Is there such a thing? If there is we at Search Control wanted to wish our readers a very Happy Monday. May you all have a productive and successful week!

Get ready for Game Day with Google
As all of you football fans prepare for the San Francisco – Baltimore game this Sunday, we thought we’d pull together some ways to make the most of the Big Game with a little help from Google. From hosting the perfect party to learning more about your favorite players, check out some tips on ways Google can help.

Planning a party for the big game? Ask Google for some help

Whether your party food is wings, dip, chili or nachos, we can all agree on one thing: the messier, the better. You can get your party prep and cooking done without getting your phone too messy, using Google Voice Search, hands-free on your tablet or smartphone. With a quick tap of the microphone icon, you can literally ask Google for help:

-Need to buy drinks? Simply ask “what is the closest grocery store?” and we’ll show you the nearest ones to scroll through. With a quick tap, you’ll be there with the help of turn-by-turn navigation.

-Maybe you want to make that cocktail that’s like a Bloody Mary but not quite… ask “what’s a michelada?” — and you’ll both hear and see the ingredients.

-Once you’re ready to cook, ask “best chili recipes” and see a range of options, or ask “how do I make guacamole?” and find your way to the best sites to answer your question.

Get the stats on your favorite players

Whether you want to impress fellow fans with your sports trivia, or if you are curious about the guy who scored the last touchdown, Google Search can get instant and more complete answers. Ask about your favorite players, teams, and explore a world of related and connected topics as well.

Indoor stadium and airport views on Google Maps

If you’re one of the lucky fans who gets to see the game in person, you can use indoor Google Maps to quickly find your gate, your seat, or some game time snacks at the Superdome.

To access the indoor map, just search for “Superdome” in Google Maps on your Android phone and zoom in to see the stadium floor plan. Search the map to find section numbers, bathrooms and points of interest, and use the numbered floor picker (on the right-hand side) to see maps for each floor.

Make sure you’ve downloaded the latest version of Google Maps for Android to access indoor maps.

Watch your favorite ads with Ad Blitz on YouTube

To make it easier to catch up on all the commercials, the YouTube Ad Blitz channel in partnership with ADWEEK will let you watch your favorite ads soon as they air live on TV. You can vote for your favorite ad at the end of the game. To learn more about all the new social, gaming, and mobile features in this year’s gallery, visit our YouTube blog.

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Quick answers to resolve holiday travel stress
It’s easy to have a love-hate relationship with the holidays. On the one hand, it’s a joyous time of the year full of festivities and delicious baked goods. On the other hand, it’s stressful. For something like traveling which is already stressful on its own, traveling during the holidays can feel like twice the trouble.

One way to cut down on some of the stress before you head to the airport is to plan ahead. Let’s say this year you’re traveling to France for the holidays. Here are some quick answers that can make your planning faster and easier — we recently redesigned these features to be richer and more interactive on mobile and tablet, and now you’ll see them on desktop as well, so you can plan ahead whether you’re at home or on the go:

• Figure out your budget. Since luggage space is limited and you don’t want to pay an overage fee, you may want to buy your gifts when you land in France. Find the currency exchange rate ahead of time so you can figure out how much that $15 (USD) fruitcake actually costs in euros by searching [15 usd in euro] or [french currency].

• Learn about French traditions. Friends who live in Paris have invited you to their reveillon dinner. Trouble is, you don’t know what that means. You can quickly find the answer by typing [define reveillon] in Google.

• Plan your holiday Hangouts. Even though you’ll be oceans apart, you can still wish your family a happy holidays in person. Schedule a date for a Google+ Hangout, but don’t forget to factor in the time difference, which you can figure out by searching [time in france].

• Track your flight before you leave the house. To avoid arriving at the airport only to find out your flight’s been delayed for hours, you can quickly check the flight status by typing the flight number like [united airlines 942] or [UA942], into the search box.

Other quick answers we’re updating on desktop over the next few weeks are finance, unit conversion, holiday and sunrise times, and weather. And, of course, you can also make your holidays easier to manage using things like our Flight Search feature to book your trip, Google+ to share your photos with family and friends, Google Docs to track your holiday spending, and more.

Happy holidays!

Posted by Robert Stacey, Software Engineer

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“People also search for” — now with explanations!
Search is a lot about discovery, and the Knowledge Graph, our map of real-world people, places and things, is designed to help you find new information easily. Have you ever flipped through the “People also search for” section of the Knowledge Graph panels and wondered — just how are those two people connected anyway? People had fun with our Bacon Number calculator, which revealed some, often surprising, connections, and now we’re taking it one step further. Just mouse over or click on a thumbnail to see an explanation of how it’s connected to the subject of your search:

We’re starting by showing major co-starring roles between actors, movies, and TV shows as well as highlighting family connections amongst famous people in the Knowledge Graph. These connections won’t show up all the time, but when there is an interesting explanation available, you can now see it at a glance. Happy browsing!

Posted by Golan Pundak, Engineer

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The new Chromebook, for everyone
As a kid growing up in India, I was fascinated with computers and the endless possibilities they presented. I had to wait until college to finally get my hands on one in the computer lab and since then began dreaming of a world where everyone could have access to one. We’re not quite there yet, but every day we get a bit closer.

A few years ago, we set out on a journey to build a better computer that’s faster, simpler and more secure. When we introduced a few Chromebooks into the market, many of you early adopters joined us on this journey. For folks living entirely in the cloud, the Chromebook is now a primary computer.

Many people use the Chromebook today as the perfect additional computer for their home. For families, it’s easy to use and share: for kids doing homework on the couch, parents catching up on emails at the kitchen counter and grandparents staying connected on video chat. There’s no need to worry about security updates and maintenance is easy; all you need to do is charge the battery. It just works.

This gets to the heart of the Chromebook vision. In order to have one, two or more computers around the house, they need to be easy to use and much more affordable. So together with Samsung, we designed a new laptop—the new Samsung Chromebook for $249—the computer for everyone.

The new Chromebook is a great computer at any price, but it’s an incredible computer at $249. It’s one of the lightest laptops on the market. You can easily carry it around all day—it’s 2.5 pounds, a mere 0.8 inches thick, with more than 6 hours of battery life for the typical user. And with 100 GB of free storage on Google Drive*, you can get to all of your stuff anytime, anywhere.

Even with its compact design, it’s packed with performance—it boots up in less than 10 seconds and resumes instantly. High-resolution videos (in 1080p) are beautiful to watch and when using the touchpad, you’ll notice smooth scrolling due to a hardware-accelerated user interface. And as you‘d expect from a Chromebook, it’s easy to share with others. Everyone—mom, dad, grandparents, tech lovers, tech haters—can have separate accounts where all of their stuff is kept safe. Finally, if you’re an active Google user of products like Gmail, Drive, Search, Maps, YouTube, Play or Google+ Hangouts, everything just works seamlessly.

Starting today, the new Samsung Chromebook is available for pre-order online from Amazon, Best Buy, PC World and other retailers. Next week it will be available for sale from these same online retailers as well as the Google Play store. You can also buy them at over 500 Best Buy stores across the U.S and over 30 PC World and Currys stores in the U.K.

So if you ever felt it was too complicated and too expensive to have an additional computer (or two), we hope you (and the entire family) will give the new Chromebook a try.

Posted by Sundar Pichai, SVP, Chrome & Apps

*You will have 100 GB of free storage for 2 years, starting on the date you redeem the offer on eligible Chrome devices. 

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Executives of the Scottsdale marketing agency, Search Control, attend the search and social media conference for innovators in technology.

Today, Search Control COO, Anthony Harding, and CTO Adam Pollicino are at the premier search and social media conference and expo, Pubcon Las Vegas 2012.  Today is the last day of the event and attendees can gather and meet leaders in the industry of search and social media.

Adam and Anthony have the chance to mingle with some of the most innovative businesses in social media, whose ideas are constantly advancing the entire search engine marketing industry.  One of the tech teams they are talking with today is from a company called Raven.  They are the creators of the internet market software for SEO, Social Media Marketing and PPC analytics that is used by many companies like Search Control.

“With so many amazing speakers from all corners of the online marketing industry, Pubcon gives us such a great opportunity to learn about products and services that are new to the marketplace,” says Anthony as he and Adam make their way down the exhibition hall.  This convention features a virtual “who’s who” of technology, where visitors like the Search Control executives can learn as much from networking and socializing as they can from the panels.

About Search Control

Search Control is a local Scottsdale, Arizona search engine marketing agency which is propelled by a team of experts in web marketing from backgrounds in a variety of business subjects.  Search Control’s forte is social media management, blogging, content writing,web development, web design, and tracking and reporting marketing results.  Small companies, corporations, public figures, and other brands from coast to coast rely on Search Control to protect their online reputation.  To learn more, please visit:http://www.searchcontrol.com

By Danny Sullivan

Another week, another update to part of Google’s search algorithm. This time, Google announced a refresh of its Page Layout filter that it first announced back in January, or what’s often called the “Top Heavy” update.

Updates, Updates

It’s the fourth Google update in the past two weeks. The rundown so far:

• Panda Update 20: Sept. 27, 2012
• EMD Update 1: Sept. 28, 2012
• Penguin Update 3: Oct. 5, 2012
• Top Heavy 2: Oct. 9, 2012

The Latest On Top Heavy

The head of Google’s web spam team Matt Cutts announced the update today on Twitter and called it “minor,” saying it noticeably affects 0.7 percent of English-language queries:

Minor weather report: Update of goo.gl/OpIDL launching today. ~0.7% of English queries noticeably affected.

The link in Cutts’ tweet points to Google’s original post about the Page Layout algorithm from January, which explains the algo thusly:

We’ve heard complaints from users that if they click on a result and it’s difficult to find the actual content, they aren’t happy with the experience. Rather than scrolling down the page past a slew of ads, users want to see content right away. So sites that don’t have much content “above-the-fold” can be affected by this change.

If you click on a website and the part of the website you see first either doesn’t have a lot of visible content above-the-fold or dedicates a large fraction of the site’s initial screen real estate to ads, that’s not a very good user experience. Such sites may not rank as highly going forward.

To read more click here: http://searchengineland.com/google-page-layout-algorithm-update-135847?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=feed-main

By: Miranda Miller

Google’s Matt Cutts has announced the first official update to January’s Page Layout algorithm, designed to reward sites with content, rather than ads, above the fold.

In a tweeted “weather report,” Cutts said less than 0.7 percent of English language queries are affected.

What is Google’s Page Layout Algorithm?

In follow-up tweets, Cutts reiterated that this update is neither Penguin nor Panda-related.

The Page Layout algorithm first launched January 19, 2012. In the official announcement, they explained who might be affected: “Rather than scrolling down the page past a slew of ads, users want to see content right away. So sites that don’t have much content “above-the-fold” can be affected by this change.”

They continued, “If you click on a website and the part of the website you see first either doesn’t have a lot of visible content above-the-fold or dedicates a large fraction of the site’s initial screen real estate to ads, that’s not a very good user experience. Such sites may not rank as highly going forward.”

The initial launch affected 1 percent of search queries globally. This update is reported to have a slightly less effect and affects English queries only.

Above the Fold Page Layout Algorithm Recovery

If you believe your site has been affected, some are reporting you will need to wait for the next Above the Fold Page Layout update to see a recovery. However, in Google’s announcement of the initial update, they advised:

“If you decide to update your page layout, the page layout algorithm will automatically reflect the changes as we re-crawl and process enough pages from your site to assess the changes. How long that takes will depend on several factors, including the number of pages on your site and how efficiently Googlebot can crawl the content. On a typical website, it can take several weeks for Googlebot to crawl and process enough pages to reflect layout changes on the site.”

Read the full article here: http://searchenginewatch.com/article/2216227/Google-Updates-Above-the-Fold-Page-Layout-Algorithm

Building positive and informative content online about your legal firm will attract new clients and keep existing clients in the loop.

Having no online presence, or worse, having a bad online presence, means that potential clients are likely to use the legal services of the competition.  Building a positive online presence to increase leads is simple with the assistance of experts in content creation and top SEO strategies.  Search Control, a Scottsdale search engine marketing agency represents legal clients from around the nation to increase their online presence and protect their professional reputation.

Legal firms specializing in all forms of law choose Search Control to build a foundation of optimized websites, blogs, social networks, and business directory profiles to claim the top “real estate” in the search results of Google, Yahoo, and Bing. By filling the search results, the brand is protected from unwarranted attacks from competitors and impersonators posting false or damaging information.  Search Control proactively defends the online reputation of their clients as new ways for their reputation to be harmed by others are appearing every day.  Search Control’s team specializes in web development with integrated legal content writing to help legal clients control their search results.

The Scottsdale marketing agency recently partnered with Attorney at Law Magazine to create a web-based national directory for attorneys and legal professionals. This new partnership gives legal clients of Search Control a competitive advantage and access to a vast legal network.  Look for Search Control’s ad and online reputation management tips for legal professionals in upcoming editions of Attorney at Law Magazine.

About Search Control

Search Control is a local Scottsdale search engine marketing agency which started in 2009 and has since rapidly developed to serve clients from all business industries. The team at Search Control is made up of a group of experts in web based business services, specializing in social media marketing, web design, web development, content writing, blogging, search engine optimization, search engine marketing, PPC advertising, and small business marketing.  To learn more about Search Control, please visithttp://www.searchcontrol.com.

Crowdfunding, the new trend for online marketers,  allows people to be an entrepreneur by accessing resources and creating projects to raise money. There are several key facts and suggestions that one must obtain before beginning with Crowdfunding.

By Erick Mott

Whether you’re serving clients or leading an organization to launch a new product, cause, or creative project on the web – you’ll find these crowdfunding tips useful.

What is Crowdfunding?

Crowdfunding is a collaborative effort of individuals to pool resources, usually via the web, to support entrepreneurial, cause or creative projects initiated by other people, businesses, and community groups.

People sometimes confuse crowdfunding with crowdsourcing – another form of community engagement to outsource tasks. The distinction is crowdfunding raises money from people for an idea or something tangible and crowdsourcing pays money to people for an idea or something tangible.

Ready to Give Crowdfunding a Go?

Great, the world needs more creators taking action rather than just talking about ideas. But crowdfunding is not for the faint of heart.

Follow these tips to increase your odds of success.

To read the tips click here: http://searchenginewatch.com/article/2213375/10-Crowdfunding-Tips-for-Your-New-Product-Cause-or-Creative-Project