Very interesting. The full text of the patent. The short of it: the patent describes a system whereby contextual ads are delivered on a user's computer using software that lives on that computer – ie a toolbar, a browser, an aggregator, etc. While the patent is not filed by Google…
The short of it: the patent describes a system whereby contextual ads are delivered on a user’s computer using software that lives on that computer – ie a toolbar, a browser, an aggregator, etc.
Read MoreRich Skrenta, he of Topix and Web OS posting fame, is turning feed searches over in his mind. This is a neat conversation, referencing our pals Jeremy, Rafer, and others. In essence, why have all the majors punted on the presentweb – the fresh stuff that's being discussed *right now*…
He sets up the question: But still it seems odd, that with the biggies supposedly in cutthroat competition for search, that they’ve left the field for Feedster as the best resource for this class of searches. Why?
Then asks a bigger one: Feeds & Blogs: Fad or something big?
Read MoreA while ago I read Ross Mayfield's post on "Cost Per Influence" advertising and thought to myself "That feels important, but I don't get it." Something was missing, or, put another way, I was missing something. So I gave Ross a call last week and we hashed through it. What…
A while ago I read Ross Mayfield’s post on “Cost Per Influence” advertising and thought to myself “That feels important, but I don’t get it.” Something was missing, or, put another way, I was missing something. So I gave Ross a call last week and we hashed through it. What I realized during our talk was that the premise for how he got to the idea of CPI was, to my mind, far more interesting than CPI itself, at least in the near term.
Allow me to explain. Ross’s musings on CPI turn on the concept of “transitive advertising” – a very interesting idea that flips current advertising models upside down. In essence, this new model for online ads reverses the relationship between publishers and advertisers.
In traditional advertising models, the advertiser holds all the cards. They decide what they want to spend, and most importantly, where they want to spend it. But the rise of pay-for-performance networks like Overture and AdWords/AdSense has changed this relationship in significant ways. First, advertisers are only paying when their ad performs – this alone is a huge shift in media. But as I’ve pointed out repeatedly, these networks also disaggregate advertisers from publishers. The advertisers are no longer choosing the publisher with whom they are doing business, they are instead choosing keywords, concepts, context. OK, but not very good for publishers nor for audiences, in my opinion.
Read MoreRafat notes that craigslist's execs are tempted by Adsense….a billion pages makes for a lot of beer money……
Customer complaints about the Green Google Lava Lamps…. The problem is that the liquid that the Green Lava Googlets float in is a murky, cloudy yellow …as opposed to the Blue Google Lava Lamp, which is crisp and clear and really lets the Blue Lava Googlets flow freely. Meanwhile….the Google…
Customer complaints about the Green Google Lava Lamps….
The problem is that the liquid that the Green Lava Googlets float in is a murky, cloudy yellow
…as opposed to the Blue Google Lava Lamp, which is crisp and clear and really lets the Blue Lava Googlets flow freely.
Meanwhile….the Google Store announces a makeover…
Talk in the blog-o-sphere about a Google browser – Jason weighs in….
Joi finds someone who has created a belt buckle that displays streaming search queries. Now that's…odd….
Joi finds someone who has created a belt buckle that displays streaming search queries. Now that’s…odd.
Spent some time on the phone with Michael Yavonditte, the CEO of Quigo yesterday. I've been getting smart on many of the new innovators in the advertising space, both for my book, as well as for my other role as band manager of Boing Boing and whatever might come next….
Spent some time on the phone with Michael Yavonditte, the CEO of Quigo yesterday. I’ve been getting smart on many of the new innovators in the advertising space, both for my book, as well as for my other role as band manager of Boing Boing and whatever might come next. Man, there’s a lot going on in the online marketing space right now – a lot of innnovation, a lot of cool new shit, and a lot of potential.
According to Yavonditte, Quigo has perfected a relevancy algorithm that does AdSense one better – far better, to paraphrase his words. Quigo is focusing on picking off the high-brand-value publishers who use AdSense but are looking for a network solution that pays them more for what they believe is significantly better inventory than the lowest common denominator AdSense approach. Great quote: “Advertisers are saying to me ‘I don’t want the Guadalupe Times, I want ESPN!'” He’s already stolen some business – he’s got USA Today, National Geographic, the New York Post, and several others signed up, and reportedly has some major equity-for-distribution deals in the works, akin to what Google and Yahoo did in their early days.
While I am sure his algorithms are good, in essence, Yavonditte’s secret sauce is vertical categorization. He’s come up with a handful of major categories – Travel, Health, etc. – that advertisers self select into. Then he applies his contextual algorithm within that category, yielding what he claims are major improvements in CTR and PPC.
Read MoreRecently ran across this (a bit dated but still worthwhile) graph from Pew on broadband penetration for all your Powerpoint presos on why your (company, idea, marketing spend) is justified……
I was just interviewed on Search Engine Radio – who knew there was a Search Engine Radio!? I have no idea how I sounded, but here's the link……
I was just interviewed on Search Engine Radio – who knew there was a Search Engine Radio!? I have no idea how I sounded, but here’s the link…
