November 18, 2009

AdGooroo Unveils Academic Program Featuring Free Tools for Educators

AdGooroo is launching a new academic program that provides free resources to educators wishing to teach their students about search marketing. The program provides free academic licenses to AdGooroo's SEM Insight.

"Supporting the academic community is a top priority for AdGooroo, and we're offering them free access to SEM Insight, our flagship research tool. Commercial users are paying at least $399 a month to use this tool," said AdGooroo Founder and CEO, Rich Stokes. "It's important to AdGooroo and me personally to cultivate the understanding of accountable online advertising and particularly search advertising at the student level. We'd like to serve as a helpful resource to academic departments and professors around the globe."

The University of Chicago is one of the first educational institutions to sign up for the program.

"Search engines and the Web in general have had a huge impact on the world around us, and this partnership program not only helps the University of Chicago expose students to the world of Internet advertising. It allows us to submerge them into actual marketer campaigns and let them see for themselves what a competitive channel online advertising has become," said Linda Darragh, Clinical Associate professor of Entrepreneurship at the University of Chicago's Polsky Center of Entrepreneurship. "Having access to resources like these from AdGooroo enables us to provide this experience for students and take the lesson from figurative to real world."

The program is open to faculty and staff, both part and full-time, that work at a qualifying educational institution, such as public and private vocational schools, correspondence schools, colleges and universities. The institution must have been accredited by an agency recognized by the U.S. Secretary of Education.

Posted by Nathania Johnson at 1:04 PM | Permalink | Comments (2)

November 10, 2009

Web Marketing Today Celebrates its 15th Birthday

If "Internet years" are anything like "dog years," then celebrating your 15th anniversary is like celebrating your 105 birthday. Can you remember what the world wide web was like in 1994?

That was the year that Netscape Navigator was launched. That was also the year that Dr. Ralph Wilson, Editor, launched Web Marketing Today.

Bryan Eisenberg, recognized authority and pioneer in online marketing and ClickZ's ROI Marketing columnist, says, "Ralph Wilson's newsletter was one of the first that I signed up for when I started in this industry and I still read it today. I would not be where I am today, and as respected as I am today, without his initial guidance. This newsletter is a must-read. Dr. Wilson really cuts through the clutter."

Jim Sterne, Founder of Web Marketing Association (WMA) and director of the eMetrics Marketing Optimization Summit, recently interviewed Dr. Wilson at SES San Jose 2009.

Jim Sterne Interviews Dr. Ralph Wilson of Web Marketing Today

To mark the 15th anniversary, anyone who subscribes to the Web Marketing Today newsletter receives six e-books/whitepapers that cover the basics of Internet marketing -- a $50 value. This includes his most requested item: "The Web Marketing Checklist -- 37 Ways to Promote Your Website."

Posted by Greg Jarboe at 4:52 PM | Permalink | Comments (2)

August 31, 2009

Global Search Market Tops Over 100 Billion Searches a Month

comScore has just released a study of the global search market that shows more than 113 billion searches were conducted in July 2009. This represents a 41 percent increase compared to a year ago.

Google attracted significantly more searches than any other search engine with 76.7 billion searches conducted, giving it 67.5 percent market share. Yahoo! ranked second worldwide with 8.9 billion searches (7.8 percent share), followed closely by Chinese search engine Baidu with 8 billion searches (7.0 percent share). Most of the top search properties worldwide experienced significant growth in search query volume versus last year, with Russian search engine Yandex growing at the fastest rate (94 percent) among the top ten.

It is worth noting that Europe accounted for the highest share of searches at 32.1 percent, followed by Asia Pacific (30.8 percent) and North America (22.1 percent). Among the five global regions, Latin America exhibited the heaviest search behavior per person with an average of 13 search usage days in July and 130 searches per searcher. Europe had the second highest overall search volume per person (117 searches per searcher) while North America exhibited the second heaviest frequency (12.5 search usage days per searcher).

This makes it as important to attend SES Berlin November 24-25, 2009, as it does to attend SES Chicago December 7-10, 2009. Why?

As Mike Grehan, the newly-anointed VP and Global Content Director at SES, SEW, and ClickZ, told me earlier this month, search isn't a static topic. The changes in the industry are accelerating. Can anyone afford to be behind the times in this new era?

Mike Grehan, the new VP and Global Content Director, ties social media to search, SES San Jose 2009

Posted by Greg Jarboe at 3:43 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

August 13, 2009

SEMPO Adds Two New Working Groups: San Fran and the ATL

SEMPO (Search Engine Marketing Professional Organization) has announced two new working groups for search marketing professionals. The new working groups will be located in Atlanta and San Francisco.

"We're excited about adding San Francisco and Atlanta to our list of SEMPO's local working groups, which are a very effective vehicle for addressing the local search community's challenges and opportunities," said Geoffrey Shenk, Managing Director of Kenshoo and Chairman, SEMPO North America. "They are becoming an increasingly popular way for SEMPO members to share ideas and expertise and, in the end, they benefit the SEMPO organization and the SEM industry."

There are 5 other working groups in the following cities: Arizona, Boston, Chicago, Colorado and New York.

Personally, if I were to add to these 7, I would add Raleigh-Durham and Dallas-Fort Worth.

Where would you add a search marketing working group?

Posted by Nathania Johnson at 1:19 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

August 10, 2009

Publicis to Buy Razorfish from Microsoft

Microsoft unloaded a potential conflict of interest today when it agreed to sell Razorfish to Publicis for $530 million.

Microsoft had picked up Razorfish (then known as Avenue A | Razorfish) as part of its 2007 acquisition of aQuantive. That put Microsoft in a position where it was selling ads to itself, and buying ads from its search engine competitors.

Publicis helped Google out of a similar situation last year when it bought Performics from Google. Performics came to Google with the acquisition of DoubleClick.

Razorfish will continue to operate under its brand name and will be part of VivaKi, a Publicis entity that includes Digitas, Starcom MediaVest Group, Denuo, and ZenithOptimedia. Razorfish's management team, including CEO Bob Lord, will remain in place, according to a joint statement issued by Microsoft and Publicis.

The deal includes a 5-year deal where Publicis will get preferred rates on Microsoft's advertising properties, including its Bing search engine, as long as it meets certain ad-buying quotas.

Posted by Kevin Newcomb at 12:36 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

August 6, 2009

My Cheese Just Moved

I've been referred to as an agent of change quite a number of times in my professional career. Not just since I moved into online marketing, but long before, when I worked in broadcast media. Much as broadcast was a very fast-moving medium, it never seemed to change direction much. You had to wait for major innovation such as cable and satellite and digital to see real change being effected.

I came online with my first internet consultancy business way back in 1995. It suited me well, although it was way ahead of its time, because, taking clients online involved a huge amount of change. Change in technology, change in culture, change in relationships.

Some people easily accept change and some people simply don't want to. If you've read the book "Who Moved My Cheese" (where the headline to this blog post is taken from) you'll know exactly what I mean.

So, having been responsible for helping to effect change with my clients for almost fifteen years online and ten off, it's time for my own big change. And that's why, seemingly out of the blue, you find me making my first of many posts to come here at Search Engine Watch.

I'm extraordinarily proud to be making a major move from the agency world to the world of publishing and events by joining Incisive Media's interactive division.

I've long been associated with its three online-powerhouse brands, Search Engine Watch, ClickZ and the global conference and expo series Search Engine Strategies. As a long-standing contributor as both writer and speaker, I'm delighted to have been offered an executive position working with this hugely talented team.

And the timing is perfect. As I gaze into my crystal ball I see change, change, change in the online marketing world. No more so than in the field of search marketing. As one surge of technology that got the industry off the ground gives way to the next, change is inevitable. It is perhaps the most exciting period in search to date.

And as the industry changes, we'll change with it, covering new developments in business and technology. As will ClickZ and Search Engine Strategies. We'll look different with a new coat of paint, start to sound different, and strengthen our thought leadership in the industry.

But wait... Before I hear the gnashing of teeth from those who don't feel comfortable with change and like things just the way they are, nothing's going to happen overnight. This is subtle and gradual change, so all your usual goodies and faves are going to be exactly where you expect them to be.

But as I work with my colleagues Matt McGowan, Stewart Quealy, Anna Maria Virzi and Kevin Newcomb (names most readers and conference goers will be familiar with), we'll be spearheading new initiatives and developing the most timely and relevant content as the industry races ahead.

And for me, it's a feet-first exercise as I jump on board just as the largest search marketing extravaganza on the planet is about to begin. This annual San Jose event is the biggest and brightest of its kind on the West Coast, and is always a highlight in the marketing conference calendar.

As literally thousands of industry folk converge under the glorious California sunshine, we'll be presenting the usual vast array of tracks, sessions, speakers and topics. If it's happening in search, you can bet we'll be talking about it next week.

And I, for one, will surely be talking to as many people as I can. Search Engine Watch is the granddaddy of SEO/SEM newsletter/blogs, Search Engine Strategies is the longest running event of its kind,and ClickZ is royalty in the online marketing space. So what would you like to see change, or hang dearly to your bosom and never let go for that matter?

I'm pumped up and raring to go. And totally thrilled to be part of future new developments with the Incisive Interactive crew.

SES next week - be there!

Posted by Mike Grehan at 10:13 AM | Permalink | Comments (17)

February 16, 2009

SEO, Inc. Teaches Search Marketing Classes at UCSD

This week, SEO, Inc. is teaching a search marketing course at University of California, San Diego. The course runs 3 days, February 17, 18 and 19 from 8:30am to 5pm and is 2.5 hours of credit.

Topics include:

• Website architecture
• Competitive intelligence
• Optimizing code
• Keyword selection
• SEO copywriting
• Link building

"As more and more small business owners are becoming aware of what SEO is and why they should be doing it, we are gaining more and more interest in this course," said Garry Grant, CEO of SEO Inc. "This our third semester teaching the course at UCSD, and I anticipate student interest will keep it a part of the university's catalog on a continuing basis. SEO is a valuable tool that can be used in any business segment or industry."

Of course, marketing professionals can also attend the upcoming SES New York. It won't count for college credit, but the knowledge and networking can certainly advance your career.

Posted by Nathania Johnson at 12:30 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

January 5, 2009

The 5 Web Resources You Need to Find a Job in Search

It's a New Year, but we've got that same old economy from 2008. If you find yourself looking for a job in search, these five resources should be the foundation of your efforts:

1. Indeed.com - Culls results from a variety of jobs sites as well as job listings from company web sites. Searching here keeps you from having to go individually to a variety of sites. You can pull an RSS feed of your job search into your news reader, making your search process even faster. You'll find results from:
   • SEMPO
   • Monster
   • HotJobs (owned by Yahoo)
   • CareerBuilder
   • Dice
   • TalentZoo
2. Twitter Let your followers know you're looking for a job. I once did and had three leads in 24 hours. I got offers from all three. The Twitter community is generally a very compassionate bunch, raising money for good causes. Helping people find jobs is something I think we'll see a lot of in 2009 - 2010.
3. LinkedIn Not only does LinkedIn have its own job listings, but here you can many times find the people who are doing the hiring or at least work in Human Resources at the company you're interested in. Use your network to get introduced and create connections.
4. Craig's List Answering an ad for a Search Marketing Copywriter on Craig's List is how I got my start in search. Well, that and the great Marketing Don taking a chance on me.
5. Search Engine Watch Board - Rounding out the list is a completely shameless plug for our very own jobs board.

What resources do YOU recommend? Leave a comment and let us know!

Related Reading: The Purple People Collective: Freelance and Job Listings for Laid-Off Yahoos Yahoo, Zillow to Cut Jobs Recruiting SEM Employees: Job Boards, Headhunters & Account Planning Boot Camp SEMPO Institute to Develop Career Opportunities for Young Chicagoans

Posted by Nathania Johnson at 10:19 AM | Permalink | Comments (5)

SEW Experts: Search Shifts and Predictions for 2009

Time to ring in the New Year with a few search marketing predictions for 2009. In today's SEM agency issues column, "Search Shifts and Predictions for 2009," William Flaiz predicts what another year will hold for Google, the Web and SEO.

» Full story

Posted by Kevin Newcomb at 12:00 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

November 24, 2008

adCenter Offers $1000 in Free Clicks for SEMPO Members

Microsoft's adCenter is launching a new offer for Search Engine Marketing Professional Organization (SEMPO) members: $1000 in free clicks. Campaigns created through the promotion will be placed on Live Search and the MSN portal. Those who wish to become SEMPO members to take advantage of the offer must join the organization by December 31, 2008.

"SEMPO members, both agency and corporate search marketers, represent some of the most knowledgeable and innovative search marketing leaders in the industry," said Valerie Bolduc, senior global product marketing manager, Advertiser and Publisher Solutions, Microsoft. "Working with SEMPO provides Microsoft with the opportunity to engage and learn from the search marketing community, which enables us to enhance our products and offerings to better serve our mutual customers."

SEMPO President Jeffrey Pruitt noted, "SEMPO's continued growth is tied to the strong support of its sponsors. Microsoft has long been our lead sponsor and advocate on several fronts including the SEMPO Training Institute, as well as for special programs like the adCenter search advertising promotion. Our industry association greatly appreciates Microsoft's strong commitment and ongoing participation."

Related Reading: SEMPO Institute to Develop Career Opportunities for Young Chicagoans New SEMPO Chairperson Dana Todd Has Big Dreams for Organization SEMPO Selects Officers for New Board of Directors

Posted by Nathania Johnson at 11:50 AM | Permalink | Comments (1)

August 28, 2008

Market Motive Search Marketing Certification Program

Market Motive announced today that they are launching a new search engine marketing certification program. The program is designed to complement their existing online training programs. Certification programs will cover SEO, web analytics, and paid search. All courses leading up to the certification are taught by known industry experts.

More details for the search engine marketing certification program can be found at http://www.marketmotive.com/search-marketing-certification.php. This web page includes a 2 minute introductory video by Michael Stebbins, CEO and co-founder of Market Motive.

Costs of the program begin at $299. Existing members of Market Motive get access to the practitioner level testing and certification at no extra cost.

Posted by at 8:16 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

June 20, 2008

Recruiting SEM Employees: Job Boards, Headhunters & Account Planning Boot Camp

One inescapable reality of the SEM industry is that finding great employees is a challenge, even if one knows precisely where to look. Mainstream and niche job sites, specialized SEM job boards, trade organizations and word of mouth are common channels for recruiting. However with demand growing sometimes it's necessary to get creative in recruitment efforts.

Whether seeking employees in-house or for an agency, as offline channels continue to fold into the 'net at a dizzying pace, finding incredibly smart staffers to service growing task lists can be a problem in this competitive environment.

Here's a 24 point list of of SEM/SEO recruitment channels and ideas, including classics and a few off-the-beaten-path sources with which aimClear and our partner agencies have had some luck. They're not listed in any particular order of importance:

SEW Job Board Free for SEM job seekers, employers pay between $375.00 and $4750.00 (multi-post packages). SearchEngineWatch is an important SEM industry player and parent of the ubiquitous SearchEngineStrategies conference series. There are many cross-over users who come from more traditional marketing industries and mainstream businesses.

Marketing Pilgrim Job Board Free for SEM job Seekers, posting costs employers $57.00 for 30 days. Andy Beal's audience is all about reputation management, natural search and his audience is comprised of well respected industry players and up-and-comers.

StuntDubl Job Board Free for SEM Job Seekers, posting costs employers $30.00 for 30 days. Todd Malicoat is well known on the SES, SMX and major trade publication circuit. His blog is frequented by industry insiders and newbies alike.

SEMPO (Search Engine Marketing Professionals) Job Board Free for SEM job seekers, posting reserved form members @ the $1000.00 annual level and above. SEMPO is as close as the SEM community gets to a consensus trade organization. They also offer training programs for SEM types.

Marketing Sherpa Job Board Free for SEM job seekers, free for employers to post. MarketingSherpa is a case study research team surrounded by some of the industries brightest minds. Advertising to this community may serve your needs.

SEOMoz Job & Contract Position Listings Free for SEM Job seekers, Join SEOmoz to build your company profile and post jobs. Rand Fishkin's venerable SEOmoz is the gold standard for "street cred" and his recommendations mean a lot. Marketplace, an SEO services directory, is a very sweet resource.

Miami Ad School This ad, design & and account planning school turns out cool copywriter-specialists focused on branding across multiple channels including interactive. Miami Ad School trains promising graduates of other design/marketing colleges, professionals in other fields (like lawyers and accountants) and helps designers build "books" (portfolios). With locations Miami, Minneapolis, San Francisco, Hamburg, Madrid and Sao Paulo the placement department emails job listings to all current and previous graduates around the world-at no charge to the employer.

OASEO An "SEO Job Community," OASEO is free for SEM Job seekers, posting costs employers $99.00 for 30 days.

ProBlogger Job Board Free for SEM Job seekers, posting costs employers $50.00 for 30 days. This site is especially strong for recruiting writers who are blog savvy and understand the game.

SEOBook Job Board Free for job seekers, free for employers. Aaron Wall is one of SEOs pioneers and the blog remains tremendously popular. SEOBook attracts a large audience of SEM insiders and other potential employees crossing over from other industries.

SEM Jobs @ Monster.com Interestingly enough, Google allows this hardwired search result to index. Everyone in the HR world knows about Monster. See site for pricing details.

Jobster hardwired SEO jobs search result. See site for pricing details

Harry Joiner – Marketing Headhunter A dominant recruiter in multi-channel client side e-commerce space and a player in the SEM recruiting trades.

Cii Associates – SEO recruiter in Raleigh-Durham A regionally focused SEM recruiting firm. The Raleigh-Durham IT market is hot and these folks are local.

Onward Search Recruiting, staffing and temporary contract, temp-to-hire and direct-hire placements at search marketing agencies, & advertising firms. Check out VP Josh Gampel's LinkedIn profile and meet a power player in the SEM recruitment field.

Most college graduates these days are plugged into the social Internet and can use basic office tools. Journalism majors seem to excel @ SEO and social media, accountant school grad's are natural PPC wizards and don't forget to check out he marketing club of your local university's Facebook group.

English teachers are wired for keyword research and traditional media buyers (like the ones getting laid off from local network affiliates) can be terrific at account planning and media seller.

Find an Associate degree IT grad' who's freakish about blogging and APIs and keep in mind that Paralegals make awesome SEOs. Here's the best tip of all: Musicians make fabulous SEOs and link builders.

There's tons of demand out there for SEM and SEO employees from office helper to executive. Hopefully these resources provide a good starting place for your company in growing your department or agency. Please feel free to join in and suggest any additional recruitment channels by commenting.

Posted by Marty Weintraub at 11:14 PM | Permalink | Comments (7)

June 19, 2008

SEM Industry Exceeded 2007 Projections as SEMs Look to Video, Mobile

The SEMPO 2007 State of the Market Survey Results are in, and the data shows robust growth in the North American SEM industry year. Spending reached $12.2 billion in 2007, exceeding projections of $11.5 billion. In 2006, the spend came in at $9.4 billion. As a result, the projection for 2011 is now at $25.2 billion, up from the $18.6 billion projection set a year ago.

Now that marketers are getting the hang of traditional search, many are looking to new channels, including video and mobile. 43% of participants are interested in contextually targeted advertising attached to video search results, while 40% are interested in mobile search. But most respondents said pricing would need to be the same as or less than it is for traditional search advertising.

Pricing was also an issue in paid search. About three quarters of those surveyed could afford a price increase, but it would need to be an increase of 30% or less.

Other stats from the survey include:

• Marketers found more search dollars by grabbing from print magazine, website development, direct mail and other marketing budgets.
• Organic SEO's popularity was up to 89% in 2007, from 80% in 2005 and 76% in 2006. Agency respondents offering organic SEO rose to 91% in 2007, up from 80% in 2005 and 87% in 2006.
• 4 out of 5 respondents would increase their budget in order to add behavioral targeting to their pay-per-click campaigns.
• 57% of online advertisers would spend an average of 11% more on demographic targeting, such as age and gender.

The numbers are on par with revenues posted by the search engines. Earlier this year, Google beat analysts estimates by posting strong Q1 2008 revenues, despite data indicating a slowdown in paid search growth. Yahoo and Microsoft also held steady financially despite declining search shares and the acquisition drama.

What do you think about this data? Are you looking to video and mobile? Let us know in the comments.

Posted by Nathania Johnson at 11:34 AM | Permalink | Comments (1)

June 17, 2008

SEMPO Institute to Develop Career Opportunities for Young Chicagoans

The SEMPO Institute is teaming with SIM Partners and i.c. stars to create search marketing career opportunities for young adults in Chicago. The president of SIM Partners, Jon Schepke, sits on the board of the SEMPO Institute. His company has been working with i.c. stars for over four years.

“As co-chair of the SEMPO Institute, it made perfect sense to connect these two organizations when the SEMPO Institute launched in 2007,” says Schepke.

i.c. stars is a nonprofit organization designed to develop community leaders in Chicago. The organization uses project-based learning to groom adults (who have at least a high school diploma or GED) for careers in business and technology.

“The i.c.stars partnership with SEMPO and SIM Partners has enabled a new and growth-oriented career option for graduates in the area of Internet Marketing,” states Eric Lannert, vice president of i.c. stars. He continues, “the volunteer efforts of SIM Partners have enabled us to modify our internal curriculum so students can manage their own Google Adwords campaigns for startup websites and gain experience. At a time of economic uncertainty, we see this partnership as a strategic initiative to continue providing meaningful and challenging job opportunities for our students.”

Earlier in the year, SEMPO Chairperson Dana Todd included expanding the Institute's baseline for education in her mission for the industry organization.

Related Reading: Top 10 Toughest Jobs to Fill? The Top 3 Are In Search Engine Marketing Search Engine Marketing Career Development Search Marketing: A Rewarding Career Path

Posted by Nathania Johnson at 9:59 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

May 14, 2008

Branding is Dead; Long Live SEO

There's been a lot of talk recently about how SEO is dead, and branding will rise out of its ashes. I have to disagree. If anything, branding is the marketing technique on its way out--a victim of how search has changed the way people think and shop, online and offline.

Once upon a time, a consumer had to juggle a lot of information just to make a relative intelligent purchase. In 1991, if you wanted to buy a portable compact disc player, you had to know: 1. What you wanted to buy (portable compact disc player) 2. What brand you wanted to buy (Sony) 3. What product you wanted to buy (Discman) 4. What store to buy it at (The Wiz) 5. Where to find that store (Menlo Park Mall)

Aside from Step 1, every other piece of information came to you from branding. Sony did an amazing job branding the Discman, to the point where it was synonymous with "portable CD player." The Wiz was also an obvious choice based on branding; after all, no one beat it. And Menlo Park Mall was close to my house and it was the mall from Mallrats. If you wanted to research prices, you either had to go store to store (and presumably know which stores to go to) or compare Sunday circulars. To compare products, you needed a copy of Consumer Reports. All that knowledge, or the ways to access it, was put into your head through branding.

Today, it's quite different. Looking to buy a new MP3 player in 2008? With a search engine, that's about all you need to know. A search in Google for "mp3 player" brings up C|Net's MP3 Buying Guide. After reading some reviews, you decide on a flash memory player and then on the Creative Zen 16GB. You might then check out the prices quoted on C|Net, or search for "Creative Zen 16GB" in Google, or in a price comparison engine like Google Product Search or Shopping.com. And you'll likely end up getting the Zen from whichever store has the best price and seems trustworthy.

Branding still matters somewhat. After all, you might recognize the names "C|Net," "Creative" and "Zen." But you didn't find them based on their brand; you found them via search. In fact, the branding that matters the most were those of the tools you used: Google, Google Product Search and Shopping.com.

Search drives the sale; branding only validates it. We've been conditioned by search not to be brand loyal. We may check out Amazon.com for the MP3 Player, but we have no qualms about buying it elsewhere. We have a world of information at our fingertips, and we only need the barest bit of data to access it. Why remember a brand when you can so easily find it again? Even when branding works on us, we validate that branding by searching for the brand in a search engine instead of going straight to the brand's web site. If that branding fully worked, the lucrative field of reputation management would disappear.

So branding isn't exactly dead yet, but in a world where we've been conditioned to use brands as--at most--a secondary measure of a company's worth, and to validate branding through search, it's importance continues to wane. In that world, a world where search still leads the way in driving revenue, SEO cannot die.

Posted by at 7:07 AM | Permalink | Comments (30)

April 25, 2008

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

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 at 4:00 PM | Permalink

April 15, 2008

SearchIgnite Releases Q1 Search Marketing Data

SearchIgnite has released search marketing spend data for Q1 2008 and the news is good for Yahoo, and so-so for Google and Microsoft. Year-over-year, same advertiser spending was up across all engines by 28.5%, but a slowdown in March spending growth is raising concerns for Q2.

Yahoo demonstrated the largest gain with a 57.6% increase in search marketing spend from last Q1. However, since Q1 2007 was a rough one for Yahoo, due to Panama's delay, those numbers should be examined with caution.

Breaking it down by month, Yahoo saw a 79.2% gain in January, 37.3% gain in February, and 43.9% increase in March.

In quarter-over-quarter numbers, Yahoo's share of the market grew from 19.6% to 24.2%, while Google dropped from 74.5% to 70.4% and Microsoft dropped from 5.9% to 5.45%.

SearchIgnite tracked over 22 billion impressions and 391 million clicks on Yahoo, Google, and MSN from January 1, 2006 through March 31, 2008 across more than 500 marketers, all of whom are clients of SearchIgnite directly or via its sister company 360i.

Related Reading: Even for Google, Conversions Matter More Than Clicks Is Google's Price Drop A Reflection Of Recent Media Coverage Search Spend Seems Healthy Despite Slowing Economy

Posted by Nathania Johnson at 9:01 AM | Permalink

April 11, 2008

Trellian Acquires Addme.com

Trellian, the company behind SEO Toolkit and Keyword Discovery, has announced its acquisition of Addme.com. Since 1996, Addme.com has been a source of information for webmasters and new website owners specializing in internet marketing, including SEO, as well as search engine submission.

"Addme.com has for many years been a great source of new clients for Trellian, that is why we were very excited to acquire Addme,” said Trellian President David Warmuz. “Trellian now plans to substantially develop Addme and add new SEO tools to the current Addme offerings, including many of the Trellian in-house tools developed over the years."

Related Reading: KeywordDiscovery offers free search term suggestion tool

Posted by Nathania Johnson at 8:24 AM | Permalink

March 31, 2008

Geary Interactive Acquires Fathom Online

Full-service digital marketing agency Geary Interactive has acquired Fathom Online, a search engine marketing firm. Though Geary already offered search marketing services, the company says it will expand it demographic reach as a result of the merger.

Geary CEO Andreas Roell said, "The combination of Geary and Fathom Online provides a compelling platform for today's digital marketing landscape. Together, we offer powerful capabilities and deep relationships with publishers and engines, expanded end-to-end customized marketing solutions, a national presence and extensive industry category experience."

The acquisition also highlights the need for integrating SEM campaigns with a larger online marketing strategy.

"Search engine tactics are the most popular element of a digital marketing campaign. In order to effectively generate search demand and convert customers' search clicks, the campaign must also include a strong integration with web development, paid and organic digital media planning and data analytics," said Roell.

Posted by Nathania Johnson at 10:58 AM | Permalink

March 26, 2008

New SEOmoz Report Features Data from 3,000+ SEOs

Search engine marketers are getting more sophisticated, still don't trust search engines, and keep spending on PPC. Those are some of the findings in a new SEO Industry Survey from SEOmoz.

Seattle-based SEOmoz has released findings from their SEO Industry Survey. The survey was conducted in February 2008 and includes answers from over 3,000 search engine marketing professionals from all over the world.

According to SEOmoz, the biggest takeaways are:

• The vast majority of respondents from SEM agencies use tools to aid their marketing efforts.
• Marketers are still unsure about things like the potential of negative effects from registering with Webmaster Central, or the use of nofollow.
• From the 2,060 people responding, we see at least $73 million is spent on PPC a month. That's more than $35,000 per respondent per month. This assumes all our respondents are from different companies.

For the full SEO Industry report, click here.

Posted by Nathania Johnson at 10:34 AM | Permalink

March 24, 2008

Stupid SEO Spammers

Generally, I like to write about what to do in SEO. Today, I want to write about what not to do.

Lesson #1: Don't spam people with your SEO services. Lesson #2: Definitely don't spam people who write for SEW and have close relations with spam blacklist owners about your SEO services.

This morning I got an email (my tenth) from a company that hadn't read my rules: National Positions, an “SEO” firm out of California, promising me “five times the RELEVANT traffic at a substantially reduced cost.” The site, which I've linked to above using a 302 redirect so as not to give out any of my link juice, said they could place my “website on top of the Natural Listings on Google, Yahoo and MSN” using their “proprietary techniques” and “valuable closely held trade secrets,” without using “link farms or black hat methods.” And they charge “less than half of what other companies charge!” Awesome.

So I checked out their site, and their SEO service includes: Keyword Market Intelligence (umm…keyword research), Meta-Data Optimization (sweet), Title Optimization and a Best Practices Doc. Considering most companies give away most of that info for free, their prices must be excellent. Their “proprietary trade secrets” don't seem to include, as far as I can tell, any blackhat techniques, so there is no need to worry about National Positions being the next Traffic Power (who cold-called me back in the day), but it's still a rip-off. They're charging people who know nothing about search to do nothing about search for them. And they're advertising through pure spam methods; they contacted me via an email posted on my site that I have never used to sign up for anything.

The email came from npseocompany.org, which I already submitted to URIBL and SURBL, the major spam blacklists. Check your inbox, and report the email if you get it too.

One of the latest emails claimed that “Our services and proven strategies are all ethical.” Perhaps no one bothered to tell them SPAM is unethical—and illegal. I've received 10 emails from them so far, without ever opting in. According to the law, any company that "harvest[s] email addresses from Web sites or Web services…for the purpose of sending email,” as National Positions did to me, is liable for a fine up to $11,000. I opted out after the first email I received, and I continue to receive emails from them—some from Gmail accounts! The law gives 10 days to honor an opt-out, and prohibits “another entity send[ing] email on your behalf to that address.” It's been more than 30 days; that's another $11,000.

I'm going to do all I can to make sure they get hit with those penalties—and I urge you to help me out if you get spammed too. Look out SEO Spammers—you pissed off the wrong group.

Posted by at 4:48 PM | Permalink

March 19, 2008

SEMPO Selects Officers for New Board of Directors

SEMPO has announced officers for its recently elected Board of Directors. The association also revealed a change in the amount of time board members serve. While previous boards served for 1 year, the new board will serve for 2 years. Officers will still serve 1 year terms and next year's officers will be chosen from this broader gang of 13.

Dana Todd replaced Gord Hotchkiss as Chairperson, while Jeffrey Pruitt continues in his position as President. Dave Fall moved from Treasurer to VP while Ron Jones moves into the role of Treasurer. Chris Boggs is staying put as Secretary.

The 2008 officers are: Dana Todd, Newsforce - Chairperson Jeffrey Pruitt, President, iCrossing - President Dave Fall, DoubleClick, Inc. - Vice President Ron Jones, Symetri Internet Marketing - Treasurer Chris Boggs, eMergent Marketing – Secretary

The 2008-2009 Board Members:

Jessica Bowman, In-house SEO Consultant Massimo Burgio, Global Search Interactive Bruce Clay, Bruce Clay, Inc. Duane Forrester, Microsoft Sara Holoubek, Free Agent Consultant Gord Hotchkiss, Enquiro Search Solutions, Inc. Bill Hunt, Global Strategies International Kevin Lee, Didit

Posted by Nathania Johnson at 6:53 AM | Permalink

January 17, 2008

SEW Experts: Search Engine Year-End Predictions: 2007 Scorecard

Last year, many industry watchers made search predictions for 2007. So how did some search gurus do? In today's Link Love column, "Search Engine Year-End Predictions: 2007 Scorecard," Sage Lewis takes a look back at 2007 to see how many predictions came true.

Posted by Kevin Newcomb at 12:00 AM | Permalink

January 2, 2008

SEW Experts: 2008 Wish List: Search Engine Hangover Cures

The new year is always a time for looking forward, and while last week's column focused on the old, we kick off the year with a wish list for 2008. In today's Searching for Meaning column, "2008 Wish List: Search Engine Hangover Cures," Kevin Ryan offers abridged, but uncensored cures for pseudo-search engines, link baiting bloggers, and stupid press release tricks.

Posted by Kevin Newcomb at 12:00 AM | Permalink

December 27, 2007

Defining Search in 2007

This year could be defined by social media, blended search, or even the changes in SEO. All told, 2007 is mainly the year that search continued to mature and fit in with other marketing disciplines. In today's SearchDay, "2007: The Year that Search Grew Up," we look at some of the top stories and trends of the past 12 months, and we come to the conclusion that sometimes you need to do more than just get better at what you're already doing.

Of course, there were many other important events in the search world in 2007. Yahoo's constant state of reorganization. Ask's unending push to become a legitimate search contender. AOL and Microsoft's continual morphing into advertising companies. And the acquisitions keep on coming.

For a list of articles, columns, and blog posts about the most significant search-related events of 2007, check out "This Year in Search." And never fear, we'll be back again next year to keep you updated on all that's relevant in the search world.

Posted by Kevin Newcomb at 6:06 PM | Permalink

November 26, 2007

Seth Godin Interview - What's a Meatball Sundae?

In my latest interview, I sat down again with Seth Godin to talk about his upcoming keynote speech at SES Chicago on Tuesday December 4th. The session focuses on his new book, Meatball Sundae, and focuses on the confusing nature of today's marketing opportunities.

Seth spoke about the nature of the problem previously in a pre-show webinar. You can see coverage for the webinar from Lisa Barone, Kevin Newcomb, and yours truly.

One of the major components of the discussion that was particularly interesting to me was a discussion about SEO. Seth had offered some criticism of SEO in the past, and I wanted to see what his thinking was on the matter.

It turns out that the real criticism Seth has is not of SEO, or SEOs. It's more focused on what happens when people start thinking that SEO is a magic bullet. I.e., take you online business, no matter how crummy it is, stir in some SEO, and presto change-o, you are raking in the dough. He goes on to say that the real challenge for all webmasters is what are they going to to present some new unique stuff to the world that people are going to want to see.

He then goes onto say:

I am just going to spend money, because I am a marketer hiring some guy to wave a magic wand to make something happen. And then, when the SEO people comeback and say here are ten recommendations, eight of which are about better stuff and two of which are about magic words and secret hyper-tags, all they do is take the other two, and leave the eight important ones off.

What I've been saying to people and mostly people who read my work or other clients is pretend it doesn't exist. Do everything you can before you call on the SEO wizards to do the last part. Because, if you are not willing to do the first part, if you are not willing to put in the effort, it doesn't matter how good they are, it's not going to work. Somebody else who is doing the first eight steps will do better even if they don't do the last two.

I have definitely seen some of this along the way as well. As an SEO, what I have learned to do is to qualify the willingness of a potential client to invest in the quality of their web site before taking them on. If they don't seem willing to do that, we turn them away. No sense in taking on a client where we will not be successful.

Posted by at 10:00 AM | Permalink

October 30, 2007

Search Engines and User Query Intent

In my recent Podcast with Bill Slawski we focused on discussing search engine ranking factors. Bill is known throughout the industry for the great work he does examining and writing about search engine patents, which he does on the SEO by the Sea blog.

One of the interesting areas we discussed was ways that search engines can determine user intent. One of the simplest of these is be looking at the search query itself. For example "buy digital camera" is a very different query from "digital camera reviews". This is the easy stuff.

The search engines can also look at query streams. For example, if the first query was for "seattle hotels", and next query is for "seafood restaurants", the chances are greater that the user is looking for seafood restaurants in and around Seattle.

Next, you can start determining a person's location dynamically. For example, if the IP address from which they are doing the query is in Boston, and they search on seafood restaurants, they may be looking for seafood restaurants in and around Boston. If the user is doing a search from a mobile device, then cell tower triangulation can be used to determine the user's location.

Of course, this can be made even more complex. For example, the user's IP address could be in Boston, and search on "seattle hotels", and then search on "seafood restaurants". So do they want a seafood restuarant in Boston or Seattle? Perhaps the best thing to do here is to show some preference to results from both cities.

There is much, much more that the search engines can do. They can look at preferences that you have specified in other products, such as language. They can see what query patterns other users followed who used similar patterns to the one the user is currently following, and try to anticipate the next query and start presenting some of those results earlier in the process.

For example, if most users who enter "digital cameras", then "sony digital cameras", and then pick a particular model number, the search engine knows that this is an indicator that they should consider highlight pages with information on that model number of camera in response to the "sony digital cameras" query. Ultimately, as more and more signals emerge, the search engines will get better and better at this.

Posted by at 10:54 AM | Permalink

August 16, 2007

Interview with Danny Sullivan

Just last week I had the chance to interview Danny Sullivan. One of the topics we focused on was Universal Search and personalization, and what it means for the market.

One of the funny aspects of the conversation was that Danny indicated that he has been telling people for years that these things are coming, but now that they are both here he wonders "what do I tell them now?".

Danny has also done some poking around at Google's Universal Search, and the companion initiatives from Yahoo and Ask. So while he believes that Universal Search will have a "big, huge impact", the current state of it is a bit less compelling. My perspective is that I believe it will have a huge impact over time as well, but it does not surprise me that it's not fully baked yet.

Posted by at 9:00 AM | Permalink

August 15, 2007

Market Motive - A new option for learning about Online Marketing

John Marshall, Michael Stebbins, and Avinash Kaushik announced today the founding of Market Motive. The company is a new venture which aims to provide a variety of online educational services focused on online marketing. Two days ago, I interviewed John Marshall about the company, it's services, and it's plans.

What you get with the service is high end written educational material, plus the ability to participate in direct Q&A with the expert staff involved in the company. And, expert staff they have. Here are some of the key players:

• Avinash Kaushik - covering Web Analytics
• John Marshall - covering Conversion
• Todd Malicoat - covering SEO
• Greg Jarboe and Jamie O'Donnell - covering online PR

The Q&A is handled through forums, but the panel of experts is signed on to provide fast and accurate responses. In addition, if you want to get the active help of these people to work with you through this online format, you can also do that as well. It's not cheap however, as the services are offered in a subscription model, with a price of $299 per month. Of course, this price looks cheap compared to a full on consulting engagement with people of this experience level.

It's an interesting twist in a market that contains so much free content out there, but I think the key difference is the interactivity with the experts, and getting your personal questions answered in a direct fashion.

Posted by at 3:23 PM | Permalink

August 14, 2007

Portal and Search Engine Satisfaction Ratings

The American Consumer Satisfaction Index has posted new Customer Satisfaction Indices for a wide range of companies, including a number of portal/search engine companies. The results are based on surveys of consumers. Here is a sampling of the data:

Company20062007% Change Internet Portals/Search Engines 7775-2.6 Yahoo! Inc. 76793.9 Google Inc. 8178-3.7 All Others 7875-3.8 Ask.com (IAC/InterActiveCorp) 71755.6 MSN (Microsoft Corporation) 74751.4 AOL LLC (Time Warner Inc.) 7467-9.5

A thread over at WebmasterWorld expresses shock that Yahoo could be rated higher than Google. It underscores the need to be careful about how you interpret this type of data. The survey does clearly state that the companies are all evalutated on an overall basis, so the Yahoo! numbers clearly include their portal properties, social media sites, etc.

One interesting thing to note is the jump Ask made from a score of 71 to a score of 75, a step forward of 5.6%. In fact, Ask was more highly rated than Microsoft in this survey (which grew by 1.4%).

It's also not a big surprise to see AOL bringing up the rear, although the precipitous drop of 9.5% was notable. I wonder if this was more driven by the accidental release of information with personally identifiable data, or by simple changes in the market need for a product that is just the Internet on training wheels.

Posted by at 10:53 AM | Permalink

August 6, 2007

Rebecca Lieb Interview

Last week I had the opportunity to our very own interview Rebecca Lieb. Rebecca is the Editor in Chief for the Clickz network, which includes Search Engine Watch. We talked about how Search Engine Watch is evolving, and we also talked about the changing world of online media. For those of you who are wondering, readership and subscriptions to Search Engine Watch have been growing steadily over the past year, Partly because search is becoming more and more mainstream.

We talked a bit about how advertising has had some great successes in Second Life. Out of that discussion emerged a great point about media campaigns in general. For example, Starwood Hotels had great success with their marketing trial of the Aloft series of hotels in Second Life. This was a new series of hotels that they were thinking of creating, and they were looking for market feedback. They got a ton of useful information.

But equally important to the long term success of the campaign, Starwood knew that they had to have an end of life plan for the campaign. Once the trials were done, they donated the properties they have acquired to a non-profit organization that was active in Second Life. By doing this, they did not leave behind an abandoned property within Second Life.

Sadly, many other brands have done this, test marketed ideas, and then left behind abandoned properties on the Second Life landscape, artifacts that simple sit there and damage the brand of the company that put them up. Doesn't sound like the goal of your typical ad campaign does it?

Starwood understood their audience, and their medium. Understanding their audience got them some great feedback, and also succeeded in enhancing their brand image. Understanding the medium caused them to do a much better job in understanding what to do at the end of their campaign.

Posted by at 11:47 AM | Permalink

July 23, 2007

17% of marketers buy ads in return for news coverage

According to a survey from PRWeek and Manning Selvage & Lee Marketing, 17% of senior marketers say their companies have bought advertising in return for a news story. About 7% of respondents say they have an implicit agreement with a reporter or editor for favorable coverage. Carol Krol of BtoB Magazine calls this "a worrisome sign that independent editorial credibility is being sacrificed."

Posted by Greg Jarboe at 12:04 PM | Permalink

June 27, 2007

Search Engine Marketing Council

I spoke with Lee Odden yesterday, and got an update on things going on at the Search Engine Marketing Council (SEMC), which is a special interest group within the Direct Marketing Association. Direct Marketers are the folks that have mastered the traditional art of direct response marketing, using a variety of techniques, including e-mail, (snail) mail, telemarketing, and other related methods.

Direct Marketers are becoming increasingly interested in search engine marketing. The SEMC is working to provide educational programs to direct marketers to help them climb the curve more quickly. For example, the SEMC is sponsoring tracks at the upcoming DMA '07 Conference in Chicago in October. This conference will include substantial sessions on search, and also on social media.

The SEMC also offers a Search Engine Marketing Certification Program. This program provides direct marketers with training in organic search marketing and pay per click search marketing. Courses are broken into two levels, Level 1, and Level II. The Level 1 courses cover the basics of search marketing, and Level II gets more advanced. Once you complete the Level II course you are eligible to seek a certification.

One of the interesting things from my conversation with Lee was his pointing out how important it is for direct marketers to obtain a direct measurement of results. In the world of search marketing the way you get that accountability is through the use of web analytics. In fact, a growing understanding of web analytics is helping accelerate the direct marketing industry's engagement with search marketing.

Posted by at 12:24 PM | Permalink

June 7, 2007

And now a few words from Kevin Ryan, VP, Global Content Director, Search Engine Watch and Search Engine Strategies

Greetings everyone, I'm very happy to announce that I have joined the team here at Search Engine Watch and Search Engine Strategies. Everyone has been asking what my role will be and what plans I have for SES and SEW. These are excellent questions with no easy or quick answer (but I'll give it a shot.)

My mission is to guide, direct and assist the tremendous team here in the continued development of the Search Engine Strategies and Search Engine Watch resources. Over the coming months I'll be spending a great deal of time working with our teams around the world to provide the best possible content for everyone engaged in search.

The industry we refer to as “The Search” has grown faster than anyone could have predicted and the need for quality information and guidance has never been greater. In other words, our world is changing and we're going to change with it. In order to be the guiding force in this industry, it will take a village.

Of course, this means you.

The Search Engine Watch and Search Engine Strategies contributors, speakers and advisors have helped define standards in the industry and kept the world at large informed about search. The world (as it is) owes you a debt of gratitude and I'd like to invite you to come along with me as we bring about the next evolution of search.

Search marketing knowledge isn't just for the precious few who have unlocked the secrets. There are many people out there struggling to get their arms around search disciplines—no easy task in an industry that is constantly evolving— that touch every aspect of marketing, advertising and the pursuit of knowledge. Indeed, search is the entry and delivery point for all things interactive.

It is an exciting time to be in the world of search marketing and I couldn't be happier to be helping out with such a great group of people. Keep an eye out for enhancements to the Search Engine Strategies and SEW experiences. Of course, if you have any suggestions, I would love to hear from you!

Posted by Kevin Ryan at 7:00 AM | Permalink

May 15, 2007

Internet Search Engine Database launches ISEdb SCOOP

Early this morning, Internet Search Engine Database launched its newest site called ISEdb SCOOP. It presents search engine industry news in such a way that user-appreciated information is pushed to the top of the overflowing pile.

Based on the now familiar social search technique, ISEdb SCOOP encourages visitors to submit news or articles then vote for their favorite search engine industry stories.

Tariq Ali, the site's owner, says, "I wanted a community powered by users where they could submit, share, bookmark and discover search engine related news, articles and tips. I also wanted their feedback in order to help promote this quality information."

On ISEdb SCOOP, users can submit articles they discover while conducting a news search or blog search. These stories will then appear in the "Upcoming Stories" section of the new site. As site visitors read articles and tips on the site, they can vote for the ones they find helpful and relevant.

What can you expect to find on ISEdb SCOOP? Virtually every type of search engine-related story, from reviews of Search Engine Strategies sessions to announcements about new technological advances.

Check it out.

Posted by Greg Jarboe at 9:04 AM | Permalink

March 26, 2007

Kinetic Results Now Dexterity Media

Dallas-based search and social media marketing firm Kinetic Results has rebranded itself as Dexterity Media, and founding partner Kevin Ryan has left the company.

"We've been working for the last year or so on ways to promote social media, and we think we've got the formula down now," Tony Wright, Dexterity's VP of client services, told SEW. "We've had tremendous demand for these services, and we wanted our name to more closely reflect what we do."

Kinetic, itself founded amidst an exodus from Zunch Communications in October 2005, has shuffled execs once more. Ryan's departure is not directly related to the name change, which was in the works prior to his decision to leave, Wright said. The team at Dexterity is now made up of Giovanni Gallucci, president & COO; Tony Wright, VP of client services; David J. Wilkie, VP of creative; and Anthony Zapata, VP of client strategy.

Over the past year, Dexterity has built up a podcast network, Media Swamp, as well as a social media optimization planner, which helps clients create a framework for social media marketing. Those services will continue to grow under the new direction of the company, without giving up on its search marketing practice, Wright said. All contracts with existing clients will be maintained, he said.

"We'll definitely continue to offer search marketing services. We think social media dovetails nicely with search offerings," he said.

Posted by Kevin Newcomb at 1:49 PM | Permalink

March 20, 2007

Website Pros Acquires Submitawebsite

Website Pros, a Web design and marketing firm targeting small to mid-sized businesses, has acquired SEO consultancy Submitawebsite. Terms of the deal, expected to close at the end of March, were not disclosed.

Submitawebsite's SEO offerings will be added to Website Pros' "one-stop shop" approach to small business marketing solutions, according to Joe Griffin Jr., president of Submitawebsite. Jacksonville, Fla.-based Website Pros will take on Submitawebsite's 18-person team in Scottsdale, Ariz., along with its roster of 500 clients. Submitawebsite will operate as a separate brand.

The idea will be to cross-sell SEO clients with Website Pros' solutions, and vice-versa, Griffin said. For example, Website Pros operates Leads.com, a PPC ad management company focusing on SMBs that don't spend enough to get attention from larger agencies, but still want to have someone manage their campaigns.

"A lot of small businesses haven't embraced the Internet in general. There's a lot of improvement to be made, and dollars that need to move over from offline ads," Griffin said.

Submitawebsite has operated independently since it was started in 1997 by Griffin and his father, Joe Griffin Sr. Griffin Jr. left for a few years to work for iCrossing, then returned in 2003 to build the company with his father, he said.

Posted by Kevin Newcomb at 12:10 AM | Permalink

March 12, 2007

Did-It's Wise Lands at Right Media

Former Did-It CEO Bill Wise has been named president of Remix Media, a division of ad exchange Right Media, according to MediaPost. Remix media is the ad network arm of the company, which operates a trading platform for online ads similar to a stock exchange, the Right Media Exchange.

Yahoo acquired a 20-percent stake in Right Media in October for $45 million.

Posted by Kevin Newcomb at 8:53 AM | Permalink

January 30, 2007

Search guru Danny Sullivan becomes Ad Age Digital's newest columnist

In yet another sign that search marketing is now mainstream marketing, Ad Age Digital's newest columnist is none other than search guru Danny Sullivan. In his first column, "What makes search magical," Danny reminds us that just because Google is getting into every medium, search still has something special: a "desire-cast."

Posted by Greg Jarboe at 1:12 PM | Permalink

January 23, 2007

Dave Pasternack Sticks to His Guns

The whole "SEO is not rocket science" debate has gone on for years, in one form or another, and has been fired up in recent months by one of the founders of Did-it, Dave Pasternack.

Without rehashing the whole debate (see the links below for that), we thought we'd point out the latest from Mr. Pasternack, Is SEO "rocket science"? A Q&A with Dave Pasternack, in case anyone was worried that he was being misinterpreted:

"Q: What's everybody so angry about? Dave Pasternack: Everybody's not angry: only a small percentage of readers with an inferiority complex who happen to call themselves SEO experts"

"A growing number of companies are realizing that their sites need to be designed in accordance with the basic SEO guidelines described by Google, and that this knowledge should be and is becoming incorporated as a core competence of their internal Web teams. Many SEOs feel that this sudden emergence of rationality is threatening their profession, and so, to hold on, must convince their clients that good SEO presents more complicated issues than the clients' personnel are willing or able to master."

Besides that, Pasternack compares SEO to baking a cake; thinks any SEO company not in the Top 5 results for SEO on Google is worthless (looks like Bruce Clay is going to be even busier, if people follow this advice), and basically accuses Danny Sullivan of defending SEO to further his own agenda of keeping butts in the seats at SES and SMX.

But paid search practitioners need not fear: Pasternack says you're still relevant...as long as you can master complex third-party tools, like...um...Did-it's?

Here's an abridged timeline of the debate:

• Troubled times for SEO firms, DMNews (Oct 24)
• Times Are NOT Troubled For SEO Firms, Search Insider (Nov 10)
• Think Organic, Act Paid, ClickZ (Dec 15 -- which was actually a republished column from May 2006)
• The Lame PPC and SEO Debate, Online Marketing Blog (Dec 19)
• The Half-Truths of Talking Frogs, WebGuerrilla (Dec 20)
• Yes Virginia, SEO Is Rocket Science - Defending Search Engine Optimization Once Again, Search Engine Land (Dec 21)
• SEM and SEO: Rocket Science, or Just Plain Science? Part 1, ClickZ (Dec 29)
• SEM and SEO: Rocket Science or Just Plain Science? Part2, ClickZ (Jan 5)
• The New On Site Optimisation, SEOmoz (Jan 6)
• SEO: Art, Science, Bollocks Or What?, ClickZ (Jan 8)
• The Bigger Question of SEO, SearchDay (Jan 10)
• The SEO Debate Continues, Out of my Gord (Jan 10)
• Shoemoney, A Fish Bowl, and Bullshit, Oilman (Jan 10)
• More Rounds In The "Is SEO Overrated" Debate, Search Engine Land (Jan 11)
• SEO: Rocket Science or Colonoscopy?,Top Rank Blog (Jan 16)
• SEO Is Not Rocket Science, It's Like Baking a Cake, SearchRank (Jan 23)
• Good SEO Humor, Online Marketing Blog (Jan 23)
And for historical perspective,
• Worthless Shady Criminals: A Defense Of SEO, Search Engine Watch (Apr 28, 2005)

If that's not enough for you, I'd recommend a Technorati search to find a few hundred more references.

Posted by Kevin Newcomb at 4:59 PM | Permalink

January 10, 2007

What's the Real Value of a Search Marketing Agency?

In today's SearchDay, The Bigger Question of SEO, iProspect's John Tawadros weighs in on the SEO as rocket science debate. His conclusion? SEO is not rocket science, but neither is it easy. But what really matters is the value a search marketing agency delivers, in the form of experience, creativity, analysis, strategy, and sound business sense.

Posted by Kevin Newcomb at 2:12 AM | Permalink

January 9, 2007

A SearchDay Carol, Part 2

In today's SearchDay, Greg Jarboe continues with the second installment of "The 12 Days of SearchDay." Last week we looked at the people that will most influence search this year, and this week, Greg counts down organizations -- In the Second Week of New Year's, My SearchDay Gave to Me: eight firms a-buying, seven forums buzzing, six engines searching, five Google things.

Posted by Kevin Newcomb at 12:58 AM | Permalink

January 2, 2007

A SearchDay Carol

Technically, today is the ninth day of Christmas, so we're still allowed to sing the search-ified version of our favorite carol. Hum along if you know the tune: In the First Week of New Year's, My SearchDay Gave to Me: 12 speakers speaking, 11 bloggers blogging, 10 scribblers scribbling, and nine Diggers Digging.

In today's SearchDay, Greg Jarboe highlights some people that will be important to the search industry this year. At first glance, focusing on people might seem strange in an industry so fixated on search engine algorithms. It begins to make more sense when one considers that people -- especially the opinion leaders who speak, blog, write, and Digg -- are going to shape the search industry this year as much as any changes by the search engines themselves.

Posted by Kevin Newcomb at 12:51 AM | Permalink

December 31, 2006

The Year in Search, redux

In addition to the 101 Biggest Stories in Search we mentioned earlier, it's worth taking some time to check out The Year in Search Reviewed, and part 2. In addition to highlighting the top stories, these lists add analysis from Chris Boggs, search strategist at Avenue A | Razorfish and SEW blogger.

Posted by Kevin Newcomb at 12:08 PM | Permalink

November 22, 2006

SEM Certification & Training Courses

The move toward offering certification and training in search marketing is accelerating. Here's a rundown on some new courses and developments I've heard of recently.

• Kalena Jordan's Search Engine College has launched "Certification Pathways," a bundle of courses designed to get people up to speed in the space.  
• Wondering if you should even be in search marketing? SEMPO's got a webinar designed to help, Starting a Career in Search Marketing, happening on November 30 at Noon Eastern time.  
• SEMPO is also offering the SEMPO Institute, a distance learning program designed to provide search engine training. The group says it will go live in January 2007 with a course on fundamentals, followed by an advanced SEO and advanced paid search curriculum. Do the training, and you get a certificate.  
• My DMA Offering Search Marketing Certification Program post from September covers how the DMA was going to offer their own training and certification course. Why We Need Search Standards from iMedia Connection provides a bit of an update on that. Courses are to launch in January -- more information can be found here.  
• Incisive is offering training courses following the SES Chicago 2006 show. This page outlines what's being offered. You can attend these classes in addition to the show (more info on the entire show here) or separately, if you want.  
• Training courses from Bruce Clay aren't new, but he's been offering them longer and more consistently than anyone I can think of. So you might want to check those out here.

Posted by Danny Sullivan at 1:58 PM | Permalink

November 7, 2006

Text Link Ads Aquired By MediaWhiz

Text Link Ads has been acquired by MediaWhiz as of yesterday. Text Link Ads (TLA) sells text advertisements on web sites and RSS feeds, they also have a publisher network where small publishers can earn money selling TLA ads on their own site. The dollar figures were not disclosed as part of the release. The Link Building Blog says notes that "the people you will be dealing with tomorrow at TLA will be the same people you have always dealt with since our doors opened in 2003." They will be moving from Cincinnati to New York in a few months to run TLA from within MediaWhiz. Patrick Gavin, co-owner of Text Link Ads, said, "We are excited to join MediaWhiz's team and their suite of products. It is a great opportunity to leverage our publisher base by offering more ways for publishers to make money. This deal will also allow us to offer our advertisers new ways to send traffic and sales to their websites." There are related articles at The Cincinnati Business Courier and the official press release here.

Posted by Barry Schwartz at 1:12 PM | Permalink

November 3, 2006

How Much Should SEOs Earn

Rand at SEOMoz has another excellent post named SEO Salaries - How Much Should You Make. He details what he believes SEOs of all calibers should make. Here is a quick snap shot:

In-House SEOs:

• VP/Director of Search Marketing: $100,000 - $350,000+
• Director/Manager of Organic Search: $75,000 - $150,000
• SEO Guru: $75,000 - $200,000
• Campaign Manager: $55,00 - $100,000
• SEO Specialist: $40,000 - $80,000

SEO Agency Employees:

• SEO Director: $50,000 - $100,000
• Search Marketing Consultant: $60,000 - $200,000
• Link Builder: $35,000 - $100,000
• Content Writer: $35,000 - $75,000
• SEO Researcher: $30,000 - $60,000
• Client Relations Coordinator: $35,000 - $75,00

There are surprising reads and detailed explanations of each category, so definitely worth a read.

Posted by Barry Schwartz at 8:29 AM | Permalink

October 31, 2006

Garrett French Leaves MarketSmart Interactive

Andy Beal reports that Garrett French has left MarketSmart Interactive. Garrett, I believe, is the last of many well-known and respected individuals who have worked at MarketSmart Interactive to leave. Jason Dowdell was first then highly respected Andy Beal was second, then Heather Lloyd Martin left, then Mike Grehan resigned and now Garrett has left. You can keep up with Garrett at http://www.garrettfrench.com/.

Posted by Barry Schwartz at 9:04 AM | Permalink

September 1, 2006

Search Engine Roundtable Starts Podcast: The Search Pulse

This is a self-promotional post but I wanted to let you know that I will be launching a new search podcast named The Search Pulse. The show is run in conjunction with WebmasterRadio.FM, much like the Daily SearchCast, but only once per week, on Tuesdays at 5PM (EST). The show will recap the most discussed and important topics within the search marketing community and have expert opinion and commentary from Ben Pfeiffer and Chris Boggs. The persona of the show will be a lot like Bill O'Reilly's show but only on search. It should be one hour of deep discussion with controversy, disagreement and fun on the topics that interest search marketers the most. More details on the new show here.

Posted by Barry Schwartz at 9:33 AM | Permalink

August 30, 2006

Don't Get Caught With Your Contracts Down

Even if you've got great search marketing chops, you need to cover your bases with clients with both pricing and contracts. In today's SearchDay article, Pricing Models for the Small SEM Shop, guest writer Christine Churchill has coverage of a recent SES conference where a number of experienced pros shared tips and insights on the mechanics of running a successful search marketing shop.

Posted by Chris Sherman at 2:55 AM | Permalink

August 23, 2006

Google's Dominance Of Big & Small Companies

Fortune has a nice write up they named "How Google can make - or break - your company." Not only does this article go over how Google can break a small online retailer who depends on organic results, but also how they can break large firms like travel agencies, newspapers, realtors, advertising firms and software makers (even Microsoft). The article makes a good read if you have the time. If you have more time, also read Google Sees Content Deals As Key to Long-Term Growth at the Wall Street Journal, which explores more of Google's future and how you may be a part of it.

Posted by Barry Schwartz at 8:27 AM | Permalink

August 2, 2006

USA Today Gets A Hold Of Danny Sullivan

Want to take a look at the past, present and future of our admired founder and editor-in-chief of Search Engine Watch, Danny Sullivan? Well, today, USA Today released a little write up named Got a search engine question? Ask Mr. Sullivan. The article goes a bit into Danny's reputation in this industry, it reviews how he got into Search Engine Watch, discusses any regrets (none) selling Search Engine Watch and possibly offers some insight into the future of Danny and Search Engine Watch. Read the article at USA Today.

Posted by Barry Schwartz at 10:40 AM | Permalink

July 25, 2006

SuperPages Buys Inceptor

As reported in ClickZ today, SuperPages, which is itself up for sale, has acquired SEM firm Inceptor for an undisclosed amount. Verizon has been the most forward thinking and acting of the yellow pages publishers when it comes to offering performance-based products and leveraging search. This acquisition gives SuperPages more range in what it can offer and how the company can implement it -- and brings that cost in house.

For more on this deal see my blog post.

Posted by Greg Sterling at 8:36 AM | Permalink

July 24, 2006

SEOMoz Spills The Beans On Pricing An SEO Campaign

Rand posted a blog entry named How to Price an SEO Campaign. He actually broke down his pricing methodology for everyone to see. I have personally never seen this done to this extent before in this industry. SEOs and SEMs can learn a lot about how to price their campaigns and proposals by Rand's post. Rand breaks down a consulting contract versus an implementation contact. His post is very detailed and can give many SEMs an idea on how to improve their contracts. Check out Rand's post here.

Posted by Barry Schwartz at 9:09 AM | Permalink

June 7, 2006

Advertisers Increase Search Marketing Budgets

Loren Baker reports on a JupiterResearch study that shows both revenues earned from search marketing campaigns and budgets allocated to those campaigns have increased. Search marketers with annual revenues of $15 million or more have increased the share of the ad budget from 25 percent in 2005 to 37 percent in 2006. Plus 66 percent of marketers plan to increase search spend this year.

Posted by Barry Schwartz at 8:32 AM | Permalink

May 24, 2006

Search Engines Using Search Ads To Promote Themselves

In the past week or so, I have been reporting on the different ways search engines use search ads to promote their own search engine. I have spotted Ask.com bidding on Google for "pimped out search engine," which is part of their marketing speak of the TV commercials. I have also spotted Yahoo using Google AdSense to promote Yahoo Search products.

Search engines like MSN come up in Google AdWords for a search on search engine, MSN and Google come up in Yahoo Search for a query on search engine also. But at this time, none of the search engines are paying MSN or Ask.com for ads on their networks for the keyword phrase "search engine." It is also interesting to note that Google and MSN do not rank themselves in the number one position organically for the keyword phrase "search engine," only Ask.com and Yahoo do that.

Posted by Barry Schwartz at 9:20 AM | Permalink

Search Marketing Standard Hits The Newsstands

I reported last week that the new search marketing magazine, the Search Marketing Standard was delivered to over 15,000 people. Danny first mentioned this magazine back in April, and now it is here. The first issue has a lot of nice beginner style articles on SEM as well as some news related coverage from the industry. The next issue is expected by the end of August with the cover story being "Search Engine Marketing and Web Site Usability - a Winning Combination."

Posted by Barry Schwartz at 9:06 AM | Permalink

May 15, 2006

A SEO Crossword Puzzle

SEO Scoop posted a link to a fun SEO Crossword Puzzle that I thought you guys would enjoy. I am flying through the answers as I type this.

Posted by Barry Schwartz at 10:01 AM | Permalink

May 8, 2006

Search Marketers: Jacks of Too Many Trades?

New research from iProspect and Jupiter Research suggests that search marketers aren't as focused as they could be, with most search marketers doing a lot of other unrelated tasks in addition to their core responsibilities. More about the study and its findings in today's SearchDay article, Study: Search Marketers Wear Too Many Hats.

Posted by Chris Sherman at 9:06 AM | Permalink

April 27, 2006

Washington Post Talks About The SEM Community

Leslie Walker from the Washington Post wrote an article named How to Juice Up a Site's Rank, which is basically an article about the SEM community. Rand Fishkin says he was interviewed for the article, but like Rand, I don't think the article 100% accurately described our industry. What is cool, is that the article not only discussed "Google Juice," a term normally not used in the industry, but also talked about the v7 competition, SEM forums, link building, spam, getting banned. Many of our every day SEOs and SEMs we here from in our community are mentioned in this article.

Posted by Barry Schwartz at 10:14 AM | Permalink

April 7, 2006

MSN, Yahoo Seek SEO People To Help Them Rank Better

There's still the occasional person who I encounter who thinks that SEO overall is somehow wrong to do or something the search engines frown upon. Yahoo!, MSN & Ebay recruiting - SEO hits the big time is an example of why this isn't so. It covers how Yahoo, MSN and eBay in the UK are all recruiting internal SEO people to help promote their own sites.

Such hirings aren't new. We've long had search companies themselves trying to rank well in other search engines, to the point of hiring people internally or externally to make it happen. But it's a nice reminder for everyone to keep in mind.

Personally, I got a chuckle out of the breakdown Threadwatch did of the MSN UK recruitment ad. Wanted: Spammer-in-chief for MSN over there highlights some of these key success metrics for MSN UK's SEO person:

• Achieve x% of traffic from Search engines within our top channels and homepage
• Achieve x% of pages cached/listed within Google and Yahoo
• Achieve first page ranking in Google/Yahoo for major channel entry points and other important MSN content areas
• Beat Yahoo! on listing results in Google on major events
• Demonstrate clear traffic improvement as a result of implementation of SEO techniques
• Ensure all new pages are SEO compliant

As for Yahoo, I found these points interesting:

• All title / meta data tagging of UK products
• URL specifications of UK products
• URL redirect mappings
• Producing SEO recommendations and documentation for UK products
• Fostering development of effective SEO tools / reporting process
• Maintaining existing Yahoo! UK product?s search engine rankings
• Identifying and flagging potential spam violations on UK products
• Identifying and flagging inappropriate Y! content that is accessible via search
• Weekly / monthly SEO reporting & statistics for UK products
• Keyword / log analysis reports for UK products
• Keeping web development, engineering and production up-to-date with developments in the SEO field

Note the part I bolded. Nice to see that Yahoo UK wants to ensure no one suddenly accuses it of spamming itself or another search engine. Nah, such things never happen. Wait a minute: Google Admits To Cloaking; Bans Itself. That was from last year, but to be fair, it was pretty much an accidental thing.

Posted by Danny Sullivan at 9:30 AM | Permalink

April 6, 2006

Search Marketing Magazine Coming Soon

Boris Mordkovich has been after me to mention his forthcoming quarterly magazine, the Search Marketing Standard. And I'm happy to do so, since it's definitely looking real now.

Boris sent me some screenshots last week, and Philip over at Google Blogoscoped got the same. You can have a look nicely posted cover over there. Want to read the magazine? It debuts in a few weeks, and if you're US based, you can get the first year free through April 30. And that's free -- no credit card is apparently required. Those of us outside the US have to cough up the $20 bucks.

Another magazine was rumored to be coming out last May, but that never seems to have happened. But it's nice to see this one now. It's another sign of search growing up to the point that those who simply prefer material printed on dead trees can tune into the industry. And I'm a firm dead tree reader myself. Plus, magazines help make coffee tables look nice and they're handy for, you know, catching up in the bathroom.

Oooh, did he really write that? Yeah, like I'm the only one doing quality reading in there :)

Posted by Danny Sullivan at 9:21 AM | Permalink

January 27, 2006

Lack of Search Marketing During Christmas Season Hurt FTD's Bottom Line, Head of Marketing Replaced

For your, "the importance of search marketing folder."

An article from DMNews: FTD: Online Search Misstep Cost Sales, points out that FTD (the flower delivery people) said that not doing more search engine marketing during the Christmas season caused the consumer end of FTD not to do as well as they had planned. The comments were made on Wednesday when FTD announced their quarterly earnings.

From the statement (full text here): The consumer business's order growth for the 2005 Christmas season was below expectations [because of] our decision not to pursue high-cost order volume associated with online search," FTD president/CEO Michael J. Soenen said in a statement. "In anticipation of continued competitiveness in the online search environment and to better manage the consumer segment business going forward, we have made management changes within this segment including the replacement of our head of marketing."

I wonder if the now replaced head of marketing received some flowers to make him or her feel better? (-:

Want to comment or discuss? Visit our SEW Forums thread, FTD's Head Of Marketing Replaced Over Failure In Maximizing Search.

Posted by Gary Price at 12:06 AM | Permalink

January 26, 2006

Watch SEOs Battle Live & New SEO Humor Site

Matt Cutts highlighted this funny site, SEO Generations, where you can pit various people in the SEO world against each other to say who you think would get a site ranked better in a face-to-face battle.

Right now, Matt's at the top of the winner list (but would he be for a battle on Yahoo when pitted against Tim Mayer?), followed by Dave Naylor, Aaron Wall, Jill Whalen and some Canadian guy (just joking, Todd!).

Loooosers are, um, Aaron and Jill at the top of the list? But they were winners? Guess it shows you win some, you lose some.

Meanwhile, Dave Naylor bares all -- heck, he's bareback and baring all -- on a new SEO humor site he's launched, SE Ops. Think of it as Gray Hat Search Engine News or In Search Of Stuff (yesterday's story, Yahoo To Secure Buzz Aldrin As New Spokesman had me rolling) with caricatures.

Posted by Danny Sullivan at 11:31 AM | Permalink

January 11, 2006

Search Marketers Deserve Some Respect

Last month at the Chicago Search Engine Strategies conference, Danny Sullivan gave a very different keynote than usual, focusing on the negative image of the search marketing industry painted in the mainstream media and elsewhere, and what we should be doing about it. Andrew Goodman recaps Danny's speech in today's SearchDay article, Search Marketing's About People and Principles, Not Just Algorithms, Part 1.

Posted by Chris Sherman at 1:27 AM | Permalink

January 9, 2006

Search Engines As Leeches, The Difference Between Paid & Free Listings & Keyword Price Rises

Jakob Nielsen's just posted a Search Engines as Leeches on the Web article that makes a good point, don't be too search engine dependent. However, he muddles his point by confusing the issue of paid search advertising and free "organic" listings. A closer look at that, plus how "super conversion trackers" and "brand idiots" are likely to keep pressure on keyword prices.

As a reminder, the major search engines give you two main types of listings when you do a search. There are the "organic" or "free" or "natural" listings that they gather from crawling the web. They don't charge for these listings (though Yahoo's paid inclusion program kind of clouds the water over there). These listings are like the editorial content you get at newspapers.

Search engines also carry paid ads. Pay, and you can get listed for terms you want without hoping that it just happens naturally.

Jakob says:

I worry that search engines are sucking out too much of the Web's value, acting as leeches on companies that create the very source materials the search engines index.

That will resonate with many who have long voiced similar concerns that search engines are making tons of money by gathering "content" from sites from across the web to make their listings.

If suddenly every site on the web were to block Google from indexing them, Google would have a crisis in short order. Its main "content" would have gone away, and the ads alone aren't going to keep attracting searchers.

Web site owners have not done that, however. That's because by and large, they've found that search engines drive more traffic to them than they cost in terms of bandwidth of being indexed.

WebmasterWorld has become a classic case study of this. Google and other search engines were banned in November along with "rogue" spiders, because somewhat similar to Jakob's "leech" metaphor, they were seen to have been sucking down more bandwidth than it was worth supporting.

WebmasterWorld founder Brett Tabke was often quoted saying he had the best sleep in months after blocking the spiders. His sleep may have improved, but what to do about the major spiders didn't go away. By the end of December, Brett had done a 180 degree turn and let the major spiders back in.

Until now, WebmasterWorld's been about the only major site I can think of that has tried to block spiders. Craigslist was rumored to have done so, but that wasn't true.

I do believe concerns over spidering are growing, especially as we have more spidering from both the major search engines and from rogues that are out there. Back in October, The lie of distribution--search engines return very little value to news/blog sites yet hog bandwidth and increase server loads from Tom Foremski was an example of this.

As I commented on his blog, it's fair to say that despite grumbles, that the vast majority of site owners do not consider search engines leeches. If they did, they would deleech themselves by blocking spiders. It's not hard to do. A simple change to the robots.txt file will block all the major search spiders. But no on does this, because they want the traffic. Even Jakob's own file isn't blocking Google and gang.

But back to Jakob's point, it turns out he really isn't talking about the "source material" being leeched but instead about the high cost of advertising. Again to his opening statement, with the key part in bold.

I worry that search engines are sucking out too much of the Web's value, acting as leeches on companies that create the very source materials the search engines index.

And the evidence of this?

Paid search confiscates too much of a website's value.

What? Paid search "confiscates" a site's value? Since when did search engines suddenly show up at a web site and demand the owner sign-up for advertising? We've long had rumors that a site that doesn't advertise might find themselves banned with various major search engines. We've even had reports of "monetization targeting" where site owners have found that doing an ad or paid inclusion buy might clear up a spam banning problem. But by and large, there are plenty of web sites that spend nil with search engines on advertising and get plenty of traffic.

In fact, the exhausting, annoying, tiring, boring, you name it regular updates to Google generate plenty of forum fodder that show people aren't spending and getting traffic from search engines. If they weren't, they wouldn't be freaking out any time Google undergoes a major algorithm change that sends rankings dancing and for some, traffic plunging. They wouldn't worry, because they'd have had both a balance of paid and natural search listings that helped them ride out the rough times if there was an issue on the natural side.

Instead, the October 2005 "Jagger" update showed plenty of site owners are still dependent on getting traffic from search engines for free. The Nov. 2003 Google Florida update should have taught many not to be free listing dependent, but clearly they remain this way. And the lessons not to be dependent were in place even before this.

So overall, the issue doesn't involve free listings. Jakob's really concerned about the rising cost in search advertising. Over time, as he's worked with client sites, they've been able to pay more by pushing up conversion rates. But at some point, others catch up and the margins of what his clients can pay is reached. He says:

If your search bid stays the same, your ad will sink off the page as more and more competing sites improve their design enough to afford higher bids. Our site therefore has no choice but to increase its own bid to $7.99 per click if it wants to stay in business.

This simply isn't true unless Jakob's clients are making the mistake of depending solely upon paid search ads to gain customers. If that's the case, yep, you should be looking to diversify. More on this in a moment.

Jakob also says (and the bolding is his):

This is great news for search engines: they can double their income by doing nothing. Just sit and wait for all other websites to improve -- then skim off the increased earnings.

In other words, the search engines get to make more by doing nothing because the advertisers are learning they can afford to pay more. And they sound pretty evil. But rewrite it this way:

This is great news for the Super Bowl: the cost of buying a commercial keeps going up even though they do nothing. Just wait for advertisers to be willing to pay more -- then skim off the increased earnings.

Honestly, perspective like the above is very much in order. Consider:

• Search advertising has long been undervalued. People still pay less than a dollar for some paid search ads and they obtain clients that will be with them for life. But few advertisers are calculating the lifetime value of search. Jakob doesn't appear to be consider this. The examples he gives are to the purchases made directly from a click on an ad. Do his B2B customers come back to the site directly the next time and buy? If so, the only reason they did so was because they found the site through search in the first place. If you don't factor that lifetime value, then you fail to understand how much you really can afford to pay.  
• Advertisers are getting smarter. Those who better measure conversion know they can pay more and they are. The search engines are to blame for this? They're simply seeing that their undervalued advertising medium is finally growing to what it really is worth. The real person to be upset with is that other advertiser. And the solution is to get smarter.  
• It's an open marketplace. Is Apple is a leech on consumers for overcharging for MP3 players that you can buy from others that work as well if not better but lack the Apple logo? The search engines aren't forcing people to buy ads. If advertisers can't afford to continue paying high prices, they won't. And when they don't, the prices will fall. The exceptions are if the search engine conspire in some way to force purchases (say they really do link buying ads to getting other types of listings) or when they set artificially high minimum bids (Google tried doing this but had to drop many because people weren't willing to pay).

So rather than "despite search engines, websites can make money," as Jakob says, the reality remains that because of search engines, plenty of web sites are making money without spending a dime, pence, euro, yen or whatever on search advertising.

I completely agree that anyone running a web site should heed Jakob's "search engine liberation" advice of alternative ways to promote a web site, such as considering RSS, email newsletters and so on. But this isn't suddenly new advice. Any long-time internet marketer would tell you not to depend just on search engines. Thinking "beyond search engines" has been the core of my basic tips since I put them up back in 1997:

Search engines are a primary way people look for web sites, but they are not the only way. People also find sites through word-of-mouth, traditional advertising, the traditional media, newsgroup postings, web directories and links from other sites. Many times, these alternative forms are far more effective draws than are search engines. The audience you want may be visiting a site that you can partner with or reading a magazine that you've never informed of your site. Do the simple things to best make your site relevant to search engines, then concentrate on the other areas.

It's all a matter of balance. Don't obsess over search engine listings, but don't ignore them, either. Do a variety of online marketing activities -- and do a variety of offline ones, as well. Search -- both paid and free -- is a component of any campaign. But it isn't something you should depend on, any more than you should depend on all television advertising, all print ads, all RSS ads or a strategy of no advertising at all. If you are not diversified, you'll have a weakness that might hit when you least expect it.

To conclude, no one should put all their eggs into any basket, search or otherwise. It's absolutely true that search engines are not the end all be all and that sites can thrive and survive without them. But many sites also can thrive and survive better by incorporating them into a diversified publicity campaign.

Search engines definitely can do more to help those with support on the organic side of things, which is especially needed since webmasters do indeed provide the content that the search engines depend on. The good news is that last year, we saw more changes and developments to give webmasters new tools than ever before.

Finally, ad prices will likely continue to rise, and different advertisers will react in various ways. John Battelle recently pointed at a blog suggesting that FTD might be nearing all it can afford to spend. But just today, we reported on a survey showing four out of five advertisers saying they can still afford to pay more, though the question of whether a plateau is being reached is raised. Then the latest Fathom report on keyword prices saw a continuing "downward spiral," as MediaPost put it. I haven't looked closely at the latest numbers, but the sample is so small (500 terms) that I'm generally wary on depending on it as a foolproof predictor.

From my part, I see two main issues with keyword prices going forward: Super Conversion Trackers & Brand Idiots.

Super Conversion Trackers are those who will indeed track a lifetime value of someone who comes to them from search. They'll understand that the initial purchase may lead to more and more purchases over time and feel comfortable paying multiples above competitors to gain a lead. That will push some out of the bidding. See Most Conversions Happen Offline; You Need To Measure These! for some further thoughts on this.

Brand Idiots are what some marketers think derisively of others who jump into bidding without linking it to a direct ROI target. They can screw up bidding on what seems to be "logical" or "fair" amount that most in the marketplace may assume. But brand idiots are part of that marketplace, and you can expect to see more of them.

Automakers Buy Up 80% Of Ad Space On Car Sites For 2006 from AdAge is a good example of this. It explains how automakers are going more and more online to extend their brands. Edmunds, a car research site, expects to take those brand dollars and buy more search as well as display ads to fuel that desire. That's big brand money that's going to be fueling those buys and putting pressure on others trying to compete.

Big Guys Crowd Out Little Guys in SEM Arena; Some Branding Focused Advertisers Willing to Spend "Whatever" It Takes and C'mon In Brand Owners, The Search Water's Fine has more on these type of moves.

Stuck in a bidding war? How To Get Out Of Bid Wars A Winner? over at our Search Engine Watch Forums may have some helpful advice if you're already tracking and improving conversions as much as possible and getting some brand idiot money is not an option.

Want to comment or discuss? Visit our SEW Forums thread, Search Engine Leeches, Dependency & Losing Perspective.

Posted by Danny Sullivan at 1:27 PM | Permalink

SEMPO Survey Sheds Light on Search Marketing Industry

SEMPO has released its annual State of the Search Marketing Industry report, which looks at the activities and budgets of search marketers during 2005, and offers perspective on where the industry is likely going in the near term. I've got a rundown of the report in today's SearchDay article, The State of Search Engine Marketing.

Posted by Chris Sherman at 8:00 AM | Permalink

December 29, 2005

The Big Stories in Search, 2005

Danny wraps up our look back at the year in search in today's SearchDay article, 2005 in Review: The Top Search Industry Stories of the Year.

Posted by Chris Sherman at 11:24 AM | Permalink

November 29, 2005

The Challenge In Hiring SEMers

As search marketing keeps getting hotter, so does the challenge in finding good people to do search marketing. Below, some articles on the topic that have come up in the past few weeks.

SEM Challenge 101: Hiring Staff from Rob Murray at iProspect outlines challenges such as the industry being new, skill sets being complex and there being a lack of standards. He then suggests those hiring look beyond "years of experience" and instead at asking a firm some core competency questions.

Searching for Searchers from InternetRetailer covers things like base pay for search marketers and the challenge in finding and hiring good people, especially with the growth that continues.

How to Cope With SEM Staffing Shortages, Part 1 has Kevin Lee from ClickZ wading in, explaining why he thinks the industry will continue to be complex, adding to the challenge of hiring people.

SEM Hiring 101 is a discussion over at our Search Engine Watch Forums related to hiring issues.

Posted by Danny Sullivan at 8:37 AM | Permalink

November 21, 2005

U.S. SEM Firm Innovation Interactive Acquired by Japan's Livedoor

It's SEM acquisition time! Clickz reports that Japan's Livedoor has acquired Innovation Interactive, parent to 360i and SearchIgnite. Financial terms were not disclosed.

Innovation's clients include large SEM customers like Office Depot and Forbes, as well as thousands of small business customers using its self-service online marketing tools. Its SearchIgnite search management software helps sophisticated marketers and advertising agencies like Digitas manage their own SEM campaigns.

More info in this news release.

Posted by Gary Price at 12:38 PM | Permalink

November 14, 2005

Omnicom Buys Resolution Media

Omnicom Buys Its First SEM Agency from ClickZ covers ad and marketing conglomerate Omnicom Group purchasing Chicago-based Resolution Media.

Posted by Danny Sullivan at 10:36 AM | Permalink

November 9, 2005

SEMPO Survey Of Search Marketing Industry Seeks Participants

It's SEMPO survey time again! SEMPO Survey Probes SEM/SEO Issues from Kevin Lee at ClickZ gives you a rundown on how the survey aims to measure the state of the search marketing industry. I'd encourage everyone to participate, because it's one of the few surveys out there driven out of the search marketing community. You can take it from here. State of the Search Marketing Industry 2004 from SearchDay covers results from last year's survey. Want to comment or discuss? Visit our forum thread, SEMPO SURVEY: Search Engine Marketing -- Trends and Metrics.

Posted by Danny Sullivan at 9:39 AM | Permalink

October 13, 2005

Don't Hate Search

I Hate Search from David Cohen at ClickZ posits the self-admitted conspiracy idea that if search engines made free listings better, then ads wouldn't be so lucrative. No, that's not the reason paid ads are so effective, plus paid search isn't exactly the inhuman, uncreative open auction model that he thinks.

Let's start with the conspiracy theory. Paid search ads are effective because, as I've talked about before, search engines are a reverse broadcast system where consumers are broadcasting exactly what they want to advertisers. Search marketers are smart enough to tune in and deliver up something that matches. It's a connection unlike most other advertising mediums except for really the yellow pages industry.

Yes, free listings can always be made better. But if you really wanted to deflect consumers into paid ads, you don't downgrade organic results. You simply put more paid listings in the "main" column rather than on the side. Indeed, Google just did that last month, putting three ads on top of free listings in certain circumstances, rather than just two.

But put too many ads up there, and unless the relevancy is always spot on, you risk losing users. That's one reason Ask Jeeves recently cut the number of ads it would display, sometimes up to 10 of them before showing regular results.

So skip the conspiracy theory, at least the idea that regular results might be reduced in quality just to push ads. That's just going to cost search engines users. Gary Stein does some further debunking here.

If you want a conspiracy theory, go with the one kicked off back during Google's Florida Update of 2003, where some wondered if Google was trying to make its free results more non-commercial.

Since that time, I've heard various search engines express the idea that they would like to see the free results be more non-commercial, or at least more about providing information rather than selling things. But it's clearly not completely that case. Take a search for ipod on Google. Yes, I get iPodHacks and Wikipedia and other news and information sites. But I also get everythingipod, "The Superstore for your iPod," coming up.

How about the concern David has that the open auction model of search means anyone can outbid you, and the relationship/clout you have with other ad sellers doesn't mean anything.

Part of me thinks, "Too bad!" I'm sorry if you the advertiser don't get to shove yet another ad I don't care about down my throat in search due to being cloutly-challenged. I get enough of that when I'm at the supermarket, watching TV, reading a newspaper and so on. You're often wasting your money, and if you're an agency, wasting client money, doing this.

Beyond this, he writes:

I don't know about you, but I always liked the "part art, part science" section of the business. I don't even want to think about being replaced by an open auction.

That's just not correct. Search is very much part art and part science. Doing well with even showing up with a Google ad is not entirely down to just spending enough money, since ads are not ranked solely on bid. MSN will be that way. Ask Jeeves is that way. Yahoo's going that way.

And what's the pitch in the copy? What's the landing page like behind that? Because if you aren't converting, you're not going to have the budget to convert. Again, as I wrote before, it's not just math and machines.

Let's be honest. I think what scares David and a lot of other non-search marketers is that money keeps flowing into search, and they may not understand the fundamentals of that medium.

Here's the good news. Other media will continue to have money come to them as well. Search especially isn't a good branding venue, as I've written before.

Here's the bad news. Those other media are going to be forced to be more accountable and they will continue to give parts of their money pie to search, since search remains largely undervalued and in demand. David understands this, as he says at the end of his column:

Unfortunately, I'm going to have to get over it. Despite my protests, our clients demand increasingly more of our digital media budgets go toward search-related spending. As a company, we're rapidly scaling our search practice to accommodate increased need.

Overall, don't hate search or be scared of it. Get educated and participate in the space!

Want to comment or discuss? Please visit our Search Engine Watch Forums!

Posted by Danny Sullivan at 9:29 AM | Permalink

October 11, 2005

Zunch Execs Depart, Form New Company Kinetic

Kevin Ryan, known to many for his search column at iMedia Connection, has departed along with four other Zunch Communications executives to restart a new firm called Kinetic Results.

Ryan joined Zunch only about two months ago, back at the end of July. He was the chief strategy officer for Zunch. Before joining Zunch, he was at Kinetic, the firm he appears to have created after departing from Did-It. He joined Did-It in December 2004 but left soon after. Prior to Did-It, he worked for Wahlstrom Interactive.

Departing with Ryan from Zunch are Giovanni Gallucci, Zunch's former president and COO; Tony Wright, the former chief interactive marketing officer; Anthony Zapata, the former director of business development; and Dave Wilkie, the former executive vice president. More details can be found in this Kinetics press release.

Spotted via Andy Beal, Zunch has posted its own press release about the departures, saying executive positions created prior to its growth needed to be restructured to omit "red tape that slowed us down."

When Ryan was hired about two months ago, Zunch pitched the opposite, that creating a new position and bringing in Ryan was to help usher in a "new phase" for the company.

Want to discuss? Threadwatch has some talk going on here, and you can also visit our SEW Forums thread, Executive Management Team Leaves Zunch Communications.

Postscript: Zunch Execs Jump Ship, Join Together has coverage of the move.

 

Posted by Danny Sullivan at 7:19 AM | Permalink

September 29, 2005

Search Pulling From Banner Ad Spend

An article in New Media Age UK titled: Long-time advertisers are abandoning banner ads in favour of search, includes comments about how firms that have been the "backbone" of Net advertising for years are moving into search marketing.

Eric Abensur from Wanadoo UK and Giles Ivey from AOL both say that big-volume advertisers are switching their spending from display ads and banners into search.

Media agency Unique Digital says it has been seeing this from finance, retail and travel brands, with some putting up to 20% of their budgets into search. "It's primarily advertisers that are looking for a direct response," said the agency's media director Martin Kelly. "Search is an easy win, but it's not a long-term solution."

While Abensur and Ivey are postive about large companies moving from banners to search spending, Phil Macauley, head of planning and strategy at Yahoo Europe, says:

Direct response advertisers are increasing their media spend online as a whole, both in branded advertising and sponsored search. But they're moving it away from other media, rather than moving budgets around within online."

Posted by Gary Price at 2:49 PM | Permalink

September 28, 2005

A Snapshot of the Search Marketing Industry

A new study by Jupiter Research and iProspect looks at several aspects of the search marketing industry, and draws some interesting conclusions about how well search marketers are performing, the effectiveness of organic vs. paid search marketing campaigns, and obstacles encountered in implementing search engine optimization techniques on client web sites, among other findings. See today's SearchDay article, How are Search Marketers Performing?, for more on the new research.

Posted by Chris Sherman at 12:28 AM | Permalink

September 27, 2005

What's An Ad Agency? What's A Search Agency?

Ad/Search Agency Convergence from Hollis Thomases at ClickZ looks at when an ad agency is NOT also and SEM firm or more to the point, how they can't be when paid search is making up so much of online ad spend.

The slant seems more on the pure-play SEM firms suggesting that ad agencies can't do well in the search world. From my experience, that's not just a marketing pitch by the firms. It's often the reality. But it depends on the ad firm you're talking about.

A pure play creative ad shop? Search is going to be weird, strange and not really what they do. If they need it, they're far more likely to outsource to someone else to do it.

In the end, you're going to continue to have a spectrum of agencies -- SEMs that focus just on search and everything to do with search (feeds, local, shopping, web, and free and organic listings in all of those), interactive agencies that do search along with other buys, traditional agencies that may or may not take on some interactive roles.

Posted by Danny Sullivan at 11:23 AM | Permalink

September 24, 2005

Search Marketing Spend Increasing at a Healthy Clip

A new survey from Marketing Sherpa reports on current and projected spend for search engine optimization and paid search campaigns.

MarketingSherpa cites Merrill Lynch data that the U.S. total SEO spending rose 177 percent over the last 12 months. The study projects the growth will continue, but at a slower pace. Pay-per-click campaigns lifted from 34 percent of marketers reporting results to be "very good" in 2004 to 43 percent now calling their campaigns "very effective." Search engine optimization (SEO) campaigns only climbed two points, from a 31 percent success rating to 33 percent. Both strategies fared better than e-mail marketing, which reported a 25 percent "very effective" campaign rate, and affiliate marketing, which garnered 22 percent effectiveness.

Enid Burns has more details on the survey in SEM Sees Optimization PPC.

Posted by Chris Sherman at 1:03 PM | Permalink

September 22, 2005

Websoured Executives Fired

Via Threadwatch, Websourced fires 2 executives from the News & Observer covers how the company has fired two senior vice presidents, after writing of $1.4 million in bad debt.

An analysis into the business continues by parent company Think Partnership continues, the article says. The debt was caused by small companies signing up for one year contracts but refusing to pay because they had too much "success" in the first few months, the company says. The clients themselves, however, are also blamed for not having enough "dedication" to achieving "sustainable search marketing results."

Websourced recently lost its vice president of search marketing Andy Beal and had a planned acquisition of Proceed Interactive get called off. This follows after earlier acquisitions of other firms and some prominent search marketing speakers and writers. Threadwatch also has earlier discussion of Websourced problems here, Rumour: Websourced being Raided by Dept of Revenue.

Want to comment or discuss? Visit our forum thread, Resignations At Websourced.

Posted by Danny Sullivan at 1:29 PM | Permalink

September 19, 2005

Traffic Power Suit Against SEO Book Moves To US Federal Court

Traffic Power Lawsuit Update from Aaron Wall notes that the suit filed against him by Traffic Power over allegedly revealing trade secrets has been moved from Nevada state court to US federal state court, through his efforts. The federal case number is CV-S-05-1109-RLH-LRL. For more background on the case, see Traffic Power Suit Could Be Quashed Through Anti-Slapp Motion and SEO Book's Aaron Wall Sued By Traffic-Power Over Revealing "Trade Secrets".

Posted by Danny Sullivan at 12:50 PM | Permalink

September 8, 2005

Traffic Power Suit Could Be Quashed Through Anti-Slapp Motion

Legal Showdown in Search Fracas from Adam Penenberg at Wired looks at the lawsuit by Traffic Power against SEO Book's Aaron Wall, alleging that he revealed trade secrets. Lawyers Penenberg talks with find the suit seems more about quashing negative opinions Wall had about Traffic Power than trade secrets. One from the EFF says the suit might be subject to an "anti-Slapp" motion, a statute to prevent lawsuits being brought with no merit and intended to silence critics.

The idea that trade secrets are involved gets shot down by citing my past examination of the case, as well as including observations from long-time search marketer Greg Boser, who says there are no secrets to protect because the code is published on a publicly-accessible web server. For more background, see my previous SEO Book's Aaron Wall Sued By Traffic-Power Over Revealing "Trade Secrets" article.

Posted by Danny Sullivan at 11:21 AM | Permalink

September 2, 2005

Think's Purchase Of Proceed Interactive Officially Off

Proceed Acquisition Won't Proceed at ClickZ covers how a planned acquisition of search marketer Proceed Interactive by Think Partnership -- parent company of WebSourced and KeywordRankings.com -- now is officially off. Think says Proceed failed to meet conditions of the sale, including audited financial statements.

Posted by Danny Sullivan at 11:20 AM | Permalink

August 30, 2005

SEO Book's Aaron Wall Sued By Traffic-Power Over Revealing "Trade Secrets"

Back in June, I heard from Aaron Wall of the SEO Book blog. He'd been served with a cease-and-desist letter from SEO company Traffic-Power.com that seemed impossible to comply with. At issue was a claim that Wall had published "proprietary and confidential information." However, the claim didn't list any specific infringing material that Wall was supposed to remove. Now things have progressed to an actual lawsuit over the matter, one that I can't help thinking will get dismissed due to a lack of evidence.

The Cease-And-Desist Letter

Let's start with the actual letter. The Max D Spilka & Traffic Power Cease and Desist Letter post at Wall's blog at the end of July reprints the letter he was sent. It's not long, but I'll highlight the key parts in bullet point format:

• It has come to our attention that on a website you control, namely www.SEO Book..com, proprietary and confidential information related to Traffic Power's business has been published.  
• The published information violates the Electronic Communications Privacy Act, 18 U.S.C. Sections 2510-2521, and is subject to certain contracts between Traffic-Power and its former and/or current employees.  
• The published information has been pirated from Traffic Power and you have obtained the information illegally, all of which you knew or should have known.  
• You are to cease and desist immediately from the same or any similar activity. In the event you fail to do so, Traffic Power is prepared to initiate litigation to obtain an injunction to enforce its rights.  
• Finally, consistant with recent court rulings you may now be obligated to disclose the source(s) of your information. Accordingly, within ten (10) days of this letter, you are to do the following:  
  • 1. Provide a list of the sources of your information complete with name, address, and telephone number; and,  
  • 2. Remove from www.SEO Book.com website all information relating to Traffic-Power.

Lack Of Specifics

As said, I found this letter almost impossible to comply with. What's the confidential information? Where was it published? Which sources are alleged to be involved?

I contacted Traffic Power to learn more about what Wall was supposed to do in response to the letter. Below are questions I sent, along with the emailed responses from Traffic Power's public relations firm AMR Partners that I received at the end of June. I've made light edits to clean up some spellings and grammatical errors in both the questions sent and answers received, produced by the informal nature of email:

Question: The letter never actually says what it is he supposedly pirated or published. What exactly is it that's in contention here?

Traffic Power tells me that in threads regarding Traffic-Power portions of private and confidential emails have been presented as well as links to proprietary company information as well as false claims against the company regard non-existing lawsuits and other potentially libelous claims.

"I just thought anyone should know, This is an interesting link to a law firm that is getting ready to file a class action against Traffic-Power.com http://www.girardgibbs.com/traffic-power.html"

Many of these links are no longer available and Mr. Wall's site - Blocked Wayback Machine with "Robots.txt Query Exclusion" (See robots.txt file at http://www.seobook.com/robots.txt) http://web.archive.org/web/*/http://www.seobook.com/archives/000314.shtml

Question: Isn't a violation of the act [cited in the cease and desist] a criminal violation?

That would be a better question for Traffic Power's attorney, Mr. Spilka.

Question: The letter suggests Traffic-Power might be entitled to damages under the act. Isn't it really that he'd be fined by the federal government?

I believe the letter is suggesting that Traffic Power will pursue all legal remedies both criminal and civil to resolve this matter.

Question: Can you be more specific of what exactly he's done to violate the act, which seems to be mostly related to federal wiretapping provisions?

Again I feel that would be a better question for Traffic Powers Attorney, Mr. Spilka.

Question: How is he supposed to comply with a demand for source disclosure when you haven't cited what was allegedly published or pirated? Are you expecting a list of every person he's ever talked with?

I have no idea what the legal team might expect in terms of disclosure of sources, but I have been told that any evidence will not be presented until it has been decided whether or not they need to file a lawsuit.

Question: Are you suggesting everything on the SEO Book web site that might mention Traffic-Power is somehow pirated material? Doing a quick search, I see http://www.seobook.com/archives/000314.shtml, where he talks about being called by Traffic-Power. Is this the pirated communication? And if so, was he informed of this before the phone call began?

I do not think the intent of the letter is to imply that everything on the site is pirated or in response to the two links you've posted, but rather to suggest that pirated material as well as material that could be considered libelous are present and that there are several issues on Mr. Wall's sites that are potentially actionable.

In conclusion, Traffic Power has assured me that they would much prefer a civil dialog with their critics instead of any legal action and that they at least, would be open to discussion.

I'm afraid the responses left me not much clearer about the situation. The cease-and-desist letter talked about Wall allegedly publishing confidential information, yet the follow-up answers went broader to suggest there was potentially libelous information at issue, as well.

Certainly Wall didn't know what he should do. As he wrote on his blog:

The only way I could have complied with it is if I shut my site down and gave them contact information of everyone I have ever contacted. Since it was impossible to comply without destroying my business model and potentially getting my friends and customers spammed or cold called I asked a friend about the situation.

The Cold Call Post

It seems the key trigger in all of this was Wall's Traffic Power & Cold Call SEO post of May 6, 2004. That's the http://www.seobook.com/archives/000314.shtml URL mentioned in the follow-up response I received (though not in the actual letter sent to Wall). That's Wall's best guess as well, as he's emailed me and as he speculates in a timeline-of-sorts in this post on August 26 about being sued.

In the post, he talks about being cold called by someone from Traffic-Power and coming away unimpressed. I didn't see anything proprietary when I looked at the post. Libelous? That wasn't an issue in the letter he was sent. Trade secrets? Again, nothing I see any the post anything remotely approaching what I'd view as trade secrets.

There's more than the post, of course. There are comments below it. Some in our forum thread on the lawsuit wonder if perhaps some of the things people have posted might have been deemed trade secrets, such as:

• Alleged use of doorway pages
• Apparently hosting keyword-targeted pages on other web sites, maintaining ultimate control of the traffic
• Alleged use of JavaScript cloaking

If these are trade secrets, none of them would be considered proprietary or unique to Traffic-Power, to my knowledge. Moreover, if these are things that have been discussed with clients and potential clients -- without requiring the use of non-disclosure statements -- then they hardly seem secrets worthy of legal protection.

By the way, how about that law mentioned as part of the letter? The EFF gives a layman's view here and FindLaw has info on various sections here. I came away thinking it was made certain wiretapping like activities a criminal action that the US government could pursue, not something to be tried in civil court.

The Lawsuit Against SEO Book

As said, I started looking into this back in June. My understanding was that the issue had gone away. Wall posted the letter he received on his blog, and that seemed to be the end of it.

Obviously, it is not. Notice! You Have Been Sued is a follow-up post on Wall's blog that contains the lawsuit. You can read through it there. It reasserts that Wall has somehow helped reveal trade secrets while not explaining where, when or how. It further alleges that Wall's published "false and defamatory" information about Traffic-Power, though again not naming or explaining what this is. Perhaps there were exhibits as part of the filing, but if so, these aren't referenced as is typical in a complaint.

Wall says that he's been told verbally that if he drops all content about Traffic Power on his web site -- regardless of whether it is legitimate -- the suit would be dropped. He's now seeking a written confirmation of this, while weighing up the pros of fighting the case versus the cons, all of which are itemized on the site. Ultimately, he says he's leaning toward pulling the material.

A Chilling Effect -- But Not For Everyone

If so, I find it unfortunate. In fact, I find the entire lawsuit unfortunate. Whatever reputation improvement Traffic-Power thought it might be gaining through such an action has just gotten worse. Small sites may react to the chilling effect of being sued. Larger publishers won't -- and many more of them just learned about Traffic-Power and the many allegations levied against them over the past year, as a result of the action.

One big publisher, by the way, is Google. As Marcia over in our forum thread on the lawsuit pointed out, there's a Google Answers question that talks about Traffic-Power "doorway pages," describes hidden links as "cloaking" and has a conclusion that "questionable SEO tactics are being employed on your website." If anything, that response on a web site hosted by Google, from a freelance question answerer paid through Google, is far more damaging than what I've seen referenced on the SEO Book blog.

In fact, maybe even other smaller sites will stick with it. Wall points over to the Traffic Power Sucks site, a protest site against the firm that talks about how to gain refunds, a possible class action lawsuit and advice from the site's perspective of things to watch out for. It sounds like the site received a letter similar to what Wall got:

I received a little letter from the same lawyer threatening me with a lawsuit if I didn't take "proprietary and confidential information related to Traffic Power's business" off of my website. I called the lawyer and asked him exactly what information he was referring to. He had no idea what I was talking about. This was the guy who signed the letter, and he was clueless. If anyone can find anything at all on this website that could possibly be considered Traffic Power's "proprietary and confidential information", drop me an email at webmaster@trafficpowersucks.com.

I take it Traffic Power Sucks has no plans to remove material and if ultimately sued, I suspect it will press onward since it seems to be organizing its own lawsuit against the firm.

Want to discuss? Visit the Traffic Power Files Suit Against SEO Book thread in our Search Engine Watch Forums.

Postscript from Gary: I did a bit of searching and on August 11th, the same day a lawsuit was filed against Aaron Wall/SEO Book, another suit was filed in a Neveda District Court listing TrafficPowerSucks.com (and those who run the site) as defendents.

Postscript 2: The Wall Street Journal now has a story with some legal comments: Blogger Faces Lawsuit Over Comments Posted by Readers.

Posted by Danny Sullivan at 3:22 PM | Permalink

August 25, 2005

New Carat Search Head

Pamela Parker's article: Carat Names Search Head After Belanger's Departure, reports that the agency will unify search and affiliate marketing practices under its new leader, Jeremy Cornfeldt.

Posted by Gary Price at 9:09 AM | Permalink

August 17, 2005

Search Marketing VP Ron Belanger Departs Carat Interactive Carat's Top Search Exec Departs from ClickZ covers how long time search marketer Ron Belanger, vice president of search marketing at Carat Interactive, has jumped to be vice president of marketing for BuyDomains.

Posted by Danny Sullivan at 6:43 AM | Permalink

July 13, 2005

Andy Beal Departs WebSourced Over Differences

Andy Beal of Search Engine Lowdown has announced he's left his day job -- vice president of search marketing for WebSourced -- due to philosophical differences over the direction of WebSourced. His Why I've Resigned from WebSourced post doesn't provide further information on those differences. More may emerge in comments on his blog. Threadwatch has some discussion, and Barry points to another resignation from a prominent WebSourced person recently, Jason Dowdell. He also said he left due to differences with the company. WebSourced recently gained two other well known search marketers, Mike Grehan and Heather Lloyd-Martin, as covered in our past post, CGI Holding Buys More, Changing Name To Think Partnership. Both are still with the company.

Postscript: Andy has removed the post explaining his reasons for leaving WebSourced. He explains why to Threadwatch.

Posted by Danny Sullivan at 6:10 PM | Permalink

June 30, 2005

Yahoo My Web: An eBay For Knowledge

Yesterday, Chris wrote about the new Yahoo My Web social search network. I expect many will be excited over the tagging component, but I remain dubious for many reasons which I cover in another article I posted today. But whether tagging works is beside the main point. What deserves the most attention, the real key development, are the trust networks for knowledge Yahoo hopes to create.

I got a tour of the new system while it was in development, when I was visiting at Yahoo last month. After seeing what was planned, I remarked to Yahoo senior vice president of search Jeff Weiner sitting next to me that they were building "an eBay for knowledge." Jeff was already literally bouncing at times with excitement in showing the new system, and the remark made him smile even more broadly.

He smiled because that's exactly the Yahoo goal. My Web is Yahoo's community rating system for information. Just as you buy things on eBay depending on ratings to know if you'll trust a seller, My Web is what Yahoo hopes will help you choose more wisely the information you receive, whether you actively check reviews, contribute or remain an ordinary searcher who completely ignores the tagging and social search components.

In short, Yahoo's not banking on tagging -- the categorization of material -- as a way to help people find things better. It's banking that the mere act of saving things at all, even without tags, will give them a clue about what are trusted pages across the web. By looking at patterns of saving, Yahoo will have trust networks to tap into.

Searching Everyone's Pages, Trust Networks & Public Experts

Chris's Yahoo Integrates Personal & Social Search with My Web 2.0 article explains how searchers can seek information posted into the My Web system. My new A Search Marketer's Look At Yahoo My Web 2.0 article posted today for Search Engine Watch members drills down in depth about what exactly you can and cannot locate in the system and how various components work.

The big missing component is that there's no way currently to search against the "Everyone's Web" content, pages saved by everyone using the My Web 2.0 system. In other words, despite there being around 20,000 pages now saved by everyone in the community (and growing fast), you can only keyword search against content saved by those specifically within your "community" of contacts.

That's going to change in the future, once Yahoo's ready. Trust networks are the missing piece to make that happen.

"Eventually, we'll have 'search everyone' enabled," said Eckart Walther vice president of product management at Yahoo. "In the future, you will be able to see what others share. You can choose to add others to your trust network."

By adding others, Walther means that you can choose to add other people's choices to your own My Web collection of documents, even if they don't wish to network formally with you. It's an important point, because it leads into the public experts system that Yahoo wants to see evolve in the system.

Right now, the only people impacting what you search for are those who have agreed to be in your community -- your friends and friends of friends. But what if you see that there is someone you really respect on a particular topic participating? Consider:

• If Tim Berners-Lee, founder of the World Wide Web, is tagging content relating to the web, you might want to have him added as an expert to influence what you see.  
• Like Oprah Winfrey? Then you might want her to have an influence on your results, if she's tagging and saving pages in all her spare time.  
• Into business with a rebel attitude? If Virgin's Sir Richard Branson were in the system, he might be attractive as an expert for you to add.  
• Interested in internet and technology law and like what Lawrence Lessig has to say? Then you'd probably like him to help influence your results.

In the current system -- assuming such celebrities were taking part -- you couldn't tap into them unless you knew them directly or were connected by a friend or friend of a friend.

That will change in the future. Not only will you be able to add anyone to your network, but Yahoo wants to evolve the system to help you better spot and use people they'll consider "public experts" you can tap into. Chances are, they won't be giant celebrities. But there will be a range of people regarded as knowledgeable in their areas that you'll likely be able to trust.

In addition, the company will be able to watch how networks begin to expand and rate content. It expects that there will be all sorts of data that can be mined to help rank results better, for when people are doing searches against "Everyone's Web" saved pages.

"We can figure out what all these people have in their trust network. We expect to have several thousand networks emerge immediately. We can then overlay those," Walther said.

Trust Networks As The New Link Analysis

Trust won't just be used against My Web content. Yahoo is going to use trust networks to refine all of its web search results -- in other words, searches on "regular" Yahoo.

In October, I explained to Search Engine Watch members that My Web data was something Yahoo was "considering" using. It isn't considering any longer. The company says My Web data will definitely be used to refine results for everyone in the future.

Why? Yahoo knows that despite all the saving that will go on, people will never save all the billions of pages on the web that it already indexes. Instead, what Yahoo accumulate a lot of information on what various trust networks within My Web seem to like. That can be applied to improve the rankings of all pages it indexes, not just those within the My Web area.

We've had a generation of search engines that depended on on-the-page factors such as word location and frequency. We've had a current second generation that tapped into link analysis, looking at how people are linking and what they say in links.

Personal search is that third generational jump, and Yahoo's flavor of personal search is a social network one that it hopes will improve relevancy in web wide results in the way that link analysis helped drive back spam and improve relevancy years ago.

"We're creating personal anchor text for pages, but by having a trust network, we can actually pretty much eliminate spamming," Walther said.

Will Trust Get Spammed?

Hmm. Link analysis has degraded over the years as people learned how to manipulate links. Aren't there going to be plenty of spammers and people trying to mislead the trust networks? Aren't there going to be a lot of well-meaning people who will nonetheless save horrible pages that they love for all the wrong reasons and categorize them terribly?

Sure. Yahoo admits all of this readily. But Yahoo is confident that these types of extremes will be lost among the overall quality it expects to dominate.

"Even if some there are some false positives in an extended trust network, the odds are much better that you won't get spammed compared to the wide web," Walther said.

Social Search Faces More Trust Vulnerabilities

The trust idea makes a lot of sense. Having a set of trusted pages that a search engine can depend on is at the core of the TrustRank system described in a paper written by both Google and Yahoo employees. If you know which pages you can trust, then you can boost them plus let them boost other pages by weighting what they link to more heavily. But to know those trusted pages, you ultimately need human beings to give you a collection.

MSN's new Neural Net / RankNet system which emerged this week seems to tap into a small set of humans doing trust training. Trust there is hard to influence -- hard to spam -- given you don't even know who is creating the core trusted documents.

The new Google Personalized Search service taps into trust by just looking at what you personally select in your searching activities. Influencing or all-out spamming trust there is even harder than with MSN, in that every individual is creating their own set of core trusted documents.

Advice to marketers looking to do better in both systems above? Very little. Have good content and hope for the best. Be trustworthy. There aren't entry points for you to directly influence the systems.

Yahoo's new My Web 2.0 system is ambitious. By virtual of being a social search network, it has various places where trust can be influenced or potentially spammed. In fact, I've been shaking my head a bit over all the time it's taken to closely examine the Yahoo system to figure out where and how things might go wrong.

Advice to marketers looking to do better in the Yahoo system? Lots and lots, as A Search Marketer's Look At Yahoo My Web 2.0 covers.

Different Paths, Same Goal -- Better Relevancy Through Personalization

All of search marketing lives with a poor reputation that isn't completely deserved. SEO -- and SEM by extension -- took another slam today from Matthew Haughey of Metafilter, who puts us on par with cockroaches.

But search marketers have long influenced search engines in good ways to help them locate quality pages that might otherwise not get found, as I covered recently in Worthless Shady Criminals: A Defense Of SEO. In fact, search engines themselves refer people to companies that do SEO, and some have even hired firms to help them. It's not something that would happen if influencing results was always bad.

So, too, influencing trust isn't necessarily bad. Yahoo's system is vulnerable in being ambitious, but it's also strong in being able to tap into things the other systems can't.

Google depends solely on what you like, but that means your more hip and knowledgeable friend that you trust in other aspects of your life can't have an impact on you when it comes to search. Moreover, want to enlist a trusted expert in a field, as described above? You need an ambitious system like Yahoo's that allows that.

It's also noteworthy that Google isn't ruling out social search. On Tuesday -- before Yahoo rolled out its new service [which I have no doubt Google knew was coming] -- I asked Marissa Mayer, director of consumer products for Google, if its new personalized service might evolve into a social search model down the line.

Marissa talked about having worked on a web recommendation tool project in her pre-Google days and was pretty positive about the upside to such systems, I felt. But her experience also taught there are a lot of nuances that need to be taken into account, she said.

"I think there's a lot of potential there, but there's a lot of infrastructure that need to get built there and built well," she said.

Yahoo certainly feels it has the infrastructure. Vulnerabilities? Yahoo says it has this covered. Defenses, plans, self-correcting systems are all supposedly ready to go. Yahoo says it's not being naive about the attacks both overt and unexpected that its system will face.

As Chris wrote yesterday, "We'll see." That's not a cynical statement, either. It's just a fact -- we'll see if it works, and I hope it does.

As Chris also wrote, Google and Yahoo are on "very different paths" in tapping into trust for personalization. So's MSN, and we'll no doubt see Ask Jeeves bring trust into its personalized system as well.

Everyone's heading for that same goal, unique results that give you the best relevancy. Whatever path they take, let's hope they all get there.

Posted by Danny Sullivan at 10:13 AM | Permalink

June 16, 2005

360i Acquired By Innovative Interactive

Search marketing firm 360i has been purchased by Innovation Interactive, 360i tells us. Innovation Interactive is the parent company of eXact Advertising and paid listings service BrainFox. eXact Advertising, which currently encompasses search marketing and other services, will now focus solely on delivering contextual ads.

Posted by Danny Sullivan at 9:36 AM | Permalink

June 15, 2005

More On AOL's SEO/SEM Campaign

AOL.com's Search Effort: Music Visitors Up, So Are Keyword Prices from MediaPost is an update on the story we blogged earlier, that AOL is to do a significant search marketing push to drive traffic to its site. Carat Interactive is heading the campaign and comments in the story. Another follow-up story, Paid Search a Footnote in AOL.com Push from ClickZ, noted briefly that the push is almost entirely on the free SEO side, rather than through buying search ads. The MediaPost article gives some examples of this, as well as how keyword buys from AOL are pushing up the cost of music terms.

Posted by Danny Sullivan at 6:47 AM | Permalink

June 14, 2005

Search Marketing Isn't Just Math & Machines

Search is all about math, right? Throw everything into a black box, let the ad management systems run, and you can forget about creativity. I don't buy into that at all. Yes, search -- especially paid search -- has a strong analytical side. But to think it's all about math and machines is dead wrong.

Did the machine take into account:

• Actually crafting the advertising copy you want to test?  
• The idea you might be after brand lift, rather than conversions?  
• The general accessibility of your site for free listings?  
• The need to generate good PR in search results or counter-act bad results?  
• The increasingly diverse types of listings you may wish to have: local ads, local organic, shopping ads, shopping organic, map listings, video ads, video organic and so on?

Those are just some examples of how search is far more diverse than you might think. Automation and machines are important, but they aren't replacements for the human element.

Paula, Pedro, and the Right Brain of Search from MediaPost today has David Berkowitz looking at this issue, scratching his head after a OMMA conference keynoter last week said that unless you work for Google, you shouldn't work in search at all.

"It's all math and machines," said Rishad Tobaccowala, chief innovation officer at Publicis Groupe Media. Oddly, however, another take on his speech has him also saying creative individuals are needed. Hmm. Maybe they just aren't needed in search.

If Tobaccowala's comments sound familiar, that's because you may have heard them before. Right-brain, left-brain advertising over at MarketWatch from the end of last month explores a similar idea, that search advertising is so complex that only machines can keep it harnessed.

No doubt, practically anyone needs to be using some type of automation, something that will become even more required when MSN's incredibly complicated paid ad system rolls out, completely with many ways of targeting people.

The math will be important. The math is important. But my gut tells me creativity isn't going to die. In fact, it ought to be one of your distinguishing factors. If everyone's using math to be efficient, the playing field levels. So what moves you higher? Getting beyond the math :)

Posted by Danny Sullivan at 3:21 PM | Permalink

June 10, 2005

AOL Moves TV Spend To Search; Rodney Dangerfield Of Online Advertising No More!

AOL Wooing Users to Portal, With a Little Help From Its Foes from the New York Times looks at how AOL is ironically turning to search ads on rivals Google and Yahoo to attract people to its new public portal offering. The story notes how $50 million intended for television ads is instead going to search because AOL realized search was already the biggest driver of traffic to its free music site. Here's a quote to warm the hearts of search marketers over the years who've had to scrape, lobby, beg and plead for more spending on search:

"We started seeing the results and said, 'Oh, my God, what if we took this money and put it into search engine marketing,' " Mr. Miller said. Now more than half of AOL's marketing budget for the portal will be used to pay for ads on search engines and formatting Web pages so they appear in the free search results.

So there you have it. Search, which I called the Rodney Dangerfield of no respect in terms of online advertising in 2001, gets an endorsement from Time Warner. If you're still dealing with some marketing department that remains dubious about search -- despite the continued rise in spend -- despite the fact that for a tiny, tiny amount of traditional spend they could discover the power of search themselves -- point them at this quote.

And hey, point the Penn State to it, as well. Gary noted recent research from Penn State yesterday, on how consumers are found to head primarily to organic listings. Yes, search marketers have known that for years. But to say about ads:

According to recent reports, businesses spent an estimated $8 billion to sell their products and services via sponsored links in 2004, despite little evidence that such advertising successfully directs traffic to Web sites. More likely to hook consumers are the organic results or those results returned automatically by the algorithmic operations of the search engine, Jansen said.

I bolded the key part. Little evidence advertising successfully directs traffic to web site? Please. Search is one of the most heavily measured advertising venues. Advertisers are spending because they know they are getting traffic to their web sites, and traffic that converts. The rising spend is direct evidence that it successfully drives traffic to sites. Spend wouldn't be rising otherwise.

Organic, of course, remains important. If anything, organic search is the new Rodney Dangerfield of search. Despite bringing in more traffic than paid search, advertiser spend on paid search dwarfs organic, as SEMPO stats showed last year.

But maybe organic will get more valuable. At the very least, note that AOL didn't say it would spend only on paid search. "Free" search results were deemed important, as well.

Postscript: Paid Search a Footnote in AOL.com Push from ClickZ is a brief story that organic listings will be the big push in AOL's campaign.

Posted by Danny Sullivan at 12:52 PM | Permalink

June 6, 2005

Internet Marketer Corey Rudl Killed In Racing Accident

Plenty of people were introduced to search marketing by way of internet marketer Corey Rudl's writings and speaking. Sad news to report. Rudl was killed last week during a racing accident. More details in this article, with tributes and discussion in this WebmasterWorld thread: Corey Rudl Dies at 34.

A memorial site has also been set up here.

Posted by Danny Sullivan at 2:03 PM | Permalink

May 30, 2005

Growing Your SEM Business Virtually

Want to grow your SEM businesses but don't want to hire full-time people, deal with getting a formal office and other issues? Virtually Perfect: How To Structure A Virtual SEM Business For Success from Stacey Williams at Search Engine Guide looks at a number tips you might consider. Also check out the recent SearchDay article The Power of Virtual Search Engine Marketing and the Virtual SEM thread at our forum that cover similar issues.

Posted by Danny Sullivan at 10:51 AM | Permalink

May 26, 2005

Search Marketing Trade Publication Coming

Spotted by Search Engine Guide, news that search marketing is looking to get its first print magazine. It will be from SYS-CON media and to be called SEM/SEO Journal. A news release has more details on the launch, to come in the second half of this year. An online site is also promised at www.SEO.sys-con.com, though that URL just resolves back to the main SYS-CON site for now.

Posted by Danny Sullivan at 2:21 PM | Permalink

May 17, 2005

Issues Facing Search & Search Marketing

Where Do We Go from Here? from Kevin Ryan at iMediaConnection has him surveying members of a panel he's assembled on the topic of the future of search, to see what they think the top issues are that need to be addressed. In summary, they are:

• Measurement: In particular, is search worth more than a click?
• Search Alternatives: Does the industry need more than Google and Yahoo?
• Better Understanding Of Search Behavior: How do searchers really interact with search pages and in actions post-search, inspired by search? We don't know enough.
• Privacy: As search integrates more into our lives, privacy issues grow. How is this addressed?
• Search Evolution: As search goes vertical, will consumers miss the "old days" of 10 textual listings or be pleased by the evolutions to come?

Meanwhile in our forums, the SEM Industry Biggest Growing Pains thread is pulling in a variety of comments about challenges to be addressed, including:

• SEM's bad reputation
• Getting more mainstream/corporate acceptance of SEO
• Lack of competition between Google and Yahoo
• Need for better search interfaces
• Need for better search marketing agency trade representation
• Lack of support for organic listings
• Brain drain as talented SEOs pull out of helping others to work for themselves
• Assumption that SEO is "easy" when it's more complicated than it seems
• Lack of business knowledge by SEMs
• Lack of standards/accreditation/references to back up SEM claims as professionals

Please come by the thread to contribute your own thoughts and comments!

Posted by Danny Sullivan at 8:12 AM | Permalink

May 4, 2005

Google Faces Customer Satisfaction & Advertiser Trust Issues

Google: biting the hand that feeds it? from CNN Money shows Google slipping in some aspects of customer satisfaction among advertisers. An annual survey of 200 ad executives about customer happiness showed that Google rose overall from seventh place last year to fifth place this year. However, it had a dramatic drop from 11th to 18th in the "responsiveness and accessibility" subcategory. The story then goes beyond the report to survey several advertisers not happy about other issues. One big gripe? Google bigfooting search marketers by trying to grab accounts away from them. Some past reading related to this issue, for Google and others:

• Search Publishers Not Friends Of Agencies, SEMs
• Advertisers Fears That Search Buys May Help Competitors
• Google AdWords Professional Status Not Good Enough For Google
• Is Google ever going to figure out how to handle Ad Agencies?
• Google Adwords Professionals - First batch of qualified SEMs due this week
• Agency Commission Or Discount Offered On Search Ads?

By the way, Yahoo comes out better than Google in the survey, ranked second overall and seventh in the responsiveness subcategory. AOL comes behind Google, ranked 14th and 21st, respectively. MSN is further behind, 19th and 43rd. Ask is also behind, ranked 20th and 27th.

Posted by Danny Sullivan at 8:24 AM | Permalink

April 28, 2005

Mom, I'm an SEO, Not a Scumbag... Really

Anyone who's spent time in the world of search marketing knows there's a wide spectrum of experience, knowledge and, frankly, ability to effectively influence search results, whether paid or organic. Unfortunately, several high-profile incidents involving unscrupulous search engine optimization "firms" have cast an unsavory light on the industry. To make matters worse, a number of marketing, design and usability experts have weighed in with wrong-headed (or simply wrong) commentary disparaging search engine marketing with an overly wide brush.

That needs to stop, writes Danny Sullivan in today's SearchDay article, Worthless Shady Criminals: A Defense Of SEO. Danny offers a great recounting of how the search marketing industry ended up cast in such a negative light, and makes a number of useful suggestions for anyone involved in online marketing to both understand and use search marketing techniques that have been proven effective, ethical and ultimately, the right thing to do for the end user.

Posted by Chris Sherman at 10:57 AM | Permalink

April 20, 2005

SEO Criminals

I mentioned the Search Champs are meeting again up at Microsoft. Spotted via Threadwatch, one champ Mary Hodder takes a swing at the SEM people invited:

There are about six search engine optimization people here. Kind of like being at the FBI and having criminals helping out in the room.

My previous post broke down the SEM people involved. Greg Boser and Todd Freisen both proudly wear black hats in the work they do at times and will happily explain to anyone -- and convincingly so -- why the search engines themselves can be the criminals at times, with the SEMs being the FBI that catches them out.

But c'mon -- Shari Thurow as a criminal? She's about as white hat as they come. Hopefully she'll end up sitting next to Hodder and help her understand that tarring the entire industry as criminal isn't very helpful.

By the way, those criminals are the ones funding the little gathering up there. That's because they buy plenty of the ads that appear on MSN. So if it's FBI and criminals, also be aware that the FBI has no problem working right alongside those criminals and cashing their checks.

Posted by Danny Sullivan at 9:14 AM | Permalink

April 6, 2005

Google SEO Support Given To Advertisers

Google & SEO Support For Advertisers now posted for Search Engine Watch members looks at how increased editorial listings support being given to large advertisers is raising concerns with search marketers and threatening the "church and state" division between ads and editorial results that Google has long sought to maintain.

In the story, I look at how Google will provide large advertisers with guidance on getting listed in its editorial results, upon request. The company has also provided this guidance to potential advertisers it seeks to gain.

Google acknowledges both points but stresses that only basic information is provided, similar to what someone might read on its web site or hear at a conference. Marketers I talked with for the story agree that no "insider" information to produce top rankings is being provided. However, the story does look anew at how some may get the go-ahead to do things that Google's public guidelines don't allow.

I also do a review of the situation with other search engines, in terms of what they say they do -- or do not -- provide in terms of express support. The story touches on how Ask Jeeves may finally come up with a free Add URL system of some type, while Yahoo hints at some type of new support system.

Overall, that's what I urge in the story -- a new, guaranteed paid support system that isn't tied to cost-per-click paid inclusion fees that all the major search engines should provide.

Be sure to also see For Whom the Search Bell Tolls out yesterday from Kevin Ryan at iMediaConnection. Kevin's heard the same stories that I've been told recently and touches on them in his piece that focuses on whether support provided by the search engines in part threatens the survival of SEM firms.

Meanwhile, see this post over in our forums that talks about how being a certified AdWords Professional wasn't enough for one search marketing company to be deemed big enough by Google to handle a large client.

Posted by Danny Sullivan at 9:43 PM | Permalink

More On Analytic Vendor Access To Yahoo's API

Earlier I posted how Yahoo was apparently not allowing some analytics vendors access to its advertiser API. Controversy Mounts over Yahoo! API Access from ClickZ follows up on that story, noting that the newly-formed Web Analytics Association put out a statement saying it was concerned about any restricted access. For its part, Yahoo put out its own statement saying that there's no change to its intent to provide open access.

Specifically, Yahoo is telling everyone:

Yahoo! Search Marketing's (Overture) position on APIs and open access has not changed. We support all advertisers, SEMs and agencies that desire to have direct access through APIs, and continue to expand the numbers of companies participating in our program.

In addition, we've been working proactively with web analytics companies to determine how they would like to add value to their customers' campaign tracking needs, how we can expand our API program to help them achieve that, and how that can extend the value of advertising on Yahoo! and the Overture network. This does not represent a change in policy for Overture / Yahoo!

WebSideStory, the analytics firm named as having been denied access, didn't comment in the article. Frank Watson, who raised the issue of the denial in his blog and in this Search Engine Watch Forum thread, explained his understanding was that the denial was more of a "not now" rather than a "not at all," suggesting that new analytics vendors not already using the API may get access in the future.

Posted by Danny Sullivan at 7:42 PM | Permalink

March 30, 2005

CGI Holding Buys More, Changing Name To Think Partnership

CGI Holding Corporation, the company of many search marketing brands, has gained additional ones recently and will undergo a name change to Think Partnership.

CGI Holding is the parent company of online marketing firm WebSourced, which in turn operates the search marketing division of KeywordRanking.com. Search Engine Lowdown's Andy Beal is VP of search marketing for both of those units.

CGI Holdings Continues Buying Spree from ClickZ looks at how CGI has acquired Smart Interactive, the two-person UK-based search marketing firm headed by Mike Grehan. It's the second time Grehan has hooked up with a large, US-based firm. He'd joined iProspect in November 2003 but departed a few months later. CGI provides additional details on the acquisition in the press release.

The ClickZ story looks at some other recent acquisitions, including the purchase of affiliate marketer KowaBunga Marketing and an intention to buy another affiliate player, PrimaryAds. More details also in this ClickZ story about those purchases, WebSourced Adds Affiliate Power, plus this announcement via Search Engine Lowdown.

CGI is still working through another purchase, that of merging with Proceed Interactive. It also hired Heather Lloyd-Martin who ran her own small SEM shop in December.

CGI changed its AMEX stock symbol earlier this month to THK, for Think Partnership, the name it seeks to have shareholders approve. From company CEO Gerald M Jacobs, in a press release about the move:

"We have chosen the new name Think Partnership Inc. because our Company is a collaborative partnership of entrepreneurs and proven business leaders who are demonstrating innovation and execution in some very exciting Internet sectors. Ben Jennings and I, and the dynamic entrepreneurs who lead our operating companies -- Pat Martin of WebSourced; Scott and Kristi Mitchell and Paul Widisky of Cherish; Steve Thanhauser, Lewis Finch and Greg Cox of MarketSmart; and Rick Anderson of Ozline -- are deeply committed to building our Company based upon the principles of decentralized management, collaboration and mutual respect among partners, aggressive growth both internally and via acquisitions, the delivery of highly professional services to our clients, and profitability for the mutual benefit of our employees and shareholders. We want our future merger partners and employees to 'think partnership' in every aspect of our businesses, so we have adopted that mantra as our new corporate name."

If approved, it will be the third name for the company. Before being known as CGI Holding Corporation, it was formerly called North Star Petroleum, Inc, according to the company's history profile.

Posted by Danny Sullivan at 9:34 AM | Permalink

March 24, 2005

Yahoo To Restrict SEM & Agency API Access?

Is Yahoo going to withdraw API access to SEM firms, agencies and other third-party companies that manage online ad spend? So hears Frank Watson, AKA Search Engine Watch Forums moderator AussieWebmaster. In Is Yahoo Destined To Be The Next LookSmart? on his new blog (well worth a regular read), he looks at how new new analytic firms are being allowed in and how there's no assurance existing contracts will continue.

What's the big deal? If you currently use a third party to manage your bids, this would make it much harder -- perhaps impossible for some firms -- to access Yahoo. Yes, they might be able to go back to screen scraping, but then they could also likely expect legal action over that.

"Individual" access to the API wouldn't be tampered with, Frank reports. The good news there is that since it's your account, you might insist that Yahoo allow the company of your choice to use your individual access to manage your account.

In the end, I'm with Frank in hoping such a move doesn't happen. Both Yahoo and Google (and MSN to come) need to fully embrace search marketing agencies and others as their friends, rather than competitors. That's because in the end, none of them individually is going to be trusted to do purchases on other properties. For a bit more on this, see my past post Search Publishers Not Friends Of Agencies, SEMs.

Want to comment or discuss? Please visit our forum thread, Yahoo Could Be Dropping API Access to PPC

Posted by Danny Sullivan at 5:34 AM | Permalink

March 21, 2005

Euro Search Marketing To Grow 65 Percent

Forrester Research estimates that search marketing will increase 65 percent in 2005 to €1.4 billion. That spend includes non-search contextual ads, however. From its new report, the UK is found to be Europe's biggest online ad marketing, followed by Germany. France is said to have shown surprising growth. If you're a Forrester client, the "Europe's Search Engine Marketing Forecast, 2004 To 2010" report is here. If not, then European Search Engine Marketing To Grow 65 percent in 2005, Says Forrester Research from Tekrati has a summary.

Posted by Danny Sullivan at 1:52 PM | Permalink

March 14, 2005

SEMs: Your Days Are Over (Not)

Search-Specific Agencies Fight for Survival from MediaWeek comes away from the SES NY show earlier this month with this frightening sounding conclusion: "Many SEMs also likely wondered whether the event might be their last trip to New York."

What's up? Interactive and traditional media agencies will buy everyone up, that's what. As I've written before, I have a bet going with a friend that this will NOT happen, and I'm sticking with that.

Yep, there's going to be more acquisitions as we've had in 2004. Yep, interactive and traditional firms will grow capabilities. But there will be plenty of space I feel for search-specific shops. That's especially true when you consider there are lots and lots of firms that are small, that serve a particular niche, a particular location or clients that simply cannot afford nor want the cost of a big agency to do the job.

One search marketing firm's CEO is quoted as saying SES will be really different next year, with the suggestion being it will be all agencies at that point. Hey, I've been to them all since they started. Change is par for the course. But I'm happy to wager there will still be plenty of independent search marketing firms out there. Maybe fewer, and maybe the agency presence will be stronger. But don't also forget that there's been a bigger change at the conference that the article doesn't mention -- significant growth in those who do SEM work in house for their companies. The in house SEM contingent has grown and grown.

By the way, at our SES Chicago show in December, someone asked me if it made sense to start referring to search engine marketing as just search marketing. I agreed, as did the room full of people at the forum where it was raised.

I've actually already been doing this slowly over the past year, saying search marketing rather than search engine marketing, which I started using as an umbrella term back in 2001 (see Congratulations! You're A Search Engine Marketer! and Search Engine Marketing: You Like It, You Really Like It.

I still prefer the acronym SEM for the activity of search marketing, however. Saying SM sounds odd. SEM is also used as shorthand for the firms involved in search marketing: SEMs. I've been wondering if perhaps another shift is in order here, such as SMAs (for search marketing agencies) or just saying "search agencies" might make sense.

What about SEO and SEOs? I still use those terms and will continue to do so for activities specifically about getting better "free" or "organic" or "natural" listings on search engines and for firms that only do that. My Intro To Search Engine Submission explains this a bit more, plus how search marketing is the combination of many activities involved with getting search-targeted traffic.

Want to comment? Join our forum thread, Will SEM exist 3 years from now?

Posted by Danny Sullivan at 8:49 PM | Permalink

Search's Long Tail

If you've somehow missed discussion of "The Long Tail," it's a reference to a landmark article of the same name by Wired editor Chris Anderson that ran last October. It covered how the media and entertainment industries will succeed not by pushing only mass market hits that are popular among many but by also mining the "long tail" of interest among a few in less-popular books, songs, movies and more.

Sure, maybe thousands want to buy a hit song. But add up all those who want to buy lesser-known titles, and they might generate as much or more revenue than the hits themselves. As a merchant, you want to tap into both the "head" of interest and the "long tail" that follows behind.

The tail makes much more sense when you see charts that illustrate it, such as the one below:

Those are the top 100 queries related to shoes on the Overture network, from an article I did last September about Overture shifting to a broad match system (Overture Shifting To Default Broad Match).

The point I was explaining in that article is that there are a large number of queries that happen far less often than the "leading" terms like "shoes" or "running shoes" at the head of the list. Most queries form the long tail that's illustrated behind the head. Tap into the tail, and you've got sizable traffic, as well as traffic that often is reported to convert better than less general terms.

In other words, search has a long tail too. Indeed, I've long heard references for years to the "search tail" or "query tail" I've illustrated above. I'm not sure where that phrase it originated and with whom, but tails aren't a new concept to the search world.

While it might not be new to search, it's certainly great to have the tail becoming more popularized in general. That's because it will further help those search marketers who mistakenly fixate on only the most popular terms to realize they need to consider the tail as well.

Over the years in my regular SES session "Intro To SEM," I've also referred to the search tail as getting the "onesies and twosies," the queries that might only happen once or twice in a month. Maybe they don't seem important because of the low volume individually, but tap into lots of onesies and twosies, and you can be doing well.

So if you're a search marketer hearing about The Long Tail for the first time, rejoice! Many of you have intuitively been mining it for ages. If you haven't, start! That means considering broad matching on both Google and Yahoo. For organic SEO, it means having lots of good content that will naturally tap into the tail of queries.

Meanwhile, some examples of how the search tail is becoming popularized and integrated as part of current Long Tail awareness for further reading:

• The long tail of software. Millions of Markets of Dozens: Out this week from the blog of Joe Kraus, one of Excite's cofounders, this has a chart of the Excite search tail from his day. Kraus says 97 percent of the service's traffic came from the tail and that the "real reason" his company went out of business was because it didn't know how to make money from that tail. I'd beg to differ on that point. Excite gained search-targeted listings through a partnership with FindWhat in April 2001. Over six months later, Yahoo finally got the same through its partnership with Overture. Both partnerships let these companies earn off the search tail. Excite was ahead of the game yet died. Yahoo survived. Blame lack of tail targeting? No, something else was at work. I'd say Excite went bankrupt because among other things, it couldn't afford to continue competing in the expensive portal competition it was trying to fight. Maybe if it had gone after the tail even earlier, it would have survived (my The End For Search Engines? article explains why this was hard). But as noted, the fact that Yahoo pulled through doesn't mean that failing to target the tail can take such heavy blame. Also be aware that while Excite the company died, Excite the web site is still going. The traffic is much reduced, but it's earning revenue today for the company that runs search there, Infospace.  
• Google's Long Tail: From Chris Anderson's Long Tail blog, you can see an example of how Google in February was trying to tap into the new understanding and popularity of the Long Tail idea to illustrate to investors how it is a long-tail type of company. Google's always been this way, but the better understanding of what it does (and what Yahoo's Overture pioneered back in its GoTo days) is growing.  
• On the Trail of the Long Tail: Also from February, this post on the Yahoo Search Blog shows Yahoo directly saying the same thing -- we're a long-tail company. Sadly, they didn't provide any charts to help illustrate this more!  
• The Paid Inclusion Dinosaur article I wrote from June last year looks at why Yahoo has stuck by its guns to run the program -- doing so lets it tap into the giant tail of queries that marketers even using broad matching might never consider, especially giant when you understand that paid inclusion ties into the editorial results that are far more likely to be clicked on than ad listings. From the longer version of the article for SEW members:

  Right now, Overture and Google struggle with how to fill out the "tail" of search queries with ads. These are queries that happen only a few times per month but in aggregate represent a huge amount of unsold inventory.

  For example, advertisers focus on high frequency terms such as "shoes," which Overture reports had over 1,000,000 requests in April 2004. It sells for a top bid of around $0.55 and has 90 advertisers competing for it.

  In contrast, "winged track shoes" happened only 27 times last month. No one is bidding on the term. That's most likely because the low frequency doesn't make it seem worth the time. Yet someone searching for something so specific might convert better than the more generic "shoes" searcher.

  Paid inclusion is a perfect solution for unsold ad inventory like this. Simply tell the advertiser that you'll spider their site and let pages appear in the paid placement area for a flat, low-cost rate when there is space available. Advertisers can still target the important terms, but they gain easy visibility for other important ones. Yahoo reduces its unsold inventory. Searchers are spared confusion.

• Search Engine Marketing Goes Mainstream: A report out of our SES Boston conference in March 2003, it covers how back then the "tail" of search was being discussed in both economic terms as well as a search marketing tactic.  
• Just Right: Targeting the Tail: Cached copy of a LookSmart presentation at SES Australia in March 2003 that says all the things you're hearing about today in terms of the Long Tail. It mentions the "keyword tail" and the "search tail" and concludes:  
  • Top 50% of queries = 80% of volume
  • 80/20 rule does not regularly apply to search
  • Focusing on just the first 20% of keywords will invariably miss most of the value  

Posted by Danny Sullivan at 4:46 PM | Permalink

February 28, 2005

Full Text: The State of Search Engine Marketing 2004

The SEMPO report: The State of Search Engine Marketing 2004, is now publicly available as a full text (PDF) document (free) here. Highlights from the report were mentioned in this December blog post. Chris also provided a detailed review in this SearchDay article.

Posted by Gary Price at 9:22 AM | Permalink

February 25, 2005

French Survey On Search Marketing Up

ZDNet France and Imitiki have posted the results of a survey on search marketing issues in France. Search Engine Marketing Survey in France has the results in English, with questions ranging from is SEO important (95% say yes), to annual budget for SEO (most don't spend anything but time), to the use of sponsored links (a huge 30 percent said they never buy these) to main paid search provider (Google with a whopping 83 percent). Survey also in French, naturellement, via here (registration appears required). Want to discuss? Check out our forum thread, Search engine marketing survey in France.

Posted by Danny Sullivan at 4:18 PM | Permalink

SEM Business Issues On Discussion

Here's a pair of Search Engine Watch Forum threads dealing with some tricky SEM business issues. In How To Start & When You Can Charge For SEO, members discuss how to get started with SEO/SEM services. What level should you be at in order to confidently charge clients. Meanwhile, Sued for Blackhat SEO? looks at whether "black hat" SEO or really any SEO activity that backfires to a client's expectations could get you into legal hot water.

Posted by Danny Sullivan at 12:03 PM | Permalink

February 11, 2005

Did-It Nabs Ask Jeeves/MaxOnline Exec

Did-it Hires New CEO Away from Ask Jeeves from ClickZ covers SEM firm Did-It getting a new CEO, courtesy of a steal from Ask Jeeves. Specifically, Wise comes from the MaxOnline advertising unit Ask Jeeves acquired last year.

A sign of bigger things to come for Did-It. Lee says there's no plans to be acquired yet (but go on, make Kevin an offer!). Biggest SEM steal from search firm to date probably remains WSPS nabbing the former Overture Europe president Nick Hynes last year.

I can't resist sharing my own MaxOnline story. Did you know I used to be the general manager of the company? Yep, danny@maxonline.com was my email. The company was Maximized Online, with maxonline.com our domain name. The company folded and in a great bit of irony, the domain name moved to MaxOnline which Ask Jeeves now owns.

Posted by Danny Sullivan at 7:50 AM | Permalink

February 10, 2005

Big Four Confirmed For Indexing Summit

The Indexing Summit is on!

The what? Earlier this year, I said it would be great to have some type of indexing summit, where search engines could hear and discuss ideas on what web site owners would like in terms how their content gets indexed.

I went forward with scheduling one for our upcoming SES New York show and just got a last confirmation for the panel. All four major crawlers, Yahoo, MSN Search, Google and Ask Jeeves, will be taking part -- and much thanks to all of them for stepping forward to participate.

Don't expect anything immediate to come out of the panel. It's unlikely that any new ideas will be suddenly embraced by all four then and there. But it is an opportunity to raise ideas for them to consider and hear some preliminary thoughts about why something might or might not be workable.

What type of ideas? Well...

• Wish you could control exactly what a search engine spiders, such as tagging content that should or should not be indexed, such as page navigational elements?  
• Wish there was a way you could explain to a search engine that although you have five different domain name names that resolve to the same site, THIS domain name is the one you want used?  
• Wish all the search engines agreed on what they will and will not index in terms of Flash, JavaScript, CSS and so on?  
• Wish there was a paid support system where you could get express answers on indexing questions?

Those are just some of the ideas that might be put to the panel. Your help is needed to provide some other things you'd like. Please come over to this forum thread: Ideas For The Indexing Summit. There, I'll be mining the ideas that come out for good things to raise to the panel.

For those looking for more background, see:

• Looking Back, Looking Ahead: Developments With Consumer Search: Toward the end, I talk about some past wish list ideas marketers have suggested.  
• Comment Spam? How About An Ignore Tag? How About An Indexing Summit!: My past article on why it would be useful to have such a summit.  
• Google, Yahoo, MSN Unite On Support For Nofollow Attribute For Links: Covers the nofollow attribute that three of the major search engines recently agreed to, the first page-element specific control that web site owners have ever been given.  
• Time For An Indexing Summit?: A forum thread now closed where the idea was discussed after my article. New ideas should go into the Ideas For The Indexing Summit thread.

Posted by Danny Sullivan at 1:44 PM | Permalink

February 8, 2005

Search Marketers are Mostly Unsophisticated, says JupiterResearch

The majority of search marketers are unsophisticated, despite having worked in the field for two or more years, according to a study by JupiterResearch. What's more, key differences in approaches to bid management, the use of analytic tools, and other factors tends to tip the overall advantage in favor of sophisticated search marketers.

Today's SearchDay article, JupiterResearch: Most Search Marketers are Unsophisticated, covers a recent Search Engine Strategies conference panel where JupiterResearch shared its findings about the behavior, attitudes and success factors of both sophisticated and unsophisticated search marketers. It makes for an interesting—and somewhat controversial read.

Posted by Chris Sherman at 10:00 AM | Permalink

February 3, 2005

Yahoo Seeks SEM Manager

Nice mention by Barry of Yahoo wanting someone to do search engine marketing for its own properties. It's not the first search engine to do this. Others like LookSmart and Inktomi have, as well. It's not even that new for Yahoo. I've written before about it running ads on Google and a campaign on European search engines to drive traffic. Question is, will the Yahoo SEM person go black hat on getting traffic from Google?

Posted by Danny Sullivan at 12:03 PM | Permalink

January 28, 2005

Video Search Means New Marketing Opportunities?

Rebecca Lieb speculates on what search engines going into video search may mean in terms of marketing opportunities in Moving Targets at ClickZ.

Posted by Danny Sullivan at 12:44 PM | Permalink

January 27, 2005

Isobar's Fay On Multiple Search Groups

Last month, iProspect was acquired by Aegis Group to be part of its still relatively new Isobar network. Isobar also encompasses Carat Interactive, which provides SEM services. So now one group has two different units with search marketing services -- very similar to the situation with WPP operating mSearch and Outrider, that I wrote about earlier.

In Q&A with Sarah Fay from iMediaConnection, Isobar US's new president Sarah Fay (formerly president of Carat), touches how Isobar will deal with the two. They won't be rolled up into some master Isobar brand -- and yes, they might even compete with each other both for search clients or for the same pot of money to go into different types of marketing. But they'll also be encouraged to cooperate, as well. Says Fay in the story:

Each of the Isobar agencies will have its own P&L, which may incur some competition within the group. But each of the agencies is also strongly incented to work together and to cross-refer business within the group. Each of the agencies is expected to collaborate in sharing knowledge, tools and best practices. I believe our agencies are different enough that the synergies far outweigh their competitive cross over.

Posted by Danny Sullivan at 11:14 AM | Permalink

January 23, 2005

Survey: Manufacturers Plan Search Engine Marketing

A new study from SVM E-Business Solutions in cooperation with the New Jersey Chamber of Commerce informs us that manufacturers plan to increase their spending in online advertising.

The study finds approximately 50 percent of respondents plan to invest in search engine marketing. One example DeStefano cited from the study is a "food-grade lubricant" business. "That's not going to be a highly searched term online, but for the company, the clicks on those ads are very valuable leads indicating a specific interest where the chance to convert is high."

More in Rob McGann's Clickz article: Study: Manufacturers to Ramp Up Online Marketing.

The complete study is available online (free, registration required) here.

Posted by Gary Price at 2:34 PM | Permalink

January 21, 2005

SEO Versus SE Ads

When I do my introductory talk about search marketing at our Search Engine Strategies shows, I explain that search marketing it is the combination of SEO and search advertising.

SEO is like getting PR -- with a little appropriate effort, you might get some nice free publicity, but no guarantees. Search advertising is guaranteed -- and that's why you pay so much for it!

In Compare and Contrast: SEM and SEO from ClickZ, Kevin Lee does some comparing of his own. SEO for many sites is mostly about clearing the hurdles that can make a site non-search engine friendly. Fix the problems, and the free listings tap might start flowing with relatively little need to watch over it on a daily basis.

Search advertising -- what he calls paid SEM -- isn't a fire-and-forget activity. It needs lots of watching and may involve skills completely different than SEO.

SEO and search ads do have some things in common, as he outlines -- but he predicts that the two may diverge even further down the line.

I agree -- and it's also why you might find yourself employing two completely different companies. Concerned about your free listings, especially in terms of how they might have an impact on your company's reputation? Turning to a company skilled with paid search but not organic might not be helpful. Think of it back in the "real" world again Plenty of companies have both PR firms and advertising firms.

Meanwhile, Gord Hotchkiss points out at MediaPost in The 70/30 Rule of Search how despite the fact that searchers pay the most attention to free listings on search engines, marketers spend the most money on getting positioning through search ads. That mix, he argues, should change to better reflect positioning in the real "prime" part of a search results page.

Posted by Danny Sullivan at 3:20 PM | Permalink

January 20, 2005

iFrontier, Rawhide Absorbed

Some updates on old SEM names we're finally losing due to past acquisitions.

First, i-FRONTIER is to be no longer, as least as a brand name. It's being fully integrated into into sister agency Avenue A/Razorfish (which itself needs a much better name!). Some more details from ClickZ: i-FRONTIER Brought Under Avenue A/Razorfish.

Meanwhile, Rawhide -- acquired by eXact Advertising last September, now has been absorbed completely into the company, though it will be known as eXactSearch. More details in the company press release.

FYI, I've added an updated my chart on various search marketing firm acquisitions. You'll find it here: Will 2005 Bring More SEM Acquisitions?

Posted by Danny Sullivan at 11:28 AM | Permalink

January 14, 2005

More Seth Godin Cluelessness On Search Marketing

Peter Da Vanzo pointed over to a blog post from Seth Godin: Is there a "search engine industry"? That's Godin's lead in to mention a new search blog that launched from Reprise Media that I mentioned yesterday. His comment:

If this is a brand new form of effective media, somebody ought to be telling us what's new, what's working and what's absurd.

Peter's shocked that Godin seems to have just discovered this. Well, so am I, Peter, so am I! It's either an absurd post or one calculated to bring him some attention. If the latter, it's bad attention, in my book.

Absurd? Yeah, absurd. Search marketing has long been a form of effective media -- even before we had paid listings. If Godin has only just realized this, then the people who have been buying his New York Times bestselling books on marketing have been cheated out of an important chapter.

I dunno. Search spend by advertisers keeps increasing! We keep doing conferences with huge attendee growth! Ad agencies are buying up search marketing firms! Anyone one of these alone ought to be proof that something's going on.

Search is so obviously huge media outlet. Geez, search engines have been among the top web sites people have used since, well, back when Godin used to work for Yahoo! It's like saying millions of people watch TV each day -- but do you think there's a TV industry? Do you think TV might be some brand new form of effective media?

I'm usually pretty mild-mannered, try to see all sides, be level-headed. But this is the second ridiculous post from someone who is supposed to know about marketing. The first was The problem with search engine optimization post last year when Godin dismissed most SEO as not worth the money. Instead, you just need to buy AdWords and hope that luck ensures your good content taps into natural listings.

Search marketing is more than buying ads -- SEO is the search world's equivalent to public relations. It also doesn't mean that you have to link spam, comment spam or content spam. Content-driven SEO -- I'm writing more about this next week -- is something anyone should be considering.

You can have all the great content you want. Neglect some basic things to make your site search engine friendly, and you aren't getting in. It's like saying that you need never reach out to the press, they'll just somehow magically discover you've launched a new product, done something interesting. Search engines are better at discover, but outreach still helps -- SEO is that type of outreach.

Postscript: Seth's since posted a In violent agreement! response to to some of the comments above. But I'm afraid I'm still in violent disagreement over his comment, "The entire Search Engine community is now more important than it was a year ago."

Nope -- it is not. Yes, there is more awareness among some people that search is important, but it has been a huge traffic generation tool since search engines first began. There has been an industry for years, and for years that industry has been getting smart companies online and visible through paid and natural search listings.

Posted by Danny Sullivan at 11:18 AM | Permalink

January 13, 2005

WPP Pushing More Into Search Marketing

Ad agencies don't get search? Well WPP Group says it gets it in a big way. From Revolution, WPP eyes world domination with search marketing arm tells us briefly that the organization plans to launch a network of 47 offices worldwide to focus on search marketing through a new agency, mSearch.

Bouncing ball time here: mSearch has been made by rebranding the AdvancePositions.com company that WPP acquired in 2000. But wait a minute, didn't I just post out WPP has acquired other firms that eventually were rolled up and rebranded into Outrider in my Will 2005 Bring More SEM Acquisitions post last month?

Why yes I did. So I called Mike Chowney, who is heading up operations of the new mSearch company outside the US. Yep, mSearch will compete with Outrider to some degree, but that's the only other WPP unit he's aware of with a search marketing focus.

Outrider does more than search marketing, of course -- mSearch will be focused entirely on this. But it still feels odd that one media group will have two different units that could compete against each other for business. Or perhaps that's the way WPP wants it :)

Postscript: See also mOne Forms Search Unit

Posted by Danny Sullivan at 10:42 AM | Permalink

January 11, 2005

Marckini On 2005 SEM Predictions

The SEM CEO's Predictions from ClickZ has iProspect's Fredrick Marckini looking at what's to come in 2005. Search will get more tightly mixed with traditional marketing, vertical search will grow and thrive while personalization still needs more time to cook. Also interesting are reader predictions.

Posted by Danny Sullivan at 9:57 AM | Permalink

January 6, 2005

Web Search Into Consumer Search & Other Reflections

In today's SearchDay article Looking Back, Looking Ahead: Developments With Consumer Search, I review some major developments I saw in search during 2004 and try some looking forward into 2005.

In particular, I think this year will be one of web search morphing into consumer search, where major search companies offer a robust range of ways to search for information in specialized areas.

In the article, I also reflect on:

• How legal issues will continue to impact the maturing search industry.
• How personal search has erupted as a significant new force for change.
• How vertical search features will continue to usurp general web searching.
• Why search marketers need more support from search engines.
• Why everyone should understand search doesn't mean just paid search and that contextual isn't search at all.

Posted by Danny Sullivan at 8:38 AM | Permalink

January 4, 2005

Resolutions For SEMs To Consider

Shari Thurow makes up a list of resolutions she'd like those in the SEM industry to adopt for this year over at ClickZ: SEM New Year's Resolutions. They include not focusing on positioning as a benchmark, being clearer with search marketing jargon and terminology, integrating search marketing into the design process, making statements based only on testing and verification, avoiding falling back on design excuses and following all search engine guidelines.

Posted by Danny Sullivan at 10:00 AM | Permalink

December 29, 2004

Search Publishers Not Friends Of Agencies, SEMs

Spotted via SearchEngineGuide.com, Buy Your Own Search Listings from iMediaConnection, Kevin Ryan writes of a concern I've heard from many search marketers over the years. Search engines aren't the friends of agencies and SEM firms. If they can, they want to go direct to the client and cut out the middleman. Heck, shoot back to 2002 when search marketer Greg Boser condemned "monetization targeting" at our SES San Jose show as just one example of this.

In my SES San Jose keynote this year, I touched on some of the issues this raises. SEM firms in particular have been what I called "foot soldiers" in winning advertisers over to search. Rather than cut them out, they need to be supported, rewarded and protected.

I also see the search engines -- the publishers as Kevin rightly calls them -- fighting the wrong battle if they think they can replace what agencies provide. The search publishers know their own publications, but it is extremely rare for an advertiser to want to be on only one network. People want both Google and Yahoo/Overture, to have as much reach as possible.

So when Google gains a client, will they do everything possible to ensure that client gets the best play on its competitor Overture? I doubt it. Instead, it will naturally want to keep as much of that client money as it can at home -- and the same would be true for Overture.

In contrast, Kevin writes (and I agree) on how agencies and SEM firms have incentive to work fully in the client's best interest, regardless of publishing venue.

For a related article on the tensions between agencies and search publishers, also see this article from MediaPost earlier this year: Search Turf War: Industry Growth Foments Tension Among Mutually Reliant.

Posted by Danny Sullivan at 10:59 AM | Permalink

And Expect More SEM Firm Acquisitions

Search Agencies Ripe for Picking from ClickZ takes a look at how further acquisitions of SEM firms may occur following in the iProspect acquisition last week. Several quotes, though mainly from those at SEM firms, rather than agencies. But no doubt we'll see more cashing out. Proceed's acquisition was announced the day after this was written. And while iProspect might have kicked off the latest round, the reality is that 2004 already had a number of acquisitions prior to that. A recap of those, in handy chart form, in my past post: Will 2005 Bring More SEM Acquisitions?

Posted by Danny Sullivan at 10:31 AM | Permalink

CGI Holding To Acquire Proceed

Only days after the acquisition of iProspect by a major marketing group, CGI Holding Corporation goes the other direction and intends to gobble up Proceed Interactive, which specializes in search marketing.

Proceed? They just went through a name change and were formerly called Meandaur. CGI Holding? It's the parent company of online marketing firm WebSourced, which in turn operates the search marketing division of KeywordRankings.com

Some brief details from ClickZ: Proceed to Merge with CGI. Value? In total, 1.3 million of CGI shares, half now, half based on performance over the next four years. Over-the-counter shares are currently trading at $6.15, so call it around $8 million, assuming the "restricted common stock" making up part of the deal is the same as publicly trading shares.

Some more details via a release on Search Engine Lowdown. That's Andy Beal's blog. Andy, of course, has a side gig as VP of search marketing for WebSourced.

Earlier this year, WebSourced also acquired Global Promoter, and the company has a letter of intent announced in November to merge the traditional marketing services of MarketSmart into its operations.

Posted by Danny Sullivan at 10:28 AM | Permalink

What Do Ad Agencies Think Of Search?

What do media buyers in traditional ad agencies think about search? That's something one of our forum members asked recently in our Media Buyers & Search Engine Advertising thread.

I responded in that thread with a variety of resources on the topic of ad agencies and search, including the fact that we've seen some recent acquisitions. But most of this is from the perspective of SEM firms who tend to think agencies "don't get it." Got some other resources giving the view from the agency side? Have your own viewpoints to contribute? Please come by!

FYI, the SEM Industry category of our Search Topics area available to Search Engine Watch members has some additional stories compiled on this subject stretching back to 1996

Posted by Danny Sullivan at 8:56 AM | Permalink

December 23, 2004

Will 2005 Bring More SEM Acquisitions?

I bet a friend last year that no, ad agencies are not going to swoop in and eat up all the search marketing firms out there. Hmm -- might have to pay out. Actually, I'll still stand by my guns that there's long going to be a place for the standalone search marketing shop.

Still, yesterday's purchase of iProspect has people wondering if there will be more buy-ups. DMNews.com looks at this in iProspect Deal Could Ignite Agency Buying Frenzy with various quotes.

It's also a good time for me to take some of the past acquisitions and make a nice little chart, as I love charts so much:

SEM Firm

Bought By

When

Amount

MarketSmart

WebSourced

Jan. 2005

$8 million

Proceed

WebSourced

Dec. 2004

$8 million

iProspect

Aegis Group

Dec. 2004

$50 million

Rawhide

eXact Advertising

Sept. 2004

???

Decide Interactive

24/7 Real Media

Aug. 2004

$26 million

Global Promoter

WebSourced

June 2004

$150,000+

Performics

Doubleclick

May 2004

$65 million

Marketleap

Digital Impact

July 2004

$4 million

SendTraffic

Traffix

June 2004

$5 million

Go Toast/ eonMedia

aQuantive (for Atlas DMT division)

Dec. 2003

???

i-FRONTIER

Avenue A/Razorfish (formerly Avenue A)

Dec. 2002

???

Website Results

24/7 Real Media (formerly 24/7 Media)

Dec. 2000

$95 million

WGI

WPP's Outrider  (part of mediaedge:cia)

March 2000

$2 million+

mSearch (formerly Advanced Positions.com)

WPP's Mindshare (part of mOne)

2000

???

MMG

Outrider  (part of WPP's mediaedge:cia)

June 1998

???

I've tried to stick with companies that were pretty firmly in the search marketing space from a service perspective that were consumed by traditional or semi-traditional agencies. Some of these we had yesterday, and I came across a nice article by Fredrick Marckini listing a few more: SEM Predictions for 2004 (The SEM CEO's View).

Fredrick, of course, is founder and CEO of iProspect -- so he fulfills his prediction of three-to-six SEM acquisitions in 2004 by getting his own company bought (and congrats, Fredrick).

Some other notes. Tempus bought a stake in MMG beginning in June 1998 to form a core part of its Outrider division. It looks like it gained the entire company from founder John Audette in Spring 2000 (side note: Bend, Oregon, where MMG operated from, remains a hot bed of SEM activity from those who later left the company).

Tempus also bought 75 percent of WGI in 2000 for $1.5 million and the rest apparently in April 2002 for some amount I can't locate. So, I've called it $2 million plus. Also, by this point Tempus had been bought by WPP -- which operates Mediaedge:cia -- of which Outrider is the digital marketing unit. So, I'm sticking with Outrider as the "purchaser" for both MMG and WGI.

Ready to sell your own firm or buy one? You might want to check out our past SearchDay article, How Much is a Search Marketing Firm Worth?

Finally, a reminder for those interested in things related to acquisitions and revenues. Search Engine Watch members have access to categorized lists of stories on these topics stretching back for years, within our Search Topics area.

Our search revenues category covers material of all types relating to revenues in the search space, while our search acquisitions category covers items relating to the purchasing and mergers of companies.

Postscript: I've added some WebSourced acquisitions and links in the chart provide more info. Value for Global Promoter involves some shares that can be earned over a two year period, so initial payout is shown. MarketSmart is actually an ad firm, rather than an SEM firm. Also added the mSearch and Rawhide acquisitions -- links again provide more info.

Posted by Danny Sullivan at 12:02 PM | Permalink

December 22, 2004

iProspect Acquired by Aegis Group

Search marketing firm iProspect was acquired today by the UK-based Aegis Group and will become part of their Isobar digital network.

According to a report on the Revolution web site, Aegis paid about $50 million for iProspect.

Here's a list of some other notable acquisitions in the SEM space (it has been a very busy year):

+ 2004...24/7 Media Purchases Decide Interactive

+ 2004...Digital Impact Purchases Marketleap

+ 2004...Doubleclick Acquires Perfomics

+ 2003...aQuantive Acquires Go Toast

+ 2000...Web Side Results Acquired by 24/7 Media For $95 Million

Posted by Gary Price at 10:39 AM | Permalink

December 15, 2004

Trends in Search Engine Marketing

We know that Google and Overture are making bucket-loads of money from selling paid listings, but how much money is being spent on other types of search engine optimization and marketing? And who, exactly, controls that spending—advertisers or search marketing agencies?

Two recently released reports, one from Jupiter Research and the other from SEMPO (which Gary blogged below), offer answers to those questions, and others. The new data provides the clearest insights yet into what has traditionally been a murky area of understanding, even for people working as search industry insiders.

Today's SearchDay article, State of the Search Marketing Industry 2004, provides an overview of these two new reports. A longer version of the article for Search Engine Watch members also discusses findings showing that search marketing budgets are poaching funds from other types of advertising and covers advertiser attitudes and concerns regarding the paid listing click fraud issue.

Posted by Chris Sherman at 10:41 AM | Permalink

December 14, 2004

Sullivan Speaks at SES

In: Search Industry Gains Clout, Susan Kuchinskas reports on Danny's keynote address at SES.

One big change in 2004 was the drop in paid inclusions by most major search engines in natural search results, Sullivan said. Now, only Yahoo shows links to companies that have paid for the privilege in its search results pages. But paid inclusion will be important in vertical search services. "There are good reasons for paid inclusion," Sullivan said. For example, online yellow pages can be very useful for searchers and they're based on paid listings. Audio and video search and shopping will be much more likely to offer a paid inclusion option to advertisers, and it will be seen as acceptable in vertical searches.

Posted by Gary Price at 4:21 PM | Permalink

December 13, 2004

The State of Search Engine Marketing 2004

SEMPO's "The State of Search Engine Marketing 2004" report was released tonight at SES. Pamela Parker offers an overview in this Clickz article.

The article highlights some numbers: The survey of 288 search marketers found the industry will spend $4 billion on both paid and organic search in 2004, including in-house and outsourced expenditures. By contrast, a recent JupiterResearch study said paid search would account for $2.6 billion in spending in 2004.

+ Next year, advertisers plan to spend, on average, 39 percent more on all types of search engine marketing than they did in 2004.

and some findings: Contrary to what's been reported in other research, the SEMPO study found that most advertisers plan to handle the majority of their search marketing in-house rather than outsourcing it to an agency. Fifty-two percent of advertisers said they would handle all of their 2005 spending in-house. Larger advertisers were more likely, however, to outsource more of their budgets. A recent JupiterResearch report said that only a third of search marketers used an agency, but, because larger marketers tended to outsource, agencies control more than half of search marketing spend.

Expect more about the new SEMPO report in SearchDay later in the week.

Posted by Gary Price at 7:40 PM | Permalink

December 7, 2004

JupiterResearch Rates SEM Firms, Says They Control Most Spending

A new report from JupiterResearch says that search marketing firms, rather than the search engines themselves, now control the majority of search spending in the US.

The report's not yet been posted to the Jupiter site, so I can't point you at an abstract or examine more specifics of what it covers. Expect a follow-up on that. If you watch JupiterResearch's Search Tactics section, I'd expect the abstract to be there shortly. In the meantime, the group has put out a press release on findings.

It's not clear to me from the release how it's determined that SEM firms control most search spending now. That's because to my knowledge, there's not been years-and-years of surveying done of search marketing firms at all. But hopefully, the actual report will reveal more about this.

The release does cite figures saying that agency spending on paid listings is up over the past 18 months, which is a time horizon I'm more comfortable with.

The Search Engine Marketing Agency Constellation report also rated 14 SEM firms. It found that in terms of paid listings management, these companies were all rated similarly (and listed alphabetically):

• AvenueA/Razorfish Search
• Decide Interactive/24/7 Search
• Did-It.com
• Impaqt
• Performics

In terms of editorial/organic search listings, these firms were rated tops (and are listed alphabetically):

• Impaqt
• iProspect

Posted by Danny Sullivan at 11:07 AM | Permalink

November 2, 2004

Most Search Marketers Unsophisticated

Another bit of catch-up from last week, news of a report from JupiterResearch that finds search marketers still have a lot of maturing to do. MediaPost provides a write-up here: Report: Three out of Four Search Marketers 'Unsophisticated'.

Unsophisticated? Wipe that image from your mind of search marketers who sit with their elbows on the table, food crumbs around their mouths and use the wrong salad fork.

Instead, "sophisticates" are search marketers that are somehow managing bids or tracking traffic from paid and unpaid listings. "Unsophisticates" are those who undertake search marketing activity without gather such feedback.

Of 538 search marketers surveyed, only 25 percent were considered sophisticates. Factors that seem to push people into sophistication are more experience with search advertising, bigger budgets and the type of advertiser (direct marketer versus brand marketer) that you are.

I've done my own write-up of the report for our Search Engine Watch members, highlighting some other interesting details and differences, between the two groups. You'll find that here: The Sophisticated Search Marketer.

Want to discuss? Visit our forum thread on the topic.

Posted by Danny Sullivan at 10:26 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

November 1, 2004

Search Ads Used By More Than "New Breed" Advertisers

According to Dan Gillmor of the San Jose Mercury News, Google and other search companies are tapping into a new breed of advertiser and don't yet covet the dollars General Motors and other large companies spend on television ads.

Not so. Not at all. Not by a long shot.

Search advertising remains new, but it is hardly dominated by small mom-and-pops who've never advertised before. Plenty of businesses small and large, new to advertising and experienced, make use of the space. I've talked with the full range of them at our various conferences.

Search isn't best viewed as attracting a "new breed" of advertiser. Instead, it's better understood as new advertising medium that has sprung up. Yes, this new medium has attracted a new breed of advertiser who understands how search ads work. However, there are plenty of the old breed who use it as well.

And believe me, Google wants those big GM ad dollars. So does Overture and other search media. If they didn't, they wouldn't be funding research showing the tie between search ads and branding, as they did with the IAB recently.

For more on that, see our forum thread Branding Boosted By Paid Ads, Research Says or my Search Can Provide Brand Lift, Study Finds article for Search Engine Watch members.

More comments on Gillmor's article also from Greg Linden: Google and the long tail.

Posted by Danny Sullivan at 12:54 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

October 28, 2004

Internet Search Firms are Parasites

Internet search engines will kill growth in the online publishing business according to Andrew Hart, managing director of Associated New Media, the online publishing arm of the UK's Associated Newspapers.

According to this Journalism.co.uk article, Hart called search firms "parasites" during a recent conference presentation.

Here's a bit more:

"Everyone from billion dollar conglomerates to penniless bloggers all have the freedom to publish and exchange information and ideas." said Mr Hart.

"And from the user point of view, search is the start of online journey. It's as if all the knowledge in the world is just one click away."

But he said that search has now become a tool that can be exploited, with specialist agencies paid big bucks by big business to improve their position in search results.

"This kind of complex distortion is only made available to the big players and will make business in the long term impossible for small firms," said Mr Hart.

"Spend on search is the fastest growing sector in online advertising spend, so money is flowing to just a handful of online web search brands - and to those with only the biggest marketing budgets."

The article also includes comments from: + Lorraine Twohill, director of European marketing at Google + Paul Rossi, publisher of Economist.com He describes Google as a "brand killer."

Read the entire article: Online publishers rail against Google.

Posted by Gary Price at 12:11 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

October 25, 2004

New Site For Search Jobs

Looking for a job in the search industry? The new Jobs In Search site aims to help. Not much there at the moment, however. Less than 30 listings, and almost all based in the UK (as is the site itself). But perhaps it will grow. Job seekers might also try various forum sites, which sometimes have areas. We have two areas at our forums: Help Wanted/Jobs Available and Jobs Wanted/Contractors For Hire.

Posted by Danny Sullivan at 9:15 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

October 23, 2004

Overture Opens Ambassador Program To Traditional Ad Agencies

Overture's long-standing Ambassador program for search engine marketing firms is now allowing interactive and traditional ad agencies to participate. More details from ClickZ in Overture, Google Reach Out to Agencies.

The program provides participants with greater support in reselling Overture's products. It does not provide a commission on sales. The ClickZ article also covers how Google says it trying to do more to educate agencies about search marketing.

The issue of commissions came up earlier this year in our forums: Agency Commission Or Discount Offered On Search Ads? The nasty rumor was agencies were being given a commission by the search companies while SEM firms were not. Both Overture and Google eventually told me that at least in the US, they aren't offering commission payments to anyone.

Posted by Danny Sullivan at 3:16 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

October 15, 2004

Search Is An Overall Marketing Thing

Bob Heyman, with the title of Chief Search Officer that I've never seen before, argues that search needs to be considered as part of anyone's overall marketing plan: SEM: Still an Adolescent? Too right. Fredrick Marckini also recently said the same thing in SEM Wants to Embrace the CMO.

Heck, I'll add more fuel to the fire. Our next SES show in Chicago has a session called "Integrating Search Into Other Marketing." Description?

Search engine marketing should be considered as an essential part of any overall marketing campaign. In this session, we look at successes from considering search from the very beginning, as well as failures that result if this is not done.

Hopefully, we'll have some good stories of actual integration happening, rather than hopes!

Posted by Danny Sullivan at 1:51 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

October 13, 2004

The Search Industry's Growing Pains

If you've ever seen one of Danny Sullivan's keynote addresses at a Search Engine Strategies conference, you know he is enlightening, provocative and always raises new issues that keep attendees abuzz throughout the show. In today's SearchDay article, Search Marketing 2004: What's Right, What's Wrong, Andrew Goodman offers his take on Danny's remarks at the recent SES show in San Jose. Andrew's coverage is interwoven with insightful and often acerbic comments about the goings-on among industry players, pretenders and wannabes observed at ground-level during the conference.

Posted by Chris Sherman at 9:15 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

October 5, 2004

SEMPO Search Marketing Survey Opened

Last week, I complained that little is known about the size of the search marketing industry. Paid search spending, sure -- we've got some sense there. But money being spent directly with search marketing companies themselves, on both paid and natural listings? Who knows?

I also mentioned that one bright spot was planned research by SEMPO to survey the market. Now that survey's begun. Anyone is able to participate using the form now posted here: SEMPO Research Survey.

Results are planned for release later this year. More details on the survey can be found in this press release: SEMPO Launches Survey on the Size and Impact of Current SEM Activities and Spending.

Posted by Danny Sullivan at 12:00 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

September 28, 2004

Political Groups Dabbling in Search Engine Marketing

Political Campaigns And Issue Groups Take Search Baby Steps Source: Media Post

The article takes a look at how the Republican and Democratic National Committees and several issue advocacy groups are using search engine marketing.

>From the article, "Once political advertisers and issue groups realize that Google ads don't just appear on Google, but alongside articles on other Web sites, use of search advertising 'will skyrocket,' predicts Clay Johnson, co-founder of Blue State Digital, an Internet communications firm that rose from the ashes of Howard Dean's primary campaign. Buying keywords related to issues and opposing candidates, says Johnson, 'was done very effectively by a lot of candidates in the democratic primary.'"

Posted by Gary Price at 7:37 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

September 22, 2004

Search As Fundamental Part Of Marketing Mix

Search engine marketing isn't an IT thing or an online marketing thing. It's part of an overall marketing effort. As such, Fredrick Marckini rightly wants chief marketing officers to push from the top down that search needs to be considered as a fundamental part of any marketing campaign, online or off. His plea here in ClickZ: SEM Wants to Embrace the CMO.

Posted by Danny Sullivan at 11:40 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

September 17, 2004

An Interview with Rob Wilk

Web Search Ad Field Finds Itself Changing Source: Investors Business Daily

Doug Tsuruoka conducts an interview with Rob Wilk, the director of search engine marketing for Avenue A/Razorfish.

>From the article, "Among the trends in paid search: growing use of shopping comparison engines — search services that help shoppers pinpoint the cheapest price for a product online. Experts also expect more use of highlighted "keywords" in online content. That means advertiser-sponsored links would be placed within news stories or other material."

Posted by Gary Price at 8:52 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

September 16, 2004

SEM and Reputation

The headline of this Netimperative article says it all, "Screwed by search marketing firms?" Mike Grehan provides an overview of several popular topics in the SEM industry today. Danny, Andy, and Jill are either mentioned or quoted.

Posted by Gary Price at 8:42 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

September 15, 2004

Web Search in the Hispanic Community

Polling Hispanic Search Users Source: Media Post A good overview of the Hispanic search market. Lots of numbers. iHispanic Marketing Group president Ignacio "Nacho" Hernandez Jr. is quoted throughout the article. Nacho is also moderates the SEW Multilingual Search Markets & Non-US Engines forum.

Posted by Gary Price at 2:03 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

September 8, 2004

Advertisers Fears That Search Buys May Help Competitors

Both Overture and Google offer conversion tracking programs, something that's concerned some search marketers. What if they use that data to better see how much the market can bear? In addition, they have knowledge of what people are bidding on, ad budgets and tons of other information.

A questionnaire from Overture recently caused some marketers to wonder if the company planned to offer a service that would let competitors tap into this data, as covered in this DMNews article, Marketers Fear Search Engines Obtain Sensitive Business Information.

Both Overture and Google say any data would be used only in aggregate, not to help particular advertisers.

Posted by Danny Sullivan at 4:08 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

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