November 28, 2006

Ask.com Challenges You To Stop The Fat Naked Man From Dancing

Phil Bradley spotted an ad in the London Metro today, asking you to take the Ask.com Challenge and win prizes by searching. ChallengeAsk.com has more details.

There's a YouTube video with a fat, hairy man doing a striptease (also shown above, if you don't want to click over). The joke challenge is to stop Sam (the man in the video) from dancing by searching at Ask.com.

The real challenge is that by searching, you can win prizes if you get a congratulations message appearing in your search results.

Smart Answers for this contest include; ask challenge and stop sam.

Ask.com is not the first to give out prizes or money for searching, Microsoft has done it (and see here), as have others like Blingo and recently, Zotspot.

Posted by Barry Schwartz at 8:36 AM | Permalink

November 1, 2006

Zotspot Wants To Share The Search Wealth

One could plausibly argue that it's crazy to do anything in the general ("horizontal") search marketplace. But new engines continue to launch. The latest, having been in semi-stealth mode for the past several weeks, is Zotspot. Zotspot is a general-purpose engine that officially launched yesterday. Here's the press release.

Like a number of others before it, the idea here is to "reward" users for searching. It claims to be the first engine to "pay users in cash for their normal search behavior." If you don't want the cash you can donate it to one of numerous partner charities.

You essentially get paid for referrals in a "multi-level" fashion. Here's how Zotspot explains how users get paid. Search engine ChaCha doesn't reward its users, but has a comparable payment structure for its "guides."

The theme here is "share the wealth." The question is will that be incentive enough to get people off their G-Y-M habit? One wants to root for companies that have their eye on the larger social good, but Zotspot's results at a minimum have to be as good as Google's or no one will be swayed.

Posted by Greg Sterling at 10:07 AM | Permalink

July 10, 2006

Kayak Launches $10m Ad Campaign - Includes TV

Kayak, the travel search engine, today launched a $10m advertising campaign with a HUGE offline component. The TV commercials are fun, creative, and potentially viral. It's no coincidence that the spots can also be found on Kayak.com and YouTube.

This is either a brilliant move by the company or a sign that Bubble 2.0 is here. You decide after checking out the commercials and then reading my interview with Kayak CMO Dean Harris and my thoughts on the campaign.

Kayak is also running a contest encouraging the creation of user generated ads in the same style as the official Kayak ads. "The 'winning creative director' will win a three-night trip to New York with a friend to see his/her ad produced in the studio. Then, Kayak.com will show your ad on TV!"

Posted by Brian Smith at 12:34 PM | Permalink

July 6, 2006

Google Ombudsman? Search Ombudsman? Great Idea -- Bring Them On!

Back in 2004, Gary Stein suggested that Yahoo hire an ombudsman, a sort of impartial referee to handle disputes involving advertising programs. I thought it was a great idea. Today, Steve Bryant over at eWeek's Google Watch calls for Google to do the same thing. Again, great idea -- let's see the search engines all start hiring ombudsmen, in the way that many newspapers and others have done.

At a newspaper, the ombudsman is someone who the readers can appeal to if they feel a paper has been unfair or had a problem with coverage. The ombudsman investigates the complaint and reports back to the readers. As an insider, they have more access than an external investigator. But as the ombudsman, their responsibility is to represent the readers, not the organization.

Google's had a series of problems recently, as Bryant points out. Was Amazon accidentally knocked out on a search for its own domain name, or was it a glitch? Is Wikipedia Watch being deliberately downranked for a search on its own name, as founder Daniel Brandt feels, or is it another glitch?

An ombudsman is the sort of person who could investigate these things and report back. In fact, Google probably would need to employ a team of ombudsmen, given the many charges people point at it, often unfounded but still which need to be addressed.

Nor is Google the only one that should consider this. I don't agree with Bryant that Google is the closest thing we have to a Pope on the internet. But the idea of it being a paper of record is more true. But Google's not the only paper of record. Yahoo, MSN and Ask are all important papers, as well. I'd like to see them all establish ombudsmen.

At the very least, it will help take the pressure off the informal ombudsmen we already have -- Matt Cutts, Jeremy Zawodny and other search employees that often step up to do informal public relations and examinations of concerns. I don't want those bloggers to go away, but it would be nice to have an official person that searchers and publishers could feel are supposed to be looking into concerns.

Postscript: Google must temper its power or law makers will over at The Guardian has Jack Schofield talking about the idea of an ombudsman, as well.

Posted by Danny Sullivan at 7:52 AM | Permalink

June 6, 2006

Baidu, Chinese Search Engine TV Ad

Baidu, the Chinese based search engine, launched a crazy new TV commercial. The commercial was translated and posted over at Valleywag and can also be watched at YouTube or use the window below:

The commercial has an ending tag line that reads something like; "with Baidu, you can 'find' whoever you want to search for."

Posted by Barry Schwartz at 9:26 AM | Permalink

January 6, 2006

Dogpile Doing Product Placement on Television

Over on Search Engine Journal, Loren posts that Dogpile (they're celebrating their 10th birthday) is doing some "product placement" on various television programs.

His post includes a link to a Seattle Times article (Dogpile is part of Seattle's InfoSpace) says placements have been seen on the season premiere of CBS' "Ghost Whisperer" and the A&E reality show "Growing Up Gotti."

On A&E's "Growing Up Gotti," for instance, Victoria Gotti uses DogPile.com to search Ellis Island records for her great-grandfather.

Perhaps Dogpile's biggest challenge is not only getting people to know about the service but also understand what it offers versus non-meta engines. A few week's ago I mentioned that two of the top five search terms entered into a Dogpile search box in 2005 were Google and Yahoo. As you know, results from both of these engines are already included in Dogpile result sets.

About a year ago, Danny blogged about mentions of A9 and Ask Jeeves on The OC. If memory serves me correctly, an episode of HBO's Curb Your Enthusiasm included a shopping bag with the Ask Jeeves logo on it. The Ask Jeeves balloon has also made appearances in the Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade.

Posted by Gary Price at 1:28 PM | Permalink

December 27, 2005

Sharing The Search Wealth At A9, MSN & The Drawbacks

In my post-Christmas mailbox was a message from A9 reminding me of its A9 Instant Rewards program that effectively pays me a bit to search with them. That was a perfect hook to revisit the entire "pay to search" idea that Microsoft chairman Bill Gates kicked off earlier this month.

Let's dive in on Microsoft first. Microsoft May Give Consumers A Share in Advertising Revenue from the Wall Street Journal covers how Gates suggested the idea that it might share ad revenues with searchers as part of a presentation he gave in India. Said Gates:

The user essentially will get paid, either money or free content or software things that they wouldn't get if they didn't use that search engine.

The story recounts how similar ideas have been tried like this before. iWon gets mentioned for the giveaway model it pioneered, though as a long-term strategy, that hasn't kept the searchers at the service. To date, semi-copycat Blingo also shows that lightning does not strike twice.

Overture -- now part of Yahoo -- was another pioneer in building traffic through payment. In Overture's case, it paid publishers $0.03 cents per query they delivered. Others soon followed, though these programs later died off. They did get a boost when Google jumped in with its Google AdSense For WebSearch program last year.

That brings us to A9. It was also last year, in September, that the service started giving a 1.5 percent discount off Amazon purchases to those using A9. Well, 1.57 percent, which is pi divided by two, a joke on sharing the "pie" with searchers.

Over a year later, the program pretty much seems to have done nil to massively boost A9's popularity. But maybe the email sent out yesterday will reawaken folks. It said:

Dear A9.com user, As a regular user of A9.com, you get many benefits from the advanced search solutions and the personalization features we offer. In addition, you can receive 1.57%* off virtually everything you buy on Amazon.com. To take advantage of this benefit, join the A9 Instant Reward program and search on A9.com a few days per week. It's easy and it's free: go to http://a9.com/-/search/joinInstantReward.jsp and join with one click.

A9.com offers you results from over 300 sources with a single search including Web, images, blogs, and many more categories. You get the results all on one page that you can personalize for your needs. A9.com also shows you which sites you've already visited. With the A9 Toolbar you can access your bookmarks from any computer and even add your personal notes to every site you visit. Your search history is also available on the toolbar together with informative statistics on every Web site.

For more information on the A9 Instant Reward program, go to http://a9.com/-/company/instantRewards.jsp.

Thank you for using A9.com.

The A9.com Team

* Why 1.57%? Remember pi = 3.1415926535... from mathematics? With our pi/2% instant reward, we are sharing with you some of the revenue from the site. We're sharing the pi(e).

The downside to any pay-for-search plan are some of those other programs like this that long-time search marketers will remember, where those being paid to search were doing it for the money, rather than a side benefit. That was a negative to advertisers footing the bill. They want qualified leads, not work-from-home searchers.

Marketing Execs Lukewarm On Plan To Pay Searchers from MediaPost has two of search marketers sounding less than thrilled over any MSN plans to do pay-per-search because of these reasons.

Posted by Danny Sullivan at 12:14 PM | Permalink

November 11, 2005

Ask Jeeves To Rebrand Tech As ExpertRank Inside?

Gary Price -- awesome sleuth that is he -- was doing some searching of the US Patent Office & Trademark Office database yesterday and noticed that Ask Jeeves filed for a trademark, a service mark to be accurate, for the term "ExpertRank" about a week ago. Perhaps the sign of a new branding campaign to come?

Ask Jeeves won't comment on what this means, but Gary reminded me that Teoma means "expert" in Gaelic. Teoma is the company Ask Jeeves bought in 2001 and the name of the search technology Ask Jeeves uses for its search results. I even joked earlier about how in the UK, Ask Jeeves has been branding its service as having "new Teoma technology."

So how about some speculation? Many are familiar with the "Intel Inside" branding campaign that Intel has run for years. You never see an Intel chip when you're using a computer, but the company wants you to have the notion that it's a good thing so you'll seek out Intel machines.

The search wars have their own sort of Intel Inside branding that's heating up. Google's long trotted out PageRank as its form of under-the-hood tech that should wow consumers. A few months ago, MSN rolled out its Neural Net technology as both a way to improve its results and to help counter the notion of Google having all the secret search sauce.

Teoma's long been the secret sauce for Ask, and ExpertRank sounds like a rebranding of that (rather than some new tech) to help Ask Jeeves compete with PageRank Inside and Neural Net Inside.

Where's Yahoo in all of this? It did roll out a Web Rank idea almost two years ago, but that never caught on or was seriously promoted by the company. But if Yahoo's going to face PageRank Inside, Neural Net Inside and ExpertRank Inside, it's almost a foregone conclusion it will look for something with a little more oomph than just saying it's Yahoo Search Technology Inside, as they did launching when launching Yahoo's own technology in early 2004.

Hmm -- maybe My Rank? Since's Yahoo's big on the entire My Web concept, I can see it now: "New Yahoo Search with My Web And My Rank Technology."

Postscript from Gary: Let's not forget that Google trademarked/service marked the term "TrustRank" earlier this year. Also, keeping with the "rank" theme, Topix.net registered the service mark "NewsRank" last year. They also have the service mark "National Network for Local News" registered with the USPTO.

Posted by Danny Sullivan at 8:34 AM | Permalink

September 23, 2005

Recapping Official Search Engine Blogs

Search Engine Blogs as Public Relations Tools from Loren Baker over at Search Engine Journal is a nice overview of how the various major search engines are turning more and more to blogs as a communication tool, with continuing unofficial help from employee blogs such as those from Yahoo's Jeremy Zawodny and Google's Matt Cutts (hey, Google, get his blog listed in your Blogs By Googlers section on the Google Blog already!).

Posted by Danny Sullivan at 7:10 AM | Permalink

June 16, 2005

Answers.com Advertising on Howard Stern Show

Ready for an example of a search engine using "traditional media" to advertise? All morning I've been hearing a commercial for the vertical search engine Answers.com on the Howard Stern radio show. The spot consists of Howard and his partner, Robin Quivers, conversing about how much they like and use the Answers.com service. Howard says it's great when helping a sixth grader (I think his daughter) with math homework. The commercial ends with Stern saying the service provides answers not links.

Posted by Gary Price at 8:48 AM | Permalink

June 6, 2005

FindWhat, Espotting Rebrand As Miva

FindWhat is undergoing a name change and taking Espotting along with it. Miva, formerly the name of the FindWhat-owned Miva Merchant ecommerce storefront tool, is now to serve as the new umbrella name for all of FindWhat's operations. What are those now and how will they be rebranded? Here's a rundown:

FindWhat & Espotting paid listing networks that primarily cover the US and Europe will become "Miva Media." FYI, there is an existing Miva Marketplace site, but that seems primarily to rebrand FindWhat listings to Miva ecommerce tool users.
The Miva Merchant tools are to become "Miva Small Business." This site is clearly the new home for that, but the home page currently brings up the umbrella Miva information. Instead, try this page for what will likely be offered at the Miva Small Business site.
Comet Systems, which provides an adware-powered search toolbar, weather applet and other desktop software, will become Miva Direct.

FindWhat's ticker will change on June 13. Rebranding is expected to be complete by the end of this month. More details in this FindWhat press release. ClickZ also has further coverage in FindWhat to Rebrand as Miva, touching on acquisitions FindWhat made in 2004 that fuel the need for rebranding, as well as some recent tough times that a rebranding might help with.

Want to discuss? Visit our forum thread, Espotting & FindWhat to Re-Brand as Miva.

Posted by Danny Sullivan at 12:38 PM | Permalink

January 28, 2005

I A9'd Him? A9 Hits The OC

We've only just gotten the second season of The OC over here in the UK, so I haven't seen the episode just shown in the US where a character apparently says that they "A9.com'd" someone. So that's what all the kids are saying these days! Or are being paid to say, more likely. Spotted via Search Views, more details in this Beta News article, A9.com Finds Promotion In The OC.

As an OC native, we never called it "The" OC when I lived there. Just OC, thanks very much. As a search person, I certainly never hear anyone say they A9'd anything. To be honest, I rarely hear anyone say that they even "googled" anything. Sometimes I wonder if we all like to think people say that more than they really do.

Postscript: A9 says it didn't pay for the placement, and Ask Jeeves has had a mention this week elsewhere, as well. See The OC Arrested By Ask Jeeves, Too for more.

Posted by Danny Sullivan at 11:46 AM | Permalink

January 10, 2005

Yahoo! Launches Print and Online Ad Campagin

Yahoo will launch an online and print advertising campaign today (aimed at media buyers, ad agencies, etc) promoting their ability to target advertising to specific audiences and groups.

The campaign will run online in publications including WSJ.com, NYT.com, various advertising trades, and on the Yahoo! network. Print versions will also run in advertising trade magazines--but, said [Jerry] Shereshewsky, "the centerpiece of the campaign is online." Yahoo! declined to provide its budget for the media spend. Yahoo! plans to use domain targeting with the campaign, which will involve displaying ads to visitors coming from Internet protocol addresses of specific companies--including ad agencies, clients, and prospective clients.

More in the Media Post article: Yahoo! Plugs Targeting Power

Posted by Gary Price at 10:45 AM | Permalink

January 4, 2005

Google's Search for an Ad Agency

The New York Post reports in: Google's Ads Ogled By Crispin, that Miami-based ad agency Crispin Porter + Bogusky, might have the inside track to win the job for a rumored "traditional" marketing campaign by Google.

Google has done very little "traditional marketing" to this point.

Crispin Porter + Bogusky has already done work for GOOG. They're the ad agency that designed the billboard campaign used to recruit Google engineers.

Posted by Gary Price at 8:28 AM | Permalink

December 23, 2004

Asking Search Engines Who's The Top Search Engine

It's been done before, but Gord Hotckiss takes a fresh look at what comes up tops for a search for "search engine" at, well, various search engines in his Of Serendipity and Search Engines article at MediaPost.

Is Google tops for that query at Google? Nope, it's some small web site no one's every heard of called Search Engine Watch or something like that. Now obviously I'm not going to disagree with that result, but Gord thinks maybe Google itself might want to rise higher than fifth place, certainly above the former search stars Lycos and AltaVista that currently outrank it.

Over at Yahoo, the big Y! puts itself first. Ah, but that's almost certainly because Yahoo appears to hand manipulate some popular queries as I've written about before and we've discussed (here and here) in our forums recently. That's not always a problem, by the way. Many times I wish Google would do some hand review of its results. As I posted recently, MSN used to do this, and it was a strength they've given up.

At MSN Search, Gord doesn't find MSN Search coming up tops, but over at Ask Jeeves, he's please to find them ranking themselves tops.

In the end, using his patented GordRank algorithm, Gord creates a list of the top search engines based on search engines themselves. Google comes in tops, followed by AltaVista.

To compare Gord's experience to the past, check out Chris Sherman's What's the Best Search Engine? article from 2003. I also used to do a somewhat similar spin on this seeing how the search engines ranked themselves for their own names in my Company Name Test. Ah, those were the days!

And for some past history on the idea of search engines making themselves tops for their own name or those of competitors, check out this News.com article from 1999: Lycos's loop has users reconsider rivals.

Posted by Danny Sullivan at 8:47 AM | Permalink

December 7, 2004

Former US President Clinton Pitches For Search Firm

We've had a US presidential candidate pitch a search service before, Howard Dean on behalf of Yahoo Local recently. Now we get an actual US president, in the form of Bill Clinton helping the launch of Accoona, which Gary reviews today. Stephanie Olsen from News.com has a nice story with details, Clinton blows horn for search start-up.

Posted by Danny Sullivan at 11:54 AM | Permalink

Blingo Brings Back Prizes For Search Model

Several years ago, iWon gained an audience quickly by giving away prizes (see my iWon Wins Users article). That didn't help retain the audience in the long-run. Nevertheless, Blingo is trying the same thing, promising prizes for search. The ads on the site come from Google. The search results themselves appear to come from Gigablast. The promotion model and hype is iWon, circa 2000.

Posted by Danny Sullivan at 9:05 AM | Permalink

December 1, 2004

Google Doesn't Seek Ad Agency

Ad Age had reported recently in its print edition that Google was seeking an ad agency. John Battelle checked into the rumor and heard back from Google that no, the report is incorrect. No agency is apparently being sought. More here: Google Making Marketing Push?

By the way, Google does indeed spend quite a bit of money on branding -- but this is on efforts aimed at potential advertisers, not searchers. They've purchased online ads that you'll see here and elsewhere across the web. I'm fairly certain I recall seeing print ads before in New Media Age. There's sponsorship of conferences we operate and others, including throwing big parties such as Google Dance 2004.

But TV ads to get consumers searching on Google? Nope -- never seen anything like that, nor would I expect to any time in the near future.

Posted by Danny Sullivan at 6:17 AM | Permalink

November 25, 2004

Jeeves Floats Over NYC

A "revamped" Ask Jeeves balloon (remember, he lost some weight and got a makeover earlier this year) floated over the streets of Manhattan today as part of the Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade. Here's an image.

A special holiday logo at Ask.com notes his participation.

Mr. Jeeves returns to the parade this year after taking a required one year hiatus.

Fast Facts about the Jeeves Balloon: + 39 feet high + 70 feet in length + 25 feet wide + Filled with 12,700 cubic feet of helium + Big Shoes! They're 19 feet long

Posted by Gary Price at 1:12 PM | Permalink

November 23, 2004

Off To New York To See Yahoo Shopping's Giant Snow Globe

I'm heading to New York on Wednesday to finally see the Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade in person. Those in the US know what a Thanksgiving television viewing tradition the parade is. Living now in the UK for the past eight years, it's something I really miss -- especially not being able to watch with our two young boys.

As it turns out, there's something else I'll have to check out on the day after Thanksgiving. That's the Yahoo Shopping Snow Globe in Times Square.

Yahoo's promising to "shake up" the shopping experience with a giant globe that features:

Yahoo's Comparison Shopping Santa (perhaps an update on the Miracle On 34th Street Santa who sent shoppers to the stores with the best prices?).
Internet kiosks so people can comparison shop online.
Free digital photos with Santa to be posted in a special online location.

The globe opens this Friday and Saturday, 7am to 3pm each day. Can't make it? Well, you can still take part in the Yahoo Shopping Wish and Win Sweepstakes running now through Christmas Eve. You can win a wish list of prizes just by playing with the Yahoo Shopping service.

As I'll be gone, I won't be posting until next Monday (OK, if I take my picture with Santa, I'll post that). Given the holiday, Gary's on a light schedule as well. So we'll be fairly quiet around the old blog-homestead from Wednesday onward.

Happy Thanksgiving wishes to everyone in the US, from us at Search Engine Watch! (and belated best wishes to those in Canada, who celebrated last month).

Posted by Danny Sullivan at 6:07 AM | Permalink

November 1, 2004

Microsoft Prepares Massive Marketing Campaign for New Search Engine

Can traditional consumer-facing marketing/advertising do anything to help gain search market share from a company, Google, that has used very little of it to build their brand along with a stellar reputation? Can intense marketing get the typical "I only need to use one search engine" type of searcher to try something different and/or switch to another search tool?

Well, get ready.

It looks like the official release of MSN's new search engine is coming very soon (pre-Christmas) as the company prepares for a massive on and offline marketing campaign, "one of its biggest ever."

October 14, 2004

Another Push For Candidates To Buy Search; Dean On Yahoo

Via John Battelle, Google for President from Slate is another take on the idea that political candidates should be making use of search advertising. But some other articles have been better, in that they include comments from some actual campaigns. For a roundup of those, see Candidates Missing Out On Search Ads. I've still yet to see anyone actually talk directly with the Bush and Kerry campaigns themselves, however.

Well, if the US presidential candidates won't come to the search engines, the search engines will come to them. At least Yahoo to former Democratic contender Howard Dean, that is. He's now shilling (and yelling) for Yahoo Local. Check out the radio spot via the Yahoo Search Blog: Howard Dean on Yahoo! Local.

Posted by Danny Sullivan at 7:32 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

September 21, 2004

Video: Mr. Jeeves Goes Around the World

Place the following in your fun folder.

Here's a video tour (-: of the places Mr. Jeeves traveled to while he was away.

I think the Teoma rocket car is cool!

Posted by Gary Price at 1:15 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

September 17, 2004

Jeeves: Profits from New Site Will Go to Red Cross

The "good idea" award of the day goes to AJ.

Ask Jeeves announced this morning that they've teamed up with the Red Cross to raise money for hurricane victims in the Southeast U.S.

>From the news release:

"Ask Jeeves has launched redcross.ask.com, a special version of the company's flagship search site Ask Jeeves (Ask.com), to offer people an easy way to help the Red Cross. Ask Jeeves will donate 100 percent of the profits generated from searches conducted on this site with a minimum donation of $50,000 and a maximum donation of $1 million."

"Redcross.Ask.com features the same searching capabilities, features and experience offered at Ask Jeeves (Ask.com). The only difference is that all profits generated from this site will go to the American Red Cross Disaster Relief Fund..."

Posted by Gary Price at 8:38 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

a9's Secret Weapon: Discounts For Searching?

What might help Amazon draw users away from Google, Yahoo, MSN and others to its new a9 search engine? How about 1.5 percent off your Amazon purchases? Now that will incent me when it's time to do my Christmas shopping. More from the Unofficial Google Weblog here: Amazon Discount for Using A9.

Posted by Danny Sullivan at 7:49 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

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