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May 7, 2006 - May 13, 2006


IE7 Default Search Given Approval By DOJ

Hot News! After all the debate the Department of Justice has approved IE7 to default to MSN Search. The news report says that Microsoft's search feature "respects users' and OEM's [original equipment manufacturers] default choices and is easily changed." Is that the end of that debate? I doubt it.

Posted by Barry Schwartz on May 12, 2006, 4:40 PM | Permalink


Behold! A Press Release

press release.jpg Can we borrow a carbon dating kit from someone out there? We want to verify this "press release" -- that was mailed to ClickZ HQ -- really does date from the 21st century.

At least they're getting a mention.

That's the point, right?

Posted by Rebecca Lieb on May 12, 2006, 2:42 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)


Search Headlines & Links: May 12, 2006

Below, a recap of stories posted today to the Search Engine Watch Blog, along with other items we've spotted but not blogged separately:

Today From The SEW Blog...

  • Search Forums Roundup: May 12, 2006
    Today's SearchDay, Search Engine Forums Spotlight, features our weekly links to this week's hot topics from search engine forums across the web: Dear Matt Cutts, I Want To Know About... Yahoo and Telemundo in Online Deal to Grab More Latino Internet Users - Two Emerging SEO Certification Programs - Are Meta Tags Still Necessary? - Microsoft Invests in Analytics Firm DeepMetrix, and more....
  • del.icio.us Adds Inline Editing
    The del.icio.us blog announced that they have added a few more features, including inline bookmark editing and prettier URLs. The changes enable users "edit and arrange your bookmarks much more quickly" and enhance the ability to "get at the conversation around the links." More details at the del.icio.us blog....
  • Microsoft Fires Back at Google Over IE7 Complaint
    News.com reports that Steve Ballmer, Microsoft's CEO, feels Google is asking for special treatment with the whole controversy on IE7 defaulting the search to MSN Search. Ballmer explains that if you configured IE to use Yahoo search, then when you upgrade to IE7, Yahoo will remain as the default. Only when you get a new computer, will the default search be MSN Search. Also, if you want to change that, the first option in the list is Ask.com, since the search engines are sorted alphabetically. More food for thought off Danny's last comment on this....
  • 5% Of Search Results Lead To "Dangerous Sites"
    Andy Beal reports on a Wall Street Journal article that claims 9% of paid search ads lead to "dangerous sites." Three-percent of organic results lead to risky sites, in comparison to the PPC ads. So on average, the article shows that "roughly 5% of the search results on average were risky sites." The SiteAdvisor study estimates a searcher will click to an "unsafe site from a search engine once every 15 days." Risky sites are defined as sites that can "infect consumers' personal computers or expose them to nuisances such as spam email." Postscript by Detlev Johnson: You can find...
  • Google's CEO & Founders Keep Control Over Google
    News.com reports that Google has kept the criticized dual class stock ownership structure. The dual structure gives Class B stockowners 10 votes per share, where Class A stock owners have 1 vote per share. Guess who the only Class B stockowners are today? You got it, only the CEO Eric Schmidt and founders Larry Page and Sergey Brin. More details on the politics involved at News.com....
  • Gmail Adds "Gmail Pictures"
    Garett Rogers reports that Gmail has announced the addition of Gmail Pictures. Gmail pictures allows you to add a picture of yourself or for your contacts. To add your own picture follow this instructions, to add a picture for your contacts follow this instructions. You can also define who can and cannot see your picture, more on that here....
  • Preview Of Google Notebook
    Google will be launching Google Notebook next week, but if you want to take a sneak peek, you can so. Philipp Lenssen found several screen captures released on Flickr already....

Other Things We Read, Didn't Blog But You Might Want To Read...

Posted by Danny Sullivan on May 12, 2006, 2:34 PM | Permalink


Daily SearchCast, May 12, 2006: Microsoft Pushes Back On Google IE7 Complaint; Yahoo's Semel Says Microsoft Has "No Chance" In Search & More!

Today's search podcast covers Microsoft pushing back on Google's Internet Explorer 7 favoritism complaints; Yahoo's Terry Semel Saying Microsoft has "no chance" in search; Google New Co-op Subscriber Links in action and more!

Tune-in by listening to this MP3 file, listening via WebmasterRadio at 11:30am Eastern and repeated at 2pm Eastern Tuesday through Friday, via our Odeo channel or through iTunes via this link (or use alternative iTunes instructions explained here) or though our Yahoo Podcasts channel. Need more help tuning in live or finding the chat room? See the Daily SearchCast FAQ.

Below are links to items discussed:

Posted by Danny Sullivan on May 12, 2006, 2:30 PM | Permalink


Search Forums Roundup: May 12, 2006

Today's SearchDay, Search Engine Forums Spotlight, features our weekly links to this week's hot topics from search engine forums across the web: Dear Matt Cutts, I Want To Know About... Yahoo and Telemundo in Online Deal to Grab More Latino Internet Users - Two Emerging SEO Certification Programs - Are Meta Tags Still Necessary? - Microsoft Invests in Analytics Firm DeepMetrix, and more.

Posted by Chris Sherman on May 12, 2006, 10:48 AM | Permalink


del.icio.us Adds Inline Editing

The del.icio.us blog announced that they have added a few more features, including inline bookmark editing and prettier URLs. The changes enable users "edit and arrange your bookmarks much more quickly" and enhance the ability to "get at the conversation around the links." More details at the del.icio.us blog.

Posted by Barry Schwartz on May 12, 2006, 9:58 AM | Permalink


Microsoft Fires Back at Google Over IE7 Complaint

News.com reports that Steve Ballmer, Microsoft's CEO, feels Google is asking for special treatment with the whole controversy on IE7 defaulting the search to MSN Search. Ballmer explains that if you configured IE to use Yahoo search, then when you upgrade to IE7, Yahoo will remain as the default. Only when you get a new computer, will the default search be MSN Search. Also, if you want to change that, the first option in the list is Ask.com, since the search engines are sorted alphabetically. More food for thought off Danny's last comment on this.

Posted by Barry Schwartz on May 12, 2006, 9:34 AM | Permalink


5% Of Search Results Lead To "Dangerous Sites"

Andy Beal reports on a Wall Street Journal article that claims 9% of paid search ads lead to "dangerous sites." Three-percent of organic results lead to risky sites, in comparison to the PPC ads. So on average, the article shows that "roughly 5% of the search results on average were risky sites." The SiteAdvisor study estimates a searcher will click to an "unsafe site from a search engine once every 15 days." Risky sites are defined as sites that can "infect consumers' personal computers or expose them to nuisances such as spam email."

Postscript by Detlev Johnson: You can find additional information at BBC with respect to natural listings that lead to risky sites. As much as 4-6% of search results in natural listings are categorized as risky, while sites in the sponsored listings can be 2-4 times as numerous.

The sheer volume of clicks this can account for is scary - 285 million per month. Search engines are known to try limiting their users from accessing risky sites through their search engines; at least as much as they combat spam. Their efforts will need to continue and be ongoing similarly to fighting search engine spam.

Posted by Barry Schwartz on May 12, 2006, 9:16 AM | Permalink


Google's CEO & Founders Keep Control Over Google

News.com reports that Google has kept the criticized dual class stock ownership structure. The dual structure gives Class B stockowners 10 votes per share, where Class A stock owners have 1 vote per share. Guess who the only Class B stockowners are today? You got it, only the CEO Eric Schmidt and founders Larry Page and Sergey Brin. More details on the politics involved at News.com.

Posted by Barry Schwartz on May 12, 2006, 9:08 AM | Permalink


Gmail Adds "Gmail Pictures"

Garett Rogers reports that Gmail has announced the addition of Gmail Pictures. Gmail pictures allows you to add a picture of yourself or for your contacts. To add your own picture follow this instructions, to add a picture for your contacts follow this instructions. You can also define who can and cannot see your picture, more on that here.

As an FYI - Apple has this feature built into "Address Book" and "iChat" and "Apple Mail" for a while now.

Posted by Barry Schwartz on May 12, 2006, 8:32 AM | Permalink


Preview Of Google Notebook

Google will be launching Google Notebook next week, but if you want to take a sneak peek, you can so. Philipp Lenssen found several screen captures released on Flickr already.

You can see the front page of Google Notebook, the SERP integration, the note management, and how to share notebooks. You can see more screen shots in Erica's profile at Flickr.

Posted by Barry Schwartz on May 12, 2006, 8:25 AM | Permalink


Search Headlines & Links: May 11, 2006

Below, a recap of stories posted today to the Search Engine Watch Blog, along with other items we've spotted but not blogged separately:

Today From The SEW Blog...

  • Semel To Microsoft: "You Have No Chance"
    The Financial Times has an article with a quote from Yahoo's CEO, Terry Semel, saying "My impartial advice to Microsoft is that you have no chance." Ouch! Semel continues by stating that "the search business has been formed," in response to rumors that Yahoo and Microsoft were to partner or merge. Semel did say that he did discuss with Microsoft the possibility of Microsoft "co-owning some" of Yahoo's search. But Semel said that it would not be a wise move to sell "your right arm while keeping your left." Microsoft just does not seem to be getting much love these...
  • Daily SearchCast, May 11, 2006: Google Trends For Researching What's Hot & What's Not; Google Co-op, Google's Big Time Tagging Experiment; Complaints Over Commission Cuts & More!
    Today's search podcast covers new Google products unveiled during yesterday's Press Day, including the hot research tool Google Trends, the "freaky weird" mass tagging system of Google Co-op, Google Gadgets for your desktop and a coming Google Notebook. Also a look at Google issues with a click fraud settlement, pushback on cutting commissions and more! Tune-in by listening to this MP3 file, listening via WebmasterRadio at 11:30am Eastern and repeated at 2pm Eastern Tuesday through Friday, via our Odeo channel or through iTunes via this link (or use alternative iTunes instructions explained here) or though our Yahoo Podcasts channel. Need...
  • Google Co-op's Subscribed Links In Action
    I had one of my developers at my company work on a dynamic implementation of the Google Coop Subscribed Links product for my site, the Search Engine Roundtable. I wanted to keep it simple, so I had him design it that when someone searched on a keyword phrase that matched any of the keywords in my category archives, it would show a "Subscribed Link" in the SERPs. To see it working yourself, you will need to subscribe to my Subscribed Link and then search on specific keyword phrases....
  • "Online Seller Advantage Program" Taps Yahoo for Buyer, Seller Data
    Prudential Real Estate is offering a new program as part of its existing marketing relationship with Yahoo Real Estate called the ?Online Seller Advantage program? (OSA). It?s designed to let sellers? agents convey market information to their clients (?real-time updates?) via email. Sellers will be able to receive a range of consumer-related and competitive market data....
  • A Closer Look at Behavioral Advertising
    Behavioral advertising is getting a lot of buzz lately, particularly as rumors of behaviorally targeted search advertising programs gain more traction. While none of the major search engines currently offer behavioral targeting, all are almost certainly developing programs that will likely be rolled out within the next year or two. But there are several other advertising networks that offer behavioral targeting today. Want to know more? Read on for Jennifer Slegg's overview of behaviorally targeted ads in today's SearchDay article, What's the Buzz Behind Behavioral Advertising?....
  • Google Maps Marriage Proposal Or Not?
    Nathan Weinberg reports that someone has proposed to his girlfriend via Google Maps. If you take a look at the this roof top in Google Maps, you will notice it reads, "Will U Marry Me." But the true question is, was this meant for a fly over via plane or helicopter or was it meant to be a proposal via Google Maps?...
  • Google & Yahoo Are Challenged In Mobile Search Space
    A Wall Street Journal article reports that InfoSpace, amongst other startup search engines, are providing a challenge for Google & Yahoo in the mobile search space. I believe both Yahoo and Google are taking mobile search very seriously. The market is still extremely new and there is a lot of opportunity for startups to make key partnerships with the carriers....
  • NetworkWorld Talks With Raul Valdes-Perez, CEO of Vivisimo & Clusty
    Gary Price points to a NetworkWorld.com interview with Vivisimo CEO Raul Valdes-Perez, of Clusty Search. Clusty uses clustering technology to provide results. The NetworkWorld author was convinced, during his interview with Mr. Perez, that Google/Yahoo/MSN provide "incomplete results." Is clustering the future of search? Give Clusty a try for yourself. Also, for past articles at Search Engine Watch on Clusty click here....
  • Google Commission Woes In Sweden, Australia
    Over the past few months, Google's been trying to reduce or eliminate commission on its ad products in countries where they are offered (North America, notably, has never had them). Now there are some news reports that the plans aren't well received Down Under and in Sweden....
  • Finding European Flights On The Move
    Stuck in a European airport and looking for a cheap flight while on the move? Skyscanner has got a new tool for you -- a mobile-friendly version of its site, Skyscanner Mobile....
  • New Google AdWords Traffic & Cost Estimator
    Google AdWords has finally launched a standalone tool where advertisers can get traffic and cost information for keywords without needing to login to their AdWords accounts to do so. Data included in the results are keywords/minimum bid, maximum CPC/predicted status, search volume, estimated average CPC, estimated ad positions, potential clicks per day and potential cost per day....
  • Advertiser Files Complaint To Block Google Click Fraud Settlement
    One Google advertiser is making a very formal rejection of the proposed Google click fraud settlement -- he's filed a complaint to try and block the agreement, and this before notifications from Google have even gone out....
  • Online Ad Spending Continues to Grow
    During the Dot Com Boom, many companies planned their online revenue models around free services supported by advertising, and for many, this model didn't pan out because many traditional ad agencies - and their big brand, big spend clients - did not embrace the online advertising opportunities available at the time. However, a new article from CNET reports on the current status of online advertising, including how it has cycled back to a point where many new services are expected to be supported through online advertising and where big brands are a major part of the expected growth of online...
  • Google Destination Guides: Not Much There -- Yet
    A part of Google Co-op, "Destination Guides" was promoted as ?Google City Guides? at Google Press Day today. And while everything about Co-op has been officially qualified as a ?work in progress,? this is something of a disappointment ?- as are many of the content areas and the general user-experience of Co-op. Danny has a more complete write up of Co-op here. Co-op is an ambitious project, not unlike Base, to create verticals, add structured and user-generated content and make the search experience more personalized. If you want to create your own "vertical search engine," which is one of the...
  • My Big Fat Google Press Day 2006 Round-Up
    We've blogged a number of items out of Google Press Day today. I wanted to recap them below, along with coverage from across the web that's beginning to flow in. I'll likely update this page over the next day, as well. New items will be posted below old stuff and flagged, or we'll do postscripts, to help those who keep checking back. Let's go!...
  • Google Co-op: Add Your Own Vertical Search To Google
    Google said it would have a health-related announcement at today's Google Press Day -- but no, it's not Google Health. Instead, it's Google Co-op, a way for people to create specialized search engines by tapping into the main Google index or the option for searchers to pick preferred vertical search providers to show up in Google OneBox results. Yes, health information is one of the new features -- but this is more than Google Health. This is Google making a giant and somewhat perplexing leap into mass tagging....
  • Fun With Google Trends
    Danny just posted about Google Trends, a service of Google that shows you search volume trends over time for a keyword or for multiple keywords. I thought it would be fun to ask Google Trends which search engine, of the top four, is the most popular, in terms of search volume. So I queries Google Trends for Google, Yahoo, Ask Jeeves, MSN (keep in mind ask jeeves is now ask.com). I also thought it would be fun to pin Apple vs. Windows vs. Linux. So let's see what Google Trends had to say......
  • Google Trends: Peer Into Google's Database Of Searches
    Now live via Google Labs is a new Google Trends service, announced today as part of Google Press Day. The service allows you to tap into Google's database of searches, to determine what's popular. For example, do a trends query on cars, and you can see the volume of queries over time, by city, regions, languages and so on....
  • Google Notebook Comes Next Week
    Announced today as part of Google Press Day is a new Google Notebook service to go live via Google Labs next week. The service will allow you to add notes to search results, which in turn can be saved into one or more notebooks. Notes you make about a site also will show up when you visit those sites, similar to how the A9 Your Diary feature works. Yahoo and Ask also offer the ability to add notes associated with search results....
  • New Google Desktop Beta Features Google Gadgets
    The Inside Google Desktop blog announced the release of a new version of Google Desktop. The new version's main feature are Google Gadgets, some of the many widgets include Weather Globe, Google Calendar and many more....

Other Things We Read, Didn't Blog But You Might Want To Read...

Posted by Danny Sullivan on May 11, 2006, 4:48 PM | Permalink


Daily SearchCast, May 11, 2006: Google Trends For Researching What's Hot & What's Not; Google Co-op, Google's Big Time Tagging Experiment; Complaints Over Commission Cuts & More!

Today's search podcast covers new Google products unveiled during yesterday's Press Day, including the hot research tool Google Trends, the "freaky weird" mass tagging system of Google Co-op, Google Gadgets for your desktop and a coming Google Notebook. Also a look at Google issues with a click fraud settlement, pushback on cutting commissions and more!

Tune-in by listening to this MP3 file, listening via WebmasterRadio at 11:30am Eastern and repeated at 2pm Eastern Tuesday through Friday, via our Odeo channel or through iTunes via this link (or use alternative iTunes instructions explained here) or though our Yahoo Podcasts channel. Need more help tuning in live or finding the chat room? See the Daily SearchCast FAQ.

Below are links to items discussed:

  • My Big Fat Google Press Day 2006 Round-Up
    We've blogged a number of items out of Google Press Day today. I wanted to recap them below, along with coverage from across the web that's beginning to flow in. I'll likely update this page over the next day, as well. New items will be posted below old stuff and flagged, or we'll do postscripts, to help those who keep checking back. Let's go!...
  • Google Trends: Peer Into Google's Database Of Searches
    Now live via Google Labs is a new Google Trends service, announced today as part of Google Press Day. The service allows you to tap into Google's database of searches, to determine what's popular. For example, do a trends query on cars, and you can see the volume of queries over time, by city, regions, languages and so on....
  • Fun With Google Trends
    Danny just posted about Google Trends, a service of Google that shows you search volume trends over time for a keyword or for multiple keywords. I thought it would be fun to ask Google Trends which search engine, of the top four, is the most popular, in terms of search volume. So I queries Google Trends for Google, Yahoo, Ask Jeeves, MSN (keep in mind ask jeeves is now ask.com). I also thought it would be fun to pin Apple vs. Windows vs. Linux. So let's see what Google Trends had to say......
  • Google Co-op: Add Your Own Vertical Search To Google
    Google said it would have a health-related announcement at today's Google Press Day -- but no, it's not Google Health. Instead, it's Google Co-op, a way for people to create specialized search engines by tapping into the main Google index or the option for searchers to pick preferred vertical search providers to show up in Google OneBox results. Yes, health information is one of the new features -- but this is more than Google Health. This is Google making a giant and somewhat perplexing leap into mass tagging....
  • Google Destination Guides: Not Much There -- Yet
    A part of Google Co-op, "Destination Guides" was promoted as ?Google City Guides? at Google Press Day today. And while everything about Co-op has been officially qualified as a ?work in progress,? this is something of a disappointment ?- as are many of the content areas and the general user-experience of Co-op. Danny has a more complete write up of Co-op here. Co-op is an ambitious project, not unlike Base, to create verticals, add structured and user-generated content and make the search experience more personalized. If you want to create your own "vertical search engine," which is one of the...
  • NetworkWorld Talks With Raul Valdes-Perez, CEO of Vivisimo & Clusty
    Gary Price points to a NetworkWorld.com interview with Vivisimo CEO Raul Valdes-Perez, of Clusty Search. Clusty uses clustering technology to provide results. The NetworkWorld author was convinced, during his interview with Mr. Perez, that Google/Yahoo/MSN provide "incomplete results." Is clustering the future of search? Give Clusty a try for yourself. Also, for past articles at Search Engine Watch on Clusty click here....
  • New Google Desktop Beta Features Google Gadgets
    The Inside Google Desktop blog announced the release of a new version of Google Desktop. The new version's main feature are Google Gadgets, some of the many widgets include Weather Globe, Google Calendar and many more....
  • Google Notebook Comes Next Week
    Announced today as part of Google Press Day is a new Google Notebook service to go live via Google Labs next week. The service will allow you to add notes to search results, which in turn can be saved into one or more notebooks. Notes you make about a site also will show up when you visit those sites, similar to how the A9 Your Diary feature works. Yahoo and Ask also offer the ability to add notes associated with search results....
  • New Google AdWords Traffic & Cost Estimator
    Google AdWords has finally launched a standalone tool where advertisers can get traffic and cost information for keywords without needing to login to their AdWords accounts to do so. Data included in the results are keywords/minimum bid, maximum CPC/predicted status, search volume, estimated average CPC, estimated ad positions, potential clicks per day and potential cost per day....
  • Advertiser Files Complaint To Block Google Click Fraud Settlement
    One Google advertiser is making a very formal rejection of the proposed Google click fraud settlement -- he's filed a complaint to try and block the agreement, and this before notifications from Google have even gone out....
  • Google Commission Woes In Sweden, Australia
    Over the past few months, Google's been trying to reduce or eliminate commission on its ad products in countries where they are offered (North America, notably, has never had them). Now there are some news reports that the plans aren't well received Down Under and in Sweden....
  • Online Ad Spending Continues to Grow
    During the Dot Com Boom, many companies planned their online revenue models around free services supported by advertising, and for many, this model didn't pan out because many traditional ad agencies - and their big brand, big spend clients - did not embrace the online advertising opportunities available at the time. However, a new article from CNET reports on the current status of online advertising, including how it has cycled back to a point where many new services are expected to be supported through online advertising and where big brands are a major part of the expected growth of online...
  • Google & Yahoo Are Challenged In Mobile Search Space
    A Wall Street Journal article reports that InfoSpace, amongst other startup search engines, are providing a challenge for Google & Yahoo in the mobile search space. I believe both Yahoo and Google are taking mobile search very seriously. The market is still extremely new and there is a lot of opportunity for startups to make key partnerships with the carriers....
  • Finding European Flights On The Move
    Stuck in a European airport and looking for a cheap flight while on the move? Skyscanner has got a new tool for you -- a mobile-friendly version of its site, Skyscanner Mobile....
  • Google Maps Marriage Proposal Or Not?
    Nathan Weinberg reports that someone has proposed to his girlfriend via Google Maps. If you take a look at the this roof top in Google Maps, you will notice it reads, "Will U Marry Me." But the true question is, was this meant for a fly over via plane or helicopter or was it meant to be a proposal via Google Maps?...

Posted by Danny Sullivan on May 11, 2006, 4:28 PM | Permalink


Semel To Microsoft: "You Have No Chance"

The Financial Times has an article with a quote from Yahoo's CEO, Terry Semel, saying "My impartial advice to Microsoft is that you have no chance." Ouch! Semel continues by stating that "the search business has been formed," in response to rumors that Yahoo and Microsoft were to partner or merge. Semel did say that he did discuss with Microsoft the possibility of Microsoft "co-owning some" of Yahoo's search. But Semel said that it would not be a wise move to sell "your right arm while keeping your left." Microsoft just does not seem to be getting much love these days. Jeff Javis also has some blogging of his talk here.

Postscript: The New Yorker posted the video of the interview here, I am listening to it now and towards the end, is the quote. You have to listen to the way he said it, it is very cool. "My impartial advice to Microsoft is that you have no chance," said the CEO of Yahoo, Terry Semel.

Posted by Barry Schwartz on May 11, 2006, 4:23 PM | Permalink


And We're Back....

Sorry if you were trying to reach Search Engine Watch earlier and couldn't connect. All of the Jupitermedia-hosted sites (they still host us, though we are now owned by Incisive) went down. Nope, I don't know why yet. I'll postscript later if I have a chance.

Posted by Danny Sullivan on May 11, 2006, 3:54 PM | Permalink


Google Co-op's Subscribed Links In Action

I had one of my developers at my company work on a dynamic implementation of the Google Coop Subscribed Links product for my site, the Search Engine Roundtable. I wanted to keep it simple, so I had him design it so that when someone searched on a keyword phrase that matched any of the keywords in my category archives, it would show a "Subscribed Link" in the SERPs. To see it working yourself, you will need to subscribe to my Subscribed Link and then search on specific keyword phrases.

Step 1: Go to my profile page
Step 2: Click the subscribe button.
Step 3: If you are not logged in to your Google Account
Step 4: Confirm your subscription
Step 5: Search at Google on Google AdSense or Search Technology or any of the titles in my category archives.

You will then notice the results that appear are listed as:
[QUERY] at Search Engine Roundtable
[Entry One In Category Queried]
[Entry Two In Category Queried]
[Entry Three In Category Queried]
[URL of Category]

So currently, for the Search Technology search you would see:
google-coop-dynamic.gif

If you do not want to subscribe to this by going through the steps above, you can also preview the results by clicking here.

Philipp Lenssen has a good how to implement the Google Coop also.

Posted by Barry Schwartz on May 11, 2006, 3:29 PM | Permalink


"Online Seller Advantage Program" Taps Yahoo for Buyer, Seller Data

Prudential Real Estate is offering a new program as part of its existing marketing relationship with Yahoo Real Estate called the "Online Seller Advantage program" (OSA). It"s designed to let sellers" agents convey market information to their clients ("real-time updates") via email. Sellers will be able to receive a range of consumer-related and competitive market data.

Those data include the following:

  • How often their property showed up on research results
  • How often their property was viewed in detailed format
  • How many viewers have saved their property in their portfolio
  • New listings and photos in the seller's immediate neighborhood
  • Price changes of homes in the seller's immediate neighborhood
  • Status changes (sold, pending, price reductions) of competitive properties in the seller's local area

From a buyer perspective, homes for sale will be equipped with a branded 'sign rider' featuring a unique ID number. Buyers can plug that number into Yahoo search and immediately be taken to details about the specific property. This is the most interesting aspect of the announcement from my point of view because it helps connect the online and offline worlds in a very direct way. It's not clear from the available information whether there's a mobile dimension to this, although presumably the information could equally be obtained through a browser on a mobile phone.

Interestingly, the seller tools and data seem to be about enabling agents to manage expectations in a cooling marketplace. As evidence, here's a quote from the press release:

"This is a time when pricing a home right can really make a difference," said Aaron Lewis, a sales professional with Prudential California Realty in Turlock, Calif. "But sometimes, the sellers' perspective of their property's value is different from what the market will bear. The OSA emails they receive daily provide hard evidence to support my recommendations on staying competitive. The OSA keeps my sellers realistic, which helps me help them."

The OSA is going to be available in 47 states and Washington, D.C. The missing three are Arkansas, South Dakota and West Virginia. But the program will be expanded in the near term to encompass those states as well.

Here's a commercial (via YouTube) for Yahoo and Prudential's marketing partnership, though not specifically this offering.

Other sites, such as Zillow offer valuation information and other market data.

The percent of U.S. homebuyers using the Internet as part of their housing search process went from roughly 2% in 1995 to 77% in 2005 according to the National Association of Realtors. The Internet is now the number one consumer resource in the home-buying process.

Posted by Greg Sterling on May 11, 2006, 12:20 PM | Permalink


A Closer Look at Behavioral Advertising

Behavioral advertising is getting a lot of buzz lately, particularly as rumors of behaviorally targeted search advertising programs gain more traction. While none of the major search engines currently offer behavioral targeting, all are almost certainly developing programs that will likely be rolled out within the next year or two. But there are several other advertising networks that offer behavioral targeting today. Want to know more? Read on for Jennifer Slegg's overview of behaviorally targeted ads in today's SearchDay article, What's the Buzz Behind Behavioral Advertising?.

Posted by Chris Sherman on May 11, 2006, 11:52 AM | Permalink


Google Maps Marriage Proposal Or Not?

Nathan Weinberg reports that someone has proposed to his girlfriend via Google Maps. If you take a look at the this roof top in Google Maps, you will notice it reads, "Will U Marry Me." But the true question is, was this meant for a fly over via plane or helicopter or was it meant to be a proposal via Google Maps?

If the later, then, possibly, this guy topped my wedding proposal.

Posted by Barry Schwartz on May 11, 2006, 9:23 AM | Permalink


Google & Yahoo Are Challenged In Mobile Search Space

A Wall Street Journal article reports that InfoSpace, amongst other startup search engines, are providing a challenge for Google & Yahoo in the mobile search space. I believe both Yahoo and Google are taking mobile search very seriously. The market is still extremely new and there is a lot of opportunity for startups to make key partnerships with the carriers.

Posted by Barry Schwartz on May 11, 2006, 9:10 AM | Permalink


NetworkWorld Talks With Raul Valdes-Perez, CEO of Vivisimo & Clusty

Gary Price points to a NetworkWorld.com interview with Vivisimo CEO Raul Valdes-Perez, of Clusty Search. Clusty uses clustering technology to provide results. The NetworkWorld author was convinced, during his interview with Mr. Perez, that Google/Yahoo/MSN provide "incomplete results." Is clustering the future of search? Give Clusty a try for yourself. Also, for past articles at Search Engine Watch on Clusty click here.

Posted by Barry Schwartz on May 11, 2006, 8:49 AM | Permalink


Google Commission Woes In Sweden, Australia

Over the past few months, Google's been trying to reduce or eliminate commission on its ad products in countries where they are offered (North America, notably, has never had them). Now there are some news reports that the plans aren't well received Down Under and in Sweden.

Sveriges Annonsörer och Mediebyråer manar till Google-bojkott from Dagens Media covers briefly what Mikkel deMib Svendsen tells me is a recount of Sweden's major media organization calling for a boycott of AdWords through the end of the year, because of changes to commissions.

Despite the call for boycott, Sveriges Mediebyråers vd kritisk till Google-event seems to cover how some major ad agencies still have no problems buying and boozing it up at a recent Google event. I say "seems" since my Swedish is limited to "thank you" and some of the numbers up to ten. Systran helped, but the translations were still pretty poor.

The changes in Sweden are part of a move Google announced last year September in Europe. Some UK agencies have pushed back, but by and large, it seems the commission change hasn't seriously hurt the company, unless that fourth quarter drop was more related to upset advertising agencies than the long UK holiday period that got some of the blame. I also keep hearing whispered rumors that some ad agencies have deals excluding them from the cutbacks. Just rumors, nothing confirmed.

What's good for Europe is good for Australia. That seems to be the Google thinking. Google to rewrite rules for media buyers: no more commissions from the Sydney Morning Herald covers how Google will end 10 percent commission paid there as of August 1. Not everyone is upset, however, as the article covers.

And what's good for Europe and Australia isn't good for China. I covered earlier the irony of how Google is trying to disentangle itself from commissions in some countries where they were offered to gain a foothold, only to do the same to gain ground in China. Then again, despite commissions, we've also blogged how not all the SEM firms in China seem to feel happy: Chinese SEMs Accuse Google & Baidu Of Stealing Clients.

By the way, it's not just Google doing the commission pushback thing. Yahoo to Reduces U.K. Agency Search Ad Commissions from last month covers Yahoo also making similar moves.

Posted by Danny Sullivan on May 11, 2006, 8:31 AM | Permalink


Finding European Flights On The Move

Stuck in a European airport and looking for a cheap flight while on the move? Skyscanner has got a new tool for you -- a mobile-friendly version of its site, Skyscanner Mobile.

Posted by Danny Sullivan on May 11, 2006, 7:52 AM | Permalink


New Google AdWords Traffic & Cost Estimator

Google AdWords has finally launched a standalone tool where advertisers can get traffic and cost information for keywords without needing to login to their AdWords accounts to do so. Data included in the results are keywords/minimum bid, maximum CPC/predicted status, search volume, estimated average CPC, estimated ad positions, potential clicks per day and potential cost per day.

This is a nice answer to some of the various tools available that estimate cost per click and traffic on PPC keywords. I am sure this tool will also get some mileage by Google AdSense publishers wanting to check out the cost per click for the keywords they are attempting to target their webpages to.

Do keep in mind that account history and settings will not be taken into account while using this tool, however it is a great way to quickly check on keywords without needing to login.

Posted by Jennifer Slegg on May 11, 2006, 7:23 AM | Permalink


Advertiser Files Complaint To Block Google Click Fraud Settlement

One Google advertiser is making a very formal rejection of the proposed Google click fraud settlement -- he's filed a complaint to try and block the agreement, and this before notifications from Google have even gone out.

Let's go back, then forward. It was announced last March, given preliminary approval by the judge in April, and now Google is supposed to notify advertisers about the settlement by May 20. To date, I've not seen or heard anything about notices going out.

Last week, I wrote in Advertisers To Get Notices From Google In Click Fraud Settlement Later This Month more about how advertisers will need to opt-out of the settlement, if they don't like it -- and how at least one was against it.

Ex-Google Advertiser Sues Over Settlement from the Associated Press today covers how a different advertiser is also against it, to the point of having filed a formal complaint asking that the case be blocked.

For its part, Google issued a statement saying the complaint is may be motivated "more by the quest for attorney fees." Of course, the same could be said about the case being settled for what many feel is a cheap price, $90 million -- 1/3 of which will go to attorney fees.

Want to know more about the proposed deal? The agreement is here (PDF), and the order giving preliminary agreement is here.

Meanwhile, the law firm pushing for advertisers to stay out sent this release to me today:

DON'T FEAR GOOGLE, SAY CLICK FRAUD ATTORNEYS; ADVERTISERS HAVE ONLY DAYS TO OPT OUT OF CLICK FRAUD CLASS ACTION SETTLEMENT

LOS ANGELES, CALIF.--Advertisers have only days to opt out of a click fraud settlement agreement negotiated between Google and attorneys representing Google advertisers (Lane?s Gifts and Collectibles LLC, et al., v. Yahoo! Inc., et al.). Of the $90 million proposed settlement, $30 million will go to plaintiffs' attorneys. Only a fraction of the remaining $60 million will be distributed to Google advertisers, says Dylan Pollard, a Los Angeles-based plaintiffs' click fraud attorney, giving advertisers less than a penny for every $100 they can prove is lost through future click fraud abuses while advertising with Google.

"Advertisers must decide: take the pennies offered by Google and be happy with the status quo or opt out and pursue legal restitution through a lawsuit," says Pollard. "Either way, they don't have much time to decide."

Pollard and attorney Shawn Khorrami have created a website, http://www.clickfraud-legal-center.com/ that includes a sample opt out letter for advertisers.

"Advertisers could very well decide to absorb their losses and hope Google cleans up its act. Google is so powerful, advertisers may be afraid to challenge the company," explains Khorrami. "But if advertisers want to try to get their lost dollars back, the current settlement proposal isn't for them; previous losses are not addressed in the settlement. To try to obtain compensation from past click fraud abuse with Google, advertisers need to be pro-active. To start the process, they must opt out of the proposed settlement."

For further information on the Google settlement and advertiser options, advertisers can go to http://www.clickfraud-legal-center.com/ or call 866-546-7266

Keep in mind that you don't have to opt-out through this site. In fact, it's difficult to opt-out when Google doesn't appear to have even sent settlement notifications yet. I'm checking on the situation with that and will postscript.

Posted by Danny Sullivan on May 11, 2006, 7:11 AM | Permalink


Online Ad Spending Continues to Grow

During the Dot Com Boom, many companies planned their online revenue models around free services supported by advertising, and for many, this model didn't pan out because many traditional ad agencies - and their big brand, big spend clients - did not embrace the online advertising opportunities available at the time. However, a new article from CNET reports on the current status of online advertising, including how it has cycled back to a point where many new services are expected to be supported through online advertising and where big brands are a major part of the expected growth of online ad revenue.

Other points in the article include that online advertising growth is expected to continue, with online ad spend increasing 24.4% this year. By 2010, US online ad spending is expected to grow to $23.5 billion while worldwide online ad spend will grow to $55+ billion. And search advertising continues to play a major role, currently 40% of the US online ad spend. By 2010, search advertising is expected to be worth $7.5 billion, up from $4.2 billion in 2005.

The article can be viewed here.

Postscript: The Wall Street Journal has an article today about big brands advertising online in Brand Marketers Return to the Web,
Driving New Growth in Display Ads

Posted by Jennifer Slegg on May 11, 2006, 6:50 AM | Permalink


Google Destination Guides: Not Much There -- Yet

A part of Google Co-op, "Destination Guides" was promoted as “Google City Guides” at Google Press Day today. And while everything about Co-op has been officially qualified as a “work in progress,” this is something of a disappointment –- as are many of the content areas and the general user-experience of Co-op.

Danny has a more complete write up of Co-op here. Co-op is an ambitious project, not unlike Base, to create verticals, add structured and user-generated content and make the search experience more personalized. If you want to create your own "vertical search engine," which is one of the aims of this project, it’s also somewhat confusing.

The concept is cool, the experience not – yet.

Google?s ?Destination Guides? aren?t really city guides, in my opinion, they?re travel-related information. Right now, there?s not much of a there there. They?re really quite weak compared to, for example, Citysearch, Yelp, AOL City Guides or many of the well-known travel sites.

I?m going to New York later this month so I plugged in "New York."

What you get are a number of standardized categories that allow for subsequent query refinements: i.e., ?Suggested Itineraries,? ?Sightseeing,? ?Dining Guides,? ?Lodging Guides,? ?Museums? among a number of others.

Here are the results for Lodging Guides. They aren?t very satisfying. I can?t compare prices on hotels or see recommended hotels; I still have to click on more links to get to hotel verticals, travel aggregators, etc. It?s not really all that helpful. Yahoo?s travel metasearch site FareChase or its community travel site Trip Planner produce much more useful results at this point, as do sites like Openlist or TripAdvisor.

Once more content partners become involved and more community content becomes available the Destination Guide experience should improve. That might equally be said of Co-op in its entirety.

As Google's Marissa Mayer said today, ?Innovation not perfection.?

Posted by Greg Sterling on May 11, 2006, 2:48 AM | Permalink


My Big Fat Google Press Day 2006 Round-Up

We've blogged a number of items out of Google Press Day today. I wanted to recap them below, along with coverage from across the web that's beginning to flow in. I'll likely update this page over the next day, as well. New items will be posted below old stuff and flagged, or we'll do postscripts, to help those who keep checking back. Let's go!

The Products

Google unveiled four major new products: Google Trends, Google Co-op, Google Gadgets (& Desktop Upgrade) plus Google Notebook (which goes live next week). Here's our coverage on the products:

Here are some other reviews of the products:

Live Coverage

You can watch the event yourself here, via a webcast. It will likely be later added to Google Video here. You can also compare it to last year's Google Press Day, which was called the Google Factory Tour. Video of that is here. As with last year, I felt the best part was the long Q&A at the end with Google's cofounders Sergey Brin, Larry Page and Google CEO Eric Schmidt.

Rather read what happened? We've got all the slides here. Even better, a number of bloggers did live written coverage of the event:

  • Matt Cutts: Matt takes the morning off from work at Google and instead does an excellent job blogging the happenings, along with his own thoughts on some of the issues raised. That's 20 percent time well spent.
     
  • Philipp Lenssen: Over at Google Blogoscoped, Philipp's got good rundown.
     
  • InsideGoogle: The plus is good coverage. The negative is that it is in seven different parts, and you can't go from one to the next. Here they are: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6 & 7.

From Google

Post Coverage

  • Google wireless network goes down during Press Day, News.com: The reporters weren't happy.
     
  • Google introduces raft of new software, Reuters: General short recap, highlights boxers versus briefs debate using Google Trends (I prefer boxer briefs, myself!)
     
  • Schmidt says Google's focus on search will trump rivals, News.com: Highlights statements from Schmidt at the beginning of the event, that it's "obvious" things will get more competitive but the competition is healthy (I agree); that none of Google's competitors are "emphasizing" search (I disagree -- but certainly Google has made a point of highlighting its own search efforts with this latest press day). Also highlights that search is "at the beginning," making it seems like Google has borrowed from the Microsoft songbook (though both are correct that search is still very much a baby).
     
  • Google Press Day: Page: Advertising On Google News Not High On the List; paidContent: Covers Page saying there's no rush to make money off of Google News with ads, one of the few places Google's yet to stick them.
     

  • Google has its eye on Vista search, News.com: Google execs say in general, they don't pay too much attention to what Microsoft is doing, though they don't like the whole browser thing, of course. Plus, comments on what shares they sold and how this happens in prearranged sales. Brin's sold 20 percent and expect to keep the vast majority "forever." Not hard when the little you've sold makes you a billionaire :)
     

  • Google Turns on the Charm, The Street: Highlights Schmidt downplaying that there has to be a winner and loser in the search wars (yep, as I've said, think broadcast networks), plus how Google says it's trying to be more open.
     

  • Google rolls out more products in high-tech battle, AP: General recap, highlights quotes from Schmidt about making a "heavy, heavy" investment in new search algorithms.
     

  • Google gets back to its search roots, USA Today: Highlights the Google emphasis on search, plus a general recap.
     

  • My Take On Google?s Press Day, ComparisonEngines: Brian emphasizes the focus on search, search search and mobile.
     
  • Google's Multimedia Ambitions, ClickZ: Highlights comments about Google testing video and mobile ads, among other things -- and how TV isn't seen to have advanced since going to color in 1960.
     
  • Google going vertical, Marketwatch: Nice look at how Google sees Google Co-op bringing in the human element to do what technology doesn't work well at. Except I'm not buying it, sorry -- not so far in the way it has been rolled out. There are easier way to build verticals and crawler-technology actually is one of the best ways to get at the long tail of queries. That's why crawlers surpassed directories, which were better at getting the best on broad topics. And Google Co-op does nothing to address the good broad issue.

     

Posted by Danny Sullivan on May 10, 2006, 8:51 PM | Permalink


Google Co-op: Add Your Own Vertical Search To Google

Google said it would have a health-related announcement at today's Google Press Day -- but no, it's not Google Health. Instead, it's Google Co-op, a way for people to create specialized search engines by tapping into the main Google index or the option for searchers to pick preferred vertical search providers to show up in Google OneBox results. Yes, health information is one of the new features -- but this is more than Google Health. This is Google making a giant and somewhat perplexing leap into mass tagging.

Subscribed Links

Let's start in with the specialty or vertical search providers, what Google calls subscribed links. Many are probably familiar with how for some queries, Google will show what it calls a OneBox result at the top of the "regular" results. For example, a search on san francisco hotels brings up a section like this at the top of the page

Local results for hotels near San Francisco, CA
San Francisco Marriott - 1.0 miles NE - 55 4th St, San Francisco, 94103 - (415) 896-1600
Hyatt Hotels & Resorts: Park Hyatt San Francisco - 1.7 miles NE - 333 Battery St, San Francisco, 94111 - (415) 392-1234
Hyatt Hotels & Resorts: Hyatt at Fisherman's Wharf - 2.2 miles N - 555 N Point St, San Francisco, 94133 - (415) 563-1234

Those results are powered by one of Google's own vertical search engine, Google Maps (formerly Google Local). The new subscribed links service lets people choose other non-Google vertical search engines to show at the top of the page, if they want to.

It's a very cool idea. For example, say you are regularly searching for information about search engines and would like to know if Search Engine Watch specifically has any matching info along with searching the entire web for that topic. If we get our act together (and we'll try soon), you could make us one of your subscribed links. Then the next time you search for something where we have content, you might see our matches right at the top of Google.

Where do you find providers? Google's got a currently very small directory of them here to choose from. Preferred partners are already listed, partners that Google thinks people will be especially interested in, not those who have paid. No money is exchanging hands in either direction to be a subscribed link provider, Google says.

Digg is the only news provider listed at the moment. I subscribed to see how it works. Not too well. Perhaps not at all. Searches for Google, Playstation, Nintendo -- all topics on Digg right now -- brought nothing up. Hmm. I tried subscribing to People. Searches on Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie gave me nothing.

Frankly, I don't think the system is working right just yet, as I'll get to further below. I also have a note out to Google about this. In the meantime, let's just pretend it's working. How do we at Search Engine Watch or anyone else get to be in that directory or a subscribed link partner in general.

Here's the guide that allows anyone to get started. I had to laugh at the intro:

The API was designed to be as easy to use as possible, and requires only basic XML skills. This guide will show you how to create subscribed links, with plenty of examples along the way.

I laughed because in short order, I was lost! Barry Schwartz, who is a programmer, still felt lost himself and said he'd through it at "one of his XML guys" tomorrow. In contrast, making a Google Toolbar Button is a heck of a lot easier. I sure wish making subscribed links were, because they are potentially going to be an important new way for people to ensure they are getting traffic from Google.

Anyone can make a subscribed link to offer on via their own site (though the developer guide doesn't go into details about this, such as how to place it). Naturally, what you really want is to be in the directory that Google itself offers. Again, the developer guide doesn't cover this. But this appears to be the submission page.

As for who gets in, Google told me that those included and featured in the directory will be based on user uptake. Get a lot of people subscribing to your results, and you'll more likely be featured to users.

Two last things on Subscribed Links:

First, another OneBox! Just how much can Google shove above the "regular" results. Google tells me that they are currently trying not to show more than two of their own -- so potentially, you might be looking at three in all on the page. You'll never see more than on Subscribed Links OneBoxes, and these will come before Google's own.

Second, if the entire idea feels familiar, you might be recalling Yahoo Subscriptions. That launched last June and is explained more in our Yahoo Search Subscriptions Brings Premium Content Into Web Search article.

I've no idea how popular the service is, but I'm guessing not much, given that most people seem never to have heard of it. Unlike the Google system, the number of partners is very small and there's no API allowing anyone to jump in. Instead, you've got to go the contact form route. I suspect Google's system will be far more popular, since it should have a much wider range of providers.

Labels, Google Health & Vertical Search

A second part of Google Co-op is the ability to allow people to label URLs into different topic areas. You mean tagging! Google still prefers the term label, while I'm still a hold out for saying categories. But whatever the name, it's not like the idea of tagging you might be used to at other places. This is industrial-strength tagging.

For example, with Yahoo My Web 2.0, I can tag any page with any words I prefer. The system is really designed for me to tag on a one-by-one basis. If I do a search, see something I like, I can click the Save button, add a tag, some notes and have that individual page stored for easy recall.

Yes, I can import many pages and assign them all tags en masse. But that doesn't seem to be the case for most people. The system currently has only 1.1 million pages tagged, hardly double the amount I recall it having not long after launching last year. If there were massive tagging imports, I'd expect the number to be higher.

In contrast, Google's label system is initially designed as a more mass tagging system for those who want to create vertical search engines. Google's now rolled out a number of these:

Let's dive into the health area. Sure, call it Google Health if you want -- though Google says a more full-fledged Google Health is coming and definitely doesn't call this Google Health itself. Whatever you all it, this health thing lets you search against pages that have been labeled with the help of contributors such as the Mayo Clinic or the Harvard Medical School as being health-specific.

Ideally, it means that I should be able to do a search and get back only stuff related to health issues. Here's an example. Say I search for cold on regular Google. The first link is for the musical band Cold, and the third link is for Cold Stone Creamery. That's great place for ice cream, but the only health connection is that it might make you fat! Midway down, Macromedia shows up because of its ColdFusion product, then there are two links on the Cold War followed by two links on Cold Mountain.

For regular Google, this variety is fine. Who knows what you want when you search for the word cold? It could be any number of things. But for a health search, you want to get rid of all that junk. Google Health's labels ideally should do this. But go there, then search and what happens? Pretty much nothing. The off-topic stuff I mentioned is still there!

I suspect there's a bug in the system right now. Google Co-op didn't go live when announced, and then it slowly came up. I'll check on this, and the better test will be in a day or so, especially when some of these new topical areas are pitted against existing verticals in various areas. But conceptually, hopefully you'll understand what's happening. In each of the topic areas above, either contributors have helped label content or Google's worked behind-the-scenes to get some of these going.

Keep in mind that for any top level label/topic/category, there are also sublabels/subtopics/subcategories. So for health, you'll see further narrowing options such as:

  • Symptoms
  • Treatment
  • Drug Uses
  • Support Groups

What about for the more individual user that wants to label? Good luck. Here are a bunch of instructions. They make my head spin. Maybe it will spin less when I read it many more times. But compared to tagging elsewhere, it's a nightmare.

Heck, it's a nightmare compared to trying to make a vertical search engine period versus a place like Rollyo. Want to make a health vertical search engine there? Give it up to 25 web sites and you're done.

Google told me it does want to make the process easier for anyone to take part, so hang in there, if the programming stuff makes you feel excluded as it does me.

The downside to Rollyo, compared to what Google's doing, is that you won't have all the refinement and subcategories. But I find it difficult to understand how well these will work, anyway. There's no controlled vocabulary for new people coming in. Moreover, it seems like some of these refinements could be done through clustering. My Yahoo My Web Tagging & Why (So Far) It Sucks article goes into some depth about these types of issues from when Yahoo rolled out My Web 2.0. They seem just as applicable to the new Google label system.

When Yahoo launched My Web 2.0, my gut felt like we were making a big step backwards, using humans to do stuff where technology actually could work. I wrote similar things when Google Base went up, pushing people into tagging content when it might not be necessary.

Don't get me wrong. I want humans involved in the search process. If anything, I've also written about how the growth of crawlers and automation has pushed human help sadly -- and perhaps harmfully to relevance -- to the side.

Certainly it's a big positive that Google's letting humans more in the door this way -- a huge jump for the service that has pretty much looked to technology to solve everything, as it acknowledges.

"We've never given our users this much control and access into our system," said Marissa Mayer, Google's vice president of search products & user experience. "We have an advantage with machines and how we crawl, but if we can turn our users into a network, that will yield better results."

Still, I think the idea of humans sharing and swapping what they like such as with Yahoo My Web or via the recent change with Google Reader might be the better way to go rather than manually tagging up millions of pages of content. But we'll see how it goes. As for the idea of subscribed links -- I've got a big thumbs-up for that part of Google Co-op.

Postscript: Google Blogoscoped has a nice guide to how Google Co-op also works for publishers, though most of the examples shown are more static than dynamic data draws.

Posted by Danny Sullivan on May 10, 2006, 7:12 PM | Permalink


Just What You Always Wanted: a Mobile In-Game Ad Network

A mobile in-game advertising network called AdWRAP has launched... with an addressable audience of approximately five unique users.

Actually, the potential reach is a million or so, at least according to Greystripe, which operates the network. Go figure.

Game types include sports, casino, action, puzzles and strategy from publisher partners Cellufun, Bogee Interactive, Big Blue Bubble and numerous others. Zagat Survey, Modtones, and SpeeDee Oil & Tune-Up are among the launch advertisers. Gaming media agency Engage In-Game Advertising has also signed on as a partner.

Posted by Zachary Rodgers on May 10, 2006, 4:21 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)


Fun With Google Trends

Danny just posted about Google Trends, a service of Google that shows you search volume trends over time for a keyword or for multiple keywords. I thought it would be fun to ask Google Trends which search engine, of the top four, is the most popular, in terms of search volume. So I queries Google Trends for Google, Yahoo, Ask Jeeves, MSN (keep in mind ask jeeves is now ask.com). I also thought it would be fun to pin Apple vs. Windows vs. Linux. So let's see what Google Trends had to say...

Battle of the Search Engines:
Search Volume:
What is very interesting to note, is that Yahoo was queried more often at Google Search than Google. Which makes sense, who in their right minds would search on the keyword "Google" at Google? Um, well, I have seen people do it, trust me. So what is really interesting is that people are actually searching on "Google" at Google. While all search engines seem to have an upward slop, in search volume, Ask Jeeves seems to have a downwards slop. So let's trend Ask.com on the list as well, and you will notice that the Ask.com search volume bar hits above the Ask Jeeves search volume bar as soon as Ask Jeeves begins to slope downwards. So based on Google Trends, the most popular search engines, in order of search volume are Yahoo, Google, MSN and Ask (as of April 2006).
News Volume:
But when you look at Google News search volume things change slightly. Yes, someone at Google News is more likely to search on the the keyword "Google" because the search is totally different in nature. I am not looking to find Google.com at Google News, I am looking to find news items on Google at Google News. So, as you would expect "Google" is has the highest news search volume. Yahoo, MSN and then Ask follow Google.
Digging Deeper:
What happens when you look at it by city, region or languages, does that change the results? Well, yes! We know Australians are found of Google and Google Trends shows us that Australians are more fond of MSN than Google, but more fond of Google than Yahoo or Ask based on search volume. In India, searchers love Yahoo more than anyone else. From Chile or Turkey, well you gotta have MSN as your favorite search engine. Poor Ask never wins the game but they do pretty well in the United Kingdom. You can also play with cities and languages to see how that makes a difference...

Battle of the Operating Systems:
Search Volume:
For those that know me, I am an Apple fan - using one right now to write this. Unfortunately, not everyone is like me, well the majority of people are not like me. Search volume on "windows" is way more popular than Apple (and Apple also stands for a fruit!) Guess what, Linux is also more popular than Apple!
News Volume:
But when it comes to news search volume, Apple has its spikes. For one, Apple is always more searched on than Linux for news search. But there are times where Apple jumps ahead on news search to surpass Windows.
Digging Deeper:
So what does this mean? Well, obviously, people are more likely to have bugs with Windows OS and Linux OS when compared to Apple. Duh! People are searching for solutions at Google for their problems. Just kidding. The region, language and city breakdown don't really show too much more on this particular query.

You see, this tool can be used for educational purposes, commercial purposes and can also be used for fun.

Posted by Barry Schwartz on May 10, 2006, 3:36 PM | Permalink


Two Edgy Video Plays from Bravo

Bravo has announced two broadband video channels with a bite.

The bigger deal of the two seems to be OUTzoneTV.com, a broadband play for the gay/lesbian audience that'll launch in June.

Named after a well-known programming block on the TRIO cable network, the site is a a joint venture of NBC Universal's Bravo and sales/promotional partner PlanetOut. In addition to a full brunch buffet of Bravo and non-Bravo video content ranging from "Queer Eye" episodes to men's bikini fashion show segments, OUTzoneTV.com will have blogs, a news feed, a "Gay of the Day" photo and message boards, among other features.

Also, Bravo will push its "Brilliant But Cancelled" ode to decommissioned shows online. BrilliantButCancelled.com will host a number of programs that were either cancelled shortly after the pilot aired or never aired at all. Billed as "too smart, too edgy or too hip for TV," the site is aimed at the same audience of TV-philes AOL's going after with In2TV.

Posted by Zachary Rodgers on May 10, 2006, 3:32 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)


Google Health? Part Of Google Coop: New Vertical Search Tool

Google said it would have a health-related announcement at today's Google Press Day -- but no, it's not Google Health. Instead, it's Google Coop, a way for people to create specialized search filters within the Google database (including for health information) plus the option for searchers to pick preferred vertical search providers to show up in Google OneBox results. Info is to be going up soon here. I'll be updating this post shortly.

Postscript: Please see the fresh, long story I've now posted, Google Co-op: Add Your Own Vertical Search To Google.

Posted by Danny Sullivan on May 10, 2006, 3:27 PM | Permalink


Google Trends: Peer Into Google's Database Of Searches

Now live via Google Labs is a new Google Trends service, announced today as part of Google Press Day. The service allows you to tap into Google's database of searches, to determine what's popular. For example, do a trends query on cars, and you can see the volume of queries over time, by city, regions, languages and so on.

Let's take a single search first and go through the motions. A query on ipod gives a chart going back through January 2004, which is as far back as Google Trends data goes. You can see spikes in searches, and these are often labeled with letters that lead to related news items. Google says it is using similar technology to do this as it does with company price charts in Google Finance.

Below the chart, you get some geographical and regional data. For example, you'll see most iPod searches are happening in New York, then in Irvine, then San Francisco, London and so on. That's the city data. Next is a Regional option, which gives you a breakdown by country (iPod searches are big in the UK then the US and Australia). Finally, you can narrow by language (Most searches for iPod are done in English, then Japanese).

Want to narrow in? You can do a variety of things. Using the drop down boxes, you can pick a particular month, such as last month. You can also pick a particular region, like last month just in the United States.

You aren't limited to single words. Enter multiple words by commas to do comparisons, such as google,yahoo,microsoft. That query shows you each term in a different color, and you can then see all the breakdowns for each word, as well. You can do up to five words in total. Want to do multiword queries? There's ways to do that -- check out the help page for more.

Sometimes when you do a search, you'll get something like this message:

Your terms - larry page - do not have enough search volume to show graphs.

What's happening here is that Google's working to help protect search privacy. There's a slight chance someone might enter something like their own name along with something embarrassing or private. Potentially, Google Trends could reveal this information.

My Private Searches Versus Personally Identifiable Searches article explains this issue more, and it's something Google used successfully to argue against handing over query data to the US Department Of Justice. Given this, it needed to put some protections into place. That mechanism is to only show data about queries that happen often.

"Something has to be in the hundreds of times per week for you to see trends," said Marissa Mayer, Google's vice president of search products & user experience, about the service. This is also touched on in the help page on the Google Trends site.

Some things to keep in mind. For example, Mayer cited to me a yankees,red socks comparison. Searches for Yankees are well above the Red Socks, so they must be more popular! Well, it's also a case that there are more people in New York than Boston, so there are more people potentially searching for the Yankees.

(Postscript: So I'm an idiot -- it's Red Sox, of course. And yankees,red sox for 2006 shows Red Sox actually much closer to Yankees. So cop-out time, the point in general remains valid. There are things that can skew the stats in ways you might not expect. For example, if you search for a particular company and you see growth in their name, are they more popular? In 2005, you might think so for Kryptonite. But go broader, you'll see a spike in 2004 associated with the Kryptonite locks-can-be-picked-by-ballpoint-pin-fiasco. That incident might have helped fuel some of the rise in following year -- searches that aren't necessarily reflecting a popular view of the company).

Another caveat. The geographic data is based on IP targeting, which isn't perfect. In particular, people who use AOL are often seen as if they are in Virginia, regardless of their true location.

How about query spam? Google's got a system designed to help filter for this, either if intentionally done or accidentally. For example, if it sees many queries all coming from the same IP address, that might be caught. Similarly, if it sees many queries coming from different cookies, it could be caused by the same person who rejects standing cookies. Each search would generate a new cookie, so potentially the same single person might be seen as different individuals.

"We are savvy to that case and make sure we saw queries from 100 different unique cookies that aren't fresh," she said.

Also, the data isn't filtered or consolidated in the way things happen in Google Zeitgeist or other search data mining tools. In other words, car brings back different results than cars. And if you want to see the dark underbelly of search, you can see in sex,ipod that if Apple sold a sexPod, it would leave iPod in the dust. You can also search for explicit adult terms, should you have the hankering.

Finally, Google rightly warns that this is more a play thing that something you can use for definitive predictions of popularity.

For a different spin on Google Trends, check out Barry's post, Fun With Google Trends. Now that we've warned you not to take the data too seriously, time for some comparisons anyway :)

Posted by Danny Sullivan on May 10, 2006, 3:26 PM | Permalink


Google Notebook Comes Next Week

Announced today as part of Google Press Day is a new Google Notebook service to go live via Google Labs next week. The service will allow you to add notes to search results, which in turn can be saved into one or more notebooks. Notes you make about a site also will show up when you visit those sites, similar to how the A9 Your Diary feature works. Yahoo and Ask also offer the ability to add notes associated with search results.

Posted by Danny Sullivan on May 10, 2006, 3:22 PM | Permalink


New Google Desktop Beta Features Google Gadgets

The Inside Google Desktop blog announced the release of a new version of Google Desktop. The new version's main feature are Google Gadgets, some of the many widgets include Weather Globe, Google Calendar and many more.

Developers can also build Google Gadgets themselves, more information on that at SDK Overview section. Let's not forget that Yahoo bought Konfabulator and renamed it to Yahoo Widgets, plus I never use Apple's widgets (i.e. Dashboard).

Postscript From Danny: A few more points not covered in the Google blog post which are covered as part of Google Press Day presentations:

  • It's supposed to automatically suggest gadgets to try based on your web history. Go to a lot of movie sites? Then it might suggest movie-related gadgets, for instance.
     
  • The new Google Desktop will sync settings across computers, if you sign in through a Google Account. It will remember your to do lists, gadget preferences and other things regardless of where you are.
     

Posted by Barry Schwartz on May 10, 2006, 2:47 PM | Permalink


Search Headlines & Links: May 10, 2006

Below, a recap of stories posted today to the Search Engine Watch Blog, along with other items we've spotted but not blogged separately:

Today From The SEW Blog...

  • Daily SearchCast, May 10, 2006: Yahoo Livesearch: Answers Before You Finish Typing!; Yahoo & Google Seek IE7 Users; Will It Be Google Rather Than Vegemite Sandwich? & More!
    Today's search podcast covers Yahoo's new Livesearch feature, which gives you results before you even finish typing in a query; Yahoo & Telemundo merge web sites; Yahoo and Google try to woo IE7 users; will Google be more popular than Vegemite Down Under? and more! Tune-in by listening to this MP3 file, listening via WebmasterRadio at 11:30am Eastern and repeated at 2pm Eastern Tuesday through Friday, via our Odeo channel or through iTunes via this link (or use alternative iTunes instructions explained here) or though our Yahoo Podcasts channel. Need more help tuning in live or finding the chat room?...
  • Daily SearchCast, May 9, 2006: Yahoo's New Panama Ad System; Getting Real Time Date; Microsoft's New Moves In Maps; Googlers Fuel California Tax Revenues & More!
    Yesterday's search podcast is now online Sorry for the delay! It covers details about Yahoo's new ad system; Microsoft's mapping moves; how to get real time data; fighting search spam; Googlers make California richer -- but have they been downgraded from Captain Crunch to Lt. Crunch and more! Tune-in by listening to this MP3 file, listening via WebmasterRadio at 11:30am Eastern and repeated at 2pm Eastern Tuesday through Friday, via our Odeo channel or through iTunes via this link (or use alternative iTunes instructions explained here) or though our Yahoo Podcasts channel. Need more help tuning in live or finding...
  • Next Week's Special Edition Daily SearchCast With Matt Cutts, Live From The Googleplex
    I'm traveling next week, making visits to Google and Yahoo before heading to our Search Engine Watch Live networking event in Seattle. SearchReturn editor Detlev Johnson will be sitting in for me doing our Daily SearchCast podcast while I'm on the trip. But I will be doing a special edition of the Daily SearchCast next Tuesday, talking with Google's Matt Cutts at while I'm at the Googleplex....
  • Yokel Local Shopping Part II
    One of the great challenges of ?local shopping? sites like Yokel is getting the data online. Brian points out in his post that Yokel doesn?t currently have real-time inventory information, but directs consumers to local retailers (mostly nationals like Home Depot and Sears) that are likely to have the desired products (clicking on products takes users to retailer websites)....
  • Watching Google Press Day, Slides & Live Commentary
    Google Press Day gets underway, well, now. Not a member of the press? You'll find the webcast here, where you can watch. Below, I've listed all the slides. Many of these are broken now, but they'll appear as the day progresses. Over at Google Blogoscoped, Philipp Lenssen is doing a good job live blogging the commentary. Valleywag is also live blogging here. InsideGoogle is also live blogging in parts -- watch the home page there....
  • Yokel Launches Local Shopping Search Engine
    Yokel today announced the beta release of it's local shopping search engine. Yokel is run by Scott Randall, former CEO of FairMarket, and Don Zeresky, former VP of Products for Lycos. Local search engines, especially local shopping engines will continue to be important as most people still research online and then buy offline at local retailers. As Scott explained to me, "even people who go to online shopping comparison engines still buy offline. 98% of commerce is still done locally." Yokel is set up to solve this problem. Scott continued "there seems to be a void. Yokel answers the question,...
  • Search Engine Journal Launches SEO Directory, SEOdex.com
    Search Engine Journal announced the launch of a new directory they just purchased named SEOdex. Loren Baker, from Search Engine Journal says he plans "on heavily marketing it in the near future on Search Engine Journal and other related properties." You can submit your firm or resource to SEOdex by finding the relevant category and clicking on "Add SEO Firm or Resource."...
  • Yahoo Italy Blocking Certain Queries?
    Nathan Weinberg reported and so did I that Yahoo Italy appears to be blocking results for certain queries. If you conduct a search on preteen at Yahoo Italy, you should notice that no results are returned. Nathan also says if you search for the capitalized version no results are returned as well. So is this some sort of censorship by Yahoo Italy? If so why? Want to discuss? Join our forum thread named Yahoo.it censored for 'preteen'?...
  • Google Ban Checker Tool
    This morning, I reported on a tool that allows you to check if you are banned in Google. The tool is a desktop application that searches Google using a site: command and also checks sites that link to you, to see if they are banned as well. You can check out the tool by clicking here. Keep in mind, Google also can notify you of some site penalties with Google Sitemaps....
  • Australians Fond Of Google; Vegemite Getting Jealous
    The Courier Mail reports that Australians are becoming more found of Google as each day pasts. A survey performed by George Patterson Y&R found that Google was amongst the top 20 brands in Australia. Supposedly, Vegemite, which I never heard of before, is the most popular brand in Australia, but Google is gaining on it. Can Google beat out a dark brown, salty food paste made from yeast extract, to become the number one brand in Australia?...
  • Google Bug or Webmaster Bug? Google Responds To Shared Server Bug Issue
    Matt Cutts responded to the Google anomaly we reported last week, where Google was displaying a different site's information from the same shared server. In short, two sites are hosted on the same server and same IP address. When conducting a search that should have brought up Site A, Site B was coming up in the SERPs. The issue was technically not on Google's side, as Matt explained. The server folks that set up the server set up the virtual hosting configuration incorrectly. So why wasn't it an issue on Yahoo, MSN or Ask.com? Matt explains that Google uses "persistent...
  • Yahoo Tests Livesearch On AllTheWeb; Google Patent Problem, Perhaps?
    Yahoo's AllTheWeb service is sporting a new Livesearch feature. It's pretty interesting. As you type into the search box, search results automatically start appearing. And more interesting, it's similar to something Google's already sought to patent....
  • Yahoo En Español & Telemundo.com To Merge
    The Wall Street Journal reports that Yahoo En Español and Telemundo.com will be merging companies. They will be merging the staff and sharing one advertising budget. If you visit http://espanol.yahoo.com/ now, you will find both logos at the top of the page, representing each company. The reason for the merger is because the online Hispanic market is growing extremely quickly and the two companies want to take advantage of "the incredible growth of the Hispanic marketplace," today. It appears that the two companies will fold under the Yahoo umbrella....
  • IE7 Users Are Prompted To Use Google, Yahoo
    ClickZ reports that they have noticed when using Microsoft's new browser, Internet Explorer 7, and visiting Google, you are prompted with a DTHML popup box that says, "Make Google your Search Engine in Internet Explorer." Is this Google's way of fighting back against their objections of IE7? Google is upset that Microsoft sets MSN Search as the default engine on IE7. So if you are using IE7 and visit Google, Google will go out of their way to help you switch that default to engine to Google Search....
  • TiVo Getting Into the Ad Serving Business
    While TiVo is well known for allowing television watchers to skip advertising, they are hoping they can entice viewers to watch branded advertising that provide entertainment value or user interest within the commercials. The program, called Product Watch, allows viewers to actually search for ads in various categories and there are already has 70 advertisers signed up....
  • Windows Live Adds New Features
    The Windows Live Blog announced changes they have made to Live.com. The changes include;...
  • GeoVector and the Mo-Lo Search 'Use Case'
    I continue to think about the challenges of mobile-local search, where there is arguably a more compelling consumer use case than on the Internet -- user needs are generally more immediate. Microsoft?s Search GM Erik Jorgensen publicly stated that he believed the majority of local searches will eventually be conducted on mobile devices. In concept it's not hard to agree. But the question is one of timing and technology. The form factor (hardware), the business model and network speeds will all need to come together to drive consumer adoption. Once the use cases are established then we can think about...

Other Things We Read, Didn't Blog But You Might Want To Read...

Posted by Danny Sullivan on May 10, 2006, 2:37 PM | Permalink


Joystiq E3 Coverage Fails to Garner Sponsor, Calacanis Not Happy

Jason Calacanis has just used to his blog to chew out his sales team:

Wow! Amazing coverage of E3 team Joystiq!!! (with the assist from team Engadget) resulted in over 1M page views yesterday. Huge...

If only we had E3 sponsors... grrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr.

Team AMN/WIN Sales: Next year sell this thing out!!! We missed a huge revenue opportunity.

Perhaps feeling a tad regretful, he then explains:

[ Note: As a publisher I'd rather have the quality without the sales, than the sales without the quality.... but we gotta get both lined up for next year. Frankly, we've got so much on our plates it's hard for our sales team to keep up--so I'm just busting on my already overworked group. High class problem to have. :-) ]

Blogger transparency taken to a new extreme!

Posted by Zachary Rodgers on May 10, 2006, 2:33 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)


Daily SearchCast, May 10, 2006: Yahoo Livesearch: Answers Before You Finish Typing!; Yahoo & Google Seek IE7 Users; Will It Be Google Rather Than Vegemite Sandwich? & More! (Corrected File)

Today's search podcast covers Yahoo's new Livesearch feature, which gives you results before you even finish typing in a query; Yahoo & Telemundo merge web sites; Yahoo and Google try to woo IE7 users; will Google be more popular than Vegemite Down Under? and more!

Tune-in by listening to this MP3 file, listening via WebmasterRadio at 11:30am Eastern and repeated at 2pm Eastern Tuesday through Friday, via our Odeo channel or through iTunes via this link (or use alternative iTunes instructions explained here) or though our Yahoo Podcasts channel. Need more help tuning in live or finding the chat room? See the Daily SearchCast FAQ.

Below are links to items discussed:

  • Yahoo Tests Livesearch On AllTheWeb; Google Patent Problem, Perhaps?
    Yahoo's AllTheWeb service is sporting a new Livesearch feature. It's pretty interesting. As you type into the search box, search results automatically start appearing. And more interesting, it's similar to something Google's already sought to patent....
  • Yahoo En Español & Telemundo.com To Merge
    The Wall Street Journal reports that Yahoo En Español and Telemundo.com will be merging companies. They will be merging the staff and sharing one advertising budget. If you visit http://espanol.yahoo.com/ now, you will find both logos at the top of the page, representing each company. The reason for the merger is because the online Hispanic market is growing extremely quickly and the two companies want to take advantage of "the incredible growth of the Hispanic marketplace," today. It appears that the two companies will fold under the Yahoo umbrella....
  • Yahoo Italy Blocking Certain Queries?
    Nathan Weinberg reported and so did I that Yahoo Italy appears to be blocking results for certain queries. If you conduct a search on preteen at Yahoo Italy, you should notice that no results are returned. Nathan also says if you search for the capitalized version no results are returned as well. So is this some sort of censorship by Yahoo Italy? If so why? Want to discuss? Join our forum thread named Yahoo.it censored for 'preteen'?...
  • IE7 Users Are Prompted To Use Google, Yahoo
    ClickZ reports that they have noticed when using Microsoft's new browser, Internet Explorer 7, and visiting Google, you are prompted with a DTHML popup box that says, "Make Google your Search Engine in Internet Explorer." Is this Google's way of fighting back against their objections of IE7? Google is upset that Microsoft sets MSN Search as the default engine on IE7. So if you are using IE7 and visit Google, Google will go out of their way to help you switch that default to engine to Google Search....
  • Google Bug or Webmaster Bug? Google Responds To Shared Server Bug Issue
    Matt Cutts responded to the Google anomaly we reported last week, where Google was displaying a different site's information from the same shared server. In short, two sites are hosted on the same server and same IP address. When conducting a search that should have brought up Site A, Site B was coming up in the SERPs. The issue was technically not on Google's side, as Matt explained. The server folks that set up the server set up the virtual hosting configuration incorrectly. So why wasn't it an issue on Yahoo, MSN or Ask.com? Matt explains that Google uses "persistent...
  • Google Ban Checker Tool
    This morning, I reported on a tool that allows you to check if you are banned in Google. The tool is a desktop application that searches Google using a site: command and also checks sites that link to you, to see if they are banned as well. You can check out the tool by clicking here. Keep in mind, Google also can notify you of some site penalties with Google Sitemaps....
  • Search Engine Journal Launches SEO Directory, SEOdex.com
    Search Engine Journal announced the launch of a new directory they just purchased named SEOdex. Loren Baker, from Search Engine Journal says he plans "on heavily marketing it in the near future on Search Engine Journal and other related properties." You can submit your firm or resource to SEOdex by finding the relevant category and clicking on "Add SEO Firm or Resource."...
  • GeoVector and the Mo-Lo Search 'Use Case'
    I continue to think about the challenges of mobile-local search, where there is arguably a more compelling consumer use case than on the Internet -- user needs are generally more immediate. Microsoft?s Search GM Erik Jorgensen publicly stated that he believed the majority of local searches will eventually be conducted on mobile devices. In concept it's not hard to agree. But the question is one of timing and technology. The form factor (hardware), the business model and network speeds will all need to come together to drive consumer adoption. Once the use cases are established then we can think about...
  • Yokel Launches Local Shopping Search Engine
    Yokel today announced the beta release of it's local shopping search engine. Yokel is run by Scott Randall, former CEO of FairMarket, and Don Zeresky, former VP of Products for Lycos. Local search engines, especially local shopping engines will continue to be important as most people still research online and then buy offline at local retailers. As Scott explained to me, "even people who go to online shopping comparison engines still buy offline. 98% of commerce is still done locally." Yokel is set up to solve this problem. Scott continued "there seems to be a void. Yokel answers the question,...
  • Windows Live Adds New Features
    The Windows Live Blog announced changes they have made to Live.com. The changes include;...
  • TiVo Getting Into the Ad Serving Business
    While TiVo is well known for allowing television watchers to skip advertising, they are hoping they can entice viewers to watch branded advertising that provide entertainment value or user interest within the commercials. The program, called Product Watch, allows viewers to actually search for ads in various categories and there are already has 70 advertisers signed up....
  • Australians Fond Of Google; Vegemite Getting Jealous
    The Courier Mail reports that Australians are becoming more found of Google as each day pasts. A survey performed by George Patterson Y&R found that Google was amongst the top 20 brands in Australia. Supposedly, Vegemite, which I never heard of before, is the most popular brand in Australia, but Google is gaining on it. Can Google beat out a dark brown, salty food paste made from yeast extract, to become the number one brand in Australia?...
  • Vegemite - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
  • History of Vegemite

Posted by Danny Sullivan on May 10, 2006, 2:27 PM | Permalink


Daily SearchCast, May 9, 2006: Yahoo's New Panama Ad System; Getting Real Time Date; Microsoft's New Moves In Maps; Googlers Fuel California Tax Revenues & More!

Yesterday's search podcast is now online Sorry for the delay! It covers details about Yahoo's new ad system; Microsoft's mapping moves; how to get real time data; fighting search spam; Googlers make California richer -- but have they been downgraded from Captain Crunch to Lt. Crunch and more!

Tune-in by listening to this MP3 file, listening via WebmasterRadio at 11:30am Eastern and repeated at 2pm Eastern Tuesday through Friday, via our Odeo channel or through iTunes via this link (or use alternative iTunes instructions explained here) or though our Yahoo Podcasts channel. Need more help tuning in live or finding the chat room? See the Daily SearchCast FAQ.

Below are links to items discussed:

  • Yahoo Unveils Public Details Of "Panama" Ad System Upgrade
    Yahoo's finally gone public with details about its new "Panama" ad system upgrade, which when launched later this year will bring the system up to matching what Google's long offered, though both Yahoo and Google will remain behind Microsoft's third-generation ad platform "adCenter," launched last week. Details have leaked before, but now Yahoo's doing the talking directly....
     
  • Google Resets Many Inactive AdWords Keywords to Active
    I reported this morning about Google resetting many of the "inactive" keywords in a Google AdWords account to the "active" status. Keywords become inactive often if the "quality" of those ads are too low, most likely because the click-through rate on that keyword is too low. It seems as if Google has reset many of the "inactive" keywords in AdWords advertisers campaigns, so they can start fresh....
     
  • AdWords Advertisements Not Censored in Google China
    Google China has censored their search results to remove certain sites and listings that are deemed by the Chinese government. However, an advertiser has discovered a loophole in the censoring system that results in these censored sites showing up in google.cn search results via the Google AdWords sponsored listings program....
     
  • New Product Additions for AdSense Referrals & Buttons Get a Makeover
    Google AdSense has launched a couple new products to their AdSense referral program, adding Google Pack and Picasso to the list of products that publishers can refer new users to. They have also updated the styling of the old buttons and added a few new color schemes to the mix as well....
     
  • New Way To Try Google Health (Maybe)
    Garett Rogers reports and Philipp Lenssen reports on a what may appear to be Google Health, which we suspect will be coming this Wednesday. They both have screen captures of new query refinement that might be related to the expected lunch of Google health. I personally can't replicate it, but with some digging, Danny and I found a way for you to hit the underlying health filters....
     
  • Windows Live QnA In Action
    The MSN Search Blog mentions the new Windows Live QnA service and also has a link to the MSN Spaces QnA blog that has details with screen shots of the new offering. So if you are interesting in taking a look at Microsoft's answer to Google Answers and Yahoo Answers, visit the QnA blog. We had a short brief on this new service on Friday....
     
  • Microsoft Acquires DeepMetrix To Enhance adCenter Metrics
    ThreadWatch points to a release that shows Microsoft has purchased DeepMetrix, a Web analytics company. The purchase is to enable Microsoft to "deliver new Web analytics applications in future releases of Microsoft adCenter." Last year Google acquired Urchin, and then renamed it to Google Analytics in November and began AdWords integration soon after. Microsoft will possibly do the same....
     
  • New SEW Blog Correspondents: Greg Sterling On Local; Detlev Johnson On News & Barry Becomes A Married Chief!
     
  • Microsoft Accelerates Mapping
    Mapping has already become one of the most competitive arenas online -- a visual version of local search. Barry posted earlier about how Microsoft wants to enable dynamic updating of online maps with traffic and other local data in real time. Last week, as I posted on my blog, the company announced the well-known acquisition of Vexcel corporation. Vexcel is a "remote sensing" and mapping company that enables, among other things, extremely high resolution aerial photography and 3-D mapping....
     
  • Microsoft To Map The World In Real Time?
    The TechnologyReview.com has an interesting article explaining a project at Microsoft named SenseWeb, that will strive to enable Windows Live Local to have real-time mapping and local data. The real-time information, is reportedly going to be up-to-the minute on local gas prices, traffic flows, restaurant wait times, parking information and more. It is important to note that Yahoo maps have been offering real-time traffic reports since at least January 2005. I am interested to see how Microsoft will enable local gas prices, restaurant wait times and parking information into this system....
     
  • ResourceShelf Offers Real-Time Resource Engines Feature
    Gary Price has launched a new feature at ResourceShelf named "ResourceShelf Real-Time." ResourceShelf Real-Time will provide links to resources, including Web resources and desktop/palm/client applications, that "offer real-time or near real-time" data and information. In Gary's first Real-Time post, he links to FlightAware, Amtrak Real-Time Train Status, What's Playing on Sirius Satellite Radio Right Now, City of Seattle Real-Time 911 Dispatch and more. So if you are a specialty search 'freak', I highly recommend you get your fix from ResourceShelf Real-Time....
     
  • Inside Google Book Search Blog Launches
    Google has recently launched Inside Google Book Search, the Google Book Search blog. The blog will not only keep us informed on Google Book Search product announcements, but will also provide Google book search tips. They will also highlight books they found useful and enlightening at the blog. Visit the new blog at http://booksearch.blogspot.com/....
     
  • Expedia-Hosted Domains Spamming
    SEO Black Hat reports that it appears Expedia France is spamming the search engines. What this appear to be are hosted spam pages on the expedia.fr domain name. If you do a search at Google for buy viagra you will currently notice that buyviagra.blog.expedia.fr is the 2nd result. There are many other examples of these pages, in fact, my blog has been denying comment spam from all sorts of Expedia France subdomains including homeequitylineofcredit.blog.expedia.fr. This may just be some sort of Expedia hack, where spammers buy the subdomain from Expedia, to do what they want with it....
     
  • Does Google Use Whois Information?
    Can whois information be used by a search engine to rank web pages? Is Google using whois information in their ranking of web pages? Some research on a recent trilogy of Go Daddy patent applications raised those questions in my mind. The patent filings involve adding additional reputation information to published whois data, and letting others use the information for a number of reasons, including letting search engines incorporate that reputation information into their ranking mechanisms. This seemed in line with something that Google discussed doing last year in Information retrieval based on historical data. But, is it something that...
     
  • Tech Memeorandum Gets New Name: Techmeme
    Memeorandium's tech page has been on my essential reading list since it launched almost two years ago. About the only downside has been remembering the name. I'd always be misspelling it. Problem solved. Creator Gabe Rivera has given it a new name, Techmeme, and a new domain: techmeme.com. A bit more from him on the change here: Goodbye tech.memeorandum, Hello Techmeme....
     
  • Google Helps California Earn Record Tax Receipts
    SFGate.com reports that Google has probably helped the State of California bring in record tax receipts for the 2005 year. The article says that California brought in "a record $11.3 billion in personal income tax receipts," which was $4.3 billion more than it collected the previous year. They attribute a "significant chunk" of the $4.3 billion towards Google employees and executives stock in Google, specifically 1/8th or more of the total gain. The executives alone could have paid around $450 million in capital gains tax on their stock sales of $4.4 billion at the 10.3% state-tax bracket....
     
  • Candygate: Googleplex still has M&M's
     
  • Giant C-130 Hercules Plane Flying Over The House
     
  • Tagging My Electrical Plugs & Computer Connections

Posted by Danny Sullivan on May 10, 2006, 2:19 PM | Permalink


Next Week's Special Edition Daily SearchCast With Matt Cutts, Live From The Googleplex

I'm traveling next week, making visits to Google and Yahoo before heading to our Search Engine Watch Live networking event in Seattle. SearchReturn editor Detlev Johnson will be sitting in for me doing our Daily SearchCast podcast while I'm on the trip. But I will be doing a special edition of the Daily SearchCast next Tuesday, talking with Google's Matt Cutts at while I'm at the Googleplex.

As a reminder, the Daily SearchCast normally goes out everyday live at 11:30 Eastern time with a recap of the day's search news. You can also tune-in by downloading it if you take either the regular Search Engine Watch Blog feed or our special Daily SearchCast feed. These options and more are fully covered in the Daily SearchCast FAQ.

Now for that special edition. We're going to be sandwiched inside the SEO Rockstars show (which is another great podcast). That show will kick off for 15 minutes, then we'll break in, talk for about 45 minutes and go away.

Specifically, our special edition happens next Tuesday, May 16 at 4:15pm Pacific time (7:15pm Eastern). Want to hear it live? Here are the instructions:

To listen, you need to load WebmasterRadio.FM live broadcast stream into your media player. Instructions for the three major players are below. Just click on the right link, and the stream will begin.

Windows Media Player (any recent Windows PC has this).

  • If you're on a modem connection, click on this link.
  • Got broadband? Listen in better quality by clicking on this link.
  • Got really fast broadband? Get the best quality by clicking on this link.

Winamp

  • If you're on a modem connection, click on this link.
  • Got broadband? Listen in better quality by clicking on this link.
  • Got really fast broadband? Get the best quality by clicking on this link.

RealPlayer

  • If you're on a modem connection, click on this link.
  • Got broadband? Listen in better quality by clicking on this link.
  • Got really fast broadband? Get the best quality by clicking on this link.

If you're listening live, you might also like to visit the chat room to talk with others who are listing. The Daily SearchCast FAQ explains more on how to do this.

Can't listen live or prefer to listen another time? Don't panic. When available, the show will be posted to the Daily SearchCast page. If you take either of our blog feeds as explained above, you'll also get it automatically.

What will we talk about? Right now, I expect to touch on:

Got stuff you'd like to see addressed? Matt's got a post about the show on his blog, so you could drop a comment there. Or, dump in your suggestions in this thread at our Search Engine Watch Forums: Dear Matt Cutts, I Want To Know About...

Posted by Danny Sullivan on May 10, 2006, 2:06 PM | Permalink


Yokel Local Shopping Part II

One of the great challenges of “local shopping” sites like Yokel is getting the data online. Brian points out in his post that Yokel doesn’t currently have real-time inventory information, but directs consumers to local retailers (mostly nationals like Home Depot and Sears) that are likely to have the desired products (clicking on products takes users to retailer websites).

This ?data problem? -- getting data from true local businesses and real inventory information -- is significant and shared by the sites that currently offer comparable services, ShopLocal, Froogle and CNET.

In a way this retailer data problem (especially re small retailers) is a mirror of the challenges of getting local businesses to advertise online. The market is incredibly fragmented and about half of local businesses don?t yet have a web presence. Getting true local retail information into the database is a messy, long-term proposition. It will take time to solve, perhaps longer than people hope, but it will eventually be solved.

Despite the challenges, the consumer use case for Yokel is rock solid. As Brian's post suggests, in the quote from Yokel CEO Scott Randall, e-commerce is less than 3% of total US retail. That number is not likely to grow higher than 10% within the foreseeable future (if that). But the Internet is growing daily in its influence on local transactions, buy some estimates to the tune of more than $200 billion. People fundamentally want to buy locally after they?ve done the online research to determine what they?re going to buy.

In my conversations with product managers at many of the major shopping engines, they recognize platform "agnosticism" as the "Holy Grail" of shopping. Meaning: after I determine what to buy I can buy online or find a local retailer with the item in stock. ShopLocal and Froogle offer limited versions of this today.

The data challenges represent significant barriers to entry in this "local shopping" arena. But it will become a feature of all the shopping engines eventually once the data and local retailer aggregation problems are solved.

Posted by Greg Sterling on May 10, 2006, 1:29 PM | Permalink


Watching Google Press Day, Slides & Live Commentary

Google Press Day gets underway, well, now. Not a member of the press? You'll find the webcast here, where you can watch. Below, I've listed all the slides. Many of these are broken now, but they'll appear as the day progresses. Over at Google Blogoscoped, Philipp Lenssen is doing a good job live blogging the commentary. Valleywag is also live blogging here. InsideGoogle is also live blogging in parts -- watch the home page there. Matt Cutts is also blogging here. Can't see the slides below this line? Click here to jump to them.

Here's the agenda:

9:30 am
Welcome - Elliot Schrage
9:40 am
How We?re Doing and Where We?re Going - Eric Schmidt
10:10 am
A Search Technology Overview - Alan Eustace
10:30 am
Be Global, Act Local - Omid Kordestani
11:00 am
Break
11:25 am
Innovation: Many Shapes, Many Sizes - Jonathan Rosenberg & Marissa Mayer
12:15 pm
Executive Q&A
1:00 pm
Lunch

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Posted by Danny Sullivan on May 10, 2006, 12:38 PM | Permalink


Yokel Launches Local Shopping Search Engine

Yokel today announced the beta release of its local shopping search engine. Yokel is run by Scott Randall, former CEO of FairMarket, and Don Zeresky, former VP of Products for Lycos.

Local search engines, especially local shopping engines will continue to be important as most people still research online and then buy offline at local retailers. As Scott explained to me, "even people who go to online shopping comparison engines still buy offline. 98% of commerce is still done locally." Yokel is set up to solve this problem. Scott continued "there seems to be a void. Yokel answers the question, where do I buy [product x] at a physical retailer near me?"

Scott admitted that we're still very early in the shopping game. Yokel does not provide real-time local inventory information, but rather looks at ever increasing specificity questions. Consumers first want to know what stores carry a particular category of items, then a particular brand, and then a particular item. Consumers don't start out knowing they want a HLR5667W (specific Maytag dishwasher). This also reflects the approach Yokel took to aggregating local information.

A local hardware store without a major web presence will not necessarily have 1000s of products listed on its site. However, Yokel still views such a store as important and would list the store on Yokel as selling a particular category of items.

Yokel covers about 1.5 million locations (not unique stores) at launch. The company is also digging especially deep in Boston with the launch of its first city centric site, http://boston.yokel.com.

Results for Yokel are culled in a variety of ways. Scott explained "Manufacturers know their authorized dealers, so we'll know which stores carry GE products, for example. If stores have websites, we'll get that information. We'll have people on the street, too."

Posted by Brian Smith on May 10, 2006, 10:33 AM | Permalink


Search Engine Journal Launches SEO Directory, SEOdex.com

Search Engine Journal announced the launch of a new directory they just purchased named SEOdex. Loren Baker, from Search Engine Journal says he plans "on heavily marketing it in the near future on Search Engine Journal and other related properties." You can submit your firm or resource to SEOdex by finding the relevant category and clicking on "Add SEO Firm or Resource."

Posted by Barry Schwartz on May 10, 2006, 10:04 AM | Permalink


Yahoo Italy Blocking Certain Queries?

Nathan Weinberg reported and so did I that Yahoo Italy appears to be blocking results for certain queries. If you conduct a search on preteen at Yahoo Italy, you should notice that no results are returned. Nathan also says if you search for the capitalized version no results are returned as well. So is this some sort of censorship by Yahoo Italy? If so why?

Want to discuss? Join our forum thread named Yahoo.it censored for 'preteen'?

Posted by Barry Schwartz on May 10, 2006, 9:50 AM | Permalink


Google Ban Checker Tool

This morning, I reported on a tool that allows you to check if you are banned in Google. The tool is a desktop application that searches Google using a site: command and also checks sites that link to you, to see if they are banned as well. You can check out the tool by clicking here. Keep in mind, Google also can notify you of some site penalties with Google Sitemaps.

Posted by Barry Schwartz on May 10, 2006, 9:38 AM | Permalink


Australians Fond Of Google; Vegemite Getting Jealous

The Courier Mail reports that Australians are becoming more found of Google as each day pasts. A survey performed by George Patterson Y&R found that Google was amongst the top 20 brands in Australia. Supposedly, Vegemite, which I never heard of before, is the most popular brand in Australia, but Google is gaining on it. Can Google beat out a dark brown, salty food paste made from yeast extract, to become the number one brand in Australia?

Posted by Barry Schwartz on May 10, 2006, 9:26 AM | Permalink


Google Bug or Webmaster Bug? Google Responds To Shared Server Bug Issue

Matt Cutts responded to the Google anomaly we reported last week, where Google was displaying a different site's information from the same shared server. In short, two sites are hosted on the same server and same IP address. When conducting a search that should have brought up Site A, Site B was coming up in the SERPs.

The issue was technically not on Google's side, as Matt explained. The server folks that set up the server set up the virtual hosting configuration incorrectly. So why wasn't it an issue on Yahoo, MSN or Ask.com? Matt explains that Google uses "persistent connections to a webserver via a Keep-Alive header" that allows Google to use one single connection for all the sites on one server, thus taking up less server resources for Google and the Webmaster's server.

Posted by Barry Schwartz on May 10, 2006, 9:01 AM | Permalink


Yahoo Tests Livesearch On AllTheWeb; Google Patent Problem, Perhaps?

Yahoo's AllTheWeb service is sporting a new Livesearch feature. It's pretty interesting. As you type into the search box, search results automatically start appearing. And more interesting, it's similar to something Google's already sought to patent.

Let's dive into the Livesearch system first. Say you are looking for information about HD TVs. You type h, and a list of suggested searches appears to the left of the main search results area, including:

  • h
  • hotmail
  • home depot
  • hi5...

In the search results, you start seeing listings for hotmail, second on the list. That's the term AllTheWeb is guessing you might be after. Ah -- but we're not after hotmail! That's OK. As soon as you enter another letter, making hd, you get:

  • hd
  • hdtv
  • hd dvd
  • henry draper star catalogue
  • hdfc bank...

In the search results, hdtv is automatically selected as your search query, giving you results on that topic.

It'll be fun to see if this takes off more if it moves to regular Yahoo. Potentially, it will speed up searching, giving you answers faster than you've even completed typing in your search terms.

Certainly it's nice to see the query refinement given better play than on Yahoo, making it easier for people to understand there are alternatives and related terms to their queries. Query refinement has long felt neglected, as I've covered more in my Robert Scoble Wants What We Had -- Better Query Refinement. So Do I! and More On Query Refinement, The Human Scale Problem & Creating The Search Dialog posts last year.

Yahoo explains a bit more about Livesearch in its blog post, Livesearch on AlltheWeb, plus they give some feedback options there. Meanwhile, a revisit to some things that Livesearch is similar to:

  • SurfWax LookAhead: SurfWax has offered its tool since at least 2003, where it suggests related searches (but not actual results) based on the content in a web site or from a controlled vocabulary. Surfwax's SurfWax News service is an excellent place to see it in action, where suggestions change as you type in the search box. You can also try WikiWax, which gives you suggestions for searching against Wikipedia. Gary Price explained more about both services in this September 2005 SearchDay article: Surfwax Offers Look-Ahead Technology for Web Sites. Gary's also just put LookAhead technology into his DocuTicker site.
     
  • AOL Pinpoint Shopping: Start entering a query and watch how suggestions start to appear below the search box. Pinpoint's been doing this since September 2004. AOL's main search site sort of offers a similar thing with its Smartbox service rolled out last January, but looking today, it doesn't seem to work nearly as well as the Pinpoint service or some of the other services above, giving me mainly company info suggestions, if anything at all.
     
  • Google Suggest: It also doesn't give you answers automatically, but it does suggest related terms as you type. It's not built into regular Google (still -- it launched at the end of 2004!), but it was added to the Google Toolbar last September and to Google News earlier this month.
     
  • Snap.com: You can't see it now, since Snap's currently down with a "come back and see the new Snap on May 15th" message. But it did offer a dynamic suggestion tool last April that probably will return.
     
  • Ask Zoom: It's not a dynamic suggestion tool, in that you won't see things appear as you type. But it probably is the most sophisticated or substantial query refinement feature any major search engine offers. Enter a query, then on the results, you can use the Narrow Your Search or Expand Your Search sections to access related queries. Introduced under the Zoom name in May 2005.
     
  • Become.com: Start entering a query, and like Google Suggest, it suggests searches right below the search box. Debuted in June 2005.
     
  • Yahoo Instant Search: Like Livesearch, enter a query and see a result appear -- but only one. Debuted in September 2005.
     
  • Answers.com: Same as Become.com -- entering a query and get suggested searches below the search box. Debuted in December 2005.

Just to stress, none of the services above goes the extra step of actually showing results automatically, in addition to suggested search terms, as Livesearch does. I do feel like I've seen someone do this combo move before, but I can't think of any offhand or after doing some searching. Those closest thing is how Google will prefetch the first result in a listed for a query for those using Firefox, as a means of speeding up access to pages. But that's a different concept altogether.

Closer to the mark, Bill Slawski's very detailed Can Google Read Your Mind? Processing Predictive Queries article talks about a Google patent application on a system that seems very close to what Yahoo's Livesearch is doing. Bill might pop in here to postscript some thoughts on how this applies to what Yahoo's doing.

Certainly Livesearch demonstrates one thing -- how quickly search engines can generate results, or more correctly, how many results they already have cached and ready to serve up without having to "hit disk" to actually do a search.

In other words, when so many people are constantly searching for things like "hdtv," search engines don't have to always go back and search through billions of pages for the results. They can simply pull up the same results they already served recently from fast memory, a long-standing practice for being speedy.

It's also nice to see AllTheWeb finally used for something again, I suppose. Back when Overture bought it, it was positioned as sort of a alpha testing platform with AltaVista a more consumer friendly beta site. Then Yahoo bought Overture, pretty much throwing both AllTheWeb and AltaVista into abandonment.

Postscript

I do see a number of similarities between Live Search and Google Suggest, but there are differences, too. I'm excited to see AllTheWeb being used in this manner.

I did look back at some of the Yahoo! patents and patent applications to see if I could find something similar to what Yahoo! is doing in this Livesearch. I did come up with something close in a patent application that is part of a larger set of refinements to a search user interface in Universal search interface systems and methods. There, we're told that:

The present invention provides highly sophisticated query completion features. As a user types, related words and units are shown (could appear in a drop-down box). These could be based on related searches but personalized to an individual user. For example, when user types in "sf", a drop-box showing weather, hotels, restaurants, etc. may be shown based, in part, on what this user has searched for in the past about "sf".

This patent application was filed April 5, 2004 and published December 9, 2004, earlier than Google's Anticipated query generation and processing in a search engine. But it covers a wider range of enhancements to a search interface. It will be interesting if some of the other concepts discussed in the Yahoo! patent application make their way into livesearch. -- Bill Slawski

Postscript 2 From Danny: I did ask Yahoo about the patent issue, but they said they couldn't comment on legal issues.

Want to comment or discuss? Visit our Search Engine Watch Forums thread, Yahoo Powered Livesearch on AlltheWeb.

Posted by Danny Sullivan on May 10, 2006, 8:55 AM | Permalink


Yahoo En Español & Telemundo.com To Merge

The Wall Street Journal reports that Yahoo En Español and Telemundo.com will be merging companies. They will be merging the staff and sharing one advertising budget. If you visit http://espanol.yahoo.com/ now, you will find both logos at the top of the page, representing each company. The reason for the merger is because the online Hispanic market is growing extremely quickly and the two companies want to take advantage of "the incredible growth of the Hispanic marketplace," today. It appears that the two companies will fold under the Yahoo umbrella.

We have been reporting on the Hispanic market growth recently. You can find out more by reading here and here.

Postscript: PaidContent.org has some more details on the merger plans.

Posted by Barry Schwartz on May 10, 2006, 8:45 AM | Permalink


IE7 Users Are Prompted To Use Google, Yahoo

ClickZ reports that they have noticed when using Microsoft's new browser, Internet Explorer 7, and visiting Google, you are prompted with a DTHML popup box that says, "Make Google your Search Engine in Internet Explorer," as you see here:





Click For Larger Image

Is this Google's way of fighting back against their objections of IE7? Google is upset that Microsoft sets MSN Search as the default engine on IE7. So if you are using IE7 and visit Google, Google will go out of their way to help you switch that default to engine to Google Search.

This is not the first time Google or even Yahoo has promoted their search engine. Philipp Lessen reported this exact thing for IE7 users back September 2005. Also, Yahoo did the same, to IE 7 users in January 2006.

Postscript From Danny: I added the Google image above, plus Yahoo's still doing the same thing, as you'll see below:




Click For Larger Image

Posted by Barry Schwartz on May 10, 2006, 8:25 AM | Permalink


TiVo Getting Into the Ad Serving Business

While TiVo is well known for allowing television watchers to skip advertising, they are hoping they can entice viewers to watch branded advertising that provide entertainment value or user interest within the commercials. The program, called Product Watch, allows viewers to actually search for ads in various categories and there are already has 70 advertisers signed up.

The ads range from cooking advice and how-tos from Kraft to Suze Orman talking about loans by Lending Tree. Some of the ads are quite heavy on the advertising, such as GM spotlighting their vehicles. Ford, on the other hand, has taken the low key approach with Penn & Teller doing one minute tricks on a golf course with a vehicle in the background. The ads are much longer than traditional 30 second spots, instead they range from one minute in length to one hour.

This model is based on pay-per-view, only instead of the end viewer paying to view, the advertiser is paying for each video download. The Wall Street Journal says this approach is attractive for smaller advertisers who may not be able to afford to target an entire audience of a network or show, yet are able to show their ad to those who are specifically chosing to watch it, meaning they are able to target that ad very well to the audience they want.

ClickZ also reports that the next phase of Product Watch will allow viewers to request more information directly from advertisers on a cost-per-lead basis.

Robin Good has detailed screenshots showing the Product Watch interface and implementation on TiVo.

Posted by Jennifer Slegg on May 10, 2006, 1:06 AM | Permalink


AOL Quietly Begins Accepting Goodmail Certified E-mail

Yes, it's probably happening right now. Goodmail Certified Email messages are wending their way to AOL subscribers. The first such messages began last week, AOL spokesman Nicholas Graham tells ClickZ. So far it's just one (unnamed) sender whose messages are slipping past spam filters and getting marked with special icons, but Graham says other senders are queued up and ready to start soon. Unsurprisingly, the Electronic Frontier Foundation and the rest of the DearAOL-ers are speaking up again in opposition of the system.

Posted by Pamela Parker on May 9, 2006, 7:51 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)


Search Headlines & Links: May 9, 2006

Below, a recap of stories posted today to the Search Engine Watch Blog, along with other items we've spotted but not blogged separately:

Today From The SEW Blog...

  • Windows Live Adds New Features
    The Windows Live Blog announced changes they have made to Live.com. The changes include;...
     
  • GeoVector and the Mo-Lo Search 'Use Case'
    I continue to think about the challenges of mobile-local search, where there is arguably a more compelling consumer use case than on the Internet -- user needs are generally more immediate. Microsoft?s Search GM Erik Jorgensen publicly stated that he believed the majority of local searches will eventually be conducted on mobile devices. In concept it's not hard to agree. But the question is one of timing and technology. The form factor (hardware), the business model and network speeds will all need to come together to drive consumer adoption. Once the use cases are established then we can think about...
     
  • Google Resets Many Inactive AdWords Keywords to Active
    I reported this morning about Google resetting many of the "inactive" keywords in a Google AdWords account to the "active" status. Keywords become inactive often if the "quality" of those ads are too low, most likely because the click-through rate on that keyword is too low. It seems as if Google has reset many of the "inactive" keywords in AdWords advertisers campaigns, so they can start fresh....
     
  • Google Helps California Earn Record Tax Receipts
    SFGate.com reports that Google has probably helped the State of California bring in record tax receipts for the 2005 year. The article says that California brought in "a record $11.3 billion in personal income tax receipts," which was $4.3 billion more than it collected the previous year. They attribute a "significant chunk" of the $4.3 billion towards Google employees and executives stock in Google, specifically 1/8th or more of the total gain. The executives alone could have paid around $450 million in capital gains tax on their stock sales of $4.4 billion at the 10.3% state-tax bracket....
     
  • ResourceShelf Offers Real-Time Resource Engines Feature
    Gary Price has launched a new feature at ResourceShelf named "ResourceShelf Real-Time." ResourceShelf Real-Time will provide links to resources, including Web resources and desktop/palm/client applications, that "offer real-time or near real-time" data and information. In Gary's first Real-Time post, he links to FlightAware, Amtrak Real-Time Train Status, What's Playing on Sirius Satellite Radio Right Now, City of Seattle Real-Time 911 Dispatch and more. So if you are a specialty search 'freak', I highly recommend you get your fix from ResourceShelf Real-Time....
     
  • Inside Google Book Search Blog Launches
    Google has recently launched Inside Google Book Search, the Google Book Search blog. The blog will not only keep us informed on Google Book Search product announcements, but will also provide Google book search tips. They will also highlight books they found useful and enlightening at the blog. Visit the new blog at http://booksearch.blogspot.com/....
     
  • New Product Additions for AdSense Referrals & Buttons Get a Makeover
    Google AdSense has launched a couple new products to their AdSense referral program, adding Google Pack and Picasso to the list of products that publishers can refer new users to. They have also updated the styling of the old buttons and added a few new color schemes to the mix as well....
     
  • Does Google Use Whois Information?
    Can whois information be used by a search engine to rank web pages? Is Google using whois information in their ranking of web pages? Some research on a recent trilogy of Go Daddy patent applications raised those questions in my mind. The patent filings involve adding additional reputation information to published whois data, and letting others use the information for a number of reasons, including letting search engines incorporate that reputation information into their ranking mechanisms. This seemed in line with something that Google discussed doing last year in Information retrieval based on historical data. But, is it something that...

Other Things We Read, Didn't Blog But You Might Want To Read...

Posted by Danny Sullivan on May 9, 2006, 3:10 PM | Permalink


Windows Live Adds New Features

The Windows Live Blog announced changes they have made to Live.com. The changes include;

+ Per Page Settings (define columns, colors and themes)
+ "Gadgets" take up less room
+ Search results get displayed (rendered) first when searching from your toolbar
+ Gadget controls are always visible
+ Ability to refresh individual gadgets
+ Improved RSS gadget
+ Export to OPML format added

Hat tip to Gary Price.

Posted by Barry Schwartz on May 9, 2006, 1:44 PM | Permalink


GeoVector and the Mo-Lo Search 'Use Case'

I continue to think about the challenges of mobile-local search, where there is arguably a more compelling consumer use case than on the Internet -- user needs are generally more immediate. Microsoft’s Search GM Erik Jorgensen publicly stated that he believed the majority of local searches will eventually be conducted on mobile devices. In concept it's not hard to agree. But the question is one of timing and technology. The form factor (hardware), the business model and network speeds will all need to come together to drive consumer adoption. Once the use cases are established then we can think about how to monetize them with advertising.

Bill Slawski previously covered GeoVector's recent patent for "pointing based" local search on mobile devices here. GeoVector's technology is already on display in Japan and the use case it offers could be something of a breakthrough for mobile-local search and location-based services.

Here?s how it works according to the company:

?Users can point their phones at retailers, restaurants, billboards, banks or historical sites to instantly retrieve information on what they are looking at, or find what they are looking for. Utilizing GPS technology and a digital compass built into wireless phones, GeoVector allows users to ?Click on the Real World? similar to how computer users point and click with a mouse to access information, conduct transactions or play games.?

The problem with mobile-local search is that waiting for mobile users to adopt smartphones will delay the mainstream development of the market for location-based services for 10 years (it may take that long anyway to mature). But GeoVector?s technology and approach is interesting because it doesn?t rely heavily on screen size or keyboard entry. And it?s not the mobile Internet per se. It?s about coding the real world; the use case is pretty simple and conceptually compelling.

I haven?t used it so I don?t know how well it works in practice, though it should be deployed in Europe soon. Mobot and NeoMedia are also in this space (let the patent disputes begin). But these companies' technologies all create connections between the digital and the real world in ways that are more immediate and more trackable than the Internet today.

The ?mobile Internet? and location-based services may develop in ways that are completely different than the Internet itself, which would make sense given the limitations of the devices and the use cases. Accordingly, monetization scenarios would follow usage and consumer adoption. And these technologies start to point to the ways that all could happen.

Posted by Greg Sterling on May 9, 2006, 1:05 PM | Permalink


Google Resets Many Inactive AdWords Keywords to Active

I reported this morning about Google resetting many of the "inactive" keywords in a Google AdWords account to the "active" status. Keywords become inactive often if the "quality" of those ads are too low, most likely because the click-through rate on that keyword is too low. It seems as if Google has reset many of the "inactive" keywords in AdWords advertisers campaigns, so they can start fresh.

Postscript From Danny: This is likely related to what Google announced last month, that for some terms, it would be pushing ads out more often. See Google AdWords Broad Match To Act Differently For Commercial, Non-Commercial Terms for more.

Posted by Barry Schwartz on May 9, 2006, 9:40 AM | Permalink


Google Helps California Earn Record Tax Receipts

SFGate.com reports that Google has probably helped the State of California bring in record tax receipts for the 2005 year. The article says that California brought in "a record $11.3 billion in personal income tax receipts," which was $4.3 billion more than it collected the previous year. They attribute a "significant chunk" of the $4.3 billion towards Google employees and executives stock in Google, specifically 1/8th or more of the total gain. The executives alone could have paid around $450 million in capital gains tax on their stock sales of $4.4 billion at the 10.3% state-tax bracket.

Posted by Barry Schwartz on May 9, 2006, 9:27 AM | Permalink


When Over-Optimizing Becomes a Problem

One of the most common mistakes newcomers to search optimization make is to go hog-wild and use every so-called "technique" in the book. The nearly universal outcome of this SEO overkill is reduced rankings, penalties and tears. How do you know when too-much is too-much? Anne Kennedy reports on a recent Search Engine Strategies panel that covered that very topic in today's SearchDay article, Curbing SEOs Who've Gone Wild.

Posted by Chris Sherman on May 9, 2006, 8:54 AM | Permalink


ResourceShelf Offers Real-Time Resource Engines Feature

Gary Price has launched a new feature at ResourceShelf named "ResourceShelf Real-Time." ResourceShelf Real-Time will provide links to resources, including Web resources and desktop/palm/client applications, that "offer real-time or near real-time" data and information. In Gary's first Real-Time post, he links to FlightAware, Amtrak Real-Time Train Status, What's Playing on Sirius Satellite Radio Right Now, City of Seattle Real-Time 911 Dispatch and more. So if you are a specialty search 'freak', I highly recommend you get your fix from ResourceShelf Real-Time.

Posted by Barry Schwartz on May 9, 2006, 8:41 AM | Permalink


Inside Google Book Search Blog Launches

Google has recently launched Inside Google Book Search, the Google Book Search blog. The blog will not only keep us informed on Google Book Search product announcements, but will also provide Google book search tips. They will also highlight books they found useful and enlightening at the blog. Visit the new blog at http://booksearch.blogspot.com/.

Posted by Barry Schwartz on May 9, 2006, 8:35 AM | Permalink


New Product Additions for AdSense Referrals & Buttons Get a Makeover

Google AdSense has launched a couple new products to their AdSense referral program, adding Google Pack and Picasso to the list of products that publishers can refer new users to. They have also updated the styling of the old buttons and added a few new color schemes to the mix as well.

Posted by Jennifer Slegg on May 9, 2006, 1:01 AM | Permalink


Does Google Use Whois Information?

Can whois information be used by a search engine to rank web pages? Is Google using whois information in their ranking of web pages? Some research on a recent trilogy of Go Daddy patent applications raised those questions in my mind.

The patent filings involve adding additional reputation information to published whois data, and letting others use the information for a number of reasons, including letting search engines incorporate that reputation information into their ranking mechanisms.

This seemed in line with something that Google discussed doing last year in Information retrieval based on historical data. But, is it something that either company can do? Is it a use consistent with the way that whois information is supposed to be used? There's the rub.

A recent task force vote from the Generic Names Supporting Organization (GNSO) recommended a limited use of whois information and a definition of the the purpose of Whois. The purpose that they came up with doesn't seem to go well with a commercial search engine using the information as part of their ranking algorithm. Their definition was agreed to by the GNSO, at a vote by teleconference on April 12th. Here's the definition of whois information they decided upon:

The purpose of the gTLD Whois service is to provide information sufficient to contact a responsible party for a particular gTLD domain name who can resolve, or reliably pass on data to a party who can resolve, issues related to the configuration of the records associated with the domain name within a DNS nameserver."

What this means is that less whois information, rather than more, will be published and available to the public.

The Go Daddy patent applications were originally filed on October 29, 2004.

Presenting search engine results based on domain name related reputation (US Patent Application 20060095404)
Publishing domain name related reputation in whois records (US Patent Application 20060095459)
Tracking domain name related reputation (US Patent Application 20060095586)


The Google patent application was published on March 31, 2005. Here are some of the uses of domain name information that it suggests could be used by Google:

  • Domain registration could be used as a way to determine the "document inception date," or an age associated with a page.

  • The expiration date of a domain could indicate the "legitimacy" of a document, with short term registrations indicating more questionable pages.

  • Changes, and the frequency of changes, in registration information, including contact information, hosting companies, and more, could also raise warning flags.

  • Information about name servers, and other sites on those name servers could also play a role in a ranking score:

    A "good" name server may have a mix of different domains from different registrars and have a history of hosting those domains, while a "bad" name server might host mainly pornography or doorway domains, domains with commercial words (a common indicator of spam), or primarily bulk domains from a single registrar, or might be brand new.

Does Google use this type of information? Some signs point to that, as noted in this Search Engine Watch Forums thread: Does New Google Patent Validate Sandbox Theory?. A Search Engine Roundtable post also describes an interest in using that information: Google Admits to Improve Search Quality with Registrar Data. Both hint at reasons why Google became a domain name registrar beyond registering domain names.

If they are using whois information, will this vote from ICANN's Generic Names Supporting Organization force their use to change? Tough question to answer.

There's an interesting piece of information hidden away in the real-time captioning of the minutes of the ICANN Meetings in Wellington, New Zealand on March 29th, which discusses the reasons for this change, and some of the implications of it, such as the removal of the name and contact information of the owner of a domain from whois information in what will be available to the public.

Near the end of the teleconference, there's a discussion, and an unconfirmed report, that Jordyn Buchanan, who has been the chair of the WHOIS task force would be leaving his present employer to work with another former chair head from ICANN, Vint Cerf.

Vint Cerf is presently the Chief Internet Evangelist at Google.

Want to comment or discuss? Visit our Google Web Search area of the Search Engine Watch Forums.

Posted by Bill Slawski on May 8, 2006, 11:52 PM | Permalink


Automakers' Latest Use of Online Ads: For Lobbying

The Alliance of Automobile Manufacturers, a trade group whose members include Ford, GM, DaimlerChrysler, Toyota and VW, is heading online to find lawmakers and policy influencers this legislative session. Besides the efforts detailed in NYTimes.com (reg. req.) today, the group is also taking to blogs.

The message: don't regulate us; we're selling plenty of alternative fuel vehicles already. The media: a Web site at discoveralternatives.org and ads on Powerline Blog, Andrew Sullivan, Red State, Daily Kos, Wonkette, Political Animal and Talking Points Memo. The agency: Mindshare Interactive Campaigns out of D.C.

The effort will continue to run throughout the legislative session with more elements rolling out over time, Charles Territo, director of communications for the Alliance, told me.

We've seen GM use online to push its alternative fuel message in the past. Interesting to see the whole industry adopt the medium -- and blogs -- to reach such a specific audience. When is ExxonMobile going to try to improve its image by using the Web?

Posted by Pamela Parker on May 8, 2006, 5:53 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)


Search Headlines & Links: May 8, 2006

Below, a recap of stories posted today to the Search Engine Watch Blog, along with other items we've spotted but not blogged separately:

Today From The SEW Blog...

  • AdWords Advertisements Not Censored in Google China
    Google China has censored their search results to remove certain sites and listings that are deemed by the Chinese government. However, an advertiser has discovered a loophole in the censoring system that results in these censored sites showing up in google.cn search results via the Google AdWords sponsored listings program....
     
  • Tech Memeorandum Gets New Name: Techmeme
    Memeorandium's tech page has been on my essential reading list since it launched almost two years ago. About the only downside has been remembering the name. I'd always be misspelling it. Problem solved. Creator Gabe Rivera has given it a new name, Techmeme, and a new domain: techmeme.com. A bit more from him on the change here: Goodbye tech.memeorandum, Hello Techmeme....
     
  • Microsoft Accelerates Mapping
    Mapping has already become one of the most competitive arenas online -- a visual version of local search. Barry posted earlier about how Microsoft wants to enable dynamic updating of online maps with traffic and other local data in real time. Last week, as I posted on my blog, the company announced the well-known acquisition of Vexcel corporation. Vexcel is a "remote sensing" and mapping company that enables, among other things, extremely high resolution aerial photography and 3-D mapping....
     
  • Expedia-Hosted Domains Spamming
    SEO Black Hat reports that it appears Expedia France is spamming the search engines. What this appear to be are hosted spam pages on the expedia.fr domain name. If you do a search at Google for buy viagra you will currently notice that buyviagra.blog.expedia.fr is the 2nd result. There are many other examples of these pages, in fact, my blog has been denying comment spam from all sorts of Expedia France subdomains including homeequitylineofcredit.blog.expedia.fr. This may just be some sort of Expedia hack, where spammers buy the subdomain from Expedia, to do what they want with it....
     
  • Yahoo Unveils Public Details Of "Panama" Ad System Upgrade
    Yahoo's finally gone public with details about its new "Panama" ad system upgrade, which when launched later this year will bring the system up to matching what Google's long offered, though both Yahoo and Google will remain behind Microsoft's third-generation ad platform "adCenter," launched last week. Details have leaked before, but now Yahoo's doing the talking directly....
     
  • Microsoft To Map The World In Real Time?
    The TechnologyReview.com has an interesting article explaining a project at Microsoft named SenseWeb, that will strive to enable Windows Live Local to have real-time mapping and local data. The real-time information, is reportedly going to be up-to-the minute on local gas prices, traffic flows, restaurant wait times, parking information and more. It is important to note that Yahoo maps have been offering real-time traffic reports since at least January 2005. I am interested to see how Microsoft will enable local gas prices, restaurant wait times and parking information into this system....
     
  • Windows Live QnA In Action
    The MSN Search Blog mentions the new Windows Live QnA service and also has a link to the MSN Spaces QnA blog that has details with screen shots of the new offering. So if you are interesting in taking a look at Microsoft's answer to Google Answers and Yahoo Answers, visit the QnA blog. We had a short brief on this new service on Friday....
     
  • Microsoft Acquires DeepMetrix To Enhance adCenter Metrics
    ThreadWatch points to a release that shows Microsoft has purchased DeepMetrix, a Web analytics company. The purchase is to enable Microsoft to "deliver new Web analytics applications in future releases of Microsoft adCenter." Last year Google acquired Urchin, and then renamed it to Google Analytics in November and began AdWords integration soon after. Microsoft will possibly do the same....
     
  • New Way To Try Google Health (Maybe)
    Garett Rogers reports and Philipp Lenssen reports on a what may appear to be Google Health, which we suspect will be coming this Wednesday. They both have screen captures of new query refinement that might be related to the expected lunch of Google health. I personally can't replicate it, but with some digging, Danny and I found a way for you to hit the underlying health filters....

Other Things We Read, Didn't Blog But You Might Want To Read...

Posted by Danny Sullivan on May 8, 2006, 4:29 PM | Permalink


AdWords Advertisements Not Censored in Google China

Google China has censored their search results to remove certain sites and listings that are deemed by the Chinese government. However, an advertiser has discovered a loophole in the censoring system that results in these censored sites showing up in google.cn search results via the Google AdWords sponsored listings program.

The blog Internet Censorship Explorer (ICE) ran an experiment using the site Human Rights Watch which does not appear in Google China search results. However, it was discovered that the URL filtering does not seem to apply to AdWords listings, as an AdWords ad with hrw.org as the display and destination URL of the ad showed up for keyword and site searches.

Although ICE recommends this as a way to circumvent the censorship of Google.cn, I would suspect that this loophole will be quickly closed for censored URLs as well as for specific keyword searches.

Posted by Jennifer Slegg on May 8, 2006, 2:03 PM | Permalink


Goodmail Adds 15 ESP Partners

Goodmail, the e-mail accreditation provider generating controversy through its partnership with AOL, has signed up 15 new e-mail service providers to implement its CertifiedEmail service, including BlueStreak, Acxiom Digital, e-Dialog, Epsilon Interactive, ExactTarget, Harte-Hanks Postfuture, Responsys, Yesmail and Zustek.

On the receiving side, besides AOL, Goodmail is expected to be implemented soon by Yahoo, though no details have been shared.

The reputation space is wide open, with differing methodologies competing to see which can gain ground. Goodmail's per-message fees strike some as the equivalent of e-mail postage, and has legislators and special interest groups whipped into a frenzy.

Other reputation providers, like Habeas and Return Path, take a more services-based approach, helping providers improve their sending practices instead of paying to send mail.

Which one of these methods will work best? Or will each find its own niche? Let me know what you think in the comments, or drop me a line at kevin-at-clickz-dot-com.

Posted by Kevin Newcomb on May 8, 2006, 1:22 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)


Tech Memeorandum Gets New Name: Techmeme

Memeorandium's tech page has been on my essential reading list since it launched almost two years ago. About the only downside has been remembering the name. I'd always be misspelling it. Problem solved. Creator Gabe Rivera has given it a new name, Techmeme, and a new domain: techmeme.com. A bit more from him on the change here: Goodbye tech.memeorandum, Hello Techmeme.

Posted by Danny Sullivan on May 8, 2006, 12:52 PM | Permalink


Microsoft Accelerates Mapping

Mapping has already become one of the most competitive arenas online -- a visual version of local search. Barry posted earlier about how Microsoft wants to enable dynamic updating of online maps with traffic and other local data in real time. Last week, as I posted on my blog, the company announced the well-known acquisition of Vexcel corporation. Vexcel is a "remote sensing" and mapping company that enables, among other things, extremely high resolution aerial photography and 3-D mapping.

Microsoft is investing very heavily in maps and map-related technology. It sees mapping as an opening in its struggle against Google and now considers itself the technology leader in mapping. Virtual Earth, like Google and Yahoo!, has an API and the company is starting to license its product to companies like Zillow and YellowPages.com. Google remains ?ahead? in terms of the proliferation of its maps and use of its API. (According to Philipp Lessen, Google has started serving AdWords in Google Earth.)

Because of the importance of mapping both "generically" to consumers and as an entry point for local search, neither Google nor Yahoo! can afford to allow Microsoft to break out in this area. Thus I would expect to see more investment and an acceleration of product development in the near term.

Posted by Greg Sterling on May 8, 2006, 11:14 AM | Permalink


Expedia-Hosted Domains Spamming

SEO Black Hat reports that it appears Expedia France is spamming the search engines. What this appear to be are hosted spam pages on the expedia.fr domain name. If you do a search at Google for buy viagra you will currently notice that buyviagra.blog.expedia.fr is the 2nd result. There are many other examples of these pages, in fact, my blog has been denying comment spam from all sorts of Expedia France subdomains including homeequitylineofcredit.blog.expedia.fr. This may just be some sort of Expedia hack, where spammers buy the subdomain from Expedia, to do what they want with it.

Posted by Barry Schwartz on May 8, 2006, 10:01 AM | Permalink


Yahoo Unveils Public Details Of "Panama" Ad System Upgrade

Yahoo's finally gone public with details about its new "Panama" ad system upgrade, which when launched later this year will bring the system up to matching what Google's long offered, though both Yahoo and Google will remain behind Microsoft's third-generation ad platform "adCenter," launched last week. Details have leaked before, but now Yahoo's doing the talking directly.

The longer version of this article for Search Engine Watch members goes into more depth about where Yahoo has come from and how this system takes it to a new campaign-oriented system. It also looks at why Yahoo wants to hold off on third-generation features, for the moment, plus a little bit more explanation on some coming features.

You won't find the new system or features in place today. Instead, all that's happened today is that Yahoo is giving the many ad management companies and others who programmatically access the Yahoo system through APIs more information on how things will work, so they can start building support.

The system itself won't start changing until the third quarter of this year, sometime between July and September, Yahoo says. The switch will mean that you'll be able to build campaigns of multiple ads linked to multiple keywords. But the ranking system won't change. Those campaigns paying the most money per click will still come up tops first.

There's no timeline on when rankings themselves will shift to being more Google-like, where ads will show ranked based on a combination of clickthrough rate, the amount being bid and other factors. In fact, similar to Google, Yahoo's not saying what all the "quality" factors will be or how scores are ultimately determined. However, it does promise that the new system will make it easier to see the "ad quality" score for all your ads and campaigns.

What else is on tap? Better local targeting, for one. Pick a region of the US, and you'll be able to deliver ads to those either searching from that region or using common terms related to that region. Wildcard targeting, which exists now, will be made easier to use. New conversion tracking tools are to be offered, assuming you want to provide data to Yahoo.

Keep in mind that while I led off saying that Yahoo and Google are "behind" in features compared to Microsoft, that's not the case with the most important feature -- traffic. Ratings services such as comScore and NetRatings still show Google and Yahoo with much more audience than Microsoft. That's the primarily reason advertisers choose these services -- lots of good quality traffic.

Ultimately, as long as there is more demand than search inventory to go around (as is largely the case today), anyone with a major unique ad network is going to be successful. It only becomes a more zero sum game when there is more inventory than demand. That's when advertisers might become more selective and individual features may matter more.

Some additional coverage:

And the mailing to Yahoo's advertisers today:

The New Sponsored Search is Coming
Better Ways to Connect with Customers Will Make Your Advertising More Effective

You've told us your needs and we've listened. A completely redesigned search marketing platform is on its way, full of advanced, easy-to-use features that will help you better connect with Yahoo!'s vast and valuable audience.

As part of creating these enhancements, we met with advertisers of all sizes to hear first-hand the things they liked and didn't like about Sponsored Search. We extensively reviewed all parts of our service, including the design, features and tools. The result of these efforts is the new Sponsored Search, which will make its debut this Fall.

Powerful New Features
The new features that will make advertising with Yahoo! better and more effective include:

  • Easy-to-Use Control Panel
    A completely redesigned, easy-to-navigate control panel will help you see what's working and what's not--at the level of detail you choose--so you can take action and get even better results.
     
  • Fast Ad Activation
    Most new ads will go online within minutes, allowing you to connect with customers quickly, and easily make changes to your ads whenever you need to.
     
  • Ad Testing
    Easily test multiple versions of an ad to find the message that works best for your customers and provides the greatest return on your advertising investment. You can then choose to shift impressions to the ad that performs best.
     
  • Geo-Targeting
    Display your ads broadly or narrow your geographic distribution to better target your customers, customize your ads and control your costs.
     
  • Campaign Budgeting, Forecasting and Scheduling
    Create, budget and schedule individual advertising campaigns for greater control over your advertising strategy and spending. Review forecasts of your potential clicks based on your bids and budget and see how many clicks you're leaving to your competitors.
     
  • Visibility
    Understand how well your ads are performing relative to your competitors with the new Quality Index displayed for each ad. You'll also see the bid range necessary for premium placement at the top of the search results page.
     
  • Easy-to-Use Control Panel
    A completely redesigned, easy-to-navigate control panel will help you see what's working and what's not--at the level of detail you choose--so you can take action and get even better results.

Thoroughly Tested and Reviewed by Your Peers
These new features have been rigorously tested by your fellow advertisers and refined over time to ensure that we delivered a service that successfully addresses the obstacles you currently face. Judging by the overwhelmingly positive feedback we've received, we are confident that the new Sponsored Search not only clears away those obstacles, but offers new and better ways to manage your account.

Frequent and Detailed Communication with You
Beginning next month, we'll begin to provide you with much more detailed information about all of the upcoming enhancements. To make your transition as smooth and easy as possible, we will provide:

  • A series of emails with tips on how best to prepare your account
  • In-depth articles on our new features in the advertiser newsletter
  • A new Yahoo! Search Marketing blog--a community forum for tips, news and your comments, as well as the inside scoop from our own staff, to help you be more successful
  • A dedicated toll-free phone number that will be available to you during your transition period, for any questions or concerns you may have

This is just the first step. After all advertisers have successfully transitioned to the new Sponsored Search, we plan to quickly introduce many more innovative products, features and tools that will give you even more ways to connect with customers.

As always, thank you for doing business with us. We look forward to delivering the new Sponsored Search to you later this year.

And the Yahoo press release on the announcement:

Yahoo! to Launch New, More Powerful Search Advertising Platform

Company outlines plans to introduce easy-to-use customer interface, new forecasting features, enhanced testing and targeting capabilities, and quality-based ranking model

Burbank, Calif. May 8, 2006 ? Yahoo! Inc. (Nasdaq: YHOO), a leading global Internet company, today announced that it will begin rolling out a completely redesigned search advertising platform in the third quarter of this year to help businesses more easily connect to Yahoo!?s vast audience. In conjunction with the announcement, Yahoo! released the new search ad application program interfaces (APIs) designed to support the new platform. Replacing the original system that created the search advertising industry, Yahoo! new platform will enable marketers to more quickly launch search advertising campaigns across Yahoo! and its distribution network, and help achieve better overall return on their search advertising investment.

The new platform will be deployed on a country-by-country basis, with multiple phases within each market to help ensure a smooth transition for the hundreds of thousands of businesses that advertise with Yahoo! and to allow search engine marketers ample time to build upon Yahoo!?s new APIs. The first phase, building the core data platform and technologies, is near completion. The second phase will begin in the third quarter, when Yahoo! makes its new campaign management application and initial features accessible to advertisers. After the majority of advertisers have become familiar with the new features in a given market, Yahoo! will begin the third phase in that market, implementing a quality-based ranking model.

?We?ve designed our new platform to allow advertisers to reach Yahoo!?s audience through search as well as take advantage of advertising opportunities across all of our unique marketplaces, communications and social media assets,? said Steve Mitgang, Yahoo!?s senior vice president of advertising platforms and products. ?Yahoo!?s new technologies and features should encourage more participation in search advertising by making it easier for marketers to understand the performance of their campaigns and experiment more frequently with the medium.?

The new campaign management application was developed based on input from thousands of advertisers worldwide. The initial version will focus on overall ease-of-use in launching and managing campaigns, and providing greater visibility into campaign performance, coupled with more control over how to improve performance The new features and capabilities that will be available in the first version of the application include:

  • Intuitive Control Panel ? provides a simplified interface with user-tested navigation, allowing advertisers to easily understand their performance and providing them opportunities to modify or enhance campaigns every step of the way
     
  • Enhanced Geographic Targeting ? leverages Yahoo!?s WhereonEarth technology, which draws from 15 years of geo-targeting expertise to enable Yahoo! to more accurately understand and match to user search intent (?Soho, NY? versus ?Soho, London?) and colloquial terms (?restaurant near Fenway Park? is in central Boston, MA)
     
  • Fast Ad Activation ? provides a streamlined content review process that allows advertisers to launch most new ad campaigns in less than 30 minutes
     
  • Ad Testing ? supports automatic rotation of multiple versions of ads to determine the most effective, and, over time, displays the highest-performing ads more frequently
     
  • Visible Quality Index ? scores ads based on quality, bid and other relevance variables, and will be made visible to advertisers to enable them to gauge and optimize placement when the quality-based ranking model is implemented
     
  • Share of Clicks Forecasting ? displays data regarding the bid needed to achieve an estimated specific share of expected clicks, helping advertisers to set and reach traffic and conversion volume goals
     
  • Goal-Based Optimization ? enables advertisers to let Yahoo! automatically help find the least expensive way to meet their business goals-defined as Cost Per Acquisition or Return on Ad Spend
     
  • Assists ? shows advertisers the full value and contribution of every campaign by allowing them to see how ads drive both immediate and deferred conversions across multiple campaigns -- not just the last click that led to a conversion

?While the enhancements to our platform are dramatic and will provide immediate benefits to our advertisers, we ultimately rebuilt our system with the future in mind,? said Mitgang. ?Once the first version of the core platform is in place, we will be able to move quickly to build in capabilities that ultimately will provide search advertisers deeper access to Yahoo!?s more than 420 million users, broader advertising capabilities, proven targeting expertise and global distribution network.?

Future versions of the new platform will include additional distribution options and audience targeting based on factors that could include demographic information or online behavior, as well as additional ad formats enhanced with graphics or rich media.

For more information about Yahoo!?s current search marketing offerings, please visit: http://searchmarketing.yahoo.com.

Are you a Search Engine Watch member? Be sure to check out the longer version of this article!

Want to comment or discuss? Visit our Search Engine Watch Forums thread, Yahoo Announces New Search Advertising Platform Is Coming. See also Details On New Yahoo Paid Listings System for what's leaked before and New Look Coming For Yahoo Sponsored Search Listings and 10 Reasons Yahoo Should Kill Direct Traffic Center on issues some advertisers have with the existing system.

Posted by Danny Sullivan on May 8, 2006, 9:35 AM | Permalink


Microsoft To Map The World In Real Time?

The TechnologyReview.com has an interesting article explaining a project at Microsoft named SenseWeb, that will strive to enable Windows Live Local to have real-time mapping and local data. The real-time information, is reportedly going to be up-to-the minute on local gas prices, traffic flows, restaurant wait times, parking information and more. It is important to note that Yahoo maps have been offering real-time traffic reports since at least January 2005. I am interested to see how Microsoft will enable local gas prices, restaurant wait times and parking information into this system.

I personally rarely use Yahoo maps for local traffic data before driving anywhere. But would real-time traffic data be of use to you while you are driving? I suspect I would use it often if it were fully integrated into my GPS system. If it is not integrated into your GPS system or you do not have a GPS system, then maybe TrafficGauge makes sense for you - it is one nice review. I would suspect whatever Microsoft does with SenseWeb, they would have plans to integrate it into their GPS device.

Posted by Barry Schwartz on May 8, 2006, 9:30 AM | Permalink


Windows Live QnA In Action

The MSN Search Blog mentions the new Windows Live QnA service and also has a link to the MSN Spaces QnA blog that has details with screen shots of the new offering. So if you are interesting in taking a look at Microsoft's answer to Google Answers and Yahoo Answers, visit the QnA blog. We had a short brief on this new service on Friday.

Posted by Barry Schwartz on May 8, 2006, 9:13 AM | Permalink


Search Marketers: Jacks of Too Many Trades?

New research from iProspect and Jupiter Research suggests that search marketers aren't as focused as they could be, with most search marketers doing a lot of other unrelated tasks in addition to their core responsibilities. More about the study and its findings in today's SearchDay article, Study: Search Marketers Wear Too Many Hats.

Posted by Chris Sherman on May 8, 2006, 9:06 AM | Permalink


Microsoft Acquires DeepMetrix To Enhance adCenter Metrics

ThreadWatch release that shows Microsoft has purchased DeepMetrix, a Web analytics company. The purchase is to enable Microsoft to "deliver new Web analytics applications in future releases of Microsoft adCenter." Last year Google acquired Urchin, and then renamed it to Google Analytics in November and began AdWords integration soon after. Microsoft will possibly do the same.

Posted by Barry Schwartz on May 8, 2006, 9:01 AM | Permalink


New Way To Try Google Health (Maybe)

Garett Rogers reports and Philipp Lenssen reports on a what may appear to be some or all of Google Health, which we suspect will be coming this Wednesday. They both have screen captures of new query refinement that might be related to the expected lunch of Google health. I personally can't replicate it, but with some digging, Danny and I found a way for you to hit the underlying health filters.

Nico explains that he found a "Refine results" option when searching on a keyword. He snagged the HTML of the page and posted it here. Notice the additional filters:

+ Treatment
+ Research papers
+ From medical establishment
+ Symptoms
+ News
+ Alternative medicine.

Now, if you click on "Alternative medicine" you are taken here, where the query terms change to [migrane more:alternative_medicine] and not a simple search on alternative medicine. You can trigger these yourself, by adding these (i.e. more:condition_symptoms) type of elements to the query string.

It is also very interesting to note that in Philipp's post he showed that the link the Google Health result refinement takes you to is the same pattern as the refinement mentioned above. The URL he listed was "cx=disease_for_patients," which is the same as the one you get when you click on this.

So is this a sign of Google Health? Is it a sign of Google refinement OneBox results? Or is Google health using refinement filters?

Posted by Barry Schwartz on May 8, 2006, 8:23 AM | Permalink

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