Mr Search Google Advertising & Marketing Blog

Web Advertising & Google Analytics

2010-01-15T07:53:00.005+11:00

Joel's musings.

Did you know that only 28% of websites make use of Google Web Analytics!? To be completely honest, when I first saw this figure, I was barely surprised. It seems there are very few businesses who see the value in web analytics.

Let me briefly explain. Without Google Analytics and Conversion Tracking, you are essentially bringing traffic through to your website, crossing your fingers, and hoping you may receive emails and phone calls. A bit like operating a checkout register and serving customers blind folded. Google Analytics allows all your advertising to be measured and optimised based upon the results achieved.

Here are a few questions which you, or your web advertising manager should be able to easily answer:

How did customers find my website? What percentage of traffic came through from Google? How about the Yellow Pages?

How much time did customers who came through to my website spend there?

Which Google keywords keep people on my website for the greatest amount of time?

What pages within my website are most popular?

What page on my website do the greatest number of people leave from?

What times of the day does the greatest number of customers come and look at my website?

What countries and states does traffic come from?

All this analytical data allows more informed advertising decisions to be made, and ensure that highest ROI is being achieved.

Here's the article from factual.com (http://blog.factual.com/very-large-websites-table-now-on-factual)

Like most respectable geeks, we at Factual get pretty excited about data. And sometimes we get so excited about something that we want to make sure our data geek brethren are aware of it. Today we have something that falls into that category. CommonCrawl.org, a non-profit web crawler, provided a data set of about 4 million websites (primarily hosted at Top Level Domains as well as some popular subdomains) with 30 various attributes. That's about 350MB -- not a shabby corpus of data to be made available to the public. The attributes on these 4 million websites include information on what's on the page (i.e., “contains a Twitter link”), what technology was used (i.e., "server"), and what crawling rules are set-up (i.e., "excludes GoogleBot"). The websites come from the CommonCrawl repository, which consists of over 3 billion URLs, and is a reasonable representation of the Internet, not to mention an interesting slice of what's happening on the Web.

A couple of interesting things we noticed were...

28% of websites have Google Analytics –- pretty impressive, while 12% of the sites have AdSense. (Side note: we're using the count of GetContentResults=Http-200 for the denominator, since it's not fair to count the sites that CommonCrawl was unable to get content from.)

5% of websites have a Twitter link and 5% have a Facebook URL, yet only 2% have both a Twitter and a Facebook URL. It'll be interesting to see how this changes over time.

The top five versions of Apache discovered are 2.2.11 (210,984 instances), 2.2.3 (200,065 instances), 1.3.41 (168,660 instances), 2.2.14 (166,644), and 2.0.52 (97,004 instances).

A bunch of very long names had enough linkage to get included in the crawl. Here's a fun one: http://iwillusegooglebeforeaskingdumbquestions.com/. Apparently they don't use Google Analytics.

You can check out the specific regular expression list on the table, just click on the "Discuss" tab. If you have any suggestions or see something wrong, chime in on the thread and let us know!

Since this data set is now on Factual, it is open for the world to share, collaborate, and mash. That's how our data sets roll! However, unlike most of the tables on Factual, this table is read-only, meaning cells can't be edited by inputting new data. Since this is CommonCrawl's analysis, it made more sense to place restrictions on who could change/add to the data.

Of course, there's still plenty of things you can do with the data. And if you want to join or merge data from another table to this one, this won't impact the original table; you simply have to do a "save as" and effectively fork it. However, if you do this, we suggest that you mention it as a thread in the "Discuss" tab. That way the community can track the various related data sets.

All of the data is available through the Factual API and anyone with some programming skills can build innovative apps on top of this table and/or any related ones. The sky's the limit. Indeed, as large as this data set already is, this is just the beginning of life for this table. Hopefully we'll see it grow and improve, and potentially power exciting products.

We believe that open and collaborative data is not only important unto itself, it also drives innovation. Removing the hassles associated with data licensing and data curation (verification, de-duping, updating) can free folks to concentrate on building the apps themselves. Perhaps over time, developers will see data as another layer in the open solution stack. Like the other open software elements in the stack, if others give back to the community, the resources can multiply and quickly surpass closed enterprise versions.

When we shared it with Creative Commons, their CTO Mike Linksvayer emailed us this response: "I am wildly enthusiastic about collaborative, web-scale analysis of the web itself, which is likely the best path to a more complete understanding and appreciation of the impact of Creative Commons. CommonCrawl and Factual are each extremely interesting in this regard, for providing web-scale data and a unique take on collaborative data curation." We couldn't have said it better ourselves.

If you have any suggested attributes or just general questions on how you can use the table, feel free to start a thread on the Factual Developer Google Group.

Online Ads Work Wonders, Research Finds

2009-12-09T21:55:00.007+11:00

Online advertising is an effective tool in raising brand and industry awareness and influencing consumers purchase behaviour. The Google Content network provides huge potential for businesses to reach prospective customers and clients before they even begin to run searches for specific keywords, by allowing text and image ads to be contextually targeted into traditional online content. These ads are relevant to the content and can be displayed on news stories, speciality and niche websites, forums, and social networking sites through the vast network of Google Advertising partners.

Have a read of the article below from the SMH (or visit the link below).

Online ads work wonders, research finds.

PAUL MCINTYRE

November 13, 2009

http://www.smh.com.au/technology/biz-tech/online-ads-work-wonders-research-finds-20091113-idmn.html

YOU might think all those online ads you thought you never noticed are never noticed but new research is forcing even the experts to think again.

According to a study of 100,000 Australians by Nielsen Online, a surprisingly high number of users can recall online ads and admit they are more inclined to buy those products.

But, in a strange twist, people who were unable to recall an ad, despite Nielsen knowing they had seen it using its online tracking technology, are equally influenced with their buying patterns.

"That's a real positive," said Nielsen Online's research director for the Asia-Pacific, Tony Marlow. "It means you can get your message through to people without being intrusive or annoying."

The figures from Nielsen show a third of online users who have seen an ad are able to recall it when asked, a result other researchers say is surprisingly strong.

"That's a bloody good result if it's delayed recall," said Brian Fine, the chairman of STW's Online Research Unit. "If there's a 24-hour gap between when the person saw the ad and they were asked to recall it, that is a lot higher than TV but not as high as cinema. If there is no time gap then it's like sitting someone down in a shopping centre, showing them a TV ad and then asking if they can remember it."

Mr Marlow said the time delay was "completely random", meaning respondents could be asked within three minutes of seeing the ad and up to three months later. "The [time lag] mix is all weighted," he said.

Whatever the research complexities, the online industry is already looking to exploit the favourable findings with a renewed assault on rival media sectors for a higher share of the $12 billion advertising market. The Interactive Advertising Bureau's chief executive, Paul Fisher, said the online advertising industry had doubled its market share gains against other media sectors in the first six months of this year to 14.5 per cent and could top 16 per cent for the December half.

In the six months to June 30 last year online publishers took 11.9 per cent of total advertising spending in Australia, Commercial Economic Advisory Service of Australia said.

"This is only going to accelerate the fact that online is one of the most effective advertising platforms," Mr Fisher said.

http://www.smh.com.au/technology/biz-tech/online-ads-work-wonders-research-finds-20091113-idmn.html

Google Keywords Unlock Sales

2009-08-24T22:55:00.007+10:00

Business owners are increasingly becoming aware of the importance of exposure on Google, and how this translates into sales, even for business owners who don't use the internet regularly themselves. Here is a recent article from the SMH (please see below for the full link).

Google keywords unlock sales

Julia Talevski - June 30, 2009

Advertising is a key part of many small businesses, particularly when, like catering company On Tap Beverage Catering, a business operates in only one sector of the market.

The mobile beverage caterer has seen most of its advertising success derive from the online space, predominantly through Google AdWords. The company has two full-time staff and more than 100 casual bar staff.

Owner Drew Davies spends all of his marketing budget online and worked with a Google AdWords company to develop his company's online marketing campaign.

"We're in a bit of niche spot in the market, Davies says.

"We run bars for events, and go to unlicensed venues such as people's homes, workplaces, surf clubs, beaches, parks and other venues.

"I purchased the business in 2006 and have put a lot of time, effort and money into it.

"The results so far have been really good; it's grown at a really high rate."

"The traditional telephone directory books are getting a bit old these days and people need a quick answer.

"They're going to the internet, Google and the like, to search for services," he says.

To help keep in contact with past clients, Davies also sends out electronic newsletters.

When Davies first ventured into online marketing, there was a bit of trial and error involved with getting the key search words right.

"You can't expect results to happen. You've got to test those key words, see if your market is responding to them and then just keep changing, to try and improve the key words until you're happy with it," he says.

Businesses considering stepping into the online marketing space should work out who their target market is and try to find out if the market is going online to search for the business, Davies advises.

"It's really important to have a presence," he says.

"Just test your key words and put yourself into your client's head to see what they would type in. The results will come after a bit of time."

For the full article, please see: http://www.smh.com.au/technology/biz-tech/google-keywords-unlock-sales-20090629-d2g9.html

Google Analytics Professionals

2009-06-22T22:34:00.014+10:00

Mr Search offers clients an end-to-end online marketing service. A vital part of any successfully marketing strategy is measuring the results, analysing them, and ensuring these results are utilised to further improve marketing techniques. For this reason, Google Analytics — Google's enterprise class web analytics package, is an important part of the proactive account optimisation we conduct on an ongoing basis. Mr Search has been a Google AdWords Qualified Company for some time now; however, when Google recently introduced the Google Analytics Professionals program, Joel (company director) didn't hesitate to sit the test right then and there, immediately passing the exam with flying colours. Mr Search is therefore now officially qualified by Google as both a Google AdWords Qualified Company, as well as a Google Analytics professional.

We are thrilled to have received this new level of Google Analytics qualification so quickly, and look forward to continuing to provide our clients with the highest possible level of service.

You may be asking....
So what is Google Analytics anyway, and what relevance does it have to my website or my business!?

It's one thing to bring qualified traffic through to your website from Google (or any other traffic source for that matter); however with today's technology, we are able to gain a good understanding of what people are doing on your website once they get there. I can't stress the importance of this, because all too often, people are bringing through traffic to their company website, but have no idea what happens beyond this point!

By embedding an advanced Google Analytics Tracking code throughout your website, and through analysis of your web analytics, we are able to answer questions like:

Does traffic from Google, the Yellow Pages or Facebook stay on my site for the longest amount of time, and which traffic source is most likely to convert into an enquiry or sale?
Which keywords keep people on my website for the greatest amount of time?
Which keywords have the lowest bounce rates
Which keywords cause people to visit the largest number of pages on my site?
What geographic areas are people visiting my site from? From Australia? Victoria? NSW? QLD?
What times of the day do people most like to visit my site?
What pages within your site are most popular, and which pages may need some work?
What page of my website are people most likely to exit on? etc

Google Mobile Search 97.5%

2009-05-13T21:45:00.005+10:00

Over 90% of Australians use Google Search on their desktop computers, but with increasing numbers of Australians making regular use of their iPhone, Blackberry, Android Mobile, or other 'Smart Phone', the importance of this market to businesses should not be underestimated.

I presumed that the market share figures for mobile search (e.g. people searching the web from their phone) would be very similar to that of desktop search figures. This however is not the case. Through Google Mobile Advertising, businesses can now reach an even greater number of searchers, in fact, over 97.5 percent!

By Chris Thompson

You may think Google (GOOG) dominates the US search market, with 63.7 percent of all searches conducted in the United States compared with Yahoo's (YHOO) 20 percent. But you haven't been looking at mobile Internet devices, which everyone agrees will be the most dynamic and explosive piece of the online world for years to come. According to a new report from the Internet marketing firm Net Applications, Google accounts for 97.5 percent of all mobile phone searches. 97.5 percent. Now that's what we call dominance...

See the full article from Reuters: http://www.reuters.com/article/bigMoney/idUS53191739520090507

New Google Search Features

2009-05-13T21:16:00.004+10:00

Today Google rolled out some very exciting new search features. Google's continual innovation provides evidence of the company's commitment to the Google 'search experience' and re-affirms their dominance in the market, particularly within Australia.

I had a play with some of their new features this afternoon, and I immediately found them extremely useful, and quite exciting, while at the same time being unobtrusive. One click access to features such as timeline, reviews and related searches allows information to be found even faster. My motto is 'do more in less time', so this is something I like very much!

The Google brand is synonymous with search. The internet and being found has never been more important for Australian businesses. I regularly hear from our clients how much of an impact the Google Marketing Campaigns we manage, have on businesses exposure, enquires, sales and overall business profitability. Talk to a friendly Google Qualified Professional today. Find out for yourself.

Google's video release:

You can read more details on the Google blog post here:

http://googleblog.blogspot.com/2009/05/more-search-options-and-other-updates.html

Today we are hosting our second Searchology event, to update our users, partners, and customers on the progress we have made in search and tell them about new features. Our first Searchology was two years ago, when we were excited to launch Universal Search, a feature that blended results of different types (web pages, images, videos, books, etc.) on the results page. Since then Universal Search has grown quite a bit, adding new types of results, expanding to new countries, and triggering on ten times as many queries as it did when we launched it.

But as people get more sophisticated at search they are coming to us to solve more complex problems. To stay on top of this, we have spent a lot of time looking at how we can better understand the wide range of information that's on the web and quickly connect people to just the nuggets they need at that moment. We want to help our users find more useful information, and do more useful things with it.

Our first announcement today is a new set of features that we call Search Options, which are a collection of tools that let you slice and dice your results and generate different views to find what you need faster and easier. Search Options helps solve a problem that can be vexing: what query should I ask?

Let's say you are looking for forum discussions about a specific product, but are most interested in ones that have taken place more recently. That's not an easy query to formulate, but with Search Options you can search for the product's name, apply the option to filter out anything but forum sites, and then apply an option to only see results from the past week. Just last week, at our Shareholders' Meeting, I had a woman ask me why she couldn't organize her results by time, with the most recent information appearing first. "Come back Tuesday," I wanted to say!

The Search Options panel also gives you the ability to view your results in new ways. One view gives you more information about each result, including images as well as text, while others let you explore and iterate your search in different ways...

Broadband and Advertising

2009-04-10T11:49:00.008+10:00

Joel's broadband musings:

Last week the Australian Federal Government made a decision to roll out a state-of-the art fibre-to-the-premises broadband network. This super-fast network will provide Australian consumers and businesses with not just an increase in speed (which is fantastic for impatient people such as myself), but will open new doors of opportunity for Australian businesses to interact with consumers. It is a clear sign that technological innovation is by no means slowing, and presents a wakeup call for Australian businesses who have not yet already embraced the internet as a medium to connect with existing and prospective customers.

"It will transform the way people live their lives," Conroy tells the Herald. "It will transform the way people communicate. It will transform the way business interacts with customers."

It is the road, the railway, the electricity, the phone line of the new age, and information can travel through it at the speed of light.

Super-fast trip to a world full of surprises

Mark Pesce from the Sydney Morning Herald Article
April 8, 2009

Now the Government has decided it won the tender for a next-generation broadband network, Australians are wondering what to expect over the next eight years.

Many probably think it will bring them more of the same, albeit more quickly. They couldn't be more wrong. Very high-speed broadband of the kind the Government promises will completely change our expectations for the internet. It's not simply that pages will load faster (and they may not, as that's more to do with the computers serving those pages than the computer displaying them), it's the new things that become possible.

A decade ago broadband was a solution looking for a problem. It offered little more than a faster web experience. Then Napster came along, and suddenly everyone wanted to share music, then movies and TV shows, and now everything. This is the age of sharing, both legal and illicit, and broadband internet is principally responsible for that.

Yet none of us knew back in 2000-01, as the dotcom bubble imploded, that another and brighter future lay just around the corner, driven by broadband. The internet was presented to us as a one-to-many publication medium - and we do use it to get our news. But the second wave of the internet - Web2.0 to its devotees - is all about sharing, collaborating, and pooling resources.

Consider that YouTube, the most popular broadband website, didn't exist four years ago. It has changed everything about how we create, publish and share video. No one predicted YouTube, or Napster, Kazaa, and BitTorrent, all applications which made broadband a must-have. It isn't until broadband is available to use, that people can explore its potential.

The next-generation broadband network (NBN) opens up possibilities we can't even dream of today, because we don't yet live in the world of super high-speed broadband.

Even so, we have some idea what's coming. Already, a small number of people are "lifestreaming" - recording and sharing their lives in their most intimate details, so that anyone, anywhere, can peer in. Within the next few years lifestreaming will become the norm for the younger generation - they'll be sharing their lives with their friends as freely as they share text messages today.

That's what happens with a truly high-speed broadband network. It'll drive parents nuts, generate endless discussion of issues from privacy to pederasty, but it's going to happen. Next-generation smartphones will tie into the network to become our points of presence within a "cloud" of information about ourselves, created by ourselves, and shared with those we love and trust.

It's all very different from the world we see today, and very different from anything the Government expects. It's providing a fast pipe for next-generation TV services, - plus a little left over for education, seniors and the arts.

But that's not the way this is going to work. We're on the cusp of a disruptive revolution, a power shift brought on by sharing, and bumping up the speed 100 times will make it happen 10,000 times faster.

The good news is that something wonderful will happen amidst all this high-speed connectivity, coming out of our blind spot to surprise us all.

Mark Pesce is honorary associate in the Digital Cultures Program at the University of Sydney.

Read the full SMH Article here: http://www.smh.com.au/opinion/superfast-trip-to-a-world-full-of-surprises-20090407-9zhy.html?page=-1

Making Ads Interesting

2009-03-18T19:44:00.005+11:00

Making ads more interesting

Joel's Musings:

The factor that contributes most greatly to the success of an online advertising campaign, is not the 'wow factor', the colours used, or even the animation, but the relevance of the ad to the person seeing it! For this reason, I am excited about the recent release of Google Interest Based advertising on the Google Content Network.

In a nutshell, the way interest based advertising works (also known as behavioural advertising), is it identifies individual consumers key interests areas (e.g. luxury cars, sports, technology etc), and allows advertisers to display highly relevant advertising to consumers, based upon these interests. The ads are displayed to you on millions of Google partner sites that display 'Ads by Google'. For example, you may be in the market for a new laptop, you have spent hours and hours looking at different models. You give it a break for a while and log into a social networking site such as MySpace or Facebook. Useful targeted ads could then be displayed to you, making you aware of laptop models, and laptop offers, that are relevant to you! All user information remains anonymous to protect the privacy of consumers.

For me, if ads annoy me, the reason about 90% of the time, is because they are advertising something that doesn't interest me. Google Interest Based Advertising solves this!

Details from the Official Google Blog

At Google, we believe that ads are a valuable source of information — one that can connect people to the advertisers offering products, services and ideas that interest them. By making ads more relevant, and improving the connection between advertisers and our users, we can create more value for everyone. Users get more useful ads, and these more relevant ads generate higher returns for advertisers and publishers. Advertising is the lifeblood of the digital economy: it helps support the content and services we all enjoy for free online today, including much of our news, search, email, video and social networks.

That's why Google has worked hard to create technology that makes the advertising on our own sites, and those of our partners, as relevant as possible. To date, we have shown ads based mainly on what your interests are at a specific moment. So if you search for [digital camera] on Google, you'll get ads related to digital cameras. If you are visiting the website of one of our AdSense partners, you would see ads based on the content of the page. For example, if you're reading a sports page on a newspaper website, we might show ads for running shoes. Or we can show ads for home maintenance services alongside a YouTube video instructing you on how to perform a simple repair. There are some situations, however, where a keyword or the content of a web page simply doesn't give us enough information to serve highly relevant ads.

We think we can make online advertising even more relevant and useful by using additional information about the websites people visit. Today we are launching "interest-based" advertising as a beta test on our partner sites and on YouTube. These ads will associate categories of interest — say sports, gardening, cars, pets — with your browser, based on the types of sites you visit and the pages you view. We may then use those interest categories to show you more relevant text and display ads.

We believe there is real value to seeing ads about the things that interest you. If, for example, you love adventure travel and therefore visit adventure travel sites, Google could show you more ads for activities like hiking trips to Patagonia or African safaris. While interest-based advertising can infer your interest in adventure travel from the websites you visit, you can also choose your favorite categories, or tell us which categories you don't want to see ads for. Interest-based advertising also helps advertisers tailor ads for you based on your previous interactions with them, such as visits to their websites. So if you visit an online sports store, you may later be shown ads on other websites offering you a discount on running shoes during that store's upcoming sale.

Our advertisers and publisher partners have been asking us for a long time to offer interest-based advertising. Advertisers need an efficient way to reach those who are most interested in their products and services. And publishers can generate more revenue when they connect advertisers to interested audiences.

This kind of tailored advertising does raise questions about user choice and privacy — questions the whole online ad industry has a responsibility to answer. Many companies already provide interest-based advertising and they address these issues in different ways. For our part, we're launching interest-based advertising with three important features that demonstrate our commitment to transparency and user choice.

Transparency - We already clearly label most of the ads provided by Google on the AdSense partner network and on YouTube. You can click on the labels to get more information about how we serve ads, and the information we use to show you ads. This year we will expand the range of ad formats and publishers that display labels that provide a way to learn more and make choices about Google's ad serving.
Choice - We have built a tool called Ads Preferences Manager, which lets you view, delete, or add interest categories associated with your browser so that you can receive ads that are more interesting to you.
Control - You can always opt out of the advertising cookie for the AdSense partner network here. To make sure that your opt-out decision is respected (and isn't deleted if you clear the cookies from your browser), we have designed a plug-in for your browser that maintains your opt-out choice.

To find out more about what Google is doing in this important area, please visit our Public Policy blog and Privacy Center.

Keyword advertising has been so successful because it's useful to users, advertisers and publishers — everyone's interests are aligned. We believe that interest-based ads will create the same virtuous cycle, by giving users more relevant ads, while generating higher returns for advertisers and publishers.

Posted by Susan Wojcicki, VP, Product Management

More Time Spent Online

2009-03-05T13:28:00.007+11:00

Time spent on the internet and online by Australians, continues to increase: Latest Report

AUSTRALIANS spend most of their waking hours consuming media and are spending more time online than ever before, a study has found.

The survey found people aged over 16 spent an average of 16.1 hours on the internet each week, 12.9 hours watching TV, 8.8 hours listening to the radio, 3.7 hours on a mobile phone and 2.8 hours reading newspapers.

Some users also used more than one form of media at once, with more than three in five internet surfers watching TV simultaneously and half surfing the web while listening to the radio.

The Nielsen Online report also found ownership of desktop computers fell 10 per cent last year, in favour of wireless technology such as laptops, and broadband use soared. More than 97 per cent of Australian internet users reported having a broadband connection at home, up from 84 per cent in 2007.

The Australian Bureau of Statistics last year reported that more than half of all Australian households have a broadband internet connection, including 800,000 new connections from the 2007/08 financial year.

We also are ditching our desktop computers for laptops, accessing the internet wirelessly and almost all internet users have broadband access at home, the report said.

The Nielsen Online Internet and Technology Report surveyed more than 2000 Australians and found the average Aussie spent 89.2 hours a week consuming media last year or almost 80 per cent of their waking hours.

Nielsen Online research director Tony Marlow said this was an increase of almost five hours on 2007 and an extra 17.8 hours from 2006.

"Given the average Australian is only awake for around 112 hours per week, it's surprisingly just how many of those waking hours are dedicated to media consumption," Mr Marlow said.

"We've seen some pretty extraordinary increases in the past few years, however we would anticipate a levelling out in consumption hours of the next few years as Australians simply run out of hours in the day."

Full Article as Seen in the Courier Mail: http://www.news.com.au/couriermail/story/0,23739,25138497-23272,00.html

Increase in Online Ads

2009-02-18T10:52:00.002+11:00

Increase in Online Advertising despite Tougher times

Online advertising is continuing to expand with analysts expecting that the worsening economic conditions will accelerate the share of ads being placed online at the expanse of traditional media.

The Interactive Advertising Bureau (IAB) Online Advertising Expenditure Report is projecting that online advertising market will pass the $2 billion mark in the next year. The latest report, which was put together by PricewaterhouseCoopers, indicated that last year’s online revenues was around $1.7 billion, which was a healthy increase of around 27 per cent compared with 2007. Search and directories advertising made up nearly half of the sales.

Communications, cars, finance and computers products comprise about 50 per cent of the advertising content. IAB Australia chief executive, Paul Fisher, said that he expected that the online sector would continue to benefit from the shift in expenditure and that total revenues would exceed $2 billion soon.

For more details go to www.iabaustralia.com.au

Online Ads Keep Growing

2009-02-10T12:53:00.011+11:00

Despite the challenging economic environment that businesses face throughout Australia and worldwide, online advertising continues to be a top priority for businesses tight budgets.

Read more from The Australian Article Below:

Online ads rise to defy crisis

Lara Sinclair | February 09, 2009
Article from: The Australian

ONLINE advertising has defied expectations that the financial crisis would also crimp its growth, with annual spending to December up 27 per cent from a year ago to $1.7 billion.

And while advertising in traditional media fell off a cliff in the December quarter it remained strong online, growing 22 per cent to $462 million over the same quarter last year.

That performance, recorded in the audited industry figures released by the Interactive Advertising Bureau today, came despite most analysts predicting growth would halve.

Overall, the growth in online ad spend was slightly lower than the 34 per cent recorded in 2007. But internet advertising was not totally immune from the malaise infecting traditional media, Interactive Advertising Bureau chief executive Paul Fisher said.

"This quarter we've just reported is very good. I was optimistically anticipating 20 per cent growth (for the last quarter) but I thought it could have been mid to high teens. It's been a very poor January and a very flat February but they're optimistic about March, according to some of the major publishers and networks that I've heard from."

Mr Fisher predicted total growth would slow this year to 17-18 per cent, which would still push it above $2 billion for the first time. "I think this quarter will grow in the high teens, increasing to about 20 per cent in the June quarter."

Classified advertising was the only sector in which spending slowed notably in the quarter, reflecting the slowdown in employment advertising, but for the year it still rose 23 per cent to $439 million.

For the three months to December, classifieds grew 10 per cent year on year to $108 million, but that was $6 million (5 per cent) less than advertisers spent in the three months to September.

Search remains by far the largest online ad market with almost one in two dollars being directed to search marketing and online directories.

It continued to outpace the total market as it was up 30 per cent to $807 million for the year as advertisers continued to demonstrate faith in accountable media. However, that was almost half the rate of growth in 2007, when search grew 56 per cent.

Search giant Google refused to say if search advertising had suffered the same slowdown seen this year in other media.

"We're continuing to see growth in our medium and we feel there is strong potential for growth in the Australian market," general manager for Australia and New Zealand Karim Temsamani said.

"We're continuing to grow at a very good rate."

Online display advertising was surprisingly resilient, growing 24 per cent in the quarter compared with 2007 and up 27 per cent from a year ago to $465 million.

Publishers are reporting new advertisers in categories such as retail, packaged goods and alcoholic beverages -- traditionally small sectors for the industry -- are beginning to use the medium.

Strong growth in performance advertising, which is generally paid for when a user performs an action rather than on the size of the total audience, is believed to be driving growth in the general advertising sector.

Liam Walsh, managing director of the Drive performance network, estimated the sector accounted for one in four general display advertising dollars spent online, but expected that to grow.

"Our financials clearly indicate this segment is growing significantly faster than the general category," he said.

"Drive recorded a 35 per cent uplift from the September quarter versus an overall general display growth figure of 4 per cent. In short, performance advertising enjoyed a very good year. It will have another good year as the economy tanks and performance advertising moves from commodity to high valued asset."

He said the IAB report should break out the share of major publishers compared with the so-called "long tail" of low-cost advertising booked on niche sites, most of which is placed by advertising networks.

Mr Fisher said the IAB was in the process of reviewing how it would break out the figures in future, with online video and lead-generation (such as email) advertising on the agenda, as well as performance.

Meanwhile, News Digital Media chief executive Richard Freudenstein said he was "still very optimistic" that internet advertising would continue to grow strongly this year.

"It's very measurable. Twenty-two per cent would be a good result. You've got to expect that given the economic climate, growth will slow down."

Despite the global financial crisis, financial advertisers increased online advertising levels, boosting their share of spending from 18.2 per cent of the market in the December 2007 quarter to 21.3 per cent in the fourth quarter of last year.

Automotive advertising decreased notably from 14.7 per cent to 13.6 per cent, but the biggest slowdown came from computer and technology advertisers, whose share fell from 17.8 per cent to 14 per cent.

LINK: http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au/story/0,25197,25025679-7582,00.html

Seven Words to Remember

2009-02-04T18:50:00.006+11:00

Website design is about more than layout, markup language, and technical wizardry. Website design is about communication, it's about turning advertising into content, and content into an experience that viewers will remember.

People are already searching Google for products and service that you offer. Bringing them to your website is extremely important, but what do they see once they get there!?

Seven Words To Remember

1. Communication
People are always asking us what's wrong with their websites, and the answer in the vast majority of cases can be summed-up in a quote from the movie, "Cool Hand Luke" (1967): "what we have here is a failure to communicate." Communication is the key to success, and that doesn't just apply to your website, it applies to almost everything you do both inside and outside your business-life.

If your website isn't communicating on both a rational and emotional level, if it doesn't provide the psychological and emotional context of your marketing message, then exactly what is it doing?

2. Audience
I can't think of too many people who actually like being sold. In fact, sometimes customers get so irritated by sales tactics that they end up not buying the thing they came specifically to your website to purchase.

Solving the problem is merely a question of altering your perspective; the average buyer is predisposed to dismiss and ignore high-pressure tactics, and meaningless sales pitches. So instead of treating customers like customers, try treating them like an audience. Audiences want to be engaged, enlightened, and entertained. And that is the most effective way to make a sales impact.

3. Focus
All too often websites inundate their Web audiences with facts, figures, statistics, and an endless líst of features, benefits, options, and whatever else the sales department can think of throwing in. All that stuff just confuses people.

Focus your message on the most important elements of what you have to say. If your website can embed that singular idea in an audience's mind, then it has done its job.

4. Language
The words used, and how they are put together provides meaning; they inform personality; they provide mental sound bites; and they make whatever you are saying, worth remembering.

Language is one of the critical elements of 'voice', the ability to convey personality; and writing without a 'voice' is instantly forgettable.

5. Performance
Even the most articulate prose can be lost in a befuddled delivery. Communication is more than words; it's a combination of language, style, personality, and performance.

Things are rarely what they seem. Even our memories are a stylized version of what we've actually experienced. Creating a memorable impression is about managing the viewer experience, and providing the right verbal and non-verbal cues that make what is being said memorable.

6. Personality
Every business has a personality. The first problem is, few medium-sized companies ever attempt to manage that persona, and as a consequence, the buying public forms its own opinion. And that opinion is often not the way you want to be regarded.

The second problem is companies either don't have a firm grasp of who they really are, or they know, and they are afraid to promote it. If your company's identity isn't worth promoting, it is time to think why that is, and change it. The bottom line is, a company without a personality is a company without an image, and that makes you instantly forgettable.

7. Psychology
The most important feature you can provide your audience is psychological fulfillment, not deep discounts, fast service, or more bells and whistles.

The real reason people buy stuff is that it makes them feel something. Cosmetics make women feel attractive or sexy, while cars make men feel they've achieved some level of status. Even services make people feel important, as in "I've got a guy, who does that for me." Finding the psychological hot spot in your marketing, and promoting the hell out of it consistently and continually should be your primary marketing goal. All those features and benefits are merely the excuse for a purchase, not the reason.

The Web Is Fast Becoming A Video Environment

Websites are not just marketing collateral; they are not just digital brochures. They are a new presentation medium that requires specialized communication skills, and knowledge of how best to use the medium.

You may be a great salesperson, and nobody knows your business like you do. You may even be skilled at delivering speeches at conventions and seminars, but performing effectively in front of a camera is a whole different ball game, and for most people, it's way out of their comfort zone, let alone their skill level.

The same old methods that used to work won't work any more. You're no longer competing with just the company down the street; you're competing with the entire world.

Web-businesses may not ever actually meet their customers face-to-face, or even talk to them on the phone, so it is imperative that they use marketing presentation methods that deliver an experience worth remembering.

About The Author
Jerry Bader is Senior Partner at MRPwebmedia, a website design firm that specializes in Web-audio and Web-video. Visit MRPwebmedia.com, 136Words.com and SonicPersonality.com. Contact at info@mrpwebmedia.com or telephone (905) 764-1246.

Google Earth Underwater

2009-02-03T18:08:00.007+11:00

Google isn't just able to drive sales for your business, or give you the answers you are looking for. Google products are actually fun to use!

I remember being blown away when I first saw Google Earth a few years back. It was simply astounding to be able to explore the surface of the earth in 3D, with the flick of a mouse! These days though we take it for granted. I use Google Maps (which is based on the satellite imagery of Google Earth) on a day by day bases with the GPS in my iPhone 3G.

New Underwater Ocean view in Google Earth

Google has launched what is touted as being one of the most comprehensive 3D maps of the ocean floor in a major upgrade to its free Google Earth program rolled out earlier today.

Using bathymetric data obtained from some of the world's leading marine and oceanographic research institutes, Google has been able to build a realistic terrain map of that part of the Earth's surface covered by its oceans and seas.

Called Ocean in Google Earth, the feature complements the existing 3D maps of the Earth and the heavens housed in Google Earth, a program which allows users to zoom in and out of specific locations on a tapestry of panoramic images that have been woven together.

The core data for this new feature typically comes from sonar soundings which are then rendered into contoured visualisations of what lies beneath.

This will include continental shelves, undersea mountains, volcanoes, trenches, ridges and other hitherto hidden geographical features.

Much of what will come up on the new feature is a fuzzy expanse of featureless terrain this will be augmented with some 20 content layers of much higher resolution imagery, video and general data.

Google says the material will include detailed content about such places as the Great Barrier Reef as well as of dive and surf sites around Australia.

Read more of this article found in the SMH. Google Earth Ocean View

Qual. Google Company Status!

2009-01-01T11:06:00.006+11:00

Mr Search has had a number of Google Qualified Professionals working within the business for some time now; but we are excited to announce today that we have just become a fully qualified company by Google. Mr Search as now recognised then, as a Google Qualified Company, and this represents the high level of expertise held by the staff at Mr Search.

What does all this mean? You can now have Mr Search setup and/or manage a comprehensive Google AdWords campaign for front page Google Exposure with more confidence than ever. Mr Search is trusted with the management of over $100,000.00 of Google click spend every 90 days. If you are NOT already benefiting from front page exposure (or if you want to see how you're doing) for all relevant keywords relating to your business, why not speak with one of our friendly Google Qualified Professionals.

Click for more information on our Google Professional status.

Happy New Year and best wishes for 2009!

Mr Search

Mr Search closed until Jan 5

2008-12-23T18:01:00.008+11:00

Mr Search is closed for the Christmas break.

Our office will open again on January 5.

For urgent requests please email: customerservice @ mrsearch.com.au.

We wish you a very Happy Christmas and a Prosperous New Year.

Listen to our new Audio Pres.

2008-11-25T19:32:00.008+11:00

Mr Search has just released a new audio presentation explaining Google AdWords Marketing in more detail, and how you can reduce expense, while maximising return for your business.

You can listen to the new presentation here

http://mrsearch.com.au/why-choose-mrsearch.html

Speak to one of our friendly Google Qualified Professionals today, to find out how we can make Google work for your business.

No more Yellow Pages Online

2008-11-04T00:18:00.005+11:00

Australia's Yellow Pages online has just made an announcement that it will stop competing with Google. It will now form a partnership where Yellow Pages will use Google Search technology.

Although Yellow Pages online only controlled a very small percentage market share in Australia, this move continues to demonstrate the dominance of Google, and the importance of having your company ACCESSIBLE to people who are searching for your products and services online. An ever increasing number of Australians are searching for products and services online. Make sure they find yours! Speak to our friendly Google Qualified Professionals today.

The SMH Article:

Asher Moses
November 3, 2008 - 2:42PM

Telstra's Sensis has given up on competing with Google in online search and mapping, announcing today it would provide its Yellow business listings to Google Maps and abandon its own search engine for one powered by Google.

From the first quarter of next year, all of Yellow's business listings - the most comprehensive directory in Australia - will be stored in Google Maps. As well, Google's search engine will power the search feature and text advertising on Sensis.com.au.

The move is being interpreted as an admission by Sensis that its own WhereIs online mapping site and Sensis search engine cannot compete with Google Maps and Google search.

Announcing the agreement at Google's headquarters today, Sensis CEO Bruce Akhurst said the deal would allow businesses advertising on Yellow to be found by the 2.5 million Australians who use Google Maps every month.

Akhurst laughed off suggestions the agreement was the first step in a possible takeover of Sensis by Google.

"We do recognise that Google is the global technology leader in this area, they're experts with helping people find information online," Akhurst said.

"So consistent with our philosophy of partnering up with the best in the business, we now will be able to provide world-class search and sponsored listings on Sensis.com.au."

Google Australia general manager Karim Temsamani and Akhurst said Google and Sensis would share any revenue generated from the deal but neither would reveal the length of the agreement or specific financial terms.

Nielsen NetRatings figures show Google Maps has 2.5 million users, compared to 1.2 million for WhereIs. Google search is used by 9.3 million Australians, compared to just 184,000 users for Sensis Search.

New features such as Street View, which provides street-level imagery of much of Australia, have allowed Google Maps to extend its lead.

In August, when Street View was launched, the number of Australians using Google Maps jumped to 3.3 million users. Temsamani said today that searches on Google for Google Maps-related terms jumped 5000 per cent after the launch of Street View.

Akhurst said despite today's announcement WhereIs would continue to operate in its current form.

Sensis' search credentials took a hit in February when it was forced to admit that the search function on the Yellow Pages and White Pages sites was "performing below expectations". Sensis has since upgraded the site with a new platform that it says fixes many of the issues.

http://www.smh.com.au/news/technology/biztech/sensis-concedes-defeat-to-google/2008/11/03/1225560716428.html

Googling is good for you!!

2008-10-19T22:51:00.001+11:00

Googling is good for you. No, really.

A team of US researchers has found that searching the internet stimulates brain activity in the elderly and middle-aged and may help keep their minds sharp.

The study was carried out by scientists at the University of California at Los Angeles (UCLA) and published in the latest edition of the American Journal of Geriatric Psychiatry.

The UCLA scientists found that searching the web triggers key centres in the brain that control decision-making and complex reasoning and may help stimulate and possibly improve brain function.

"The study results are encouraging, that emerging computerised technologies may have physiological effects and potential benefits for middle-aged and older adults," said Dr Gary Small, the principal investigator of the study.

"Internet searching engages complicated brain activity, which may help exercise and improve brain function," said Small, a professor at UCLA's Semel Institute for Neuroscience and Human Behaviour.

The study's authors noted that their findings are the latest to suggest that complex activity that keeps the mind engaged, such as crossword puzzles, may help keep the brain healthy.

The UCLA researchers said they tested 24 neurologically normal research volunteers between the ages of 55 and 76, half with experience searching the internet and half with no experience.

The study participants performed web searches and book-reading tasks while undergoing functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) scans, which record brain-circuitry changes.

They all showed significant brain activity during book reading and web searching, but the internet-savvy group registered a twofold increase in brain activation during web use when compared with those with little internet experience.

They said the web-savvy group also registered greater activity in the frontal, temporal and cingulate areas of the brain, which control decision-making and complex reasoning.

"Our most striking finding was that internet searching appears to engage a greater extent of neural circuitry that is not activated during reading - but only in those with prior internet experience," said Small.

"A simple, everyday task like searching the web appears to enhance brain circuitry in older adults, demonstrating that our brains are sensitive and can continue to learn as we grow older," he added.

AFP