While not an easy concept to fathom, Glyn Moody believes it may become necessary to create distributed search engines for company intranets that would decentralize information and services. He points to three -- some of which are open-source. Moody hopes the movement toward this new type of engine could squash some of the "serious vulnerabilities of traditional search engines."

Derek Lidow, one of the great entrepreneurs and founder of electronics company International Rectifier, tells us to listen to our ego before starting a business, but the message also rings true to anything we do as search engine marketers. Since true motivation can "thwart" success if left unstated, search marketers must think like entrepreneurs and align the company's motivation with the campaign. Here's how.

Retail has latched on to location-based services through technology like iBeacons and BLE Beacons, but there will be other markets generating bigger demand for shipments during the next five years, creating a 60-million-unit market in 2019. ABI Research points to BLE Tags and the location of things for everything from the connected home to personal asset tracking. It all feeds into the Internet of things theory.

Nothing much has been done to plug Google Maps' vulnerabilities since a series of incidents demonstrated that people can use the map's crowdsourcing function to create new and alter existing business listings, and fake Secret Service offices. The risk goes beyond fake phone numbers. It can ruin a business. Kevin Poulsen tells us why the Serbian Crown restaurant closed its doors after nearly 40 years in the same location after search results from Google Places misreported its open hours.

YouTube has partnered with India's telecom operator Tata Docomo to offer a range of data plans to its 3G customers. New Vision, a Uganda media site, claims the plan allows Tata Docomo to give mobile customers access to YouTube for half the regular price. YouTube says that 40% of its content is consumed on mobile devices but, in markets like India where many people are leapfrogging the desktop PC experience and going straight to mobile Internet, more affordable access and transparent billing are important points to increase adoption of mobile data plans, per New Vision.

Data targeting, ad extensions, great content and diversifying traffic sources are some of the tactics that marketers can use to increase paid-search conversions without raising bids in a competitive category such as home insurance. Malcolm Slade summarizes a new Econsultancy report that focuses on the home insurance category to demonstrate how search marketers can operate in a highly competitive space and still achieve visibility to acquire new customers and secure old without simply increasing their paid search bids.

Google has bought about 24 office buildings in Mountain View since 2011 at a whopping price tag of about $600 million, reports the Oakland Tribune. The company is asking city officials to change the zoning rules in northern Mountain View, enabling Google to tear down the old and build taller, sleeker buildings. While Google remains hush to its plans, the media outlet cites commercial real estate industry experts who say the company continues to focus purchases in areas where the city is considering high-density development that would yield taller offices, between five to 10 stories high.

Some California cities like Huntington Beach and Newport Beach outlaw the use of "illegal" fireworks, although authorities do little to enforce the ban. That doesn't mean searches are in decline. Bing took the data to determine the states and counties that are most interested in the tradition. The southern portion of the United States has a mild interest in fireworks, per Bing, which analyzed interest and intent based on search queries. Historically, Bing has seen a spike in interest on July 4, with a sharp incline just days prior. On the West Coast, Washington State residents appear to be most …

The role of the chief marketing strategist -- part creative director, technology leader, and teacher -- began to emerge more than a year ago, but few companies caught on to the newest C-level exec. Scott Brinker and Laura McLellan have been touting this role for some time. Now, Harvard Business Review is running a piece on the rise of chief marketing technologists - something near and dear to Brinker's heart. The Rimm-Kaufman Group, which Merkle acquired this week, appointed a chief marketing technologist or scientist a couple of years ago.

Zillow.com now powers real estate searches on MSN, owned by Microsoft, offering access to millions of for-sale and for-rent listings, as well as more than 1 million pre-market listings and data on all homes. Real estate professionals list clients' homes on Zillow to provide additional exposure for free listings. The listings also run on Zillow mobile, Yahoo Homes, AOL Real Estate, HGTV's FrontDoor, and HotPads.