April 20, 2008 - April 26, 2008

April 25, 2008

Top 10 Toughest Jobs to Fill? The Top 3 Are In Search Engine Marketing

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Here's the best example of misleading statistics we've seen, outside of the ads skewering the mythical Cable Corp: "DirecTV - Cable Corp Inc. - Statistics" directed by Christopher Guest) "Whip up some numbers that make it look like we have, like, I don't know, a thousand HD channels."

Today the WSJ blogged about the hardest jobs to fill based on an annual employment survey conducted by temp firm Manpower Inc. We all agree with the famous German ad shown here, "Life is too short to be in the wrong job."

Not surprisingly, the very temp-to-perm jobs Manpower specializes in ended up high on the Top 10 list of the 42,500 global companies surveyed.

Based on the response to SEW Experts columnists Ron Jones (SEM.edu), Fionn Downhill, and William Flaiz, we know better.

In fact, rather than linking to all their columns about learning SEM or how to attract and hire talent, I asked John Skroly, vice president of business development for Onward Search what jobs Fortune 500 companies and top search marketing firms can't easily fill.

Here's what Skroly had to say:

Based on feedback from clients this is what we are finding:
1) Qualified Web Analytics professionals – Omniture, Web Trends etc
2) Organic SEO experts with e-commerce experience from top tier IR's (Internet retailers)
3) Paid Search with vertical experience

So what gives?

Manpower asked companies, "What is the one job you are having most difficulty filling due to a lack of available talent?" The categories were so broad they practically broke down into the age-old categories of white collar and blue collar:

1. Skilled Manual Trades (carpenters, welders and plumbers)
2. Sales Representatives
3. Technicians (production/operations, engineering and maintenance)
4. Engineers
5. Management/Executives
6. Laborers
7. Secretaries, PAs, Administrative Assistants & Office Support Staff
8. Drivers
9. Accounting & Finance Staff
10. IT Staff (primarily programmers/developers)

Do those jobs sound like the future of the American economy?

Has that been your experience? Discuss your career here.

Posted by Kevin Heisler on 4:00 PM | Permalink

Social Media Power: UC Berkeley Student Twitters Out of Egyptian Prison

CNN is reporting that Student James Karl Buck twittered his way out of jail with single-word text messages after being arrested. The "twit" (messages) communicated to his "tweeple" (friends) on micro blogging platform "Twitter," resulted in pals hiring a lawyer. Buck twittered all during the experience, the transcript of which is visible here. This is yet another case study speaking to the societal power of modern networking tools.

There is a lot of passion regarding Twitter in the search marketing community, with top SEOs/social media pros like Lee Odden and DoshDosh having dozens or even hundreds of "followers."

Respected link builder Jennifer Laycock has written extensively regarding applications of the platform. Others use Twitter (on their computer and/or phone) to stay in constant touch with family, customers and friends throughout each day. Twitter deployed recently in Japan with advertising in an attempt to leverage the channel. Stay tuned...

Other Twitter Resources:
The Many Uses of Twitter
techipedia

Twitter: Different Ways to Use Twitter
Lifehacker

200+ Internet Marketing Gurus on Twitter
Marketing Pilgrim

5 1 Favorite SU, Sphinn, Twitter & Facebook Posts of 2007
SocialDesire

Posted by Marty Weintraub on 12:39 PM | Permalink

Londoners faceoff online in support of their candidates for the Mayoral Election

If the popularity of Facebook fansites was an indicator of how Londoners will vote on May 1st then Boris would be a clear winner with 7466 supporters whilst Ken and Brian trail behind with 2152 and 2130 respectively. Thankfully it seems that Londoners will vote with their feet rather than faces but latest results from a social media study reveal that online PR strategies could count for something in the electoral race.

Nielsen Online revealed today that London Mayoral candidates Ken and Boris are top of the blogs, dominating 80% of the social media conversation. Liberal Democratic candidate Brian Paddick is third with 9% of comments, followed by the Green Party's Sian Berry with just under 4% and the BNP's Richard Barnbrook with 2%.

According to Alex Burmaster, Internet Analyst from Nielsen Online, Londoners penchant for social networking continues to thrive and users are taking their opinions mainly to non-political forums, blogs & message boards including those of national newspapers and sites like Twitter and Facebook.

“Ken and Boris are the two leading candidates, neck and neck in the polls and the levels of conversation in the social media space utterly reflect this. If conversation levels were a guide, Ken would narrowly pip Boris to win. However, it's when we look at the sentiment of these conversations that a far more interesting and revealing picture emerges.”

Controversy, positivity, negativity: sentiment towards the five leading candidates in social media

• Controversy: Boris is the ‘marmite' candidate – being the most likely of the top five to generate some form of opinion either way. Only 30% of posts relating to him were of ‘no opinion'

The Green Party's Sian Berry generates the least controversy / most apathy – having the highest percentage (54%) of ‘no opinion' posts

• Positivity: Whilst Boris is most likely to generate positive sentiment, 29% of posts being ‘positive' – Sian Berry had the highest overall ‘net' positive score of 15% (positive sentiment % minus negative sentiment %). Brian Paddick is the only other candidate to come out with a ‘net' positive score (11%)

• Negativity: Richard Barnbrook is most likely to generate negative sentiment, 38% of posts being ‘negative'. He also had the lowest overall ‘net' positive score of -19%

Indeed Nielsen's results seem to suggest that, shock horror, actually participating in blogs, forums and social media is effective in helping other people to form opinions on issues that affect them. The most active candidates online garnered a net positive score in total comments posted on social media sites. Brian Paddick employed a web ace, signed up to twitter, where he hosted a policy debate and also broadcasted himself via uStream.tv.

“Of the three leading candidates in the polls it's not surprising that Brian Paddick is the only one to have an overall positive sentiment score in social media. His campaign, involving a US web strategist firm, has focused the most heavily on social media including a pioneering British political use of sites like Twitter, Facebook and UStream.TV – and it certainly seems to have paid dividends.

However, judging from the sheer levels of social media conversation on the election, it may not be enough to grab victory over Boris or Ken. If social media were a crystal ball it might tell us Boris is likely to get more votes than Ken. However, positive comments on Boris more often centre on personality rather than policies and only time will tell if this is a strong enough factor for voters when faced with putting the cross in his box to change the status quo.”

So, positivity is not the cure for apathy and clearly Londoners like myself, vis-a-vis this post, whether online or on the underground, don't know what we really really want but we sure do love a good rant!

Posted by Jonathan Allen on 12:33 PM | Permalink

Q1 2008 Click Fraud Down from Last Quarter, Up from Last Year

Click Forensics has released data showing a decline in click fraud rates in the first quarter of 2008. The overall industry number came in at 16.3%, which is down 16.6% quarter-over-quarter but up 14.8% year-over-year.

Search engine content networks saw a higher average click fraud rate at 27.8%, which is down 28.3% from last quarter but, again, up from last year by 21.9%.

Botnet click fraud traffic was up 8% year-over-year.

Search engines are addressing the click fraud problem head on. Yahoo recently announced the provision of Click Filter Reports, which show advertisers the number of discarded clicks in their PPC campaign. The Sunnyvale search engine also announced a partnership with Click Forensics to address their click fraud woes. Lycos has announced a similar deal with Click Forensics.

Posted by Nathania Johnson on 11:45 AM | Permalink

So You Wanna Be a SearchMonkey?

Yahoo is creating some wide open spaces for web developers. This is no API playground, people. It's a zoo.

SearchMonkey will let developers go hog wild with search results. Simple links are so old school. Listings could now include photos, reviews, ratings and contact information via developer mashups. Want portability? You got it.

And if you don't want it, you should. Yesterday, I reported that search is integral in finding social media results that affect a consumer's opinion about brands. SearchMonkey should be a tremendous tool to help influence your online reputation.

The launch party for SearchMonkey is May 15th. Here are the details:

When:May 15, 2008, 5:30 – 8:30 p.m.

Where:Yahoo! Headquarters – Url's CafÃ©, 701 First Ave, Sunnyvale, CA 94089

RSVP: Register at upcoming.org AND send your full name and company name to searchmonkeyevent@yahoo-inc.com. Space is limited.

Posted by Nathania Johnson on 10:24 AM | Permalink

T-minus 1 Day: Last Minute Rhetoric from Microsoft and Yahoo

On yesterday's earnings call, Chris Liddell, Senior VP and CFO, affirmed recent statements by Steve Ballmer to focus on the online advertising market. He said that the strategy was based on three pillars:

To drive innovation and search

To increase value to advertisers and publishers

To grow user engagement across MSN and Windows Live properties

Liddell said that Yahoo would accelerate that strategy. But later, he made this statement:

We've yet to see tangible evidence that our bid substantially undervalues the company. In fact we see the opposite.
Yahoo continues to lose search share and profitability continues to decline year-on-year. The results that they announced on Tuesday were in line with the guidance that they gave on their last earnings call on January 29, after which their stock price closes at $19.05 and Wall Street analysts' consensus on value was significantly decreased.

Just how is Microsoft expected to accomplish their three pillars if Yahoo is as awful as they say?

Perhaps Liddell and Ballmer are beginning to ponder that exact question. Earlier this week, Ballmer suggested that Microsoft would go forward without a merger. During yesterday's call, Liddell suggested that an alternative to Yahoo's “no” is to withdraw the proposal.

Meanwhile, Yahoo remained consistent in what they've been saying all along – that they're worth more than Microsoft's original offer. Speaking on Yahoo's earnings call on Tuesday, CEO Jerry Yang reinforced his confidence in the overall value of his company:

Yahoo! has a unique and valuable combination of assets that include our global brand, our large worldwide audience, our leadership in online advertising, our strategic positions in Asia, our mobile and emerging market franchises, and our scales, tools, and technology.

Yang stated that Yahoo's Q1 revenues were particularly remarkable in the light of uncertainty caused by Microsoft's unsolicited offer. He also said that Yahoo remains open to its options, including a deal with Microsoft.

Then Yang zeroed in on what he felt was his most important statement on the matter:

If you take only one thing away from this brief discussion, I hope it will be that our board and management are committed to choosing a path to maximize stockholder value and will not enter into any transaction that does not recognize the full value of this company.

Tomorrow, the ultimatum comes. Decisions will be made and actions will be taken. But the rhetoric still has just begun.

Posted by Nathania Johnson on 9:54 AM | Permalink

Microsoft Earnings Key Takeaways: Where's the Search?

The biggest acquisition news yesterday wasn't Microsoft-Yahoo but Arby's-Wendy's. In both cases, search marketers are asking, "Where's the beef?"

Better yet, analysts on the Microsoft conference call should have asked, "Where's the search?"

Microsoft search queries and page views are up year-over-year. By how much? No Wall St. analysts asked the question.

Microsoft reported $4.4 billion in net income for the quarter.

Microsoft's online services business increased revenue 40 percent to $843 million, including $143 million from aQuantive, which added 96 new publishers this quarter to the Atlas Publisher Solutions, the ad management platform that competes with Google's DoubleClick division.

Online advertising for Microsoft grew 39 percent. If aQuantive ad revenue ($47 million) is excluded, Microsoft was up 29 percent. Microsoft's online audience is still growing. Live IDs increased to 18 percent to 448 million.

Microsoft remains focused on the online advertising market (doubling by 2010 to $80 billion).

Yahoo would accelerate growth but the core strategy won't change: drive innovation and search, increase value to advertisers and publishers through innovation and scale and grow user engagement across MSN and Windows Live properties.

The weak U.S. dollar may be Microsoft's best friend. While about half of Google's revenue comes from the U.S., two-thirds of Microsoft's revenue is derived from users abroad. In addition, about 15 percent of revenue is in high-growth emerging markets.

Microsoft's strategy of reinvesting existing business, pursuing organic and acquisition growth opportunities makes the company a formidable competitor with or without Yahoo - except in search.

Posted by Kevin Heisler on 7:43 AM | Permalink

April 24, 2008

ComScore CEO Fires Back at Google, Wall St, and Bloggers

Google CEO Eric Schmidt took an indirect shot at comScore paid click data during Google's (stellar) Q1 earnings call this week, referring to the inaccuracy of "third party data" that led Wall St. analysts to reduce earnings estimates for Google based on softness of the paid search advertising market.

This afternoon, comScore CEO Dr. Magid Abraham fired back, defending the validity and accuracy of comScore aggregation of Google paid click data.

"When Google announced strong Q1 earnings last week, some financial and media analysts wrote that comScore's reports of slowing growth in Google's paid clicks missed the mark. That conclusion is patently false," said Abraham in a statement to the press. "Following several historical quarters of strong sequential domestic revenue growth (including the seasonally equivalent Q1 2007), Google's Q1 2008 revenue growth was essentially flat, which represented a significant change for Google's domestic business."

The trend comScore identified shows the relationship between comScore's domestic paid click trends compared to Google's domestic revenue trends.

comscore%20google%20paid%20clicks.jpg

The comScore chart isn't a "perfect correlation" because comScore doesn't account for changes in Google's average CPC (cost-per-click). Nor does comScore data include paid clicks from partner sites (AOL, Ask, Washington Post) or from the AdSense network, where Google paid out $5.4 billion to publisher sites in 2007 based on Google Content Advertising click volume.

Abraham warns (analysts) against extrapolating from a single data point. That's excellent advice for bloggers as well.

Earlier, comScore provided an apples-to-apples comparison of the data sets. Google doesn't release specifics on paid click data or partner revenue. Nor does the search engine giant provide guidance to Wall St. analysts.

The key takeaway: only Google can verify the accuracy of comScore data, and Google will never do so. So third party data (such as Google Analytics) is crucial for marketers to track.

Google paid click data for comScore did not include international paid search click data so Google's strong global growth (supported by comScore research on increased paid search spending in non-U.S. markets)

Posted by Kevin Heisler on 4:47 PM | Permalink

We Still Don't Rely on Video Search

While video content continues to skyrocket, people still don't rely on video search. Over half of people, in a recent ClipBlast! survey, said they find videos through their own exploration (53%) or recommendations from others (52%).

However, a sizeable amount (40%) searched for specific videos. What's surprising are the differences based on sex, as 45% of males searched while 35% of females did so.

There was a racial divide reported too: nearly 60% of non-Whites and 35% of Whites reported search activity. It's hard to say why there's such a spread, even accounting for survey size.

Bucking the tide, the youngest adults didn't search videos the most. Some 66% of 25-34 year-olds searched more, as compared with 48% for 18-24; 39% for 35-44; and 28% for 45-54 year-olds.

Other forms of video findability were lower, including 18% following online recommendations from people they didn't know; 10% via unsolicited email; and 9% via email or RSS feeds.

For now, browsing and sharing are still more important than searching videos. As new and better approaches emerge, perhaps these behaviors will shift.

Survey Details: Synovate conducted this research for ClipBlast! between March 3-5, and reached 1,000 adults through their national online panel.

Posted by on 3:30 PM | Permalink

Ballmer Wears Poker Face in Advance of Ultimatum Deadline

Yahoo earnings? What Yahoo earnings? Steve Ballmer doesn't seem to care about no stinking Yahoo earnings. Or their Google Adwords test. Or their three year revenue projections. Or their talks with Time Warner. Or forming the OpenSocial Foundation with Google. Or planning to make IndexTools free (like Google analytics).

Ballmer wants Yahoo at $31 a share and that's that. He's talking tough, saying he'll go forward without a merger. But almost no one believes him. Analysts still think the bid will be raised to anywhere from $32 to $34-ish per share.

Which brings us to Jerry Yang. He's got a poker face too, according to the analysts. Yahoo has already said No to Microsoft's bid and then issued a reminder after Ballmer's eviction notice. But many think Yahoo will indeed go for the sale should the bid be increased.

Increase or no increase, Wall Street seems to want this deal to go through. Unlike Google, Yahoo's positive earnings were followed by loss on stocks on the Street. Though Google is a pesky reminder that Wall Street doesn't always know what it's talking about.

Culture clashes could cause huge problems for Ballmer's goal of giving Google a run for its money. And, this will be especially true if it turns out that there is no bluff to call.

Posted by Nathania Johnson on 11:13 AM | Permalink

Study: Search Plays Key Role in Brand Loyalty, Customer Care Research

A new study about social media customer care had some interesting finds about how search factors into brand loyalty. While 59.1% of study participants use social media to vent about customer experience, 90% said search was valuable in finding information about customer care.

This data is among the initial findings of a new study conducted by the Society for New Communications Research entitled, “Exploring the Link Between Customer Care and Brand Reputation in the Age of Social Media.”

“This study indicates that there is a growing group of highly desirable consumers using social media to research companies: 25- to 55-years old, college-educated, earning $100,000+ - a very powerful group in terms of buying behavior,” said Dr. Ganim Nora Barnes, senior fellow, Society for New Communications Research. “These most savvy and sought after consumers will not support companies with poor customer care reputations, and they will talk about all of this openly with others via multiple online vehicles. This research should serve as a wake-up call to companies: listen, respond, and improve.”

Customer care was a key determinant in brand loyalty.

• 72.2% of respondents research companies' customer care online prior to purchasing products and services at least sometimes
• 84% of respondents consider the quality of customer care at least sometimes in their decision to do business with a company
• 74% choose companies/brands based on others' customer care experiences shared online
• 84% of respondents consider the quality of customer care in their decision to do business with a company at least sometimes
• 81% believe that blogs, online rating systems and discussion forums can give consumers a greater voice regarding customer care, but less than 33% believe that businesses take customers' opinions seriously

“With consumers increasingly using social media to share feedback on their care experiences, it has become increasingly difficult for businesses to ignore or hide from bad experiences,” said Lynda Kate Smith, vice president, Care Business, Nuance Enterprise Division. “As this research highlights, the consumer's voice is louder and travels further than ever before. One poor customer interaction can have a very significant impact on a public impression of a brand.”

If you want examples of how to do it right, look to Dell and Amazon. They were cited more frequently than any other company in using social media to respond to customer care issues. Breaking it down by industry, technology, retail, and travel companies were reported as doing it well, but utilities, health care, and insurance have some catching up to do in the brand loyalty department.

Posted by Nathania Johnson on 10:27 AM | Permalink

Yahoo! Local Adds Dynamic Radius Circle to Maps

Yahoo Local has added a nifty little feature that lets you interact with their maps. Their new dynamic radius circle helps you narrow down the area that you are searching in.

When you're on Yahoo Local, look on the right side of your results for a map. Click “Expand Map.” Then you can drag the circle around, as well as zoom in and out.

The only thing I didn't like is that when you zoom in, the circle stays in proportion to the page instead of expanding or contracting with the zoom on the map.

Here's a screenshot of a search for “coffee” in Washington, DC:

Posted by Nathania Johnson on 9:49 AM | Permalink

Dogpile.com Updates Search Algorithm, Design and Content

Dogpile.com has been doing a little spring cleaning and has come out the other end with an updated search algorithm, design and new partner content. Don't worry. Arfie, the cute spotted Dogpile mascot, still greets you on the homepage.

Here's what to expect from Dogpile's updates

• Improvements in the blending of results
• Tabbed search categories on the home page
• The launch of a SearchSpy social networking widget for Netvibes or iGoogle
• Deep links (think Google sitelinks)
• Integrated content from new partner agreements

“Search is now the primary focus at InfoSpace and we are committed to enhancing Dogpile.com, our flagship site,” said Mark Whidby, director, search product management of InfoSpace, Inc. “We've listened to our users and have conducted additional research to bring them an enhanced search experience at Dogpile. We look forward to continuing to upgrade the site and offering our users improved features and technology.”

Posted by Nathania Johnson on 8:44 AM | Permalink

Yahoo's Adwords Test Continues, Raises Justice Dept's Eyebrows

After reporting great success with the test of Google Adwords, Yahoo's test continues. But that's making a few people in Washington just a little bit nervous. It seems the Justice Department is checking into the all-too convenient relationship to see if there's any antitrust violations going on.

The test is slated to run just two weeks and was reported to the Justice Department in advance, according to Reuters. The first week brought great results, according to Yahoo. Though, the timing of the announcement is surely mangled up in the whole Microsoft-unsolicited-bid fiasco. With the test ending at around the same time as Microsoft's ultimatum, it's no wonder we heard about the success early.

Posted by Nathania Johnson on 8:32 AM | Permalink

Google Launches Mobile Image Ads

Google has announced the addition of images to their mobile ad service. They compare the ads to a smaller version of desktop web pages. The ads run on the mobile content network.

Only one image ad per mobile page will be displayed. Google says the ads will be great for branding and have shown solid clickthrough rates.

Google assured mobile users that the ads will be relevant and unobtrusive. Contextual targeting will be used to place the ads and they hope that only one ad per page will be acceptable to mobile web surfers.

Posted by Nathania Johnson on 8:19 AM | Permalink

April 23, 2008

Google Says ‘No' to Ecocho

Last week, we reported the launch of Ecocho, a custom search engine that promises to plant up to 2 trees for every 1,000 searches. Users could choose to search either Yahoo or Google in their quest to help the planet.

But just one day after Earth Day, word has come that Google isn't so cool with Ecocho's modus operandi. It seems the mission of the green-minded site doesn't jibe with Google's Adsense policy, which prohibits the compensation of third parties through the promise of performed searches.

Searchers can still embark on “green” searches using Yahoo via Ecocho, and now there's even a “black version,” meaning it displays a dark background (and not a niche search site for African-Americans), which some think uses less energy.

Posted by Nathania Johnson on 11:37 AM | Permalink

Twitter Expands to Japan, Includes Ads

Popular social media network, Twitter, has announced its expansion to Japan. But this time, ads will be rolled out with the launch of the service. The Twitter blog said that users will see “media from two clients.” So far, it seems as though the Japanese ads are display ads placed on the Twitter site, while rumors of contextual ad testing in the US have creeped up on blogs in recent weeks.

Part of Twitter's appeal is social search. Users are finding that asking their followers for recommendations often yields better or quicker results than using a search engine.

Twitter as a utility offers only limited search – providing users the ability to search user names and locations for keywords. But third-party applications like Tweetscan enable searching actual tweets for keywords.

It will be interesting to see if any search functions will eventually include the inevitable contextual ads and if social aggregators such as FriendFeed will end up including them in their search results as well.

For now, it's just hurry up and wait.

Posted by Nathania Johnson on 11:14 AM | Permalink

New Yahoo Feature Reports Number of Discarded Clicks

Yahoo has been throwing out bad clicks on search ad campaigns, but now a new feature will give further insight into those clicks. The new “Click Filter Report” will show how many bad clicks Yahoo is discarding.

Users can customize the report to display the data across various metrics including time, impressions, invalid clicks and average cost-per-click. Additionally, data can be viewed across an entire account or by individual campaign.

Using the report in conjunction with third-party analytics (or the forthcoming IndexTools?) will help you should you need to submit a “click investigation report.”

To access the report, click on the “Reports” tab, then go to “Traffic Quality Reports” and select “Click Filter.”

Yahoo says it typically discards 12-15% of all clicks, but advises that the mileage may vary from one ad campaign to another.

Posted by Nathania Johnson on 10:38 AM | Permalink

212 Interactive Advertising Club Tonight: Kevin M. Ryan on Search

212%20ad%20club.jpg

If you're in Manhattan tonight (or even in Weehawken, NJ for the SEMPO Board meeting) stop by Ogilvy Worldwide HQ at 6pm and meet up with the 212 Interactive Ad Club. SEW Expert Kevin M. Ryan, VP & Global Content Director for Search Engine Strategies, is the featured speaker on search marketing.

212 is NYC's forum for ad agencies and publishers to interact, network and learn. Some events are for members only; others are free and open to the public. This one's free and open to all marketers and publishers.

Here's an excerpt from the 212nyc.org site promoting the event:

Back by popular demand, Kevin Ryan returns to share his unabashed, unedited and uncensored views on search marketing. In addition to the latest research on blended search results and listing multiplicity, Kevin will cover the differences between Paid Search, Paid Inclusion, and SEO and how to effectively incorporate search into your marketing program.

When: 6:00 PM - 8:00 PM
Where: Ogilvy Worldwide Headquarters
309 West 49th St.

Membership in 212 is open to all advertising agency or online publishing professionals, as well as related technology vendors and research companies in the New York area.

Posted by Kevin Heisler on 10:37 AM | Permalink

Microsoft Goes Deep with Search Results, Competes with Google's Sitelinks

The team at Live Search as announced the addition of a deep links feature to its search results. Similar to Google's Sitelinks, the feature lists prominent internal links for the #1 result on certain searches.

I did a comparison of this feature for both Live Search and Yahoo. My first search is for the “State Department.”

As you can see, Live Search lists the deep links in a single column, indented underneath the home page of the State Department's website.

While Google lists more results in 2 columns, and offers a search within a search box underneath the Sitelinks.

Next, I did a search for Starbucks. Live Search listed a paid search link, followed by local listings and then served up the first organic results with deep links. It's pretty far down on the page, especially since the closest Starbucks to me is not one of the three local listings provided by Live Search. Also, it provides Related Searches on the Sidebar, one of which is a search for a link provided in the deep links.

Google had a much more simple results page for Starbucks. The paid search ads are only on the sidebar and you get to the corporate Starbucks website right away.

For the most part, Google seems to turn up more Sitelinks than Live Search. Also, Google provides Sitelinks for sites that Live Search doesn't. Searches for both “Search Engine Watch” and “Nike” both returned Sitelinks in Google but no deep links in Live Search.

Posted by Nathania Johnson on 9:27 AM | Permalink

Turning Sensationalized Content into a Resource

Over the past couple of weeks, I've talked in-depth about types of blog content, and types of social media content.

One interesting observation was that on generic social media sites such as Digg and Reddit, Resource/Educational content typically doesn't perform as well as Sensational/Entertainment type content does.

On the other hand, after the initial burst of traffic to Sensationalized/Entertainment pieces via social media, traffic typically declines to very low levels, while Resource/Educational based content tends to maintain much more stamina over prolonged periods of time.

Of course, Resource/Educational posts typically take much more time to create, often to the point of seeming prohibitive to many small and medium sized businesses.

Solution:
Launch with a fun News or Sensationalized/Entertainment type post to attract lots of traffic initially, and recruit the readers gained through the social media success of this post to add much more content ... hopefully to the point where the post becomes a resource.

Sometimes this is possible organically, but other times an incentive must be given. Incentives not always need be financial either. Some additional ideas are:
a. limited recognition (acknowledge their contribution)
b. links (link to the contributor's blog or site)
c. coupons (offer coupons for products
d. interviews with the person (if the reader appears very knowledgeable, perhaps award an interview)

Wouldn't it be great if we could transition a post from a Sensational piece to a Resource piece using little of our own time. Well, it can be done, and here's how.

At the end of your Sensationalized piece, ask the readers for more examples on the same topic (you may find that you want to reward people to do so). In any case, as social media readers contribute and add more resources, the piece becomes more of a resource. Ultimately, if it was a top 10 list to begin, and ends with 100 ... it has now become a tremendous resource.

Posted by on 7:00 AM | Permalink

Forget Google's 20% Jump, Baidu UP 78% In Month

The strength of Chinese search engine Baidu in the Asian market - beating Google in the valued China market - has been reflected in investor confidence it seems. While Google made back some of their recent drop in value, it is the 78% rise in Baidu over the past month that is truly impressive.

The Motley Fool asks "Do You Believe in Baidu?" And seem to present a good argument to do so.

"Baidu has been on the move in many ways, expanding outside its search engine stronghold with recent forays into instant messaging, consumer auctions, online games, and even a bold leap into the mature yet lucrative Japanese search engine market," they report.

Nice to see another engine growing in a Google like manner, both financially and corporately.

Posted by Frank Watson on 1:03 AM | Permalink

April 22, 2008

Ebay Suing Craigslist For 'Diluting Investment' In Company

Minority interest holder, EBay is taking Craigslist to court for actions that have yet to specify have "diluted" their investment, the New York Times reported.

NYT reported:

“The recent actions by the Craigslist directors have disadvantaged eBay and its investment in Craigslist,” said Mike Jacobson, eBay's senior vice president and general counsel, in a written statement. “Since negotiating our investment with Craigslist's board in 2004, we have acted openly and in good faith as a minority shareholder, so we were surprised by these recent unilateral actions. We are asking the Delaware court to rescind these recent actions in order to protect eBay's stockholders and preserve our investment.”

Sort of like the Coke commercial. What actions will be interesting to know given the wise stewardship the Craigslist officers have shown over the years. Though their continued mainly free service may not be popular with investors, it is a well-used and enjoyed destination for many web users.

Posted by Frank Watson on 11:58 PM | Permalink

Google Retains Top Brand, Microsoft Third

For the third straight year, Google has topped Millward Brown's annual ranking of top international brands, with Microsoft coming in third behind GE. The 2008 Brandz report reflected a growth of technology companies growing recognition.

This global survey "measure(s) the intangible value of a brand using customer interviews, market data and financial information," SFGate.com stated.

Posted by Frank Watson on 11:29 PM | Permalink

Google Sued for Ad Fraud; Another Class Action Settlement?

Today Google was slapped with a an advertising fraud lawsuit that will be fascinating – and important – for AdWords advertisers to watch.

The lawsuit, which seeks class action status, was filed by the firm of Kabateck Brown Kellner, on behalf of David Almeida, a Massachusetts-based private investigator. The lawsuit claims that Google defrauds advertisers by obscuring the fact that new AdWords campaigns are set by default to display ads on both Google's search results pages (and like pages served by partners like AOL) and pages owned by site publishers who display AdWords ads via Google's Adsense programs.

Readers of my weekly SEW Content Advertising column are familiar with this phenomenon, and my suggested best practice of creating separate search and content campaigns.

At the risk of making life harder for my friends at Google, I need to point out that the suit seems to get one important fact wrong. Reports today in CNET, Yahoo! Finance, Wired and other outlets imply that advertisers are presented with the ability to “opt out” of displaying ads on the content network during campaign creation. Here's the way Yahoo puts it:

“During this process, users encounter two adjacent boxes. Into the first, customers enter the amount they wish to pay per "click" of an ad displayed on Google.com. The second box is marked "optional." Into this box, a user can enter the amount they would be willing to pay per "click" of an ad appearing on a third party web page. But leaving the box blank does not prevent ads from appearing on third-party sites.”

The truth is, advertisers don't see this option during campaign creation. The only way for them to opt out of displaying ads on the content network is for advertisers to explicitly edit the settings of their campaign after creating it, and un-check the box labeled “Content Network” – which is checked by default. Some would reason this makes Google even more exposed to fraud charges.

Another irony: some of the reporting claims the content network is inherently flawed in some way. Here's how Yahoo! puts it:

“Ads on third-party sites are widely-acknowledged to be far less effective (and therefore less valuable to the advertiser) than ads on Google.com.”

Readers of my column know that the content network is not “less effective;” savvy advertisers realize that great, profitable results can be obtained by advertising on content sites. The rules and best practices for creating effective content campaigns are, however, much different than for search campaigns. To Google's credit, they've been trying to make these differences more clear.

I'll dig into this subject more deeply in the next installment of my column. Meanwhile, my predictions, no matter which way the lawsuit is decided:

1. Google will finally make opting out of the content network much more straightforward, with clear instructions during campaign creation.

2. Google's advertiser education efforts, via their tutorials and help files, will much more explicitly teach the differences search and content ad campaign best practices.

Posted by David Szetela on 7:53 PM | Permalink

Yahoo Earnings Beat Estimates

Yahoo reported its quarterly earnings today, beating previous analyst estimates. It's probably the most important earnings report Yahoo has ever had to make, since a weak showing would almost certainly lead investors to agree to a speedy acquisition by Microsoft at its current $31 per share offer.

Yahoo reported $121 million operating income on $1.35 billion in net revenues. Earnings per share of $0.11, above $0.09 estimates.

"We believe we can significantly accelerate our revenue growth, return to our historically high margins, and double our operating cash flow by 2010," co-founder and CEO Jerry Yang said in a statement. "This quarter's solid performance underscores the fact that we are executing on that plan. Yahoo! is beginning to realize the benefits of the very substantial and deliberate long-term investments we've made to capitalize on the opportunities ahead in display and to recapture momentum in search.”

Microsoft's three-week ultimatum to Yahoo expires this weekend. After that point, Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer has said the gloves will come off, and Microsoft will take its case directly to shareholders in a proxy fight.

Yahoo is still not out of the woods, since its full-year revenue guidance remains the same, though its operating income guidance was upped by $50 million.

Ballmer already began minimizing the importance of Yahoo's earnings before they were even reported. "We think we can accelerate our strategy by buying Yahoo and will pay what makes sense for our shareholders," Ballmer said earlier today at an MSN launch event in North Africa. "I wish Yahoo all the success with its results but it doesn't affect the value of Yahoo to Microsoft."

Posted by Kevin Newcomb on 4:30 PM | Permalink

GreenDimes & Google Earth Gang Green: Sic Google Transit Gloria Mundi

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Happy Google Earth-A-Palooza Day! As the search engine with the biggest carbon footprint on the planet, Google celebrates Earth Day with more green than a Green Day concert.

But first, GreenDimes of Palo Alto, CA, will help you stop junk mail and earn cold hard cash: $1.00 USD.

Go to GreenDimes, the largest full-service company that removes you from catalog mailing lists and gets rid of junk mail. Fill out the online form, save trees, and earn a dollar. It's that easy. To date, GreenDimes has stopped 3.5 million pounds of waste paper. (Shhhh, don't tell the DMA.)

Google Transit is now available in 9 new cities: San Francisco, CA; Denver, CO; Millwaukee, WI; Ann Arbor and Holland, MI; Kansas City, MO; Framingham and Cape Cod, MA; and the entire state of Rhode Island (RI).

Google Transit in Google Maps allows users to find info on public transportation. Public transit directions appear as an alternative to driving directions. Bus stop, subway and train station icons will do the Googlescape. Google Transist currently provides data for more than 50 agencies in 9 countries, including nearly 40 in the United States.

Web 2.0 start-up Hop-Stop just hit the 1.5 million monthly visitor mark.

To celebrate Earth Day: The Energy Saver gadget for Google Desktop. This gadget enables and optimizes power management settings on PCs, euthanizing them when not in use:

Google SketchUp has launched a new Web site for green design professionals, with a case study from Michelle Kaufmann Designs.

Google for Educators offers recommendations for teachers who want to use Google Earth and Maps to teach about environmental issues in the classroom.

Google's Green Energy Czar, Bill Weihl, rallies the troops and helps others go green on Google's blog. We like to think of Bill as the leader of Google Gang Green.

Posted by Kevin Heisler on 3:34 PM | Permalink

Google Xooglers Launch Social Search Engine Mechanical Zoo

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Everyone knows that the Google search engine no longer wants to be a social donut.

But the first true social search engine may have already escaped the innovation machine at the Googleplex.

CNET reporter Stefanie Olsen scooped the industry on the launch of Mechanical Zoo, a stealth search engine currently in alpha with several hundred users.

Led by Nathan Stoll, former product lead of Google News, Mechanical Zoo may launch in beta as early as May, 2008. Search Engine Watch readers may remember Stoll's Google News presentation at SES San Jose in 2005.

San Francisco-based Mech Zoo was co-founded by Max Ventilla, a former Google business development manager; and computer scientist Damon Horowitz, former lead engineer of Perspecta, a search software firm. Former Google Firefox app-security engineer Fritz Schneider, is on staff.

Ex-Yahoos joined the team, too: Winton Davies, (Yahoo Research Labs), and Bob Zoller (Yahoo 360).

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Sep Kamvar, founder of search technology company Kaltix (sold to Google) is an adviser.

Mechanical Zoo is building products that enable "social search" by accessing the knowledge of people in your network. It's not too far from the old Bebo space.

Their plan is to develop several experimental offshoots built around their core technology.

The 12-man team is looking for a few good people. So what skills would you need? AJAXy web development; rapid prototyping and development with rails; new paradigms of data availability and access (OpenSocial); distributed systems and large datasets; statistics; algorithms; NLP and machine learning; recommendation systems; usability research; online community building; and data-driven marketing.

Sounds like there's more than a one-trick pony search engine at the Mechanical Zoo.

Posted by Kevin Heisler on 12:03 PM | Permalink

Nielsen Releases March 2008 U.S. Search Data

We've already seen the numbers from Hitwise, Compete, and comScore. Now it's Nielsen's turn to serve up its March 2008 data for top U.S. search providers.

Google, of course, took the top spot with 58.7%, up 25.5% year-over-year. Yahoo came in second at 18.1%, a decline of 4.5% year-over-year. MSN rolled into third with 12%, a 36.6% increase while AOL experienced a decrease of 19.4% to get just 4.1% of the market. Ask.com came in at just 2.4% but that's a 52.4% increase from last year.

Here's the big breakdown/comparison for each of the top 5:

Google

Hitwise 67.25%
Compete 69.4%
comScore - 59.2%
Nielsen – 58.7%

Yahoo

Hitwise - 20.29%
Compete – 14.8%
comScore – 21.3%
Nielsen – 18.1%

MSN

Hitwise – 6.65%
Compete – 10.2%
comScore – 9.4%
Nielsen – 12%

AOL

Hitwise – N/A
Compete – 1.5%
comScore – 4.8%
Nielsen – 4.1%

Ask

Hitwise – 4.09%
Compete – 3.7%
comScore – 4.7%
Nielsen – 2.4%

Posted by Nathania Johnson on 10:08 AM | Permalink

Yahoo Updates Search Algorithm, Fixes Delete URL Bug

Recently, search marketers have been noticing changes to Yahoo rankings. And now, Yahoo has plans to roll out updates to its crawling, indexing and ranking algorithms, as reported on the Yahoo Search Blog. Expect to see the changes unfold over the next few days as the updates are rolled out.

Yahoo also took the opportunity to announce a fix to the Delete URL function on its Site Explorer tool. Previously, some search marketers were experiencing problems with submitted URLs remaining on “pending” status for a bit too long.

Posted by Nathania Johnson on 9:39 AM | Permalink

Marchex Develops Partnerships with Several Local Content Providers

Local online advertising and content publishing company Marchex has announced local content partnerships with several content providers, including Yelp and Avvo. The separate agreements will add more than 5 million reviews and ratings to Marchex's local network, bringing the total to over 8 million.

The content partners include the following:

• Yelp.com: A site where people read and write reviews of their favorite neighborhood businesses and had more than 9 million unique visitors in the month of March.

• Avvo.com: An attorney rating service

• HealthGrades.com: Provides detailed listings for more than 750,000 physicians and will be adding more than 5,000 hospitals nationwide.

• lilaguide.com: Contains more than 150,000 user-generated reviews and recommendations for parents on local shopping, baby gear, activities, restaurants, daycare and other parenting resources.

• Restaurant.com: Online dining resource providing reviews, restaurant photos, wine lists, links to menus and discounted gift certificate offers from thousands of restaurants across the United States.

• Gusto.com, Urbanspoon.com, Frommers.com and Priceline.com: Restaurant and travel sites providing tens of thousands of customer reviews of restaurants in select markets across the United States.

The content from these sites will be integrated into Marchex's local network, which sees more than 26 million unique users per month and features more than 150,000 local Web sites.

Posted by Nathania Johnson on 9:13 AM | Permalink

Coremetrics Announces Advanced Attribution Management

Yesterday Kevin Heisler and I spoke with Chad Baldwin, a product manager at Coremetrics. We learned about the announcement being made by Coremetrics today. There is some very interesting stuff in this announcement.

For those of you who are heavy into PPC, you may also be used to treating your campaigns in a direct response model. Someone came in by clicking on your ad after searching on a particular keyword within a search engine. So did they convert? Did enough convert to justify the cost for the keyword?

But the world has changed, and dramatically so. More and more purchases are being made only after multiple visits, and multiple purchases. A classic sequence of searches may be "digital camera", followed by "Sony digital camera", followed by "Sony cyber-shot DSC-W70". Only after that 3rd search did the customer in this example finally purchase.

One of the clasic bid management problems has been that we have always provided all the credit to the last click (in this case Sony cyber-shot DSC-W70). However, if the user came to your site for all 3 of these searches, surely some credit should go to the earlier searches. Yet classic web analytics packages and bid management systems don't allow you to handle this.

How this hurts you in your PPC campaigns is that your bid management solution might tell you to turn off that broad keyword (digital camera) because it is not profitable in a direct response model. But, when you do, your total margin goes down.

With this new announcement by Coremetrics, a unique new solution to this problem is available. Now you can associate the revenue with the last click, the first click, average it across all clicks, or setup a custom allocation across the various clicks. This allows advertisers to balance the allocation of revenue in the manner that best fits their business.

Better still, Coremetrics' announcement also includes detailed tracking and attribution of clicks that come in from display advertising campaigns, including those that come through from Google AdSense advertising you might be doing. So, if you are running AdSense, and a click on your ad comes in from About.com, you can attribute some of the revenue to that campaign, even though the purchase does not occur until 2 visits later after 2 click throughs from regular search ads.

This is really cool too. A while back I did an article on Search Engine Watch with the help of Dustin Engel of Range Online Media. This article outlined one element of the relationship between display advertising and search advertising. It recommended a cyclical approach to emphasizing display versus search spend. It just illustrated one element of how diplay and search advertising interact. Now with this Coremetrics announcement you can begin to truly measure some of the interactions.

Ultimately, the key to this announcement is the recognition that user sessions may in fact span multiple visits. You want to be able to track the cumulative behavior across all of a user's visits, and to understand the interactions between them. This is a new frontier that top marketers are major brands are already embracing. Coremetrics is now offering the tools to be able to look at this more closely than ever before.

Posted by on 8:00 AM | Permalink

April 21, 2008

Online Advertising Shifting from Branding to Direct Response

Advertisers are increasingly turning to ad networks with their online advertising dollars, according to the New York Times. Ad networks sell display advertising across a variety of sites and can be targeted or vertical (focusing on a niche like sports or travel).

The appeal of ad networks lies in their price and improved targeting technology. Paying $4 for a highly targeted ad on a lesser-known site is garnering better results than many, generalized eyeballs seeing a $40 ad on a big site like MSN.

This should come as no surprise to seasoned search marketers. Conversions are a more important metric than clicks and ad networks enable advertisers to enact that strategy in their online campaigns.

But advertisers should buy while the getting is good. With the rising popularity of ad networks, expect prices to rise in a competitive marketplace.

Posted by Nathania Johnson on 10:14 AM | Permalink

MySpace Launches Beta Version of New Advertising Platform

Social media networks have struggled to produce confidence in their advertising options, but MySpace is hoping to change that with the beta launch of Community Builder, the social networks' new advertising platform. According to Bryce Emo, Senior Vice President of Sales, the new platform, “enables marketers to fulfill long-term communication strategies with consumers who engage in and friend their communities. It's an opportunity to connect with users faster and easier than ever before.”

Emo added, “Community Builder is the next evolution of the MySpace brand profile -– a more flexible solution that puts creative freedom and control into the hands of advertisers to ensure that a community stays dynamic and interesting in between major campaigns and projects.”

There are two versions of Community Builder: Self-Service and Full-Service. Self-service is for advertisers with advanced coding skills in CSS and XHTML, while Full-service is for the coding-challenged. Both versions offer advertisers 24/7 access to update community elements (blogs, bulletins) as well as increased analytics (via Hitbox) and profile functionality.

Posted by Nathania Johnson on 9:51 AM | Permalink

Google Pursues the Baidu-Dominated Chinese Search Market

In an effort to catch Baidu, the dominate search engine in China, Google has plans to add 200 employees to the 600 it already has dedicated to efforts in the world's largest country. Some estimates have Baidu as enjoying a 62% market share there, comparable to the share Google has in the United States.

Google will also increase its ad spend on promoting Google Maps and Gmail, as well as boost the online advertising revenues. The advertisements will appear on Chinese web sites and hopes to develop profit-sharing partnerships with Chinese web sites similar to the partnership it has with Sina.com.

Posted by Nathania Johnson on 9:21 AM | Permalink

Survey Finds Search Engine Marketing Budgets in UK to Increase

According to the UK Search Engine Marketing Report 2008, released today by E-consultancy in association with Search Engine Marketing agency Neutralize (*\*), the industry is thriving in the UK with 63% of companies planning to increase their paid search (PPC) budget and 61% planning to increase their search engine optimization (SEO) budget.

In a press release, Lucy Cokes, the Managing Director of Neutralize (*\*), said, "It appears evident that search engine marketing is now cemented in the minds and therefore budgets of UK marketers. It is fantastic to see a greater understanding of the benefits of a well managed search marketing campaign and budgets being increased accordingly across both paid and organic search."

Now in its second year, the UK Search Engine Marketing Report is based on the results of a survey completed earlier in the year by more than 1,000 respondents from both agencies and companies with first-hand experience of search engine marketing.

One of the key trends found in the report is this one: Since 2007, the proportion of companies conducting PPC and SEO exclusively inhouse has declined. Correspondingly, the proportion of respondents using an agency for both disciplines has gone up.

For more information, go to http://www.neutralize.com/media-centre/research-reports.htm.

Posted by Greg Jarboe on 9:04 AM | Permalink

SEW Experts: B2B Advertising Brilliance: Word Frequency Techniques for Killer PPC Campaigns

Creating ad groups for a business-to-business (B2B) content advertising campaign can be done by examining the pages that show up high in the results for your targeted keywords. In today's Content Advertising column, "B2B Advertising Brilliance: Word Frequency Techniques for Killer PPC Campaigns," David Szetela explains how to create top performing content ad groups for a B2B ad campaign.

Posted by Kevin Newcomb on 12:00 AM | Permalink

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