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Brandon Saltalamacchia’s office, adorned with a dazzling collection of retro gaming paraphernalia, offers a glimpse into the passions that have driven his professional life. In this interview with Saltalamacchia, you’ll learn about his humble beginnings as an independent publisher to navigating the labyrinthine challenges of SEO in a Google world. The early days: A camper van and a dream Saltalamacchia’s foray into independent publishing began in 2017 while working full-time for Future Publishing. A self-described “newb” in SEO and content marketing, he channeled his love for camper vans into a small passion project — a website dedicated to van life. “It was a little pot on wheels,” said Saltalamacchia, recalling his first camper van, “but we had a bunch of fun with it.” That website, built on pure enthusiasm and curiosity, caught the eye of a buyer in 2019. The sale allowed Saltalamacchia to pivot toward his true passion: retro gaming. Retro Dodo was born as a personal project, combining Saltalamacchia’s knack for content creation with his lifelong love of classic games. “I started writing about things I enjoyed and unboxing Game Boys [on YouTube],” he said. It wasn’t long before the site began to gain traction, fueled by Saltalamacchia’s genuine enthusiasm and a simple, straightforward content strategy. Building Retro Dodo: From passion to business Retro Dodo grew steadily from its inception, thanks in part to Saltalamacchia’s willingness to experiment with SEO and social media. “I installed the Yoast SEO plugin and made sure every little thing was green,” he said. While Saltalamacchia admitted to following some misguided SEO advice early on, the site flourished due to its authenticity and dedication to serving its niche audience. By 2021, Retro Dodo had evolved into a full-fledged media company with a team of six, producing daily content, video reviews, and even books. It reached about 2 million readers at its peak and Saltalamacchia recalled “My [Google] Search Console said, “Congratulations, you hit 1 million organic results in May [2023],” Saltalamacchia said. The site’s success brought collaborations with major brands and recognition from influencers like Casey Neistat, who invited Saltalamacchia to New York to discuss their shared love of retro gaming. However, beneath the surface of Retro Dodo’s success lay a precarious dependence on organic search traffic — a vulnerability that would soon be exposed. The Google algorithm crash Google’s September 2023 helpful content update sent shockwaves through the SEO world and impacted many other independent publishers. For Retro Dodo, the impact was devastating. “We lost about 85% of our traffic,” Saltalamacchia said. “It felt … like you’re almost swimming and someone’s put a big weight on your feet and it’s just dragging you and dragging and there’s nothing you can do.” Saltalamacchia’s initial optimism gave way to stark reality as months passed without recovery. “I tried pretty much everything,” he said, detailing attempts to improve site speed, refine content, and follow advice from SEO consultants. Despite his efforts, Retro Dodo remained essentially invisible in Google. The experience brought Saltalamacchia face-to-face with Google representatives, including Search Liaison Danny Sullivan. While the meeting offered a platform to share his frustrations, it ultimately provided little in the way of actionable solutions. “Danny told me, ‘Keep doing what you’re doing. Your site’s great. I can’t see anything wrong with it.’ Which I wish he never said that to me in all honesty because you almost want to find something wrong to snip,” Saltalamacchia said. Reinvention and a new chapter Faced with dwindling traffic and mounting financial pressure, Saltalamacchia made difficult decisions, reducing his team and scaling back operations. Yet, Retro Dodo’s core community remained loyal, and Saltalamacchia refused to give up on his vision. “We’re very lucky to have quite a large community and a lot of people that return to our work to read, especially news and reviews. We’re quite well known in our niche for that. So, we’re still profitable, we’re definitely nowhere near as what we used to make,” Saltalamacchia said. Heading forward, Retro Dodo is pivoting toward video content, premium memberships, and creating its own products and events. Retro Dodo’s transition to the Ghost platform reflects a broader shift in focus: building a sustainable, high-quality digital magazine for retro gaming enthusiasts. Simultaneously, Saltalamacchia embarked on a new venture with Kagi, a paid, ad-free search engine designed to prioritize user experience over ad revenue. “Kagi [is] trying to humanize the web,” he said. “No ads, no tracking … My full focus is on making Kagi a great environment and helping independent publishers and helping families search without distractions.” In his role as a consultant, Saltalamacchia wants to help Kagi champion independent publishers and redefine the online search landscape. Lessons for creators Saltalamacchia’s journey offers valuable insights for aspiring creators and independent publishers. “People won’t really be blogging anymore unless they’re super passionate about that subject. So, I think creators are going to move to YouTube even though it’s just as competitive,” Saltalamacchia said. “The only people that are still doing it and still surviving are the ones with true passion for the niches that they cover.” Google changed the game for independent creators. So what’s his advice for creators in this era of when we’re watching the enshittification of Google? Focus on creating exceptional premium-level content and building genuine relationships with your audience. What’s next? For Saltalamacchia, the future is a mix of nostalgia and innovation. With Retro Dodo’s evolution and his work at Kagi, he’s poised to make a lasting impact on the retro gaming community and the search landscape. “Google and YouTube are [basically] the same thing. And the creator economy over at YouTube is phenomenal. … There’s a really good financial incentive to build great content and build a community that supports you. “Whereas then there’s Google just destroying blogs left, right, and center. It really bewilders me how the search team have got it so wrong when the YouTube team have created such a fantastic environment to learn to be informed to entertain yourself and to build a potential great content business. so I think that’s where creators are going to move to.” As Saltalamacchia looks to the future, one thing seems certain: it’s far from game over. Never miss a new video. Subscribe to the Search Engine Land YouTube channel. View the full article

If you've considered trying DeepSeek—the hot new AI app from China—but been put off by concerns around privacy and censorship, you'll be interested to know there's now a tweaked version of the DeepSeek R1 model available inside Perplexity. Perplexity has long given users a choice of in-house and third-party AIs for answering prompts, and DeepSeek R1 is the latest to make the list. Perplexity cofounder Aravind Srinivas has promised the censorship guardrails have been taken off—so yes, you can ask about Tiananmen Square—and that all associated data (like your prompts and their responses) is stored in the U.S. DeepSeek is now an option inside Perplexity. Credit: Lifehacker This is all possible because the DeepSeek models are open-source: Anyone can use and adapt them, free of charge. If you've got the technical know-how, you can modify these AI models yourself, though most of us will want to let the experts (such as those on the Perplexity team) take care of that—if you're interested, there's more on this here. Specifically, it's the DeepSeek R1 reasoning model that's been added to Perplexity, rather than the more general-purpose V3 model, and both Pro subscribers and those using Perplexity for free can access these models: You get five queries per day for free, or 500 per day if you're paying $20 a month. DeepSeek cuts off conversations about some topics. Credit: Lifehacker If you want to see what all the fuss is about when it comes to the speed and performance of DeepSeek, without worrying about your data being piped back to the Chinese government, or finding yourself up against China-centric censorship, this is one of the best ways to go about it. Your data is still held by Perplexity, but in the U.S., and in accordance with the company's privacy policy. It's also worth noting that other AI providers are following Perplexity's lead: Microsoft is bringing DeepSeek R1 to Windows as part of Copilot, and it's also now been introduced to the You.com AI platform, available alongside other models from the likes of Anthropic, Meta, Grok, and OpenAI. Using DeepSeek inside PerplexityYou can use Perplexity on the web, and on Android and iOS. On the web, your prompts can be inputted in the main text box on the Home tab, or by clicking New Thread on the left. To get an answer from DeepSeek R1, turn the Pro toggle switch on, then pick Reasoning with R1 from the drop-down menu. Everything works similarly when it comes to the mobile apps. Tap inside the Ask anything box on the main Perplexity tab (the magnifying glass icon, lower left), then tap the Pro label and choose Reasoning with R1. You can then type out and submit your query for the AI. An answer inside Perplexity produced by DeepSeek R1. Credit: Lifehacker As DeepSeek R1 is a reasoning model, you'll see that it thinks about your prompts—and explains how it's thinking as it goes. Answers come with website citations attached, where relevant, and at the end of the response you get icons for copying, sharing, and regenerating the answer Perplexity and DeepSeek have given you. I tested out the Perplexity version of DeepSeek with a few questions that might throw up different answers if they were asked in China, compared to the rest of the world—questions about Taiwan, for example—and there was a free and full flow of information in return. Posing the same prompts on DeepSeek proper returned the following message: "Sorry, that's beyond my current scope. Let’s talk about something else." You can see DeepSeek R1 'thinking' as it works. Credit: Lifehacker As for DeepSeek R1's reasoning, it seems fairly robust based on the time I've spent with it—it certainly makes AI responses more trustworthy if you can see how they've been arrived at, and the web sources that have been consulted along the way. You can look all of this up after the answers have been presented, as well as while they're being generated. We've written before about how well Perplexity stands up to rivals such as Gemini and ChatGPT, blending both generative AI and web search and giving you a choice of different AI models on top. The company has also just launched a Perplexity Assistant feature on Android, so you can use the AI bot in place of Gemini or Bixby. View the full article

This post was written by Alison Green and published on Ask a Manager. A reader writes: I started a job eight months ago that I was very excited about. I was looking to get out of a highly stressful position and got this offer (same pay, somewhat worse benefits but growth potential) and what I thought would be a solid work-life balance. The first day, my boss mentioned how we typically end at 4:30. I’m used to working long hours so I was excited, thinking I’d have more time with my two small kids and husband. I was very wrong. The first couple months were good and then “efficiency” became a big part of conversation. I was asked why reviewing a report would take me 15 minutes and could I get it down to 10? We also lost two people in our department and did not replace them while also being told we were no longer “outsourcing” any of our work. My colleague and I took it in stride and tried to be team players. Six months later, I’m working from 9 am until 9-11 pm every night or later. Before going out of office, I’ve worked until 1am and still been told I had too many items “outstanding” and it’s unacceptable to leave without all my work completely finished (which is not always possible when I’m awaiting responses from several people for info I’ve been following up for). This all came to a head when my colleague and I both got really ill. We live in the same area and cold/flu was going around; my kids got it too. We were told we could take a sick day but all our deadlines still needed to be met. So, we couldn’t take one since that wasn’t possible, and we worked through it despite 102 fevers and both losing our voices entirely. Now more and more work is being piled on. I haven’t ended before 9-11 pm in months and the burn-out is affecting my performance and physical and mental health. The stress keeps me up. I also feel like a terrible mom as I never get to spend an evening with my family, my husband is frustrated he never sees me at night, and my colleague is about to quit. But I have a family and I need this income. We’ve brought it up to my manager and another higher-up, who say that we’re not being efficient enough and they’d love for us to finish on time but its not acceptable to log off/take PTO/a sick day if the work is not done. Despite not having experience in our day to day, they also say this workload should be manageable. Is there a solution here? I’m a yes person and I realize I could have set better boundaries but in a new job I wanted to start strong. I’m outputting a ridiculous amount of work but it’s never enough. You need to quit this job, because your company is abusing and exploiting you. It’s one thing to expect people to pitch in and work (some) extra hours for a short-term, high-needs period. It is not reasonable to expect that as a routine way of operating, let alone daily — at least not unless people were clearly told of that expectation before they signed on and are being compensated accordingly. The idea that it’s unacceptable to leave until all your work is done, even if that means staying past 1 am, is absurd. So is the idea that you can’t take sick days when you’re sick if there’s work waiting to be done. That’s not how jobs work. If they want to end each day with no outstanding work remaining, they need to hire the correct number of people to make that happen, not expect you and your colleague to work around the clock so they can avoid paying what that actually costs. Your management is probably happy that they’ve convinced you to go along with this because they’re getting multiple positions worth of work from you, while only paying you for a single job. But you should stop going along with it. You said you and your coworker wanted to be “team players,” but your company doesn’t seem like they’re on your team; you’re giving them far, far more than they’re giving you, and they’re happy to just keep taking unfairly, no matter the cost to you. That’s not the sort of team you want to play on. Frankly, this is bad enough that you should consider quitting immediately (and explaining that during your notice period you’ll only be able to work the 40 hours per week that you agreed to when you came on board). If that’s not possible financially, then you need to go all-out on a job search because this isn’t okay or sustainable. Meanwhile, while you’re stuck there, you need to set boundaries on your time. Tell your boss that your situation at home has changed and effective immediately you need to work the hours you were promised when you accepted the job. I strongly, strongly suggest you talk to your colleague and get her onboard with this plan too (because you’ll have more power standing as a team, and because she deserves it too, and also so that your work doesn’t just get piled on her). Obviously, your boss won’t like this. You’ll probably be told you need to keep working late hours. The words to use in response are: “I was able to help out in a pinch, but I’m not able to work 14+-hour days anymore. When I was hired, we agreed I should 40-hour weeks on average, and the salary I’m being paid reflects a 40-hour week. I’ve gone above and beyond to help out after we lost two people, but this is affecting my health and my family and I need to return to normal hours.” Is there a danger that they’ll fire you for daring to set utterly reasonable boundaries? Yes. (If that happens, you’ll be eligible for unemployment, which I know is likely cold comfort, but it’s worth factoring into your thinking.) But right now you’re being badly mistreated, have been thrust into a situation you never agreed to, and it’s affecting your health — and I would bet that if you calculate the actual hourly wage you’re receiving for those 70-hour weeks, that will help illustrate how bad this is. And while yes, putting your foot down is a risk, if you don’t do it, your company will simply keep expecting this of you and you’ll be in this same situation six months from now, or a year from now. The only way out is to say no. View the full article

Immigration Judge Ana Partida sat before a mostly empty courtroom on an afternoon in October, her body angled toward a television on one of the side walls. None of the people scheduled to appear before Partida, who hears cases inside San Diego’s Otay Mesa Detention Center, were present in person. That’s because Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) had transferred all of them to other locations around the country, even though their cases were already underway in San Diego. One by one, an ICE attorney asked Partida to move the detainees’ cases to courts closer to their new locations. All of the people who were transferred had attorneys in San Diego, including some through a county program that represents people in local immigration custody for free. Moving their cases would mean, at least for those with county attorneys, that their lawyers would no longer be able to represent them. Partida said that she felt she had no choice but to move many of the cases because she had been experiencing technology issues and a lack of cooperation from the other detention centers in presenting people for their hearings when she tried to keep them on her docket. During two afternoons, Capital & Main observed the judge having to restart the videoconference software multiple times and struggling with dropped calls from detainees held at other facilities. “This has become a very big problem,” she told one attorney as she ordered the case moved. ICE started transferring an unusually high number of detainees who already had attorneys out of the facility back in the spring of 2024, according to many attorneys who regularly represent clients there. At the time, the agency told Michael Garcia, head of San Diego County’s free immigration legal defense program, that it had to move people because of an uptick in the number of border crossings in the area. But crossings dropped and still transfer picked up again in fall 2024. ICE said it follows a 2012 agency memorandum regarding transfers that says officers will not transfer people who have documented attorneys on file, family in the area, pending hearings in ongoing cases, or been granted bond or scheduled for a bond hearing unless the local ICE field office director determines that the move is necessary. “U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement officials use a network of detention facilities for the intake of individuals detained by the agency,” a spokesperson said on behalf of the agency via email. “All noncitizen transfers and transfer determinations are nonpunitive and based on a thorough and systematic review of the most current information available.” But in many of the cases that attorneys described to Capital & Main, ICE is transferring people who have attorneys, family, and pending hearings in the San Diego area. Garcia said he recently met with ICE again to ask why his attorneys’ clients keep getting transferred. “ICE’s position was that this is strictly because of the needs of the facility,” Garcia said. “They didn’t have any numbers that they showed me that indicated an increase in the number of detentions.” In September, the month that Garcia’s team noticed that transfers were ticking up again, Border Patrol agents in San Diego made the lowest number of apprehensions the sector has seen in more than a year, according to Customs and Border Protection data. That month, San Diego agents apprehended people entering the United States roughly 13,300 times. That’s less than half of the roughly 32,500 crossings that agents apprehended in May 2024, when Garcia said transfers first increased dramatically. Several attorneys whose clients have been transferred noted that many of the courts where detainees from Otay Mesa have gone have higher asylum denial rates than the San Diego facility. Studies have shown that having an attorney can make a big difference in asylum outcomes. The county program that offers free legal representation to people detained by ICE in San Diego County was launched partway through 2022. Since then, in the past two fiscal years, Otay Mesa judges denied asylum in roughly 67% of cases, according to data from the Transactional Records Access Clearinghouse of Syracuse University, which gathers government data through public records requests. Judges at the receiving courts denied asylum in 74% to 95% of cases in that same time period, the data show. The court with the highest denial rate during that time period was Adelanto, in San Bernardino County. That’s the court where attorney Aude Ruffing’s client from Jamaica ended up after his transfer. Ruffing, who contracts with the San Diego County program to take detained cases, said that ICE decided to move her client soon after she submitted the paperwork for his asylum claim. She said the transfer caused a several-month delay in the case getting to trial. Ruffing said she felt bad for her client but that he has been dealing with the situation surprisingly well. “He’s just been really patient,” she said. “He’s been a real trooper through the process.” Meanwhile, the transfers are complicating cases at the Otay Mesa courts. On the afternoon in October, the first person on Judge Partida’s docket, a man from Nicaragua, wasn’t in the courtroom or on the video conference system. He was still in ICE custody, but the agency hadn’t produced him for his case. Capital & Main isn’t identifying the Nicaraguan man or other asylum seekers in this article due to the uncertain fate of their ongoing cases. Partida asked the ICE attorney what they should do. “I don’t know how counsel and the court want to proceed if the respondent is not here,” ICE attorney David Aronlee told the judge, using the legal term for someone who has a case before the court. “I don’t have an answer for how we can proceed at this point.” The man’s legal representative, Victor Valdez-Gonzalez, complained that the organization that had offered to do a psychological evaluation for his client’s asylum application could no longer complete it because the man had been moved out of state. On another afternoon in October, a slim man sat alone in his blue detainee uniform in front of Partida. She asked why the man’s wife wasn’t in court. His wife had previously been held at Otay Mesa as well, but Partida soon learned that ICE had transferred the woman to Louisiana. ICE hadn’t been able to produce the wife via video because of the time difference, ICE attorney Antonio Estrada told Partida. At the couple’s last hearing in September, Partida had combined their cases so that they could be heard together and get one decision for both husband and wife, saving time for the court. Having both partners at the same detention center would’ve also meant that they could both testify in the case. At the October hearing, Partida separated the cases and sent the wife’s case to a Louisiana judge. She said the couple would now have to write statements to be used in each other’s cases since ICE wouldn’t arrange for them to testify in person for each other. When the couple’s attorney pushed back, Partida said she couldn’t count on being able to hear the woman via video for their scheduled hearings. “There is nothing this court can do to bring the respondent back to Otay Mesa,” Partida said. Many of the people that ICE has transferred in this second push already had their final hearings scheduled, according to Garcia, meaning that they were almost done. The transfers meant delays in those cases, further contributing to the immigration courts’ ever-worsening backlog. Garcia said that in May, when ICE transferred 43 of his attorneys’ cases, 37% had already scheduled their trials, known in immigration court as merits hearings. In September, ICE transferred 31 of his program’s cases and 74% were at that final stage, he said. “Once you get the individual hearing set, that’s when you have done all the work, you have presented all the evidence, you have worked with the client for months, that’s when ICE sends them to another detention center,” said Rocio Sanchez Flores, an immigration attorney who contracts with the county program. Sanchez Flores represents an Afghan woman who fled the Taliban with her husband, who had worked as a translator for the Afghan National Directorate of Security communicating with U.S. forces, Sanchez Flores said. The couple were separated at the U.S.-Mexico border when they requested asylum. The wife was held at a detention facility in California while the husband was sent to one in Washington. The husband’s case was scheduled to finish earlier than the wife’s, Sanchez Flores said. A few days after her final hearing was scheduled, ICE transferred the wife to Eloy Detention Center in Arizona. In October, the husband won his case, Sanchez Flores said, meaning that his wife could now get asylum through him. Sanchez Flores contacted the ICE attorney on the wife’s case to ask for a joint motion to close. Instead, Sanchez Flores said, another ICE attorney made a motion to change venue and move the wife’s case out of the San Diego court. “This came as a shock to me because it’s way easier to just terminate the case,” Sanchez Flores said. “The government doesn’t have to waste resources. She can get released and obtain asylum through her husband.” As a result, the wife spent an extra month in ICE custody. — Kate Morrissey, Capital & Main This piece was originally published by Capital & Main, which reports from California on economic, political, and social issues. View the full article

Efforts to diversify workplaces and promote equality are under attack—most recently with a sweeping crackdown from the Trump administration. But advocates and professionals who’ve dedicated their careers to diversity, equity, and inclusion are still committed to seeing the work continue. “We’ve been here for years,” said Amira Barger, executive vice president of communications and head of DEI advisory at Edelman. “I’m still encouraged, even in the midst of all this backlash.” While a number of prominent companies have recently changed or scaled back their DEI initiatives, other big names have worked to reinforce commitments to diversity and inclusion. Barger expects the majority to find a way to continue these efforts and stresses that leaders need to stand up and defend the work now more than ever. Barger recently spoke with the Associated Press. This interview has been edited for length and clarity. Q: Tell me about your work at Edelman. A: I actually wear two hats here at Edelman. So 50% of my time is focused on communications specifically for the health ecosystem. That’s everything from pharma to hospital systems, medical schools, you name it. And then the other 50% of my time is broader U.S. DEI advisory, which is sector agnostic. Every day is a little bit different—depending on what’s happening in the world, what our clients are focused on and the goals that have been set for the year. Our teams work to help counsel clients on anything from executive orders that might come out around DEI rollbacks and initiatives, like we’re seeing today, to how to frame a particular communication for a multicultural audience in ways that are honoring people’s lived experiences. Q: We’ve seen a handful of big names pull back from their DEI efforts recently. What has that been like to witness? A: The pendulum continues to swing on the world of diversity, equity and inclusion. And what I’m feeling right now, in this moment of pushback that has been happening in this space, is that we’ve been here before. A lot of people earmark 2020 as a milestone for corporate DEI efforts—in the movement following the murder of George Floyd. But we’ve been in the background doing this work quietly and sustainably for decades, going back to the writing of the Civil Rights Act. With all of the backlash and executive orders we’re seeing today, I think that’s probably what’s going to happen again. The work will continue, but executives might be a little more quiet about it. I foresee the majority of companies to continue efforts, but they might change the words or evolve in other ways. We’re seeing a lot of that, and it’s not new. We’ve also seen some big names reinforce their commitments to DEI, like Costco and Apple. Q: What other impacts do you anticipate from Trump’s actions to dismantle DEI initiatives at the federal level? A: Specific language from Trump’s recent executive orders dismantling federal DEI initiatives labels these efforts as being forced “illegal and immoral discrimination programs.” My concern here is that it undermines progress and ignores the systemic inequities that these programs are trying to address. And the orders may carry several implications for federal contractors. DEI initiatives could be deprioritized or deemed less relevant in the bidding process. Companies might encounter compliance or restructuring challenges. Suppliers that promote DEI principles may also face reduced preference in government contracting, potentially impacting existing partnerships. And businesses may find themselves navigating polarized stakeholder reactions. Q: What message would you give businesses navigating all of this? A: When DEI initiatives are attacked, companies need to be prepared to address the criticism by being really clear about demonstrating positive impacts of this kind of work. That means defending the work with facts. From increased innovation to a greater sense of belonging among employees, there are very real outcomes that companies can use to show measurable progress because of the existence of these programs. And it’s also important to invite input and take it seriously. What we need in this moment are leaders who have the nerve to be brave and to stand up for this work. There’s a lot of fear-mongering and uncertainty right now—and I think that can drive people to do things outside of what they might believe is true or right—so we need leaders to show that nerve in really big and powerful ways. My hope is that we’ll see some of that over this next year, even in the midst of a new administration that is clearly very anti-DEI. —Wyatte Grantham-Philips, AP Business Writer View the full article

We may earn a commission from links on this page. People tend to start gardening the same way: They grow their first plant outside, feel the pride of eating their own sun-ripened tomato, and decide to plant two plants the next year. Most of those plants are bought from a nursery, but as you build a garden, buying starts from the store begins to make less sense. If you’re at the point where you’re considering planting, say, eight tomato plants, it might make sense to start growing your own. And you should. You can save a lot of money by growing your own from seeds. Buying garden starts makes sense at firstPeople buy garden starts for simple reasons: By the time the weather cooperates and the soil is warm enough to grow in, you don't want to waste time waiting for seeds to germinate. Planting grown plants instead of seeds can save weeks—sometimes months—and plants at the nursery are usually tough, resilient, and close to fruiting. Buying grown plants also allows you to space them appropriately in your garden, and bigger plants are more likely to survive the elements, including weather and predators. All in all, it’s not a bad deal. But you’re paying for it. For an investment, someone else has done most of the work. The downside of buying seedlings for your gardenAside from being limited to a nursery's inventory, the downside of buying seedlings is the cost. Starts tend to come in three sizes: a six pack for smaller vegetables, a six pack for larger vegetables, and four-by-four inch singles. In my city, prices of single plants have gone from $3.25 to $6 since 2020, and a jumbo six pack has jumped from $5 to $7. I browsed prices in Utah, Arizona, and Massachusetts for comparison and found that prices have jumped 25% of more in the last few years. It quickly adds up. If you’re planting twenty five vegetables in your garden (an average of how many plants gardeners buy each spring from my local nursery), that means your costs would have gone from around $100 to $150. Conversely, growing your own seedlings means that you get to choose specifically what plants you want to grow—not tomatoes versus peppers, but what kind of tomatoes or peppers. You can grow what you want, when you want, and you can start them much earlier than the nursery, which is great if you're someone trying to extend your season by using low tunnels or greenhouses. And growing your own seedlings teaches so much about plants. The costs of growing your own seedsThe downside of growing your own seeds is that it involves more work and comes with start-up costs. You need a place to grow your seedlings, and since most people don’t have a greenhouse, you might use a simple freestanding wire rack or shelving unit that you can buy at Home Depot (although I found mine by watching Craigslist, as people are always giving away garage storage units). You also likely need grow lights to hang over your plants, and that cost can add up too, as people commonly miscalculate how many lights they need. (For the shelves linked above, for example, most people would need two sets of the grow lights linked together.) You also need trays to plant your seeds in—like these nicer air pruning trays, but you can also ask your local garden group or garden center for old, free ones—and bottom watering trays for each one so you can water your seedlings. To keep your seedlings warm and humid enough to germinate, you'll also need heat mats and tray domes. At this point, you’re in for a few hundred bucks, which admittedly seems like a lot. If you plan to garden into the future, though, it's a capital investment into equipment you'll use year after year. You can also scale your operation up or down easily: You really only need one tray of seeds (a tray can hold between fifty to one hundred twenty eight seedlings), a cheap dome, heat mat, and grow light, and to find a good spot in your home. With a little resourcefulness, you can likely bring that cost to under $75. Soft costs include the seeds themselves, obviously, which can go from $2 a packet to as much as $7-8 depending on how many you buy. I recommend starting with Burpee or Ferry Morse seeds, which are on the cheaper side, so you can learn with less expensive seeds before buying more expensive kinds. You can also often find free seeds at a local seed library or by asking neighbors or your local gardening group. Plenty of people save their own seeds and share them, and you can, too. You’re unlikely to use all your seeds each year, so you can organize your own seed library to spend less money year to year. You’ll also need seedling mix—often confused with potting soil—which is a specific blend of finer soil without nutrients that can cost you $7-15. Other soft costs like fertilizer and pest control cost the same whether you buy garden starts or grow your own. Comparing the costs of garden starts versus seedsLet’s say, for example, that you’re buying the average twenty five plant starts for $150. If you grew them from seed, you could grow them in one tray for as little as $75 in startup equipment costs and, say, $40 in soil and seeds, bringing your total to around $115. More importantly, though, is that you’d be set for year one of growing, plus have a head start for next year when you won't need to buy seeds or soil again. Once you have your equipment are are freed from some of the cost restraints, my bet is that you’ll also grow more. (For instance, annual flowers—a few dollars for a packet of 100 seeds versus $6 for a pack of six starts—are expensive to buy as starts but cheap to grow from seed.) Even if you decide to scale up your operation with more lights and trays, the cost for the same number of starts would far exceed your start-up costs. In my experience, $400 spent on start-up supplies could easily cost a thousand dollars at the nursery. Instead, you can grow your plants from start to finish, save a lot of money, and learn a lot in the process. View the full article

Are you ready to take your SEO and PPC campaigns to the next level of success? Tackle the challenges of the New Year with actionable tactics, expert guidance, and the inspiration you need to succeed at the spring edition of the SMX Master Classes — happening live online this March. In-depth training. Actionable tactics. Invaluable Q&A. This spring’s lineup features seven outstanding courses tackling core topics critical to 2025 success: Your Training, Your Way. You asked, and we listened: For the first time ever, each Master Class will take place on different days, giving you the flexibility to attend multiple classes live and customize the perfect training experience. Essential SEO with Bruce Clay – March 3-4 Google Ads Beyond Search with Jyll Saskin Gales – March 5-6 (new!) Generative Engine Optimization with Julia McCoy – March 10-11 (new!) Google Analytics 4 & Reporting with Colleen Harris – March 12-13 Technical SEO with John McAlpin – March 17-18 (new!) Advanced SEO with Anna Crowe – March 19-20 (new!) Advanced Google Ads with Brad Geddes – March 26-27 Each Master Class is a two-part deep dive into critical search marketing topics, with live Q&A designed to answer your specific questions and 120 days of on-demand access for deeper learning. Why Attend? Affordable Excellence: Just $299 per Master Class. Exclusive Perks: Earn a certificate of completion to showcase your knowledge. No Travel Hassles: Join from anywhere — no plane tickets or hotels needed. Unlock 15% Off Create the ultimate cross-training experience by purchasing more than one Master Class – and save 15% on your total registration. Book Now For Best Rates What are you waiting for? Choose your classes and secure your spot today! View the full article

The rise of phishing attacks poses serious security challenges to small business owners. As phishing attacks exploit human psychology, learning about various phishing examples is the most effective way to protect businesses from phishing scams. This article will explore common examples of phishing attacks to help you protect your data and IT infrastructure. What Is Phishing? Phishing is a form of social engineering attack where hackers attempt to deceive users into revealing sensitive information, such as login credentials, or installing harmful software on their devices. In standard phishing attacks, cybercriminals reach out to users while impersonating reputable organizations. Types of Phishing Attacks Here are common types of phishing attacks you should be aware of: Spear phishing: Spear phishing attacks are highly targeted and customized, keeping the target audience in mind Whaling: Whaling attacks, also known as CEO fraud, target high-authority individuals like CEOs as they have the power to authorize high-value transactions Smishing: These phishing attacks are carried out over text messages. Vishing: These phishing scams take place over phone calls or voice messages. Pretexting: In pretexting scams, hackers use a pretext or story to dupe victims into making payments, installing malware, or divulging sensitive information. Angling: Angling phishing attacks happen on social media where hackers pose as representatives of trusted brands and trick users into sharing personal details, visiting a malicious website, or installing malware on users’ computers Pharming: In these attacks, malicious actors use a domain name system server (DNS server) to send users to a fake website to steal account credentials. Search Engine Phishing: Cyber criminals create fake websites for high-traffic keywords. When users submit account details on these fake websites, hackers get hold of sensitive information. Common Examples of Phishing Here are common examples of phishing you should be aware of to stay safe: Email Account Block In such a phishing attack, users receive an email stating that their email accounts will be blocked because of a request to terminate the account. Click the embedded link (phishing link) to withdraw the request for account termination. Hackers often generate a sense of urgency in emails regarding account blocks, claiming that users have only a few hours to cancel a request for email account termination. If you ever receive such an email, do not click on the link. Subscription Cancel Email Subscription cancels phishing emails mention that your subscription to a popular service will be canceled within a few hours, and you will no longer be able to enjoy the service. If you didn’t raise a cancellation request, click here to terminate it. When you click the link, malware will be installed on your computer system. Exciting Job Offer Fake remote job offers have increased after the Covid-19 pandemic. You should be careful about these scams. If you haven’t applied for a job recently and received an email mentioning that your profile has been shortlisted for a job that seems too good to be true, then it is not true. Somebody is trying to trick you. Copyright Infringement Notice In these scams, hackers send small business owners emails that state business owners have infringed on copyright owned by hackers. So, business owners are liable to pay a certain amount of money, or they could go to jail. Hackers also mention a link in the email for small business owners to check how they infringed the copyright. Clicking on the link leads to malware installation. PayPal Account Suspension Email “We have seen suspicious activity on your account. After further investigation, we have found that the security of your PayPal account is compromised. Your account will be deactivated within 4 hours unless you verify your credit card details. Verify your credit card information here.” A phishing email of this nature originates from fraudulent websites that mimic PayPal. When users enter their credit card information, hackers capture the data. Bogus Invoice Scam A bogus invoice scam is a form of fraud aimed at deceiving recipients into paying for products or services they never ordered or received. Hackers may send invoices that appear legitimate and claim to be from a company you recognize or trust; however, these invoices are actually fraudulent. Hackers obtain login details when an employee in your billing department logs into the account. Occasionally, they may prompt users to confirm payment for an invoice or to cancel an order. Email Account Upgrade These emails pose as messages from well-known email providers, like Gmail or Outlook, and urge recipients to update their accounts or lose their services. In reality, these scam emails are designed to steal your login credentials and access your email account illegally. Don’t let this happen – don’t click on any malicious links in the message or enter personal information into the fake sign-in page. Dropbox Phishing Emails With Dropbox phishing scams becoming more common, it’s essential to be aware of the warning signs. Emails that look like they’re from the popular file-sharing platform often tell recipients that they have documents to review. When recipients click the CTA, it takes them to a phony website. Once there, the scammer can steal your login information and other personal data. More Phishing Attack Examples to Avoid The following are some additional phishing scam examples small business owners should know about: Bank Scam Emails Bank email phishing scams are becoming increasingly popular. This type of scam attempts to steal personal information by spoofing the sender’s identity and tricking the recipient into entering their login credentials or other valuable information. The scammers usually send out fake emails that appear to be from a well-known bank, asking for your bank account details or verification code. If you happen to enter account information into the login page of a scammer’s fake website, they can then employ your username and password to steal your money or hijack your bank account. Fake App Purchase Scam A malicious email will typically have a subject line that references an app from a reputable company you didn’t download. There is usually a serial number in the subject line. Once you click through to find out more about the payment, you are taken to an invoice that asks for your permission to view, manage, or cancel the application. The lack of specific detail in the message leaves victims open to attack because they may be inclined to open an email attachment- potentially installing malware on their devices. Social Security Number Request Hackers are constantly looking for ways to steal your personal information, and one of the most common scams is when they pretend to be from a government agency. They may call you and tell you that your social security number has been suspended or that you need to confirm it so it can be reinstated. Billing by a Technical Support Service Billing by a technical support service is a scam where the attacker tries to sell you technical support services that don’t actually exist. They may email you that an issue has been detected with your PC and that you need to call a phone number to get technical assistance. Another common way to scam victims is to call directly and alert them that there is a device failure. And contact is being made to resolve the issue. At the end of the service, they will charge fees for repairing problems that did not exist initially. Offering Financial Solutions Another frequent tactic used in phishing involves enticing victims with the chance to settle debts for less than the original amount or to invest in opportunities that promise high returns. These “offers” appear credible and are typically available for a limited time, creating a sense of urgency for the individual to act quickly. Tax Scam A cybercriminal sends a text message to persuade victims that they owe money after filing their taxes, or they may direct victims to a website where a payment is required. Another common tactic for scammers is to tell their victims that they are eligible for a large refund, encouraging them to click on a link that installs malware on their phones. You Have Won Something These scams are often easy to spot because they promise something that simply isn’t true. A message or email says that you need to click on a link to Google Docs in order to submit details so that you can collect your prize. In reality, scammers are trying to steal your personal information in order to scam you further. What Is the Most Common Phishing Example? There are numerous phishing schemes, with the two most prevalent being email spoofing and Fake Login Pages. Email spoofing occurs when an email is sent that appears to originate from a trusted source. Meanwhile, Fake Login Pages are designed to closely resemble legitimate sites, complete with the same logo and branding as the original websites. What Are The Signs of Phishing Emails? The signs of phishing emails include but are not limited to urgency, unusual requests or content, grammatical errors & misspelled words, mismatch of domain names and email addresses, and familiar greetings. Security awareness training is the most effective way to help your employees to identify phishing emails. What Is Considered an Example of Phishing? Any wilful activity that aims at stealing individuals’ sensitive information, swindling money from them, or installing malware on their computer systems is considered an example of phishing. Image: Envato Elements This article, "Common Phishing Traps to Avoid" was first published on Small Business Trends View the full article

The rise of phishing attacks poses serious security challenges to small business owners. As phishing attacks exploit human psychology, learning about various phishing examples is the most effective way to protect businesses from phishing scams. This article will explore common examples of phishing attacks to help you protect your data and IT infrastructure. What Is Phishing? Phishing is a form of social engineering attack where hackers attempt to deceive users into revealing sensitive information, such as login credentials, or installing harmful software on their devices. In standard phishing attacks, cybercriminals reach out to users while impersonating reputable organizations. Types of Phishing Attacks Here are common types of phishing attacks you should be aware of: Spear phishing: Spear phishing attacks are highly targeted and customized, keeping the target audience in mind Whaling: Whaling attacks, also known as CEO fraud, target high-authority individuals like CEOs as they have the power to authorize high-value transactions Smishing: These phishing attacks are carried out over text messages. Vishing: These phishing scams take place over phone calls or voice messages. Pretexting: In pretexting scams, hackers use a pretext or story to dupe victims into making payments, installing malware, or divulging sensitive information. Angling: Angling phishing attacks happen on social media where hackers pose as representatives of trusted brands and trick users into sharing personal details, visiting a malicious website, or installing malware on users’ computers Pharming: In these attacks, malicious actors use a domain name system server (DNS server) to send users to a fake website to steal account credentials. Search Engine Phishing: Cyber criminals create fake websites for high-traffic keywords. When users submit account details on these fake websites, hackers get hold of sensitive information. Common Examples of Phishing Here are common examples of phishing you should be aware of to stay safe: Email Account Block In such a phishing attack, users receive an email stating that their email accounts will be blocked because of a request to terminate the account. Click the embedded link (phishing link) to withdraw the request for account termination. Hackers often generate a sense of urgency in emails regarding account blocks, claiming that users have only a few hours to cancel a request for email account termination. If you ever receive such an email, do not click on the link. Subscription Cancel Email Subscription cancels phishing emails mention that your subscription to a popular service will be canceled within a few hours, and you will no longer be able to enjoy the service. If you didn’t raise a cancellation request, click here to terminate it. When you click the link, malware will be installed on your computer system. Exciting Job Offer Fake remote job offers have increased after the Covid-19 pandemic. You should be careful about these scams. If you haven’t applied for a job recently and received an email mentioning that your profile has been shortlisted for a job that seems too good to be true, then it is not true. Somebody is trying to trick you. Copyright Infringement Notice In these scams, hackers send small business owners emails that state business owners have infringed on copyright owned by hackers. So, business owners are liable to pay a certain amount of money, or they could go to jail. Hackers also mention a link in the email for small business owners to check how they infringed the copyright. Clicking on the link leads to malware installation. PayPal Account Suspension Email “We have seen suspicious activity on your account. After further investigation, we have found that the security of your PayPal account is compromised. Your account will be deactivated within 4 hours unless you verify your credit card details. Verify your credit card information here.” A phishing email of this nature originates from fraudulent websites that mimic PayPal. When users enter their credit card information, hackers capture the data. Bogus Invoice Scam A bogus invoice scam is a form of fraud aimed at deceiving recipients into paying for products or services they never ordered or received. Hackers may send invoices that appear legitimate and claim to be from a company you recognize or trust; however, these invoices are actually fraudulent. Hackers obtain login details when an employee in your billing department logs into the account. Occasionally, they may prompt users to confirm payment for an invoice or to cancel an order. Email Account Upgrade These emails pose as messages from well-known email providers, like Gmail or Outlook, and urge recipients to update their accounts or lose their services. In reality, these scam emails are designed to steal your login credentials and access your email account illegally. Don’t let this happen – don’t click on any malicious links in the message or enter personal information into the fake sign-in page. Dropbox Phishing Emails With Dropbox phishing scams becoming more common, it’s essential to be aware of the warning signs. Emails that look like they’re from the popular file-sharing platform often tell recipients that they have documents to review. When recipients click the CTA, it takes them to a phony website. Once there, the scammer can steal your login information and other personal data. More Phishing Attack Examples to Avoid The following are some additional phishing scam examples small business owners should know about: Bank Scam Emails Bank email phishing scams are becoming increasingly popular. This type of scam attempts to steal personal information by spoofing the sender’s identity and tricking the recipient into entering their login credentials or other valuable information. The scammers usually send out fake emails that appear to be from a well-known bank, asking for your bank account details or verification code. If you happen to enter account information into the login page of a scammer’s fake website, they can then employ your username and password to steal your money or hijack your bank account. Fake App Purchase Scam A malicious email will typically have a subject line that references an app from a reputable company you didn’t download. There is usually a serial number in the subject line. Once you click through to find out more about the payment, you are taken to an invoice that asks for your permission to view, manage, or cancel the application. The lack of specific detail in the message leaves victims open to attack because they may be inclined to open an email attachment- potentially installing malware on their devices. Social Security Number Request Hackers are constantly looking for ways to steal your personal information, and one of the most common scams is when they pretend to be from a government agency. They may call you and tell you that your social security number has been suspended or that you need to confirm it so it can be reinstated. Billing by a Technical Support Service Billing by a technical support service is a scam where the attacker tries to sell you technical support services that don’t actually exist. They may email you that an issue has been detected with your PC and that you need to call a phone number to get technical assistance. Another common way to scam victims is to call directly and alert them that there is a device failure. And contact is being made to resolve the issue. At the end of the service, they will charge fees for repairing problems that did not exist initially. Offering Financial Solutions Another frequent tactic used in phishing involves enticing victims with the chance to settle debts for less than the original amount or to invest in opportunities that promise high returns. These “offers” appear credible and are typically available for a limited time, creating a sense of urgency for the individual to act quickly. Tax Scam A cybercriminal sends a text message to persuade victims that they owe money after filing their taxes, or they may direct victims to a website where a payment is required. Another common tactic for scammers is to tell their victims that they are eligible for a large refund, encouraging them to click on a link that installs malware on their phones. You Have Won Something These scams are often easy to spot because they promise something that simply isn’t true. A message or email says that you need to click on a link to Google Docs in order to submit details so that you can collect your prize. In reality, scammers are trying to steal your personal information in order to scam you further. What Is the Most Common Phishing Example? There are numerous phishing schemes, with the two most prevalent being email spoofing and Fake Login Pages. Email spoofing occurs when an email is sent that appears to originate from a trusted source. Meanwhile, Fake Login Pages are designed to closely resemble legitimate sites, complete with the same logo and branding as the original websites. What Are The Signs of Phishing Emails? The signs of phishing emails include but are not limited to urgency, unusual requests or content, grammatical errors & misspelled words, mismatch of domain names and email addresses, and familiar greetings. Security awareness training is the most effective way to help your employees to identify phishing emails. What Is Considered an Example of Phishing? Any wilful activity that aims at stealing individuals’ sensitive information, swindling money from them, or installing malware on their computer systems is considered an example of phishing. Image: Envato Elements This article, "Common Phishing Traps to Avoid" was first published on Small Business Trends View the full article

A report finds organic traffic is declining, costs are rising, and user frustrations are growing, forcing marketers to prioritize retention. The post Digital Ads Cost 19% More, Convert Less: User Frustration To Blame appeared first on Search Engine Journal. View the full article

The US president is likely take the reaction to tariff rises as a winView the full article

Former President Jimmy Carter has won a posthumous Grammy award. Carter, the peanut farmer who won the presidency in the wake of the Watergate scandal and Vietnam War, died in December at age 100. Prior to his passing, Carter was nominated in the audio book, narration, and storytelling recording category at the 2025 Grammys for “Last Sundays in Plains: A Centennial Celebration,” recordings from his final Sunday School lessons delivered at Maranatha Baptist Church in Georgia. Musicians Darius Rucker, Lee Ann Rimes and Jon Batiste are featured on the record. It’s Carter’s fourth Grammy. His posthumous Grammy joins his three previous ones for spoken word album. If the former president won before his death, he would’ve become the oldest Grammy award winner in history. Jason Carter, Jimmy Carter’s grandson who now chairs The Carter Center governing board, received the award on his behalf. “Having his words captured in this way for my family and for the world is truly remarkable,” he said in an acceptance speech. “Thank you to the academy.” In the category, Jimmy Carter beat out Barbra Streisand, George Clinton, Dolly Parton and producer guy Oldfield. If Streisand won instead of Carter, it would have been her first Grammy win in 38 years. Currently, the oldest person to win a Grammy was 97-year-old Pinetop Perkins in 2011. “He’s such an enormous music fan. He loves the creative aspect of music,” Jason Carter said backstage about his grandfather. “It’s been an important part of his political life, an important part of his personal life. He’s an artist in many ways.” Former presidents Barack Obama and Bill Clinton have two Grammys apiece. First ladies Michelle Obama and Hilary Clinton have also each won. Former presidents Harry S. Truman, John F. Kennedy and Richard Nixon were all nominated, but didn’t win. AP Entertainment Writers Andrew Dalton and Jonathan Landrum Jr. contributed to this report. For more coverage of this year’s Grammy Awards, visit: www.apnews.com/GrammyAwards —Maria Sherman, AP Music Writer View the full article

Unlock insights quickly, from QuickBooks to custom systems. Quick Tech Talk With Steve Yoss CPE Today Go PRO for members-only access to more Stephen Yoss. View the full article

Unlock insights quickly, from QuickBooks to custom systems. Quick Tech Talk With Steve Yoss CPE Today Go PRO for members-only access to more Stephen Yoss. View the full article

Tax season is officially here! Understanding the available tax deductions can help you keep more of your hard-earned income. Be aware, however, that you must claim all of the freelance taxable income you have received and substantiate all of your deductions with proper receipts (not just credit card statements). There are a few new key updates for freelance tax deductions in 2024, including: Form 1099-K Threshold: The threshold for receiving Form 1099-K has increased to $5,000 in gross proceeds. This form reports payments received through online platforms like PayPal, Stripe, and Venmo. It's essential for tracking income from online platforms. Even if you don't receive Form 1099-K, you're still required to report all income, including cash payments and foreign sources. Good record-keeping is crucial to ensure accurate reporting.Receiving Form 1099-K doesn't change your tax obligations. It's simply a record of your financial transactions. Make sure to include this information when filing your taxes to avoid any discrepancies. Ensure the information on the form is correct, including your Taxpayer Identification Number (TIN) and the gross payment amount. Retirement Contribution Limits: The contribution limits for retirement accounts have increased. For example, the limit for employees participating in 401(k) plans has increased to $23,000, and the SEP-IRA contribution limit has increased to $69,000. Contributions to retirement accounts like SEP IRAs, Solo 401(k)s, and SIMPLE IRAs can significantly reduce your taxable income.Standard Deduction Increases: The standard deduction has increased for 2024. For married couples filing jointly, it's now $29,200, for single taxpayers, it's $14,600.In addition, here are some of the top freelance tax deductions for the 2024 tax year: 1. Home Office DeductionIf you have a dedicated space in your home used exclusively for business, you can deduct a portion of your housing expenses. This includes rent, mortgage interest, utilities, and even property taxes. The IRS offers two methods for calculating this deduction: the simplified option and the regular method. The simplified option for home office deduction offers a straightforward way for eligible taxpayers to claim a home office deduction on their tax returns. Instead of tracking actual expenses, you can use a standard rate of $5 per square foot of the home office, up to a maximum of 300 square feet. This means you can deduct up to $1,500 for your home office space without the need to keep detailed records. It's an easier way to potentially save on taxes if you qualify! The regular method for the home office deduction requires more detailed record-keeping but can potentially yield a larger deduction. Here's how it works: Calculate the Percentage of Your Home: Determine the percentage of your home used for business by dividing the area of the home office by the total area of your home.Direct Expenses: Track expenses directly related to your home office, such as repairs specific to the office space. These expenses are fully deductible.Indirect Expenses: Track expenses that benefit your entire home, like mortgage interest, utilities, insurance, and repairs. You can only deduct the business-use percentage of these expenses.Depreciation: Calculate and deduct depreciation for the part of your home used as an office.Using this method, you’ll need to keep thorough records of all your expenses, but it allows for the deduction of a wider range of costs. If your home office qualifies, this method might offer greater savings compared to the simplified option. 2. Office Supplies and EquipmentThe cost of office supplies like pens, paper, printers, and computers can be deducted. Additionally, equipment such as cameras, software, and other tools necessary for your work are also deductible. 3. Vehicle ExpensesIf you use your car for business purposes, you can deduct related expenses such as gas, maintenance, insurance, and depreciation. Be sure to keep detailed records of your mileage and business-related trips. 4. Advertising and Marketing CostsExpenses related to promoting your business, including website maintenance, online ads, business cards, and social media marketing, are deductible. 5. Health Insurance PremiumsAs a freelancer in 2024, you can deduct the cost of health insurance premiums for yourself, your spouse, and your dependents. Here's a summary of what you need to know related to deducting health insurance premiums as a freelancer. You can claim this deduction if you are self-employed and report a net profit on Schedule C. You cannot claim the deduction for any month you or your spouse are eligible to participate in a subsidized employer plan. The deduction covers premiums for medical, dental, and qualifying long-term care insurance for yourself, your spouse, and your dependents. It also covers your children under age 27, even if they are not your dependents. The deduction cannot exceed your net profit from your business, reduced by your self-employment tax and contributions to retirement plans. If your deduction is limited, you can carry over the excess premiums to Schedule A as an itemized deduction, but only if your total medical expenses exceed 7.5% of your adjusted gross income. It is very important to keep detailed records of your health insurance premiums and any other medical expenses to ensure accurate reporting and maximize your deductions. 6. Education and TrainingExpenses for courses, workshops, and professional development that maintain or improve your skills are deductible. 7. Travel and AccommodationIf you travel for business, you can deduct expenses for transportation, lodging, meals, and other travel-related costs. 8. Self-Employment TaxesAs a freelancer, you're responsible for paying self-employment taxes, which include Social Security and Medicare taxes. However, you can deduct half of these taxes on your income tax return. 9. Professional ServicesFees paid to accountants, lawyers, and other professionals for services related to your business are deductible. Maximizing your tax deductions as a freelancer can significantly reduce your tax liability and help you save money. Be sure to keep meticulous records and consult with a tax professional to ensure you're taking advantage of all available deductions. View the full article

Tax season is officially here! Understanding the available tax deductions can help you keep more of your hard-earned income. Be aware, however, that you must claim all of the freelance taxable income you have received and substantiate all of your deductions with proper receipts (not just credit card statements). There are a few new key updates for freelance tax deductions in 2024, including: Form 1099-K Threshold: The threshold for receiving Form 1099-K has increased to $5,000 in gross proceeds. This form reports payments received through online platforms like PayPal, Stripe, and Venmo. It's essential for tracking income from online platforms. Even if you don't receive Form 1099-K, you're still required to report all income, including cash payments and foreign sources. Good record-keeping is crucial to ensure accurate reporting.Receiving Form 1099-K doesn't change your tax obligations. It's simply a record of your financial transactions. Make sure to include this information when filing your taxes to avoid any discrepancies. Ensure the information on the form is correct, including your Taxpayer Identification Number (TIN) and the gross payment amount. Retirement Contribution Limits: The contribution limits for retirement accounts have increased. For example, the limit for employees participating in 401(k) plans has increased to $23,000, and the SEP-IRA contribution limit has increased to $69,000. Contributions to retirement accounts like SEP IRAs, Solo 401(k)s, and SIMPLE IRAs can significantly reduce your taxable income.Standard Deduction Increases: The standard deduction has increased for 2024. For married couples filing jointly, it's now $29,200, for single taxpayers, it's $14,600.In addition, here are some of the top freelance tax deductions for the 2024 tax year: 1. Home Office DeductionIf you have a dedicated space in your home used exclusively for business, you can deduct a portion of your housing expenses. This includes rent, mortgage interest, utilities, and even property taxes. The IRS offers two methods for calculating this deduction: the simplified option and the regular method. The simplified option for home office deduction offers a straightforward way for eligible taxpayers to claim a home office deduction on their tax returns. Instead of tracking actual expenses, you can use a standard rate of $5 per square foot of the home office, up to a maximum of 300 square feet. This means you can deduct up to $1,500 for your home office space without the need to keep detailed records. It's an easier way to potentially save on taxes if you qualify! The regular method for the home office deduction requires more detailed record-keeping but can potentially yield a larger deduction. Here's how it works: Calculate the Percentage of Your Home: Determine the percentage of your home used for business by dividing the area of the home office by the total area of your home.Direct Expenses: Track expenses directly related to your home office, such as repairs specific to the office space. These expenses are fully deductible.Indirect Expenses: Track expenses that benefit your entire home, like mortgage interest, utilities, insurance, and repairs. You can only deduct the business-use percentage of these expenses.Depreciation: Calculate and deduct depreciation for the part of your home used as an office.Using this method, you’ll need to keep thorough records of all your expenses, but it allows for the deduction of a wider range of costs. If your home office qualifies, this method might offer greater savings compared to the simplified option. 2. Office Supplies and EquipmentThe cost of office supplies like pens, paper, printers, and computers can be deducted. Additionally, equipment such as cameras, software, and other tools necessary for your work are also deductible. 3. Vehicle ExpensesIf you use your car for business purposes, you can deduct related expenses such as gas, maintenance, insurance, and depreciation. Be sure to keep detailed records of your mileage and business-related trips. 4. Advertising and Marketing CostsExpenses related to promoting your business, including website maintenance, online ads, business cards, and social media marketing, are deductible. 5. Health Insurance PremiumsAs a freelancer in 2024, you can deduct the cost of health insurance premiums for yourself, your spouse, and your dependents. Here's a summary of what you need to know related to deducting health insurance premiums as a freelancer. You can claim this deduction if you are self-employed and report a net profit on Schedule C. You cannot claim the deduction for any month you or your spouse are eligible to participate in a subsidized employer plan. The deduction covers premiums for medical, dental, and qualifying long-term care insurance for yourself, your spouse, and your dependents. It also covers your children under age 27, even if they are not your dependents. The deduction cannot exceed your net profit from your business, reduced by your self-employment tax and contributions to retirement plans. If your deduction is limited, you can carry over the excess premiums to Schedule A as an itemized deduction, but only if your total medical expenses exceed 7.5% of your adjusted gross income. It is very important to keep detailed records of your health insurance premiums and any other medical expenses to ensure accurate reporting and maximize your deductions. 6. Education and TrainingExpenses for courses, workshops, and professional development that maintain or improve your skills are deductible. 7. Travel and AccommodationIf you travel for business, you can deduct expenses for transportation, lodging, meals, and other travel-related costs. 8. Self-Employment TaxesAs a freelancer, you're responsible for paying self-employment taxes, which include Social Security and Medicare taxes. However, you can deduct half of these taxes on your income tax return. 9. Professional ServicesFees paid to accountants, lawyers, and other professionals for services related to your business are deductible. Maximizing your tax deductions as a freelancer can significantly reduce your tax liability and help you save money. Be sure to keep meticulous records and consult with a tax professional to ensure you're taking advantage of all available deductions. View the full article

Some things in life are constant – Google rankings aren’t one of them. If you’ve been paying attention (or just reading this website), you’ve likely noticed that rankings are becoming increasingly unstable. Industry veterans, with years of context, may feel this shift the most. That’s why I believe SEO is evolving into something new. What that means – and whether the industry is adapting well – is a discussion for another time (TL;DR: we’re not doing great, but we’re not failing either. Change is hard). One key driver of this shift is SERP instability. What I’d like to do here is explore that notion and give some concrete facts. The average level of volatility in 2024 Rank was 26% more volatile in 2024 than in 2023. It’s not as simple as it sounds, which is why we’ll look at multiple metrics to create a data picture as best we can. However, if you looked at how much rank volatility increased in 2024 and compared it to how much it either increased or decreased in 2023, the answer would be 26% – at least on desktop. Now, that’s not universal across every sector of the web. For example, as you can see above, certain niche industries saw far higher volatility increases in 2024 relative to 2023. If your site helps folks relish information about their favorite snack, it might be over 50% more volatile (for the record, relish is no one’s favorite snack). However, what was almost universal was that all but one of the vertical’s Semrush tracks saw an increase in rank volatility in 2024: All but one vertical (Real Estate) saw what I would call a “noticeable” increase in rank volatility over the course of 2024 compared to 2023 (which itself was “noticeable”). I want to highlight that the data shows average volatility – already high in 2023 and even higher in 2024 (except for Real Estate). I don’t always report on desktop versus mobile when discussing Google algorithm updates. In general, the numbers across devices are close enough that it doesn’t justify wasting your time. In this case, the difference between devices was clear – a full 10 percentage points. While the desktop SERP was 26% more volatile in 2024 than in 2023, the mobile SERP was “only” 16% more volatile. The disparity between devices continued all the way down to the niche level. On desktop, the Health vertical, for example, was not one of the niches that saw the most increased volatility in 2024. On mobile, as shown above, it clearly was. That’s not because keywords associated with the medical field were so much more volatile on mobile. The numbers for the Health niche are quite similar across devices. The disparity is largely due to other verticals having higher rates of volatility in 2023 on mobile than on desktop: If you look at ecommerce, the vertical had literally the same level of rank volatility on both desktop and mobile in 2024. However, on mobile, the volatility average was 5 points higher. The gap between the mobile and desktop volatility increase is due to the higher levels of mobile volatility in 2023, which resulted in less of an increase relative to 2024. However, the levels of absolute volatility are the same across devices. (Again, using the Shopping vertical, the average volatility was at 8.5/10 on both devices in 2024.) By the way, a volatility score of 8.5 is out of this world. All these numbers, when factoring in the volatility levels in 2023 and then the increase of them in 2024, are out of this world. The SERP is not safe. Dig deeper: How to diversify your traffic sources Get the newsletter search marketers rely on. Business email address Sign me up! Processing... See terms. Is increased rank volatility a lasting trend or a temporary spike? An increase in average volatility in 2024 doesn’t tell the whole story. We need to determine if a single event skewed the data – perhaps one or two months of extreme volatility. The answer? No. Volatility in 2024 was widespread. Except for July (and to some extent August), the year was consistently more volatile from the start. July 2023 is interesting to recall because there was no official update. The volatility you see above in July 2023 was the result of an odd and ongoing period of extreme rank volatility that happened around the middle of that month: Image courtesy of Search Engine Roundtable The upshot and the importance of the data is that it means we’re not just in a more volatile rank period that may or may not abate. Rather, it would appear we’re in a new scenario of what volatility on the SERP looks like. I can only speculate that it will get worse as Google has been reported to say they are moving to continuous and ongoing algorithm updates. How drastic is drastic? Another question neither the average level of volatility nor the volatility trends answer is how volatile? Meaning, how drastic is the rank movement? It’s entirely possible that smaller micromovements are a big part of the more volatile SERP (which, for the record, was already incredibly volatile for years – more on that later). Standard deviation is one of the best metrics to measure rank volatility. When you look at the baseline and how far off the volatility is, rank volatility is noticeably less drastic: Every vertical saw a decrease in the standard deviation relative to 2023, aside from one (and the “news” SERP is its own beast). Now we have a scenario where the “amount” of volatility increased, but the extent of the movement itself decreased relative to 2023. Do not mistake that for “Oh, rank isn’t fluctuating in a drastic manner.” It’s relative to 2023, not in absolute. If we take the Dolorean to 88 mph, we’ll see that back in 2021 standard deviation, outside of News, ranged between 1.15 and 1.69: That range in 2024 (again outside of News) is 1.3 – 2.5. Rank is not “less volatile” over time. The average level of rank fluctuation may not be as drastic as in 2023, but as a paradigm, we are not even close to the levels seen in 2021 and have surpassed the higher extremes of rank movement seen in 2020. Back in 2020, we were looking at standard deviations above 1. Now, we’re talking about deviants above 2 (of which I have four above 2 at home). We can still pull back another layer. Is the reason the standard deviation is higher overall related to a few strong spikes of colossal rank volatility? That doesn’t appear to be the case. The above graph shows a narrowing of the gap between the minimum and maximum levels of volatility. The difference between minimum and maximum volatility in 2023 was 8.1 points, down to 7.2 in 2024. That’s a less drastic “spiking” of max volatility (relatively speaking). There are two (if not more) possible reasons for this: The minimum score was higher, meaning we started at a higher level of volatility, which would make the gap between the minimum and maximum levels of volatility narrower. There were fewer large spikes but overall more “less drastic” rank movement so the levels just never got as high in 2024. Thus, the gap between the minimum and maximum levels of volatility is narrower. If you look at all the data together (see, there’s a method to my madness), some signs point to more volatility that is less drastic overall. Why? The average amount of volatility is up in 2024. The rank movement is less drastic overall in 2024 (see standard deviation). Thus, to apply Occam’s Razor (which has nothing to do with actual razors), the most likely scenario behind the narrowed gap between minimum and maximum volatility is that the volatility, while more frequent, did not get as many “highs” as it did in 2023. However, the counterargument would be the month-by-month volatility trends we saw above (adding here again for convenience), which show that the jump in the amount of volatility was steeper in 2023 than in 2024: It’s not hard to see. August 2023 and August 2024 show just about the same levels of volatility. But look where the amount of volatility started in 2023, far lower than in 2024. One might speculate that if the amount of volatility spiked like it did in 2023, so did the levels of volatility. This is a fancy way of saying, I don’t know – which I am not supposed to say in official SEO articles. (So you didn’t read that). But it also brings me to my next data point. The pivots are so good here it feels like a podcast. Things are volatile, but who’s counting? Me. I am counting. Did you know that Semrush only recorded 15 days or low volatility in 2024? Of course, not. Who would actually know that off the top of their heads? That’s just weird. But it’s true. On desktop, there were just 15 days of low volatility and just 83 days of “normal” volatility. For the record, yes, 2024 has 366 days, not 365. It was a leap year. I know how to add numbers. So, just assume there is one less day of high volatility to make yourself feel better. By the way, that means a 64% reduction in the number of days of low volatility in 2024 and a 39% reduction in days of normal volatility. Conversely, there was a 19% increase in “high volatility” days in 2024 and an absolutely massive increase of 80% in “very high volatility” days! Slightly different on mobile with a few more days of low volatility throughout 2024 (although the number of high volatility days was the same): However, there were 12 fewer “very high” volatility days on mobile in 2024, so that’s good. But mainly, none of it is good. Roughly 78% of 2024 was volatile, with 36% of the year being very volatile (desktop). That feels like a nightmare. For many, it was and still is. More volatility? Who freaking cares?! (Or as most Search Engine Land articles put it: why we care) You. At least you should. Our conception of what Google is as a marketing channel is starting to shift. First, the results are less than stellar at times. I was Googling a medical condition, and I was forced to choose between the same content from different websites such as the Mayo Clinic, Web MD, whatever, or Reddit. That’s like having to choose between strawberry ice cream or strawberry ice cream with nuts. Then there’s the whole LLM thing, AI search engines and AIOs, AI-generated content, AI something whatever, and yada, yada, yada. And then, on top of that, content consumption trends have totally changed IMHO (they’re constantly changing, BTW). Oh, and I forgot about Reddit being firehosed into the SERP. (Would you like sprinkles on that ice cream?) On top of all of that, the SERP is a heap of volatility. That’s a lot. It’s like Thanksgiving dinner with your family and your in-laws, and all that’s being served is boiled tofu. Also, they don’t have a TV, so you can’t watch football, and they don’t have beer; they have Zima from 1992. So what should you do about it? I didn’t say I was giving advice; I was just showing why you should care. What you should do about it is a whole other conversation. And yeah, it goes far beyond “diversify your channels” or “aim for owned audiences.” Personally, I think it means taking a very hard look at how we approach audiences and resonate with them. Let that sink in for now. Dig deeper: SEO beyond Google: Building your brand on Reddit, Quora, TikTok and more View the full article

Here is a recap of what happened in the search forums today, through the eyes of the Search Engine Roundtable and other search forums on the web. Google is testing using AI to generate backgrounds automatically for your shopping campaign images...View the full article

In this week's trip into the cultural zeitgeist of people too young to rent cars, I explain why everyone is arguing over robot abuse, take a look at a niche TikTok subculture dedicated to sticks, and explain why you should never say "sigh name cuff" on video. All that, plus warnings of dangerous TikTok trends and a look at gleeking. Viral video of the week: Kai Cenat buys a $70,000 robot Massively popular YouTube and Twitch streamer Kai Cenat may have doomed humanity in this week's viral video. On a recent live stream, Cenat and his pals unbox and assemble a human-like robot that set Cenat back $70,000. The video begins as a hilarious demonstration of impressive and creepy technology. But things turn sinister—to some. Very shortly after Kai and company get the robot up and walking around, they start attacking it, kicking it, hitting it and pushing it over. Here's a link to the relevant part of the video. At one point it almost looks like the poor little guy is trying to run away. The internet responded with a debate as to whether bullying a human-like machine is a sign of something troubling or just clean fun. As Ian Miles Cheong put it on X: This Tweet is currently unavailable. It might be loading or has been removed. Overall, I think the video is funny and harmless. A robot isn't a person and isn't sentient, so there's no cruelty here. I don't think it reveals anything dark about the people in the video, either, just like shooting "people" in a video game doesn't reveal you to be secretly murderous. But still, I get why it's distressing to some. I can't help but feel bad for the poor little robot, even though I know my compassion is misplaced. It's in our nature to personify things, and that robot looks so helpless. It's easy to write off this specific video, but with machines (arguably) on the verge of something like consciousness, we may soon have to decide what rights they have and what responsibilities we have in how we treat them. This is why I always say "Thank you" to Siri; she might remember it later on and spare my life. Cenat is a goner, though. Welcome to SticktokI love that there's a corner of TikTok for every possible niche interest, like finding a cool stick and saying, "this one looks like a sword!" That's what the kids over at the sticktok and sticknation do. They find cool sticks! Sticks for hunched-over dwarves, sticks for smashing things, magic wand sticks, and any other kind of stick you could possibly imagine. If you like sticks, you can find your people here. It's a way cheaper way to get some views than buying a $70,000 robot. What is "gleeking?"I remember people talking about gleeking—spraying spit directly from under your tongue, often when yawning—when I was in high school in the 1840s, so it's not a new slang word, but it's having a culture moment among the kids. Gleeking has crossed generations and is blowing up, as the kids (used to) say, on TikTok. Tutorial videos are hitting hundreds of thousands of views and some are saying they're addicted to it. "Gleek" is also how a fan of the show Glee might refer to themself, so the hashtag is all over the place. Another interesting fact about "gleeking": no one really knows where the word came from. Shakespeare used it, but he was referring to a jest of jape, then hundreds of years past and it started to mean shooting saliva from under your tongue. It was prevalent in the 1980s basically everywhere, but how did a pre-internet nation of youth share this information? How did it spread? No one knows. Mysterious! (If you'd like a full glossary of slang the kids are using these days, I maintain one here on Lifehacker.) TikTok warnings: don't do any of these dangerous internet things!This is part eight of my 4,394 part series "Don't do anything you see on the internet or anywhere else, ever," in which I warn you of the terrible things children are doing because they saw them on TikTok. Do not eat tiramisu from your car's cup holderThe below TikTok video demonstrating how to eat the Italian dessert from your car's console should not be emulated! According to medical professionals like Dr. Shivram Singh, "Storing and eating food in your vehicle can lead to an increase of bacteria growth, which can result in many health implications." Do not shave off your eyelashes to look more manlyYoung dudes are not all right. Some are so weird about their masculinity that they're shaving their eyelashes so they don't look so girly. While I haven't spoken to an ophthalmologist about this, I do know that eyelashes help keep dust and detritus out of your eyes, and if you're shaving your eyelashes so women will like you, there are probably other reasons women don't like you. Do not bother to rub banana peels on your faceI'm on the fence about this one. Some beauty influencers are posting before and after videos of what happens when you rub banana peels on your face. The claim is bananas are like nature's Botox because they contain lutein, which can smooth wrinkles. According to skincare expert Dr Dave Reilly, "While it may be true that banana peel contains this antioxidant, it will not be topically absorbed through direct application to the skin. The concentration of lutein in the peel is also not high enough to produce significant results.” But it doesn't seem like this one is dangerous, so I say rub banana peels on your face all day; what do I care? But do not tell any children that smoking banana peels gets you high. Let's keep that our little secret. What does "Sigh Name Cuff" mean? If a young person in your life points a camera in your face and asks you to say "Sigh Name Cuff," definitely do it, but understand what you're getting yourself into. The young person will take the video, reverse it, and you will be saying something very rude instead of "sigh name cuff." It's like backwards masking in heavy metal albums, except Satan isn't involved and it's real. Here's a video that demonstrates the phenomena: You can check out a ton of other examples here. View the full article

Canadian province retaliates against US tariffsView the full article

We may earn a commission from links on this page. Push-ups are a great exercise, and almost everyone can find a starting point to train them. But if you’re running into problems because of discomfort in your wrists, here are some things you can try. I’ll suggest quick fixes for positioning, drills that can make your wrists more comfortable, and stretches that can help you to have an easier time with this wrist position in the future. For a quick fix: use push-up handles, or do push-ups on your knucklesIn a standard floor push-up, our hands are at a 90-degree angle to our forearms. This is a position that most of us will eventually be comfortable in, but it’s OK if you want a different way to do push-ups. Enter the push-up handle, which allows your wrist to be in a more neutral position. Redipo Push Up Bars $11.99 at Amazon /images/amazon-prime.svg $13.99 Save $2.00 Get Deal Get Deal $11.99 at Amazon /images/amazon-prime.svg $13.99 Save $2.00 Dumbbells or kettlebells can stand in for push-up handles in a pinch. (If you’re using kettlebells, pick heavy ones that won’t topple over.) Another option is to make a fist, and do the push-ups that way, so that your knuckles rather than your palms are on the floor. You may want some padding, like a folded towel or yoga mat, underneath. Warm up with wrist CARsAnother quick fix, but this time using your own body, is the wrist CAR. A CAR is a controlled articular rotation, and it just means that you slowly move a joint through its full range of motion. There are shoulder CARs, hip CARs, and, of course, wrist CARs. To do a wrist CAR, firmly grasp your wrist (let’s say your left) with your other (right) hand. Straighten out your hand with your fingers all pointing the same direction, and move your hand in circles at the wrist. After a few rotations, do the opposite direction. This video should give you the idea. I like to do my wrist CARs with my forearm vertical, fingers pointed toward the ceiling, but this type with a horizontal forearm is fine, too. After doing the wrist CARs, you may find that your push-up problems have disappeared. If so, great! You’ve discovered a powerful tool to add to your warm-up on push-up days. Adjust your positioning with towelsIf you still have some discomfort and you think it’s because your wrists just can’t quite stretch to 90 degrees, grab a pair of small gym towels (or anything similar) and prop your palms up on them. This works the same way as elevating your heels for squats. By changing the angle of your hands, you no longer need to bend your wrists as much, and so you can keep the heels of your palms on the ground (or towel) without stretching. Anchor your hands into the groundAnother positioning tip that can help is to make sure your hands are directly below your forearms, and that you’re spreading your hand out to distribute the weight of your upper body. You don’t want to lean into the heels of your hand, but rather, to use your fingers, thumbs, and your whole palm to grab the ground and support your body. If you don’t feel like this is happening, think about holding jar lids in your palms, and screw them both outward (pinkies away from your body). This can help to get some supportive tension in your hands, which often relieves wrist pain. Do some gentle wrist stretchesBefore or after your workout, do some gentle stretches to get your wrists used to operating in that more-stretched position. (Here’s one follow-along video that includes several great stretches.) This type of stretch shouldn’t hurt. Just apply pressure until you feel a gentle stretching sensation. That’s enough to do the job. If you want to be really thorough, four minutes of stretching in a given warmup, or ten minutes total per week, should be enough to see results. View the full article

Tech group reveals it put $19.9bn into its Reality Labs division, which develops its smart glasses and headsets, last yearView the full article

President Donald Trump said Sunday that Americans could feel “some pain” from the emerging trade war triggered by his tariffs against Canada, Mexico, and China, and claimed that Canada would “cease to exist” without its trade surplus with the United States. The trade penalties that Trump signed Saturday at his Florida resort caused a mix of panic, anger, and uncertainty, and threatened to rupture a decades-old partnership on trade in North America while further straining relations with China. Trump on Sunday night returned from Florida and threatened to impose steeper tariffs elsewhere, telling reporters that the import taxes will “definitely happen” with the European Union and possibly with the United Kingdom as well. He brushed aside retaliatory measures from Canada, saying, “If they want to play the game, I don’t mind. We can play the game all they want.” Trump said he plans to speak with his Canadian and Mexican counterparts on Monday. By following through on his tariffs campaign pledge, Trump may also have simultaneously broken his promise to voters in last year’s election that his administration could quickly reduce inflation. That means the same frustration he is facing from other nations might also spread domestically to consumers and businesses. “WILL THERE BE SOME PAIN? YES, MAYBE (AND MAYBE NOT!),” Trump said in a social media post. “BUT WE WILL MAKE AMERICA GREAT AGAIN, AND IT WILL ALL BE WORTH THE PRICE THAT MUST BE PAID.” His administration has not said what specific improvements would need to be seen in stopping illegal immigration and the smuggling of fentanyl to merit the removal of the tariffs that Trump imposed under the legal justification of an economic emergency. But Trump, speaking to reporters after Air Force One, landed said that the trade imbalances with Canada and Mexico would also need to be erased as a condition for lifting the tariffs. The president also tried to clarify his post about the possible inflation, saying on Sunday: “We may have in the short term, a little pain, and people understand that. But long term, the United States has been ripped off by virtually every country in the world.” The tariffs are set to launch Tuesday and triggered confusion as Canada’s U.S. ambassador, Kirsten Hillman, told ABC News that her country was perplexed by the move because “we view ourselves as your neighbor, your closest friend, your ally.” In his Truth Social post, Trump took particular aim at Canada, which responded with retaliatory measures. Trump is placing a 25% tariff on Canadian goods, with a 10% tax on oil, natural gas, and electricity. Canada is imposing 25% tariffs, more than $155 billion Canadian (US$105 billion), on U.S. products, including alcohol and fruit. Despite Trump’s assertions that the U.S. does not need Canada, one-quarter of the oil that America consumes per day is from its ally to the north. He reiterated his false claim that America subsidizes Canada by running a trade imbalance, a reflection in part of Canada exporting energy to the U.S. Trump contended that without that surplus, “Canada ceases to exist as a viable Country. Harsh but true! Therefore, Canada should become our Cherished 51st State. Much lower taxes, and far better military protection for the people of Canada—AND NO TARIFFS!” Prime Minister Justin Trudeau is encouraging Canadians to buy more Canadian goods, and says Trump’s moves will only cause pain across North America. More than 75% of Canada’s exports go to the U.S. Canada will first target alcohol, cosmetics, and paper products; a second round later will include passenger vehicles, trucks, steel and aluminum products, certain fruits and vegetables, beef, pork, dairy products, and more. Canada is the largest export market for 36 states and Mexico is the largest trading partner of the U.S. Mexico’s president, Claudia Sheinbaum, also announced new tariffs and suggested the U.S. should do more within its own borders to address drug addiction. She and Trudeau spoke after Trump’s announcement and agreed “to enhance the strong bilateral relations” between Canada and Mexico, according to the prime minister’s office. The Chinese government said it would take steps to defend its economic interests and intends to file a lawsuit with the World Trade Organization. For Trump, the open question is whether inflation could be a political pressure point that would cause him to back down. As a candidate, Trump repeatedly hammered Democrats over the inflation under President Joe Biden that resulted from supply chain issues during the coronavirus pandemic, the Biden administration’s own spending to spur the recovery and Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. Trump said his previous four years as president had low inflation, so the public should expect the same if he came back to the White House. But he also said specifically that higher inflation would stagger the U.S. as a nation, a position from which he now appears to be retreating with the promise of even more tariffs to come. The U.S. president did not offer details Sunday about when he would impose tariffs elsewhere, but he said they would be coming “pretty soon” for the EU, which is also composed of U.S. allies. Larry Summers, treasury secretary in the Clinton administration, said the tariffs were a “self-inflicted wound to the American economy.” He told CNN’s Inside Politics that “on the playground or in international relations, bullying is not an enduringly winning strategy. And that’s what this is.” And the ultimate winner, Summers suggested, would be Chinese leader Xi Jinping because “we’ve moved to drive some of our closest allies into his arms” and “we’re legitimating everything he’s doing by violating all the international norms that we set up.” Outside analyses make clear that Trump’s tariffs would hurt the voters that he intended to help, meaning that he might ultimately need to find a resolution. An analysis by the Budget Lab at Yale shows that if the tariffs were to continue, an average U.S. household would lose roughly $1,245 in income this year, in what would be the overall equivalent of a more than $1.4 trillion tax increase over the next 10 years. Goldman Sachs, in a Sunday analyst note, stressed that the tariffs go into effect on Tuesday, which means they’re likely to proceed “though a last-minute compromise cannot be completely ruled out.” The investment bank concluded that because of the possible economic damage and possible conditions for removal “we think it is more likely that the tariffs will be temporary but the outlook is unclear.” Associated Press writers Michelle L. Price in New York and Rob Gillies in Toronto contributed to this report. —Josh Boak, Associated Press View the full article

Remarketing campaigns can drive significant results when executed effectively. This article explores advanced strategies for setting up and optimizing your remarketing efforts for greater profitability and long-term success. Go beyond the basic remarketing setup By default, Google Analytics creates an “All Users” audience for website visitors over the past 30 days. While this basic audience may be useful for beginners, setting up advanced audiences can significantly improve campaign performance in the long term. Here are audiences to consider testing: Pre-built templates in GA4: Ready to use or customizable to fit your specific needs. Different timeframes: Instead of simply 30-day website visitors, test 10-day, 60-day, 90-day, or 180-day audiences based on your industry and website traffic. 365-day audiences: Ideal for remarketing annual products or services, such as trips, holidays, or Black Friday deals, to previous customers. Page-specific visitors: Retarget users who visited key pages, like pricing, by setting up “Page location” contains “your specific URL.” Converted audiences: Target users for other products or exclude them from campaigns based on completed purchases or form submissions. New visitors: Show ads only to new users, excluding repeat visitors. Traffic sources: Use audiences from other platforms, like Facebook, Instagram, TikTok, YouTube, or large newsletter lists, by applying Templates > Acquisition > First user source, campaign, or medium. Additional advanced options include: Inactive users: Retarget users who haven’t been active for a set timeframe (e.g., 7 days), or delay ads until specific events, like a free trial expiration. Session duration: Target users who spent significant time on your website (e.g., over 1 minute) to exclude low-interest audiences. Dig deeper: How to combine Google Ads with other channels to retarget, nurture and convert There are three primary campaign types for targeting remarketing audiences. Let’s explore best practices for setting them up and optimizing their performance. 1. Search remarketing Setup best practices You can target the same remarketing audiences you’ve set up in GA4, often called RLSA (remarketing lists for search ads). To avoid overlap, separate your search remarketing campaigns from standard search campaigns that don’t target a remarketing audience. The simplest approach is to create a search remarketing campaign using the same and/or different keywords while excluding that remarketing audience from your standard search campaigns. In search remarketing, you can test broader keywords, including: Broad match terms. Review-related queries. Competitor names. Since these users have already visited your site, broader targeting carries less risk. For ad creative, you can either reuse existing ads or test unique copy tailored to search remarketing. Choose what performs best. If using unique ads, consider adding more selling points and testimonials. Also, test different landing pages, coupons, or special deals. For bidding, test manual bidding, max conversions, or target CPA – especially if the campaign generates a high number of conversions. Even with higher CPCs, maximizing conversions can be worthwhile, as these users are already familiar with your brand. Optimizing search remarketing campaigns Optimization follows the same principles as standard search campaigns: Test different ad copy. Adjust ad group variations. Experiment with new keywords. Pause underperforming ones. Add negative keywords. However, avoid directly mirroring changes from your standard search campaigns. What works there won’t necessarily work in search remarketing. You can swap out audiences as needed, but otherwise, optimization remains similar to standard search. Regular adjustments are essential. Don’t leave it on autopilot. Dig deeper: How to boost PPC retargeting efficiency with an RFM analysis 2. Display remarketing Setup best practices When targeting different remarketing audiences, use separate ad groups or campaigns. Avoid grouping drastically different audiences together or expanding them with “optimized targeting.” For ads, you can reuse copy from search or banner ads or test unique messaging specific to display remarketing. Choose what delivers the best results. With remarketing banner ads, include your logo and branding to ensure immediate recognition. Even if users don’t click, the impressions still provide branding value. For high-traffic websites, consider testing three separate remarketing campaigns: Desktop-only. Tablet-only. Mobile-only. Combining all devices in one campaign often results in mobile traffic consuming the most clicks and budget. Instead of blocking mobile traffic entirely or reducing bids, testing a separate mobile campaign may be more effective. Mobile clicks – especially from in-app ads – are often accidental or irrelevant. For bidding, test manual CPC to control volume and spend or use Maximize Conversions to stop showing ads to users who don’t convert quickly. Brands with larger budgets aiming for long-term visibility may benefit from manual bidding to maximize touchpoints and reinforce brand presence. Be cautious with Maximize Clicks bidding. This strategy may favor high-click placements, such as mobile games, where accidental clicks can waste budget. Optimizing display remarketing campaigns Optimization follows the same principles as standard display campaigns. Regularly review placements – especially apps, games, celebrity gossip, quizzes, and entertainment sites – to prevent wasted spend on users who aren’t in the right mindset for your product or service. If mobile traffic dominates the budget, consider blocking it or running separate device-targeted campaigns. Continuously test ads to determine which ones drive the most conversions or relevant clicks. If an ad underperforms with a remarketing audience, replace it. Avoid leaving display remarketing campaigns on autopilot. Ongoing adjustments are key to maintaining effectiveness. Dig deeper: How to make your display campaigns profitable 3. Video remarketing Setup best practices Video remarketing campaigns follow a similar setup and optimization process as display remarketing campaigns. Use separate ad groups or campaigns for different remarketing audiences. Don’t combine them with other audiences. For ads, you can use generic branded videos or specific product/service-based videos tailored to the user’s recent activity. If producing new video ads is challenging, brands often repurpose existing TV or streaming ads. For lower budgets, you can create simple videos using Google Ads’ built-in tool or third-party tools like Canva. These videos can now be hosted directly in Google Ads without needing YouTube. Video ad campaigns offer various subtypes and bidding strategies. For remarketing, the simplest option is Video Views, which supports skippable in-stream ads, in-feed ads, and Shorts ads using CPV (cost per view) bidding. This is the easiest way to retarget past website visitors or YouTube channel viewers. For larger budgets, consider Video Efficient Reach, which allows CPM (cost per thousand impressions) bidding and supports unskippable ads. Brands focused on reach may also use Non-Skippable Reach if that format aligns with their goals. When setting up the campaign, consider disabling TV screen targeting unless you have a large brand and budget. Most advertisers prefer engagement beyond just branding, so blocking TV placements can help allocate spend more effectively. The Drive Conversions subtype for video campaigns is transitioning to Demand Gen in early 2025. If you don’t want to expand into Gmail and Discovery ads, it’s best to focus on Video Views for remarketing. Optimizing video remarketing campaigns Video remarketing follows the same optimization principles as display remarketing and non-remarketing video campaigns. Regularly review and block irrelevant placements, including: Video placements. YouTube channels. Topics. Apps. Entertainment content. Video ads often waste budget on kids’ videos, unrelated apps, or entertainment channels. Make sure to continuously block irrelevant placements If mobile traffic dominates the budget with little to no results, consider blocking it to improve campaign efficiency. Advanced remarketing strategies For advanced users, enhance remarketing by layering audience targeting with relevant placements, topics, and keywords simultaneously. This ensures your remarketing ads appear to past website visitors while they browse specific websites, YouTube channels, or content related to your targeted topics or keywords. For example, if you offer retirement planning services, you can target previous website visitors while they visit financial or retirement-related websites or view relevant topics. This strategy works for both display and video campaigns. You can also handpick high-authority financial or retirement websites and layer them with your remarketing audience for more precise targeting. It’s important to note that adding a remarketing audience to a Performance Max campaign is not true remarketing. Performance Max uses remarketing audiences as a signal – a starting point to find similar users – rather than exclusively targeting past visitors. It will expand beyond that audience based on Google’s machine learning. By leveraging advanced remarketing and optimization techniques, you can achieve significantly better results than default remarketing strategies. Dig deeper: From search to social: Retargeting organic traffic with video strategies View the full article

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