PardonMyFrench

Google Paid Search versus Organic Results for your Brand Terms

To buy brand terms or not to buy brand terms, that is usually the question all brand marketers ask, but especially political ones. There are certain fundamental tactics that are the foundation of great search campaigns, and buying your own brand terms, rather than just relying on organic listings is one of them. Before we dive into why paid search is essential, let’s  quickly look at data to understand how we came to our conclusions.

I looked at Google search data between October 1 and November 3, 2020 for a competitive Senate campaign. During that time, I saw more than 5.2 million organic searches and our ads appeared more than 3.2 million times in paid searches for our Senate client.  Then I looked at search terms that had clicks from both organic listings and paid ads. For example, “Senate Client Name” had organic listing clicks and paid ad clicks during this period. We found 39 of these search queries and those searches delivered 50% of all paid search impressions. That should jump at you because there were another 1.6 million paid search impressions that didn’t generate ANY organic search clicks, and those impressions delivered 1/3 of all donations from paid search. 

So which does better when a paid ad and an organic listing appears at the same time?  I found that: 

• Paid ads generated 160% better click thru rates and 155% better conversion rates than organic listings. 
• Paid ads brought in 72% of all conversions and had 168% better average donation per click than organic clicks.  
• So paid has better conversion rates, better click thru rates and higher average donation per click. Winner, right? Well, maybe but organic listings have their own story to tell.  We found that:
• Organic listings deliver twice as many clicks via twice as many impressions. 
• The average donation from organic search was over 300% higher than paid’s average donors.

So what do we make of this data? Clearly if someone already knows your client an organic listing will probably deliver higher average donors and a lot more clicks to your website. If I had to guess the reason for higher average donors, it’s due to more large donors. If you are looking for a lot of small dollar donors, paid ads seems to be the way to go. Paid ads have higher click thru rates, higher conversion rates, and the average donation per click is better. 

So you might ask yourself, what built-in advantages do paid ads have over organic listings? Well plenty. 

1. Creative Variety: Besides rotating in different messaging (which you should be doing) and different ad formats (responsive, static, and dynamic keyword insertion), you can quickly change the messaging to take better advantage of fast moving stories.
2. Landing Page Testing and Optimization: You can send clicks into different pages and update the messaging to reflect the ads
3. Top of Page Results: Paid ad positions can dominate the top of the page and when it it’s a mobile page, there are even less positions available to you.
4. Your Ads Stand Out and Are Flagged as Ads: In the example above, the campaign website isn’t even above the fold. People have to scroll to get to it. Very often, Google has tons of information ahead of your organic listing  An official listing, Wikipedia, Knowledge Boxes, Top Stories, Questions, and Images. That’s a long way to go to find your organic listing for your campaign website.

Yes, buying brand terms costs money but they deliver higher click thru rates, conversions, and ultimately higher donations per click. Only about 1/3 of your impressions will result in a paid ad click, but when they do click it’s super important. 

Buying brand terms works and it’s the only way to make sure your campaign site gets top priority. In a hotly contested race, I would never ignore paid ads on brand terms and without paying for those ads, you have no guarantee that the searcher will donate to your campaign and besides about 2/3 of the searchers will click on the organic brand listing anyway.

PardonMyFrench,

Eric

Google Ads Universal App Campaign Setting is Not Universally Good

I know it's been a while since I've posted. I've been very distracted lately and when ideas pop into my head for a post, if I don't act on them it's usually too late. So, this is a post I thought about making a year ago but didn't act fast enough. So here goes...

Google Ads Universal App Campaign Settings is really not that great and I think it's a necessary evil if you have want to promote your app. It needs an upgrade badly but I'm afraid that Google's move into more automated campaign management means more of the same and less customizations rather than more. My biggest issue (and I'm not alone) is that you really can't optimize the campaign. You basically hand the keys over to Google to promote your app, hoping Google can deliver at your CPA. It's basically a magic box where you input basics like a link to your app, link to a YT video and some ad images. Yes I do believe after some time Google can deliver app downloads at your allowable cost but I want more control and I want it faster. I want more visibility but it's not there. What can you change? Not a whole heck of a lot.

SETTING UP A GOOGLE UNIVERSAL APP CAMPAIGN

When you set up a Universal App campaign, you can choose the following:

1. Which App Store you want to promote downloads from
2. Location options including exclusions. Note, when you do set this up Google automatically defaults to an option that infers location interest which I can't stand. Yes it works for restaurants and stores but when you are trying to specifically target people in an area you need to adjust this.
3. Target CPA
4. Budget, language, start and end dates
5. Creative Assets where you can specify a YouTube video, 5 lines of text, and images to upload

What else can you do? Well you need to make sure you set up your app conversions. If you don't have that then you are just throwing your money away with a Universal App Campaign setting. Here's what that looks like: Notice the grey text below the setting you typically could change; all of that "Not Editable" language. Yes that means you can't edit how Google counts App installs. Now, for me most of the settings are what I recommend except for one. That's the conversion window of 30 days. That means if someone clicks on a Google ad and installs the app within 30 days Google will attribute it back to the campaign. I'd shorten it to 2 days but can't. I've seen other clients want to change the attribution model but I usually go with last click too.

UNIVERSAL APP RESULTS

So after you get going you'll have to look in a few spots to see how you are doing. First if you want to see the creative results you click the Ad Assets tab and you can see results by the assets you've uploaded. Think your video should get served more because it performs the best? Guess again, you can't do that. 

Next you can click on overview and you get some pretty charts. You'll see a tab for devices but can you shut off any? No. Right below that is a tab for Network? Want to shut off say the display network? No can do. Next box over is time of day/ day of week targeting. Want to change that? Sorry, not available. Finally right above that you get a box for location results? Want to change that. Actually you can. That one is allowed (whew). How about adding some negative keywords? Nope.

When you dig around looking for help from Google you get basic platitudes about how to find the right user and how to optimize your universal app campaign. What does Google recommend? Add in more creative assets and adjust your bids slowly. That's nice. Looking for more tips? Well don't call their help line because after explaining your problem, you'll get no more answers than what's on those links. So what can you do? 

ERIC'S TIPS FOR OPTIMIZING YOUR UNIVERSAL APP CAMPAIGN

1. Follow Google's advice and just make tweaks to the creative and adjust your bids.
2. Maybe setup separate campaigns on your own breaking up search, display, and YouTube. That can work but you run into a few issues. The first is, you need to send your clicks somewhere. Your choices are the app store link or your website or perhaps a landing page hanging off your website. You will most likely run into some Quality Score issues sending into the app store link because it isn't your domain while the website/landing page adds extra steps. Sending them into your domain can help your QS issues but now you added at least one step to your user downloading the app.
3. My favorite option --> The Hybrid Option. If your results look anything like mine, maybe you can run both. Maybe you run Universal App Campaign settings for search and video and a separate campaign for the Display Network clicking through to a landing page. GDN campaigns use relevancy but I've found the penalty a lot less severe than search.

I get that Google wants to move to more programmatic optimizations. I'm willing to give Google some control but not letting me opt out of networks, optimize ads, etc is a bit much. Google will say, we can do it better but as of right now, I don't see it. There are differences between apps and the users of those apps; not being able to make changes is a problem. There are good work arounds that give you control and I suggest you do them. Good luck.

PardonMyFrench,

Eric

 

 

 

 

 

 

My 1 Week with Google +: It's a Twitter Killer

Yes the world is all a twitter about Google+ which is Google's real social networking application.  And my initial reaction is, it's a Twitter killer and will be an effective alternative to Facebook.  I've had a hate, love, hate, relationship with Twitter over the years, but I think Google+ puts Twitter out of its misery.  Sorry if you like Twitter, but it kind of sucks. So, here's why I think Google+ is a Twitter killer and why I like it in addition to Facebook.

1. Twitter posts are kind of like spitting out your car window while cruising on the NJ Turnpike.  If someone is following you or happens to see it, someone might read your Tweet (ie - gets hit by your spit). Otherwise, the Tweet just makes the Tweeter feel better.
2. Twitter has no real advertising model and they are out of time.  Yes you can run promoted tweets or promoted trends, but their model has suboptimal targeting so no sophisticated, one:one advertiser can use it.
3. Are you a celeb, football player, etc?  Then maybe your tweets can get you some earned press.  If you are a regular person, do you really think your friends are online waiting anxiously to read your tweet?
4. Twitter is another site or app you need to access.
5. Finally, not to leave Facebook out of this rant, but the one thing Twitter has over FB is its ability to broadcast worldwide.  One of my beefs about Facebook is that it isnt easy to just broadcast to groups of people.

Google+ solves a lot of Twitter's problems, my one main issue with FB, and then has something that the other two are desperately trying to get which is more utility.  Here's why...

• G+ gives you the ability to broadcast publicly or to specific circles
• There is a slick interface to add friends and to put them in circles.
• It's really easy to message to specific circles; yes you can do something like that with FB but it isnt as slick.
• Google's entire basis for existence at this point is advertising
• I love the hangout application
• G+ finally gives Google the application that wraps everything together.  Gmail, Account, AdWords, Social, YT, etc.  Twitter and FB can't do that...
• If I'm awake, I'm in AdWords.  So having everything linked to my Google account is very efficient.

I think Facebook is too large and too embedded in the web for Google+ to displace it. Twitter on the other hand is dead man walking.  I think G+ can easily replace it and once G+ is linked with news sites like FB, it will be an effective foil to Facebook.

PardonMyFrench,

Eric

 

 

Google Why Are You Hiding Broad Match Data

I have a new pet peeve with Google AdWords.  Back in the summer (I think) Google stopped providing complete data on your broad match campaigns when it discontinued certain reports.  It annoyed me then and I asked some of my Google Account Reps to dig into it, but nothing changed.  Confused?  Well here's what's going on in Google's ongoing effort to dumb down advertising...

1. Broad match is the defaulted match type that Google gives you for keywords.  The data they publish is almost always broad match too.  Broad match is the process by which Google determines which search queries your ads appear on.  It's the reason why early on people saw McCain for President ads on people searching for french fries.
2. Google determines a Quality Score for each keyword you are looking to have your ads appear on.  It's a score between 1-10; 10 means you are awesome and theoretically pay less per click and a 1 means your ad won't get served very often if at all.  Google also defaults to NOT showing you your Quality Score (another pet peeve)
3. Click thru rate is a factor in Quality Score
4. So here's what happens.  Google shows your ads on additional search queries for broad match keywords.  If those ads don't get clicked on, Google's rationale is that well they'll eventually stop serving those ads on those queries and you aren't paying for them anyway, so what's the harm? Well see this screen shot for why I think this is a problem 

Notice how my ads were shown on 18,760 search queries and received zero clicks?  Sure I didn't pay for those ad impressions but what did they appear on?  Were they impacting my brand awareness?  Are there new terms that I didn't know before and haven't put a negative in that my ads are appearing on? Plus, are they session based searches?

In Google's drive to simplify their platform they have hidden data from their users.  Sure I didn't pay for them, but that's not the point.  I want control.  I want to see these terms especially for a branding or a political client.  I want my data back so I can make better decisions.  Come on Google you can do better and you have...

PardonMyFrench,

Eric

P.S. Here's what Google says about the "other search terms"

• The search term resulted in an ad impression but didn't receive any clicks in the last 30 days.
• The search term didn't receive a significant number of impressions.
• The search term triggered your ad within the past 24 hours.
• The search term contains private or personally identifying information such as a phone number.

 

Session Based Searches and Other Wasteful Clicks

A few friends shared this Wall Street Journal article with me yesterday called The Price of Unwanted Clicks and I found it very enlightening and sometimes often laughable.  The biggest discussion was on session based search results and how some advertisers think these clicks are costing them lots of money.  You know what?  They could be, but I'm not sure the average advertiser even knows what's going on and in the case of doctors, lawyers and other expensive click services it can be very costly. First, let's go over what these session based clicks are, how you can minimize them, and why hiring an expert is a good idea.

Session based clicks are a result of ads being shown on potentially unrelated keyword searches when a user has multiple searches within a single session.  Basically it is a way for Google to serve ads to a unique user rather than just a unique search.  The ads are shown below the typical paid sponsored results.  The way these ads are shown are when you use Broad match for your keywords.

Broad match is basically Google's way of expanding the amount of searches your ads appear on by an algorithm.  That of course includes session based searches.  Buying the name "john mccain" on broad match means if you don't know what you are doing, your ads can be shown on "french fries".   Broad can expand your buy to new search terms, cheaper clicks, and more sales, but of course can also generate unwanted useless clicks.

You can manage your broad searches with a number of techniques including negatives, account structure, search query data, and broad match modifiers.  See this is more complicated than what you thought, right?

Of course, Google wants to sell you more ads and wants to simplify the ad buying process for you.  However, paid search is anything but simple.  They want to make it so simple to expand their advertising base, but unless you are paying attention and stay up to date, you will most likely be dissatisfied with Google.  Remember, Google is in this to make money and constantly tries to improve the engineering behind search and marketing, so changes happen all the time.

You want my advice?  Hire an expert to manage your search campaigns.  If you are a business owner, why waste your time keeping up with the changes?  Let someone manage it who lives and breathes this stuff.  If you are paying like $8 per click, why mess around? It can cost you like the advertisers in the article.

PardonMyFrench,

Eric

Google's AdWords Holiday Offer - Did You Sign Up?

Google has been running what they are calling The Big Small Business Plan where new AdWords users and existing ones who implement conversion tracking  or maintain it, get $100 from Google when they spend $100.

They are even advertising on websites beyond just the AdWords login page - I found this ad on The New York Times. Now before a few opinions, let's take a look at the offer itself

1. The messaging is classic Google.  You don't have to stay small anymore and that you can grow with pay per click only advertising.  
2. They offer free account setup by calling an 800#
3. The sign up offer is good through 1/15 but they extended it at the end of the year (actually they were a little late in extending but anyway)
4. And it is good for the first one million small businesses which sounds great

So you as a small business should jump all over this, right?  Yes of course you should but you need help and not the kind Google is offering although their free setup is a good start. If anyone gives you $100 for free you should jump at it, however, jump in knowing what's happening...

1. Google advertising is much more complicated than the offer suggests.  You actually need professional, non-Google help
2. Google typically looks to manage accounts $10K+ per month and even then that's probably not enough any more.  I have one client billing $40K per month without a Google Account person - what do you think will happen with the small business billing $100 per month?
3. Years ago when Google was just starting out you could have had first mover advantage and just using their simple tools, you could have succeeded.  Now, unless you are entering a completely new market, the odds are there are prior advertisers with account history.
4. Google defaults you to all devices and all sites and recommends this for new advertisers.  Do you understand what this means?
5. Google uses different match types - exact, phrase, broad, negatives and recommends broad match.  Do you know how this impacts your campaign?
6. When you run a search campaign, you obviously get results and most of them are straight forward.  However, they automatically don't include Quality Score and Impression Share. Quality Score is probably the most important data point for you.
7. Quality Score determines whether your ad gets shown, how often, and your CPC.  It is impacted by account history, history of other advertisers, relevancy of keywords and ads, and relevancy of your landing pages.   Guess what?  Broad matches are more difficult to control
8. I could go on and on but I won't.  I'll leave you with this final point.  Text ads in Google's Display network, even though you are paying a CPC, suck and 99% of the time, I don't include them.
9. Oh and one more point.  Google is in this to make a lot of money.  They make money by showing the ads that makes them the most money.  You don't get clicks your ads don't get shown.

Is Google being generous?  Yes.  Should you sign up for the offer?  Yes.  Should you get help before you do any of that?  Yes.  Here's a link to help you find people in your area to help you.  

PardonMyFrench,

Eric

 

Google Maps for Mobile Phones Illustrates The Google Apple Fight

I was researching a mobile campaign for a new client.  I can't go   into details, but let's say that Google Maps is an important application for them so I clicked on a text ad to get more details on Google Maps and I saw this chart which got me thinking.  Why doesn't Google provide Business Reviews, Biking Directions, Latitude, Layers, My Maps, and Starred Items for iPhones yet provides them for Blackberrys, Nokia S60, and Windows devices?  Is this chart a typo or is Google purposely trying to make iPhones look the worst of any devices when it comes to Google features?

Seriously, you don't have to look very hard to see that the iPhone appears to be the worst device on the chart.  Is this what Apple vs Google has come down to?  Google penalizing Apple device users yet supporting Windows based phones?  I get saving special features for Android devices, but purposely penalizing a device that people love the most?  This doesn't seem very Google like and it appears to be purposely evil....I hope/wish this chart just hasn't been updates because it seems quite sad....

PardonMyFrench,

Eric

Old School Facelift #11 - Helping The Local Florist

About a month back I outlined my wife's terrible experience with 1800Flowers.  One of my comments I received was from a local florist who outlined the behind the scenes payment and delivery they received from 1900Flowers.  Now I have no idea whether what she wrote was true or not, but I tend to believe her.  So it got me thinking, what's a local florist supposed to do in order to avoid being a 1800Florist partner and fight them on their own. 

Old School Facelift #11 What's A Local Florist Supposed to Do?

1. Look You Need a Decent Website - I'm not a huge fan in spending a ton of money on a website unless you are planning on taking online orders.  If you do, then you need a good local website designer and programmer.  If not, you need a good, cheap brochure like site that drives to a phone number.  If that's your path you take, it is much more important for you to get a good URL that is search engine friendly, choose good titles, and write content carefully; all of these are critical in making sure your site is search engine friendly (ChesterNJFlorist.com)  Your goal is to get listed very high in Google's organic search results for say "florist 07930"   You need to out maneuver the giant advertisers by being smarter about your listings.
2. Capture Your Google Local Business Listing/Places Page - You know those great map listings that appear between the paid search ads at the top and the organic listings, make sure you edit your listing (for free or I can help you) because I've found that owner verified listings are placed ahead of the unverified listings.  Upload photos, coupons, plus you can pay a flat amount per month to have your listing stand out from every one else.  Finally, the Place listing comes back into play later on.
3. Updating Your Content - Again, I'm not a huge fan of building a blog right into the website, but if you can afford it, go for it.  However, if not, make sure you go to Wordpress or Typepad to get a free or cheap blog; it will work just as well as long as you link back to your main website.  You don't have to go crazy, but posting 1-2 times per week with pictures would be a good start.  This keeps your site(s) fresh and makes the search engines visit your sites more often.
4. Facebook if You Can - Now I see tons of local businesses with their Facebook pages and this is a good start, but just having a page is only the first step.  If you really want to make it work, you need to post regular updates because if you are an active Facebook user like myself, you will miss that once per month post and fade into obscurity.  Infrequent posts on a Facebook page will only get you a word of mouth endorsement if one of your potential customers has a Facebook friend who also happens to be a fan of your page.  Twitter is even more difficult because it offers you little to no utility from infrequent updates,  I would however, update and capture your Yelp listing.
5. Google AdWords - You knew this was coming, however you have a leg up if you link your AdWords and Places account.  By doing that you can enable local ad extensions so that when people are searching in your area for a florist, your text ad will show an address and phone number.  You should keep your paid search campaign very tight and focus your campaigns in your geo target.  Plus, you should geo your keywords (florist chester nj, florist 07930, etc) and put those words into regional geo targeted campaigns to get people who looking to send flowers to someone who is not in your immediate area (ex - sending flowers to a sick relative).  Next, I'd DEFINITELY make sure you set up a separate mobile campaign to capture people on the go.  Finally, if you can afford it, extend your Google campaign out to Bing-Yahoo because by the fall the merger will have gone through and you'll be able to capture an additional 30% of search volume.

Those are my quick tips to help the local florist.  If you are smart and set this up properly, Google is the great marketing equalizer where a well organized highly relevant campaign can compete and win versus the much larger advertiser.  Good luck,

PardonMyFrench,

Eric

How Important Is Google Places to AdWords?

I just finished taking the Search Advertising Advanced Exam for Google's Professional Certification Program and there were quite a number of questions on linking your Google AdWords accounts with your Google Places Account.  (BTW if you are wondering, the exam is super hard but I did pass).  So this got me thinking how important is Google Places?

Now, I've been keeping a close eye on the local marketing tactics available via Google Places.  Not familiar with it?  Basically as a small business owner you can customize the way your business appears in the local map results.  This is super important because the odds are if you are a local business your website will most likely never get enough visits to warrant a high organic listing.  However, if you customize your local business listing/Google Places page you can be high up when Google shows the map results ahead of the traditional organic listing. 

Besides getting the high listing in maps, you get free traffic reports, ability to add coupons and events, and for a flat fee per month you can highlight your listings.  However, the big kicker for me is when you link your AdWords account with your Places account.  Now your text ads can show an address which makes it stand out from your competition.

I can only conclude based on the amount of questions regarding Google Places that it is a key component of Google's growth in the future.  Sure the big ad agency is slowly embracing paid search, but if I had to guess, Google is really looking for a surge in accounts from the small business universe; hence the amount of questions that you needed to answer correctly in order to get your Advanced certification.  Need some help with your small business account, let me know...

PardonMyFrench,

Eric

Dear Google - Fix My AdWords Pet Peeves

Dear Google,

I love you.  You know how much I do.  I spend countless hours in AdWords for both desktop and mobile campaigns.  I also religiously use Reader, Gmail, Docs, AdPlanner, Google Places - the list goes on and on. However, I'd really like you to fix these pet peeves on mine - some are easy while one requires some work.

1) Please, please make Quality Score a default setting in AdWords.  Do you have any idea how many times I have to customize my keywords view to add Quality Score?  A ton.  Now any real student of paid search will profess how important Quality Score is so why not make it a default setting?  Yeah I get it that a small percentage of users actually add it to their views, but maybe that's because they have to know to add it.

2) Make an iPad version of AdWords Editor (this is the hard one).  Look you have to know by now that the iPad is really a mini computer, so why default users to your stripped down, kinda lame AdWords reporting interface?  Why not make an AdWords app?  I get you are in this battle with Apple but really this just hurts your users.

3) Writing about AdWords Editor why not add the ability to download ads made with your Google Ad Builder tool? Yeah I get that the ads are perhaps proprietary to you and perhaps you don't want users to get access to the Flash code, but cut us a break.  These ads are pretty cheesy so I wouldn't worry so much about people copy and pasting them onto their desktop or perhaps you can use some of those engineers to figure out a way to prevent the code from being downloaded.

4) Finally, give me the ability to download click to play video ads into AdWords Editor.  You know you want advertisers using it so why not make it easy for us to copy and paste it into other ad groups?

Thanks Google for listening.  I hope you make these changes.  PardonMyFrench,

Eric 

Facebook, Twitter, and Buzz - Which Tools Work Now?

(First let me state, I get the irony of this post being sent out to my Twitter account)

I used to be a religious user of Twitter.  Going back into early 2007, I Tweeted.  I even took upon myself to Tweet out McCain's daily campaign news clips in addition to my own opinion and articles that I found interesting.  Facebook for me, wasn't something I was really into and it did take a while for me to embrace their advertising platform, not because I'm stubborn, but because it took Facebook a while to come into the advertising prime time. Also, I didn't have a ton of my real life friends and family on Facebook, but that has changed and so has my use of both of them.

Nowadays Twitter has become so popular in everyday life, to me it has almost become a joke.    Not that the the platform isn't useful but people use it as a punch line it sitcoms, news programs, etc that it just doesn't seem cool anymore.  Sure, it is still the best place to get fast breaking news in addition to political news, but as a way to have interactive conversations with people, it just doesn't do it for me anymore.  I won't be disconnecting Twitter any time soon, but as a primary vehicle for communicating, it just doesn't seem right anymore.  Yes, I still Tweet but not as often.  Yes I still read Twitter for political news, but if you are a small business trying to get your own story out, I think there are better vehicles for you.

One of those is Facebook.  I do check Facebook multiple times per day and I do make a lot of posts.  It's just more personable and interactive.  Plus, a lot of friends and family are on there so it doesn't feel so alone anymore.  Also, if you are a new business and you can't figure out how to communicate in Facebook, what makes you think that Twitter will work for you?  Hone your marketing skills in Facebook and then move out to other communication tools.  However, Facebook has privacy problems and they are definitely in advertising revenue generation mode, so if you are a little nervous about them, there are alternatives.

That takes me to Google Buzz.  I was into it at the start and drifted away.  Now, I'm starting to take a look at it again.  The integration with Gmail and Google Reader is just too much to ignore.  However, you know what's holding it back?  Integration into other tools - like Typepad which doesn't have a link to share this post in Buzz or good integration into my iPad.  However, I think Google has a much better advertising model and takes privacy a little more seriously than Facebook.

My thoughts?  I think long term Twitter goes away somehow.  Facebook has too many regular people on it for it to be ignored.  They of course have a downside risk of becoming Geo Cities like MySpace.  I think Google Buzz is worthy enough to start to be taken seriously, so I'm going to be spending more time on it..I think you should too.

PardonMyFrench,

Eric

Yes It Is Google Surge Season

Last week during my online advertising panel at the Personal Democracy Forum, we spent some time discussing when and how to use a Google Surge.  This followed up another panel at the AAPC annual conference when we also spent some time discussing a Google Surge.  Since it is Google Surge season (if you haven't started running one by now, you are too late), here's what we discussed....

1. I like using Google's Ad Planner for forecasting a daily spend.   If you have a Google account manager they can also provide forecasts, but personally I've found my own personal forecasts are closer to what we spend.
2. Generally speaking, a Google Surge is not for the cheap advertiser.  You will spend a LOT of money if you do it correctly.
3. Do not expect to generate any donations from it and if you think you want to, you are running the wrong online tactic.  This is a branding, messaging, and Get Out The Vote tactic.
4. We have successfully generated email and petition signups as long the message is a current hot topic or you have a great creative; otherwise, don't expect any decent CPAs and if you think you have a good, pertinent message, test your way into it because you can blow your money quickly,
5. Speaking (really writing) about creatives, I prefer TV commercials as my creatives.  Your offline agency has spent a lot of time and money testing the message and building the creative, so why reinvent the wheel?  Google makes it super easy for you to use it - either run a click to play video or a YouTube video ad or if you have the money, use a rich media vendor like Mixpo.
6. Finally, the geo-target is your most important factor, but also take a look at the settings available in Google so you can fine tune your marketing.

PardonMyFrench,

Eric

Mobile and Google Reader and Buzz - More Reasons to Like Buzz

OK - I've been experimenting with Google's Twitter Killer Buzz and while the web version is good, what makes Buzz even more interesting is the interoperability with Google Reader and how you can use it on your high end mobile device.  Before I give some screen shots of what Buzz looks like on an iPhone, here's what I like about Buzz and Google Reader.

Reader is nicely integrated with Buzz.  Now whenever I share an article with a note it gets automatically  sent out to my Buzz.  Also, the people I follow in Buzz now appear as a Reader subscription.  Both of these are nice additions and compliments Reader as much as it does Buzz.

However, as I mentioned in my first post on Buzz, the really interesting part is the iPhone app.   Buzz is easily read on my iPhone but it also adds in some neat feature like nearby Buzzes to your location as well as creating a map that overlays the Buzz especially when it comes to places on Google maps.  So for all of the naysayers about what Buzz will look like on a high end mobile phone, here you go...

 Here's a screen shot of what Buzz looks like for people near you...

And here's a screen shot of the main page.    Once again very easy to use and see on your high end mobile device.

Anyway - between Gmail, Reader, and Mobile the Google team had a lot of good things to be proud of at launch.  I also think they reacted quickly regarding the privacy concerns by publishing more information to help people get over them.  Anyway, I think Twitter's run is over as the primary spot for short message updates.  It will get absorbed by a desperate company like Yahoo while Facebook and Google continue their stand off (BTW - I get the irony of stating Twitter's run is over and using Twitter to push this post out),

PardonMyFrench,

Eric

Google Gives Twitter a Buzz Cut

Just the other day Google launched Buzz which is an add on feature into Gmail that lets you follow people and have people follow you for updates.  Basically it is Twitter on steroids because you aren't limited to 140 characters and can add in video, pictures and more.  However, what makes this a major problem for Twitter are the easy linkages into Gmail and the mobile aspect of Buzz.

First the linkage to Gmail and before I go into a detailed conversation about it, let me just preface it by saying I am a Google fanboy.  There are few things Google does that doesn't work.  However, one part consistent about Google is the relentlessness it is in interoperability with all of its products (except really Google Wave). Gmail, Reader, Docs, YouTube, AdSense, Voice, etc all can work together under one account and that's the first part of Buzz that hits Twitter right between the T's - Buzz has something that Twitter will never have - interoperability with dozens of other products you use every day.

Second is Google's mobile version of Buzz which makes it even more powerful. You see once you sign in it asks to use your location.  Now you can find people nearby with Buzz activated.  Also, if you visit a Google Places you can see any buzz about that location and also leave your own Buzz.  Finally, you can also leave a Voice Buzz from your Android or iPhone.  

Twitter has absolutely no answer for Buzz.  Sadly, over time Twitter will either be bought by someone desperate (Yahoo comes to mind) or will fade into the sunset like MySpace or Geo Cities. I don't see Facebook going downhill because of Buzz, but who knows.  Right now it just looks like a Twitter killer to me.  Oh before you jump right in, make sure you read this great piece by Molly Wood about Privacy issues with Buzz...

PardonMyFrench,

Eric 

It's Official Google Renames Network Blast To Google Surge

You knew it was bound to happen.  In true open source fashion and crowd sourcing, Google is now calling their network blast technique a Google Surge - the phrase which yours truly coined back in the 2007 election when we (Connell Donatelli Inc) used it to help Bobby Jindal win the Governor's seat in Louisiana. Since that time, I can pretty much guarantee you that we've run more Google Surges than anyone else in the political space; don't get fooled if we (and I) don't talk about a Surge for a client.

Anyway, a nice summary of the Google Surge technique from Google's AdWords Agency blog can be found here.  Personally, I'd be very interested to hear from non-political advertisers on how they've used a Google Surge to help with the marketing goals.  Obviously it works great in politics because of the hard deadline we have, but I can also think of other uses for it outside of politics including financial services (IRA season ends on April 15), general brand awareness at a product launch, heck even during the holiday season (last chance to get a gift delivered in time for the holidays).

If you want more detail on how to run a Google Surge, see my original post - not only do I explain what it is I also give you some helpful tips.  Anyway, glad to see Google is giving into my link baiting strategy (just joking) and started calling it a Surge.

PardonMyFrench,

Eric

Are You Still Not Using Google's Ad Planner?

I've been directing online advertising campaigns since the mid 90s for very large companies (AT&T, DLJ/Harrisdirect) as well as small companies and political campaigns (ex - John McCain for President). When I've worked for big companies I had access to media planning tools and I've used them all - Nielsen, @Plan, comScore; in fact, I met with some of the current comScore executive team before they became executives. Usually these services are great for planning, but when you actually made a specific media buy these analyses don't match what actually went into market.

These types of services cost a monthly fee that as a small business owner I find a little tough to swallow and it was a little tough to swallow for the political agency I do work for.  So, that's why I'm a huge believer in Google's Ad Planner tool; the new enhancements including actual ad placements make this invaluable to the small advertiser.  This is just another reason why working with Google helps small advertisers operate like big advertisers without all of the upfront costs:

1. Ad Planner allows you to build media plans and forecasts by demo and geographic targets for FREE
2. Ad Planner provides pretty, professional charts for your plans for FREE
3. Build your own banner ads gives you the chance to run flash ads for FREE.  Sure they are slightly better than average creatives, but did I mention they are FREE?
4. Paid search is the great money equalizer because you are rewarded for great relevancy; plus the geo targeting, time of day targeting, creative building, and budget management are all FREE
5. Google's Content network allows you to buy on a CPC or CPM basis across big and small sites all using demographic and content targeting

The actual media buys themselves of course costs money but you can have everything run via credit card which gives you maximum freedom to lower or increase spends or shut it off whenever you want.  Plus, if you spend a moderate amount per month (~$10K) you can get access to one of Google's account teams.

Yes improvements to the Ad Planner are just another reason why Google is your best friend for advertising, especially if you are a small business or small client.  The only complaint I have with the Ad Planner is the lack of ability to geo-target at anything other than Country, State, Metro, or City; plus the City targeting is annoying because they aren't grouped alphabetically by state, but alphabetically by Metro (try looking for specific cities in Virginia).  However, I'm happy with the tool I have because it does most of what I want for FREE and I know Google will continue to make improvements.

PardonMyFrench,

Eric

Confessions of a 10 Year AT&T Vet - I Like Google Voice

Those of you who read this website might not know that I worked at AT&T for 10 years.  In fact, after my first year of graduate school I started as an intern at an internal consulting group called Business Operations Analysis - kind of a nerd factory of nerds that was even part of Bell Labs for a short while.  After about 4 years in BOA I joined the consumer marketing groups and stayed there for about 6 years progressing up the ranks to Division Manager of a 25 person group called eAT&T or OneRate Online.  I dropped a lot of direct mail (probably about 100 million) and made millions of outbound telemarketing calls over those 6 years of marketing. 

One of those campaigns was for a product called TrueConnections.  TrueConnections is/was a follow-me 500# so that your callers called one number and you could program the number to ring at various numbers you owned.  Of course AT&T charged you for it and back in the mid 90s it seemed pretty cool, but as I recall it was too niche of a product targeted at Road Warriors and we didn't sell many plans.  Personally I didn't really use mine and didn't have much use for a product like that until last week.  That's when I got my Google Voice invite.

Now some of my AT&T brothers and sisters will turn their noses up at this product and when it first came out I didn't care for it either.  However, after setting it up last week I'm hooked.  Here's my experience with it so far:

1. Domestic calls are free.  I get that - no big deal, but if you don't make international calls, what's better than free?
2. Yes there's some issues with making calls on its network using your iPhone but I don't care.  I have one of those all you can eat plans with AT&T and have some rollover minutes.  I want Google Voice for the inbound calling features, not the outbound so the iPhone fight doesn't impact me.
3. It took me about an hour to pick out my number.  You can try coming up with a vanity number but I couldn't come up with one I liked, besides I'm not convinced a vanity number isn't a pain for dialers.  In the end I chose a local number that I think is easy to remember - 908.867.8001.
4. Setting up which numbers ring when you dial my Google Voice # was a piece of cake as is the user interface.
5. Ok - then came the time consuming part which took me about 2 hours.  In order to really get some use out of Google Voice you need to organize your contacts and put them into groups.  Each one of these groups can have different ring options and different voice mail greetings.  For example:

• Vendors that you don't want to hear from go straight to voice mail
• Friends and Family ring my three numbers, but the home phone only rings after 6 PM
• Connell Donatelli and Campaign Solutions co-workers get a special greeting

So after a few hours of organizing my contacts and then a few minutes setting up my voice mail greetings I experienced the last really cool part (so far) of Google Voice.  After someone leaves you a message you get an email or a text message notification that you have a new voice mail.  And, if that isn't cool enough Google does an ok job of transcribing the voice mail into text.  My experience with it so far is that this feature isn't something to rely on but cool none the less.

A single number for people to call you on for free?  Email notifications, transcription of voice mails to text, and individual greetings and call routings by group - those are a lot of cool features.  

I like Google Voice and so will my AT&T brothers and sisters.

PardonMyFrench,

Eric

Google's New View Through Conversions Tracking - About Time

I logged on to one of my political AdWords accounts last night and I saw a new column called View-through Conv. and I was definitely pleased.  Sure it is only for your Content Network campaigns but I'm glad they finally added it because this type of metric has been around for years and as I've written before Google's Content Network is a great platform for display advertising especially for the small business marketer. 

View-through or impression based conversion tracking has been available for a while.  Historically, around 50% of your conversions could be view-through for banner ads with about 80% of them coming through within the first 5 days.  I tested this for search years ago and found that 90% of the latencies come within 1 day so that's probably one of the reasons Google isn't providing this for search.  If you want to read more I've reprinted a short post below that I made almost 4 years ago.  Enjoy the walk down memory lane - I did....

Latency What Is It Good For?

I was asked a few days ago to explain latency or view through/impression sales in a beautiful office overlooking the Potomac River. And, if you don't know either, I'm honored to be the first to explain it to you. Now maybe we can explain a lot of those unknown sales you've been tracking on your sales reports!Have you ever been looking to buy something at your favorite e-commerce site while at work and just before you hit the next button, your pesky boss pops up from behind, so you close your browser. Sound familiar? Well it should. Industry studies (although an old one) show that 75% of all shopping carts get abandoned. Are we to assume that these items are never bought or are they sometimes bought later? Perhaps when the boss is at lunch? 

Let's say (really write) that you are an online marketing manager for a shoe company and you use an ad server to place your ads on your media buy. A potential buyer clicks on your banner, visits your site, and just before they complete the shopping cart, that boss shows up again, and they abandon the cart. However, they show up the next day without clicking on the same banner and complete the sale. Now what? Well, armed with a cookie courtesy of your ad server, a completed sale, and a click on a banner, your ad server should be able to determine which cookie completed the sale and which banner generated the sale. Therefore, you have a latent sale. Sometimes, those pesky consumers never click on your banner and then mysteriously arrive at your site and make a sale; this is called a view through or impression based sale.

Doesn't sound like a big deal to you? Well it should because I've seen average latent sales in the 55%-60% range and the % varies from site to site and from product to product; especially when the product has a long sales process or sign-up page. Several companies that I'm aware only started tracking latents recently and up until then had a large % of sales generated from unknown channels.

Think you know everything now. Well there's a lot more to it especially when it comes to interpreting the number and running campaigns using latent sales. However, that's for another week.

PardonMyFrench,

Eric

Let's say (really write) that you are an online marketing manager for a shoe company and you use an ad server to place your ads on your media buy. A potential buyer clicks on your banner, visits your site, and just before they complete the shopping cart, that boss shows up again, and they abandon the cart. However, they show up the next day without clicking on the same banner and complete the sale. Now what? Well, armed with a cookie courtesy of your ad server, a completed sale, and a click on a banner, your ad server should be able to determine which cookie completed the sale and which banner generated the sale. Therefore, you have a latent sale. Sometimes, those pesky consumers never click on your banner and then mysteriously arrive at your site and make a sale; this is called a view through or impression based sale.

comScore Shows Google's Nearly Impregnable Search Fortress

comScore released its August 2009 search numbers and while a lot of people, especially Microsoft fanboys, will be jumping for joy as Microsoft gained core search share by 0.4% to 9.3% and Google dropped by 0.1% to 64.6, I for one don't see the joy.  In fact, comScore's report show's Google's dominance is quite secure and for the moment quite safe.  

You see the numbers that everyone reports is a comScore metric called core searches which is basically searches off of the main search site like Google.com.  However, as any Google fanboy (like me) will tell you, Google is much more than searches off of Google.com.  It includes Gmail. Google Docs, Google Books, News, and of course a little known site called YouTube.  And, that's where things get very interesting.

Look a little lower in the report and you'll see something called Expanded search which lists out all search activity including video and search activity on the non-core sites.  It is this report which shows how dominant Google's search strategy is and why Microsoft has a long, long way to go to catch a giant.

1. Google isn't just 7x larger like the core report shows; all Google properties versus all Microsoft properties is TEN TIMES LARGER THAN MICROSOFT.  Why do you think Google gives you all of those products for free?
2. YouTube while losing some share in August is the second largest search property around.  YouTube is so large that it is 28% larger than Yahoo and twice as large as Bing.  Think about that for a second, if Bing is hugely successful they'd have to knock of Yahoo and YouTube before Google even blinks.
3. You can look at the rest of the sites on the list, but they are so small it really doesn't matter much but they are interesting.  For example, eBay and AOL losing share and Facebook is growing quickly probably driven by their huge growth. 

Yes Bing is an exciting product.  Yes Microsoft is spending $100 million in advertising to boost their search but right now all they have generated is a little buzz and some excitement.  I haven't noticed a blip in the amount of paid search advertising that I've run for clients and I've tried.  I also doubt Google has noticed a blip in their search activity.  In fact, I bet Google is more concerned with expanded search and in that case, Google is STILL growing.  Microsoft isn't even close right now.

PardonMyFrench,

Eric

Google's Content Network Just Got Better

With the early morning announcement that DoubleClick's Ad Exchange Network is now available in Google's Content Network, you should be very excited.  Now there are even more sites involved and based on my experience with DoubleClick's network, I'd assume that there are some new high quality sites.

What this means for you is that if you were running a Google Surge, you should now go back and ask your Google Reps for an updated site list.  If you had been using Google for placement targeting against certain demographics you should now go update that list.

I'm thrilled.  This gives you more reasons to shift dollars to Google where you get good placements with great targeting and reporting, all with competitive prices via at worst a credit card where you get maximum flexibility.  This already makes a great product, even better.

PardonMyFrench,

Eric

Fight The Smears versus The Birthers

(Just a fair warning  - I AM NOT A BIRTHER)

The other day while working on an online advertising campaign for one of our clients I came across the following text ad from FightTheSmears.com.  It's obviously an ad trying to debunk the theories that President Obama is not a US citizen.  However, I found this ad interesting on a number of fronts...

1. It is September 2009 which is almost a full three years before President Obama's reelection.
2. I found another ad in Google's Content Targeting network which suggests either a tactic to massively expand out the campaign and/or garner dirt cheat impressions.  Notice I wrote impressions and not clicks.  Text ads in Google's Content Network woefully under-perform and I always recommend to not waste your time with them.
3. They are also running paid search ads to intercept people looking for this information, but what I find very fascinating is that the Google Search Trends on this topic is slowing down and appears to be limited to a few states in the South and West.
4. The actual text ad I grabbed was an in-text video overlay on top of a YouTube video about a California Small Business Owner ripping into her Congressmen at a Town Hall Meeting on Obama Care.  It takes a little more effort to put this ad inro your AdWords system so clearly this is something they wanted to do.

Is the Obama Administration really that concerned about the birther theories that they will run ads almost 3 years before a massive amount of people will care again?  If you ran the trends back to fall 2008 you'll see that the peak was really October 2008 which of course was right before the election.  However, they are spending time, energy, and money to really blast this message out via Google's Content Network and YouTube.  The in-text video overlay clearly shows that they are ok with a very loose targeting and even though it is really out of context (ObamaCare versus Obama's Birth Certificate) they are getting an impression view of the message.  

Then again there is always the flip side that could be happening.  That's is since the Trends are slowing and it appears that most of the significant traffic is from the South and West, wouldn't they be better off just leaving this alone?  Aren't they potentially fueling the fire by keeping this alive and being defensive?  Heck even risking that the impressions that are being served will leave the reverse message in the viewers mind since the ad isn't really in the right context?

BTW  -  just to drive you readers crazy, is it possible that Obama is ok with the wrong message? Perhaps they think that by keeping it out there that they are making the extreme right side of the Republican base seem a little crazier than normal.  Perhaps by responding in this matter they can keep the issue alive, driving a wedge between potential independent voters who may not want to be associated with birthers?

Unless Obama has data for my last theory, at this point I'd recommend shutting this campaign down.  It really makes them look defensive on an issue that has lost steam.  Then again, I wouldn't be surprised that they have polling data to support my last theory.  At any rate, it is clear that the Obama Administration will be a never ending campaign and unlike past administrations the next election will always be front and center.  That's certainly a change from the past.  

PardonMyFrench,

Eric

How to Run Advertising in Google's Content Network

Those of you who have been reading this site for the past years know how much I love Google for marketing. Even during the campaign season I was a huge proponent of Google especially Google's Content Targeting for branding and messaging.  Occasionally during the Presidential Campaign we'd hit a home-run like the ads we ran for McCain against Obama meeting with Iran's President Ahmadinejah but for the most part Google's Content network was good for getting dirt cheap impressions as well as dirt cheap cost per video view; during the primary season we enjoyed a 7 cents cost per video playrate - beat that TV!  Plus, there's always the use of Google Surge for blasting out ads in a geographic area.

Anyway, I think Google must have made some changes to their targeting  in the content network because as of late I'm seeing marvelous results.  Here's why I'm loving Google's Content Targeting and I'm using my own small marketing campaign to try and rent some space in my Union NJ office.

• Paid Search Can Be Super Expensive - I'm targeting a 25 mile radius around Union, NJ which would include NYC.  The paid search per click rate just to get on the first page is north of $2.00 for the most part and before you jump all over me, I'm talking about a quality score of 7+ in my ad groups; rental real estate is just competitive and with big players. I have to run it, but I'm not happy because it is my own money.
• Building Banner Ads - I don't recommend running text ads in Google's content network because I   believe there is little brand value and you are typically in a 300x250 ad unit with two other advertisers.  So you are probably saying, Eric - I can't make flash ads or Eric - I dont want to pay my agency to build them.  Well don't worry because Google has tools to build your own ads - all you need is a click thru URL, some ideas, as well as an image or two and then go through their library looking for the creative you like.  Make you changes, Google resizes them for you (please evaluate all sizes) and bingo you have a flash ad for FREE.  Here's what one of mine looks like.
• Setting Up Content Ad Groups - I recommend smaller keywords in your ad groups to get maximum exposure.  It also seems to help with the targeting engine as long as the words in the group relate to each other
• Top 3 Position Only - I usually start cost per clicks in the 30 cents range and let it run for a day or two.  Then I adjust the bids to make sure I am in the top 3.  In my example, my actual cost per click is 57 cents with an average position of 2.3.  In search my average cost per click is $1.59 with an average position of 6.8; that's a 64% savings for the same amount of clicks.  
• Site Targeting - once I get going I like to add in actual website addresses so I make sure my ads appear.  I can use the Content Targeting Site Selector tool or Google's Ad Planner which is a personal favorite of mine (did I mention this is free?) to find sites.
• Demotargeting - you can also further segment your marketing using simple demographic targets like age, gender, income, education, and a few other.  Again this is FREE.
• Optimize and Track

Seriously - cheaper rates, free impressions, ability to create your own flash ads for free, add in geotargeting and demotargeting for free, plus a media planning tool that most companies pay $10K per month means that Google's Content Network is a must use for advertisers, especially small advertisers.

PardonMyFrench,

Eric

Google Becomes Bing Only on Chrome?

I went on this morning to research a new client for a meeting I have later on this morning.  I typed in the keyword "energy drink" and low and behold the search results in Google are now very Bing like.  I was surprised to see the new left hand margin this morning which now includes the ability to filter based on time (much welcome) and related searches.  See this screen shot:

It didn't take Google very long to launch a competitive view similar to Bing which either means they have great spies at MSN or their engineers work at lightning speed.  On other searches, Google now includes a section called "All Results" which tries to further refine your search results.  The one thing I'm still waiting for from Google is search previews on the natural search results which I've read somewhere they are testing.

Also of interest is that I tried the same search with Internet Explorer and Firefox and I DID NOT see the same type of new search results.  It seems to be only available with Google's browser Chrome and of course I'm not sure if Google is just testing it out now.

So, for you Chrome users enjoy the new search layout.  If you are an AdWords advertiser you should start thinking about how to reorganize your search to make sure you are buying the "related search" terms for your best performing words.  That's what I'm instructing people to start working on today.

PardonMyFrench,

Eric

Bing versus Google on Local Search Results

My wife just walked into my office and asked if had the number to our local Long Valley, NJ PNC bank.  So like the smart mouth I am sometimes I said "You know there's this thing called Google" and then I gave her the phone number.  As she walks out she says "I use Bing!" which was an awesome reply. So out of curiosity I went to Bing and then to Google and typed out the exact same search queery "pnc bank long valley, nj". And do you know what I found, Bing's results were organized better.  See these screen shots:

Now we'll look at Bing. Right up at the top is the Long Valley branch phone number.  Now it is hard to find it on their local map, but I know it is Long Valley because of the NPANXX combination (908876).  Of course at the bottom is the Yellow Pages listing.

Now let's pop over to Google and here's their screen shot.  At the top is the main PNC Bank page with some links but nothing there about branch locations and historically those bank branch locators take too many clicks to get the answer.  #2 result is Yahoo's local listing where the phone number is which is what I originally gave to my wife.  #3 is a job listing and #4 is Google's local listing with a much easier to read map and the phone number.

It is almost like Bing knew I just needed the local branch phone number and not everything else.  Google correctly listed the most relevant search for PNC Bank at the top but put the local listings at the bottom which is not quite the order for a local search.  Anyway, Google is still #1 for me but Bing offers a good product - Yahoo and the rest are not relevant.

PardonMyFrench,

Eric

Revenge of Google Reader and The Blog

About a week ago Google announced major changes to Google Reader.  Obviously you can read the post for more details but here's what I liked...

• Send To Function - while reading your feeds you can immediately send the article to Facebook, Twitter and a host of other sites.  Oddly enough I couldn't get Twitter to work using Google's browser Chrome; I think it has something to do with the pop up blocker, but sadly I gave up.  I couldnt even find the ability to white list Twitter.
• Clear Out Unread Feeds Automatically - Instead of going into your reader and seeing 1000s of unread news and then clearing them out one by one, you can have Reader clear them out every day, week, or every two weeks.

There were other changes but sadly I couldn't find too many friends to follow, but it did cause me to upload my contact list to Google to look for them.  I also rediscovered Google Reader's Share This with comments and loaded that on to my blog in the margin.  

More reasons to love Google.  This is the revenge of Google Reader and probably will help boost blog readership and more importantly blog authorship.  Believe it or not, I think this is a shot right up against Micro Blogging...

PardonMyFrench,

Eric

Florida's Archaic Election Laws

The Wall Street Journal reported yesterday on a ruling by the Florida Election Commission that St. Petersburg Mayor Candidate Scott Wagman's ads on Google appear to violate state disclosure laws even though exceptions already exist for bumper stickers and buttons and the click thru URL did contain a disclosure.  My friend Kate Kaye also reported on this ruling as did techPresident's Nancy Scola  who supplied a local news video in the article.  After reading these articles plus some of the testy comments left on them, here's my take on what's going on since I've run quite a lot of political paid search, social networking, and banner advertising in the past few years :-)

• According to the video Scott Wagman relied heavily on the internet to get his message out.  That's good for him.
• Scott believed (guessing here) that Google ads and Facebook ads were kosher without the disclosure as per Federal guidelines that gave an exception to these small ads.
• Florida's Election Commission believes the ads violate their state disclosure rules.  They give exceptions for bumper stickers and buttons, yet didn't think about search ads EVEN THOUGH NATIONAL CAMPAIGNS RAN A TON OF ADS DURING THE PRIMARY AND GENERAL.
• When Hillary Clinton finally launched her paid search campaign they used some of the characters for the disclaimer which resulted in this terrible creative. Is this what the Florida Election Commission wants to have running?
• Look, don't try and tell me that Florida's Election Commission never noticed the national ads in the past few years so to not take some time to issue updated guidelines and then flag a local guy using them is well, pure BS.
• A lot of local elections have a lot of, how should I write this, personal issues and some times (not all), a competitor or competitor supporter files a complaint.  I don't know if that's the case here, but it seems strange that the campaign relying on online advertising gets flagged.

Generally speaking I'm a state's right kind of guy but this is a case of where the states are clueless.  To turn a blind eye to what's going on at the national level and rule on a campaign that desperately needs the internet is shameful.  BTW - it highlights that Google has a long way to go in policy education.

PardonMyFrench,

Eric

Yahoo's Deal with Microsoft Like Eating Bacon Every Day of Your Life

Who doesn't like bacon?  In the short term or in small doses it tastes great and heck it is low in calories (high in fat).  You eat it every day and in the long term it will kill you.  That's what I think about the Microsoft Yahoo marketing partnership.  In the short term it helps Yahoo but in the long term it kills their search business.  The most significant part of this deal to me is that Bing will power Yahoo's search and that's going to kill Yahoo over the long term.

PRE GOOGLE OVERTURE RULED
Back in the early days of search, I cut an advertising deal for CSFBdirect with GoTo.com which would later be rebranded as Overture.  This was before Google had a paid advertising platform.  The folks at Overture were great and so was the platform powering our paid search results for delivering new account openings.  Everyone was happy, everyone that is who wasn't getting screwed on the bid spread. Anyway then along came Yahoo who bought Overture.

YAHOO FAILS TO INVEST IN SEARCH  - GOOGLE GROWTH
In 2003, Yahoo bought Overture and in the beginning things were fine.  The search sales team remained the same and our results were pretty steady.  Google came on the scene and then of course the paid search landscape changed.  However Yahoo held its own for us (then Harrisdirect) but by the middle of 2004, Yahoo really started to tank and Google zoomed past them.  This was a double whammy for Yahoo.  They hadn't invested in the search platform and Google grew which actually ended up hurting them.  Google never looked back and left Yahoo in their dust.

NOW BING
Basically Yahoo is repeating history.  Clearly they were caught off guard by Bing with all of their management shakeups and as I wrote Yahoo was the short term target for Microsoft with Bing.  In fact, Business Week's article on Bing a month back or so highlighted how much damage it would do to Yahoo.  Now instead of being able to invest in their search platform or my likely because of their lack of investment in the search platform in recent history (Lu left Yahoo in August 2008), they can't compete with Bing let alone Google.

Therefore Yahoo pretty much dooms itself in the long term by ceding control of their search technology to Microsoft.  Sure in the short term it is Yahoo's only option to even have a viable search program; plus, combined with Microsoft who gets a huge boost in search traffic, it actuallyt creates a reasonable competitor to Google.  However, this market is driven by technology and the latest improvements to search, now Yahoo removes itself from the game probably forever.

PardonMyFrench,

Eric

P.S. Copy of Microsoft's Steve Ballmer email below.  BTW - further backing up my post above, Steve wrote 

We will get the resources and scale we need to compete effectively in search and to continue to drive new innovation for customers and advertisers, while Yahoo will increase their focus and investment on their online consumer experiences and other business priorities.

Even Microsoft isn't sure what Yahoo gets out of the deal

Eric

From: Steve Ballmer [mailto:[email protected]]
Sent: Wednesday, July 29, 2009 7:30 AM
To: Microsoft - All Employees (QBDG)
Subject: Announcing a partnership with Yahoo! to expand search innovation and competition
Importance: High

As you’ve heard me say many times, search is a critical business for us.  We took a major step forward two months ago, when we announced Bing.  Already, Bing has generated huge buzz, great reviews, and early usage figures ahead of our expectations. 

Today we’re taking another important step in redefining search and search advertising.  Later this morning, I’ll be announcing a partnership with Yahoo in a conference call with Yahoo’s CEO Carol Bartz.

This deal is a win-win for Microsoft and Yahoo.  We will get the resources and scale we need to compete effectively in search and to continue to drive new innovation for customers and advertisers, while Yahoo will increase their focus and investment on their online consumer experiences and other business priorities.

As part of the deal, Bing will become the search and search advertising platform for all Yahoo properties, and we will acquire the rights to Yahoo’s search engine and advertising platform technology.  The combination of Bing and Yahoo’s scale and technology will accelerate the improvement of search – we’ll be able to add new features and improve the relevancy of search results more quickly than ever.  And with expanded scale, we’ll be able to offer advertisers greater return on their investment. 

There will be tremendous efficiency gains for both companies.  Microsoft will assume responsibility for constantly improving search and search advertising technology on behalf of both companies.  We see so much opportunity improve search on behalf of our customers – to make search more relevant and more useful to consumers, and more than just a list of blue links.  Yahoo will assume responsibility for search advertising sales to certain premium customers on behalf of both companies.  Given the huge opportunities in search and online advertising, we plan to redeploy most if not all affected employees into new high-priority functions. 

Given the importance of the search marketplace, this proposed agreement will of course require careful review by regulators, which will take some time, but we believe it will strengthen competition and choice. 

It’s been a long road to today’s announcement, but I’m extremely happy with where we ended up.  This agreement will help bring choice and transparency back to consumers, advertisers and publishers.  It will accelerate our efforts to restore competition to the search market currently dominated by one company.  And it’s a huge validation of our strategy to redefine search, and all the great work the Bing and adCenter teams are doing.  This deal will accelerate our efforts toward long-term success in search and search advertising.

You can learn more at a joint website we’ve established, which provides a summary of the deal and the advantages it will provide for consumers, advertisers and publishers.

Steve

Microsoft's Search Target with Bing is Yahoo Not Google

I saw a bunch of links over the weekend that was touting some small minute gain of Microsoft in the US Search market due to Bing.  Most of these posts promote the $100 million in advertising Microsoft is spending and the rave reviews Bing receives for usability as a reason for Google to worry.  I think these articles are just ways for people to take a shot at Google or folks that really want to cheer for an underdog.  BTW - here's a good synopsis of the recent search postings courtesy of MediaPost.

I've worked with Microsoft for about 10 years.  I also spent a while at AT&T so I know how big monopolist companies think.  Sure would Microsoft like to knock down Google?  Of course.  Do I think that's their short term target?  No.  It is Yahoo.  Here's why...

1. Microsoft tried buying Yahoo and was turned away.  That was the classic telcom move from the 90s.  Don't spend the money buying share, spend the money buying the competitor right above you.  When Yahoo turned them down, now we see what MSN's plan B was.
2. Google has way too many intertwined products that all types of users benefit from.  Google has free tools for publishers, advertisers, and consumers.  Some like Google Docs and Google Reader cut across multiple user types.  Basically thinking about wars fought without computers, Google is an entrenched opponent dug in on a giant mountain - it would require too many battle fronts to take them on.  However,
3. Yahoo has little defenses.  Seriously, how many Yahoo products do you use?  Sure they still have a dominant web presence, but they don't work together that well.  You use Flickr?  Is it integrated with their products?  Do you advertise with Yahoo?  Is their display advertising inseparable from their search?  Do they have intertwined products that all types of users want or use?  Yahoo with its new CEO is a company in disarray right now and their search share is clearly within MSN's reach.
4. Microsoft needs Google to protect them.  Huh?  Yes protect them from the Federal Government.  Let Google be the dominant force in search and let them take any potential heat.  MSN would rather play the David to the Google Goliath and stay out of the Federal Government's anti-trust cross hairs.

Yahoo is the search company in deep trouble because of Bing.  Yahoo once lost their lead in search to an upstart named Google because of internal struggles and an unwillingness to invest in their search platform.  I'm afraid it will happen again.  Microsoft clearly has Yahoo in their sight and Bing was the plan B when buying Yahoo fell apart.  Steve Ballmer will get his revenge on Yahoo.

PardonMyFrench,

Eric

Google The Great Money Equalizer

I just finished a fun interview with Micah Sifry over at Personal Democracy Forum and I used one of my favorite lines which is Google Is The Great Money Equalizer.  I also touch on this subject in my keynote next week in London for Econsultancy's Future of Digital Marketing conference.

Basically the idea behind this is that Google puts so many tools at your disposal there is no reason a smaller marketer can't take on and compete with a big marketer.  I perfected this while at Harrisdirect when we competed with the big players like Schwab and Fidelity and one could argue that we did quite well with Senator McCain's Primary and General Election campaigns.  Anyway, here's why Google is the great money equalizer:

1. Keywords - everyone's keywords are different and depending on your strategy you may or may not choose certain words to bid on or you might even focus just on long tail words.
2. Quality Score - Google rewards your smart, relevant campaigns with good Quality Score so even though you might not have as much money as your competitor  you can out Google them.
3. Free Conversion Tracking - using Google's own tools you'll know how effective your marketing is and once again if you are setting and meeting your own conversion goals, you can be smarter on how you use your marketing dollars.
4. Click to Play Video Ads - have a commercial you are running or perhaps that's too expensive?  You can add click to play video ads on Google's content network where you can have your ad watched for free and only pay per click when they go to your website.
5. Geo-targeting - zipcodes, states, MSA, major cities, or even hand drawn targeted areas, you can dominate a target market for no additional costs.
6. Behavior Targeting - even though Google is not as major of a supplier of Behavioral Targeting as say - Yahoo or Ad Networks, you can use age, income, gender, demos to reach a specific audience.  Throw in content targeting off your keywords and you can finely target for no additional money.
7. Placement Targeting - Again for no additional fees you can hand select sites where your ads appear and then get good placements based on an ongoing auction process.  Are you just looking forward to buying crap impressions on MySpace?  Have no fear you can usually get on that "site" for about 10 cents per 1000.
8. Self Directed - You can turn your campaign off and on or even increase it all with the click of your mouse.  No more calling into an account exec who won't honor a 24 hour cancellation clause.
9. Google Surge - Dominate your competition in a short, contained burst across 80% of the internet.

That's why Google is the great equalizer.  Where else can you get service like that for no increased rates and no commitments?

PardonMyFrench,

Eric 

Dear Google - I Still Have Two AdWords Pet Peeves

About two weeks ago we were involved in some primary races in PA which of course meant a heavy dose of using Google for marketing.  In fact, ALL down ballot races should run Google for marketing.  Anyway, we were supposed to map our Google ad buy to targeted areas in the state.  One of our selling points is that with Google you can target down to a zip code level so we could do an even better job of mapping the targeting strategy than the TV buy.  The sales pitch went this way...

• DM - of course you can target to individuals, but counties and zip codes are also used
• TV - you are usually buying at the MSA level
• Print - county for local levels and MSA for statewide races
• Search - anything right?

Well it wasn't as easy as you'd think.  Sure if the client gave me zip codes I could have loaded them up, but they didn't have them.  What they did have was County targets, but Google doesn't allow for county targeting.  You of course can hand draw for Congressional DIstrict targeting, but try doing that for more than one district. 

It took me about 8 hours to map the buy using the major cities in each county that they wanted to target.  It was a major pain in the seat, but I told the client we could do better targeting than TV.  Sure it was better targeting but without County targeting it took forever which is very un-Google like. 

I don't understand why Google doesn't supply County targeting?  For that matter, I don't understand why Google doesn't supply some population estimate when listing cities.  It would seem so matter of fact to include counties if Google is trying to grab a piece of the local marketing mix.

And, while I'm on my rant, I can't wait for Google to ad click to play video ads into the desktop AdWords Editor.  Once I set the targeting up for this buy, it would have been nice to copy and paste the ads into different ad groups. However, we had to manually load each click to play video ad, ad group by ad group.

Anyway, still a huge fan of Google of course.  AdWords is the best marketing tool available today and even the small marketer can act like a big advertiser with little to no money.  I just wish they'd make a few more targeting tweaks to really go after local targets.

PardonMyFrench,

Eric

Using Search for Political or News Rapid Response

During the Presidential Campaign season I didn't realize I used search marketing for a very unique tactic - Political Rapid Response.  In fact, while moderating a panel on search marketing at AAPC a lot of folks came up to me after the panel and asked me to elaborate on using search for Rapid Response.  In this YouTube video, you can hear Peter Greenberger at 1:20 singing our accolades using search for Rapid Response. We used Rapid Response in quite a number of very high profile situations including:

• Sarah Palin Defense - Forget about the day she was announced as McCain's running mate which is a whole different story, the story I like to tell is when I was called over to McCain's Hotel in Minneapolis on Labor Day during the convention to fix some search problems.  In particular the truly disgusting blogging stories that tried to say that Governor Palin lied about giving birth to her last baby.  Besides running Rapid Response on that story, we also bought words around the most search on keywords including Palin Nude Photo, Palin is Hot, Palin Vogue Photo and Sarah Palin Photos.
• Joe The Plumber - You can see this post I made watching the search results on Joe The Plumber and you'll see we had a search campaign running within minutes of Senator McCain mentioning Joe The Plumber.  That night I watched that debate from McCain campaign HQ in Crystal City, but had no idea it was going to be mentioned and built that campaign from scratch on the fly.  Not only that, I put in thousands of economic and financial services terms in over night.
• ACORN Voter Fraud - While driving my daughter to a doctor's appointment I had Fox News on when they were talking about a breaking story that involved fraudulent voter registration records submitted by ACORN.  By the time I got home, I built a search campaign around ACORN and waited for the results to pop. It took a few days for the rest of MSM to pick the story up, but when it did, the campaign was already ready to go.
• Countering Joe Biden's Announcement

Rapid Response doesn't just have to be for political campaigns.  Issue Advocacy can certainly use it as well as private companies and even news organizations (ex - Fox Sports).  So how do you actually use search for Rapid Response?

HOW TO USE SEARCH FOR NEWS RAPID RESPONSE

1. Dedicated News Hounds - Of course political campaigns have a war room, but for a variety of reasons I wasn't tapped into it.  I kept Fox News, CNN, and CNBC running in the background of my office so I was very likely to catch breaking stories.  You also of course can use Google Trends multiple times per day. 
2. Google Trends Is Your Best Friend - Even if you get a story elsewhere, Google Trends is helpful because it quantifies how hot a story is and helps get you started with keyword development. 
3. Website Access - The person building the campaign must either have an in-depth knowledge of your website to know where to point the traffic to or access to someone who can build landing pages on the fly.
4. Autonomy - The person or group building the search campaign needs autonomy to build it on the fly.  Sure you might have some legal approvals, but the way to lose out on the traffic is to get bogged down in an approval process.  Don't lose your traffic with a slow approval process.
5. Budget - Some times we were given new budget other times we just used the extra spend available from a very high ROI on search.  This search activity comes and goes and you need money quickly to run a campaign.  Also, keep in mind that some times this search activity is brand new and you might have to suck up a high search bid as Google learns more about the activity,
6. Hire An Expert Like Me

PardonMyFrench,

Eric

How To Run a Google Surge aka a Google Network Blast

My favorite ClickZ reporter and Jersey City native Kate Kaye has been on a roll lately when it comes to writing about a seldom used, yet increasing in popularity tactic offered via Google called a Google Surge or a Google Blast.  First she wrote an article about the New York Congressional Race in which the Democrats used a Google Surge, then she followed up with a profile of the Yes on Proposition 8 race, and a blog post naming me (yes yours truly) as the inventor of the phrase Google Surge.

As you can see in the comments I left, yes I did started calling it a Google Surge but it had nothing to do with McCain's strategy of supporting the Iraq Troop Surge; it was simply a surge in spending and the first time I employed it, it was during Bobby Jindal's campaign for LA Governor which he won.

Since Jindal's campaign I've used it several times including the RNC during the 2008 Presidential Race, McCain's campaign during both the Primary Season as well as the General Election season, and in my own race to gain a seat on my town's Board of Education (just ask some of my neighbors who couldn't log on to their PC without seeing one of my campaign ads).  Since the cat's out of the bag (thanks Kate), here's some more details on how and why you'd use a Google Surge.

  THE INS AND OUTS OF RUNNING A GOOGLE SURGE

1. I didn't invent this process at all and never claimed to have invented it.  All I did was listen to my Google Sales Rep years ago that told me I could have my ads run across Google's search and ad sense networks.
2. A Google Surge can work because Google's network reaches about 81% of the internet according to comScore's February traffic rankings.  Google ranks fourth behind Platform A (AOL and ad.com), Yahoo, and ValuClick. 
3. However, Google makes it very easy and transparent to buy across their ad network as opposed to the other three ahead of them.  You can turn it off and on, switch your creatives out on the fly, use their conversion tracking, and adjust your cost bids by site or overall.
4. The only real catch with Google is that you are buying this Google Surge on a CPM basis not on your typical CPC purchase tactic.
5. The amount of money you are spending on a Google Surge is not for the timid advertiser, but you can of course geo-target and time of day target it.
6. Google supplies you with the site list and you can adjust it.  That makes any Google Surge a proprietary strategy unless of course you don't change the site list.  I ALWAYS DO. 
7.  The site CPMs also need to be adjusted, but don't forget you are dealing with 1000s of individual sites so it really takes dedication and knowledge to make the changes.
8. You need to make sure running a Google Surge aligns with your campaign's goals.

Anyway, I have other tricks of the trade for running a Google Surge, but the most important thing for you to remember is to work with your Google account team when setting something like this up.  As my version of the name implies, this will definitely cause a surge in your daily spending.

PardonMyFrench,

Eric

Google's Expanding Ads Helps Advertisers and Google Too

Google announced March 4 on both their AdSense blog (for website owners) and their AdWords Blog that they are testing expanding ads placed via 3rd party ad servers in Google's Content network.  I've been running expanding and streaming video ads for as long as I can remember marketing online.  My original use with them was the old Enliven product and I've used BlueStreak, Atlas, Eyewonder, and PointRoll.  So I love them.

Google's version is a little different than what I've run in the past, but here's what they've told both advertisers and website owners.

• The ad expands on a click and not on a rollover
• The website earns money and/or the advertisers pays money on a click sent to a website or on a CPM basis.  So like Google video ads, no money is exchanged on the expanding unit.
• The advertiser must be using one of Google's approved 3rd party ad servers
• The expanding ad won't get larger than twice its size.

The reason Google is doing this is simple.  Expanding ads get higher click rates and while they are not huge jumps, based on Google's volume it provides a slight bump.  Based on my experience, I'd peg rich media increased CTRs at about 10% which is enough to make significant changes to Google's bottom line.  Advertisers love it because the interaction rates (% of people expanding ads and doing things within the expanded unit) are in the low single percentages which is awesome.

Are you an advertiser?  If yes, you should be building expanding ad units and now that you can run them on Google's AdSense network, you'll only pay a CPC if you buy it that way.  This is just another reason why Google dominates the online advertising world.

PardonMyFrench,

Eric

Google Tracking Flu Trends - A Public Service

Google announced last night that they will be tracking flu trends and I think this is a public service.  You can find the actual Google Flu Tracking page here.  You can sort by state, roll over the US map by state, find flu shot locations, and recent Google news about the flu.  People - THIS IS A PUBLIC SERVICE for you.  This isn't personalized to you.  It is aggregated data and publicly available.  If you have flu like symptoms and search on it, then there are other people searching on it in your area.  I'd like to know if there is an outbreak of flu in my area so I can take proper precautions. Don't you?

Does it seem like big brother Google is watching you? Yes, but you use their services for free, they have a customer agreement which you agreed to by usage, and as long as they anonymously aggregate the data than it is OK to make available.  Clearly there needs to be checks and balances on protecting the personal data - but that's just not related to flu searches. 

I watched Fox and Friends this morning and they seemed scared of it?  Me - I think it is a public service.

PardonMyFrench,

Eric

Confessions from a Google Junkie on Google AdSense's Political Advertising Policy

I got a real chuckle out of this post that Google had to make on their Inside AdSense blog called Political Ads on AdSense Sites.  A chuckle because Google waited until November 7th to make that post which revealed nothing new.  They could have made it years AGO but waited until their revenue dropped down to almost nothing before they made this post.  Basically Google reiterated their policy and reminded blog owners that there are competitive filters in their AdSense for Publisher tool system.  That's why you NEVER saw Obama ads on my site. 

You can read more details on my experiences with Google AdSense in the posts called Go Run Google's Content Placement Report Now, How Reliable is Google's Content Network, and Yet Another Reason to Love Google. However, let me shed some light on the subject for you in my....

CONFESSIONS FROM A GOOGLE AD SENSE JUNKIE:

1. Obama as well as Romney ran a ton of money through AdSense.  The McCain campaign (which I ran the online advertising for as part of CDI) used it a lot as did the RNC (me too) but we focused more on search advertising.
2. Running ads on Google AdSense is a great way to stretch your ad dollars and offers demographic as well as content targeting that allows the small advertiser to act like a large advertiser.  Also, because it can be credit card based and self-servicing you can move the dollars around at lightning speed.  Hence the reason why political advertisers used it.
3. While Google offers up some major sites in their network like WSJ and CNN the vast majority of the impressions come from blogs and secondary sites.
4. I very rarely recommend using text ads in AdSense programs and instead focus on flash and video ads.  I NEVER run text ads when I'm buying on a CPM basis.
5. Google does a great job filtering the content on their partner sites but does a HORRIBLE job understanding the tone.  So that means while you have a site that bashes Republicans Google doesn't know that and might have run RNC, Romney, or John McCain ads.
6. #5 also includes sites that had a URL like www.IHateRepublicans.com
7. I used Google Alerts via a RSS feed to see when people complained about the ads.  Depending on how pressed for time I was I commented to let people know how to filter the ads or I removed them from our Google program.  By the end of the campaign we had thousands upon thousands of site exclusions.
8. We also ran reports in Google to see where the ads actually ran and then we subtracted sites out.  This was particularly important during the primary season when every few hours a new Ron Paul site showed up.
9. While some people think it makes sense to competitively advertise when a reporter, site, etc makes negative comments, that wasn't a strategy we employed.  In politics it was a major problem if our ads appeared on a site that was bashing us and besides, we didn't have enough money to advertise on negative sites.  I'm sure Obama's team didn't care or had a strategy as witnessed by their ads on Townhall and Drudge.
10. Finally, there was a time when we ran McCain ads that said "Surrender is Not an Option on Iraq" and they ended up on The Daily Kos.  That wasn't something we planned to do.  Kos turned on Google AdSense and we didn't have them excluded because they were new to Google; plus it wasn't like I was reading The Daily Kos to see them go live.  As soon as we found out we turned the ads off.

We did what we could to avoid running ads on sites where they didn't belong.  It wasn't a strategy of ours and while Google could do a better job filtering for political tone, you as a site owner should have used the available tools at your disposable to remove ads you didn't want running.  That would have been far more productive instead of just complaining about them or making a post that says "click those ads."

PardonMyFrench,

Eric

Watching Joe The Plumber on Google Trends

So I of course heard about Joe The Plumber a lot earlier in the day, but I wasn't sure if it was something that would be needed or wanted in our search campaign.  However, as soon as Senator McCain mentioned it during the October 15 debate with Senator Obama, we knew it would be hot.  Well as I write this post it is the 3rd hottest search term on Google and coincidentally it is behind two other debate topics "congressman lewis" and "repudiate". 

Anyway so within minutes after becoming a debate topic we put it into the search campaign sending it into our Rhetoric versus Record landing pages.  We were the only one there for about 90 minutes and then the advertisers started.  Now you have the RNC (!) and a host of others (see below) but I can't find an Obama ad and I checked in multiple states (correction - I saw an Obama ad about 1AM but that was just as I was going to bed and when I checked at 9AM their ads were gone).

Above is the first Joe The Plumber Google ad and then a screen shot of the other advertisers that quickly jumped on board including a travel company, Superpages.com, and Plumber directories.  The advertising competition around Joe The Plumber keywords is now very very fierce but I wonder if some of these advertisers have th budget to hang in there.

PardonMyFrench,

Eric

P.S.  Regarding the Barack Obama text ads when they are live (the ads curiously shut off multiple times per day which is odd considering they have a ton of money) mention "Joe The Plumber's Tax Cut Calculator" and take the clicks to a tax cut calculator landing page.  I find this extremely strange because Joe's point was that if he did upgrade his business he'd be in a different tax bracket and then would get hit with Obama's tax increase.  Sending clicks to this page seems like a bait and switch.  Here's the video...

 

How Google Dominates Online Politics Part 2

Interesting day today.  I received a call from a reporter from OrthoNewsline who wanted to discuss using search campaigns in the Dental business.  Really.  No joke. 

During the interview I said something that really reminded me about a recent National Journal article called McCain Buys His Way to Top of Google and a second one called Online Campaign Ads Come Into Their Own.  What I said was that search marketing and in particular Google, is the great equalizer when it comes to advertising spend.  So instead of being outspent by a large advertiser, Google provides you with advertising tools so you can operate like the big spender without the actual money.  And, if you know what you doing you can actually out market the big spender without the dollars. 

That's in direct opposite to that first National Journal article that said McCain buys his way to the top.  We didn't do that; we did it by using tools, having dollars, and measuring results.  This quote from McCain eCampaign Director and personal friend of mine Mike Palmer puts it straight "We obviously have limited resources in this campaign as compared to Barack Obama, so we have to spend in the most effective way," said e-campaign director Michael Palmer. "We found that form of advertising, where you are getting people who are already looking for something, is a very cost-effective way of getting those people to our site and getting them to do the things we want them to do."

Why is Google the great equalizer?  Because you can't buy your way to the top and a smaller budgeted advertiser can be very competitive if they do the following:

• Think through your campaign and develop well thought out groups of keywords
• Build relevant and creative text ads for each group of words
• Send those text ad clicks into very relevant landing pages with clear calls to action
• Use available tools and your own creativity to build the keyword list; use Google Trends to capture the hot searches and Google Insight to see how people search.
• Add post-click tracking tags to the actions on your site that you want to track
• Set your budget based on objective
• Use ad scheduling, geo-targeting, ad optimization, and other search tools Google provides for free
• Opt into Content if you can; use the site targeting and demo targeting
• Optimize based on your results
• Use click to play video ads to showcase your own commercials and if you pay per click on those remember they watch the ad for free

I have so many other tips and history that if you want more detail click here.  This is why Google is the great equalizer and that no advertiser, Dentist or Presidential Candidate should ever run marketing campaigns without putting significant dollars towards Google.  You don't have to buy your way to the top, you just have to out market your opponent on the way to the top.

PardonMyFrench,

Eric

Reading Some Moronic Posts Regarding Buying Competitive Names

I saw a post this weekend from some moron saying that the McCain campaign is unethical because it buys Barack Obama's name.  Then I read some of comments and for the most part they are accurate save for one person who thought a competitor shouldn't be allowed to buy a brand name.  For you search morons out there allow me to explain under the Google rules....

1. Google won't allow you to buy a trademarked name
2. If you somehow sneak through when you turn on your competitor name buy you will eventually get caught and have it shut off.
3. Political names (or personal names) are not trademarked.  Sure the occasional name is trademarked but I have yet to find a politician's name trademarked.
4. If you are able to buy a competitor's name you won't be stealing traffic and it is never a "no no".
5. Simply stated you buy search terms because you are trying to find someone looking for information.  So if someone is searching for say "Derek Jeter" they are obviously looking for information on baseball, Yankees, shortstops, and of course Jeter.  If you have a competitor product why wouldn't you want to put a message in front of that person?
6. Buying a competitor's name in search is the equivalent of lining Coke and Pepsi up in the soda aisle.  You know the person is shopping for soda so why not put your message there?

Buying a competitor's name is good business practice when you are allowed to do it.  It fine tunes the traffic and intercepts someone with a relevant message.  You are not stealing traffic and it certainly isn't unethical.  Grow up.

PardonMyFrench,

Eric

How Google Dominates Online Politics

As I wrote the other day I was on a panel at GOPAC to discuss online advertising and I thought it was an excellent panel and not just because I presented.  Each one of us had completely different subjects to speak about.  I presented case studies on streaming commercials online, McCain's search campaign, and online advertising.  David Kralik spoke about the marketing efforts behind Drill Here, Dill Now, Pay Less for American Solutions.  And, Robert Willington from the Massachusetts GOP offered a ton of social networking tips for campaigns.  Robert Willington's presentation really had a lasting impressions on me for how Google Dominates Online Politics.

As you flip through Rob's presentation, you see can seen how userful Google's FREE product offerings are for political campaigns and other marketers.  Did I mention that this was ALL FREE!!!

• Blogger for having your own campaign blog.  Personally I prefer Typepad and probably Wordpress, but so what?  Blogger is a decent product and I even started there myself.
• Google Maps where you can track your users and supporters for free
• YouTube for commercials, video ads, and responses from your voters
• Google Analytics to track your marketing results
• Google Docs for sharing information
• And not in the presentation but I mentioned it - Google Alerts to track comments and posts as well as Gmail for email and Google Reader for feeds

Not once (other than myself) did David or Rob mention Yahoo, MSN, or any other online advertising luminaries. It was pretty much Google, Digg, MySpace, and a few other social networking tools and sites. 

This is why Google dominates politics.  They have great free products and then get you hooked with their brand and usability.  When it actually comes time for you to spend money for advertising where do you think you are going to go first?  A company like MSN where you have had little brand interaction or Google?

Google isn't buying political favors or leaning towards any side.  They just have a simple marketing proposition.  Get you marketers into their product line and then upsell you when you are ready.  That's why they dominate Politics and other industries.

PardonMyFrench,

Eric

Google's Peter Greenberger Throws Props To McCain's Paid Search Campaign

While having meetings in Crystal City a savvy sales person (don't get excited that doesn't mean I will cut a deal with you) sent me a link to the latest Kate Kaye article on ClickZ called Clinton Needed More Search: Q&A with Google's Greenberger.  As always you can read the article for yourself but here are my highlights and then commentary.

1. He argues savvy search advertising contributed to the success of both Barack Obama's and John McCain's primary season wins by helping them build supporter lists.
2. Through sponsored links in search results, the McCain and Obama camps have driven users seeking information on the candidates to their official Web sites to register for newsletters, volunteer or to donate money.
3. The McCain campaign was the savviest among the Republican presidential primary campaigns. We think it's not a coincidence that the two savviest primary campaigns with Google are the winning ones.
4. Even in the darkest days of the [McCain] campaign... they never stopped spending on Google AdWords... There were times, corresponding to the political polls, when maybe interest waned in his campaign, but he was ready to capture interest.
5. We saw the use of video and I would highlight the McCain campaign for being ahead of the curve on that...

OK, so why did Peter (and I agree with him) believe that Clinton needed more search?  Pretty simple.  People look for almost an infinite amount of keyword combinations and no matter how savvy you are at SEO you can't possibly optimize for those combinations let alone direct people into new or updated landing pages.  For example, if you were trying to get people to sign a petition for a summer gas tax holiday perhaps you'd buy keywords to send searches into your page instead of either a) letting someone else steal your message or b) letting the searchers fend for themselves via the organic listing.  Notice how the page itself isn't listed on the first page of organic results.  You need a paid search campaign for that. 

#1 is correct, but I'd add in that we get $3 - $4 in donations for every $1 we spend online.  It just isn't about building lists and capturing searchers; we balance generating money for the campaign with other activities.  As Peter said we were ahead of the other campaigns when it came to using using video advertising and while I like to pat myself on the back for that, some times when you have a great TV/media team and when you have money challenges, you do what you can for the limited dollars you have.  That meant click to play video ads on the internet.

The article that Kate mentioned (darkest days) includes quotes from me about our online advertising just when the campaign was switching the team around.  I gave that interview in Crystal City that week and I told Kate that the campaign was more charged than ever and it wasn't doom and gloom.  We just had to focus on the early primary states and focus on the Senator.  During that week I was just formulating ideas for how to approach the primary states and hinted as much in the interview "Whether he's buying keywords specifically to counteract the negative press and commentary about the campaign, however, he wouldn't say specifically. "There is a strategy that I'm' working on….I wouldn't call it trying to counteract negativity," he said"  I can't tell you exactly what we did because that was just a warm-up act for the big show.  BTW - we are in the midst of a new approach right now.

Anyway, I thought the article by Kate was very insightful and Peter Greenberger was pretty much on the money with his interview.  One of the things that amazes me is how far we've come since I started with Connell Donatelli 30+ months ago.  I've met a lot of great people and I'm getting the chance to work on a Presidential Campaign which was unfathomable a few years back.  It still amazes me today to see how many people are now working on the campaign.  And it all started because my Yahoo account executive Adrienne Skinner set up a lunch meeting with Becki Donatelli in the summer of 2004.  I still can't believe that I actually do this for a living.

PardonMyFrench,

Eric

The Tobi Steamer Dominates NJ TV at 11AM on NBC

Yesterday I had a dentist appointment.  Nothing serious, but just a cleaning (and for you fans keeping score at home - NO CAVITIES).  When I got unto the chair, playing on the TV was this ad for the Tobi Steamer so I didn't pay much attention to it. After a few minutes I looked up again and saw more ads for the Tobi Steamer which got me a little upset.  Come on I'm a captive audience here so I stopped my dental hygienist and said "Why do I keep seeing an ad for the Tobi Cleaner?"  "Is Dr. Goodkin getting a $5 kickback from every Tobi Steamer that the patients buy?  That's a little unfair because I'm a captive audience"

After she stopped laughing with me, she called Dr.  Goodkin into my room even though it wasn't time for me.  BTW - Dr Goodkin is one of the top 5 nicest people you'll ever meet and a GREAT dentist.  If you are in the Long Valley area you should stop in.  Here's their website.  After I yelled (jokingly), he said "No, we aren't taking kickbacks but I know exactly what you are talking about.  It seems that Channel 4 runs this infomercial  everyday at 11AM."  So after some more jokes we flipped on MSNBC.

So, I was thoroughly confused that this wasn't a one time event and that NBC-NY actually runs this infomercial more than a few times as Dr.  Goodkin told me.  What happened to some game shows or reality TV shows like some crappy judge or some talk show.  Don't tell me that NBC actually figured out a new model for the 11AM slot.  So I consulted the TV Guide and found such behemoths as Price is Right and The View in there but the rest of the channels looked pretty lame.  Well maybe not as lame as a 30 minute commercial in the middle of the day.

Seriously, can't NBC figure out something else other than a commercial to run in that slot?  I know it is probably making money for them, but WHAT's the point of having a TV station if all you do is show a commercial the whole time?  I wonder at what point it costs NBC money to serve that ad for them? 

Wouldn't they be better off putting a show in there, even if it is reruns and then use Google TV to fill their unsold inventory on commercials.  Dr.  Goodkin uses satellite so it might fall back to DirectTV for that, but you understand where I'm going.  Seriously, how lame is daytime TV now?  It is lamer than root canal.  OUCH.

PardonMyFrench,

Eric

I'm Bullish on Google TV

Now this is a new Google product I can get into.  At first I thought it was a dog of a product like Google Print or a product like Google Audio that political campaigns couldn't use, but alas I was wrong when it comes to Google TV.  I had a meeting in Crystal City and I came out of the meeting very impressed.  Here's what I liked about it:

1. I can run TV on the Dish network for very little cost ($150 per day?)
2. The Dish network covers like 15% of the US
3. I can pick the channels as well as the content using what amounts to a searchable TV guide
4. It is an auction based CPM model where I get to name my own price and adjust accordingly; of course my ads may not run at the price I choose, but that's ok.
5. You only pay when the ad runs and according to the meeting, DVR playbacks are not included in the cost.
6. You get some great reporting from the TV buy including where and when the ads ran, impressions, paid CPM, # impressions that watched the entire ad, and total/avg seconds viewed.

I walked away from that meeting very excited.  This puts the power of TV, albeit on Dish Network only, into the hands of small advertisers.  And, if you don't have any commercials, Google will give you a $2K credit to spend on building the ads if you agree to spend $2K per week for 4 weeks on Google TV.

If you have the money and don't get the attention you need from your media agency, you should give this a shot yourself.  It is also great for testing content and ads on different shows before you go big nationally.

The only problems I can find with Google TV are that there is limited geo-targeting available today and it is just available on Dish.  The geo-targeting is more problematic since it excludes local markets, but there might be a way to get around it by choosing a specific network (New England Sports Network), but that is a poor method for approximating geo-targeting.  Other than that, I'm so pumped on Google TV that I might run my own ads!

PardonMyFrench,

Eric

BTW - I know I'm about a month behind on this, but I didn't think it was a big deal because of the problems we ran into with Google Audio.  After the meeting last week, I'm a believer.

I'll Pass on Google Health

So Google Health is now out into a public beta based on several blogs I read including the Official Google Blog in the post called A peek into our search factory.   Here's the Google announcement:

In terms of new products, we made Google Health publicly available. It offers users a safe and secure way to collect, store, and manage their medical records and health information online. How many of us have touched, or even seen, our medical records? In this day and age of information, isn't it crazy that you don't have a copy of your medical records under your control? You could use those records to develop a better understanding of your health and ultimately get better care. It's your data about your own health; why shouldn't you own and control it?

There are other great aspects about Google Health which you can read for yourself.  Me?  I'm sticking to keeping this information off the internet. 

Google does a good job of outlining their Privacy Policy and actually making it easily found.  I would have liked it a little more if they actually showed examples of what types of advertising you might see on their platform and on their partner's platforms.  Again I'm assuming you'll see targeted ads based on keywords in your health information and perhaps you'll find that useful.  I think they could have gone a step further to explain to the people that actually need this level of data tracking what types of ads they'll see.

However, this is one Google product I won't test and won't be using.  Some things are better left on your desktop or your home and this is one of them.  I believe that doctors and pharmacists went to different types of schools, spent more time in school, and then onto residencies that they can actually do a better job of filtering the information for me.  Even today, save for paid links it is extremely hard to navigate through a Google search results page to find the right information.

I don't want my information stored on the internet no matter how big and powerful Google gets that they can protect the information.  My medical history thankfully does not change that often that I need constant updates and I can figure out on my own when I need a refill (if you take daily pills you can see when you are running low).    The selling features from Google include the following (my comments to the right):

• Organize your health information all in one place (can't I do that now offline or on my desktop?  Does it change so often that I need instant access to it)
• Gather your medical records from doctors, hospitals, and pharmacies (don't you ask for it now if you can?  If you do, do you need it instantly on an on demand basis)
• Keep your doctors up to date about your health (I'm sure the doctor's can't wait for this especially if they can figure out a way to charge for it)
• Be more informed about important health issues (served up based on your information?)

I really believe Google has the best intentions with this and will protect your privacy to the best they are able to.  Take away my office and store it on the net.  Give me Gmail and I'm happy with it.  Google reader is great as is the search product itself.   These are all trade-offs I'm ready to make for targeted ads, but when it comes to medical records I'll pass.  Perhaps as I get older and need constant health updates I'll change my tune, but for now, I'll keep what I'm doing offline.

PardonMyFrench,

Eric

My Tips for Setting Your Google Ad Prices

About a week ago Google made a post called How auctions set ad prices which I thought was very important for you to take a look at.  I would have posted a little sooner, but I was slammed with work last week.  Let's take a look step by step and I'll give you my personal tips along the way.  I figured what's a little online marketing secrets revealed between friends.

1) Each advertiser enters a list of keywords, ads, and bids.  OK, here's where a little art and a little science starts and helps later on when they get to quality score. 

• First you need to come up with your strategy for how you'll organize your words.  Don't just stick them in a single ad group -create multiple groups and organize your words.  This is probably the most important tactic for you.  ORGANIZE YOUR KEYWORDS INTO GOOD GROUPS
• Second, you need to figure out what your daily spend is based on your goals
• Third, use Google's keyword tool as well as other ones to come up with your base of keywords by ad group.  Make sure you use another keyword tool otherwise the words will look like your competitor's words
• Build your text ads by ad group.  Make sure if it warrants, to use the keyword insertion tool
• Start your basic maximum bid at the ad group level to what you can afford.  When Google determines your Quality Score you'll know what to do next

2) Google matches search queeries with keywords - Don't forget long tail words (think three or more keywords); these will probably convert better for you but at much lower volumes and hopefully cost.

3) The list of ads are ordered by bids and Quality Score.  This is where things get a little tougher and separates the search children from the search adults.  Google lists 6 ways it makes up Quality Score so let's examine them but quickly

• Historical click rates on Google's network (which you may or may not have anything to do with).  This will be one of the reasons why you need to pay the mythical $5 CPC bid for an extremely relevant campaign.
• Other relevancies factors again that contribute to a higher CPC which probably upsets you
• Relevancy of keywords in your ad group (see step #1)
• You account's CTR history (that is your quality score changes over time)
• Historical CTR of the display URL in your ad group (see step #1)
• The quality of your landing page.  Make sure your pages are relevant by your ad group

4) Google ranks the ads
5) Once a user clicks on an ad the advertiser is charged the minimum CPC over the advertiser right below it based on bid and quality score.  You can try and optimize these bids by hand or get a bid manager to automatically adjust your bids multiple times per day based on your goals.
6) There are actually two auctions Google runs.  One for the shaded bar on the top left of the page and one for the links on the right hand margin.  To get listed on the top you must have a high quality score for a particular keyword; the top shaded area will cost you more than your normal #1 place.  According to a blog post back in August 2007 your maximum cost per click will be considered to get you in the shaded region.  So what does this mean to you?  You will pay close to your maximum bid and when I personally tracked my best keywords over time I did see a significant increase in actual CPC for my #1 placements.  Basically you must know for sure whether you want that #1 for a certain word; you might be better off with a lower placement at a much lower cost.

That's it.  Enjoy your search tips...

PardonMyFrench,

Eric

So Microsoft Didn't Get Yahoo For Now

Yes you woke up this morning and you can read all of the reports and blog posts on Microsoft removing its bid for Yahoo.  Me?  I still think it will get done, but based on my own personal observations, I think Microsoft should take a long hard look at why they want Yahoo so badly.  I've never been in mergers or acquisitions and I'm sure the folks at Microsoft who are/were running the deal are highly paid and very experienced individuals, but here's why I believe Microsoft should be happy about the deal breaking up.

1. I don't believe the online advertising world is as simple as buy up your competition and Yahoo's ad revenue become Microsoft's ad revenue.  All buyers today know about both companies and make decisions based on audience, content, and price.  The audiences are different and buyers know this.  How much of Yahoo's ad revenue Microsoft would have kept was probably the biggest factor in Microsoft's bid.
2. This isn't like TV in the 70s where there are only a few channels.  Today's online advertising marketplace is very splintered with social networking, blogs, portals, and other sites vying for your time.  Sure a few publishers dominate the top of the pyramid, but there are large audience duplication rates and experience media buyers know this.  Simply buying one of the top 3 properties doesn't mean you are buying up a specific audience.  However, this strategy does work from a search perspective and how much of that revenue Microsoft would keep was probably factor #2 in the bid.
3. Yahoo, AOL, Microsoft, and Google all have a different look and feel and people choose these sites to frequent for various reasons.  Google pretty much makes a living indexing and aggregating the information for you in a simple fashion.  The other sites make a living arranging the information, cutting deals with content generators, and sometimes making the content themselves.  People go to different sites for whatever their reasons are and Microsoft probably would have kept some of that unique Yahoo traffic, but how long would have Microsoft kept the Yahoo properties and would they continue over the long haul to invest in it?  My guess is - not very long.
4. So after looking at advertisers, audiences, and content what assets do you have left?  Employees and that is where this deal probably was meant to never get closed.  I have friends at both companies and while I'm sure quite a number of them could work in either organization for the most part there is huge culture clash.  Just visit the NYC offices of Google, Yahoo, and MSN and you'll see what I mean.  Google looks like a huge frat house with gourmet food, Yahoo like a college dorm, and Microsoft, well it looks like a Government office building.  The people who made Yahoo an internet destination and are making changes to their platform are people that I just don't see being willing acquisition pawns.  And, without Yahoo's staff who helped create the content and look and feel, the Yahoo brand would have just whithered away which would have killed the audience and advertising revenues.  When I don't know but you get the idea.

Point #4 is probably the biggest reason why Microsoft should be happy the deal didn't get done.  The rule of thumb in acquisitions is that the vast majority of employees from the acquired company don't stay.  However, unlike a lot of other acquisitions (like E*Trade's acquisition of Harrisdirect) it is/was Yahoo's staff that built their presence and continues to make changes to their platform to keep it fresh.  Unlike other businesses, in the internet if you don't continue to invest in your product people will leave and find the newest site (Overture losing out to Google).  The Yahoos who made/make those changes are probably people who wouldn't have stayed past a retention bonus that Microsoft was nervous to pay out on.

PardonMyFrench,

Eric

Google for Senator McCain

A couple of good stories from the past two weeks that I'd thought you'd enjoy.  I was too busy with the Board of Education campaign and now that it is over, I'm catching up a bit. 

About two weeks back I was down in DC/VA for meetings and the first night I was there I went to a McCain fundraiser with folks from Campaign Solutions, Connell Donatelli, and the campaign.  Towards the end before we scrambled for dinner, I walked up to a true internet legend former eBay CEO Meg Whitman.  Whitman knew about our phenomenal Search ROI and was very impressed with it and that gave me a personal boost knowing how large eBay's search campaign is.  I can't get into much more about what we talked about, except I asked for this picture with her.  Yes I'm in a suit....

Next up was an interview I gave for Mother Jones magazine called Googling for McCain. Believe it or not, I'm always very nervous when I give interviews, but this one scared me the most.  Not because of the magazine, but because the reporter wanted to profile me.  It seems a friend of hers had some McCain campaign ads running on their website and she wanted to know how they ended up there.  So instead of being content after finding out it was Google, she contacted Peter Greenberger who runs politics for Google and then wham - over to me.  I've had a few jobs in between AT&T and Connell Donatelli, but all and all an interesting article.

Finally, iCrossing came out with another study on Presidential Paid search campaigns and guess who came out on top?  No it wasn't the Obama campaign, it was the McCain campaign (surprise).  Kate Kaye from ClickZ had a flattering post on the analysis called Clinton: Bitter About Search Ads? where she looked specifically at paid search instead of lumping in SEO and SEM as some other sites did.  Kate highlighted that we spend about twice as much as the other campaigns put together and buy a lot of issue related words.  According to iCrossing, "McCain is also the only candidate with paid coverage on competitors’ names in addition to his own, including candidate keywords hillary clinton, barack obama, obama, and clinton," and since some of you remember that we have been quoted as saying we generate $3-$4 dollars in donations for every $1 we spends proves once again how remarkable of a job the entire Connell Donatelli, Campaign Solutions, and McCain eCampaign are doing on paid search.  Everybody works on this marketing program and it shows how integrated we really are.  Finally, I enjoyed that Kate called me out as "this guy" in the article.

Anyway, that's it for now.  You have some good reading and a cool picture of me with Meg Whitman.  Of course after that iCrossing study, we'll need to step it up some more.

PardonMyFrench,

Eruc

Google Won't Put Agencies Out Of Business Unless of Course An Agency Provides No Value

I'm still catching up on my RSS feeds but I saw this post by MEDIAWEEK called Google Goes On Charm Offensive at AAAA Media and I really had to laugh; hence the need for a post.  Google's Tim Armstrong went out of his way to point out that Google is not the enemy to agencies, at least in my opinion to agencies that provide value.  Allow me to explain.

As a client and now as a political agency executive and consultant, I've always purchased my media.  Whether that was search marketing or display buys I always had the media buy under my control (for a brief time DLJdirect used Modem Media to purchase media before my time, but I ended up taking it back).  So I think I have an interesting reference point.  Google as well as most online advertising publishers are geared towards a self-servicing  or client centric model; that's the way it was built as compared with TV, Print, DM, and Radio which were built around an agency model. 

Google to me is the premier self-servicing model.  You as an individual, small business, or eCampaign manager can go right in, pop-in a billing option (or wait for credit), pick your keywords, design your text ads, use their targeting, and finally implement their tracking package.  The thing that makes Google so great is that it gives small marketers the tools historically unavailable to you unless you had huge marketing budgets.  Hence the perceived agency threat.

For me there were only three reasons why a client would hire an agency; creative, media, or consultant.  These reasons are:

1. A Guru at the agency that can move your business forward
2. Client does not have the time or resources
3. Client does not have the resident expertise in-house

That's it.  Three simple reasons and if your agency doesn't have a guru you can make a great living at #2 and #3.  And if you continue to provide value and services, you'll keep your clients assuming you don't get lazy. 

Google is not a threat to any of those reasons.  As an agency do you have a digital strategy and search guru you can pimp out?  If yes, then no worries your sales pitch is we have this expert you'll love and then charge your premium.  Isn't that how most agencies started anyway; hence the old agency name with the founder in the company title (my all time favorite agency names wa Messner Veter Berger McNamee Schmetterer).

Agencies should stop being scared of Google and embrace it.  Google helps your business model and even if you have a smart client that runs media, often they don't have the time or dedicated resources to devote to it.  There are a lot more clients in that model than the old Harrisdirect model of buying direct.  This is a time where the agencies should stop being threatened and get on board with the search/digital strategy.  That's where a huge share of the marketing budget is going, so instead of fighting it, join it and get a bigger share of the budget.

PardonMyFrench,

Eric

Publisher's Ridiculous Logic of Suppressing Ad Buys Via Google

I'm really flabbergasted  at some of these publishers that shut off Google Advertising for certain clients or advertisers. Claiming that they'd like to go direct with us or the client themselves, all they do is drive a wedge further and further between themselves and the end client which is a ridiculous way to run a sales business.  Look it isn't my problem that you hired sales people and now need to figure out something to do with them.  Here's a typical exchange which highlights my frustration with these tunnel vision sales execs.

ME:  ShortTermThinking Website, out of curiosity did you realize that you turned off our long running ad campaign on your site.

SHORTTERM: Yes and I want you to know that the decision didn't come from me it came from my CEO.  He thinks we should go direct with you.

ME:  OK, well the calculated CPM rates I've been paying Google is (made up number) $1 which is 1/10 of your direct price and oh by the way, you've been getting $X thousands of dollars every month from me up until recently.

SHORTTERM:  Well as you know that is non-guaranteed inventory and often below the fold.  I can get you guaranteed inventory that is also premier.

ME:  Well at those prices your premier inventory doesn't perform at the same CPA as the Google inventory, so I'm not sure why we would want to pay more for something that doesn't perform.  Remember about 6 months back we went direct with you and it was unacceptable.

SHORTTERM:  Well when we ran that test with you our inventory wasn't as good and we didn't have as much traffic.  Now, I'm sure you'll see better results.

ME:  Hmmm, but I know the Google placements perform and you've been getting a decent amount of money.  Plus, I can turn the campaigns off and one, change demographic and geographic targeting at a moments notice, and have new ads live within a few minutes of loading them up.

SHORTTERM:  Well we have a great account team and we'll give you great service.

ME: Maybe you didn't understand me, I can do these things at any time of day on the weekends, on a holiday, and look we have to spread our dollars around on many sites and this really is the best way for us right now.  How do you not see this as a win win for both of us?

And that's where the exchange ends until the next time the sales person fires off an email to check in with me or lobs a horrible rate card proposal ignoring the history and the results we've had in the past. 

Look maybe you didn't understand me.  If I'm able to buy at a rate that is 1/10 below your proposed premier guaranteed plan, why would you shut it off for a particular advertiser?  Isn't that the market price?  Also, aren't you more efficient because it requires little intervention on your part?

There are quite a few smart sales execs/publishers that recognized this and offer rates that are very close to what we can buy via an ad network and for them, when we need to we'll go direct and get better inventory.  These smarter sales executives see the advertisers on the site, see where they are coming from, and know the rate they are receiving.  Their sales pitch is better - look you can keep going through the network, but what if I gave you rates that were only slightly higher, but I guaranteed the inventory and made it premier; not our best stuff but better than what you are getting today.  Plus you can have a 24 hour out clause and you can 3rd party ad serve, plus we can move the targeting around within a few hours notice during the day.  That's where the smart sales teams are going.  Better rates, better terms, and in the end better service and more dollars.  And they are definitely trying to build bridges to the advertisers.

Sorry about the rant, but this has been happening a lot lately and I don't get it.  Yes we go direct very often especially when it warrants it and the publisher is big enough, but to cut off advertisers who were gladly spending money on you for deals that are substantially worse by going direct makes NO SENSE.  Finally, thanks to Jackie H who got me going on this subject today.

PardonMyFrench,

Eric

More on Microsoft's Bid for Yahoo

I read this article this weekend in Business Week called Will Yahoo! Feel the Love? and I found it very interesting.  The article basically focused on two important aspects of any merger - people and product.  Here are a couple of very relevant points from the article:

• "If I was Google, I'd be thrilled.  I can steal a lot of top talent out of Yahoo" said Norm Fjeldheim
• "Virtually all of the deals from Hell are done by companies that are collapsing into each other's arms like defeated prize fighters" say Robert F Bruner author of Deals from Hell.
• "Google is the single biggest threat Microsoft has ever had" said david B. Yoffie
• The company (Microsoft) is hoping to bring together Yahoo's research and development staff  who've done innovative work in online advertising auction theory and data mining
• "We're the better technology (referring to Microsoft's  adCenter versus Panama)" said Tarek Najim Microsoft's adCenter general manager

Those 5 bullet points outlined the challenges Microsoft has and that's assuming that Yahoo agrees to the deal which is looking less likely at this point based on this other article found on Business Week.  Yahoo has been losing key staffers and management now for almost a year, but there are some very talented people still left like my good friend Richard K.  I wonder how they would feel if they were kept on by Microsoft.  Sure there will be a lot of duplication in staff positions but based on my experience the acquiring company has the leg up on key positions; plus as mentioned in the article the cultures are really different.

Yahoo! well is still that company with the purple chairs, fun loving people and Microsoft is very business like.  Microsoft's attorneys are slow and methodical as is their sales staff.  Speaking of sales staff Microsoft's has always been multi-layered and I could never tell what the chain of command was; for me it was my account person (ex - Dave M whom I like a lot) and then their head of media Joanne Bradford.  Seriously, I can't tell you how many different layers of upper management I've had over the years with Microsoft.  Every few months the new Account VP would want to meet their clients (always a good practice) but I grew tired of the meets and greets because the people would get changed out.  Personally, I can't see how the employees will merge together.

The article referenced Yahoo's data team and I've always been fond of them.  The problem with them going forward is how many of the data folks stick around with MSN's more conservative privacy policies?  Remember I grew up in a data and analytics group in the old Bell Laboratories at AT&T and at the end of the day the data was only as good as the people that managed it and the people who analyzed it.  An old boss of mine in BOA named Rich L once said "information is what smart people do with the data" and keeping those smart Yahoo data geeks around will be a problem for Microsoft.

Finally Microsoft's Najim is 100% accurate when he says that adCenter is better than Panama.  I've had my problems with Panama from day 1.  Panama increased my costs and I saw my conversions drop.  Microsoft I've always been a fan of when it comes to ROI and conversions but sadly there isn't enough volume on Microsoft.  Other than MSNBC there really isn't much traffic and that of course goes for search.

I do think Microsoft has to make this move to compete with Google.  However, they have huge challenges ahead if they are counting on key people remaining through the merger.  When E*Trade acquired Harrisdirect one person told me that historically 90% of acquired employees don't last a year.  I don't know the source and it could only be anecdotal but based on my experience I certainly believe that number.  Sure you can pay people with retention bonuses but they only last as long as that contract.

PardonMyFrench,

Eric

McCain and NJ's Morris County Results

You can tell when I'm so busy that I make next to no posts.  I was up very late Tuesday night waiting for the Missouri and California results that it pretty much knocked me out until today. 

Obviously John McCain took NJ, but what got me more excited was to see the Morris County results where we made a ton of calls and put up our fair share of road signs.  Hopefully by sharing these numbers with you, you can see how important get out the vote activities are in your local area. 

• 60,030 out of 96,916 registered Republicans voted Tuesday and that compares with 48,756 voters out of 41,280 registered Democrats.
• No, the Democrat number doesn't mean that people voted multiple times; that means that another 7,476 declared at the polls which is a pretty powerful statement
• John McCain received 55.2% of the vote which translated into 33K votes
• Obama received roughly 22K votes

What these numbers show is that yes you can make a difference.  I didn't tally up the calls we made out of Long Valley, but I'd guess it to be around 2K calls to ask people to vote.  Plus, we probably put up about 200 signs and I couldn't even guess how many people saw these signs.  The calling was very easy and seriously we didn't receive more than a handful of rude answers or hang ups.  Plus putting up the signs and making calls with other supporters is actually fun.

Please join up with a campaign, especially if it is John McCain's campaign.  Don't sit back and assume people will vote for the right person.  With Mitt Romney dropping out today you can bet a lot of his supporters are thinking what else could they have done.  Put up signs, make donations, tell your friends, and join up with other volunteers to participate in GOTV calls.  You won't regret it.

PardonMyFrench,

Eric