Amid questions of the channel's effectiveness, one of the Web's biggest interactive shops is forecasting that search will command a smaller share of its advertising output this year than last year.
Search represented 35 percent of the gross billings of aQuantive's Avenue A/Razorfish last year, but the ad shop is reporting that that share will likely fall 2 or 3 percentage points this year as
advertisers migrate their interactive spending to branding opportunities on Web portals and niche sites. You'd think click fraud paranoia might have something to do with this, but according to
TheStreet.com, citing "several recent surveys," advertisers are less worried about click fraud than the high cost of keywordswhich have generally stabilized in the last year. Meanwhile, Google's
investors will be anxious to hear how the company responds to Avenue A's report at its investor's meeting on March 2 in California.
Read the whole story at TheStreet.com »
