A Week In Digital
Site speed now a ranking factor for organic search
Google has confirmed that site speed is now a factor in organic rankings. While the new factor is now in place in the US, Google has cautioned web owners against giving it too much importance. According to Google people shouldn’t sacrifice site content or relevance in favour of faster page loading time and that the change will only affect a small number of queries. The change to the algorithm to include site speed issues follows a number of research studies that show that users prefer faster sites and that anything slower than half a second will negatively affect user experience. Google will monitor the results of the US test and eventually roll out to other countries.
Google market share slipping in the US according to both Comscore and Hitwise
Recent reports by both Hitwise and Comscore show that Google’s market share in the US may be plateauing. Hitwise has shown Google giving away ground to Yahoo and Ask for the last 4 months while Comscore has shown Yahoo, Bing and Ask gaining share at Google’s expense. Some reporters are suggesting that Google could have hit a glass ceiling in market share.
Apple’s iAd platform to target Google online advertising dominance
Apple plans to launch a mobile advertising platform called iAd later this year in an attempt to compete head to head with Google in the lucrative online advertising space. The platform will allow iPhone developers to incorporate ads within iPhone applications.
Digital Economy Bill passed the House of Commons
The Digital Economy Bill was passed the House of Commons last week in what has been described as a bad day for democracy. The bill was rushed through in a late night session of parliament and if passing the House of Lords will see the government attain powers to restrict and filter any website that is deemed to be undesirable for the public and also cut off broadband access indefinitely, without evidence or trial, to users who download copyrighted material.
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