CGI Holding Corporation Reports Record Year CGI Holding Corp d/b/a Think Partnership (AMEX: THK; parent company of WebSourced) today announced 2005 was a record year. The company posted a 203% revenue increase and 820% after-tax earnings increase over 2004.
The Company's 2004 revenues rose to $21,473,565, a 203% increase over 2003. The Company's 2004 pre-tax earnings rose to $4,726,199, a 500% increase over 2003. The Company's 2004 after-tax earnings rose to $2,939,966, an 820% increase over 2003. The Company's 2004 after-tax earnings rose to $0.10 per diluted share, an increase of 900% over 2003.
Gerard M. Jacobs, the Company's CEO, stated, "Think Partnership Inc. grew significantly during 2004: our WebSourced subsidiary showed robust growth in its search engine optimization business, and launched a new pay per click advertising campaign management business which is now managing an average of $1.9 million per month in spending. We also entered the growing online dating business with our acquisition of WebCapades, now called Cherish. And, our aggressive acquisition efforts during the second half of 2004 have culminated in our 2005 acquisitions to date of the MarketSmart Companies, Personals Plus, Ozline, KowaBunga and Smart Interactive." Andy Beal
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Dissecting Google's Annual Report
Over at WebmasterWorld's forum, they're having fun breaking down the details in Google's 2004 annual report. Andy Beal
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Winners Of 5th Annual Search Engine Watch Awards Announced
Search Engine Watch has announced the winners of the 5th Annual Search Engine Watch Awards, voted for by their readers.
Couple interesting things...
1. Google's four-year winning streak of "Oustanding Search Service" came to a halt, with Yahoo winning this year.
2. Google did win "Most SEO/Webmaster Friendly Search Provider". Is that a good thing? Could that award also be referred to as "Easiest Search Engine Results to Manipulate"? ;-)
Congrats to all the winners and runner-ups. Andy Beal
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Shopping.com Launches French Comparison Shopping Engine
While Google is busy tackling French lawsuits, Shopping.com is shouting Vive la France and opening a French language shopping search engine, according to Reuters.
The new site, at http:/fr.shopping.com, helps users shop for items, ranging from cameras and infant car seats. It automatically handles currency and language translations as well as shipping cost calculations. This is the first of two sites the company plans to launch in Europe this year (the being in Germany before the end of 2005).
Already, the company's DealTime.co.uk site is the No. 2 online shopping engine in the U.K., behind Kelkoo's U.K. site, according to Hitwise.
Shopping.com said it will integrate all of its Web operations and in the coming weeks will change the name of its U.K. site to UK.Shopping.com.
Interestingly the company decided to go with sub-domains and a ".com" extension, instead of fully embracing France, Germany and the UK with country specific extensions. Andy Beal
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WSJ's Mossberg Looks at Two New Vertical Search Engines
Walter Mossberg today looks at two new search engines that cater to niche vertical markets.
The first, called Ziggs, helps you find people with particular skills or other characteristics for hiring or networking purposes. For instance, it might help you find a lawyer in Washington specializing in international trade, or an alumnus of Brandeis University who lives in Delaware.
The second, called Indeed.com, is a search engine for jobs. Unlike traditional job sites, like Monster.com, Indeed indexes more than 500 Web sites (including Monster) that list job openings, and allows job seekers to search them all from one place. For instance, you can look for all jobs in Michigan, or all jobs at General Motors, or only job openings in Michigan for engineers at GM.
Mossberg gives his review of each. Andy Beal
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It "tackles highway congestion by providing individuals with real-time, accurate traffic information." Some of the technology is/was intended to allow mobile phone users get real time traffic info using GPS. Andy Beal
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Google Adds Stock Charts
John Battelle tips us off that stock ticker searches at Google now reveal a stock chart embedded in the results page. Andy Beal
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Copernic Releases Full Update to Desktop Search Tool Copernic announced today the official launch of its new and improved desktop search product, Copernic Desktop Search (CDS) version 1.5. The new update has been in beta testing for more than five weeks and Copernic promises some major enhancements.
The final release of CDS 1.5 features smarter CPU resource usage, improved Mozilla Thunderbird support, broader metadata indexing, support for Netscape 8, multiple performance increases, and much more. The key features introduced in the beta version of CDS 1.5 were Thunderbird and Eudora email search, indexing of network drives, improved multimedia metadata indexing, usability improvements, and a new API for adding custom file indexers.
"We always try to satisfy our customer’s needs promptly," said Eric Bouchard, EVP of Products for Copernic. "Thanks to tens of thousands of beta testers, our very experienced development team was able to bring CDS 1.5 to its final version in a matter of weeks." Andy Beal
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Yahoo Launches Search Engine for Creative Commons Content
Podcasting News points to a new beta search engine from Yahoo for Creative Commons content (basically stuff that is not copyrighted see the update below).
The search engine helps you quickly find those authors and the work they have marked as free to use with only "some rights reserved." If you respect the rights they have reserved, then you can use the work without having to contact them and ask. In some cases, you may even find work in the public domain -- that is, free for any use with "no rights reserved."
One slight issue. Many of the sites listed carry content that they have "borrowed" from other sources. For example, a lot of Search Engine Lowdown content appears on these sites.
While I don't have a problem with my content being shared, I don't have an explicit creative commons license available either. Could Yahoo inadvertantly send you to a site - that you think you can license content from - only to find that the site has content mined from a copyrighted source?
Update: So as you may have noticed this site is not called "Creative Commons Lowdown" and hence we don't pretend to be experts on CC. However, one of our readers is and we thought we'd share his rant with you...
"... basically stuff that is not copyrighted."
I will thank you to stop spreading FUD like this. Creative Content is indeed copyright and this comment of yours does great damage to the movement -- unless you're being bankrolled by Hollywood, and even if you are, I recommend you read Lessig's excellent Free Culture to gain an understanding of how Copyright works, what it means, and especially how those spreading the anti-CC FUD do so to dupe the consumer for their own profit.
Since you're likely not likely to read that reference, let me summarize: Copyright Licensing is not about restricting rights, it is about granting rights; in the absense of any statement (such as your own site), maximum restrictions apply and the Creative Commons licenses provide us with an explicit means to grant a sane set of allowances suitable for the information sharing that is common practice in a digital networked world.
And thank you for the heads up on your own ad-hoc rule for sharing -- I'll delete your link from our aggregator, so save us any surprises should you have a change in your social weather.
mrG
Clearly there is a sense among CC advocates of being royally screwed by the establishment. I didn't even know it qualified as a "movement".
Anyway, mcG, I don't think you get my point. Bloggers are an important vehicle for the distribution of CC content. Many bloggers, myself included, freely share our content and the blogosphere thrives by sharing each others thoughts. However, what if a blogger, who has a CC license on their web site, publishes copyrighted information, obtained from a source that does not have a CC license. That blogger could get themselves and Yahoo in a lot of trouble. Make sense? It does in my world. ;-) Andy Beal
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March 30, 2005
Danny Sullivan on Think Partnership
Thanks to Danny Sullivan for providing this excellent summary of our recent growth and M&A activity. Andy Beal
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99 Problems for Ex-Google Employee
Let's start wednesday off right, shall we?
The .NET Sweatshop is a blog maintained by a Microsoft employee (anyone know who?) and they decided that the recent woes of former Google employee and blogger, Mark Jen, were worthy of a putting to music.
Download Jay-Z's song "99 Problems" and sing the following words along to it...
The year was '05 and he was a bloggin’ Google fan
But in his rear view mirror was the angry HR man
He had two choices: apologize and rescind his words or
test his bounds and see if they were really open nerds.
Now he ain't tryin to lose his job near the beach
but he lives in America and knows about free speech
So he keeps the site until they got real sore
And hears "Son do you know what we’re mad at you for?"
”Cause I’m young and I’m honest and my audience has grown
Do I look like a mind reader sir, I don't know
Am I terminated or should I guess some more?
"Well you was saying Google’s not as cool as people think we are
Looking at your resume, you were a Microsoft star.
Were you plant by Bill Gates? I know a lot of you are"
”I’m here cuz it’s hip and my site is legit”
"Do you mind if we look around your blog a little bit?"
”Well my blog is on Blogspot and Google owns my lock
So go ahead and look—most of it says that we rock
"Aren't you pretty cocky are you Sergey or Larry or something?"
Or somebody important or somethin?"
"Now I ain't a founding father but I know some PR
Enough to know that you won't fire a blogging star
"Well see how smart you are when the paychecks don’t come"
He got 99 zeroes but his job ain't one.
LookSmart Launches Vertical Search Engines
LookSmart has today announced the launch of its first five vertical search destinations to provide niche audiences with targeted search results.
After analyzing audience and research data from FindArticles, LookSmart has developed five separate vertical content destinations, including homework helpers: the trendy www.teenja.com for teens; the more studious www.gradewinner.com for "tweens;" and www.24hourscholar.com for college students. Two additional resources are dedicated to parents -- www.parentsurf.com for all family matters, and www.gobelle.com for moms on the go. Andy Beal
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Answers.com Launches Mobile Interface
According to SEW, Answers.com has today launched a mobile version of their site. Andy Beal
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MSN Search Buying Market Share?
Greg Sterling writes for Search Engine Journal and looks at the efforts MSN has taken to increase its market share.
According to Nielsen, MSN’s search market share grew 1.4 percent from 12.8 percent to 14.2 percent in the previous month.
The apparent cost of that growth has been MSN’s US$150 million, spent on high-profile TV broadcasts such as the Super Bowl, as well as other media. Is that any kind of ROI?
Good question. Ask IAC if they think $2b for 5% market share (from Ask Jeeves) is worth it. By comparison, 1.4% at $150 million looks like a bargain! Andy Beal
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Francisco Partners to Acquire WebTrends from NetIQ Big news day for web analytics firms. Technology-focused private equity firm, Francisco Partners today announced that it has entered into a definitive agreement to acquire WebTrends from NetIQ.
NetIQ will effectively spin-out the WebTrends arm of its business with current general manager, Greg Drew, becoming the new company's president and CEO.
The transaction is being undertaken with the full participation and support of the WebTrends management team, members of which will be investing in the new business together with Francisco Partners.
Google Acquires Web Analytics Firm Urchin Google has announced the acquisition of Urchin Software Corporation, a San Diego, California based web analytics company.
From the press release...
Google plans to make these tools available to web site owners and marketers to better enable them to increase their advertising return on investment and make their web sites more effective.
"We want to provide web site owners and marketers with the information they need to optimize their users' experience and generate a higher return-on-investment from their advertising spending," said Jonathan Rosenberg, vice president of product management, Google. "This technology will be a valuable addition to Google's suite of advertising and publishing products."
As Google stated, the main reason for this acquisition is to be able to provide AdWords advertisers with data that demonstrates the ROI of their ads, and encourage them to spend more with Google.
But what about this idea? I wouldn't be surprised if this were a step closer to offering a performance-based pricing model. With the tracking offered by Urchin, Google could move towards a product that only charges an advertiser when a transaction is completed.
I'll stick my neck out and say that we'll see some type of performance model by the end of the year.
Terms of the deal were not announced but Battelle has word that Urchin was bought for $30 million. Andy Beal
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March 28, 2005
Beware the Security Risks with Desktop Search Tools
Today the role of London Buses will be played by desktop search articles. You can stand around for ages, waiting for one, then two come along back-to-back. ;-)
In this story by USA Today, they take a look at some of the potential security risks involved in downloading and using desktop search tools. Andy Beal
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FyberSearch Upgrades Relevancy
Nathan Enns never seems to stop tweaking FyberSearch, in an effort to continually improve the user experience. He has added some new features today and you can read details here. Andy Beal
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New Classifieds Search Engine Has Oodles of Potential What do you get when former Excite.com executives, fresh from taking (very) early retirement, reunite to figure out a better way to sift through online classifieds? You get Oodle.com, a new search engine for classifieds that beta launches today in three local markets; Chicago, Dallas and Philadelphia. The service is complete free (for now) and will eventually roll out to more than a dozen sites, for other cities, by the end of 2005.
Single source for classifieds
We caught up with Craig Donato, CEO of Oodle, who told us, "Oodle was started 18 months ago and is the first service to focus on the needs of the buyer. Whether you are looking for a job, housecleaner, used car or snowboard -- you want to see all the local listings, quickly find what you need, and jump on great deals when they pop up."
Oodle – which is the coolest name with two "o"s to launch since the late nineties - enables consumers to easily see all of the classified listings available in a local area. The beta versions include most of the major sources for local listings: a region’s anchor newspaper, small suburban papers, Craigslist, eBay and national online sites like Monster.com and Cars.com. According to Donato, Oodle will "continue to role in more listings every day".
The clever search engine also offers traditional "drill-down" filters that allow searching by categories and uses its patent-pending ClassiFind™ technology to assess listing quality and detect SPAM or inappropriate listings. It also helps filter out annoying abbreviations commonly used in classifieds.
Classifieds in your inbox
Taking direction from the success of Google & Yahoo news alerts, Oodle also offers users the opportunity to be notified by email when a new listing matches their search criteria. Donato tells us that they expect to offer RSS notifications and cell phone alerts in the near future.
As we said, Oodle is completely free and while the company does not have written agreements with all of the classified publishers they crawl, they hope quickly to demonstrate their benefit to sites such as eBay and Craigslist. Oodle will make its money by displaying Google AdWords ads alongside search results.
Oodles of potential
Oodle certainly fills a void. Searching online classifieds can be a pain and I am looking forward to Oodle reaching the Raleigh/Durham area (hint, hint). There is a question of whether they can avoid any conflicts with the sites, whose classifieds they are republishing, but Oodle hopes to avoid any conflict by always directing the searcher back to the original classifieds page. Indeed, Oodle hopes to demonstrate such a value to classifieds publishers that they will be willing to up-sell their advertisers to enhanced listings on Oodle.
So can Oodle be successful? Donato thinks so. "By making it easy to get a single view of the entire market of local listings, Oodle will attract more buyers to online classifieds," continued Donato. "This, in turn, benefits everyone in the category." Andy Beal
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CGI Holding Continues Buying Spree
Thanks to Kevin Newcomb, of ClickZ, for his comprehensive summary of our recent M&A activity. Andy Beal
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Google Code Jam Winners
For the winners of Google's Code Jam, we turn to none other than The Times of India. Rather fitting, considering that three of the top five winners are Indian.
Ardian K Poernomo of Singapore and Pascal Alfadian of Indonesia bagged the first two places at the Google Code Jam contest, while the Indians – Rajsekar Manokaran of Chennai, Nishant Redkar of Mumbai and Sreeram Ramachandran of Singapore – won the third, fourth and fifth places.
The contest, the first to be held in India, had more than 14,000 participants. Andy Beal
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Looking at Desktop Search
It's been a few weeks since anyone "looked at" desktop search tools, so I am glad that the Washington Post gives us all a deserved fix.
Rob Pegoraro test drives six different desktop search tools, including our favorite Copernic, and provides feedback on each. Andy Beal
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Internet Advertising Growth Funds Online Acquisitions
According to SFGate.com, the recent increase in M&A activity is fueled by the growth of internet advertising.
Internet industry giants such as Yahoo and Google are blossoming, thanks to a strong online advertising market. At the same time, traditional media companies are looking to expand their Internet presence to get a bigger share of the advertising profits.
Of course, this is not just felt at the sharp-end. You may have heard of another internet advertising company that is heavily involved in M&A right now. ;-) Andy Beal
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BusinessWeek Offers SEO Advice, Seriously
BusinessWeek online has embraced SEO and uses Sherry Alpert to convince readers that optimization is good for their business.
It's nice to see BW endorsing SEO, but the article doesn't have a single mention of the importance of links and the author seems to use the story for a little self-promotion. Andy Beal
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The World's Number 1 "Matt" According to Google
You've heard about renowned bloggers being #1 on the search engines, for their name; "Scoble", "Jeremy" etc. The Mercury News (sub) takes a light-hearted look at how Matt Mullenweg ended up as number one for "Matt" on Google.
As he explains it, his ascent in Google has mirrored the success of WordPress, his open-source blogging software. About a quarter of new WordPress blogs leave a link to Mullenweg in their blogroll, and ``that has certainly not hurt my search-engine ranking,'' he says.
One of the authors of the piece is Matt Marshall. I can't help thinking that the idea for the story possibly came from his own search engine vanity. ;-) Andy Beal
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March 27, 2005
Lawsuits Could Hurt Google's Growth
Interesting article looks at how the increasing number of trademark infringement suits, filed against Google, could reduce the company's future revenue potential.
The growing number of lawsuits against Google around the world could diminish that advertising revenue by reducing the number of search words that could be sold to competitors - a threat to Google's business model that the company has acknowledged in regulatory filings.
The article includes examples of lawsuits and focuses on the recent flurry of French rulings.
France is home to as many as 15 cases, according to lawyers involved. Andy Beal
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March 24, 2005
AFP's Dispute with Google Has Far Reaching Impact
Search Engine Guide has details of an unfortunate victim of the recent dispute between Google and AFP (a French based news service).
Google decided to respond to the extortion and stupidity of the lawsuit by actually winning the battle. Google’s response? They stopped syndicating the news from sites using AFP of which this site is one. Not only is our AFP news not syndicated, but our editorials and independent news feeds are also blacklisted. Any news posted after Tuesday morning at 3am cannot be found on Google anywhere. It is a matter of time before the other services that ‘grab’ our news follow suit.
The author represents Political Gateway.com and they rely heavily on AFP news. It appears that they no longer appear in Google News because Google removed all AFP content, regardless of the source or consequences.
In time the lawsuit will end, AFP will lose, Google and AFP will compromise and all will be as it was. Except for sites like this one who will lose financially and emotionally, as it always is when big business collide. Andy Beal
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Ask Jeeves StockHolder Sues to Prevent IAC Deal
According to the Seattle Post-Intelligencer, an Ask Jeeves shareholder is obviously a little disappointed in the valuation IAC has placed on Ask Jeeves.
Ask Jeeves shareholder Richard Wiltsie said in a suit filed yesterday in Delaware Chancery Court in Wilmington that company directors agreed to the deal "without fulfilling their most basic obligation to conduct a full and fair sale process" to get the best price.
Affiliate Marketing Blog
If you're looking to keep up-to-date with the last news in the world of affiliate marketing, check out the blog of our sister company, KowaBunga. They do a great job of keeping on top of affiliate marketing news and tips. Andy Beal
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WebSourced Acquires Smart Interactive; Mike Grehan to Lead UK and European Office
WebSourced today announced our continued growth and expansion will take us further and deeper into Europe. We're extremely delighted to bring Smart Interactive on board and assist them in their growth in the UK. Oh and you may be familiar with Smart's Managing Director, a charming chap by the name of Mike Grehan. ;-)
We're extremely excited to have Mike join us and are 100% committed to establishing a true presence (that means offices, staff etc) in the UK and Europe.
Here's the release:
CGI Holding Corporation's WebSourced Subsidiary Acquires Smart Interactive; Mike Grehan to Lead UK Search Engine Marketing Initiative
Internationally Renowned Search Engine Marketing Expert, Mike Grehan, Will Spearhead WebSourced's Expansion Into Great Britain and Europe
RESEARCH TRIANGLE PARK, N.C.--March 24, 2005-- WebSourced, Inc., a leader in search engine marketing (www.websourced.com) and a wholly owned subsidiary of CGI Holding Corporation (AMEX:THK; the "Company"), today announced that the Company has acquired the assets of Smart Interactive Ltd. ("Smart Interactive"), a leading provider of search engine marketing services to companies throughout Great Britain and Europe (see www.smart-interactive.co.uk). The terms of the transaction were not disclosed.
Based in Newcastle, England, Smart Interactive is led by world-renowned search engine expert, Mike Grehan. He is the author of the best-selling book "Search Engine Marketing" and one of Europe's most recognized and sought-after search engine marketing speakers. Grehan was also recently named one of the UK Internet industry's Top 100 most influential people for the past decade by more than 22,000 members of London-based e-Consultancy. Grehan has more than a decade of experience in the search engine industry and has worked with dozens of FTSE 100 companies and Fortune 500 corporations.
WebSourced is the world's largest search engine marketing company. The Company provides clients with organic search engine optimization, paid inclusion and pay-per-click advertising services. WebSourced also helps companies secure a well-rounded online marketing presence that will generate new business. The Company's roster of 1,400 plus clients includes such market leaders as Lowe's Home Improvement, NBC, Black & Decker, DeWALT and CitiFinancial.
The acquisition of Smart Interactive will position WebSourced with a full-time, fully staffed UK office. This will set the stage for the Company to expand services in Great Britain and throughout the rest of Europe.
"WebSourced is the world's largest search engine marketing company. They approached me with an attractive offer and demonstrated a genuine commitment to emulating the huge success they've had elsewhere, here in the UK and Europe," said Grehan. "Having met the management and staff at WebSourced's headquarters in North Carolina, I was very impressed with the operation. The use of superior proprietary technology at the back end and the professional human touch at the customer end simply endorses the reasons why they have become market leaders."
Pat Martin, CEO and President of WebSourced, stated, "Smart Interactive, led by Mike Grehan, is one of the most recognized and trusted names in the UK search marketing industry. With Forrester Research predicting the European search marketing industry to grow by 65 percent in 2005 and reach EUR 3 billion by 2010, this is an important acquisition for WebSourced and one that will allow us to quickly expand our European client base." Martin continued, "No other search marketing company in the world can boast a line-up of experts such as Mike Grehan, Andy Beal, Heather Lloyd-Martin, Jason Dowdell and Garrett French."
Added Andy Beal, vice president of marketing for WebSourced, "Mike Grehan is without doubt one of the top search engine experts in the world. His experience, knowledge and excellent reputation among Europe's largest companies, will allow us to become the first U.S. search marketing company to successfully expand into Great Britain and Europe." Andy Beal
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No Bonus for the Google Guys
According the NY Post, Google's Brin, Page and Schmidt will not be getting a bonus for 2004.
In a meeting held earlier this month, Google's board decided not to give 2004 bonuses to the company's chief executive, Eric Schmidt, or its co-founders, Larry Page and Sergey Brin, according to documents filed yesterday by the Mountain View, Calif.-based company.
Sheesh. Not sure what else the trio could have done better. A huge increase in revenues, lots of new products and a successful IPO. Now they'll have to dip into the $billions they own in stock. Poor things. Andy Beal
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March 23, 2005
UK Online Ad Spend Continues to Soar
According to data from the UK Advertising Association, internet advertising spend grew 46% in 2004 to £597m.
The total UK spend on internet advertising is now only 0.1% behind that of radio, demonstrating that the UK continues to be a very strong space for search engine marketing.
Heather Lloyd-Martin's "Successful Search Engine Copywriting" Book Our multi-talented SEM expert, Heather Lloyd-Martin, has her new book "Successful Search Engine Copywriting" reviewed by equally talented SEM expert, Chris Sherman.
"Successful Search Engine Copywriting is an excellent book. It's packed with solid, reliable information and techniques that can help improve the visibility of any site in search results. Perhaps more importantly, applying its lessons can also improve the overall success and increase the conversion rate and return on investment of a web site. The book should be on the must-read list for anyone wanting to hone their search engine optimization skills. It's also an excellent insight into an important part of the mechanics of search engines that's valuable for anyone who wants to have a better understanding of how these mysterious information-finding tools really work."
Barry Diller Reveals Plans for Ask Jeeves InformationWeek has Diller's thoughts on what they plan to do with Ask Jeeves.
Appearing on CNBC the other day, Diller addressed the search engine sector: “It’s the very beginning of its growth. … This is going to be a world, just like the media world, where there will be many players, many people providing service.”
Diller plans to grow Ask Jeeves by placing a search bar on Web pages of IAC’s other sites such as the online travel agency Expedia, Home Shopping Network, Ticketmaster, CitySearch, and Match.com. Diller said IAC sites attract 44 million unique visitors, and expects many of them to use the Ask Jeeves search bar instead of going to another site to conduct a search, such as Google.
I cannot think of a better match for Ask Jeeves. They get exposure to a network of users that Google cannot reach and they get the financial support they so dearly needed.
We're still confirming reports that the Ask Jeeves Butler is planning an early retirement on Maui. ;-) Andy Beal
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AOL Launches PinPointTravel.com
InternetWeek has details of AOL's new travel search engine, PinPointTravel.com.
Search, the Next Generation
BusinessWeek takes a look at recent start-ups in the search space. It looks as though there is still plenty of opportunities for the next "The Google of [insert vertical here]".
Though exact data is hard to come by, entrepreneurs say venture capitalists are sinking new money into search startups. Tech pundits believe that if one area has lots of room to grow, it's search, given that advertising sales in the field alone are expected to increase more than 40% this year. "I do believe there's every opportunity for another company to become another Google," says Ken Cassar, an analyst with researcher Nielsen/Net Ratings in New York. Andy Beal
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Google Sends Cease & Desist to Google X Clone
The English would say that Google "has some cheek".
Why? After announcing Google X - a Google interface that clearly copies (and maybe infringes copyright) Apple Mac's operating system - Google apparently was forced to take the site down. Since the plug was pulled, "clones" of the site appeared.
Now in an ironic twist, Google has sent a cease & desist order to one of the clones, claiming they are infringing Google's copyright. So if the clone stays live, could Apple sue Google and then Google sue the clone operator?
To add another level of irony. The clone is hosted by a French company. Will Google finally have a reason to get back at France? Will the clone get the support of the French government? Does anyone care? ;-)
Google removes AFP from Google News
According to DMeurope, Google has started removing AFP content from Google News, after the French news agency filed a $17.5m law suit for copyright infringement.
Smart, decisive move by Google. They have plenty of other news sources and if AFP doesn't have the sense to see the reach Google News brings them, pull it off. Andy Beal
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March 21, 2005
Google Working to Fix Blogger Performance Issues
InfoWorld reports that Google is adding more resources in an effort to improve the performance of Blogger.
Good! 'Cos it has been sucking recently and if I have to put up with it for much longer, I'll be switching! - that should scare them ;-) Andy Beal
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French News Agency Sues Google
I'm still not sure why France has an axe to grind with Google, but it appears a week cannot go buy without at least one law suit coming out of France.
Google is being sued by French news agency, Agence France Presse, under claims the search giant used the agency's copyrighted material in its news service feeds without permission. AFP is seeking damages of $17.5 million and an injunction barring Google from publishing their content.
The only good news for Google is that the suit has been filed in a U.S. court, which at least gives them half a chance of winning. Andy Beal
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Yahoo Acquires Flickr
After much rumor, Yahoo has indeed acquired photo management and sharing application, Flickr. You can get more details at the Flickr blog. Andy Beal
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InterActiveCorp to Buy Ask Jeeves for $1.9 Billion I can't leave the country for 2 minutes!
ZDNet is reporting that IAC will today announce the acquisition of Ask Jeeves in a deal worth $1.9 billion.
IAC/InterActive owns a variety of internet businesses. Its principle holdings are Expedia, Ticketmaster, Home Shopping Network, Match.com and CitySearch.
IAC/InterActive is expected to acquire Ask Jeeves in a stock transaction, exchanging shares in IAC/InterActive for shares in Ask Jeeves then buying 60 percent of the just-issued IAC/InterActive shares back for about $1.2 billion.
Wow, that's pretty big shake-up in the industry and also huge validation for not only Ask Jeeves but the entire search engine space. IAC can now pair-up its local search business, CitySearch, with the global search engine reach offered by Ask. Jeeves also stands to benefit from the technology IAC has at its other divisions. Andy Beal
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March 17, 2005
Heading to England
Blogging will be erratic, once again, the next few days. I'm flying to London tomorrow for a mixture of business and pleasure.
This is the first time I've had a reason to go to England on business and I'm glad I'll get to spend a couple of days with my family. [insert your own nostalgia here]
Anyway, I'll be back on Wednesday, but hope to keep you updated of the latest breaking news from across the pond.
BlowSearch Launches PPC Service, Takes Unique Approach to Click Fraud
We've got advance news that BlowSearch is launching its very own PPC product, next week (not next year, like Microsoft). They'll introduce some interesting options including:
* Competitor Blocking tool — competitors can be deterred from maliciously clicking on paid results as advertisers can enter a competitor’s IP address to automatically prevent paid listings from being displayed to that specific IP address.
* ROI tracking technology — lets advertisers follow how network partners perform in order to tailor and customize their search advertising campaign.
* Traffic Source Selection technology — lets users control their listings on a site-by-site basis across the BlowSearch network.
Now wouldn't it be nice if Google, Yahoo or MSN offered just one of the above features. ;-) Andy Beal
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Google Has Larger Market Share in UK than US
New Hitwise data suggests that Google has a more impressive market share in the UK than in the US.
The report...found google.co.uk topping the list in the UK in terms of both market share of visits (48%) and volume of searches (63.7%).
The figures put Google UK ahead of its US parent, which Hitwise said represents 36.6% of all visits and 56.7% of all searches by US Internet users.
European Search Engine Marketing To Grow 65% In 2005
According to CRM Today, new Forrester research suggests search marketing will grow by leaps and bounds in Europe.
Forrester Research, Inc. estimates that search engine marketing will generate €1.4 billion of spending in Europe in 2005, a 65% increase compared with 2004. By 2010, European marketers will spend almost €3 billion — up from €856 million in 2004 — on search marketing.
In the UK, the largest online ad market in Europe, search marketing will grow to over €1 billion in 2010 — up from €763 million at the end of 2005; marketers in travel, finance, auto, and retail will fuel the spend.
The report does show that growth will slow by 2007, due to a number of reasons. Andy Beal
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New Market Share Data for Paid Search
According to AlwaysOn, Microsoft is already in a good position to challenge Yahoo and Google in the paid search arena.
MSN, with a 16 percent share of the paid-search market, is in third place behind industry leader Google , at 35 percent, and Yahoo , at 31.8 percent, according to research firm comScore Networks. Andy Beal
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March 16, 2005
Microsoft CEO Ballmer Tells Advertisers They're Important
ClickZ reports from a gathering of more than 500 of MSN's top advertisers in Redmond. Microsoft's CEO, Steve Ballmer, made it clear that they understand the importance of their advertisers.
Ballmer repeatedly told the crowd,...that advertisers were an integral part of MSN's plans. Improving technology for advertisers is an area where the company is focusing its current development resources and where it expects future innovations to come. Andy Beal
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Google Loses French Court Appeal
The BBC reports that Google has lost their trademark infringement case appeal.
Google X Takes Idea from Apple Mac OS
This is a cool little interface from the Google Labs - Google X. It looks just like the OS found on Apple Macs. Very neat!
From the creator, Chikai Ohazama, Software Engineer...
And now there's Google X, which came about because I wanted a quick fun way to access all of Google's services. I gave it to a few friends in the company, who gave it to their friends, some posted it on their blogs, others sent it around on mailing lists, and it eventually made its way to Marissa Mayer, who liked it enough to say, when do you want to put it up on Labs? So after some spit and polish from some enthusiastic Googlers and the keen eye of the UI team, Google X is here. I hope all of you enjoy it - especially Mac users, who I'm sure will appreciate its lineage.
UPDATE: Google X now longer appears to be live. I guess Apple wasn't too pleased with the tribute. ;-) Andy Beal
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Get the Latest NCAA Basketball Scores with MSN Search
MSN is making it easier for you to check the scores of your favorite college basketball team.
We teamed up with FOX Sports to show real-time scores and schedules during the games. You get a quick snapshot of the tournament just by searching for “college hoops”. You can also track a specific team such as “niagara purple eagles” or using just the college name like “ucla basketball”. Season stats show up when you type in a player from one of the teams in the tourney. Andy Beal
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Yahoo 360 Offers Blog Tool
CNet has details of a new blogging service from Yahoo. Andy Beal
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First Screenshots of MSN adCenter
Thanks to Charlene Li, we can now bring you actual screenshots of the new MSN adCenter. What is really cool, and not shown in the static images, is that the graphs are all animated. For example, the chart for gender "grows" from 0% until it reaches the actual percentage number. Hard to explain, but looks very slick.
A key component of the service is the ability to look at audience profiles for specific keywords. In the first screenshot, you can see gender, age group, and lifestyle segment for the keyword “bmw”. This allows an advertiser to target their ad more finely to that audience. It does NOT mean that advertisers will be able to target their ads only to men between the ages of 26-40 – that type of functionality is still far, far in the distance.
Reporting is also pretty robust. In the second screenshot, you can see the audience profile for people who clicked on all of the keywords in a specific campaign. Andy Beal
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WebTrends Updates WebPosition Gold
WebTrends today announced a new version of WPG.
Free to customers of the current version WebPosition 3.5 simplifies the creation and execution of the SEO process through a new wizard-based interface for reporting on keyword rankings, while offering more sophisticated and flexible reporting capabilities with its new Excel-based tool, WebPosition SmartReports(TM).
"These enhancements afford both beginner and advanced users the ability to dramatically accelerate their time to results," said Jason Palmer, vice president of products, WebTrends. "By making it easier to execute, analyze and manage SEO efforts as part of a continuous process, WebPosition 3.5 will help more and more companies realize the full potential of their ability to secure higher natural search positions."
Supplying advertisers with detailed information about users moves MSN a step closer to a concept called ``behavioral targeting'' which is enjoying a resurgence in the ad world. The technique allows advertisers to try to serve their ads only to users who are most interested in them, based on their Web-surfing habits.
Advertisers will not be able to do that initially with adCenter.
But Forrester Research advertising analyst Jim Nail said he anticipates the day when search-engine ads are triggered by a user's demographic information, such as gender, in addition to the keywords the person enters into the search box. The technology could also allow MSN to customize the ads it shows its Hotmail e-mail users.
"They're trying to take paid search to the next level. Because right now, a click-through on an ad is not enough for advertisers,'" said Andy Beal, vice president of search marketing for WebSourced, a search-engine marketing firm.
On where MSN is getting their demographic/behavioral data...
The data will be gleaned from MSN's 280 million monthly unique visitors who opt to provide additional information, and all of it will be provided without identifying individuals, she said.
MSN developed adCenter in-house, and it eventually will provide a "one-stop shop" for advertisers wanting to market using search advertising, banner ads and even e-mail ads through MSN Hotmail, Redetzki said.
Providing advertisers with more variables for targeting will potentially make campaigns more efficient, [Frederick] Marckini said. For MSN, an unintended side effect of increasing efficiency may be to reduce revenue -- with fewer wasted clicks, advertisers pay less for the same number of qualified clicks.
"Having inefficiency in search is a moneymaker," Marckini explained. "But improving efficiency by doing what's technologically possible, despite it being slightly less profitable in the very short term, it is real long-term thinking because great results will ultimately attract more advertiser dollars."
"In larger terms, Microsoft developing into the third major paid online search advertising platform is likely to support market growth as Global 2000 corporate clients find additional keyword inventory available," Internet analyst David Garrity, of Carris and Company, wrote in a research note.
Are some upset with MSNs behavioral tracking? But although the personal information is anonymous, analyst David Garrity with Caris & Co. said the detailed profiles could dissuade some consumers from using the search engine.
"This all very much smacks of Big Brother," Garrity said. Andy Beal
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March 15, 2005
WSJ Jumps Gun on MSN adCenter Announcement
I've been speaking to journalists about the new MSN adCenter and they all tell me that they are under embargo until Wednesday. Well, someone over at the WSJ didn't get that memo. They've gone ahead and posted their story tonight.
The article reveals - so I'll comment - details of the demographic data that MSN adCenter advertisers will have access to. As an SEM, I can tell you that the graphs make for a nice visual display and will certainly help advertisers to achieve better targeting of their adverts, although don't confuse that with the ability to actively select which demographic your can show your ad to. Mark Boslet at Dow Jones has some other opinions and speculations.
There are still a lot of cool details that will come out over the coming weeks. We'll keep you posted! Microsoft Tests Software Link Of Web Searches to Advertisers
By ROBERT A. GUTH and KEVIN J. DELANEY Staff Reporters of THE WALL STREET JOURNAL March 16, 2005
Microsoft Corp. is testing software that links Web searches to advertisers, firing the latest salvo in a battle with Google Inc. and Yahoo Inc. to pull more advertising dollars online.
The pilot, to be run in France and Singapore, is the second half of Microsoft's effort to build its own Internet search business. Microsoft late last year opened its "algorithmic" search engine, which pulls up links to Web pages based on key-word searches.
The new software allows advertisers to link advertisements to relevant search results. Microsoft charges advertisers a fee each time users click on the ads. Called MSN adCenter, the software eventually will also allow advertisers to access detailed data on MSN users, such as age, gender and "lifestyle" characteristics, helping them to tailor their marketing efforts.
For now, the new functions Microsoft is testing appear to be more advanced than those offered by its lead competitors. Today most services charge fees based on the number of "clicks" on a specific advertisement but provide little information about people who searched on a specific term.
An advertiser linked to "NCAA basketball," for instance, on MSN adCenter could view graphs showing that mostly males age 16 to 60 searched for the term. Such information can be used by Microsoft to tailor its fees based on the audience and move online advertisers from "buying keywords to buying an audience," Microsoft Vice President Yusuf Mehdi said.
Microsoft said it will give advertisers only aggregate data, not the identities of individual searchers.
Mr. Mehdi says the company plans to expand the software so that it can give "one-stop shopping" for buying advertisements across MSN's various services. Microsoft Chief Executive Steve Ballmer will announce the new service today at a conference for online advertisers that Microsoft is holding at its headquarters in Redmond, Wash.
Microsoft's initiative comes amid a scramble by the fast-growing search industry to beef up its advertising offerings to appeal to deeper-pocketed advertisers and smaller companies that to date haven't been big spenders online. The search companies are also trying to expand beyond the traditional advertiser categories that have spent heavily with them -- midsize companies and specific sectors such as telecoms, travel and finance.
Yahoo, for instance, is working on a system to broker online advertisements for small and midsize Web publishers that matches advertisements with relevant content on partner Web sites, according to people familiar with the company's plans.
"The big thing here is: How do we grow the advertiser base" online, Mr. Ballmer said in an interview. He estimated that just 500,000 companies advertise on the Internet, compared with about seven million in the Yellow Pages. In addition to attracting large advertisers, Microsoft hopes the service allows small businesses "to participate in a more effective way." MSN already sells advertisements on its sites, including some on its search pages, but on a negotiated contract basis,
Google and Yahoo already dominate the market for search-based advertising, so Microsoft must play catch-up. Currently, Microsoft pays Yahoo to handle the advertising links in a deal that runs until June 2006. Yahoo executives have conceded in recent weeks that they probably can't count on brokering ads for Microsoft's search results in the future. Still, "our relationship remains intact," a Yahoo spokeswoman said.
Already, Microsoft plans to replace search ads provided by Yahoo with its own ads in France. Microsoft executives won't comment on their plans to roll out the service in other markets.
A Google spokesman declined to comment on MSN's plans. Andy Beal
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AOL Search Helps Pick NCAA Basketball Tournament Winners Have you filled out your bracket yet?
Well, you might want to take a look at the latest info from AOL Search, showing which teams are the most popular right now.
Here are the top most searched for teams on AOL Search -- as well as their bracket information -- for the past seven days:
1) Duke (#1 - Austin) 2) Florida (#4 - Syracuse) 3) UNC (#1 - Syracuse) 4) UCLA (#11 - Albuquerque) 5) Miami (not invited to the tournament, but going to NIT) 6) Kentucky (#2 - Austin) 7) Central Florida (#15 - Syracuse) 8) U Conn (#2 - Syracuse) 9) Arizona (#3 - Chicago) 10) Boston College (#4 - Chicago) Andy Beal
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WebSourced Adds Affiliate Power
ClickZ has a nice article that talks about our efforts to shake-up the affiliate marketing industry.
KowaBunga!'s union with WebSourced is likely to strengthen the former company's fledgling affiliate network, called Kolimbo, affiliate marketing experts say. The result could be a strong competitor to dominant affiliate networks LinkShare and Commission Junction (CJ), which is owned by ValueClick.
"LinkShare and CJ have an effective monopoly," said one seasoned affiliate manager, who asked not to be named. "I used to be able to get deals out of CJ that I can't anymore. Here you have a third player shaking up the space. The competition is good for merchants, it's good for publishers, it's good for affiliates."
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Have you filled out your bracket yet?