Monday, January 30, 2006
Google Censors Web Results...Sometimes
From SEORoundtable about Google's change to their policy on censoring search results.
New Search Engine Marketing Magazine
There's a new magazine devoted to search marketing set to be published this year. It's called Search Marketing Standard (reminiscent of the Industry Standard, I guess). I'm doubtful that a magazine will give any real useful insight that's not already available online, but they're offering a free subscription, so I figure for that price, I'll give it a try and see if it's any good. Apparently the first issue will come out in June of this year.
The Real Cost of SEO
Just read a great article by Gord Hotchkiss about why he thinks SEO is such a hard sell in many corporations, even though it's so cost-effective compared to other marketing tactics. He makes some very good points in his article.
Some of the payoffs he mentions will come after to company comes around to SEO:
- What's good for a search engine is good for humans. The changes that make your site easier to index are almost always changes your visitors will appreciate as well. More content, less unnecessary Flash, standard navigation options and cleaner code will bring you in line with long standing usability guidelines.
- Organic traffic is not dependant on budget. This traffic base goes on, day after day, whether you're topping up your AdWords account or not.
- Organic optimization gets less painful the longer you go. Once you make the commitment, the painful part can be over relatively soon, but you'll be reaping the benefits for years to come.
- You'll reach a whole new market segment. People tend to look at organic listings when they're in the research phase, higher in the buying funnel. This gives you the chance to intercept them earlier and build a relationship that can last a long time.
More...
Some of the payoffs he mentions will come after to company comes around to SEO:
- What's good for a search engine is good for humans. The changes that make your site easier to index are almost always changes your visitors will appreciate as well. More content, less unnecessary Flash, standard navigation options and cleaner code will bring you in line with long standing usability guidelines.
- Organic traffic is not dependant on budget. This traffic base goes on, day after day, whether you're topping up your AdWords account or not.
- Organic optimization gets less painful the longer you go. Once you make the commitment, the painful part can be over relatively soon, but you'll be reaping the benefits for years to come.
- You'll reach a whole new market segment. People tend to look at organic listings when they're in the research phase, higher in the buying funnel. This gives you the chance to intercept them earlier and build a relationship that can last a long time.
More...
Friday, January 27, 2006
11 Reasons Advertising Agencies Hate Search Engine Marketers
At some point, ad agencies will be forced to come to terms with the fact that they will have to accept and work with search engine marketers even if they have to bring them in house. I must admit to having a bit of a chip on my shoulder when it comes to traditional ad agencies, because I’ve been totally shot down every time I tried to have an abundance mentality with them. Since I fall somewhere in between affiliate marketing mercenary and corporate stooge, I love comparing the two worlds - the personalities involved, and the lifestyle associated with each. It is truly an intriguing comparison of people that share a lot in common, but can also be polar opposites.
More from Stuntdubl
More from Stuntdubl
Matt Cutts on linkbait
Matt Cutts gives his 2 cents about linkbaiting
On a meta-level, I think of “linkbait” as something interesting enough to catch people’s attention, and that doesn’t have to be a bad thing. There are a lot of ways to do that, including putting in sweat-of-the-brow work to generate data or insights, or it can be as simple as being creative. You can also say something controversial to generate discussion (this last one gets tired if you overuse it, though).
I agree that the controversial thing can work really well, especially on blogs, but I also find that the "controversial" blogs that are always spouting out controversial comments 100% of the time tend to lose the controversy factor very quickly. It's like the boy who cried wolf. People get desensitized after a while if all they hear is attacks on other people or businesses.
Speaking of controversy, I think you should be cautious about posting slanderous comments on your blog, but if you name names when talking about controversial issues, you will get people's attention. A lot of people are closely monitoring the net for mentions of their name and they will swoop in to defend themselves if you mention them and if you're lucky, they'll link back to you from their blog and tell their readers how stupid you are.
On a meta-level, I think of “linkbait” as something interesting enough to catch people’s attention, and that doesn’t have to be a bad thing. There are a lot of ways to do that, including putting in sweat-of-the-brow work to generate data or insights, or it can be as simple as being creative. You can also say something controversial to generate discussion (this last one gets tired if you overuse it, though).
I agree that the controversial thing can work really well, especially on blogs, but I also find that the "controversial" blogs that are always spouting out controversial comments 100% of the time tend to lose the controversy factor very quickly. It's like the boy who cried wolf. People get desensitized after a while if all they hear is attacks on other people or businesses.
Speaking of controversy, I think you should be cautious about posting slanderous comments on your blog, but if you name names when talking about controversial issues, you will get people's attention. A lot of people are closely monitoring the net for mentions of their name and they will swoop in to defend themselves if you mention them and if you're lucky, they'll link back to you from their blog and tell their readers how stupid you are.
Tuesday, January 24, 2006
MSN AdCenter Date Annouced
According to MarketingShift, June will mark the end of Yahoo's ads formerly known as Overture on the MSN network.
Use Link Bait to Catch Better Rankings
An article about using link bait to catch better rankings - what is link bait? Well, it takes on many forms, but usually look like something unique that attracts or baits other webmasters into linking to it just because it's clever, funny, cool, controversial or whatever.
Thursday, January 19, 2006
v7ndotcom elursrebmem
Yes, it's time for yet another SEO competition. This time the keywords being targeted are v7ndotcom elursrebmem. The objective: to be listed at the top of Google (that's #1 in the natural results) on May 15th at noon. For full details and rules, check out the Forum on v7n.com
Big Brother is Watching You Search (or at least wants to watch)
The US Government wants Google's search data. Danny Sullivan points out there are other ways they can get the data they're looking for. They don't need to subpoena Google for their data. They weren't looking for personal information or unique user IPs, but they did want Google to hand over a list of all search queries for a one-week period. The government's reasons seem noble, but the tactics they're using don't fall within the bounds of what's acceptable. Like Google says, the Gov is overstepping its bounds on this one.
Google to Buy Radio Advertising Sales Unit
Is it just me, or is Google really trying to take over the world? NY Times article about Google buying dMarc Broadcasting, a radio advertising company. Hey, they've got the money...might as well spend it, right?
I've never heard of dMarc, but apparently they make software that allows marketers to send advertisers directly to radio stations. Hmmm...I can see how that might be of interest to Google who happens to have several hundred thousand advertisers who might want to give radio advertising a whirl. It has the potential to Googlize the entire radio advertising world.
I've never heard of dMarc, but apparently they make software that allows marketers to send advertisers directly to radio stations. Hmmm...I can see how that might be of interest to Google who happens to have several hundred thousand advertisers who might want to give radio advertising a whirl. It has the potential to Googlize the entire radio advertising world.
China Search Marketing Tour
Anyone interested in doing business in China, might be interested in the China Search Marketing Tour. They're putting together a tour to show interested parties around China and the Chinese search engine industry in particular. It's March 9-19. I won't make it to this one, but it sounds very interesting.
More info on McAnerin's blog
More info on McAnerin's blog
Yahoo Laughs Off Click Fraud Report
I noticed some very unusual activity in my Yahoo account for one of my sites a couple days ago. Several hundred clicks came in on a keyword that normally generates a few clicks a day. The traffic resulted in zero leads, which leads me to believe it's some kind of click fraud.
I just read this post on SERoundtable that makes me wonder just how widespread this was.
I got a similar response to what other forum posters received, but they did offer to refund part ($100) of the $325 I was charged for the (apparently fraudulent) clicks. And since I didn't actually call (I emailed), I didn't get laughed at.
I just read this post on SERoundtable that makes me wonder just how widespread this was.
I got a similar response to what other forum posters received, but they did offer to refund part ($100) of the $325 I was charged for the (apparently fraudulent) clicks. And since I didn't actually call (I emailed), I didn't get laughed at.
Wednesday, January 18, 2006
Web sites judged in a blink
Is your ugly site giving visitors the wrong impression? This is an excerpt from an article on CNN.com about web design:
In just a brief one-twentieth of a second -- less than half the time it takes to blink -- people make aesthetic judgments that influence the rest of their experience with an Internet site.
More from CNN.com
In just a brief one-twentieth of a second -- less than half the time it takes to blink -- people make aesthetic judgments that influence the rest of their experience with an Internet site.
More from CNN.com
Why your 2% conversion rate is so lousy
This article by Robbin Steif provides an explanation of why a 2% conversion rate from your website isn't the same as a 2% response rate from a direct mail campaign. She explains that the 2% response rate for direct mail is 2% of everyone who received the mailing, regardless of whether they actually opened it. When we're talking about online conversion rates, the 2% figure represents 2% of all site visitors who actually converted into a customer. Robbin's argument is that the consumer has already decided to visit the website (comparable to opening the envelope), so the conversion rate should be much higher.
I agree that you shoud always work on improving your conversion rates, but I also think web traffic is comprised of a lot of different types of visitors. Just because someone ends up on your website doesn't mean they're glad to be there. You can get visitors to your site by tricking them, or misleading them about what they will find. Those types of visitors are certainly not going to convert to paying customers at a very high percentage. Sometimes websites show up for keywords that have more than one meaning, so a visitor may have intentionally clicked on your link, only to find that you don't actually sell meatloaf recipes on your Meatloaf (the musician) fan site.
I think the article kind of gives the impression that any visitor to your website is hyper-targeted and should convert at a high rate. The truth is, there are many different types of website traffic, and you need to keep a close eye on conversion rates relative to each traffic source to determine the effectiveness of your marketing campaigns.
I agree that you shoud always work on improving your conversion rates, but I also think web traffic is comprised of a lot of different types of visitors. Just because someone ends up on your website doesn't mean they're glad to be there. You can get visitors to your site by tricking them, or misleading them about what they will find. Those types of visitors are certainly not going to convert to paying customers at a very high percentage. Sometimes websites show up for keywords that have more than one meaning, so a visitor may have intentionally clicked on your link, only to find that you don't actually sell meatloaf recipes on your Meatloaf (the musician) fan site.
I think the article kind of gives the impression that any visitor to your website is hyper-targeted and should convert at a high rate. The truth is, there are many different types of website traffic, and you need to keep a close eye on conversion rates relative to each traffic source to determine the effectiveness of your marketing campaigns.
Monday, January 16, 2006
Craigslist Spammer Techniques
I love craigslist. I think it is the essence of what people love about the 'net. It's beatiful because in all it's ugly design and basic GUI, it's a cool marketplace that people love because they can go out and buy and sell stuff for free. It's what the Internet is all about.
Like all the other great marketplaces on the web, spammers are drawn to Craigslist. They crawl through the listings and add thousands of email addresses to their databases. Craigslist has the cool feature that lets you use a craigslist email address for your listing so you don't get your personal email address picked up by spambots. The spammers are very cunning, however. They appear to have figured out a way around this that appears to be working very well. They have their spambots pick up the anti-spam email from Craigslist and then send an innocent-looking email to ask for more information about the job listing or the product for sale. The one I got asked for the website address, which was actually in the job posting. I wondered how the "person" could have missed it, but I replied anyway before I realized it was probably a spammer trying to get my actual email address.
I was talking to my dad on Saturday and he said he got a weird emial from some guy who wanted to have the product (a big screen T.V) shipped to somewhere in Africa. Dad responded asking if the guy was for real. I have a feeling it was another one of those spammers since he didn't mention the product by name and who would really want a big TV gift-wrapped and shipped to Africa?
So let this be a warning to all you Craigs list users out there...if you use the email masking feature of Craigslist, don't respond to weird emails from your listing. If you don't use the email masking feature, the spammers probably already have your email address, so you're out of luck anyway.
As a related sidenote be careful buying event tickets on Craigslist (or any other website for that matter). We recently bought some that turned out to be invalid when we tried to get into the Jazz basketball game :(
Like all the other great marketplaces on the web, spammers are drawn to Craigslist. They crawl through the listings and add thousands of email addresses to their databases. Craigslist has the cool feature that lets you use a craigslist email address for your listing so you don't get your personal email address picked up by spambots. The spammers are very cunning, however. They appear to have figured out a way around this that appears to be working very well. They have their spambots pick up the anti-spam email from Craigslist and then send an innocent-looking email to ask for more information about the job listing or the product for sale. The one I got asked for the website address, which was actually in the job posting. I wondered how the "person" could have missed it, but I replied anyway before I realized it was probably a spammer trying to get my actual email address.
I was talking to my dad on Saturday and he said he got a weird emial from some guy who wanted to have the product (a big screen T.V) shipped to somewhere in Africa. Dad responded asking if the guy was for real. I have a feeling it was another one of those spammers since he didn't mention the product by name and who would really want a big TV gift-wrapped and shipped to Africa?
So let this be a warning to all you Craigs list users out there...if you use the email masking feature of Craigslist, don't respond to weird emails from your listing. If you don't use the email masking feature, the spammers probably already have your email address, so you're out of luck anyway.
As a related sidenote be careful buying event tickets on Craigslist (or any other website for that matter). We recently bought some that turned out to be invalid when we tried to get into the Jazz basketball game :(
Thursday, January 12, 2006
Google Tests Local Ads on Maps
Hot off the press from Clickz (who apparently got the tip from David Galbraith:
"Google is experimenting with plotting local advertisers' locations on its Maps product, giving marketers a visual and spatial accompaniment to their locally targeted ads."
Read More on Clickz
"Google is experimenting with plotting local advertisers' locations on its Maps product, giving marketers a visual and spatial accompaniment to their locally targeted ads."
Read More on Clickz
Wednesday, January 11, 2006
Hitwise Report on Search Engine Traffic to Shopping Sites
From a HitWise press release:
According to Hitwise, the world’s leading online competitive intelligence service, 11.1 percent of all Shopping & Classifieds site visits originated at Google in December 2005, an increase of 28 percent over December 2004. Yahoo! Search and MSN Search drove 4.05 percent and 0.79 percent of Shopping & Classifieds site visits respectively, while search engines in total drove 18.3 percent of all Shopping & Classifieds visits. The leading retail sites receiving visits from Google in December 2005 were eBay, Amazon, Froogle, and BizRate. These four sites combined accounted for 18.1 percent of Google’s downstream retail traffic.
“Just when some thought that search as an acquisition channel had reached its limit, it continues to outpace the market,” said Bill Tancer, General Manager of Worldwide Research at Hitwise. “In order to succeed in this increasingly competitive environment, online retailers must find new and creative ways to intelligently leverage this channel.”
According to Hitwise, the world’s leading online competitive intelligence service, 11.1 percent of all Shopping & Classifieds site visits originated at Google in December 2005, an increase of 28 percent over December 2004. Yahoo! Search and MSN Search drove 4.05 percent and 0.79 percent of Shopping & Classifieds site visits respectively, while search engines in total drove 18.3 percent of all Shopping & Classifieds visits. The leading retail sites receiving visits from Google in December 2005 were eBay, Amazon, Froogle, and BizRate. These four sites combined accounted for 18.1 percent of Google’s downstream retail traffic.
“Just when some thought that search as an acquisition channel had reached its limit, it continues to outpace the market,” said Bill Tancer, General Manager of Worldwide Research at Hitwise. “In order to succeed in this increasingly competitive environment, online retailers must find new and creative ways to intelligently leverage this channel.”
Friday, January 06, 2006
The best Google Logo I've Ever "Seen"
I agree with Matt Cutts - the braille Google logo has to be the best ever. They've had some good ones, but this one is also my favorite. It's interesting how a company with such a simple logo can come out with such cool ones every once in a while. They could get Dennis Hwang to design a better logo, but if their regular logo was cooler, these special ones wouldn't come off so well. Besides, at this point, the Googleers would be fools to change a logo with such a strong brand behind it.
Loyal to None
It seems like everybody loves Google these days, but I just read an article on InternetRetailer.com that refers to a report from Forrester about cunsumers' lack of loyalty to any one search engine.
I guess some things never change. It's been talked about for a long time how fragile market share is in the search engine space. "The competitor is only a click away," is the oft-used phrase. Forrester's new research appears to reinforce that fact.
However, I found it interesting that 40% of online users said they are loyal to a single search engine, which I think is up from numbers in previous studies. Also, Google was rated as most effective for most information search tasks--and Yahoo and MSN were rated more effective for finding music or video content. AOL was rated least effective in all 11 search task categories, which is pretty humorous, especially since AOL's search is really just Google. What's up with that? It makes me wonder how accurate consumers' assessments of search engines really are. Like most things in marketing, I guess it's just a matter of perception...that, or maybe the people who were polled have never really used AOL for searching, they just "know" that AOL sucks so they gave them the lowest ratings.
I guess some things never change. It's been talked about for a long time how fragile market share is in the search engine space. "The competitor is only a click away," is the oft-used phrase. Forrester's new research appears to reinforce that fact.
However, I found it interesting that 40% of online users said they are loyal to a single search engine, which I think is up from numbers in previous studies. Also, Google was rated as most effective for most information search tasks--and Yahoo and MSN were rated more effective for finding music or video content. AOL was rated least effective in all 11 search task categories, which is pretty humorous, especially since AOL's search is really just Google. What's up with that? It makes me wonder how accurate consumers' assessments of search engines really are. Like most things in marketing, I guess it's just a matter of perception...that, or maybe the people who were polled have never really used AOL for searching, they just "know" that AOL sucks so they gave them the lowest ratings.
Thursday, January 05, 2006
Search Toolbar Usage Statistics
I was just browing the current issue of OMMA and and noticed some very interesting numbers I hadn't seen before from ComScore regarding toolbar searches. According to these ComScore numbers, searches originating from a search engine toolbar break out as follows:
Yahoo - 49.2%
Google - 45.6%
MSN - 3.7%
Time Warner Network - 1.3%
Ask Jeeves - 0.1%
I'm quite surprised to see Yahoo topping out over Google, but Yahoo does have a strong brand and must have a very large user base for their toolbar, or since the number is based on total searches, perhaps they're just more actively searching from the toolbar instead of from the Yahoo homepage.
The same stat box in the magazine also shows MSN gaining ground on the other guys since the last time I looked. It shows MSN at 14.6% of total searches compared to Google at 39% and 29.2%. Of course, AOL search is counted separately at 8.9%, even though they actually use Google's search results and ads.
Yahoo - 49.2%
Google - 45.6%
MSN - 3.7%
Time Warner Network - 1.3%
Ask Jeeves - 0.1%
I'm quite surprised to see Yahoo topping out over Google, but Yahoo does have a strong brand and must have a very large user base for their toolbar, or since the number is based on total searches, perhaps they're just more actively searching from the toolbar instead of from the Yahoo homepage.
The same stat box in the magazine also shows MSN gaining ground on the other guys since the last time I looked. It shows MSN at 14.6% of total searches compared to Google at 39% and 29.2%. Of course, AOL search is counted separately at 8.9%, even though they actually use Google's search results and ads.
Wednesday, January 04, 2006
Top 10 Retail Websites During The Holidays
InternetRetailer.com lists the ComScore top 10 most visited retail sites dureing the holiday shopping season:
1. eBay
2. Amazon
3. Wal-Mart
4. Apple Computer
5. Target
6. Dell
7. Toys R Us
8. Overstock
9. Best Buy
10. Circuit City
1. eBay
2. Amazon
3. Wal-Mart
4. Apple Computer
5. Target
6. Dell
7. Toys R Us
8. Overstock
9. Best Buy
10. Circuit City
What we can learn from eye-tracking studies
MarketingSherpa.com offers an overview of some of the things we can learn from the various eye-tracking studies that were conducted this past year.
Some of the highlights include:
1) Incredibly short attention span: 0.7 seconds:
2) Copywriting really matters:
3) The role of organic vs. paid listings:
4) Multiple listings improve results:
5) Only shopping engines get right-column attention
More from Marketing Sherpa
Some of the highlights include:
1) Incredibly short attention span: 0.7 seconds:
2) Copywriting really matters:
3) The role of organic vs. paid listings:
4) Multiple listings improve results:
5) Only shopping engines get right-column attention
More from Marketing Sherpa
Choosing a Web Design Firm
P.J. gives her 2 cents on how to choose a web design firm. Some good advice for choosing a web design firm, especially for those who care about search engine visibility with their website.
Tuesday, January 03, 2006
Google Stock to reach $600?
Piper Sees Google at $600 - Why not? It's already topped $400 and shows no signs of slowing down.
Top 10 Marketing Predictions For 2006
Jason Dowdell's Top 10 Marketing Predictions For 2006
Some of the more interesting predictions include:
Multimedia search
RSS replacement
Feed marketing
Bortals (blog/portal combo)
The rise of the API
Some of the more interesting predictions include:
Multimedia search
RSS replacement
Feed marketing
Bortals (blog/portal combo)
The rise of the API
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