Month: August 2007

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Thank You, Robert Nelson

This morning I noticed a new link in my WordPress dashboard. So I check out the site and don’t immediately see the link in a recent post.  Then I look closer and see a new blogroll link in Robert’s site!

Thank you Robert! There is likely no higher honor you could pay me as a blogger than to add me to your blogroll. It’s not only humbling but also it occasionally makes me write a post like this! If I ever make it to Seattle again to talk to a company about moving there, I’ll have to look you up.

Wanna be like Robert? The code for adding a link and the suggested anchor text is on the right hand side of the screen. Thanks!

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Bloggers – Where are the C-Level People?

Marshall Kirkpatrick’s post, introducing good bloggers and the companies that hire them points out some interesting issues. It just leaves out one extremely important point! Having a series of blogs being managed by non-bloggers is a recipe for one or more of the following: ineffective blogs, unhappy bloggers, internal corporate strife and/or worse, serious pr problems in the blogosphere.

How does one avoid this? Simple. Integrate blogging into your C-level management team. Don’t have any bloggers in your C-level management team or board of directors? Maybe it’s time to consider a new approach altogether with fresh faces. Is a highly educated and experienced person who is a blogger, with startup and innovative company experience mutually exclusive? No. But it’s a requirement if you are going to win in today’s increasingly complex world that requires broad generalist thinkers to navigate not only the blogosphere, but the constantly changing world we live in everyday. Stop building organizational pyramids from 1975 and start building effective organizations that look more like tree trunks! An informal survey at Blogher07 showed that are almost all self taught people and therefore innovators of the future.

So, where are your C-level bloggers? I know where you can find more than a few that understand that blogging is about living the Peter Drucker principles of innovation and customer listening.

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University of Michigan Consumer Satisfaction Index Report 2007

The report is out. Greg Sterling has a great write up at Search Engine Land. Congrats to Yahoo! and Ask on their improvements!

However, the numbers are extremely fine and as Greg asked the authors, “Why the disconnect between the satisfaction data and market share?” The other thing that should be pointed out is that these numbers are not that granular in nature. My advice is to take these numbers with a grain of salt as they may of may not result in the market share changes they suggest over the next 12-24 months. Essentially the question is will this report cause people to talk about switching over dinner with family and friends tonight?

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Search Engine Strategies San Jose – Silicon Valley August 19-23

I look forward to seeing all of my wonderful search engine, mobile search and mobile advertising friends next week at Search Engine Strategies (SES) San Jose!  While I’ll definitely be in Mountain View for the Google Dance (hopefully they won’t run out of XL t-shirts in 2 minutes like last year), I’m unsure whether I’ll make it to Palo Alto, San Francisco, Sunnyvale, Oakland, Monterrey or Santa Cruz to visit and see some other awesome things. I do hope to make it to Barcamp Block.

Who else will be there and what spontaneous events, product launches and parties are you looking most forward to? I’m getting very close to some of my goals! I look forward to seeing you.

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Yahoo! Launches New Applicant Tracking System

Yahoo! recently launched a new applicant tracking system interface over the past few days. It has a much cleaner interface than the previous one. It also has a box titled concept search, where one could enter educational and leadership qualifications, technical and speaking skills, passions, competencies and blogs to get suggestions of potentially appropriate roles. Changes that were immediately apparent to me include shorter career position id numbers and a smaller set of categories that make it easier to navigate clusters of open positions needing to be filled by qualified applicants.

Below is a screen shot, I wish Yahoo! good luck with the new system!

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adtech Chicago: Redefining Search to Realize Its Full Potential

August 1, 2007

MODERATOR:
Jeffrey Pruitt, President, SEMPO, and Executive VP, Search, iCrossing

PANELISTS:
Kelly Graziadei, Senior Director, Agency Development, Yahoo! Search Marketing

James Colborn, Group Marketing Manager, adCenter Communications Group, Microsoft

Kevin Willer, Central Region Development Manager, Google

James Colbourn, Microsoft

Kelly Graziadei, Yahoo!

Think about the many different faces of search.

– The Researcher – look at Yahoo! Buzz to create an audience pyramid. Look at other content. Miller Beer Run. Showed a campaign with getting the beer – Yahoo! created the game and got excellent results

– The Reputation Manager – geo-targeting, ad testing, etc. Jet Blue built a campaign to respond to negative news.

– The Brand Manager – 79% introduced to new brands in search and 61% expect brand leaders to be consistently in the top of search results.

– The Great Integrator – TV, web, games, mobile all at the same time.

– The Advocate – Searchers are advocates that build brands through social media – significant in the pre and post purchase mode.

Kevin Willer, Google
– Information silos in the past. You almost needed a search engine for the search engines. Now all the silos are in one universal search.

Google Promotion – search for Bourne – showed how the site with Youtube

Search for PR. – You need to be ready to answer those searches

Search the New Performance Link – showed Motorola example and Presidential campaign data for Hilary Clinton, Barack Obama, Giuliani, John McCain, Mitt Romney (He said the

We want to start thinking about search in different ways.

James Colbourn, Microsoft
Search Today: A Performance Tool
– To increase brand awareness
– To Sell Products
– To Generate Leads
– To Drive Traffic To Company Website

How do advertisers measure success?
– Traffic
– Conversions
– Impressions
– ROI

Brand, Awareness, Acquisition Tool and Lead Generator

Search as a research tool is a leading indicator for:
– A Business
– An Industry

Beyond Search
– Media Buying
– Budget Allocation
– PR Activity

The potential for search is higher than current usage…

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adtech Chicago: Search + Video + Contextual Targeting: Is the Holy Grail Upon Us?

July 31, 2007

Shashi Seth, Head of Monetization, YouTube.com

Rebecca Paoletti, Director, Video Strategy, Yahoo!

Patrick Moorhead, National Manager, R&D Advanced Marketing Solutions, Avenue A | Razorfish

Chris D’Alessandro, Group Director, Customer Insight, Organic, Inc.

Moderator: Curt Hecht, Executive VP, Chief Digital Officer, GM Planworks/Starcom Mediavest Group

Rebecca: Video search is not as important to core clients as media that is relevant to the brand. The off network piece is important as well. Reaching your users wherever they are, walking down the street, whatever…

Patrick: It’s almost the Holy Grail. We need to redefine contextual to mean what the user means at that moment.

Chris: If you are looking at an awareness company, it’s not the Holy Grail.

Curt: How does this scale? How are the agencies? Pre-rolls?

Rebecca: The trend to distribute us towards pre-roll. We are far away from dynamic video smart ads. What they search for. Dynamically delivered video is hard to deliver. Dynamic video is a long ways away.

Patrick: I disagree that we are far away from dynamically generated video.

Curt: Who is digging in on this?

Chris: Emerging and bleeding technology is getting there.

Curt: Are you talking about testing and learning?

Chris: Search is always part of everyone’s repertoire.

Rebecca: Shopping and merchandising makes a lot of sense. We have huge testing and learning going on right now.

Curt: Marketers will have to deal with versioning of creative.

Chris: we’ve had to segment sites. What kind of content do we deliver?

Patrick: We have to measure this stuff from an optimization of media dollars. The same investment can service a much broader audience. Campaign management tools will catch up at some point. Look at things holistically; it’s half about people management.

Shashi: Traditional click through and engagement numbers are not sufficient. We need to come up with standard metrics across the board.

Audience question on pre-rolls and potential attrition to smaller sites.

Shashi: When we announce our ad unit, we will take all those things into account.

Rebecca: We only use it for premium inventory. We balance the pre-roll with the length of the content. We’ve done a lot of testing in this area and found it had no adverse impact.