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Jim Hedger of Search Engine Journal, reported today that Ask Jeeves and Lycos will begin offering Search Engine Optimization Services. Seeing the search engines, who have inside information on their own algorithms and the ability to adjust algorithms and placement in their own engines to suit their clients, could cause some concern among the SEO community. On one side: Search engines that offer paid optimization services, might call into question the quality of the search results. On the other side: As a business, if I wanted to make sure my site works well with a specific search engine, who better to help me out than the owners of the engine? They can insure that my site works well, gets ranked, and doesn't violate any of the rules that might get my site in trouble. This one will be interesting to watch to see how it plays out. Comments (0) + TrackBacks (0) | Category: Organic Search Engine Marketing & Optimization (SEO) November 25, 2004Happy Thanksgiving
In keeping with the Holiday Logo tradition, here are some of the many thanksgiving faces of Google:
Have a great Turkey Day! Comments (0) + TrackBacks (0) | Category: Organic Search Engine Marketing & Optimization (SEO) November 23, 2004Google Sued for Looking at Porn!
E-Commerce Times reported that Google has been sued by a company that claims that Google has indexed it's copyrighted nude pictures from 3rd party sites and failed to remove the images and the infringing sites from their index when the company contacted Google to ask them too. It may just be me, but it would seem that the company should be more concerned about the 3rd party sites that are posting their copyrighted images without permission, and thank Google for showing them that it is happening. Heck, doesn't everything that Google indexes belong to someone? You could argue that all content is copyrighted therefore Google should not exist. What do you think? Comments (0) + TrackBacks (0) | Category: Organic Search Engine Marketing & Optimization (SEO) November 19, 2004MSN Search Launch - Overture to run PPC till 2006
Microsoft quietly launched their new search engine at beta.search.msn.com. There had been some speculation that MSN would roll out their own PPC management utility to go head to head with Google Adwords and Overture when their existing contract with overture expired in June of 2005. However, the companies have announced that they have extended their agreement for another year until June of 2006. I guess Microsoft wants to focus on perfecting their organic search engine and spider technology before building a new platform to own 100% of their PPC traffic. A quick search on their beta site for web hosting, indicates that Microsoft may be planning a hybrid strategy of hosting their own sponsored ads along side of Overture’s. The top two links in the top box and bottom box appear to be run from ads.msn.com while their 3rd link in these boxes and all the ads on the right hand side appear to be driven by overture. Comments (0) + TrackBacks (0) | Category: ! Hot Topics Keyword Phrase Study
ClickZ reported yesterday that according to an iProspect research study, one and two word phrases account for 88% of natural search referrals for about 40 "high traffic" websites between 2002 and 2004. Here is the breakdown: It would be interesting to see data on "sales conversions" vs natural search referrals (clicks). Comments (0) + TrackBacks (0) | Category: Organic Search Engine Marketing & Optimization (SEO) November 14, 2004Feeling Normal at Google
The familiar Google CTR performance ratings of Strong, Moderate, At-Risk, and Disabled have been replaced by a new labeling system. Nothing really interesting about these new normalized states, however, Google's explanation of the labels is: "There are a limited number of in trial keywords per account, so when this limit is reached, additional keywords will be moved to on hold status with priority given to those keywords with higher predicted CTRs. Accounts that have proven to perform very well will be rewarded with a greater number of in trial keywords. The limitation placed on the number of keywords that may be in trial helps ensure that users continue to see the most targeted, relevant ads via the AdWords program. "
It's clearly one small step in a strategic direction for an ad serving platform that is saturated with text-based ads. The question is how far will Google go to enhance their users experience? Remove dynamic keyword insertion for in-trial AdWord accounts? It could happen sooner that you think. Talk to you soon, Todd Tweedy ========================================== Improved AdWords Minimum CTR and Performance Monitoring We wanted to inform you of changes in the keyword evaluation process that will help focus your advertising dollars on keywords with proven relevance for your ad campaigns. These changes will help our users find exactly what they're looking for and improve the overall advertising experience for both our users and our advertisers. We've streamlined the keyword review process so that your keywords and their related ads get the chance to run with less of a restriction on their accruable impressions. The minimum clickthrough rate (CTR) of 0.5% won't be changing. However, when you submit a keyword, we'll now predict its CTR based on data such as the performance of your account and other accounts with the same or similar keywords. This ensures that we make our prediction based on a careful review of all available keyword data. Depending on a keyword's predicted CTR, the keyword may enter one of several states. The most noticeable change you'll see within your account will be the keyword status labels for some of your keywords: Previously strong, moderate, and at risk keywords will now be labeled as normal. The status label, based on your keyword's clickthrough rate (CTR) on Google search pages (not sites on the Google ad network), indicates the state your keywords are in. Your keyword states can be any of the following: Normal: Targeted keywords are above the minimum 0.5% CTR on Google search pages, and their associated ads show regularly. There's currently little to no risk to your advertising exposure. However, every Ad Group can use occasional optimization, so you may want to consider periodic re-evaluation of your ad text and keywords. In trial: Keywords are below the minimum threshold and under evaluation. They'll continue showing ads until we're statistically confident their CTR is below or above 0.5%. These keywords may then become either normal or disabled. They may also be slowed if necessary. You may want to refine these keywords. There are a limited number of in trial keywords per account, so when this limit is reached, additional keywords will be moved to on hold status with priority given to those keywords with higher predicted CTRs. Accounts that have proven to perform very well will be rewarded with a greater number of in trial keywords. The limitation placed on the number of keywords that may be in trial helps ensure that users continue to see the most targeted, relevant ads via the AdWords program. Disabled: Disabled keywords no longer trigger any ads. Keywords may be disabled if they don't meet the quality threshold or if they are older than 90 days and have never triggered an ad. If you still feel strongly about using these keywords, you have a few options. To see an overview of the keyword evaluation process, view our keyword evaluation flow diagram. You can also review three examples of the path a new keyword might take when added to your account: The path of a targeted and relevant keyword Comments (2) + TrackBacks (0) | Category: November 10, 2004Is Affiliate Markeing on Google going away?
A friend of mine sent me a link to a posting on Webmaster's world which reads as follows: --- I'm a full-time affiliate who primarily uses AdWords to send customers to the exact product page on a merchant's website. If this is true quite frankly I'm in trouble. I called my account rep immediately in horror and he said he'd heard nothing of the sort. I would certainly hope Google would give plenty of warning if they were planning such a huge change. My concerns were dampened slightly by my colleague informing me that he also said Froogle was going to be 'huge' in the UK this Christmas. Anyway, I really don't understand what Google's long term plan is. How could they possibly afford to cut off all the revenue from affiliate bids, then kill AdWords completely by giving Froogle a big push (let's face it, why click on AdWords ads when Froogle gives the price). A double whammy, shortly after going PLC with investors to please, I don't think so." This is probably just a nasty rumor, I am checking with my Google reps to make sure. This would be bad news for super affiliates, bad news for merchants and bad financial news for Google. I was kind of hoping that Overture would take a look at all the revenue that Google is making and change their policy to allow affiliate links. Has anyone heard anything similar? Comments (2) + TrackBacks (0) | Category: ! Hot Topics November 5, 2004No indirect bidding on brand names?
Look out everyone, new standard verbiage has started to appear on CJ affiliate merchant agreements when merchants choose not to allow trademark bidding. It reads as follows: The word that causes me the most concern here is "indirectly". When you combine that with misspellings, it prevents affiliates from using any type of PPC search on a broad or phrase match basis. Let's look at an example so you can see what I mean. I ran into this exact problem with Network Solutions, which is why I had to stop marketing them and take the $200k per year in revenues I was generating to one of their competitors. Network Solutions is a good example, because they went through a lot of changes in their policy to arrive at the type of policy based on the wording above. If you ask Network Solutions for a list of keywords to market under, the will give you terms like Domain Names and Web Sites. So I will use these terms in my examples since they are the terms they really want to cover. Here are some policies they had and what an affiliate would have to do in their account to adhere to those policies: No Bidding on our Trademark terms: No showing up when Trademarks are included with other terms: No showing up directly or indirectly for trademarks or misspellings: This could have a great chilling affect over traffic volumes since a broad match or phrase match of "Domain Names" would catch searches like "I am having a problem with my Domain Name Provider", "How to I get a Domain Name". Now with this new verbiage affiliates must identify every possible search phrase and get it EXACTLY right to insure that they don't inadvertently show up when a trademark or misspelling is typed.
Quite frankly, as our 2-year profitable relationship with Network Solutions found out, it's just easier to move to a competitor who "gets it" than to struggle with one who doesn't. Comments (6) + TrackBacks (0) | Category: Cookie Stuffing Explored
Looks like there is a new sheriff in town affiliates using spyware and cookie stuffing. His name is Ben Edleman. Ben is a student at Harvard University and Harvard Law School and his current research agenda includes analyzing methods and effects of spyware and uncovering affiliate commission fraud. Ben has posted an interesting explanation of Cookie Stuffing where he outlines who benefits and why networks, who profit from the practice indirectly, may be less than financially motivated to put an end to it. Ben has also "called out" some affiliates by listing their sites, and showing exactly how they are performing the cookie stuffing. When you look at how some of these affiliates are attempting to hide the practice, you can't help but think, wow some of these guys are really smart. I was especially impressed with asmartcoupon.com's method of referencing an affiliate link as a 1x1 image call. Let me start by saying that I am no saint. I toyed around with some iframes in my early days. I don't do it anymore, but let me explain why I went down that road in the first place, it certainly wasn’t in an attempt to “cheat” anyone. My feeling was that I put a lot of time into building a site, and was paying on a per-click basis to have the person come see and learn about the specific merchant, if I did an effective job pre-selling the customer, I should be paid for the duration of the cookie period, regardless if the customer clicked through at that very moment or logged off and then went directly back to the merchant's site and bought the next day. Merchants benefit from affiliate sales activity without paying the affiliates all the time. In the travel industry they say that the number of transactions that start online and get completed via the telephone is 5 times the number that start online and complete online. Typically merchants don't have the technology to track back phone sales to affiliates, so affiliates lose out on sales they had a direct part of creating. At Network Solutions, they extended the affiliate cookie period from 1 day to 7 days for affiliates, and quickly dropped it down to 3 days because they felt they were paying out too much for the sales. At the same time they track their own PPC activities out to 30 days and beyond for internal reporting purposes. As an affiliate I was happy to be getting 3 instead of 1, but know that the merchant continued to benefit from my sales activities long after they stop compensating me. Don’t get me wrong, I am not complaining about not making enough money from my partners. I think it only works when you are able to create win-win partnerships. And when it comes to issues like “cookie-stuffing” today, or other issues that come up in the future, it is important to look at the issues from all angles. What are your thoughts? Comments (3) + TrackBacks (0) | Category: Affiliate Marketing
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Adam Viener
