Google Explains the Name HotPot

Google sent me a note on Twitter when I tweeted about Google HotPot recently when I had blogged about it last week. Turns out there actually is a story behind this queer name they chose for their terrific new online review interface.

“Hot pot, the dish, is about community. You and your friends huddle together and add ingredients to a pot of boiling broth, creating a delicious soup to be enjoyed by all. Sometimes you take your own food from the pot, and sometimes you taste what your friends have added. This shared experience of gathering around a fire to cook and eat communally is a fundamental illustration of how we’ve come together to enjoy food from the earliest days of humanity.” Read the full article on the HotPot blog.

So it appears that the Google HotPot team is watching Twitter which that in itself is an interesting note. Okay I’m not sure I buy into the HotPot thing for food, who wants people double dipping into food you actually will eat, but the concept of sharing information on reviews, restaurants, businesses, hair salons, all makes perfect sense.

I like Google HotPot, it is similar to Four Square, but I like HotPot better as I can be at my computer updating Facebook and jot a note in HotPot. I don’t have to be on my mobile phone to write a review like you do with Four Square. The sharing aspect is cool and I am personally using it to write reviews for the local businesses that I use.

Even more interesting for me is that HotPot is integrated with Google.com and Google Places. So anyone who is in my HotPot group has their reviews shown on my Google.com searches and all HotPot reviews appear on Google Places. I think Google has a winner with HotPot, but here are a few names that I ask them to consider while they are at it: Stew Pot, Add to My Stew, Fondue It, Tell Me More, Crazy Spot. What weird and wonderful names can you think of? Just put them in comments below. Google appears to be listening.

Google HotPot a Great Idea With a Silly Name

Google released HotPot about two weeks ago and so far I have used it several times and like it. I have to say if you have not checked it out you definitely should. If you are a local selling and serving business, you for sure need to come up to speed with HotPot as it will be incredibly more important to your business in the months to come.

First check it out here: http://hotpot.google.com. I think it has a stupid name and should have been named something more indicative of the service, but if you think about it, reviews stir the pot of attention so maybe HotPot works. Not sure who was at what bar with what drinks under their belt at Google when they dreamed the HotPot name up.

Never the less, once you start to use HotPot you will understand the this is one powerful tool that you will definitely want to encourage others to use to help your own business. First HotPot is very similar to Four Square. In fact so much so you may say – hey did they steal this idea. Well most likely they did as Google is not incredibly creative on its own, its MO is to see something they like and then knock it off.

If you have a Google account, you have a HotPot account. The great thing about HotPot is that it is a web interface and not solely a mobile interface like Four Square. Additionally, HotPot ties in directly with Google Places. Have you wondered how reviews appear now on your Google Places account? Well they are now going to come in via HotPot.

I personally just reviewed two restaurants that I ate at in the last two weeks. Both got 5 stars from me. Not only can you star rate a local business or place, but you can leave a comment and rate service, ambiance,  and value. When your review is done, you get another review registered on your HotPot account. You can add friends automatically with which you will share reviews. I think that Google is pulling your GMail address book contacts for this, but I am not positive.

The important take away on this is that HotPot feeds reviews to Google Places. For local businesses, HotPot activity will be key to getting reviews and plenty of them. No longer will Google need to rely on City Search, Yelp, or Google Maps, they now have their own “Four Square” like tool to garner reviews and build up activity on Google Places so they can further monetize local search.

Google Voice – Why You Must Have It

Google Voice is my new tool that I can now not live without. In fact, I have found it so helpful that I may replace my landline phone number posted on my website with my Google Voice phone number. This last trip, I found my Google Voice account to be an indispensable asset for any business traveler.

There is nothing worse than feeling tethered to your computer when you are a small business owner and there is no faster way to make your family mad at you when you are on vacation and you are stuck doing business on “their” special time. I found that Google Voice put me in the “driver’s seat” when it came to managing my phone calls while on travel.

In the Google Voice settings, I was able to set up groups for my business contacts and then set attributes on who would have immediate access to me by phone. Clients were asked to say their names on dialing, and then Google Voice phoned me and asked if I wanted to answer the call or have it send them directly to my voice mail.

With an additional setting I was able to have all my Google Voice messages transcribed and emailed to my mobile phone. This way I could decide who to call and when. Additionally, when I returned to my office I now had a full archive of all phone calls and transcribed messages. With one click I could listen to the actual phone call to figure out if the transcription was accurate with names. (The transcription was not perfect, but pretty good.)

If you are a business owner on the go, I would highly recommend Google Voice to you for your next trip. For now Google Voice is still by invitation only, but you can sign up to get access when it is opened up for public use from this link.

P.S. Google is not paying me for this post, I just feel they have a great new product and wanted to share it with you.

Google is Trying Out Social Networking Integration on Search

I just checked this out yesterday and as I was doing testing on this new Google.com tool I said to myself, “now, this is really cool”. What I am speaking about is Google’s integration of your own social media networks into your personal search results.  To get involved in the project sign into Google.com and then enter this URL: http://www.google.com/experimental/index.html select the first experiment at the top of the page called Google Social Search.

Once enrolled you will see a new feature at the top left of every Google.com page. The feature says Web and then a show options + mark. Open the + and you will now see a new left navigation bar that stretches down the page.  From here you can search in Google.com sectors such as images, video, news, blogs, updates, books, forums, and even social.

The take away from this new experimental project is that when you yourself are personally involved in social media like Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, and other platforms, the information you post is now searchable by others in your expanded social network all tied together in one neat interface using Google’s Social Search.

This is a real boon for web exposure and the creation of web authority for business owners and serious entrepreneurs. With some saying that social media is too time consuming to pursue, I say think again look at this new Google experiment which will most likely be the “face” of search to come and rethink your position on social media and social networking sites.

Google’s Instant Search Results

This past week Google announced that its search results would be instantaneous. Meaning specifically that indexing the web every week or every month just had to go! They have to spider the web continuously to provide up the second results.

Sounds like Google is feeling the pinch with the popularity of Twitter news sharing and Facebook interaction to me. With instant news being found out on Twitter and shared, who has to go to Google News anymore. Remember when Michael Jackson died? I found out on Twitter before any of the news networks had picked up the story. That really must have made ole Google feel out of the loop.

In the past weeks Google has signed non-exclusive agreements with Twitter and Facebook to use their instantaneous news to update their own index hoping that it can woo back immediate news and information junkies from Twitter Search and Facebook updates. Although this doesn’t sound like a problem, Google must be scared with the increasing popularity of Facebook and migration of regular email users to solely Facebook mail users as this will hurt them in their pocketbook for sponsored advertising.

For Twitter users this new Google thrust is a boon. Your tweets may very well be the hot property and viral message that now gets incredibly huge exposure and bonus staying power by being included into the Google index.

Based on this information if you are not on Twitter, you’d really better be considering getting started. This mash-up of Twitter, Facebook, and Google is bound to be a huge boon for website and businesses who dare to really take advantage of it.

If you need help with implementing Twitter check out our Twitter services to help you get started.

Huge Change in Google Algorithm Coming in December/January

Not to worry, Google has said that they will hold this huge algorithm update until after the holidays, but except a new algorithm called Caffeine to roll out late December early January. Huge updates and strategic changes end up with names. The last really massive one that turned webmaster’s world upside down was called Florida and it was infamous. In fact the changes were so big that with all the squawking after the update Google actually tweaked it and softened the impact. But needless to say many sites had their organic placement take a huge nose dive.

I just read this article and I think it is the best one in regards to explaining in fairly simple terms what webmasters think will happen with this update. You can read the full article here. The author Titus Hoskins supposes what will be in the update, but I have to say I could not agree more.

One of the biggest takeaways from this is that we suspect Google is changing how they value links as a factor for organic search placement.

Hoskins says, “The major question here is this: has the importance of backlinking been downplayed in this new index in favor of the keyworded domain and onsite content and optimization? Has there been a major shift to listing more quality content rather than relying on the number of backlinks a site is receiving, even from important related themed sites? The major problem and question to Google is this: if links can be bought, how do you keep your organic results democratic and fair, which was the original intention of Larry Page and Sergey Brin when they started Google in 1998.”

This is a very valid point. Hoskins goes on to propose that the new update will more heavily weight social bookmarking which is much more difficult albeit nearly impossible to scam. Interesting supposition considering that not everyone is using social bookmarking tools.

We can predict some things as Google has rolled Caffeine out to one data center so far and allowed webmasters early sandbox review of the new algorithm in an unprecedented rollout several months ago.

1. Links are devalued but to what extent we are not sure.

2. Content is again king and now becomes even more important.

3. Load speed of your website may now be a factor. Google has rolled out several speed clocking tools and has really put the word out on the Matt Cutts blog that speed is Queen next to content being King.

4. It appears that keyword domains will rank better in the new update.

5. On page factors will be more important than previously, Hoskins states, “‘OnPage Factors’ to play a much greater role in Google Caffeine. Quality unique content, page design, good navigation, title, meta tags, description, keyword density, alt tags, page views, bounce rate, traffic numbers, time spent on page, and the number of social bookmarks may play an increased role in achieving high rankings.” I would agree several patent disclosures ago Google stated that it was watching these figures and I could see that in the long run click and traffic activity would be coming in to play and it appears that Caffeine is the update where these factors finally are being considered.

6. Social bookmarks may be considered key organic factors. Here, I am not sure, but it does make sense. Social bookmarking is like a vote for content or popularity. You cannot buy this kind of traffic it happens naturally. It makes sense that Google who likes to level the playing field and reward performance not scamming would consider this important.

Take some time to read this excellent article so you will have a good understanding of what will be happening with your website most likely in late December to early January.