| | | Yahoogle Deal Looms Closer
Back in June, I wrote about an upcoming search agreement between Google and Yahoo. I have always been more than a little concerned over the effect this partnership will have on the industry I work within and as time passes, little has changed t o alleviate that concern.
Should this deal go through, Yahoo expects to rake in $800 million additional ad revenue annually.
There has been plenty of speculation from both proponents and opponents about the potential effects of this agreement on competition in search marketing. Due to the limited nature of the specifics of this deal in its publically available form, no-one seems to know what's really going to come of all this. The one common thread in everything I have read on this topic, is that there is a lack of specific detail as to how this will be managed.
Last week, the American Antitrust Institute released a white paper outlining their take on this arrangement. One comment really stood out for me:
"The agreement does not appear to call for any cooperation between the parties as to the bidding or quality overlay processes."
From my point of view, as one who has to deal with the repercussions of this agreement on behalf of my clients, this is a critical issue. How will this affect existing campaigns? Who do I call if something is messed up?
One question I haven't seen raised is the issue of advertiser choice.
Over the past year, I've become disenchanted with Yahoo search advertising. I have run a number of campaigns across multiple engines and overall, the performance of the same campaigns has been much poorer in Yahoo than in either Google or MSN. I have found the ad's click costs are not that much cheaper than Google and the ability to convert in Yahoo has been disproportionately lower across the board. I am weaning my clients off of using Yahoo for advertising because I don't regard it as cost effective. Apparently, I am not alone in this, according to this article.
My most important question therefore, is this. Will Google advertisers have the option to disallow their ads from being displayed on Yahoo search? Given my experiences with Yahoo, I am concerned about seeing a reduction in overall effectiveness of the Google campaigns I run if this is not something that can be toggled off.
A lot of points in this agreement indicate that Yahoo has a great deal of leeway on how to implement this at their discretion, but frankly, I don't have a lot of faith in Yahoo and would like to see a lot more detail than what is currently available.
My concerns may be moot, as the possibility of US Department of Justice intervention is very growing likely. I suppose we'll find out soon, as the deal is to commence next week.
by Tim Rule, PPC Specialist
| | August Search Marketshare
The latest search market share figures are in at Nielsen, ComScore, and hitwise, and, for the most part, Google continues to rise.
Depending on which provider you prefer, Google saw yet another increase in market share in August as did Yahoo. MSN has dropped according to all three providers.
Over at ComScore Google has seen an increase of 1.1% to 63%, Yahoo is down 0.9% to 19.6%, and MSN is also down 0.6% to 8.3%. Nielsen NetRatings reports Google down 0.2% to 60%, Yahoo up 0.7% to 18.1%, and MSN down 1.2% to 10.7%. Finally, hitwise is showing Google up 0.3% to 71.07%, with Yahoo and MSN both down slightly to 18.26% and 5.32% respectively.
While the numbers between these providers range a fair bit, there is no denying that Google's strong hold is not going anywhere.
by Scott Van Achte, Senior SEO
| | Google to Give Away Millions!
How would you like to have Google cut you a check for a few million dollars? Well, if you have the right ideas that co uld help change the world you just might get some cash from Google. There is of course a catch.
If your idea to help make the world a better place is chosen by Google, you will get a share of $10 million, but the money you get must go directly towards putting your idea into action. Google is putting up $10 million which will be divided up among the top five submissions to be used for project funding.
Submissions must be made by Oct 20, 2008. In late January 2009 Google will select 100 of the ideas and leave it up to the public to narrow down the list to 20 semifinalists. The five winners will be chosen and announced in February by a Google-sponsored advisory board.
To submit your project ideas or for more information, visit Google's project10tothe10.com.
by Scott Van Achte, Senior SEO
| | Yahoo Opens Doors in Grenoble France
Yahoo has opened up another location, this time with a research center in Grenoble France. This follows shortly after news that Yahoo may also be opening up a location in La Vista Nebraska creating at least 50 news jobs. Layoff notices for more than 1000 employees were also handed out near the start of the year, and Yahoo's shares have just hit a 52 week low - interesting that they are expanding in all this turmoil. Regardless, it looks like the new facility will employee 220 engineers and be Yahoo's biggest center in France. The French minister of economy is offering sizable tax credits for research based operations, which helps to explain the choice of location. by Scott Van Achte, Senior SEO
| | $28.7 Million to Improve Digg
Funding to the tune of $28.7 Million, led by Highland Capital Partners, will be used over at Digg to incorporate a number of changes, Jay Adelson announced in the official Digg blog Wednesday.
Changes will include improvements in infrastructure, newfeature development, international expansion, and hiring new employees to make the whole thing happen. New features will include personalizing the "Digg Experience" and incorporating a number of user suggestions from over the years.
Adelson notes that nearly half of their 30 million monthly users are from outside of the US, so making adjustments for localized tastes and languages are on the forefront for their growth strategy for 2009.
He also notes that they will be hiring, so if you are a techie in need of a job, you may want to take a look at their jobs page!
by Scott Van Achte, Senior SEO
| | The Net Reality
Clickjacking Alert: Two researchers have discovered a high level threat affecting all the major desktop platforms including IE8 and Firefox 3.
Clickjacking is "In a nutshell, it's when you visit a malicious website and the attacker is able to take control of the links that your browser visits. The problem affects all of the different browsers except something like lynx. The issue has nothing to do with JavaScript so turning JavaScript off in your browser will not help you. It's a fundamental flaw with the way your browser works and cannot be fixed with a simple patch. With this exploit, once you're on the malicious web page, the bad guy can make you click on any link, any button, or anything on the page without you even seeing it happening."
Information at the moment for a proper fix is limited, but here is what they say. "In the meantime, the only fix is to disable browser scripting and plugins. We realize this doesn't give people much technical detail to go on, but it's the best we can do right now."
One Laptop per Child Foundation: A great stocking stuffer for the holiday season is back again. The "Give 1 Get 1" program lets us buy two low cost XO laptops from Amazon.com with one of them going to a needy child somewhere in the world.
Food Blogging in Southeast Asia: All the rage and certainly worthwhile checking out are the sites noted this article. Of particular interest to those of you thinking about attending a cooking class while visiting a country or simply looking at a blog with great photos of local dishes.
Social Networking Profile used in the Hiring Process: According to a new survey by CareerBuilder.com 20% of the time hiring managers are checking out, in addition to the written references, the social networking profiles of candidates on the Internet. Some findings:
- The survey found that 34 percent of the managers who do screen candidates on the Internet found content that made them drop the candidate from any short list.
- The top area for concern among the hiring managers with 41 percent citing this as a downfall were candidates posting information about drinking or using drugs.
- The second area with 40 percent of concern were candidates posting provocative or inappropriate photographs or information.
- As a result, more job seekers are taking action to make their social networking profiles employer-friendly. Sixteen percent of workers who have social networking pages said they modified the content on their profile to convey a more professional image to potential employers.
By Bill Stroll, Sales Manager
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