Here's something search marketers don't see often. Google followed Bing by adding a Bitcoin calculator to its search engine. The Bitcoin price serves up when searching for "Price of BTC" or "Bitcoin price." Bitcoin is the digital currency where transactions are made without a central bank. Google is working with Coinbase to support Bitcoin conversions.

There's an opportunity for search marketers to help brands build an identity, especially those whose images are fragmented. Fragmentation remains a major problem because it slices the company's image into many sections. It typically occurs when the company lacks a consistent off and online marketing strategy. Nigel Hollis says if the brand's strategy remains fragmented, the consumer's opinion of the brand will also remain fragmented.

Google just added Alan Mulally, former Ford Motor CEO, to its board. Pondering the implications of Mulally’s appointment, the Associated Press notes: “Google has developed car prototypes that drive themselves, but hasn't revealed what it plans to do with the technology in the long term.” More broadly, “Mulally … is the only director with a background in traditional manufacturing on Google's board.” 

Google teamed up with Swiss drug manufacturer Novartis AG to develop smart contact lenses with embedded electronics. The lenses will have non-invasive sensors, microchips and embedded miniaturized electronics to monitor insulin levels for people with diabetes, or to restore the eye's natural focus in people who can no longer read without glasses. Novartis will take responsibility for the marketing and commercialization the product.

Microsoft has created an artificial intelligence (AI) engine, Project Adam, an effort to build a large scale distributed system. It's Microsoft's attempt to use deep learning to improve natural language processing, computer vision and speech recognition, per Liam Tung. The groundwork for the project began in 2012. He points to a video interview with Trishul Chilimbi, partner research manager for Microsoft Research, which explains the project's purpose. The technology allows users to photograph food to immediately discover its nutritional information, for example. It recognizes 22,000 categories from an image.

Microsoft shared details about its partnership with the academic community and how Cortana, powered by Bing, will integrate scholarly information. This fall, Cortana will gain the addition of the academic data to give researchers a maturing personal assistant. Through Bing, Cortana recognizes more than 1 billion words in multiple languages that often are mixed in a single utterance. Rob Knies explains that it will let researchers speak uncommon words in a query, rather than typing on a keyboard.

Babak Parviz, the man who led Google's development of Project Glass, is taking a position with rival Amazon. Ryan Mac tells us that he posted a photo Saturday of the Amazon logo with the short comment "status: super excited." Mac explains that an Amazon spokesperson confirmed Parviz' hiring, but would not comment on his role.

"OK Google, does this look discreet?" James O'Toole asks the Samsung Gear Live smartwatch on his wrist. The device relies on voice search to compensate for the lack of a keyboard to type queries or commands, which will require Google and other search engines to develop a different type of advertising model in the future. O'Toole says Android Wear has only recently been opened to independent app developers, so the platform has yet to find its way with consumers.

It takes more than keywords and links to build a successful SEO strategy. Rand Fishkin champions the art and science of SEO and offers insight into expanding the search optimization tactic. He delves into complexities, challenges and controversy, and why marketers cannot fit SEO into a mold. Although some marketers describe SEO as anything that impacts potential site links, it's any input that engines use to rank pages, as well as anything people or technology does to influence those ranking elements, per Fishkin.

Familiarity breeds use. So making similar features can attract more consumers to the app. Google Maps app's update for iPhones and iPads adds features known in Yelp, such as a local guide that shows places and activities depending on the location and time of day. It also provides the ability to view search results in the Map or as a list. Previously in Google Maps, users could only view results from the map one at a time. Business Insider points out these features have been popular in Yelp for some time.