Komodo Links: Google Universal Search, Robot Language, and EULAs

We've got a short edition of Komodo Links this week. Two posts from the Google Webmaster Central Blog and a humorous post from Techdirt regarding companies EULAs.


The Google Webmaster Central Blog had an interesting post from earlier this week about taking advantage of universal search. The post has some good tips for small businesses to make the most of local search, video search, image search, and personalized search basics.

Google Webmaster Central also launched a Robots.txt Generator available in Webmaster Tools. Read all about it at the Webmaster Central Blog.

Techdirt has a humorous post about how companies don't even read their own EULAs. The post includes some funny examples.

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YouTube Gives Insight Into Who Likes Your Videos

Yesterday YouTube announced the launch of Insight, a free tool that enables anyone with a YouTube account to view detailed statistics about the videos that they upload to the site. Currently Insight offers a few key metrics, including a breakdown of video views by geographic location, a video's popularity in a market relative to other YouTube videos, and video popularity growth rates over a given period of time. The YouTube blog post also mentions that they will be releasing more features in the near future.

I think Insight can deliver significant value to small businesses and franchise companies that make use of YouTube videos to drive traffic to their site or locations. Even the Google Analytics Team is pumped up about it. As YouTube adds more features and metrics, businesses will be better able to gauge the ROI of online video production. One metric that the YouTube blog post mentions that should be rolled out "fairly quickly" is "a specific breakdown of how viewers discovered the video." This metric alone will offer businesses and franchises great "insight" into how to title and describe future videos, as well as, what the subject matter should be. One specific case is the use of YouTube videos in Google Local business listings. Franchise companies with numerous locations that make use of business listing videos will be able to see which listings get the most video views. Perhaps people searching for their business in California watch the videos a lot more than people searching in Florida.


Let us know what you think of Insight.

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Komodo Links: AdWords Demographic Bidding, Limiting Consumer Tracking on the Internet, Phorm Knows Everything About You

Today we have a short but very sweet edition of Komodo Links. This week's edition is all about online consumer data, those who track and sell it, those who use it to target ads, and those who want to stop it. Read on and let us know what you think.


In January, Google invited AdWords advertisers to join a beta test of a new demographic bidding feature. Today demographic bidding is available for all AdWords advertisers. Demographic bidding is a feature that helps advertisers target ads to users of certain age groups, gender or a combination of both. Advertisers can use demographic bidding for both contextual and placement targeting and with CPC and CPM bidding. You can also use demographic bidding to refine your ad's reach on certain sites in Google's content network. Advertisers can also access demographic reports in the AdWords Report Center to see how well their ads are performing across different demographics.

Here is a perfect follow up to the AdWords demographic bidding announcement. The New York Times reported yesterday that New York Assemblyman Richard Brodsky has drafted a bill "that would make it a crime for certain Web companies to use personal information about consumers for advertising without their consent." Yahoo and Microsoft have already sent lobbyists to meet with Mr. Brodsky. The article covers some interesting issues that this bill raises.

Some interesting highlights from the article:

“A law like this essentially takes some of the gold away from marketers,” said Joseph Turow, a professor at the Annenberg School for Communication at the University of Pennsylvania. “But it’s the right thing to do. Consumers have no idea how much information is being collected about them, and the advertising industry should have to deal with that.”



“There has really been no harm shown by behavioral targeting or third-party advertising, so this rush to regulate the Internet is really unnecessary,” said Mike Zaneis, vice president for public policy for the Interactive Advertising Bureau, an industry group that represents companies like Google and Yahoo.



Moreover, Mr. Zaneis said, the New York bill threatens to undercut the business model that supports the Web. “If you take the fuel out of this engine, you begin to see the free services and content dry up,” he said.

And to finish up, check out Janet Meiners' post at Marketing Pilgrim about the British company Phorm. Apparently Phorm is using British ISPs to track every single action a British web surfer takes to be able to show them ads. The company claims they have access to the surfing habits of 70% of all British households that have broadband.

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Google Local: Add Videos to Your Business Listings

Another great reason to use YouTube for your business...

We logged into to the Google Local Business Center today to edit the listing for our search engine optimization company SEO Komodo. We were excited to see that Google now allows you to add up to 5 videos to a business listing. This feature is in the photos section of the listing editor. The videos must be on YouTube first but then it is as simple as adding the YouTube URL.

Motion pictures have existed for 100+ years. If you are not convinced of their power to shape human thought and emotion by now then I can't help you. Your savvy competitors probably are. Why not beat them to the punch by adding a few nice videos to your Google Local business listings? When users are presented with a business listing that has video vs. one that doesn't, guess which one gets clicked?

Video is a simple but extremely powerful medium for conveying large amounts of information in a short amount of time and with minimal effort by users. Adding video will truly engage users with your Google Local listings. With the rise of YouTube and other video based websites, businesses that could not afford TV commercials in the past are beginning to learn just how effective video can be for showcasing your location/products/services etc.

Uploading videos to YouTube is free and so is adding/editing your Google Local business listing.

If you haven't made the jump yet give us a call.

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Komodo Links: Self Serving Reviews, FriendFeedFeed, an Open Letter to Google, and AOL Buys Bebo

We've got some interesting and humorous links from the past week for this installment of Komodo Links. So sit back and enjoy while you wait for the weekend to begin.


RealSelf.com, an independent site for consumers to discuss anti-aging treatments, has accused plastic surgery corporation, Lifestyle Lift, of breach of contract and computer fraud. Basically RealSelf.com claims that Lifestyle Lift agents posed as patients and posted positive reviews about Lifestyle Lift procedures. These charges were filed as a counterclaim to a Lifestyle Lift lawsuit filed against RealSelf.com for trademark infringement. MediaPost has more on this plastic surgery soap opera.

Here's a funny post (and comments) about FriendFeedFeed. FriendFeedFeed, currently in "pre-beta," aggregates all your social networking aggregator feeds into one aggregated feed of aggregator activity feeds. Definitely a quality piece of Web 2.0 satire.

On a more serious note, Danny Sullivan writes an open letter to Google. In the letter, Danny asks Google to divest itself of Performics, DoubleClick's SEO firm. "Google's in the SEO business now, ...conflict of interest? You bet."

And in an unexpected move, AOL buys social network Bebo for $850 million. In response, AOL users ask their grandchildren, "what's a Bebo?"

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Miami Business Resource: Where to Go and What to Do in Miami - Miami.com

Miami.com is a site dedicated to showing you what there is to see and do in Miami and South Florida. Miami.com staff and users can write reviews of restaurants, nightclubs, lounges, hotels, best beaches, museums, movies, best places to shop, celebrity sightings, and more. Users can also rate and comment on businesses listed on the site. Miami.com is owned by Miami Herald Media Company, which is owned by McClatchy Company. Miami.com is a great resource for locals looking for something new, tourists looking to plan the perfect South Florida vacation, and relevant local businesses for a host of reasons.

Check out this video from Miami.com to find out what they are all about. Yea, the video is a little cheesy...but just roll with it.





For local businesses:

Miami.com is a great resource for South Florida businesses, especially those in the entertainment, restaurant, and tourism industries. The site does offer advertising space for businesses, but they also write articles on varying nightlife and entertainment topics. These articles and reviews are independent of advertising. The About Us/Contact Us page of Miami.com states:

Our reviews and stories are not paid for by advertisers – our pages spotlight the best of South Florida, handpicked by our editors and users.

As an example, Miami.com currently has an article with information and reviews about local bars that offer the best (and largest) selection of beers. Now thats my kind of topic. Getting reviewed on Miami.com is a great source of free publicity for these businesses. Once a business has been added by the staff or a Miami.com user, the business can see what other users think of their location, product, or service by reading user comments and additional reviews. Check out the screenshot below of the Miami.com page for The Bar in Coral Gables, Florida. (click to enlarge)



So what are people saying about your business?

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Marketers Preparing for Pricier PPC Ads

MediaPost published a great article yesterday about the increasing costs of paid search and how marketers are coping by investing in natural search. The article includes many quotes from Tim Kauffold, director of business development at Oneupweb.

The following are some of Mr. Kauffold's quotes from the article along with some of my thoughts on the issue.

"In most cases, natural and paid search campaigns perform better together than they do separately. Greater awareness of a Web site created by a paid ad can lead to more natural traffic. In similar fashion, people are logically more likely to click on a paid promotional ad of marketers they recognize, such as those they've encountered during a natural search." -Kauffold

I would also add that paid search and natural search campaigns perform better together through shared data analysis. Paid search campaigns provide detailed data about which keyword phrases are performing the best. This data is also great at spotting keyword trends like what keywords have increasing conversion rates and vice versa over a given period of time. Marketers can use this keyword data for their SEO campaigns to optimize content around those keyword phrases. On the flip-side, traffic data gathered from search engine optimization can give insights into user behavior on your website. These insights can help marketers improve the quality of paid search landing pages.

"One of the things that surprises marketers--particularly those who have been using the media for several years--is how the costs are rising. They think, 'Why doesn't the same dollar buy me the same volume it used to?' But there are really big inflation numbers with cost-per-click. It's still a great avenue, but as more folks jump in, costs are going higher." -Kauffold

I briefly covered this basic market concept about two weeks ago in our post covering the Kelsey Group's annual forecast, but it's worth repeating here. As Kauffold says, paid search is still a great avenue but costs are increasing. Companies that optimize for natural search will reduce their dependence on paid search for leads and customers.

"Paid search is a media buy, and natural search optimization is an investment in the site itself, and that can take some time--maybe even a few months--to see results," -Kauffold

This statement pretty much speaks for itself, and it is a statement that is important to remember. Many large companies and tech/internet related companies have known this for years. However, many small businesses and franchise companies are just beginning to realize the importance of natural search optimization and how long it takes to see results. If anything, undertaking a search engine optimization campaign is all about building a foundation for the future.

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Google Finally Gets EU Approval for Acquisition of DoubleClick

The European Commission announced today that Google's $3.1 billion acquisition of DoubleClick can proceed without conditions. Google proposed the deal back in April to increase its sales of online display ads. Microsoft had vigorously opposed the deal saying it would hinder competition in the global online ad market. In the end Microsoft could only stall the deal, not kill it. You can read the rest over at Bloomberg.

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Komodo Links: Why Data Matters, Landing Page Load Time and Quality Score, New Yahoo Maps Data, Zuckerberg on Facebook

It's Friday and its time for some Komodo Links. Google, Yahoo Maps, and an interview with Mark Zuckerberg are on the list.



The Google Blog posted Why Data Matters a couple days ago. A great read including "a brief history of search."

In the next few weeks Google's AdWords will begin to factor landing page load time into your quality score. The primary goal is to improve the user experience.

Yahoo Maps has been updated with new data and functionality.
Improvements include:

• 300 cities with new neighborhood data added throughout North America
• 12,000 new neighborhoods added
• Expanded worldwide coverage
• New Points-of-Interest (POI) information

And to finish up, BusinessWeek has a short interview with Facebook founder and CEO, Mark Zuckerberg. In the interview Zuckerberg discusses Sheryl Sandberg's role at Facebook, their expansion plans, and his perspective on a possible initial public offering of stock.

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Ask.com Wants to Answer Your Questions...Again

Ask.com, one of the major players in the search engine space, has announced that it will be cutting 8% of its workforce and focusing on its core user, married women. The Wall Street Journal article outlining ask.com's new strategy (free preview) goes into greater detail. The San Francisco Chronicle touches on the ask.com retreat in their Daily Digest.

After years of trying to compete as a credible, all-purpose alternative to Google, Ask is throwing in the towel. Ask's new strategy will be a return to their AskJeeves days where they catered to the married women of middle America "looking for help managing their lives." As a result, Ask will go back to focusing on answering search queries posed as questions.

It will be interesting to see how Ask's loyal users react to this new strategy. How many users who don't fit Ask's core demographic flee to one of the remaining major search engines? I think Ask will loose a fair amount of search traffic, as once loyal users become dissatisfied with the new strategy.

Another interesting question to ponder, will Ask's retreat create a viable opening in the major search space for a new search engine player such as True Knowledge or Cuill?

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Apple: America's Most Admired Company

Apple took the top spot in Fortune Magazine's "America's Most Admired Companies" ranking for 2008. Google came in at number four and Microsoft made it into the Top 20 at number sixteen.

The Industry Champions list is worth looking at as well. Anheuser-Busch is not only the King of Beers but the King of Beverages. Altria Group is the champion of the tobacco industry. I guess thats a good thing... Two companies with a large presence in Florida made the Industry Champions list. Publix Super Markets took the top spot in the "food and drug stores" category, and FPL Group (Florida Power and Light) took the honors in the "electric and gas utilities" category.

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