SEOBook and a bunch of people are discussing this today and the new acronymn for blog is not a shortened way of saying web log but “Better Listings On Google”.
This is a discussion that should grab a bunch of comments throughout the industry over the next few days.
Google’s first quarter net revenue was $1.3 billion – or if the numbers hold through without continued growth would be $5.2 billion for 2005. At the start of the year forecasts for the industry as a whole were around that number and people thought them about right.
Merrill Lynch saw the numbers for the industry at between $5.1 and $5.6 billion.
Forrester Research saw the numbers at about $5.7 billion.
Gary Stein, a senior analyst at JupiterResearch,said “paid search will continue to grow faster than any other sector of online advertising, increasing from $2.6 billion in 2004 to $5.5 billion in 2009.” So I guess we will see no more growth for the next 4 years.
Early this year I questioned these numbers and the whole forecasting approach in general. Obviously like us PPC marketers the industry needs numbers and the ability to do some predictions. I would think in an industry that lives by numbers we would be a little more accurate.
Guess the numbers were taking into account the refunds that will be coming once all this click fraud is worked out!!!!
The aptly named Click Defense Inc. has filed suited against Google for $5 million, according to a Reuters new article. The problem much in the minds of advertisers and searchers recently is going to get some definition if this suit is allowed to go to court, which suggests a settlement will be reached.
The problem is as soon as one case goes to trial and definitions and precedents are created the entire search industry will be headed for a massive change. One that I hope happens and the industry uses the opportunity to get itself to the next level, where advertisers and PPC providers work together to clean up the frauds and create a solid platform to invest in.
Interesting article at Xbiz tells how the government is expecting Google and Yahoo! to improve the filtering of adult content from the search results.
Stating children are using the search engines to access adult content, government officials, are looking to the top engines to lead the way in improving adult content filters.
I missed this when it was first posted 10 days ago, and am surprised it has not gotten much play on other sites. But Yahoo plans on offering a subsciption search service.
Essentially people will be able to sign up for various info that is behind subscription walls at various major places such as LexusNexus and the Wall Street Journal.
Guess it is a glorified affiliate program for subscriptions that will be placed in search results. I am curious as to the whole method and will be talking with the Yahoo poeple I know tomorrow and try and get more info.
The recent Google Sales Conference in Arizona apparently had a mentalist there to entertain the employees. Bet there will not be one attending the Engineers Conference, they would not risk exposing the alogorithm to anyone.
The evening’s entertainment was a mixture of magic, hypnosis and mind reading. The guy had people from the audience up on stage and was able to get them to do various things… now doesn’t that open itself up for all sorts of interpretation.
“When you get back to your office you will give my account a million dollar click fraud credit….”
Seems the DMCA regulations scare Yahoo. Enough to have them take sites down erroneously and without fact checking. Thanks to Nick W. at www.threadwatch.org for bringing this story to light.
I am now wondering how many people will be running around trying this and creating another search nightmare. Only time will tell…. now which of the competition do I want to remove…..
MindComent has a free tool that they use to find pages that contain bad comments about the company’s website etc. Guess they are firm believers that there is no such thing as bad press, since they use this as a means to gauge branding on the internet.
This one actually can be used to find who is writing against your site or services and use it to repair bad will.
AOL PUBLIC ACCESS PORTAL LAUNCHES
Though it looks alot like Yahoo!, the new AOL free access portal may be an interesting step in the development of web.
The new AOL.com is a full-fledged web portal. The search results are a rework of Google listings… though they grab the most profitable stem of any term in the PPC side as far as I have been able to test.
You can access your AOL mail, play those AOL games and access most of the areas that were previously just available to paying members.
It is this familiarity that may move them into an interesting position in the industry.
If they deceide they want to create their own search engine and sell their own PPC listings, I am not predicting a long life. They are better off making the right partnerships and concentrating on the content and products side.
Too many people have faltered and failed attempting to climb the search mountain when a well-negotiated partnership takes all the backend and slaes work out of the equation.
Seems the changes are around the corner and the combination of the recent human editors and the possible implementation of TrustRank and Good Seed has people speculating about a new methodology being used or about to be initiated at Google. Search Engine Watch forum discussion and blogs from various search industry members suggest this will be the next big exploration of the algorythm.
Should be fun. And I am sure the Google engineers are laughing about it as they battle each other on the ping pong tables!!!
