Posts filed under 'Did You Know?'

Getting There With Search

Six steps you can take to help search engines find and index your content

You’re trying to get your website noticed and search engines are an excellent channel for visibility. In this article, we’ll look at some basic things you can do to make sure your content is being indexed by search engines. The more of the items you can implement below, the more noticeable your site will be to the search engines. 

1. Check your “Robots.TXT” file
One little line of code in a simple txt file can be very costly if it’s blocking your site from search engines. A robots.txt file allows you to tell search engines to crawl or not crawl certain directories or files in your site.

For example, this simple line of code disallows all crawlers (a.k.a. robots):

User-agent: *
Disallow: /
To find your robots.txt file simply type in your domain followed by /robots.txt. For example, here is the robots.txt file for the W3C: www.w3.org/robots.txt. For more details on what can be in this file and how search engines treat it visit robotstxt.org.

2. Make sure your content is indexable
Although search engines have come a long way over the years in terms of indexing all kinds of content on the web, there are still some types of content that may not be fully indexed or not indexed at all. If you are seeing missing content when you look at the search engine’s cache of your page, you may want to check if the content is presented in one of the tough-to-index ways below.

This is also true for people using screen readers due to a disability. A screen reader “sees” the page much in the same way a search engine crawler does – by crawling content and deciphering the elements.

JavaScript
Some JavaScript is crawled by search engines today and more will likely be in the future, but JavaScript (including its related scriping technique AJAX) can still present an issue.  Because most content in JavaScript is usually not indexed, things like navigation, on-page apps, and any other content presented by using JavaScript may not be seen and therefore cannot contribute to the context of the page (or sometimes cannot be followed, in the case of links) for search engines.

Flash
With better indexing capabilities coming about recently, Flash sites are becoming more prevalent in SERPS (Search Engine Result Pages), although a site built entirely in Flash is still probably not the best idea if you care about search engine traffic.

Today search engines primarily attempt to index links and text from Flash files. While this is better than it used to be, 100 percent of content still may not be indexed depending on how your Flash site is created. Navigation through “pages” in a Flash file is all contained within a single swf file that lives on one URL, eliminating separate topical content for separate pages.  This can be problematic when you’re up against competitors with much more targeted topical and sub-topical content living on distinct URLs (with links to each of those specific URLs providing even more context).

To minimize indexing difficulties, try to use Flash in smaller pieces. Make sure each topical page of your site has its own unique URL first, then put Flash elements on each page if you like.  Beware though—the more of your content you put in Flash, the less content and context you may be providing to the search engines. 

Image Text
It’s rare to see the entire content of a page posted as a .jpg or other image these days, but it still happens. And when it does, a crawler goes through the code and just sees an image instead of seeing all of the pictures, content, and link text on the page. Search engines simply cannot read any textual content you present in an image, whether it is the entire content of the page or just titles or headers.  You will see the images displayed when you check the cached version of a page.  This is because it is displaying the actual image that is cached, not reading the text content within it.

3. Strenghten your link structure
Links to and from your pages are very important for the “findability” of your pages.  If a page has no links connecting it with any other indexed pages on the web, it may not be found by search engines, since they follow links to discover new content. 

Internal links
Make sure you have a sensible linking structure in place on your site that is crawlable, links to top level as well as deeper level pages, and links to content relevant to the page the links are on.

Crawlable links are links that can be seen by search engines, meaning they’re not in JavaScript or in unindexable links within a Flash file. Also link to different pages within your site, not just from the home page, but all pages. Deeper pages in a site tend to be tougher to find and index, since they are linked to less often, or from more obscure pages in a site. Try to include links to pages most relevant to the content of each page, to give the search engines better context, and to provide a good mix of deeper links. 

You can also include a sitemap page on the site (similarly named xml sitemap files are discussed later).  Provide the sitemap link from your home page and/or from a header or footer on all pages.

External links
If you provide worthwhile content, your site and the pages within it will attract links naturally.  These links from external sites help search engines find and classify your site, especially if your site is newly published. To kick-start your visibility,you can add your site to  trusted directories like The Open Directory Project and Yahoo! Directory.  If it is relevant, you can also add your site to online local listings pages like Yelp, Yahoo! Local or CitySearch. 

Promote your website in your advertising campaigns, add it to your business card, and provide any other means for visibility that you can. If people find your site interesting and useful they will link to it.

To see what your inlinks looks like, go to https://siteexplorer.search.yahoo.com/ and type in your URL. Click on the Inlinks button.  Use the dropdowns to look at links to one page or the entire site, or to look at links from all pages, all pages except that subdomain, or all pages except that domain.

4. Create a  sitemap XML file
The major search engines we’re addressing here all support xml sitemap files. These sitemap files are different from the onsite sitemap pages previously described. They are xml files that contain a list of the URLs on your site along with a small amount of information about the URLs that is placed on your server and crawled by search engines. This allows you to tell search engines about your URLs, even if they haven’t crawled them naturally by following links on the Web.

Visit sitemaps.org for more information, or see Yahoo!, Google, and Bing’s support of sitemaps.

5. Verify your “nofollow” and “noindex” tags
Noindex and nofollow tags can be used to block search engines from crawling specific links or content. 

Noindex
The noindex meta tag tells search engines not to index a page.  It looks like this:

<meta name=”robots” content=”noindex” />

To check for noindex tags on any of your pages, right click on the page in the browser and choose “View Source”.  Search for noindex on the page.

For more information on the search engines’ support of noindex, see these Yahoo!, Google and Bing pages mentioning it.

Nofollow
Nofollow tags can be found in a robots meta tag at the page level, or within the <a> tag at the link level.

Nofollow at the page level tells search engine robots not to follow any of the links in the body of the page that the nofollow meta tag is on.  It looks like this:

<meta name=”robots” content=”nofollow” />

Nofollow at the link level tells search engine robots not to follow that particular link that the nofollow attribute is applied to.  It looks like this:

<a href=”http://www.example.com/” rel=”nofollow”>link text</a>

To check for nofollows on any page, you can look at the source code of the page by right clicking on the page and choosing “View Source.” Then do a search for the word nofollow in the source code.

For more information on nofollows, see this Wikipedia article, or see Yahoo!,  Google and Bing’s  support of nofollow.

6. Specify your site’s language
You can also help search engines by specifying what language your site is written in. This is a simple meta tag that looks like this:

<meta http-equiv=”content-language” content=”en”>

See all ISO codes at the Library of Congress site for more information.

To check for language meta tags on any page, you can look at the source code of the page by right clicking on the page and choosing “View Source.” Then do a search for the word language (or content-language) in the source code.

Still having problems?
If you’ve tried everything above and believe you still have indexing issues, browse the webmaster guidelines below for more information, troubleshooting, and contact information for the search engines. 

Search Engine Guidelines for webmasters

• Yahoo! Search Content Quality Guidelines
• Google Webmaster Guidelines
• Bing guidelines for successful indexing

For more on getting your site noticed, refer to Laura Lippay’s previous post “Is Your Site Invisible?”

— Laura Lippay, Director of Technical Marketing

(Image by Kapungo via Flicker, CC 2.0)

Five Ways Advertisers Can Save Time

Yahoo! Search Marketing Desktop simplifies multiple campaign management

If you’re an advertiser running more than one campaign, you will probably welcome the new Yahoo! Search Marketing Desktop, a free offline tool that lets you spend less time on the tactical details of campaign management, and more on increasing your return-on-investment.

With Yahoo! Search Marketing Desktop, it now takes just a few clicks to modify multiple campaigns, ad groups, keywords and ads at the same time. And if you get carried away, you can even undo selected changes with no harm done.

Yahoo! Search Marketing Desktop puts an intuitive face on five major campaign management tasks:

• Bulk editing: Easily make mass changes to settings such as status, match types and budgets within an intuitive interface; increase or decrease multiple keyword bids; and export your view of keywords, ads, ad groups and campaigns into Excel for use however you wish.
• Campaign transfer: Import your third-party campaign data in one easy step.
• Keyword research: Use our keyword suggestion engine to find and add new, relevant keywords to your campaigns; get URL-based keyword suggestions to increase your keyword relevance and improve your performance; and export the keyword suggestions into Excel to share this information or to add tracking URLs.
• Find, replace and search: Find and replace text in ads, keywords, ad groups and campaigns; search for specific campaigns, ad groups, ads, or keywords in your account; or search for information in any of the account tabs.
• Account performance statistics: Retrieve status and statistics for your account’s impressions, clicks, CTR, cost, ad quality scores and other information.

By using Yahoo! Search Marketing Desktop you’ll have more time to analyze campaign performance, test your ads, and do all the other things that can help make campaigns succeed. Or, you could go do something else entirely!

Ready to get started? Download the free Yahoo! Search Marketing Desktop, or register now for a webinar that will introduce you to the tool and its benefits.

–-Chris Marlowe, Staff Writer

(Stopwatch image by Casey Marshall via Flickr, CC 2.0)

Optimize Your Way to a Cleaner Account

Keeping your list of blocked domains up-to-date

Some things are just plain messy. And unlike the savvy behind keeping previous W-2s neatly filed and probably the sanity behind saving—even electronically—old credit card statements for at least some time, there’s less to be said for clutter.

Desks strewn with random bits of paper and neon-colored post-it notes taped to every empty surface evidently work wonders for some. For others, it’s an impediment to productivity. Which might be why Spring cleaning has become an actual event for many.

Here at Yahoo!, we’re offering our own version of staying organized. Specifically as it relates to the list of blocked domains you’ve accrued within your account. As you know, we recommend using conversion data paired with the information within the recently launched Ad Delivery Report (ADR) to make sound decisions around which domains to block. And to help make sure that your list is as fresh, crisp and clean as possible, we’re happy to optimize those domains for you on a bi-monthly basis.

Optimize?

Yes, that’s our fancy little way of describing what one of our talented teams will do for you, at your request. That is, we’ll go through your list of blocked domains and highlight any that are no longer a part of our publisher network. Once you remove these, it will free up space, allowing you even more room to block those referring domains which don’t meet your conversion criteria.

Within a short time-frame, your account’s blocked domains list will be squeaky clean.
Which could possibly be as refreshing as purging old, indecipherable conference call notes, or getting rid of those crumpled Starbucks receipts that somehow accumulate at the bottom of your wallet.

Think of it as spring cleaning but offered year-round. To get started with a clean sweep, contact your Yahoo! account manager.

—Malin Kennedy, Senior Manager, Advertiser Experience

Is Your Site Invisible?

Easy ways to determine if search engines can find your site

If search engines can’t find your site, it may as well be the Invisible Man. Search engines like Yahoo!, Google, Bing and others are often a primary source of traffic and determine your ranking. Unfortunately, publishing your files to the Internet does not guarantee that the search engines are going to find them. 

Search engines crawl the Web, indexing pages and following links to find more pages. That’s their job. Pages that are newly published can appear in a search engine’s index (and in search results) within minutes, but sometimes it takes hours or even days.

This article will help you to get an idea of whether the search engines are finding your site, and what they see. In the examples below we’ll look at Yahoo!, Google and Bing, the three search engines with the highest market share in the U.S.

How to tell if your pages are being found by search engines
To determine if your site is indeed being indexed, do this simple search in the search box on any of the search engines by putting “site:” before your URL. Specific instructions like this are called “operators.” By typing that before the URL, you’re using what’s known as the “site operator.”

Example: site:yoursite.com

Don’t leave any spaces in the query. It should look like this:

The results will bring back pages from that site only. If you do not see any results from a site:yoursite.com search, then the search engine is not finding your site. 

Google does not show duplicate pages in these results, but it does allow you to see what’s been filtered. In order to see all pages, including ones Google deems as duplicates, look for a link after your very last search result listing that says, repeat the search with the omitted results included.  Click on that link to see all pages that Google considers duplicates of the ones listed in the initial query results. 

Or simply add &filter=0 to the end of the URL in your browser address bar and hit enter.

If you don’t see the “repeat the search with the omitted results included” link or do not see any changes when you add &filter=0 to your URL string, then you don’t have any previously filtered duplicate pages. This is a good thing because duplicate pages can split your in-link value among many landing pages instead of one, potentially hurting the rankings of your canonical landing page.

Is your content being crawled by search engines?
Search engines may find your page URLs when they crawl the Web following links, but they may not have the content of your pages indexed. To determine what search engines are actually indexing, you can click on the “cache” link on listings in search results.

If you’re looking for any page on your site–You can use the same site: operator referenced above.

If you’re looking for a specific page on your site–You can do a search for the page by entering the exact URL in the search box.

If you’re looking for specific content on your site—Enter the site: operator followed by an exact phrase in quotes in the search box (no spaces).

To check what each search engine has cached, click on the cache link under the result you’re interested in.  Here are screenshots of the cache link on Yahoo! (Google and Bing look pretty much the same).

When you click on the cached page, you will see the content that the search engine has actually indexed. Compare that to the page you see in your browser when you visit the page itself.  Do you see any content missing?

Note the content may have changed since the last time the search engine crawled your page. Search engines also sometimes choose not to index “noise” on a page such as advertisements. What is important to look for here is that the topical content of the page at the time the crawler visited was indeed indexed. If there is important content missing, there could be various reasons why.

Read the Search Engine Guidelines referenced below for more information, and stay tuned for the next SEO article where we’ll discuss steps you can take to make sure you’re doing everything you can to help the search engines index and crawl your content. 

Search engine guidelines for webmasters

• Yahoo! Search Content Quality Guidelines
• Bing guidelines for successful indexing
• Google Webmaster Guidelines

—Laura Lippay, Director of Technical Marketing

(Image courtesy ‘J’, via Flickr, CC 2.0)

Top Toys for Boys, 2009

Video games, Legos and Transformers lead the way

With the holidays as close as they are, anyone still shopping for toys is either a great parent or a glutton for punishment. If you’re finding yourself in this conundrum, you might like to get an idea of the top toys for boys this season, according to the National Retail Federation’s 2009 Top Toys survey. Knowing these most-wanted boys’ gifts won’t make shopping any less insane, but it might save you a few precious minutes:

Video games – Video games and boys have been a natural combo for more than 20 years now, and 2009 doesn’t appear to show any signs of that trend ending. With big-name games such as “Batman: Arkham Asylum” and “Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2” topping wish lists this holiday season, boys across the world will likely be madly mashing buttons come Christmas morning.

Transformers – The huge success of the second Transformers movie only helped increase the demand for Transformers, which have been a popular favorite for boys for over 25 years now.

Lego – Though they don’t light up, plug in, make noise or play mp3s, Legos have been consistently popular for over 50 years, and according to the 2009 Top Toys survey, that’s not about to change this holiday season. And, as a matter of fact, today’s Lego has lines that do plug in and light up, so whatever your son prefers, he’s covered.

Cars (generic) – Show me a boy who doesn’t enjoy playing with cars, and I’ll show you a kid who’s probably too busy playing with Transformers, Legos and video games. But still, good ol’ toy cars are as popular now as they’ve ever been.

Nintendo Wii – Though the Wii has been around for a few years now and sales are starting to slow down a bit, the popular video game console is still a highly sought after item by kids and adults alike.

Nintendo DS – The recently introduced Nintendo DSi boasts bigger screens, 2 cameras and a bunch of fun new interactive games that should keep boys entertained, while keep parents from going crazy during long car rides.

Zhu Zhu Pets – One of the hottest toys this season has to be Zhu Zhu Pets. Kids are going bonkers for this interactive hamster, and Zhu Zhu Pets are flying off the shelves so fast that retailers are having trouble keeping them in stock. And with a low $8 to $10 price tag and a high cuteness factor, it’s easy to see why. The bad news: Due to the high demand, Zhu Zhus are now selling at sites like eBay for upwards of $50. So if you can’t snag one at a store, bringing one home could get costly.

Feel free to print out this list before you attempt your next mall incursion!

— Noah Belson, Content Quality Analyst

Top Toys for Girls, 2009

Barbie, Hannah and Dora trump the Easy Bake Oven

The other day I was on an elevator with three women who were discussing the toys their children wanted for the holidays. One woman expressed concern that her daughter wanted an iPod Touch, and said “a two-hundred dollar electronic item for an eight-year-old girl? Whatever happened to the Easy Bake Oven?!”

I chuckled (to myself, since I wasn’t actually part of the conversation) and recognized that the landscape of gifts for girls has changed a lot since the days when girls just wanted toy ovens that cooked cakes with lightbulbs. iPod Touch aside, here are the other most popular gift items for girls this holiday season, according the National Retail Federation’s 2009 “Top Toys” survey:

Barbie – Most girls wouldn’t go ga-ga for a 60-year-old doll, but if that doll is Barbie, all bets are off. Even though she’s rapidly approaching AARP status, Barbie is still extremely popular among the schoolyard set.

Hannah Montana – Though they may one day occupy a landfill next to Lizzie McGuire and Spice Girls merchandise, right now, Hannah Montana items are hotter than ever.

Video games – They may lean more toward games about princesses than those where the object is  shooting zombies, but still, these days girls are reaching for the controller every bit as much as boys.

Disney Princesses – If there’s one thing that girls love, it’s young sovereignty. Add a little Disney to that and you’ve got a recipe that turns girls’ heads all over the world.

Dora the Explorer – Girls have been going nuts for this pint-sized Indiana Jones for over ten years, and the 2009 holidays don’t seem likely to curtail Dora’s exploring even in the slightest.

Zhu Zhu Pets – These little mechanical hamsters are one of the hottest toys this holiday season for both girls and boys. The only problem is, they’re also one of the hardest to find, due to their extreme popularity. With their low price tags and high desirability, Zhu Zhu Pets are being snatched off of shelves almost instantly. So if you see one, grab first and ask questions later.

Other top gift choices for girls include American Girl dolls, the Nintendo Wii and the Nintendo DS.

Of course every girl is different, but for the most part, these are the items that today’s young lady would love to receive over the holidays this year. I think that it’s a little sad that not one of these toys will bake a cupcake, but I guess that’s progress.

— Noah Belson, Content Quality Analyst

Getting into the Game

Video game console and game sales are through the roof again this year

When it comes to holiday gifts, video games have been at the top of many people’s wish lists since Pac-Man first started gobbling power pellets in the early 1980s. As gaming technology has grown, so has the demand for the systems, games and add-ons that it takes to keep gamers happily mashing buttons (until the batteries run out).

According to the Entertainment Software Association, video game hardware, software and peripheral sales climbed to $22 billion in 2008, a 22.9% jump over the previous year. And that record was primarily set by the strength of video game sales in December of 2008, which came to $5.3 billion. That’s somewhat staggering when you consider that as recently as 1997, the industry generated only $5.1 billion over the entire year.

Without a doubt, sales are bound to be huge again this month, as shoppers clamor to make sure they’ve got the latest and greatest under the tree come December 25. And these are the items that are likely to be on gamers’ wish lists this holiday season:

Consoles
PlayStation 3 – With a recent $100 price drop and a sleek, new design, PlayStation 3 is suddenly on the tip of everyone’s tongue again. In fact, in September, PlayStation 3 outsold the Nintendo Wii for the first time ever, which indicates that the changes in price and form has had a huge impact among consumers. Throw in the fact that the PS3 has a blu-ray player, and suddenly movie buffs are turning their heads toward Sony’s console, too.

Nintendo Wii – Though the Wii’s been around for a few years now and the bloom is slightly off the rose, the demand for that rose is still quite high. A recent $50 cut in the price of the console should help shore up demand this holiday season, and the Wii’s family-friendly appeal means that many moms and dads will want to thrill their kids with one this season.

Xbox 360 – Always a favorite, Microsoft’s stalwart gaming console is on schedule to be a crowd-pleaser yet again this holiday season. Popular games that are specific only to Xbox, as well as a vibrant online community, make the console extremely appealing to several levels of gamers.

PSP GO – Sony’s recently released handheld is smaller than the original PSP, and is absolutely turning heads among gamers on the go.

Nintendo DSi – With bigger screens, two cameras and fun downloadable games, the DSi was a huge seller over Black Friday weekend and is poised to repeat that triumph when it comes to holiday sales.

Games
While video games are popular all year long, there are a handful that are expected be huge sellers this holiday season, such as:

• Rock Band: The Beatles (PS3, Xbox 360 and Wii)
• Batman: Arkham Asylum (PS3 and Xbox 360)
• Grand Theft Auto: Episodes From Liberty City (Xbox 360)
• Assassin’s Creed 2 (PS3 and Xbox 360)
• Uncharted 2: Among Thieves (PS3)
• New Super Mario Brothers (Wii)
• Call of Duty: Modern Warware 2: (PS3 and Xbox 360)
• Borderlands (PS3 and Xbox 360)
• Forza Motorsport 3 (Xbox 360)
• DJ Hero (PS3, Xbox 360 and Wii)
• Halo 3 ODST (Xbox 360)

The demand for video games and consoles is stronger than ever, and it looks like a few new sales records will be set by the end of the year, which is good news for game sellers and players alike. This holiday season, it’s going to be “game on” for consumers!

— Noah Belson, Content Quality Analyst

2009 Holiday Shopping Trends

As expected, consumers are tightening their budgets and looking hard for good deals

Though 2009 wasn’t the financial nightmare that many predicted it would be, there’s no denying that it hasn’t exactly been a pleasant night’s sleep, either. And while many pundits predict it’s nearing an end, the recession has changed the consumer landscape and forced shoppers to totally rethink the way they shop; how much they spend, where and when they spend, and, most importantly, why they spend.

Careful consumer spending will be in full effect going forward, and the 2009 holidays will likely be no exception to the “new normal” of consumer caution. Here are some of the trends being reported among shopping-savvy consumers this holiday season…

Consumer caution
While holiday shopping is happening, it’s being done with the same caution that shoppers have been exercising for several months now. In fact, according to a National Retail Federation survey, 84.2% of people interviewed said they’d spend less on holiday gifts than they did last year.

Also, changes in the economy have made consumers think twice about doing all of their shopping at big-name chain stores. Now they’re considering other sources, such as discounters, thrift stores and resale shops. The NRF reports that 70% of people surveyed were planning to shop at discounters, and that at least one in ten people would shop at thrift stores this holiday season.

Savings, savings, savings
It’s probably no surprise that in this era where everyone’s looking to cut back on spending, consumers are eagerly searching for the best possible deals that they can find. Coupons, discounts, free shipping and just about anything else that can shave a few bucks are highly desired by holiday shoppers. The NRF survey reports that nearly half (43.3%) of respondents chose sales or price discounts as the most important factor in deciding where they shopped this holiday season.

Additionally, the era of “grab it and go” appears to be over. Consumers are researching their purchases before they buy them, both to determine if they really need them, and to try to find the best possible deals. Product reviews, message boards and online videos are great resources for careful consumers, and in 2009 holiday shoppers are using those resources more than ever.

Impulse spending way down
Retailers hoping that consumers will make a lot of “oh, what the heck” purchases for themselves or others may want to give up that hope. All signs indicate that tightening belts will lead to a consumer crackdown on impulse purchases. Shoppers are going to be setting their budgets—and sticking to them.

While projected holiday spending for 2009 is down across most categories, it’s actually up when it comes to food and candy. According to the NRF’s survey, food spending will be up an average of $10 per person, which is the only expected increase in any category this holiday season. Whether people are buying food gifts for friends or just planning more parties at home, it looks like there will be more than enough to go around.

While most categories will suffer from spending declines, some will take less of a hit than others. For example, Americans say they’ll spend only 2% less on greeting cards this year. Since spending is expected to decline for friends and co-workers, this may mean that some people are getting a simple card instead of a gift this year. But hey, it’s the thought that counts, right?

— Noah Belson, Content Quality Analyst

Black Friday Anything But Bleak

Online spending during the early part of the holiday shopping season is strongest ever

Brick-and-mortar stores weren’t the only recipients of consumer love, as the holiday season kicked off with Black Friday and Cyber Monday following Thanksgiving. Even before Cyber Monday (the biggest online shopping day of the year) actually began, shoppers were heading online to get great deals. According to the analytics firm comScore, U.S. online spending on the Black Friday weekend was the strongest it’s ever been, up 11% over the prior year, with $595 million spent online.

A jump that high is worth taking notice of, especially when you consider that the increase in brick-and-mortar sales from 2008 to 2009 was only 0.5%. Of course, brick-and-mortar spending greatly overshadowed online spending for Black Friday weekend, but the huge disparity between yearly increases for both areas of sales is interesting to note.

And that rise in sales carried over to Cyber Monday as well. According to comScore, Cyber Monday sales were up 5% from a year ago, reaching $887 million and matching the heaviest online spending day on record (December 9, 2008).

Gotta spend money to make money
What’s the cause for this sort of impressive increase in spending? First is the aggressive marketing that online advertisers have begun to master, which entices consumers to open their wallets. Offering the right incentives, such as low prices, free shipping, coupons, discounts and other promotions, can go a long way toward turning a shopper’s head. Smart shoppers know they can find great deals online, and smart advertisers know that the shoppers are looking for them.

Additionally, online shopping offers an enticement that traditional shopping is sorely lacking: comfort. Shopping from home is quicker, easier and requires less hassle, stress and even gas. The rise in Cyber Monday sales indicates that not only are consumers getting more mentally comfortable about buying online, but thanks to the ease involved, they’re getting more physically comfortable, as well.

What’s more, online shopping allows consumers to shop during times when stepping out to the store might be impossible. For example, comScore reports that this year, more than half of the dollars spent online at U.S. web sites originated from work computers (52.7%), representing a gain of 2.3% from last year. That number illustrates the fact that even when they’re stuck at the office, consumers can and will still shop.

The holiday shopping season has just begun, but as the numbers indicate, we’re off to a great start. And if we can keep this momentum as we head into December, the holidays in 2009 may really be something to celebrate.

— Noah Belson, Content Quality Analyst

Photo courtesy of Flickr user Whoohoo120.

Anti-Phishing Reminders

Defend yourself from scammers looking to steal your account

Though we have previously published articles on “phishing,” we think it never hurts to remind you of ways to protect yourself from these scammers.

You may receive an e-mail that looks like it came from Yahoo!, taking you to something that looks like a Yahoo! Search Marketing log-in page. But in reality it can be a phishing scam from somebody who is trying to duplicate our login page to get your user name and password to hijack your account.

Well, don’t fret. To help combat these phishing scams, we have installed what’s called a “sign-in seal” on our log-in page. Already in use by many financial institutions, a sign-in seal is a cookie-based secret message or image that is displayed on your computer only. (That is, the machine you use to log in to your account.) If you use more than one computer, you’ll need to set up your seal for each. You can create your own custom text message to use as a seal, or upload your own image.

If you do not see your custom seal—and you haven’t cleared your cookies on your browser—when signing into your account, the site you’re on may be a “spoof” site designed to hoodwink you into giving up your valuable personal information. We encourage you to create a customized sign-in seal for your Yahoo! Search Marketing account today, then look for it every time you log in. You can set up your seal from your Yahoo! Search Marketing log-in page (the real one).

How to recognize a scam email
Phishing emails usually try to hook you with some official-sounding message about your account. A common subject line is “Please Verify Your…”. Once you open the email, you’ll often see familiar corporate colors, branding, logos and language. Sometimes they will tell you that your account has been disabled for a bogus reason. At other times, they’ll offer a “free upgrade” to a new (and often non-existent) service.

Don’t give out account or personal info to anyone
The biggest clue in the fake email is that it asks for your username and password. We will never send you an email asking for your password.

Another way to help tell the faux from the friendly is by looking at the sender’s email address. Most of the official communications we send you will come from an address that looks like this: solutions (at) ysm.yahoo-email.com. If you get an email from a yahoo.com address asking you for info, it’s a good bet that it’s a fake.

If you think you’ve been “phished” for info, please let us know by emailing phishing (at) cc.yahoo-inc.com, or forward the email in question to that address.

To learn more about how you can keep from getting reeled in by “phishermen,” and how to guard against other Internet-based scams, visit these resources:

• Common Abuse Issues
• Yahoo! Security Center

— The Team

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