’ll do what other people will never do.”
Many digital marketing students are taking a break from the books this summer. They’re too busy having fun to stay up with what’s going on in the fast-moving world of online marketing.
Not you, though.
You’re here. That’s how we know you’ll be at the top.
BONUS INFO
The video algorithm: Facebook vs. YouTube
Nine Types of Questions to Ask On Your Facebook Page to Get More Comments
