Beginner’s Guide to Google Webmaster Tools

 

Are you looking for some love… from Google? Other than buying paid traffic through their AdWords program, the best way to get more traffic from them is through search engine optimization. But before you start optimizing your site, the first thing you should do is sign up for Google Webmaster Tools (GWT).

GWT is a free toolset provided by Google that helps you first understand what’s going on with your website. This way you make decisions based off of data instead of going in blindly.

Here is how GWT works.

Adding your website

The first thing you need to do after you login to GWT (it’s free to sign up) is to add your website.

After you add your website you’ll have to verify that you actually own the website. You can do this through four ways:

1. Add a DNS record to your domain’s configuration – You can use this option if you can sign in to your domain registrar or hosting provider and add a new DNS record.
2. Add a meta tag to your sites homepage – You can choose this option if you can edit your site’s HTML.
3. Upload an HTML file to your server – You can choose this option if you can upload new files to your site.
4. Link your Google Analytics account to GWT – You can use this option if your site already has a Google Analytics tracking code that uses the asynchronous snippet. You must be an administrator on the analytics account for this to work.

Dashboard

Once your site is verified you’ll start seeing data on your website. Sometimes it can take a few hours before you see any data, but it’ll start rolling in.

The dashboard gives you a rough overview of everything from what keywords you are ranking for to how much traffic you are getting. In addition to that you’ll see if the Google bot is experiencing any crawl errors when going through your website, the number of sites linking to yours, and how many pages Google has indexed.

Site Configuration

Just like everything else, Google isn’t perfect. So configuring your site can help them do a better job of ranking your website. When configuring there are a few areas that you should be familiar with:

Sitemaps

Submitting a sitemap will help Google determine what pages you have on your website so they can index them. If you don’t submit a sitemap they may not index all of the pages on your website, which means you won’t get as much traffic.

Sitemaps have to be submitted in an XML format and they can’t contain more than 50,000 URLs or be larger than 10 megs. If you exceed any of those limits, you need to split up your sitemap in multiple files and then submit them.

If you aren’t technical, you can go to XML Sitemaps to create a sitemap. All you have to do is enter in your URL of your homepage and click “start”.

Once your sitemaps have been uploaded, Google will tell you how many of your URLs are being indexed. Don’t worry, it is common for them to not index all of your web pages. But your goal should still be to get as many pages indexed as possible.

Typically if pages aren’t being indexed it’s because the content on those pages aren’t unique, the title tags and meta descriptions are generic, and not enough websites are linking to your internal pages.

Crawler access

There will be some pages on your website that you just don’t want Google to index. This could be private login areas, RSS feeds, or crucial data that you don’t want people accessing.

By creating a robots.txt file you can block not just Google, but all search engines from accessing web pages that you don’t want them to get their hands on. However, for highly sensitive areas of your website you may want to consider password protecting all relevant directories.

Through the robots.txt generator and tester, not only will you be able to create a robots.txt file, but you will be able to see if it is done correctly before you upload it to your server. It’s wise to do because the last thing you want to do is make a mistake and tell them not to index your whole website.

And if you accidentally mess up and find Google indexing pages that you don’t want them to index, you can request them to remove it through this section.

Sitelinks

Sitelinks are links to a site’s interior pages displayed on a Google search results page. Not all sites have sitelinks, but as you grow in popularity you’ll naturally get them. Google generates these links automatically, but you can remove sitelinks you don’t want.

Through this section you can somewhat control what sitelinks show up when someone searches for your website. The reason you can’t fully control what pages show up here is that you can only block which pages you don’t want to appear, and you can’t pick which pages you want to appear.

Change of address

If you are looking to change the URL of your website, you better let Google know or else your traffic is going to decrease.

You can tell them through 4 easy steps:

1. Setup the new site – You have to get the new domain up and running. Make sure all your content is available for the public to see.
2. Redirect the old traffic – A 301 permanent redirect tells users and search engines that your site has permanently moved.
3. Add your new site to GWT – Make sure you also verify your new website.
4. Tell GWT your new domain – In the change of address section, you can select the new domain name of your website.

Settings

If your target audience is someone in a specific country, then you can select this option in GWT. For example if my target customer for KISSmetrics lives in the United States, I would then tell GWT that my target audience lives in the United States.

In addition to that you can select a preferred domain name. This is going to be http://yourdomain.com or http://www.yourdomain.com. Either one works, you just have to select which variation you prefer. The reason for picking one is that people may link to both versions of your domain and by selecting one Google will combine the links, which will help your rankings.

The last setting you should be worried about is crawl rate. If you feel that the Google bot needs to be crawling your website more often and faster then you can tell them to do so. Or you can just let them pick the crawl setting for your website. (this is typically the best option because if they crawl your website too often it can cause too much bot traffic going to your server and increase your hosting costs)

Your website on the web

Have you ever wondered how Google looks at your website? After all, it’s a search engine and not a human… so naturally it won’t be able to look at a website in the same way you do.

But luckily for you, through GWT you can see how Google views your website.

Search queries

Not only is it important to go after keywords that have high search volume, but it is important to make sure that you have a good click through rate.

By monitoring the search queries page, you can work on improving your click through rate so that people are more likely to click on your listing when they search. Typically you can do this by making your title tag and meta description more attractive as that is what people read before clicking through to your site.

Links to your website

The best way to increase your rankings on Google is to get more sites to link to you. Usually this happens naturally if your website is providing valuable information to potential customers.

A good way to monitor your link growth is to continually monitor this area in GWT. In addition to that, make sure you monitor which pages people are linking to.

If your links aren’t growing fast enough consider writing relevant linkbait that could be submitted throughout the social web. Getting on the homepage of Digg.com can drive thousands of new links to your site.

Keywords

You may have a good idea of what keywords you want to rank for, but that may not be consistent with what Google is ranking you for. Under the keywords section you can see what keywords your website is the most related to.

You can also see what variations of each keyword that are also relevant to your website. For example some people misspell keywords and you can find out which misspellings your website is most relevant for.

And if those aren’t the keywords you care to rank for, you can then use that data to adjust the content on your website.

Internal links

Linking your web pages together is a great way to get more Google love. For example, if you want your about page to rank for your company name make sure you link to it multiple times.

If you don’t link to your internal pages, they will not get as much PageRank and they won’t place as well in the search listings.

In addition to that, this data will also help you determine which pages Google feels is the most important. For example, if you look at the image above you’ll see that website owner felt that their about pages was one of the most important pages on their website. So naturally Google felt that as well.

Subscriber stats

If you have a blog, this area of GWT will be useful for you. If you don’t, it won’t.

Under the subscriber stats section you can see which of your blog posts are the most subscribed to by Google’s feed reader. You can then take that data and write more posts that are similar to your popular ones. And of course, you can stop writing blog posts similar to the ones that no one subscribed to, as readers probably didn’t enjoy them as much.

On a side note, if you want to track your RSS growth, you can also check out Feedburner, which will allow you to track how popular your feed is.

Diagnostics

Websites are made by humans, so don’t expect them to be perfect. Your code maybe a bit messed up, and even worse, your website may contain malware.

Through the diagnostics section, you can figure out what’s wrong with your site and how you can fix it.

Malware

If you have malware on your server, you should see a message here. If you don’t, GWT won’t show you much.

The reason it is important to not have malware on your server is that Google tries not to rank infected sites high because if someone goes to an infected site, their computer may get infected. If you do happen to have malware, make sure you clean it up.

Crawl errors

The crawl errors section will show you if there any problems that relate to your site on the web or on a mobile phone. The most common error that you’ll see is a 404 error, which means Google’s bot can’t find that page.

The most common reason that you’ll see 404 errors is because other websites sometimes link to pages that don’t exist on your website or used to exist.

What you need to do is get a list of all of the websites that are linking to dead pages on your site and hit them up. When emailing them, ask them if they can change that link to a valid page.

Or if you see a lot of people linking to a dead page on your site, you can always 301 redirect that old URL to the new URL.

Crawl stats

If you have thousands of pages on your site, then you should expect Google to crawl most of these pages on a daily or weekly basis. If they aren’t, then something is wrong.

Through the graphs and data tables that GWT provides, you should be able to get a good sense if they are crawling enough pages on your website. If they aren’t, consider adjusting the crawl rate under the settings tab.

HTML suggestions

When Googlebot crawls your site, it may find some issues with your content. These issues won’t prevent your site from appearing in Google search results, but addressing them may help boost your traffic.

The most common problem is related to title tags and meta descriptions. If every page on your site has unique and detailed title tags and meta descriptions, you should be fine. At the same time, you also have to make sure your title tags aren’t too short or too long.

And if that isn’t the case, then you can go through the URLs that GWT tells you they have an issue with, and fix it.

Labs

GWT regularly tests new features out. The easiest way to find out about these new features is to go through the labs sections.

Fetch as Googlebot

With Fetch as Googlebot you can see exactly how a page appears to Google. All you have to do is type in a URL and GWT will tell if they could successful see it or not.

There currently isn’t a ton of data that GWT is showing in this area, but I expect this to change in the future.

Sidewiki

If you’re a webmaster, you can leave a special Sidewiki entry on pages of your site. You can choose to leave a master entry for the whole site, or create page specific entries to engage your visitors.

All you have to do is:

1. If you’ve successfully validated your account in GWT, you will see an option to write as the page owner.
2. Select the “Write as the page owner” checkbox in the entry form. If you’d like to leave a master entry across the whole site, also select the “Show this page owner entry on all pages…” checkbox.
3. Click Publish.

Site performance

Your website’s load time is one of the most important things you should be monitoring. Every month you should be making sure you improve this number because if your website is too slow your Google traffic may drop.

Numerous website owners have seen a positive increase in their traffic by improving their website load time.

If you aren’t sure how fast your website should load, don’t worry. Google will tell you if your website is too slow or quick enough.

Video sitemaps

If you have video on your site, you want to make sure you include those raw video files in your sitemap. This way, Google can index them as they may not be able to find them otherwise.

This will help ensure that your videos are getting the traffic they deserve from Google video search.

If you are trying to create a video sitemap, this page should explain how to do so.

Conclusion

GWT is a useful tool that’s free. If you aren’t making use of it, you should start doing so now. The reason it’s worth using is because it will help guide you and tell you what to do if you want to improve your Google traffic.

What are you waiting for? Sign up for Google Webmaster Tools, it’s FREE!

A Guide to Google’s APIs

Image via CrunchBase

 

 

Google has been opening up many of its most popular services to outside developers over the past year, including the Google Docs API this week. From quirky applications to venture-funded startups, a wide variety of new services are being launched leveraging Google’s APIs, helping users perform a multitude of tasks. Here is a non-technical introduction to some of the company’s most popular APIs and some of the most interesting applications built on top of them.

Google Toolbar API

The Google Toolbar is widely-used and comes standard with Firefox. The Toolbar API allows developers to create buttons for Google Toolbar, thus creating a way for you to add data from your web site to the user’s web browser. For example, the Fox News – Latest Headlines button will display all of the latest news from the Fox News site and let you click to the story. In addition to the more than 100 apps featured in the Google Toolbar Gallery from mainstream names like CNN and YouTube, dozens of independently developed applications and mashups have also been created. For example, the Twitter Google Toolbar Button allows you to input Twitter feeds and receive updates in your toolbar.

Google Gadgets API

Perhaps the most important of the Google APIs for those looking to take advantage of Google’s massive user base, the Google Gadgets API allows developers to create applications that run on iGoogle (formerly Google Personalized Home), Google Desktop, Google Page Creator, and the “Google Gadgets for Your Web Page” directory. For example, the CNN TV gadget streams live news, while Outlook Tasks imports your task list from Microsoft Outlook. Assuming you are able to get your application into Google’s official directory, the Gadgets API is a great way to gain exposure for your company’s product.

Google Base API

Google Base is Google’s service for listing things online – essentially a classifieds service integrated with the company’s other products like search and Google Checkout.

The Google Base API allows developers to both search the Google Base database and input new listings. Thus, shopping sites, classifieds aggregators, and others are building applications that either expand their own listings or allow sellers to submit items to multiple sites at once. vFlyer is a service that enables you to post to Google Base, Craigslist, and eBay, among others. For real estate listings, BaseEstate integrates Google Base listings into their service, which displays properties on a mashup of the Google Maps API.

Google Calendar API

The Google Calendar API allows developers to build applications that let users create, manage, and delete events from their calendars. Online task manager Remember The Milk has utilized the Google Calendar API to enable their users to sync their task list with their Google Calendar. For business users, there is a mashup on Salesforce.com that allows you to merge your events from salesforce.com with your Google Calendar. If you want to sync your Google Calendar with your mobile phone, open source project GCALSYNC allows you to do so. With dozens of startups focused on finding and managing events, expect more mash ups with Google Calendar in the future.

Google Desktop SDK

The Google Desktop SDK (Software Developer Kit) allows developers to build plugins that extend the functionality of Google’s popular desktop search software. Some plugins add capabilities to Google Desktop, while others are essentially widgets for other programs that you can place in your Desktop sidebar. An excellent example of an application that adds capabilities is the Google Desktop Search Plugin for Windows Explorer which links the “Search” icon that can be found throughout Windows to Google Desktop instead of the default Windows search tool. On the widget side of things, any Google Gadget can be quickly and easily added to your Desktop sidebar, thus making Gadgets an attractive method for developers to reach new users.

 

Google Maps API

One of the most popular (and longest running) Google API’s is that of Google Maps. The API allows developers to built applications that plot their own data on top of Google Maps. We recently took a look at 13 Must-See Google Maps Mashups, but there are hundreds (if not thousands) of applications using the API, ranging from Frappr’s social maps to Trulia’s real estate search. In addition to the API, Google also recently introduced Maplets, essentially allowing developers to place Google Gadgets on Maps.

AdWords API

The Google AdWords API allows developers to design new programs for managing and analyzing AdWords campaigns. This has lead to a variety of software packages (many of which are of course advertised on Google) that built upon AdWords. For example, the VisualCalc AdWords Dashboard turns data from AdWords into charts and graphs for analyzing which campaigns are performing best, how clicks and conversions are tending over time, and how various metrics compare in different ad groups. Unlike most of Google’s other APIs, developers pay a fee to build applications for AdWords, which is why most of the applications built to-date such as VisualCalc cost money.

Google Docs & Spreadsheets APIs

As announced earlier this week, the Google Documents List Data API allows developers to build applications that can upload documents to Google Docs, request a list of a user’s documents, or search content within a document. The Google Spreadsheets API performs similar functions, allowing external applications to access and edit data within the company’s spreadsheet program. A good example of these relatively new APIs in action is Swivel, where data can be pulled in from Google Spreadsheets and then utilize Swivel’s community tools for analyzing and discussing data.

–

In all, Google currently offers more than two dozen APIs, which can be found on the Google Code site. Much like the Facebook platform or the APIs offered from widely-used startups like Flickr and Twitter, Google’s APIs provide developers with an “in” to millions of potential users through Google’s vast reach. In turn, creating applications that are both useful and provide smooth integration with an existing Google service is an effective way to spread your product through technology instead of relying solely advertising or viral marketing. At the same time, as Google continues to add new APIs and expand on existing ones, the company further expands its reach as the developer community builds new products tailored to Google products and services.

Make use of Cloud services. More effectively

Image via Wikipedia

 

Cloud and cloud services are the latest buzz words, be it with major organizations, medium businesses, individual developers or ordinary home users. Everyone wants to share and store their documents, media and files on to the cloud. That is because it is simple, you can access it anywhere, gives you centralized storage, providesbackup and most cloud service companies claim that it is exceedingly secure. Many technology evangelists around the world foresee Cloud as the next big thing incomputer technology and predict that it will change the way we work, store, share and connect.

Listed below are few common tips on how an individual or home user can effectively use cloud service.

Backup your documents from Google Docs

Google Docs is the most extensively used online documents storage and sharing cloud service offered by Google. It offers to store, edit, save and share all major document formats commonly in use. Even after the assurance of online reliability from Google, it is safer to keep a backup on your offline storage. Not because Google data centres may crash tomorrow, but simply because your Internet connection may face issues one day and you may need a specific document urgently.

With Google Docs, you can download all your online documents into a zip file and save it offline. It allows a maximum download of only 2GB per zip file.

Open Google Docs and log in using your Google account. Select checkboxes of all or only required documents. Click Actions. Click Download. Choose the respective document formats or proceed with the default selection. Click Download. Wait for the processing to complete, post which it will prompt you to open or save the zipped file. Save it offline.

Listen to music from Dropbox

Dropbox is fabulously good for storing and sharing any kind of files over the Internet. You can even store your music collection on Dropbox. These music files can also be played online via DropTunes service.

If you do not have any music files in your Dropbox, upload few from your hard drive. I uploaded a track by Enrique Iglesias.

Now, go to DropTunes and log in with your Dropbox credentials only. Navigate to the folder where your music files are stored. It will list all music files with a Playnext to each one. Click the respective Play button to play that track online.

Sync My Documents on your Windows to Dropbox

The My Documents directory on Windows acts as a primary document storage directory for most of us. Isn’t that the sole purpose Microsoft created it in the very first place? I think yes.

You can sync your My Documents directory to Dropbox. Therefore, anything you store, move or delete within My Documents will automatically synchronize with Dropbox. You should have the Dropbox client installed on your computer and a Dropbox directory already set.

Right click on My Documents and select Properties. Click on Location tab. Click the Move button and choose the already set Dropbox directory. Click Select Folder. Click Apply and then OK. Your My Documents directory is now synced with Dropbox.

Note: My Documents directory in Windows 7 may be found under the directory with your Windows Username (commonly placed on the desktop).

How do you play around with Cloud services?

Top 10 Free Software To Install On Your New Windows PC

A new Windows computer needs good software if the user wants to make the most out of his machine. Windows 7 does come bundled with useful tools, but that isn’t enough. The millions of consumer software vendors around the world would have gone out of business if that were the case.
This post will talk about top 10 free software that one must install on his new Windows computer. I’ve tried to limit the article to only those tools which, in my opinion, should be the first 10 tools one should install and use on a new PC. If you have other opinions and suggestions for tools, which I am sure a lot of you would, I urge you to share them in the comments so that all our readers can take a look at them.
So, lets begin with the list.

1. EASEUS Partition Master
easeus partition manager

Download here

EASEUS partition manager
 is a nifty tool to create and manage disk partitions on Windows systems. Even if you created partitions during the setup process, and know how to use the disk management console to create partitions
, I’d recommend you download and keep this tool. That’s because it offers some amazing features like resize, merge or split partitions, convert FAT to NTFS, convert primary partition to logical and vice versa, and much more.
The personal edition of the tool is free. It has professional and business editions too.

2. PC Decrapifier

Download here

Most of the branded laptops and desktops come bloated with proprietary (and useless) software which you should get rid of if you want your computer to function properly in the long run. Hence the old and trusted PC Decrapifier becomes a must-install software for new Windows computer owners to weed out junk software and make space for better stuff.

Click here for guide

3. Macrium Reflect or Windows Backup and Restore

Download here

We have previously talked about the importance of creating a system image and how to create it using the built-in Windows backup and restore center (you should also create asystem repair disc). Now, this might not be available in all editions of Windows so I’d suggest a worthy, and more powerful alternative called Macrium Reflect.
Use it to create an initial system image, and for other such tasks as you start using the computer.

4. Ninite

Download here

Ninite will cover the “how to install” part when installing new stuff on your PC. This all-in-one installer lets you pick software and install them at one go. And the choices of course are very diverse.

5. Revo Uninstaller

Download here

Revo Uninstaller remains my tool of choice to clean uninstall applications and programs from my Windows PC. It’s far better than the default Add/Remove programs tool. A must-have software for sure. Check out our guide on using Revo Uninstaller to uninstall programs

6. CCleaner

Download here

You didn’t think I’d give a miss to CCleaner in this list, did you? I am yet to find a better tool to perform a routine PC maintenance and get rid of temporary files and data. The tool is as amazing as it ever was. In fact, better, as it continues to be regularly updated.

Click here for guide

7. Microsoft Security Essentials

Download here

Microsoft Security Essentials might go down in history as one of the best free software released by this tech giant. This tool has given a number of antivirus vendors, especially those who provide full-fledged free versions, a run for their money. It can protect your PC from viruses, spyware and malware.

8. Dropbox or Syncback SE
dropbox

The thing about data backup is that people tend to procrastinate on it, which ultimately ends up in a crisis situation when they have lost important data, and had no backup whatsoever. Hence an online backup tool like Dropbox
, and an offline sync and backup tool like Syncback SE is included in this list of immediate installations for a new PC. Get either, or both of them. I use both – Dropbox for online backup and Syncback to keep my data synchronized with an external hard drive.

9. Recuva

Download here

Recuva is an excellent (and free) software to recover deleted files. But why do we need it now? That’s because there’s a lot of deleting and uninstalling happening with CCleaner, Revo Uninstaller, PC Decrapifier and all. If you suddenly delete something that you shouldn’t, and then want to recover it, you would have this tool to fall back on.

10. VLC and Chrome / Firefox

Lastly, but by no means the leastly (or least, whatever), we have our usual suspects – VLC media player and Chrome and / or Firefox, which I am clubbing together in the same point. Oh, and you don’t need to install these separately because Ninite will take care of that. Just make sure that you tick their names in Ninite before you start off with the installation. And while you are at it.

If you have any free software suggestions please feel free to post a comment.

HOW TO: Become a Google+ Beta Tester

Want to test new Google+ features before they become available to the public? Now you can, thanks to a newly launched Google+ program.
To sign up to be a beta tester, head over to the Google+ Platform Preview page and enter your email address. Any address will work, so long as you’re signed in to your associated Google+ account.
You’ll need to click on a link in a subsequent confirmation email to confirm your entry into the program. After that, Google will email you every time new features are available for you to test out.
If you’re looking for additional Google+ resources, be sure to check out our roundup of 15 guides and services for Google+ power users.

HOW TO: Protect Your Company’s Passwords

It’s almost impossible to understate the importance of having and using strong, secure online passwords. As important as it is for consumers to heed this advice, it can be even more important for businesses to use and secure the passwords of their various accounts. As tools like Firesheep
 have shown, gaining access to an email or Facebook
 account can be alarmingly simple.
Fortunately, there are tools and precautions companies can take that will help simplify the process of keeping passwords safe, Use Unique Generated Passwords for Different Accounts

No matter how often we’ve been warned, the reality is that most of us use the same password or group of passwords for all of our major accounts. At first, this doesn’t seem too bad especially if that password is a unique and long mix of numbers, letters and cases. The problem with using the same password or group of passwords, however, is that if one account is compromised, other accounts can follow.

This is especially true for users that associate an e-mail address with an account. When Gawker Media’s web servers were breached last year
, thousands of commenters had their usernames, passwords and e-mail addresses exposed. As a result, some of these users had their email, Facebook and Twitter
 accounts compromised as well.
For business accounts, using a separate, unique password for each major service and making sure that none of these passwords are the same as those associated with personal accounts is essential.
Good password management applications typically include a password generator, however, websites like Strong Password Generator are great in a pinch. Using more than 7 characters is a good idea, but be sure to check with your application or service for rules associated with the use of special characters.

Password Management Tools Are Your friend

One of the primary reasons individuals reuse the same passwords is because keeping track of 100 different logins is difficult, if not impossible. This is where password management applications become crucial, especially in a business environment.
In the past, I’ve written about password management apps for Mashable and here are a few of my favorites:

1Password

: 1Password is a solution for Mac OS X and Windows that allows users to not only store their passwords safely, but also access those passwords from within their web browser. That means that rather than relying on the built-in password manager, a user can use 1Password to fill in logins instead. These logins are protected by a master password, and Agile Web Solutions also makes an iPhone and Android app for accessing and securely logging into websites while on the go.
1Password starts at $39.95 for a single license and is $59.95 for a 5-user license.

LastPass

: LastPass is a cross-platform password manager that works with all major web browsers to securely store and generate passwords. LastPass also has an Enterprise option for businesses that includes support for applications as well as websites.
LastPass Premium is $12 a year for individuals and starts $24 a year for Enterprise customers.

Passpack

: Passpack is a tool designed for teams and businesses that want to make passwords accessible without making them insecure. What we like about Passpack is that it lets users store their personal and work-related passwords in one place, but then choose who has access to what passwords. Plus, Passpack makes sharing passwords secure and also makes it easy to update or change group passwords in bulk.
Passpack for departments and workgroups is $4 a month.

Use HTTPS Logins

Beyond just using unique, secure passwords and password management tools, it’s also important that businesses use secure logins, especially when accessing web services from outside of a corporate network.
In the last few months, a growing number of websites including Twitter, Facebook
,Gmail,Foursquare and HootSuite have started to implement HTTPS as a login option. Using HTTPS, logins are encrypted over the network. This means that even if the network itself is open, the password and username to your account isn’t visible to those sniffing the network.
Turning on HTTPS as a default login option in the web services that support it is a good idea for all users, but it makes even better sense in a corporate context.
Feel free to share your password protection tips in the comments.

In Battle for Patents, Google Buys a Batch From I.B.M.

In the heated battle for technology patents, Google is using its checkbook to bulk up.
The technology giant bought more than a thousand patents from I.B.M. this month, for a broad range of applications. In an e-mailed statement, Google confirmed the purchase: “Like many tech companies, at times we’ll acquire patents that are relevant to our business needs. Bad software patent litigation is a wasteful war that no one will win.”
The purchase was earlier reported
 by SEO by the Sea blog.
The deal comes less than one month after Google failed to win a cache of more than 6,000 patents from telecommunications equipment maker Nortel Networks
. The company lost out to a consortium of competitors that included Apple and Microsoft, which paid $4.5 billion in cash for the lot — well above Google’s initial bid of $900 million.
Google pursuit of patents is largely seen as a defensive maneuver, to deter lawsuits from rivals.
In a blog post in April, Google’s general counsel, Kent Walker, wrote, “a company’s best defenses against this kind of litigation is (ironically) to have a formidable patent portfolio, as this helps maintain your freedom to develop new products and services. Google is a relatively young company, and although we have a growing number of patents, many of our competitors have larger portfolios given their longer histories.”