Google may begin to require users to register or otherwise provide personal information to use certain of its applications. An AP report attributed that idea to comments made by Google CEO Eric Schmidt during a four-hour meeting for Wall Street…
Here's an interesting piece in Wired News about the very real impact of ranking higher in search engine placement. It's mostly about optimization, but the same goes true for SEM. There's lots of data that show CTRs drop off significantly…
In addition to seeking personal information, Google representatives said they would do more direct sales (probably for larger advertisers) but would also focus on acquiring more local advertisers and creating tools to make it easier for those advertisers to adopt…
Tuesday??s article in the New York Times about Google??s million dollar employee incentives inspired Shawn Wiora, a former Verizon Information Services manager and Yellow Pages consultant, to send me an e-mail asking what might happen if directory publishers followed suit…
Empirical research has a habit of confirming what people already know. In this case, ShopLocal and The Dieringer Group released a study, which tracked consumer shopping during the final three months of 2004. The study found that so-called Web-to-Store shoppers?"those…
Yesterday Keynote Systems (formerly Vividence Corporation) released the results of a consumer survey that reported Yahoo!, MSN and Ask Jeeves making gains in search market share and user perceptions. The survey, based on observation and interaction with 2,000 consumers, found…
Check it out: maps.google.com. First impression: it's pretty robust and will rival Yahoo!'s SmartView. I will write about this more extensively later. Here's the public announcement: Today, Google released Google Maps at http://maps.google.com, a dynamic online mapping feature that enables…
Ask Jeeves has acquired Bloglines, a site that provides a range of functions associated with blogging. A search engine for blog content and an RSS aggregator/reader, Blogline's acquisition reflects the growing importance of RSS feeds and blog content to search.…
The fact that a smaller Yellow Pages publisher such as New York's Ambassador has adopted a fixed fee/guaranteed clicks program shows that momentum is building around this product concept. There are now multiple players ("small business aggregators") in the market…
Tuesday€™s article in the New York Times about Google€™s million dollar employee incentives inspired Shawn Wiora, a former Verizon Information Services manager and Yellow Pages consultant, to send me an e-mail asking what might happen if directory publishers followed suit…
The so-called €œsearch wars€ have opened a new front€"mobile. Yesterday Yahoo! introduced Local Send to Phone, which enables users to send and store listings (business names, address, phone, cross-streets, etc.) on SMS-enabled mobile phones free of charge€"though carrier text messaging…
Now that Google has formally joined AOL, Yahoo!, Blinxx and others in offering TV/video search, the time has come to speculate more seriously about Web-TV convergence.As more and more video content (and related rich media advertising) goes online, will search…
Gary Rivlin wrote an interesting piece in today's NYTimes about Friendster's fortunes and how it's been eclipsed by MySpace in the critical 18 to 29 demographic. That demographic, right now, is Friendster's entire value proposition to advertisers. The article suggests…
AOL is upgrading its search functionality and interfaces and taking €œbaby steps€ toward personalization (i.e., saving recent searches). An extensive discussion of the enhancements is available at Search Engine Watch. The company is bringing together many disparate elements to create…
Empirical research has a habit of confirming what people already know. In this case, ShopLocal and The Dieringer Group released a study, which tracked consumer shopping during the final three months of 2004. The study found that so-called Web-to-Store shoppers€"those…
Yesterday Keynote Systems (formerly Vividence Corporation) released the results of a consumer survey that reported Yahoo!, MSN and Ask Jeeves making gains in search market share and user perceptions. The survey, based on observation and interaction with 2,000 consumers, found…
Conferences tend to reflect how the business is right now. When business is struggling, publishers will either put a numerical limit on the total number of employees that can attend an event or institute the more draconian requirement that everyone…
A report in Australia€™s The Age newspaper citing unnamed sources within the Australian government says the spin-off of Sensis Pty. Ltd. by its parent company Telstra is in the works. The story was posted on theage.com.au on Feb. 8.Within the…
I joined the residential marketing group at AT&T in 1978 because my Director convinced me that €œthe Biggest Company on Earth€ was going to become a marketing driven company. I was young and na¯ve then, and I should have paid…
Recently, start-up Find YP launched a competitive product to the Yellow Pages Association??s (YPA) IRIS Rates & Data product called eRates and Data. eRates and Data is a Web-based database that provides the same data as YPA??s product as well…
