Archive for 2009

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Google Adwords Beta: Latest Browsers Only

February 11, 2009

My trusty MacBook Pro hard disk drive failed and I have had to switch to an older box to try and work on while my hard disk drive gets replaced.

Its easy to forget just how far computers and browsers specifically have come in the last few years until you have to try to get any work done on an older machine!

Browser page load times take an eternity.

In the time it takes for one of these pages to load on this old box, I could have completed three other tasks on a newer machine.

Which brings me to the subject and point of this post: The new Adwords Updated Interface will not work with older browsers.

Should I now thank my Apple MacBook Pro for failing because it gave me this topic to cover?

I can still log into My Client Center in Google Adwords and access my clients’ data because my personal Adwords account was the only one to get the Adwords Beta Invite.

More from Google Adwords about use with older browsers:

The updated AdWords interface may not work properly in your web browser. We are working hard to add support for more browsers. Until then, please use Internet Explorer 7, Firefox 3, or Chrome to manage your campaigns. The updated AdWords interface may be slower on older versions of Firefox. For better results, we recommend upgrading to Firefox 3.

Indeed Google. Firefox’s Beta 3.1 worked fine just a few days ago when I was working on my MacBook Pro.

I bought my MacBook Pro to get and run all of the latest and greatest software.

Unfortunately, I didn’t upgrade this old PowerBook G4 which requires Mac OS 10.4 to run Firefox 3.

I have Mac OS 10.3.9.

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Posted in Google Adwords, My Client Center | 1 Comment »

Argh! MacBook Pro Hard Disk Drive Failure

February 10, 2009

A post about a hard drive failure on this blog is off topic but then again without the portability and performance of Mac laptops, I would not have been able to write or publish my thoughts here as consistently as I have been able to.

If the next several posts tend to ramble or run far afield from search marketing, its because I am having to work on one of my older and slower laptops.

I have already had to replace a warped battery on my June 2007 MacBook Pro.

Now it looks like I am going to get to replace the hard disk drive too.

I bought my MacBook Pro before the Mac Time Machine back up product was invented.

I wish I had a real Time Machine now so I could go back before my drive failed and back up the last several months of data which I failed to do.

However, if I had a Time Machine – Mac or otherwise – I wouldn’t have had the opportunity to write this specific blog post!

Yeah.

Over the course of several months during 2008, I reorganized all of all my back up media chronologically and alphabetically so I could layer new data on top going forward without having to think about where to put or file it.

As a result, I have all of my files organized and backed up in a manner so I can find and access work I have produced on any one of my six Apple computers since I first bought my first Apple IIci in 1989.

Of course and I am sure is often the case sans Time Machine, I haven’t been backing up my new data since Christmas due to time constraints.

Of course, all of the projects I have been working on recently are the most important.

The local Apple store has my MacBook Pro now.

I am supposed to get my machine back within three to five days.

If I were to take a crack at predicting the future, I would guess the first application I will be buying for my newly repaired MacBook Pro will be a copy of Mac Time Machine.

This whole ordeal has wore me out and messed with my rhythm.

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Posted in Apple, Mac | Leave a Comment »

Twitter Spam

February 9, 2009

I have noticed over the past several day lots of new followers with familiar sounding Twitter celebrity like names.

Clicking through to the new followers site instead finds an impersonator of the well known and heavily followed Twitter personality.

Twitter impersonators usually have to employ a slight misspelling or underscore before or after their their more famous host.

Of the Twitter personality impersonator followers I have received in the last week, each have contained the same message and link within their updates:

Friends, “5 Steps to Twitter Success” was just released! Get your copy here.

Friends, if this is any indication of how spammers plan to experiment with methods for monetizing the Twitter community get ready for truckloads of more Twitter Spam.


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Posted in Twitter, Twitter Spam | Leave a Comment »

New to Google Adwords: Low Share of Voice

February 8, 2009

Google Adwords will soon be rolling out a new status within Adwords accounts worldwide called “Low Share of Voice”.

Google Adwords Low Share of Voice

Google Adwords Low Share of Voice

Adwords advertisers who aren’t familiar with the advertising concept of  “Share of Voice” will be able to click on the question mark next to their alert to learn more about Google’s definition of Low Share of Voice.

However, my Updated Adwords Beta doesn’t yet include Google’s definition of Share of Voice or Low Share of Voice.

Share of Voice

Share of Voice

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Posted in Google Adwords, Low Share of Voice, Share of Voice | 1 Comment »

Innovative Link Exchange Strategy from TNS Media Intelligence

February 7, 2009

Today I received an interesting email from a link builder asking to exchange links with one of my sites.

Granted, receiving link exchange requests from webmasters is not unusual.

However, this link exchange request was not directly from the site seeking the link but instead from a link building agency working in the site’s behalf.

What caught my attention was the site who was indirectly requesting a link from my site via their agent.

The company requesting a link from site is the highly regarded market intelligence firm TNS Media Intelligence.

From TNS Media Intelligence’s web site:

TNS Media Intelligence is the leading provider of strategic advertising intelligence to advertisers…

Nothing unusual about one website requesting a link from another.

What is unusual is for a firm of TNS Media Intelligence’s caliber to think they can hire a firm to request a link from a site they would like to have a link from but for them to then think they can not offer a link from their site in exchange and not have them called out for trying something like this to begin with.

Ever heard of brand management TNS Media Intelligence?

If this email would have come from any other company, I wouldn’t have taken the time to write this post.

By definition my being in the business intelligence requires my public deconstruction of their strategy.

As you can see from the email below, TNS Market Intelligence is the firm who wants a link from my web site and they in turn through their link building agency will then give me a link to some hokey .biz directory their link building agency built for them but not the TNS-MI.com site.

Yippee!

Where do I sign up again?

Innovative link building strategy but in this case TNS Media Intelligence and their representatives misjudged their audience’s intelligence.

Hi,

My name is Kimmi Sanders  I’ve just visited your website
marketingprinciples.com and I was wondering if you’d be interested in
exchanging links with my  website?. I can offer you a home page link
back from my Business and Marketing Research Guide website  which is
(http://www.theywill.biz/)  with page rank 4

Your link will be placed here:

http://www.theywill.biz/ (It`s a Business and Marketing Research guide
website with pr 4)

As mentioned, your link would be placed on the site home page, not on
any “links” pages ,  which means the link is more beneficial to you
with regards to your search engine rankings.

If you are interested please add  the following information to your
website and  kindly let me know when it´s ready and I will do the same
for you in less than 24 hours, otherwise you can delete my link from
your site.

Please link with the following details:

TITLE: TNS Media Intelligence
URL: http://www.tnsmi.co.uk/
DESCRIPTION: TNSMI provide leading media monitoring and evaluation
services.

Or you can use the following html code:

<a href=”http://www.tnsmi.co.uk/”>TNS Media Intelligence</a> – TNSMI
provide leading media monitoring and evaluation services.

I hope you have a nice day and thank you for your time,

Kimmi Sanders

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Posted in Advertising, Advertising Intelligence, Brand Management, Link Exchange, TNS Market Intelligence, TNS Media Intelligence | Leave a Comment »

Google Print Ads Still Active on Google’s Site

February 6, 2009

Today I was surprised to see the page promoting Google Print Ads still active on Google’s site.

Google Print Ads?

Google Print Ads?

With Google’s newspaper advertising program coming to an end soon, you would think they would have some kind of “program closing” announcement in its place instead.

Not every one has got the memo…

Twitter Print Ads

Twitter Print Ads

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Posted in Google | Leave a Comment »

Estimated Average Google Advertiser Annual Spend Per Hour

February 5, 2009

Google had $21.8 Billion in 2008 revenue 99% of which comes from advertising.

It been estimated Google has between 1.0 million and 1.5 million advertising clients worldwide.

With 1.5 million advertisers, Google’s average annual revenue per advertiser would be roughly $14,333.33.

Dividing $14,333.33 average annual spend by 365 days yields an average of $39.27 spent per day per advertiser.

This in turn suggests the average Google advertiser spends $1.64 per hour 24 hours a day 7 days a week.

Google handles 8 Billion searches each month now or approximately 266,666,667 million searches a day.

By combining the previous figures with the average Google property visitor session length and page views couldn’t we then also extrapolate what percentage of advertisers ads are clicked on daily as well as what Google’s average income per click is?

I will have to do more research to see if I can come up with more solid numbers.

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Posted in Google, Google Advertiser, Google Advertising, Google Adwords | Leave a Comment »

TED: Live Blogging (Tweeting) By Some of The World’s Brightest People

February 4, 2009

Twelve years ago, I read an article about Richard Saul Wurman the co-founder of the TED (Technology, Entertainment, Design) Conference and I have been intrigued with TED ever since.

The annual TED conference is happening now in Long Beach, CA.

This year a convergence of the latest technology and new communication habits provides a rare glimpse into conferences like TED.

In this case, attendees at the TED conference who are Twitter users are Tweeting their individual impression of what is being said on stage by TED presenters.

Searching Twitter for TED effectively reverse engineers TED’s Tweeting audience which in turn provides a rich source of innovative thinkers for – those who are interested – to follow on Twitter.

For instance, 297 Tweets related to the TED conference have occurred since I began writing this post.

Ted Tweets

Ted Tweets

Most Tweets pertained to Tim Berners-Lee who just suggested to the audience they share their raw data over the web.

Many TED attendees have since provided the link to Tim Berners-Lee’s TED presentation which is here.

Searching Twitter for TED will provide any searcher with their own list of some of the world’s brightest people.

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Posted in TED, Tweeting, Twitter, Twitter Search | Leave a Comment »

Include Your Twitter Address in YouTube Videos

February 3, 2009

Danny Sullivan tweeted his plans for placing his Twitter address on his business cards.

Great idea.

I too have been considering ways to cross promote some of my content from one platform to another.

His tweet prompted me to follow through with several ideas I have had for extending my Twitter account’s reach.

I have added my Twitter address to my Google Adwords Professional video on YouTube.

YouTube Twitter

YouTube Twitter

To me, it seems only natural for YouTube producers to add their Twitter contact details to their videos.

I am surprised YouTube hasn’t yet added Twitter as one of their sharing options.

Share YouTube with Twitter

Share YouTube with Twitter

Its not an option on YouTube yet…

Surely adding Twitter to YouTube’s share options would help both properties further develop and deepen their respective shares audience attention.

Connecting YouTube’s  and Twitter’s audiences may provide further monetization opportunities as well.

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Posted in Google, Google Advertising Professional, Google Adwords Professionals, Tweeting, Tweets, Twitter, YouTube, YouTube Video, YouTube.com | Leave a Comment »

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