June 1, 2006
Search Headlines & Links: June 1, 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:
From The SEW Blog...
- Daily SearchCast, June 1, 2006: New Online Ad Spending Record, Offline Print Ads Disappoint, Ask Debuts Impressive Blog Search, Clickfraud, the Google settlement and much & More!
Today's search podcast covers record new online ad spending while offline print ads disappoint, Ask launches impressive blog search with preview feature, a new AdSense API and Google Base used to generate Froogle feeds. Listen in as we talk about clickfraud, the Google settlement and much 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... - Google Settlement: Online Merchant Opting Out
The unfolding story of Radiator.com starts as the company began spending $1,000 per month on search ads, and grew the spend up to $20,000 at which point Google wrote a case study to help promote AdWords. Since they are reportedly a mid-sized company that "lives on data," there came a time to analyze the effectiveness of the campaign. They found that between Yahoo! and Google they were not turning a profit, and much of the problem was easily discovered as buying broad terms that stood little chance of converting. But it didn't end there. Analyzing the data, an outside firm... - Google Base Absorbs Froogle Feeds; Other Submission Systems Remain Independent
When I was at Google last this month, I got an update on Google Base for a forthcoming article. One of the things I was told was that Google Base was now the preferred way for merchants to submit content to Froogle. Really? Then why was Google still telling people on the Froogle site still to submit Froogle feeds? That oversight has now been corrected. As Garett Rogers notes, the feed submission mechanism formerly in the Google Merchant Center has now been replaced with Google Base submissions. Garett also highlights specific help pages about the change here. The consolidation is... - Offline Print Ad Experiment Disappointed Google
During an investor call held yesterday, Google's Jonathan Rosenberg mentioned the experiment in print ads "probably hasn't taken off as fast as we would like." The plan for future success is to seek the right combination of ideas with producers of magazines to find the format that can work. Eric Schmidt commented that it took several years for the successful model to crystalize online, and he is not detered from further development of offline print ad experimenting.... - MSN adLab Launches With a Variety of Keyword Tools
MSN first announced adLab back in January, but it has now been made available to everyone (in beta) with a wide variety of interesting keyword tools for advertisers and marketers. They have launched with 11 demos, broken down into areas Paid Search, Contextual Advertising, Behavior Targeting and Emerging Markets.... - AdSense API Launched for Developers
Developers with 100,000+ daily page views and users contributing content will now be able to offer a "one stop shop" for their content creators to sign up for AdSense while allowing developers to integrate and optimize their AdSense ads for them. And while doing so, developers could be eligible to earn not only a $100 referral bounty, but also a 15% revenue share which would be paid directly by Google.... - Yahoo Video Allows Uploads & Sharing
Yahoo Video, previously offering content found only by crawling the web, now has changed to also allow uploads from content owners, similar to services that YouTube and Google Video offer. I'm away at our SES London show, so I can't take a longer look at the service now. Instead, TechCrunch has a short review here and the press release is below. TechCrunch is disappointed that the product isn't integrated into Flickr. Putting video into Flickr is something that Yahoo's debating, they told me when I talked with them about upcoming changes last month. However, there's a concern that it might... - Ask Launches Blog & Feed Search
Nearly a year after acquiring Bloglines, Ask has rolled out a new blog & feed search that combines the best aspects of its web search engine with the intelligence it has gained from the thousands of Bloglines users who read blogs on a daily basis. The result is a terrific new search tool for the blogosphere?one that will appeal to heavy feed readers and casual searchers alike. More on the new service in today's SearchDay article, Ask Debuts Blog & Feed Search.... - Record New Online Ad Spend
The latest figures from PricewaterhouseCoopers and the IAB shows another quarter of tremendous growth in online ad spending. By now it has reached just about double the spend during the year 2000 before the tumble. Inside the numbers, search is going to be a fraction of that total spend since media placement with banners, email and affiliate marketing also are represented in "online ad spend" figures. Online ad spending shifted since the year 2000, to a better portion of it ending up with search than ever before. Tim Beyers of The Motley Fool helps us do the numbers with respect...
Other Things We Read, Didn't Blog But You Might Want To Read...
- Chinese excuses ? Terry Semel keeps digging his hole deeper, Jeff Jarvis
- Googleheads, Valleywag (watch and be amused or perhaps fearful).
- Krugle gets funding, programming code search engine gets funding.
- Sawafi gets new partner, Arabic region expected to grow as a result, and at the same time GMail now available in Arabic and Hebrew.
Posted by Detlev Johnson on June 1, 2006, 7:13 PM | Permalink
SideStep Adds Travel Guides Beta, Names SVP of Engineering
The battle of features in travel search continues with SideStep launching Travel Guides Beta. Most of the content is licensed from Frommer's with additional information courtesy of hotel partners. This launch by SideStep comes just about a month after the company announced its activities search.
Consistent with other travel search sites, Travel Guides is a stand alone section not heavily promoted in flight or hotel search. I think it's smart that SideStep, Kayak, and Mobissimo have kept their travel search engines squeaky clean, but there are natural synergies in stronger integration. As a first step, it's good to see a big 'Find a Room' button for some hotels in the Travel Guides. Unfortunately, I wasn't able to find similar booking options for any activities.
The content for Travel Guides is good...of course it is, it's Frommer's. However, there's room for improvement and SideStep definitely has to take advantage of more user friendly, Web 2.0 functionality to beef up the user experience. Here are some other quick notes:
-SideStep is a search engine, but there is no option in Travel Guides to search for Bouchon or Ghost Bar if you're headed to Vegas (for example).
-The map functionality will soon be upgraded to Mapquest's new platform (the sooner the better).
-There's no mashup between the map on a city page (here's New York City) and attractions or hotels as Farechase and Kayak provide.
-Frommer's is great, but where's the user generated content? SideStep should allow users to add their own ratings and reviews. At the very least, a partnership with TravelPost is in order.
In related news, SideStep named John Robison as SVP of Engineering. John was most recently the VP and GM of Yahoo's Premium Services Infrastructure, "playing an integral role in the development and support of Yahoo!'s technology and business infrastructure."
Posted by Brian Smith on June 1, 2006, 7:11 PM | Permalink
The Further Adventures of Pud
Philip "Pud" Kaplan, former steward of FuckedCompany.com, is stepping down as CEO of blog ad marketplace AdBrite to make room for a "hardcore business guy."
CNET had a story on it today painting Kaplan as a partying bungler sneered out of the room by the company's board. That's off-base he says, and I'd have to agree given that he remains chairman and will continue with the company in a product management role.
He told me in an email today, "Im not going anywhere. AdBrite had huge growth over the past six months and I wanted a hardcore business guy with experience & success to work here."
Taking over as CEO is Iggy Fanlo, former president of Shopping.com.
I wrote a feature last year comparing Kaplan with John Battelle, who runs a very different blog ad network. The two men have oddly parallel histories with digital media. They're like inverted reflections of one another.
Posted by Zachary Rodgers on June 1, 2006, 3:59 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)
AOL Experiencing System-wide Outages
AOL is right now in the midst of a massive, system-wide e-mail outage, ClickZ has learned. Word of the problem, complete with tales of AOL asking ESPs to stop sending mail to its users, is flying all around the INBOX event in San Jose, where our own Pamela Parker is speaking on a panel today.
It was confirmed by AOL spokesperson Nicholas Graham:
"Late this morning, an e-mail software issue started to cause delays in the sending and receiving of AOL e-mails for our members and AOL.com users. We are in the process of implementing a resolution and investigating its cause," Graham said. "All e-mails sent by AOL members and individual Internet users during this temporary hiatus will be delivered to email inboxes. During this time, some e-mails will be able to be sent and received intermittently."
Graham was unable to say whether the outages were caused by any kind of malevolent attacks, but AOL has certainly not been making friends lately with its CertifiedEmail program.
UPDATE: According to Graham, the outage lasted from 11 a.m. to 4 p.m., when millions of messages were stuck in a queue. All the affected messages were successfully delivered, and this "rare and isolated incident" will not impact users again, Graham said in a statement.
Posted by Kevin Newcomb on June 1, 2006, 3:10 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)
Daily SearchCast, June 1, 2006: New Online Ad Spending Record, Offline Print Ads Disappoint, Ask Debuts Impressive Blog Search, Clickfraud, The Google settlement And Much & More!
Today's search podcast covers record new online ad spending while offline print ads disappoint, Ask launches impressive blog search with preview feature, a new AdSense API and Google Base used to generate Froogle feeds. Listen in as we talk about clickfraud, the Google settlement and much 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:
- Record New Online Ad Spend
The latest figures from PricewaterhouseCoopers and the IAB shows another quarter of tremendous growth in online ad spending. By now it has reached just about double the spend during the year 2000 before the tumble. Inside the numbers, search is going to be a fraction of that total spend since media placement with banners, email and affiliate marketing also are represented in "online ad spend" figures. Online ad spending shifted since the year 2000, to a better portion of it ending up with search than ever before. Tim Beyers of The Motley Fool helps us do the numbers with respect... - Offline Print Ad Experiment Disappointed Google
During an investor call held yesterday, Google's Jonathan Rosenberg mentioned the experiment in print ads "probably hasn't taken off as fast as we would like." The plan for future success is to seek the right combination of ideas with producers of magazines to find the format that can work. Eric Schmidt commented that it took several years for the successful model to crystalize online, and he is not detered from further development of offline print ad experimenting.... - Ask Launches Blog & Feed Search
Nearly a year after acquiring Bloglines, Ask has rolled out a new blog & feed search that combines the best aspects of its web search engine with the intelligence it has gained from the thousands of Bloglines users who read blogs on a daily basis. The result is a terrific new search tool for the blogosphere?one that will appeal to heavy feed readers and casual searchers alike. More on the new service in today's SearchDay article, Ask Debuts Blog & Feed Search.... - Yahoo Video Allows Uploads & Sharing
Yahoo Video, previously offering content found only by crawling the web, now has changed to also allow uploads from content owners, similar to services that YouTube and Google Video offer. I'm away at our SES London show, so I can't take a longer look at the service now. Instead, TechCrunch has a short review here and the press release is below. TechCrunch is disappointed that the product isn't integrated into Flickr. Putting video into Flickr is something that Yahoo's debating, they told me when I talked with them about upcoming changes last month. However, there's a concern that it might... - AdSense API Launched for Developers
Developers with 100,000+ daily page views and users contributing content will now be able to offer a "one stop shop" for their content creators to sign up for AdSense while allowing developers to integrate and optimize their AdSense ads for them. And while doing so, developers could be eligible to earn not only a $100 referral bounty, but also a 15% revenue share which would be paid directly by Google.... - MSN adLab Launches With a Variety of Keyword Tools
MSN first announced adLab back in January, but it has now been made available to everyone (in beta) with a wide variety of interesting keyword tools for advertisers and marketers. They have launched with 11 demos, broken down into areas Paid Search, Contextual Advertising, Behavior Targeting and Emerging Markets.... - Google Base Absorbs Froogle Feeds; Other Submission Systems Remain Independent
When I was at Google last this month, I got an update on Google Base for a forthcoming article. One of the things I was told was that Google Base was now the preferred way for merchants to submit content to Froogle. Really? Then why was Google still telling people on the Froogle site still to submit Froogle feeds? That oversight has now been corrected. As Garett Rogers notes, the feed submission mechanism formerly in the Google Merchant Center has now been replaced with Google Base submissions. Garett also highlights specific help pages about the change here. The consolidation is... - Google Settlement: Online Merchant Opting Out
The unfolding story of Radiator.com starts as the company began spending $1,000 per month on search ads, and grew the spend up to $20,000 at which point Google wrote a case study to help promote AdWords. Since they are reportedly a mid-sized company that "lives on data," there came a time to analyze the effectiveness of the campaign. They found that between Yahoo! and Google they were not turning a profit, and much of the problem was easily discovered as buying broad terms that stood little chance of converting. But it didn't end there. Analyzing the data, an outside firm...
Posted by Detlev Johnson on June 1, 2006, 3:05 PM | Permalink
Google Click Fraud Settlement: Why One Online Merchant Is Opting Out
Radiator.com is a company spotlighted in a recent Associated Press article about the proposed settlement of a class action suit against Google over click fraud. Radiator.com Boiling over Bum Clicks from Multichannel Merchant takes a closer look at Radiator.com's experience with alleged click fraud and why the company plans to just say no to the settlement.
The story details how Radiator.com didn't feel Google took seriously its claims, ironically despite also having used the company has a success story for AdWords. From the article:
The result, Thys says, was a boilerplate e-mail message from Google?s quality enforcement team informing him that the company had concluded, after examining his data, that it had caught those bogus clicks before he was charged for them and therefore that he had no fraud credits coming. The message contained no itemized details about the data Thys had found suspect. ?They simply said, ?Thanks for the data, and by the way, our algorithms are smarter than you, and we?ve determined these clicks were filtered out already.??
To add insult to injury, the e-mail was signed simply ?Ray?. ?No last name, no phone number, no e-mail address,? Thys says. ?To me that was insulting. We were spending upwards of $20,000 a month with Google almost since they started selling PPC ads. We followed their reporting procedure. Getting that kind of result didn?t sit too well with me.
While opting-out of the settlement, the company has no plans to join another lawsuit or start a new one. Instead, it hopes for an expanded pay-per-call system, something Google is testing:
What would make Thys feel better about running performance ads on the big search engines?
?Calls,? he says. ?I?m begging for Google to expand their distribution network with pay-per-call.? His company has run a small program on the network operated by pay-per-call provider Ingenio and seen some good results. The model makes perfect sense for radiator.com, which after all began life as 1-800-Radiator and operates its own CRM call center.
Posted by Detlev Johnson on June 1, 2006, 12:29 PM | Permalink
Google Base Absorbs Froogle Feeds; Other Submission Systems Remain Independent
When I was at Google last this month, I got an update on Google Base for a forthcoming article. One of the things I was told was that Google Base was now the preferred way for merchants to submit content to Froogle. Really? Then why was Google still telling people on the Froogle site still to submit Froogle feeds? That oversight has now been corrected. As Garett Rogers notes, the feed submission mechanism formerly in the Google Merchant Center has now been replaced with Google Base submissions. Garett also highlights specific help pages about the change here. The consolidation is good, as Google Base is meant to be a central submission point of all content for Google, as I've written before (and SEW members, see also this). However, that goal still remains far off. Google Co-op, Google Sitemaps, Google Book Search and Google Scholar all remain independent ways to submit content of various types independently of Google Base, as the links for those services explain. I'll come back to this issue in more depth, in the future.
Posted by Danny Sullivan on June 1, 2006, 10:28 AM | Permalink
Offline Print Ad Experiment Disappointed Google
Google Fumbles Offline from BusinessWeek covers how during an investor call held yesterday, Google senior vice president of product management Jonathan Rosenberg mentioned the experiment in print ads "probably hasn't taken off as fast as we would like." The plan for future success is to seek the right combination of ideas with producers of magazines to find the format that can work. Eric Schmidt commented that it took several years for the successful model to crystalize online, and he is not detered from further development of offline print ad experimenting.
Posted by Detlev Johnson on June 1, 2006, 7:27 AM | Permalink
MSN adLab Launches With a Variety of Keyword Tools
MSN first announced adLab back in January, but it has now been made available to everyone (in beta) with a wide variety of interesting keyword tools for advertisers and marketers. They have launched with 11 demos, broken down into areas Paid Search, Contextual Advertising, Behavior Targeting and Emerging Markets.
7 more demos are listed as "coming soon", providing a teaser of what is to come, although no timeline is given for when they will be available.
Some tools will definitely be useful to advertisers, such as the Search Volume Seasonality Forecast, Search Funnel and Keyword Mutation Detection. Those in Local Search will want to check out the demo on Local Ads, which ironically uses Starbucks for their opening demo (along with an outdated notation about their Christmas Blend), although you can specify your own keywords.
Some interesting tools, and I am sure those in paid search will be watching closely to see if any of these are integrated more closely into Microsoft adCenter, and how Google and Yahoo will respond.
Posted by Jennifer Slegg on June 1, 2006, 6:58 AM | Permalink
AdSense API Launched for Developers
Developers with 100,000+ daily page views and users contributing content will now be able to offer a "one stop shop" for their content creators to sign up for AdSense while allowing developers to integrate and optimize their AdSense ads for them. And while doing so, developers could be eligible to earn not only a $100 referral bounty, but also a 15% revenue share which would be paid directly by Google.
For more details, see the AdSense Blog, AdSense API home, or JenSense.
Posted by Jennifer Slegg on June 1, 2006, 6:33 AM | Permalink
Yahoo Video Allows Uploads & Sharing
Yahoo Video, previously offering content found only by crawling the web, now has changed to also allow uploads from content owners, similar to services that YouTube and Google Video offer. I'm away at our SES London show, so I can't take a longer look at the service now. Instead, TechCrunch has a short review here and the press release is below. TechCrunch is disappointed that the product isn't integrated into Flickr. Putting video into Flickr is something that Yahoo's debating, they told me when I talked with them about upcoming changes last month. However, there's a concern that it might change the style or usage of Flickr too much and remains something the company is examining and debating. So stay tuned. The press release:
Yahoo! Debuts Next Generation Video Experience
Yahoo! Video combines search, upload and community, enabling publishers to be discovered by users everywhere in the world of online video
SUNNYVALE, Calif., June 1, 2006 - Yahoo! Inc., (Nasdaq: YHOO) a leading global Internet company, today introduced Yahoo! Video (http://video.yahoo.com), an online video destination that combines the power of Yahoo! Search with new upload, browse and community features. These new services, coupled with Yahoo!?s extensive and highly engaged global audience, uniquely position Yahoo! to deliver a comprehensive, entertaining online video experience to users and an unparalleled distribution platform to video publishers.
?As the video space continues to emerge, our strengths in search, content, personalization and community make it possible for Yahoo! to offer a highly engaging video experience for both users and publishers,? said Jason Zajac, general manager of social media. ?Yahoo! Video makes it easy for users to discover high quality content, while video creators can be discovered by the Web?s largest global audience.?
Yahoo! Video allows users to access the most popular and relevant videos on the Internet including Lazy Ramadi, The Glomp, and the latest Shakira music video. It brings together content in more ways than any other video Web site by crawling the Web, accepting uploads, receiving direct feeds from partners, and leveraging the Yahoo! Media Group?s unique content and industry relationships. As a leader in online video, Yahoo! already hosts and serves hundreds of millions of music, news, sports, movies, and television videos per month. Now, Yahoo! Video combines these assets with content from across the Web and directly from publishers, enabling users to determine what videos are most important to them:
? Featured, Popular, Category and Tag sections enable users to easily browse for videos.
? Users can subscribe to and watch channels, groups of videos related by source or topic, to stay current on content from their favorite publishers.
? Users can access the largest database of videos on the Web through Yahoo! Search
Additionally, Yahoo! Video enables users and video enthusiasts to participate in an active social community by rating, reviewing and sharing videos. Users can save videos to a ?My Favorites? section and then tag them, making retrieval easier. Friends can share content via Yahoo! Mail and Yahoo! Messenger. In addition, users can also share uploaded videos by embedding a version of a Yahoo! Video player with the video of their choice into their Web site or blog for the world to see.
Yahoo! offers video publishers the opportunity to be discovered by millions. Yahoo! Video empowers publishers with free tools and a platform to distribute their content and to create both individual identity and shared communities around video. Publishers can:
? Upload videos to Yahoo! Video, manage content, and track views and ratings through ?MyStudio?
? Build a publisher profile, create channels and establish an identity for the Web to discover
? Potentially have their videos featured on Yahoo! Video, within a Yahoo! property, or on the Yahoo! Homepage
About Yahoo!
Yahoo! Inc. is a leading global Internet brand and one of the most trafficked Internet destinations worldwide. Yahoo! seeks to provide online products and services essential to users' lives, and offers a full range of tools and marketing solutions for businesses to connect with Internet users around the world. Yahoo! is headquartered in Sunnyvale, California.
Posted by Danny Sullivan on June 1, 2006, 2:36 AM | Permalink
Ask Launches Blog & Feed Search
Nearly a year after acquiring Bloglines, Ask has rolled out a new blog & feed search that combines the best aspects of its web search engine with the intelligence it has gained from the thousands of Bloglines users who read blogs on a daily basis. The result is a terrific new search tool for the blogosphere—one that will appeal to heavy feed readers and casual searchers alike. More on the new service in today's SearchDay article, Ask Debuts Blog & Feed Search.
Posted by Chris Sherman on June 1, 2006, 12:01 AM | Permalink
