Doh!

There’s a strong emphasis on usability that makes me wonder if this could be built out to an enterprise level. I’m not sure what tools CNN.com and NYTimes.com use to assign stories, but the interface is very slick.

My only complaint is the name. RustyBudget? Come on! I understand wanting to keep the brand consistent with RustyBrick, but I’m not loving “RustyBudget.” What about RustyBloggit or RustyBloggin?

Also, I wonder if they are using this for Search Engine Land?

Cord tagged me earlier, and I’m finally getting around to 8 random things you may or may not know about me:

1. If I weren’t in advertising/marketing, I would be a chef. I love cooking…just hate cleaning.

2. In the months before my daughter was born, I weaned myself down to four hours of sleep per night. After she was born, this turned out to be a disaster, because while I was sleeping about five hours, they weren’t in a row.

3. At age 11, I was traumatized during an airboat ride in Everglades National Park. The tour guide fell out of the boat into the water at least once, and the boat ran out of gas in the middle of nowhere (and this was before cell phones). There’s something about the sun setting over the sound of alligators’ mating calls while you’re floating helplessly through a bug-ridden, grassy river that will haunt your dreams forever.

4. I have the worst penmanship on the planet.

5. Throughout my childhood, I was forbidden from watching the following shows:

· Sanford & Son

· WWF

· G.I. Joe

· The A Team

· Mama’s Family

Apparently they glorified violence and/or gross stupidity. Surprisingly, my mom didn’t seem to have a problem with “Good Times”…Dy-No-Mite!!!

6. The day I received my driver’s license, I mixed up the gas and brake pad and was two inches away from scratching a Ferrari with dealer plates in the parking space next to me.

7. I eat chocolate of some variety/quantity everyday.

8. My first job out of college was renting extra crappy apartments. The maintenance crew fumigated for insects in an apartment where a family was set to move in within a week. The next morning, a carpet of MILLIONS (this is not an exaggeration) of cockroaches was all throughout the rooms. I’m not ashamed to admit that I puked everywhere.

The ninth random thing is that I really hate perpetuating chain-letter type activities, so I won’t burden anyone else with being tagged. If it’s poor netiquette, I’ll live.

The problem with this target market is that they are rarely challenged for long. Once a user understands the AOL interface, it’s not a far jump over the wall to the real Internet. For some reason this glaring problem didn’t appear to be glaring enough for anyone at AOL Time Warner until today.

Time Warner is now considering spinning off the more profitable cable from the sucking sound coming out of McLean. They also are considering major changes at their publishing unit.

It couldn’t come soon enough. Let’s face some harsh realities:

· The number of individuals who are new to the Internet is rapidly diminishing (obviously, this doesn’t include your drooling 1-year-old, but feel certain he/she will be introduced to Google pretty soon)

· Individuals who use AOL have the ability to easily migrate to the real Internet—they inevitably will and really won’t miss AOL

· AOL does not possess their own search algorithm or paid search advertising platform; instead, relying on Google for both

· AOL has consistently lost market share over the past year

How do you turn something like that around? The short answer is you can’t…at least not in the search space. However, AOL does have an opportunity to do what it does best…teach new technology. Specifically, the synergy between the Web and television.

Here are a couple of completely made-up, but potentially viable scenarios:

• AOL Time Warner remains intact, and allows TNT, TBS, TMC, CNN, etc. to be broadcast in real time through AOL. Banner ads and Google-powered search remain intact.
• Microsoft or IAC (aka Ask.com) or Yahoo buys AOL to increase an abysmal search share from “total crap” to “pretty crappy,” and then combines a TV element. BTW, Microsoft could do this very easily with their plans for LiveStation.

AOL has failed in providing customers with a reason to stay with them. This includes developing new technology that hasn’t been ripped off from a competitor, or something that drives new business from real web users.

However, AOL has historically done a commendable job helping individuals learn interactive technology. And that makes AOL a prime candidate to teach the world how TV and the Web will soon combine to become the most powerful medium the world will ever know.

I’m not ashamed to admit that AOL was my first online experience back in the early 1990s. It helped me understand keywords and usability. I have no plans to go back anytime soon.

What would it take for you to start using AOL again?

Whoops.

Is this a good idea? Well, sort of.

Pros:

1. It eliminates problems with fraudulent page refreshes
2. It measures interaction with individual pages, which has some baring on usability of the site
3. Sites with streaming media, Flash, Ajax, etc. will have more opportunities to show their value

Cons:

1. Sites that have focused on conversions by reducing time on site will drop in rank (i.e. Amazon, Google, etc.)
2. Data skewed by users who leave browser windows open, but who are not actually interacting with pages
3. Sites with chat software (i.e. AOL) will actually earn more weight as it reflects time on site.

Overall, as new Web 2.0 technology goes even more mainstream, Neilsen Net Ratings new format is a smart idea. It forces site stickiness, and forces online agencies to look past the normal metrics at the true value of the web property.

Historically, I’ve always been a fan of Google Trends, and I was thrilled to see MSN take a step further by breaking down age and gender of search terms. Here’s the problem…either comScore’s search engine share numbers are seriously flawed or Microsoft has some explaining to do. Let me explain:

If we do a simple search for “wedding favors,” we see that there is a huge spike in March of 2007.

Unfortunately, adCenter Labs doesn’t show us data from 3/2006. Luckily, SEW does with 13.2% market share from comScore. And unfortunately in 3/2007, that number is down to 10.4%.

If Google Trends shows impressions on this term to be flat, can someone please explain to me how growth has improved to these levels?

What am I missing? Any and all insights are welcome.

I’m excited about this for a couple of reasons:

1. It becomes an obvious next step towards effectively integrating traditional and interactive marketing. Google has already taken a huge leap in this direction with the introduction of Google Audio radio advertising. Don’t be surprised if Microsoft uses LiveStation as an entrée into buying television commercials through adCenter.

2. It coincides with my prediction of how I believe we will watch television in the near future. Not necessarily on your laptop or mobile phone (which Silverlight allows), but combining television and the web. From an advertising perspective, this would become a fundamental shift in the way we think about action-focused messaging.

Here are some examples of how the viewing experience changes:

• You watch a movie on HBO and see an actor you recognize, but can’t remember his/her name. Your wireless keyboard allows you to click on the actor for more information in a new window. In addition to name, D.O.B., etc., the new window also has other films where the actor has appeared and links where you can buy those films.

• CBS broadcasts the Victoria's Secret Fashion Show. Each time a new outfit appears, there are opportunities for promotional coupons to purchase either online or in the brick and mortar locations.

• While watching favorite NFL game, a local pizzeria commercial promotes a new home-town pizza special. You order online (including a tip for the driver).

I still haven’t quite grasped how they maintain image quality on a peer-to-peer foundation, but that’s why I’m not a software engineer.

Seems like a no-brainer on this blog, huh?

I tend to agree with the majority of Seth Godin’s opinions, but he couldn’t be more wrong on this one. Specifically, Godin contends that brick and mortar stores position product based on what is easy for employees versus what is convenient for customers.

So, all the Armani blue suits are next to each other, then by size.

So, all the boxer shorts at the Gap are on a wall, organized by style first (checks over here, stripes over there,) then by size.

So, all the power tools at Home Depot are together, sometimes by brand, sometimes by function (saw) and then by type of material to be cut (wood).

This is dumb, and the web makes it obvious why it's dumb. It's dumb because it makes it easier for the clerk, not for the customer. And dumb because it plays to the label's ego, not to ours.

Not at all.

It’s done this way because while the Home Depot is a large store, it isn’t a football stadium. Organizing products in this way might be easier for clerks, but it also keeps customers from having to back a sleeping bag and GPS system. Can you imagine how large your local Home Depot would be if you:

find the glue and the wood saws and the screwdrivers and the screws all together in a section called, "working with wood"?

The reason is because while there is a right tool for every job, lots of tools multi-task. And that means overlap.