When success hits you, then things go wrong, the first instinct is to protect. But the right thing to do is be transparent. Seems momentum is building in the b’sphere for Google to do the same.
Along those lines, I did finally get a response on the issue of the “keyword hint” feature that had apparently been beefed up for publishers like Boing Boing (see the post here). Here is Google’s “official response” to my query, which was essentially this: is this a new feature, previously unannounced, or are you selling something that doesn’t exist? Why is a Google rep cold calling me with this feature, and promising it to me as something to draw me into using AdSense?
The response:
“The keyword tool is a limited test and only available to premium publishers at this point. We continue to work on making more tools available for all of our publishers.”
Sigh. Transparency, guys. Upfront, and on the backend. It works, really, I swear. And admitting mistakes. Two things that are hard to do, but pay huge dividends.
Fact is, the Google rep who called me didn’t tell me this is a “limited test only available to premium publishers.” Nope, he made it seem like it was a normal feature, ready for me if only I signed up. What did he think I was going to do with the information that Google had new tools that might make AdSense work better? Keep it to myself? I’m a ***publisher*** after all.
Anyway. End of rant. It’s hard being number one. But it’s easier if you are in conversation with those that put you there.
Update: I hadn’t noticed, but a reader tipped me – Google linked to me in a recent corporate blog post. That’s a very good sign – it was one of the things that seemed off about their blog – that they never pointed to anyone else. Cool.