Driving Directions Your Way with Google Maps Drag & Drop

Search Engine Roundtable
::: THE PULSE OF THE SEARCH MARKETING COMMUNITY :::
A well-rounded view on search engines and search engine marketing by senior members of the major SEO/SEM forums on the Internet.

1. Driving Directions Your Way with Google Maps Drag & Drop - 2007-06-29 09:18:54-04
   

   I prefer to drive from my office to Newark airport a different route then the driving directions on MapQuest, Yahoo Maps & Google Maps suggests. I prefer to stay on the Garden State Parkway, the whole way. In fact, if you hire a service to take you to the airport, they prefer to take you that way.

   But I was never able to easily show people how to go that way, until now.

   So instead of taking the GSP to I-80E to I-95 etc like this shows, you can now pretty much just stay on the GSP, like my version shows. How does this work?

   As the Google Lat Long Blog describes, you simply drag the lines to the roads you would like to take. I took a screen cast of my doing this for the route I mentioned above, here it is:

   You can then overlay satellite imagery, traffic, hybrid, etc over your map, if you prefer and finally, give someone the link to your preferred route.

   Forum discussion at Google Groups.

   

   
   
   
2. MSN ContentAds are Now Live to All Advertisers - 2007-06-29 10:37:26-04
   

   A Search Engine Watch Forums post by Discovery alerts the community to the official launch of MSN ContentAds, which occurred yesterday. Every advertiser has now been pulled into the service.

   As Barry mentioned earlier, you must opt out manually. To do so, Discovery has provided the following steps:

   * Click the Campaigns tab.
   * To change the settings for specific campaigns, select the check boxes next to those campaigns.
   * Click Bulk edit.
   * In the Edit settings for multiple campaigns section, from the Campaign settings drop-down list, select Content distribution, and click Apply.

   Discovery also provides additional tips on separating your content ad keywords from your keywords for search or for combining them.

   Tips for managing MSN ContentAds and discussion can be found at Search Engine Watch Forums .

   

   
   
   
3. Online Auction Listings Ranking Lower in the SERPs? - 2007-06-29 10:54:35-04
   

   A business owner at WebmasterWorld noticed that he has been getting an increase of sales lately which seems to be predominantly because online auction listings, which were ranked higher in the Google SERPs, are now not as visible. The auction rankings seem to have dropped.

   Members speculate that this may have something to do with the recent eBay versus Google advertising campaign gone wrong. Perhaps now this is a Google experiment on relevancy.

   Either way, business owners are happy to hear that this is occurring.

   That sounds like good news -- much better search results for the end-user, who was often getting expired auction pages. I do see some action like this -- not universal, but still a good tweak.

   Those sites have their own marketing plans which shouldn't involve natural search results.

   Have any small business owners been noticing any change of rankings (and increased sales/traffic) as a result of this?

   [Thanks Ogletree!]

   Discussion continues at WebmasterWorld.