Back in July 2009, the ball began to roll on a merger of sorts between Yahoo and Microsoft’s Bing search engines. This March the deal became more finalized and a shape began to form for what would become a joint search marketing effort. (Read our own article from January this year.)

What has happened since?  Well, not much really. However, any SEO you talk to will most likely have received countless emails regarding how it’s moving forward, how big things are happening, etc. etc.

In case you haven’t heard, the idea behind this Search Alliance is to allow Bing to power Yahoo’s organic search results, basically replacing Yahoo’s ‘search engine’ with Bing’s. In addition to this, Microsoft’s AdCenter advertising platform will eventually replace Yahoo! Advertising.

What is Yahoo! providing for their end of the deal? They are still the #3 most visited website in north america, which will provide Bing with an enormous playing field for ad impressions. In addition to that, they are providing Microsoft with their own search-technologies (albeit for a 10-year license).

The way that the transition has been handled is very PR heavy, with little effect on the users who rely on the services every day.  We still log in to Yahoo Site Explorer, Microsoft AdCenter, etc. and will continue to do so for months, until the dust settles.

Even the official website itself is not 100% certain when the full transition will take place. As a quote taken directly from the FAQ proclaims :

Our aim is a high quality transition of advertisers and partners in at least the US prior to the 2010 holiday season. However, we may wait until 2011 if we determine this will be more effective.

We will be advancing with a ‘business as usual’ attitude unless there are drastic changes. Will you be changing your SEO approach due to this new alliance? Do you think Google will have some real competition? Leave a comment, or visit us at our Facebook or Twitter pages!

It seems that nearly everyone has a mobile device of some kind, especially ones that have online access able to view content and advertisements.

Why then, do so few people discuss mobile as a viable advertising vehicle? Could it be because of the much smaller viewable area on the device’s screen? Could it be because people are scared of using data on their mobile device, due to the potentially sky-high fees incurred by their mobile carrier? Or could it be that they simply don’t use their mobile devices for viewing media, content or other ad-supported material?

Whatever the case, mobile advertising is growing and is a very large part of the future of companies such as Google and Apple. Approximately $3.8 billion will be spent on mobile ads in one form or another this year, which provides a lot of opportunity for businesses.

This does not include social efforts, such as Foursquare, Gowalla, Google Local Mobile (organic) searches, Yelp, among other available mobile based services. As these services become more refined and widely used, additional marketing efforts and budgets will need to be allocated in order to capture the growing audience.

Solution : Start small. Make sure your Google Places account is setup.  Make sure you are on Foursquare and Gowalla. Then… setup a Google AdWords – Mobile campaign. Allocate a portion of your existing AdWords budget (you DO have an AdWords account, right??) towards the mobile campaign, and keep a close eye on it.  This shouldn’t be scary, it’s an exciting new way to connect with potential customers!

Here are some other related posts :

- Location Based Advertising, How Could It Go Wrong?
- Twitter Announces Promoted Tweets
- Online Advertising Vs. Print

One of the latest trends in online social activity has been the explosion of location-based search.  Whether it’s through Google search, Foursquare, Yelp, or the myriad other services available through a quick query to your mobile phone’s built-in GPS, tracking a user’s location is proving to be beneficial for both users and businesses.

Security and Privacy

The biggest fear of location based marketing is not a big surprise. Personal data, including the chance of an individual’s location being publicly spread, is highly sensitive and is still a very difficult roadblock for many online businesses to overcome.

A level of paranoia still exists for many people who still believe that “Big Brother” is watching them, and it’s sometimes difficult to prove them otherwise. (See the very highly publicized PleaseRobMe.com) What I try to suggest to these naysayers, is that companies want to know as much about their customers as they can, but they do not necessarily concern themselves with each individual’s activities.

In fact, the largest of all social networking websites, Facebook, is in the process of implementing a service which allows its users to enter their location into their status updates. This could be a boon for businesses as their locations may show up in searches and other friend feeds. Facebook has seen its share of bad press lately though, with a variety of privacy related issues, so this is an update that must be handled carefully.

Imagine searching for ‘Running Shoes’ in your mobile browser, only to be directed to the 5 nearest running shoe stores?

There are other websites, with questionable business models, such as Blippy, who have had some very unfortunate experiences. It’s a service where users can log their credit card purchases and share them with the world.  Why anyone would want to this is beyond me, but… to each his own. User’s credit card numbers were showing up in search results, with obviously detrimental results.

The Benefits

The biggest benefit of location features for users, at least for the near future, is mobile search. Imagine searching for ‘Running Shoes’ in your mobile browser, only to be directed to the 5 nearest running shoe stores? This effect can even be seen on your desktop or laptop browser, with your location being pulled through your IP address.

If carefully executed, location focused activities could create a substantial increase for local businesses. A fantastic example of this, taken from Report On Business magazine, involved an individual searching for a Christmas tree, using the search term ‘Christmas tree, palo alto”.  He was immediately instructed to go to the local Boy Scouts office, who were selling Christmas trees, showing up as  the #1 website in Google’s search results. The Boy Scouts hadn’t spent a penny on billboards or advertising, but due to a mobile location-based search, they were able to reach a customer who was looking for a specific product.

This is one of the millions of stories that have, and will be told in the months and years to come, as the possibilities for retailers and geographically targeted businesses are endless.

Some location based tools include :

• Foursquare
• Gowalla
• Blippy
• Facebook, Twitter and Google have some form of location based marketing either in the works, or in practice, with MANY more to come.

Too often when managing AdWords campaigns, the content network gets the cold shoulder. Sure, you’ll set it up, let it run for a while without doing too much, but do you really get dirty and sift through the sites to see which ones are performing and delivering good quality visitors?

Well, you definitely need to. The numbers below are an example of a campaign’s Content Network that has not received the attention it deserves.

The 100% (or more!) CTR’s immediately raise a red flag. What that means is, when an ad shows on the specified website, it is clicked upon it’s VERY FIRST viewing. While this isn’t impossible, it is very unlikely.

You are able to see the exact website that delivered the click, and more often than not, they are completely irrelevant and very frequently are simply domain squatters with a handful of links and nothing else.

Don’t worry, this happens to everyone. There’s no way to eliminate it 100% without compromising a potentially enormous network of websites on which to display your ads.

“How can I fix this?”

Well, this is where regularly scheduled monitoring comes in handy. Not only can you select specific websites from google’s content network that you wish to have your ads displayed on, but you can exclude ones that you don’t. This can be a painstaking process, however if you invest some time, it can save you hundreds, if not thousands of dollars and ensure your clicks are as effective as possible.

The methods in which businesses connect with their customers have changed in ways many don’t realize.

When you mention the word advertising, most think of a flyer, the daily newspaper, television or even radio. The problem with these traditional mediums, is the lack of accuracy through tracking a return on investment. Not only that, but the overall cost can be much higher than a well planned online strategy.

Print Campaign.
For example, imagine that you have an advertising budget of $1000. For that amount, you might receive a single, black & white flyer, distributed to 10,000 local homes or less. From that distribution of 10,000, you should expect to receive approximately 100 interested individuals, with the possibly of 1 or 2 becoming a paying customer.

Remember, this cost is for ONE flyer and would be spent EACH time the flyer is sent. It also does not include design fees, printing fees or any possible courier fees.

Online Campaign.
For the same $1000 spent on an online ad campaign, a simple text ad has the potential to be viewed by tens of thousands, if not hundreds of thousands of potential visitors as it is online 24/7, for as long as the budget allows. The ad viewers can also be targeted by factors such as geographic location, age, or search phrase. This provides relevant, quality visitors.

Not only can online ads be targeted towards any specified market, but a variety of tracking methods can also be applied to receive an accurate return on investment. Need to know how many ad visitors submitted your contact form? No problem. How about how many visitors purchased a product through your online store? Easy. Defining a goal and tracking the progress of your online ad visitors towards that goal is a snap, and can produce incredible results.

No matter how many articles are written about the decline of traditional advertising, many businesses, small and large, assume it is still the most effective way to reach their potential customers. This is just not true.

Set aside some of your monthly advertising budget and invest some time towards an online advertising campaign. Please contact us any time for some advice, or visit our website for some more information.

While advertising is never a bad idea, it can easily be wasted if the proper tracking measures are not taken. Through the use of online advertising, a wide range of different techniques can be used in order to track the effectiveness of ads.

By far the most effective method is by tracking what are called Conversions.

A potential customer would click on an advertisement (found on Google.com or on another website through the content network) and end up on www.YourSite.com. The visitor would then browse through the website and find a contact form (which if you don’t have, get one!). They fill out the contact form and click ‘Submit’. The act of clicking ‘Submit’ on the contact form acts as a Conversion. The visitor has now taken the next step in becoming a paying customer.

Many businesses have a preconception that websites are notorious for being poor in providing sufficient tracking data. The tools are available, but they need to be integrated effectively and monitored on a frequent basis.

If you have links from other websites, or are running multiple ads, you can add a tracking code to the end of the incoming link. For instance :

• If you have an incoming link directed to : http://www.YourSite.com/ProductPage?ID=456, it may direct the visitor to the correct page, but this will not benefit tracking at all.
• Use the following URL instead : http://www.YourSite.com/ProductPage?utm_source=SiteA&utm_medium=BannerAd&utm_campaign=ProductShowcase

Some services such as Google Analytics and Google AdWords provide tracking services which when setup, can track a range of different conversions, from when a visitor lands on a specific page, to when a visitor downloads a file, and more.

Another tracking service available for both online and traditional advertisers is Call Tracking. What this service does, is generate a unique 1-800 phone number for each targeted ad, which are used by the potential customer in order to call the advertiser. Each time a number is called, it acts as a conversion. This is very effective at determining which method of advertising is more effective and which ad is the most appealing to visitors.

Beginning in December, Glacier-Digital will begin offering this service to all of its SEO & SEM clients. Please contact us for more information.

If you plan on rolling out an online advertising campaign, be it large or small, be certain that the proper tools are in place to track your return on investment. While the ads might do the job otherwise, you’ll never truly know.

You have no doubt heard the news that Microsoft and Yahoo! have joined forces to take on the ever persistent Google.

What the partnership means for Yahoo! is they will be using Microsoft’s Bing search technology for searches on their own site, in exchange for an expanded platform with which to show their ads. This will allow Yahoo! to concentrate on ads and their network of websites, which are still among the most visited on the internet.

With Microsoft’s recent launch of the search engine Bing, they need all the push they can get in order to extend the momentum of its early success. The search engine has been touted as being as good as, or better than Google and with Microsoft’s seemingly endless supply of advertising dollars, they will make sure everyone knows.

Depending on who you talk to, the joint venture will give Microhoo! approximately 28% market share, which, while still much less than Google’s 65%, is a somewhat respectable second place. Google has been increasing slowly, month over month, almost a direct opposite to Yahoo!.

This 10 year deal will not be fully realized until 2012, which is when both companies expect the full transition to be complete.

What does this mean for our clients? We will be able to focus our SEO and SEM efforts more effectively on Google/Adwords and Bing/Adcenter. What this means for the future of Yahoo! is anyone’s guess, but I believe it’s Microsoft’s foot in the door and they have some muscle they are not afraid to use, in order to get what they want. Don’t forget, Yahoo! denied a $9 billion offer from Microsoft just over a year ago for this exact same joint deal.

My bet, Yahoo! will be a very different entity by 2012. The search world just got a bit more interesting.