Google's Transition From Search To Tech Company by Laurie Sullivan

Google is a technology company. This doesn't mean it will abandon search. But after 20 years in technology and marketing, I know the signs and can say unequivocally that the company has crossed over. It reminds me a little of Microsoft's climb to the top, complete with regulatory issues and privacy concerns. Perhaps the Google I/O conference set to get underway Wednesday, where attentions turn toward applications, contributes to this energy and buzz. ...Read the whole story

  • YouTube Ad Options For Searches And Clicks At Five by Laurie Sullivan

    There are 24 hours worth of videos uploaded each minute onto YouTube and 45 million home page impressions every day. The site gets more than 2 billion views daily and monetizes a billion videos per week that managed to triple partner ad revenue in 2009. ...Read the whole story

  • Google Makes Bid For VoIP Co. Supporting Yahoo, AOL, Baidu by Laurie Sullivan

    Google said Tuesday it has made a $68 million offer to acquire Global IP Solutions Holding, an Internet voice and video company. The deal could put the Mountain View, Calif. company in direct competition with Skype, as well as supporting search rivals. GIP customers include Yahoo, IBM, AOL, Nortel Networks, and Baidu. ...Read the whole story

  • Women Seek Online Communities To Validate Purchases by Laurie Sullivan

    If a new study is to be believed, you should be building direct relationships through search, online and mobile Web sites with women who show interest. It will become one of the most valuable marketing tools a company can have. The joint study from iVillage and SheSpeaks highlights that interaction between women through online community Web sites, forums and message boards have a "dramatic" influence on driving product preference, loyalty, and purchase, both online and off. ...Read the whole story

Turning the Tables: Why Google Will Win and Facebook Will Lose by Kaila Colbin

"Hang on," you're saying to yourself right now, "Isn't this the same Kaila Colbin who, not three weeks ago, predicted Facebook would kick Google's posterior?" Why yes, it is. So why am I arguing the opposite today? Well, to cover my predictive bases for one -- but, more importantly, because the opposite view is potentially much more interesting. ...More

  • Searching Pays Off More by Jack Loechner

    According to Internet Retailer's recent search engine marketing survey of 102 web-only retailers, chain retailers, catalogers and consumer brand manufacturers, 28.0% of merchants report more than 25% of their site traffic stems from paid search advertisements, while 51.5% say more than a quarter of their traffic comes from natural search. Search engine marketing is one of Internet retailing's fundamentals, says the report. Web merchants keep pouring money into advertising on search results pages and on search engine optimization projects to move up in natural search results. ...More

  • Warning: Maddening Complexity Ahead! by Steve Baldwin

    Once upon a time, search meant learning more about the world by typing a keyword into a search box and being presented with an authoritative SERP. Search advertising meant running an ad based on the keyword a user typed. While search has been changing at a slow creep for a few years now, the change agents have accelerated their impact on the landscape in the past 18 months, which is going to make search marketing that much harder. Let's look at some of these changes, and what they mean for paid search marketers. ...More