Channel Sales (partnerships with local resellers of AdWords) is one of Google’s fastest growing divisions. That’s according to Global Channel Sales Director Todd Rowe who was interviewed along with an executive entourage in a Google mega-panel at ILM ’14 today.

James Croom, Google My Business Senior Product Marketing Manager, Google
Max Frause, Global Business Lead, Google Shopping, Google
Christine Merritt, Head of Premier SMB Partnerships, Channel Sales North America, Google
Todd Rowe, Managing Director, Global Channel Sales, Google
Francisco Uribe, Adwords Express Product Manager, Google
Moderator: Matt Booth, CEO, Connectivity

According to Rowe, this was born in a meeting with Larry, Sergey, and then-CEO Eric Schmidt about tackling the SMB sector through partners. And that’s a departure from Google’s normal “invented here” way (my words). So the channel sales division was born out of this necessity.

“The good news is there’s 100 million SMBs,” said Rowe. “The bad news is there’s 100 million SMBs. How do you wrap your arms around that?”

The discussion, moderated by former BIA/Kelsey Chief Strategy Offer Matt Booth, reached into many functional areas relevant to local and SMBs. Those included product listings ads, AdWords Express, Google My Business (GMB), and of course mobile.

— Product listings ads are growing within search results, particularly in mobile where users are high-intent shoppers. The product data are primarily from retailers and partners, but the next step is to get better real time inventory data for SMBs (likely through partners).

— Listings integrity is another sticky area, given the quickly changing SMB landscape and the fact that they aren’t always self-policing location data in Google (including Maps). So finding the right sources for accurate listings is an ongoing strategy for GMB.

— The biggest question coming from AdWords reseller partners is how to offer YouTube to advertisers in more turnkey ways. “We are working to provide more scalable ways to create content,” said Christine Merritt. “If we can scale it well for SMBs, it will take off.”

— The way towards this video goal, according Rowe is to templatize — in both production and distribution. SMB video quality has lots of variance, given typical cost of high production quality. Local videographers, templates and standardized pricing are the path.

— In mobile, the strategy is to go beyond the cliche of “mobile-first” in cases where the market is “mobile-only” (emerging markets). “It’s a great force function to design something simple that lets them get online with google and grow their business,” said Frause.

The post At ILM 2014: Google Mega Panel Wants More Partners, Video and ‘Mobile-Only’ appeared first on BIA/Kelsey - Local Media Watch.

Channel Sales (partnerships with local resellers of AdWords) is one of Google’s fastest growing divisions. That’s according to Global Channel Sales Director Todd Rowe who was interviewed along with an executive entourage in a Google mega-panel at ILM ’14 today.

James Croom, Google My Business Senior Product Marketing Manager, Google
Max Frause, Global Business Lead, Google Shopping, Google
Christine Merritt, Head of Premier SMB Partnerships, Channel Sales North America, Google
Todd Rowe, Managing Director, Global Channel Sales, Google
Francisco Uribe, Adwords Express Product Manager, Google
Moderator: Matt Booth, CEO, Connectivity

According to Rowe, this was born in a meeting with Larry, Sergey, and then-CEO Eric Schmidt about tackling the SMB sector through partners. And that’s a departure from Google’s normal “invented here” way (my words). So the channel sales division was born out of this necessity.

“The good news is there’s 100 million SMBs,” said Rowe. “The bad news is there’s 100 million SMBs. How do you wrap your arms around that?”

The discussion, moderated by former BIA/Kelsey Chief Strategy Offer Matt Booth, reached into many functional areas relevant to local and SMBs. Those included product listings ads, AdWords Express, Google My Business (GMB), and of course mobile.

— Product listings ads are growing within search results, particularly in mobile where users are high-intent shoppers. The product data are primarily from retailers and partners, but the next step is to get better real time inventory data for SMBs (likely through partners).

— Listings integrity is another sticky area, given the quickly changing SMB landscape and the fact that they aren’t always self-policing location data in Google (including Maps). So finding the right sources for accurate listings is an ongoing strategy for GMB.

— The biggest question coming from AdWords reseller partners is how to offer YouTube to advertisers in more turnkey ways. “We are working to provide more scalable ways to create content,” said Christine Merritt. “If we can scale it well for SMBs, it will take off.”

— The way towards this video goal, according Rowe is to templatize — in both production and distribution. SMB video quality has lots of variance, given typical cost of high production quality. Local videographers, templates and standardized pricing are the path.

— In mobile, the strategy is to go beyond the cliche of “mobile-first” in cases where the market is “mobile-only” (emerging markets). “It’s a great force function to design something simple that lets them get online with google and grow their business,” said Frause.

The post At ILM 2014: Google Mega Panel Wants More Partners, Video and 'Mobile-Only' appeared first on BIA/Kelsey - Local Media Watch.

The end of the year usually means a few things to us: the holidays; our annual predictions; and Leading in Local: Interactive Local Media, the industry’s flagship event.

This year’s event is especially hot — a 2 1/2 day extravaganza taking place Dec. 3-5 in San Francisco. More than 50 speakers have been recruited by the analyst team, and we’ve added some great extra-curricular activities, including a Tech Expo with top companies showing off their wares “Before The Bell” on Day 1; a Women’s Leading in Local networking event on day 2; and an International Roundtable.

Here’s our newest news: BIA/Kelsey Analyst Emeritus Matt Booth (currently CEO, Connectivity) is coming back to moderate one of two Executive Sessions with Google leaders. We’ll kick off with Managing Director of Global Channel Sales Todd Rowe, than go deep in conversations with Head of premier SMB partnerships Christine Merritt; Adwords Express Product Manager Francisco Uribe; Google My Business Senior Product Manager James Croom; and Global Business Leader for Google Shopping Max Frause.

We also have feature presentations set by YP CMO Allison Checchi; Deseret Digital Media CEO Clark Gilbert and President Chris Lee; Yodle CEO Court Cunningham; Pinterest Head of Partnerships Joel Meek; and Salesforce VP Randy Wootton.

We are also set with a great discussion between me and Business Book of the Year Winner Brad Stone, author of The Everything Store: Jeff Bezos and the Age of Amazon. And then there are the feature presentations by First Data SVP Krish Mantripragada; InfoGroup CDO Matt Graves; and Go Daddy SVP Raj Mukherjee. And we’ve also got a great, seven company Superforum dedicated to local’s most important issue: “Make the Phone Ring.”

There’s so much more. Check out the Full agenda. Register here.

The post Leading in Local Update: 50 Speakers Are Set (Dec. 3-5, SFO) appeared first on BIA/Kelsey - Local Media Watch.