Google PR Kool-Aid? I'll take a second glass Jeremy Jeremy Zawodny was more than a little sceptical about the release of an Apple Mac version of Google's Desktop. He even gave me a light-hearted ribbing for drinking the Google PR Kool-aid.
Come on, Andy! Do you really think that any PR person in their right mind would have responded negatively to that sort of question?
According to Reuters, we have word from the horses mouth that a Mac version is on the way.
"We intend to do it," Schmidt said at a University of California-Los Angeles conference commemorating the 35th anniversary of the Internet.
So Jeremy, am I still gulping or do we believe yet? ;-)
Early Google Investor Shares Thoughts on Success
According to Mercury News, Ram Shriram, one of Google's earliest gurus, held court Thursday evening before a crowd of a couple hundred people.
He didn't talk much about Google, but did share a lot of thoughts on what makes a company successful. Andy Beal
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IceRocket & Blog Search Engine to Offer Cell Phone Photo Search
Loren reports that Blog Search Engine and IceRocket have teamed up to provide a search for cell phone picture blogs, often called MoBlogs. Andy Beal
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October 29, 2004
PR Newswire Offers Press Release Optimization
Big ad in the PRSA trade paper lead me to a new press release optimization service from PR Newswire.
Now for the irony. They announced this service 4 weeks ago. I keep track of all the search engine news and this release never once appeared on my radar. Doesn't say much for their abilities, does it. ;-) Andy Beal
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Mark Cuban Believes IceRocket can Challenge Google If you know Mark Cuban - billionaire owner of the Dallas Mavericks - you'll know that he is not afraid to express his opinion. You'll also know that he has a passion for search engine technology with recent investments in Mamma.com and IceRocket.com.
I had a chance to chat with Mark at Web 2.0 recently and pressed him about his take on IceRocket.
With many new search engines coming to the market, what attracted Cuban to IceRocket? "The big guys are going for mass market features, with IceRocket I can create features that work best for the way I search," said Cuban.
So what does IceRocket have that maybe Google or Yahoo do not currently provide? Cuban said, "Images is where we blow them away. We have so many more sources. We also break up searches by source type, blogs, as an example so you have a different type of context."
I also asked him about what he feels the next evolution of search technology will be. Clustering? Linking? Local? None of these are important, compared to what Mark believes will be the next "big thing" in search. "Customization! What's relevant to you isn't the same for me," said Cuban.
One of the hurdles that prevents IceRocket from becoming a major search engine, is its lack of proprietary index. Currently IceRocket is a meta-engine, displaying search results from a number of other search engine indexes. However, the future of IceRocket may involve the development of its own crawler and index. "Its something we are looking at," said Cuban.
What happened with his interest in Mamma.com. When news broke that Cuban owned a significant share of the search engine, its stock went through the roof. Since then, Cuban has dumped his interest in that search engine. The reason? "They did a financing using a PIPE offering. I won't own a company that uses them."
Halloween at WebSourced
When you work hard, you play hard. And when Halloween rolls around, a Halloween costume contest is a lot of fun...
Two CEOs??? Say it's not so!
Howard Stern quits radio, joins WebSourced
Viva las WebSourced!
The largest SEM in the world? We're not joking!
Zombie bride marries blind ACC ref!
Let's not talk about this one. ;-) Andy Beal
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Google Tweaks Froogle
Aaron has details on some new Froogle features, including a new Ad Automator, merchant ratings and price comparison tool. Andy Beal
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LookSmart Breaks Even, Surprises Analysts
According to ClickZ, LookSmart posted better than expected numbers. Andy Beal
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Instituition Investors Driving Up Google Price
CBS MarketWatch speculates that many instuitional investors, who previously spurned Google, could now be the reason the price is soaring to record highs.
On Thursday, Google was the most active Nasdaq stock, as measured by the dollar value of the shares traded. Trading volume in the stock has exceeded 10 million shares for seven straight days.
"With this kind of volume, it's not just retail demand," said Mark Lehmann, head of securities at the San Francisco investment bank JMP Securities.
That likely means some deep-pocketed investors have had a change of heart. Andy Beal
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October 28, 2004
Yahoo's Chief Talks Search
A rare appearance on Yahoo's Search Blog sees Jerry Yang discussing the future of search engine technology. Andy Beal
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Why Ask Jeeves Lost Stock Value
The Motley Fool has a good summary of why investors got nervous about their stake in Ask Jeeves. Andy Beal
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Photos from WebSourced's SEM Live 2004
We wanted to share with you spme photos from SEM Live 04. We took some of our own photos but it just so happened that Cramer Gallimore, professional photographer extraordinaire, was an attendee. We thought his photos were superb and wanted to share a couple with you.
How Optimizing Your Press Release Improves Your Market Exposure and Increases Traffic
By Laura Cunningham.
It’s a fact. Newsworthy press releases help your business. What if you could get traffic and better rankings, too? The four easy steps outlined in this article help you get results. First, let’s discuss why it’s important.
The standard method for press releases is pretty simple. You write your press release on something newsworthy—a new product launch, announcement of new service, awards, or other item of interest. Usually, you run your press release through the proper channels, send it out over the wire, and it’s complete. If it’s a great release, it gets picked up on various sites and channels and possibly results in media calls.
Newsworthy press releases that are optimized with keyword-rich content are invaluable to your business. If properly optimized, press releases add the potential for increased traffic to your site from clients searching for your product and business, provide improved rankings overall and in News search engines, increase your chances of additional press and may even enhance backlinks (links back to your site). It also increases your brand awareness to existing or new constituents.
Once you release the press release over the wire, make sure to publish it on your website as well for double the impact. Not only is this smart for optimization purposes, it is good PR strategy as well.
Target Editors
Once released over the wire, optimized releases help you get ranked in News search engines such as Google or Yahoo! News. Millions of visitors, including journalists searching for a story, search Yahoo! and Google News daily. Since it is updated with fresh, new releases and articles less than 30 days old, the right target audience will find your relevant release with keyword-rich copy. Editors looking for new fodder or information for a story may contact you as a source, or for fresh content, solely based on your press release being properly optimized and relevant.
Target Your Audience
As touched on earlier, optimized press releases also offer the benefit of targeting your audience. Effective press releases build brand awareness with your customers, target new ones and continue to build your reputation. Optimized releases have the added benefit of driving potential clients to you. Your chosen keywords drive traffic to your site and build market exposure for your product or service.
How to Optimize Your Release
Why not get extra benefits from your press release? Add four simple steps and have a search engine optimized press release. It’s simple. Follow the normal process for writing a release with the following additions:
1. Research keywords for your target audience/subject matter
2. Add keywords to the press release to create keyword-rich content
a. Add keywords to your H1, header tag
b. Add keywords strategically within your press release copy
c. Add keywords in links back to your site
3. Make sure density levels are appropriate (recommend 8-15% overall density)
4. Make sure your optimize the first 250 words of your content
And, that’s it!
An optimized press release is an extremely effective marketing tool. You will experience significant traffic from potential clients, interest from editors and higher overall rankings on your selected keywords. Increase your brand awareness and get listed in the top News search engines. Optimize your release and see results!
About the Author:
Laura Cunningham is the SEM Copy Editor and Team Lead for the Copywriting Team at Websourced, Inc. She leads the team in writing effective SEO copy for over 1,300 Websourced clients. She has over a decade of writing, editing and publishing experience including both technical and marketing writing. Her marketing experience includes both B2B and B2C markets. She has implemented effective marketing and branding strategies including traditional and interactive marketing for various companies. Laura is a 2004 STC Online Communications Judge, a member of the HTML Writer’s Guild, IAGA and Webgrrls, and an Associate, Certified Web Professional from the International Webmasters Association. Laura can be reached at lcunningham@websourced.com.
BellSouth Will Sell Google Ads
Gary Price has the scoop on a deal between Google and BellSouth. Andy Beal
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Ask Jeeves Posts Strong Third Quarter Numbers
Ask Jeeves reported strong Q3 earnings with revenue rising from $27.2m to more than $75m. Unfortunately, Ask's forecast for Q4 was lower than expected, sending their stock price plummeting.
But shares in Ask Jeeves shed almost 18 percent of their value after the company forecast fourth-quarter revenue that fell just short of Wall Street's consensus estimate, a move that caused some analysts to worry that growth may be slowing. Andy Beal
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Yahoo and Google Battle for your Cell Phone
Silicon.com discusses Yahoo's new launch of cell phone services and how they will compete with Google. Andy Beal
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October 27, 2004
Google Acquires Keyhole Satellite Mapping Company
Google today announced that it has acquired satellite mapping company Keyhole Corp.
SEL readers first learned about Keyhole after the company previewed their technology at Web 2.0. At that time we said...
So what does it have to do with search? Can you imagine if I searched for "chinese restaurant" at a major search engine and then not only had website info and addresses, but I could also zoom in and see the actual buildings and "walk" down the street it is on - all from the comfort of my desktop?
It seems Google thought that was a good use of the technology too (insert smug grin here). According to Jonathan Rosenberg VP, Product Management, "It turns out Keyhole brings a similarly astonishing perspective to its visual mapping software, and it's an incredibly powerful information tool besides. That's why we've acquired the company. We like the way the Keyhole folks think, and can't wait to get under the hood to see how this service might assist Google users around the world in finding the information they need." Andy Beal
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Searches for Sex Declining
According to AP news...
Internet users are doing far fewer searches for sex and pornography and more for e-commerce and business than they were seven years ago, University of Pittsburgh and Penn State researchers say in a new book.
Twenty percent of all searching was sex-related back in 1997, now it's about 5 percent," said Amanda Spink, a University of Pittsburgh professor.
What is disturbingly interesting is...
"The searches are taking less than five minutes.." Spink said.
So a lot more teenage boys must be searching then! ;-)
WebSourced Rides Search Engine Advertising's Growth
I'm glad we're finally able to announce the latest numbers for our PPC management services. We started offering full PPC management - after only offering it to a handful of clients before - back in March. Since then we have grown the business to more than $13 million in annualized client spending.
Huge credit goes to our VP of Interactive Advertising, Tom Dwyer and his expert team for hitting around 350% growth in the last 3 months alone! Maybe I should email Credit Suisse First Boston and let them know that we're kicking the butt of Google's paid search predicted growth. ;-) Andy Beal
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Spam Finds its Way to RSS Feeds?
I subscribe to a number of RSS feeds including Feedster, where I get updates for many different search terms. For example, if any blog or news site mentions "Ask Jeeves", it typically appears in my RSS aggregator.
Just recently, I started seeing what looks like spam in my RSS feeds. Take a look at this example...
http://www.1tasers.com/law-taser/law-taser.html
Do You Dare To Ask Jeeves about law taser ? Well you can sure do this if you want to find out about law taser but we have made your life much easier. This is our favorite Net Butler and he answers detailed questions about anything. We put him to the test and asked several questions about law taser. Jeeves give his answers in several ways. Some of the answers are from companies promoting law taser. These answers are some that we have reviewed in our research of law taser and in an effort to find the best value available. Well we asked and here is the very best of the best sites.
Now, I don't mind getting ads now and then but this looks like someone who has realized that placing popular terms in their news posts, will get them picked up by thousands of RSS subscribers. Is this RSS Spam? Andy Beal
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Jupiter Study Shows Two Types of Search Marketers
According to ClickZ, a new study by JupiterResearch shows there are two distinct types of search engine marketers.
After surveying 538 marketers in August 2004, the researchers divided respondents into two categories -- "Sophisticates" and "Unsophisticates." Sophisticates bid on keywords based on historical data or cost of goods sold, and measured performance at the keyword or keyword group level. Only one in four marketers fell into the Sophisticates group, with the other three failing to use what JupiterResearch calls "intelligent" bidding and measurement techniques. Andy Beal
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Copernic Launches New Enterprise Search Initiative
According to eWeek, Copernic has announced that it has spun off its enterprise-search business into a separate company.
Newly formed Coveo Solutions Inc., will focus on providing enterprise search software to businesses, organizations and government. Coveo will lead the marketing, sales and research and development of the renamed Coveo Enterprise Search product that Copernic had launched a year ago under its name
It's always a gamble when a small company splits its services as it takes a lot more effort and money to promote two companies and create to brand positions. The best of luck to them. Andy Beal
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Google Desktop Search Too Efficient?
Mike Langberg thinks Google Desktop might work too well...
...if someone else uses your PC and enters the word "bank" or "brokerage" in Desktop Search, they could uncover your confidential financial information. There are controls within Desktop Search to block each of these three search features, but it's not immediately obvious how to find them, and many users will never bother to learn. Andy Beal
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October 26, 2004
WebSourced's SEM Live Conference a Hit!
Ok, so we're biased, but informal feedback from attendees today suggests that we our SEM Live conference was a hit. "A conference that lives up to its hype" was one of the kind comments we received about the sessions and the speakers.
Special thanks to Diane Rinaldo (Overture) and Bryan Schreier (Google) for speaking and a huge "thank you" to our expert staff for their valuable contribution. We'll be following up with new friends - including RC Jordan, the only SEO we let through the doors - and thanking individually, those that contributed their efforts.
Many thanks to all of you who attended today and thank the good Lord that the conference went without a hitch. I'll also be buying Danny Sullivan a beer next time I see him, now that I have glimpse of what he goes through every 3 months (no wonder he looks knackered after 4 days).
For those of you who couldn't make it, don't fret. We planning another, bigger and more in-depth conference for the future. Stay tuned! Andy Beal
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A New Interface for MSN Search?
Looks like I didn't miss much news today - I spent the whole day organizing and moderating SEM Live - but we did want to highlight one development discovered by Gary Price.
Google's Market-cap Tops Yahoo's
Google's market cap is now higher than Yahoo's and some investors are taking out profits, according to CBS MarketWatch. Andy Beal
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SMA Europe Launched, USA Next?
The death knell is tolling for SEMPO. After the recent launch of SMA-UK was such a huge hit, a European verion was launched. With SMA-EU now a reality, can it be much longer before we get a SEM-USA? (thanks Aaron).
We decided to dig a little deeper. According to WhoIs, RC Jordan has registered SEM-US.com. Is he cyber-squatting or will he lead the formation of a SEMPO rival? We'll ask him?
Update: RC tells me he is simply "Protecting my friends' right flank." Which you can read as him taking steps to help out SMA, should they launch in the US. He also points out that he was one of the first supporters of SMA-UK. Andy Beal
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UK Search Engine UKWizz Alistair McIntyre contacted me to let me know about a new UK-focussed search engine he has recently launched.
UKWizz promises to focus on UK web sites, has no ads or sponsored links and it's not a meta-crawler either.
McIntyre tells us, "I love web search and search engines, I have been working on UKWizz since the start of 2003, it is only now starting to become a reality. My aim is to index as much UK specific content as possible and present it in a simple and searchable format." Andy Beal
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Microsoft Desktop Search by Year's End
According to CNet, we'll see a Microsoft desktop search tool by the end of the year (probably before or during the SES show in Chicago, seeing as they are sponsoring the event).
During its earnings call with financial analysts, Microsoft said an MSN-branded tool would be made available before the end of 2004. The tool and an algorithmic Web searching engine will be in beta testing by year's end, a representative said Friday.
"In terms of search, we should see some good MSN search technology in this calendar year, probably late the second half," John Connors, Microsoft's chief financial officer, said in the conference call. "We're going to have a heck of a great race in search between Google, Microsoft and Yahoo. It's going to be really fun to follow."
Update: Matt Hicks emailed me to point out that both he and I already knew this from the SES conference back in August. I must keep off the catnip! ;-) Andy Beal
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Are Analysts Pumping Google Stock Price? The New York Times suggests that analysts could be pumping Google's stock value causing investors to buy the shares, lemming-style!
Such an enormous increase in the value of a company over a few weeks recalls the day in December 1998 when Henry Blodget, then an analyst for Oppenheimer & Company, famously predicted that Amazon.com, then trading at $240, would soon rise to $400. It reached that target in three weeks. Three years later, Amazon shares were selling for one-tenth that price.
"We have seen this before," said Jake Zamansky, a New York lawyer who has represented investors who claim they were misled by brokerage firms. "Google is another bubble that will burst. Next year we will bring claims by investors who were hyped to buying Google by analysts with a herd mentality."
Yeah, and some people think McDonalds should pay for making them fat. We have free-will in this country and even retail investors should carry-out their due diligence. If they blindly part with their money just because of the word of an analyst, I'd like to speak to them about a great opportunity in Llama farming! Andy Beal
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No Web Browser from Google
According to Google's CEO, the search engine has no plans to build a web browser.
Yahoo and Adobe Make a Deal
Yahoo and Adobe have agreed to work together and share product benefits, according to CNN.
Under the deal, Adobe will first introduce a co-branded Yahoo browser toolbar that users can choose to install on their computers when prompted to download an update of Acrobat Reader.
Later, the companies said, the toolbar will add features such as the ability to quickly convert Web-based content into Adobe PDF files.
Yahoo search will also be built into a future version of the Acrobat Reader, allowing users to search for more information from within the document without going through the extra steps of launching a Web browser. Andy Beal
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Google's Image Ads a Success? Brian Morrissey takes a loot at the current status of Google's Image Ads. Of particular interest is news that Google has begun testing the placement of Image ads on its own network, something they said they would not do at the launch.
Speaking to investment analysts on the company's first-ever earnings call last week, Google executives said its fledgling effort at distributing graphical ads was an important initiative for the company. Google has begun to test the display of graphical ads on Google Image search.
"Currently, it is a small component of our business, but we think it has a very exciting future," CEO Eric Schmidt said of graphical ads.
Google's image search engine has indexed more than 880 million images from the Web. A Google spokesman said the test began recently.
"It's a limited test and we're serving the ads on a small percentage of queries," the spokesman said.
So, is the "do no evil" search engine already feeling the pressure from Wall Street? Could we ultimately see Google displaying Image ads at Google.com? Andy Beal
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Google's Growth Comes from Own Ads
Lots of stories about Google's Q3 numbers, so we'll just pull out those that have a new angle. Like this from the Chicago Sun Times.
Google's revenue for the third quarter totaled $805.9 million, up from $393.3 million last year. It generated most of the revenue -- $411.7 million -- through ads displayed on company-owned sites. That's an important factor, because Google doesn't have to share the money with other advertising partners.
Subtracting the commissions Google paid to deliver ads to other Web sites, the company's third-quarter revenue would have been $503 million, topping the mean analyst estimate of $456 million, according to First Call.
While many of us are delighted with the new innovations coming from Google, don't lose sight of the main reason for these new developments...money! Google is going to be under immense pressure to maintain 30-50% annual growth and, with the number of searches not growing that fast, they will have to squeeze every drop out of existing search engine users. The more products Google can launch, the greater the opportunity to display AdWords ads and, most importantly, the less money they have to split with partners as commission. Andy Beal
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October 22, 2004
Google Soars to New High
Time for the weekend, but I'll leave you with this riddle...
Google Lucky With AdWords?
The National Post today covers Google's Q3 earnings announcement and quotes me on how the industry has grown.
Andy Beal, vice president of search marketing for WebSourced Inc.'s KeywordRanking.com unit, said search engines "accidentally stumbled across paid-search" and turned what would have been a US$200-million to US$300-million industry into one that could reach US$7-billion to US$9-billion within the next five years.
"Without search engine discovering paid-search, the industry wouldn't be anywhere near as big," he said.
"They have seen the benefits with higher revenue. Now, they are turning focus on additional ways to milk the cow.
"It will be interesting to see what new developments come out of the search engines for the next few years. Will it be focused on products and services that make money or products and services that improve search? If they develop the technology, it will naturally encourage more users and revenue will take care of [itself]."
I do believe that us search marketers demonstrated that their was "gold in dem der hills" by monetizing search with SEO. Until then, search was nothing but a tool offered to make ISP's useful to subscribers, with revenues coming in from banner ads etc. Then Overture introduced PPC and the rest, as they say, is history. Andy Beal
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Are you in love with your search engine?
According to MSN Search, half of men turn to search engines first when looking for advice.
Male search vanity apparently knows no bounds. Almost a third of men admit to searching for themselves online and awarding themselves an average 80 per cent satisfaction rating for their general searching abilities. By contrast, just over one in five women have searched for their own name.
More interesting results here (another article with Google in the headline, yet the survey was conducted by MSN Search..aargh!!) Andy Beal
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Yahoo Acquires Outlook & Gmail Rival, Bloomba Co-worker, Jason Dowdell has news that Yahoo has just acquired Stata Labs. Stata Labs makes the Outlook alternative Bloomba which will give Yahoo a robust, search-based email client.
Previously dubbed the "google of email", Bloomba had gained critical acclaim for being a robust search based email client, long before Google launched its own Gmail. Could Yahoo be strengthening its products to go head-to-head with Google? Andy Beal
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SMA-UK Formed to Represent UK Search Engine Marketers
After learning from all of the mistakes SEMPO has made and obviously being tired of being told how to operate by a US organization, search engine marketers in the UK have joined together to launch their own association.
The proposed Search Marketing Association UK (SMA-UK) will provide a platform to inform and educate the marketplace of the benefits of search marketing in the overall marketing mix, as well is giving its members an industry voice.
Barry Lloyd of search marketing firm MakeMeTop is acting Chairman of the group, with Andy Atkins-Kruger of search marketing firm Web Certain as acting Deputy.
The Chairman and Deputy Chairman were elected by a secret ballot, single transferable voting system monitored by the Electoral Reform Society with votes being cast by the members of the working group.
"We intend all elections will be held in the same manner in the future, with early elections from the full membership to be held as a matter of urgency" said Barry Lloyd.
"Presently, we are a group of people working to create an association, but we felt it was important to sidestep the trap of being seen as self-appointed so we chose to use the Electoral Reform Society to conduct an independently verified secret ballot of the group to elect the Chairman and Deputy Chairman" added Andy Atkins-Kruger.
An existing US based association was not seen by the group to be appropriate in its operations for the UK market. Barry Lloyd, commenting on the reason for a new UK based association said: "The UK search engine market is currently the second largest in the World outside the United States. After looking at the way trade associations are being developed internationally it has became apparent that the UK should have its own association for this growing sector, set up in a manner to reflect the specific way that both businesses and trade associations operate in the UK and other parts of Europe."
Good luck to them. Maybe they can teach their US counterparts a thing or two. Andy Beal
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October 21, 2004
Google Doubles Revenue
Looking at Google's Q3 earnings, the search engine advertising industry is stronger than ever.
According to Reuters, Google had net income of $52.0 million, or 19 cents a share, in the third quarter, compared with $20.4 million, or 8 cents a share, a year earlier.
Revenue jumped to $805.9 million from $393.9 million.
Excluding items, Google had a profit of $125 million, or 45 cents a share.
Analysts had expected Google to post a profit before items of between 52 cents and 61 cents a share on total revenue of $751.7 million, according to Reuters Estimates.
"We are very pleased with the results of this quarter. Record revenues, robust margins and cash generation all illustrated strong performance and execution over the last quarter," said Eric Schmidt, Google's chief executive officer.
Google was up more than 8% in after hours trading. Andy Beal
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Yahoo Search Increases Image Index
According to Battelle, Yahoo Search is set to announce an increased index of more than one billion images. Andy Beal
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Time's Running Out to Register for WebSourced's SEM Live You have just a few days left before WebSourced's first SEM Live conference kicks-off. We have a few more spaces available for the October 26th event, but we don't expect to have any room for "walk-ups" so if you plan to attend, register now.
As a side note...I've always had respect for Danny's ability to coordinate Search Engine Strategies. That respect has increased tenfold now that I have been through it myself! Andy Beal
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Using Search Engines to Check on Employees
A survey, conducted by Harris Interactive for search engine Dogpile, said about 23 percent of adult Internet users in the United States have searched online for their clients or customers, workers or potential employees, and supervisors or prospective managers.
Very interesting, but I'd be pissed if I was an exec at Dogpile, as the CNet article leads with the headline "Is your boss Googling you?". For the love of Pete, do we have to include Google in every headline? Andy Beal
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SearchGuild Halloween Caption Contest
Over at SearchGuild, Chris Ridings is running a fun Halloween caption contest.
My vote? "We can't stand to be associated with those 'Black Hat' SEOs" Andy Beal
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Yahoo Will Hurt Google's Earnings
CNBC explains how Google's Q3 earnings will be lower, due to a settlement with Yahoo.
Yahoo! will affect Google’s results in two says. First, Yahoo! sold back to Google a stake it owned in the company and settled a patent dispute as well for a total of some $300 million. That helped Yahoo!’s earnings and will detract from Google’s by perhaps 20 cents a share. The loss we noted is what one analyst sees as a result of that share buyback. Andy Beal
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Testing the Search Engines...Again!
Did I miss something? Is today National Test the Search Engine day? Seems like every new article today is a review or test of the latest search engine technology. Matthew Fordahl takes his turn testing the latest search technology. Andy Beal
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Find.com and MarketResearch.com in Strategic Partnership
From the wire...
Find.com today announced that it has entered into a strategic partnership with MarketResearch.com Inc.
Under the terms of the strategic partnership, MarketResearch.com, which offers more than 80,000 reports from over 350 research firms and consultancies worldwide, has become an on-line content partner for Find.com. Andy Beal
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Test Driving Google Desktop & Others
The NY Times reviews the Google Desktop.
And for WSJ subscribers, Walter Mossberg looks at recent new search engine technology offerings, including Google Desktop. Andy Beal
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Testing the Smaller Search Engines
Leslie Walker of The Washington Post takes a number of smaller search engines for a test drive.
I have been testing these newbies to see how they stack up against Google and its chief rival, Yahoo. While none seems likely to dethrone Google, I am convinced that more people will start using a wider variety of search tools to find what they want online. Andy Beal
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WebSourced Finalist for Mid Size Company of the Year
The North Carolina Electronics and Information Technology Association - thankfully shortened to NCEITA - has named WebSourced as a finalist for its 21 Awards.
It is my great pleasure to inform you that WebSourced, Inc. has been selected as a finalist to receive a 2004 NCEITA 21 Award as Mid-Size Company of the Year. On behalf of the NCEITA Board of Directors, I congratulate you and WebSourced, Inc. on this recognition by your industry peers. Andy Beal
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Google Announces Third Quarter Earnings Today
Google has kept quiet about its earnings for Q3, but at the bell today, they will announce their quarterly earnings.
Financial analysts are projecting that it will earn 54 cents a share on revenue of $456 million in the third quarter, according to a consensus of analysts surveyed by Thomson First Call.
While GOOG has jumped nearly 80% since the IPO, some analysts believe the stock is over-priced.
At least one research firm believes that Google's stock is overpriced, based on its earnings per share growth rate from 2004 to 2005. "On a price-to-earnings ratio...we value Google's stock at $100 based also on a 20 percent discount to Yahoo's current valuation," financial analyst Martin Pyykkonen of Janco Partners wrote in a research note.
Yeah, well investors would have to have some common sense in order to price Google at $100. The meteoric rise of TZOO shows that some tech stocks are just "hot". More from CNet. Andy Beal
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Google Fixes Desktop Security Flaw
We had speculated that Google's new Desktop tool might pose some security risks. According to Stefanie Olsen, it did, but they have since been fixed.
According to a report posted to the Bugtraq Security Focus list on Wednesday, Google's new Desktop Search tool did not prevent a hacker from inserting JavaScript, a programming language, into the Web address of its page image, or logo. That vulnerability could have allowed any rogue third party to change the appearance of Google's Web page to ask for personal data such as credit card numbers from its visitors, what's known as a phishing scam, according to the warning.
Google said it has fixed the problem. Andy Beal
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October 20, 2004
Happy Anniversary to John Battelle's Searchblog
John's blog celebrates its first year anniversary. Congrats John! Andy Beal
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Does Relevance Equal Popularity on Google?
Lance Ulanoff is clearly peeved that a search for his own name on Google still turns up some results that contain criticisms of an article he wrote almost a year ago.
He argues that Google is confusing what is relevant with what is popular.
This article is almost a year old, yet Google presents it as one of the most relevant results. It's not. There are new columns, more pressing and timely topics, and Google misses them all. So does popularity equal relevance? Not in my eyes.
It's alway unfortunate to have your name associated with a slurr - ask Mr. President how he feels about "miserable failure" - but in this case Ulanoff should concede that maybe Google does have it right. While he may have written many great articles and stories over the past few months, if the masses still associate him with one particular story, who is Google to argue? Andy Beal
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Google Launches Search Appliance in UK
According to ZDNet, Google officially launched its standalone enterprise search appliance in the UK and Europe on Wednesday, claiming the product has matured after two years of field testing by US customers. Andy Beal
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KaZaZZ in Your Face You know what? It's hard for small search engines to get any press. Google, Yahoo and Ask Jeeves dominate most search engine announcements and to be honest, it's hard to find newsworthy releases from a lot of the smaller search engines.
KaZaZZ today get's a mention. not because of any significant announcement, but purely because of the high number of announcements they have been releasing lately. So here you go KaZaZZ, you win by attrition! Andy Beal
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Google Leads the Tech Growth Race
The USA Today examines how Google has been able to dominate the re-bound of tech company growth.
Google, with astounding revenue growth of 437,115% since 1999, topped the list. It reported revenue of nearly $1 billion last year. The runner-up, glucose-monitor maker TheraSense, experienced a revenue jump of 249,140% ($212 million) in the same period.
"Tech has stabilized and worked around the (Internet) bubble" that eviscerated dot-com stocks several years ago, says Mark Evans, a Deloitte executive in charge of the study. "The story of Google proves that the bar has been raised before a company goes public." Andy Beal
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Microsoft Employees Claim "Google is Kicking our Butt" Mike Bazeley happens to read a lot of blogs, including some that include Microsoft employees unhappy with their employer being in Google's shadow.
"Right now Google is kicking our butt,'' wrote one. Another (http://minimsft .blogspot.com/) said Google was the focus of "questions and angst'' at the latest company meeting. Andy Beal
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Google Hopes to Add 372,000 Advertisers During Next 4 years
Google may be keeping quiet about their future growth, but that doesn't stop Verne Kopytoff from getting the goods.
According to internal reports obtained by Verne, Google expects to add 372,000 new AdWords accounts over the next 4 years.
Google predicted that the number of advertiser accounts will jump from 280,000 this year to 378,000 in 2005, according to the documents. From 2004 to 2008, the number of accounts is expected to more than double to 652,050.
However, it looks like Google will have to squeeze out more dollars per advertiser - if it is to grow revenues by 50% each year, as predicted by CSFB - as it expects advertiser increases to decline in the future.
Google expects its advertiser accounts to grow 35 percent between 2004 and 2005, according to the internal documents. However, Google estimates that the growth rate will decline to 15 percent between 2007 and 2008. Andy Beal
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October 19, 2004
Charlene Li's Blog
Cool, search engine industry analyst Charlene Li has a new blog. Added to my RSS feed! Andy Beal
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Theories Flying on Purpose of New Google Spider
WebProNews has a summary of all the speculation surrounding Googlebot's hyper-activity recently. Lots of interesting thoughts, so I'll add my own. Could be they are using it to compile their new clustering database we reviewed at Web 2.0. Andy Beal
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Off Topic: $750 Off Dell Laptops
It's rare that we go "off topic" but Dell has a deal that should not be missed. $750 off laptops costing $1500 or more. Details here, offer good for today only!
I'm going to be the proud Dad of a souped-up 700m. Come to Papa! Andy Beal
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Google Expands Search Empire with Life Search
This would give privacy advocates a heart attack. Google's new Life Search is perfect for those days when you can't remember what you were doi......sorry, where was I?
Laura Casper, Google's director of consumer web products states, "We think of this as the photographic memory you never had. Simply type in what you are looking for and Google Life Search will quickly locate that item. For example if I enter 'car keys' Life Search responds with the result 'In your pocket', and there they are right where it said! There is also a cached version to show you where your keys were."
It gets better...
Several regular contributors to the tech site Slashdot posted reports of suspected problems in the new search algorithm saying they entered the term "life" and were presented with a "Result Not Found" error. They were presented, however, with several ads for internet dating services and online gaming sites.
Wotbox Launches Instant Inclusion Service
Maybe if all paid inclusions products were as fast and cheap as Wotbox's new service, more companies would consider using them. Wotbox today announced their service will cost just $1 and have instant inclusion. I'm sure they thought about using Yahoo's "per click" model, but collecting 0.001 of penny would be a bit too much. Andy Beal
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Google Desktop Security Risks
USA Today looks at why owners of shared computers should think twice before installing Google Desktop.
"It's clearly a very powerful tool for locating information on the computer," said Richard M. Smith, a privacy and security consultant in Cambridge, Mass. "On the flip side of things, it's a perfect spy program."
Type in "hotmail.com" and you'll get copies, or stored caches, of messages that previous users have seen. Enter an e-mail address and you can read all the messages sent to and from that address. Type "password" and get password reminders that were sent back via e-mail.
Acknowledging the concerns, Mayer said managers of shared computers should think twice about installing the software until Google develops advanced features like password protection and multi-user support.
The best thing to do is to prevent any new installations on all public computers. Andy Beal
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AOL Europe and Google Make Deal on AdWords
According to a joint press release, Google will now provide AdWords to AOL Europe.
Google currently provides web search results for AOL search products in Europe. Under the new expanded alliance with Google, users of the AOL services in the UK, France and Germany will now also get targeted advertising from Google related to their search request. Google AdWords advertisers can now appear on the search results pages of AOL's European properties based on users' expressed interests. This enables Google advertisers to reach millions of potential customers searching on AOL properties across the UK, France and Germany. Andy Beal
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Ask Jeeves Announces New AJinteractive Division
All the facts... Andy Beal
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If you know Mark Cuban - billionaire owner of the Dallas Mavericks - you'll know that he is not afraid to express his opinion. You'll also know that he has a passion for search engine technology with recent investments in Mamma.com and IceRocket.com.
The 
Co-worker, Jason Dowdell has 
You have just a few days left before WebSourced's first 
You know what? It's hard for small search engines to get any press. Google, Yahoo and Ask Jeeves dominate most search engine announcements and to be honest, it's hard to find newsworthy releases from a lot of the smaller search engines.
