Cincinnati Internet Marketing Blog

Internet Marketing News Articles from June 26 Meeting

We had a great Cincinnati I-marketing Group meeting this past Thursday.  My thanks go out to all those who attended for coming and participating in the discussion, as well as Ed Estes of Web Media Tools for hosting us.  Our next meeting will probably be in August or September.

Here are links to news articles I went through and we discussed at the meeting

UK Online ad spending to overtake TV this year: http://www.reuters.com/article/internetNews/idUSL1748087420080617?rpc=28

Facebook Heads MySpace in Unique Visitors: http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/302914bc-40a7-11dd-bd48-0000779fd2ac.html?nclick_check=1

Big dollar signs for microblogging service Twitter: http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/technology/2008/06/big-dollar-sign.html

Google insists its Android phone is still on track: http://www.independent.co.uk/life-style/gadgets-and-tech/news/google-insists-its-android-phone-is-still-on-track-852884.html

It was really enlightening and satisfying for me to see that online ad spending will exceed TV this year in the UK, and in a few years that will likely be the case in the USA as well.  For all of you out there still doubting the Internet as an effective advertising medium... WAKE UP!!!

Jeff Bezos, the founder and CEO of Amazon.com participated in the $15 million round of funding for Twitter, which had over a million unique visitors in May.  Twitter and Facebook are really hot Internet marketing topics right now. 

   

March 2008 Search Engine Market Share Data

Everyone knows Google is the most used search engine, but I'm often asked what their (and their competitor's) actual market share is, so I thought I'd post these Nielsen/Netratings numbers for March that were included in a Nielsen Online press release from last week.  The press release also lists total number of searches and year-over-year growth for each engine in the top 10, so if you click on the link you can that data too.

1. Google 58.7% of searches
2. Yahoo 18.1%
3. MSN/Windows Live 12.0%
4. AOL 4.1%
5. Ask 2.4%
6. My Web 0.9%
7. Comcast 0.5%
8. NexTag 0.4%
9. AT&T Worldnet 0.3%
10. Dogpile 0.2%

I usually tell people the "Big Three" (Google, Yahoo & MSN) handle 90% of searches in the US and according to this data for March the number was 88.8%, so 90% is a pretty close estimate.

It's important to keep in mind this data is for total searches done on each engine and does not reflect paid search or "PPC" market share.  With respect to PPC, I am finding with my clients that Google gets about 3-4 times the traffic Yahoo Sponsored Search and the Yahoo is about 3 times to volume of MSN (Microsoft adCenter).

Google Stock Goes Up $89.87...In One Day

How's this for staggering numbers?

Yesterday (Thursday), Google stock (Ticker Symbol: GOOG) closed at $449.54 and today it went up $89.87 or 19.99% to close at $539.41.

So what prompted such a run up in Google stock.  Staggering numbers of course, specifically Google's Q1 numbers which were released after the close of trading on Thursday.  As detailed in this AP story, Google's 1st quarter profit rose 30% from the first quarter of 2007 to $1.31 billion or $4.12/share.  Revenue for the first quarter was $5.19 billion, which is 42% higher than their revenue for Q1 of '07.

One company with over 5 billion dollars of revenue in 90 days.  Pretty staggering huh?  Still don't believe in Internet marketing?   

   

Yahoo Adds Voice Commands To Mobile Search

Today Yahoo unveiled new features for its' oneSearch mobile search service including the ability to search using voice commands.   This article from Yahoo Finance describes the new features and explains briefly the concept of "semantic web" search. 

"Semantic web" is a term you should know.  If you're not familiar with this term, check out the semantic web page on Wikipedia or other web resources so you can quickly get up to speed. 

As stated on the Wikipedia page: "The semantic web is a vision of information that is understandable by computers, so that they can perform more of the tedious work involved in finding, sharing and combining information on the web." 

In other words, search and a lot of other online functions are going to be much more powerful and effective in the future and Yahoo's rolling out these new features today is an example of this trend and provides a glimpse of where we are headed. 

European Union Clears Google to Buy DoubleClick

The European Union today OK'd Google's acquisition of DoubleClick, the largest ad-serving company in the US, despite the objection of some privacy and consumer advocates. 

Here is an AP story on today's developments and a good article from Clickz on how Google looks to dominate the display (banner) advertising market.

Maybe someday soon Google will dominate display advertising like they do in search.  We'll see.  Today's news is helping the stock, which has been falling lately, and as I post this Google stock (GOOG) is up $23.

Microsoft Makes $44.6 Billion Offer for Yahoo!

Well it took a while but after two-years of negotiations and at least one previously rejected offer, Microsoft today announced a $44.6 billion bid to takeover Yahoo at $31 per share, a hefty 62% premium over yesterday's close for Yahoo of $19.18.

A combined Microsoft-Yahoo would supposedly be able to compete with Google for leadership of the Internet marketing industry.  Microsoft's engineering and Yahoo's brand and traffic make for a juicy combination, but merging the two cultures and Internet businesses will not be easy.  You should have no trouble finding tons of articles on the Web on this today, here's a short one that sums up the numbers at ClickZ and an article discussing the challenges from the New York Times.

The Czar's Quick Take: This was inevitable as they have been talking for quite a while and also shows how far they are lagging behind Google in search and monetizing web traffic.  For example, Yahoo's Panama search platform (for their pay-per-click Yahoo Sponsored Search program) was over a year late and over budget.   Microsoft was very late getting into the search game and their web advertising solutions have not been very innovative.   

It looks a lot like mixing oil and water to me, as the firms have different cultures and there aren't nearly as many synergies and cost saving as say when two banks or airlines merge.  We'll see.   

If you have a take, please post a comment! 

         

The Shifting Internet Marketing Industry Landscape

Back in the late 90's when I got into the field of Internet marketing there was a popular expression in the industry that played off one of the new bumper stickers of the day: WWYD - What Would Yahoo Do?

Ten years ago your site had officially "arrived" when it was listed in Yahoo's directory of the web and Yahoo held a dominate position in the Internet marketing industry as they had so many eyeballs visiting their various properties, like My Yahoo or Yahoo Mail.  Yahoo was the leading "web portal" - as Wikipedia defines as "a website site that functions as a point of access to information on the World Wide Web."  Back then portals were seen as the main jumping off point for how people would access the web and Yahoo and rivals like Excite and Lycos fought for the eyeballs and loyalties of users.

As I post this, the two most popular tech articles at the New York Times are a report that Yahoo is expected to layoff several hundred employees and an article talking about how the expanding and evolving MySpace (the website with the most pages viewed in the world by the way) has grown and is changing under the ownership of Rupert Murdoch's News Corporation.  Social networking sites like MySpace and Facebook are getting tons of visitors and business press while courting Madison Ave. advertisers and their huge ad budgets.  Yahoo is profitable and by no means dead, just laying off folks in less profitable business segments, but clearly they no longer dominate the industry as they once did.

Last week in my previous post I asked the question: Does MySpace Make Internet Marketers Look Bad?  In my opinion, sometimes profiles or ads on MySpace do reflect negatively on the industry, just as annoying TV commercials or poorly targeted direct "junk" mail do in those industries. 

Spam, hideous banners and irrelevant pop-up ads (remember the x10 camera?) were the predecessors of today's fake MySpace profiles, but we as web users and marketing industry pros have adapted.  Online marketing vehicles that are effective in producing results for clients will flourish over time, even if not every foray is a success.  If companies can make money advertising on or being a part of the MySpace community, the site will survive and look good (most of the time). 

There are well-founded criticisms of MySpace and other social marketing sites, so we Internet marketers need to address these issues with solutions, such as effective ad campaigns and profile sites for clients, and promote and educate the public about the many examples of firms doing things right.   

To me, success always looks good.  It's good for business too.               

Does MySpace Make Internet Marketers Look Bad?

MySpace made front-page news on Monday when they announced new safety measures intended to better protect children from sexual predators and bullies.  Here is an AP story about the safeguards.

With MySpace being such a popular web destination and receiving so much media scrutiny on privacy and security issues, clearly whenever MySpace makes this level of news (this was on the front page of USA Today and in the A section of many other papers), it has ramifications for the entire Internet marketing industry.   

There have been tons of segments on TV news shows the past few years about how MySpace is a haven for sexual predators and bullies or is simply a huge waste of time for people with nothing better to do.  It's also got tons of comment and message spam and that has turned off a lot of users and potential advertisers who would like to reach the millions of eyeballs MySpace has.

I'm not here to praise or denounce MySpace, just discuss the topic of their image and how it reflects upon our industry.  So I ask you - Does MySpace make us look bad?  If so - What do we do about it?  I'd like to hear your thoughts and will share mine next week. 

 

FTC Clears Google's Acquisition of DoubleClick

Google had a big win today when the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) OK'd their planned acquisition of DoubleClick that was announced back in April.

Many privacy groups and advocates have spoken out against this with the argument that Google would have too much consumer information at their disposal.  This Business Week article quickly summaries today's developments and the background.  Here is Google's take on the news on the Official Google Blog: http://googleblog.blogspot.com/2007/12/analysis-ftc-clears-our-acquisition-of.html

The European Union still has to approve the deal, so it's not done yet.  I really don't have a problem with this deal but would love to hear what you have to think, so post comments and let's talk about it!

Recent Developments At Facebook: A Summary

Facebook has been in the news a ton recently and it's no surprise given the: explosive growth they are experiencing, the growth of the social media sector as a whole and the innovation Facebook has ignited after opening up their platform for people to develop their own applications.

So it makes sense to quickly get up-to-speed on the "toplines" of what's new at Facebook, and that's the purpose of this post.  As always, please feel free to post comments & ask questions about what interests or confuses you you have a resource article or thought to add, and we'll go deeper into those topics in future posts.

Microsoft Investment: In October Microsoft paid $240 million for a 1.6% stake in Facebook.  You can read a quick summary of the ramifications of that in this New York Times article.

Software Platform: Facebook's announcement in May of this year they were allowing developers to create applications for Facebook and pocket the money from their efforts has spurred hundreds of applications.  Business 2.0 had a great article in their September issue on The Facebook Economy.

Advertising Platform: In November Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg announced Facebook Ads, "an ad system for businesses to connect with users and target advertising to the exact audiences they want".  This enables businesses to build pages on Facebook, users to spread viral brand messages through Facebook Social Ads and a way for marketers to gather data on people's activity.  For more details, check out the press release and the Facebook Ads page at Facebook.com/ads

Privacy Concerns: One of the drawbacks of adding applications or new advertising vehicles to a site like Facebook is that some of those apps or ad vehicles are bound to be controversial.  One of the biggest controversies lately has been around the Beacon widget, which shows a Facebook user's friends what they'd purchased online from a third party site. These  DM News & Business Week articles have the details and here is a press release from Facebook