Google has added the "suggestions" feature worldwide to Image Search, a week after it rolled the feature out globally to its other two search engines, Web Search and Google Video. It's a way to explore trends and generate ideas. I've noticed that the tool, while convenient, has a hiccup that Google needs to fix. People can query red and expect to see the suggestion "rose," but search results will also suggest "redtube," a pornography site.

David Harry provides an extensive list of factors affecting search rankings. He admits it took flowcharts to map out the post. Harry covers more than 10 categories that affect rankings, each listing several subcategories with pointers on how to apply the strategy. The lengthy list runs through link-related factors, header data, link age, domain history, Web-page hosting location, and much more.

Rae Hoffman tells us the importance of creating custom category hooks. The lengthy post is geared toward SEO professionals using Thesis 1.4, or a more recent version. Thesis works best for those planning to customize every category on the blog, but can get a little complicated, she writes. Hoffman provides the code along with the instruction to get started creating custom categories and tag pages. If you get lost, consider reading "Hooks for Dummies" before continuing to follow her instructions, so the code makes more sense.

For many, the correct ways to use keywords remain a mystery. This post aims to sort through some of the misconceptions. Keywords are generally not case-sensitive, have more weight if used in title or header tags, and the singular word is often associated with its plural counterparts, according to Stoney deGeyter. In the lengthy post deGeyter points to the differences between how keywords are used on Web pages vs. the ways search engines interpret them. He also warns against keyword stuffing, along with bolding a bunch of keywords on the page.

Budgeting for 301-redirect pages when building a new Web site is critical. Many company execs don't realize the importance of having enough caching power, so SEO professionals need to make sure their clients understand that content management servers require enough space to cache the content. Will Critchlow has been working on a project that forced him to think about the least expensive way to insert and display redirects on high-traffic Web sites. Tapping into his recent experience, he offers up some dos and don'ts.

Brian Carter provides a brief overview of advanced reporting techniques that SEO professionals could miss by limiting their research to the AdWords starter edition. The beginning guide gets you started quicker, but keeps you ignorant longer because it leaves out some important details, Carter writes. The biggest hindrance to following the starter kit is not having the information to track leads or sales. Carter suggests instead that you work with the standard or advanced edition. Doing so will give you an advantage over competitors, optimize your account, and increase your return on investments.

Testing ad copy means reviewing performance statistics, determining the benefits, and developing calls-to-actions that drive the best click-through and conversion rates. John writes that testing the text of an ad is one of those tedious tools/tasks that can quickly become a pay-per-click manager's friend. John provides a list of must-reads to get the basics in testing ad copy. Don't create the ads and walk away assuming everything will work as planned. "Nobody can instantly understand all of the nuances of a keyword (or group of keywords) and its competitive landscape, and write the perfect ad from the …

In a very long post about the sometimes-tempestuous relationship between newsapers and search engines, Danny Sullivan makes a sarcastic suggestion for Rupert Murdoch, who has been worried lately about Google stealing "all our copyrights." One simple line of code could put that to rest, Sullivan notes. The code "User-agent: *, Disallow: /" is all it takes. "Done," Sullivan writes. "Do that, you're outta Google. All your pages will be removed, and you needn't worry about Google listing the Wall St. Journal at all. "Oh, but you won't do that," he continues. "You want the traffic, but you …

Much ado has been made about search engines not indexing Twitter's tweets. But Gyutae Parks has managed to generate 35,967 extra hits to his Web site in just 14 days by using the microblogging site to direct traffic to his site. Parks began by writing an article that would appeal to Twitter users. The topic: "6 Reasons Why Twitter is the Future of Search - Google Beware." Writing the article was simple. The trick was getting people to pick up and share the content. Parks also provides a trending graph to demonstrate the lift of visitors to his …

It's rarely a good idea to add your street address to the title tag. Too much information in the tag can hurt a site trying to rank highest for their most important keyword phrases. Chris Smith, however, believes there's an exception to this rule. Smith calls it "leveraging reverse search for local SEO." It works when the address is on a famous street or near a famous building such as Grauman's Chinese Theatre in Los Angeles or the Empire State Building in New York. This strategy is especially helpful when people search for businesses on Google Maps.