Social feeds in premium display advertising become more important as brands and their agencies look for ways to advance media. As part of the discussion, panelists at the MediaPost OMMA Premium Display conference in Los Angeles Tuesday talked about the possibility of Facebook offering a banner or takeover ad on its home page. What role do social, real-time bidding, and search contribute to premium display advertising? The panelists agree that agencies and brands must keep the conversation going, but Charlotte Cochrane, director of digital invention at Mindshare, said it's the responsibility of agencies and clients to provide content worth sharing. The paid media buys should complement the earned media, she said. While the term "display advertising" may conjure images of old-time digital advertising, the panel of experts agrees that social and analytics play a major role. It's about real-time optimization, based on data -- especially when pulling in social content and coordinating insights from the community. When it comes to Facebook, Patricia Galea, SVP of digital at Edelman, believes the ads in the feed have more value than those down the right rail. "It's about providing content for members," she said. "It's all about pushing and amplifying content rather than creating a rich-media ad unit." Adam Kasper, EVP at Havas Digital, doesn't view the ads down the right rail as a "premium experience." He's wondering when Facebook will introduce a takeover home page ad that may integrate social feeds. What is premium advertising and how should analytics play a part? For Kasper, gathering analytics starts even before the campaign, but the metrics behind premium advertising is "squishier," he said. That's the challenge. There's always a proxy for premium digital -- rarely a fixed measurement. "That's the flaw with premium advertising," he said. "The programmatic type of buying is measurable and rolls into a return on investment" or measurement that procurement executives or chief financial officers look for in order to quantify investments.
Increased traffic across mobile devices in Q2 prompted marketers to spend more for mobile search ads on smartphones and tablets -- shifting costs per click, especially for Google, according to a study published Wednesday. The study shows that costs per click on Google continue to decline, falling 13 percentage points, while Bing and Yahoo CPCs declined sequentially to end the quarter flat, according to the Adobe Q2 2012 Global Digital Advertising Update. The study cites the decline in overall Google CPCs to an increase in share of mobile clicks, where CPCs are less expensive. The decrease in Bing/Yahoo CPCs is attributed to changes in the finance sector, where CPCs dropped considerably during the prior quarter. While Google's CPCs dropped because of mobile traffic, the overall click volume rose 32%, compared with the year-ago quarter. "The average consumer is using multiple devices before converting, so the average conversion length has increased and, as a result, the value of a click on average for the advertiser dropped, though the volume of clicks increased," said Sid Shah, Adobe director of business analytics. "Advertisers are willing to pay less per click, but buy more clicks to make the conversion happen as the consumer uses more channels and more devices to make purchases." Overall, tablet conversion rates rose 20 percentage points higher than those of PCs. Likewise, smartphone conversion rates were significantly lower across the board, with overall conversion rates approximately 42 percentage points lower than PC conversion rates. U.S. search spend grew 13% in Q2 compared with the year-ago quarter, while ROI rose 23%, according to the report. Marketers spent more in Q2 for search marketing, about 18% in the United States and 12% in Germany, compared with the year-ago quarter. Yahoo gained 1% market share, and Google declined 1% in the quarter. Google's sequential click volume fell slightly, but rose 32% compared with the same quarter in the prior year. The click volume from the combined Bing and Yahoo alliance rose 26%. This sequential "surge" in Bing/Yahoo's click volume may be due to algorithmic changes and lower CPCs, as the alliance gains market share lost to Google in the prior two quarters. By the end of Q2, market click volume share for Google and Bing/Yahoo were 81.5% and 18.5%, respectively. The study forecasts better days for search in the United States during the second half of 2012, but not Europe. Adobe analysts expect marketers to spend between 10% and 15% more, compared with the prior year. In Europe, growth in search faces challenges, which may slow growth rates seen year-to-date. Smartphone and tablet traffic will represent 20% of all traffic from search by end of year, and Facebook brand pages will grow an additional 45% by the end of this year.
In the week that’s passed since Marissa Mayer was named CEO of Yahoo, it seems like she’s been getting unsolicited advice from everyone and their mother -- including advice on how to be a mother! Back in 2008, I wrote a column outlining 10 things I’d do if I were running Yahoo. As it turns out, four of my wish list items came to be -- but the company’s no better off than when I wrote them, so I guess that means I wasn’t qualified to be Yahoo CEO. Besides, even if I were the right person for the job, I’m not sure my LinkedIn profile would meet the documentation requirements that are surely part of Yahoo’s recruiting due diligence these days. You see, under Honors, I’ve listed the very prestigious Solomon Schechter Day School Fourth Grade Record for the One Mile Run, but have no tangible proof of said achievement. While I can assure you this was no “resume blunder,” I don’t have the proper documentation and I can’t imagine Mrs. Starr still remembers my race time. Therefore, I shall throw my support behind Mayer and arm-chair quarterback her tenure as CEO, starting with these five suggestions: 1. Keep the Search Alliance with Microsoft. In my 2008 column, I said that, as Yahoo CEO, I’d “tear up the Google syndication deal” because “the search ad marketplace needs vibrant competition.” Indeed, Carol Bartz followed through on this and struck the alliance with Microsoft. Fortunately for Yahoo, this deal included revenue guarantees, as adCenter has yet to meet minimum revenue per search requirements. Danny Sullivan has a good recap of this saga on Search Engine Land, ending in speculation that Mayer will cancel the Microsoft deal in favor of a Google partnership. For all the same reasons I opposed a Google search deal for Yahoo in 2008, I oppose it in 2012. If Google were to gain an even more dominant global marketshare, it would inevitably lead to increased costs for advertisers. For one thing, we’d see increased competition in keyword bid auctions as advertisers dump even more money into AdWords. For another, Google would be emboldened to roll out further paid inclusion programs, forcing advertisers to pay for traffic that previously could be obtained through unpaid organic listings. That said, Yahoo can’t just roll over on search. It’s not like I’m counting or anything, but Yahoo has lost search share in the U.S. in each of the last 10 months and now sits at a measly 13% overall. Forgetting the monetization aspect (which is propped up for now by the Microsoft guarantee), Yahoo needs people to use its search functionality if it wants to maintain its overall site traffic. As Google favors its own properties in search results, each person who leaves Yahoo to search on Google is less likely to find and return to Yahoo content. This puts Yahoo’s primary source of revenue (display advertising) at risk. 2. Double down on display. Despite assembling a portfolio of best-in-class display assets over the years -- including Right Media, Dapper, and interclick -- Yahoo’s display business was up just 1% year-over-year in Q2, and down 4% in both Q1 and Q4. Yahoo’s new Genome platform for audience buying is a very robust solution, but will require continued investment to achieve its potential and have a material impact on the bottom line. I have full faith that Peter Foster, Yahoo’s GM of audience and performance advertising, will deliver on the “holistic combination of data inputs, premium supply and actionable analytics that can help marketers achieve their objectives from the top to the bottom of the funnel" -- but not without a sizable budget for further product development and retention of top sales talent. 3. Organize around mobile. U.S. mobile ad spend is going to double in 2012 and is poised to “dominate the future of media and advertising.” Yahoo must make a bold play in mobile. This includes creating new content, functionality and apps that are native to mobile devices. This also includes innovation in mobile ad technology lest Yahoo have its mobile apps, er, lunch, eaten by the likes of the Rubicon Project. 4. Bring back the yodel. This may just be anecdotal, but I love me some Yahoo yodel. Let’s bring those funky tracks back5. Ignore this column. Marissa, please ban this column and every other one like it that’s been written (especially those related to your pregnancy!) from your index. Well, not literally, as I’m sure MediaPost would not appreciate that. But I urge you to tune out the backseat drivers and blaze your trail. Only you know what’s best for you, and only you can decide what’s best for Yahoo now. I look forward to revisiting this column in four years and seeing how much of my advice you ignored. Meanwhile, I’ll be tracking down my fourth grade classmates to serve as professional references on the off chance your job opens up again.
Over the past week, Google was at it again, challenging the sanity and stress levels of SEOs everywhere. Last week, many Webmasters received a message in Google Webmaster Tools stating: Dear site owner or webmaster,We've detected that some of your site's pages may be using techniques that are outside Google's Webmaster Guidelines.Specifically, look for possibly artificial or unnatural links pointing to your site that could be intended to manipulate PageRank. Examples of unnatural linking could include buying links to pass PageRank or participating in link schemes.We encourage you to make changes to your site so that it meets our quality guidelines. Once you've made these changes, please submit your site for reconsideration in Google's search results.If you find unnatural links to your site that you are unable to control or remove, please provide the details in your reconsideration request.If you have any questions about how to resolve this issue, please see our Webmaster Help Forum for support.Sincerely,Google Search Quality Team WHAT? The letter seems to threaten site removal from the Google index by saying, “Once you've made these changes, please submit your site for reconsideration in Google's search results.” That statement alone is enough to scare the pants off any SEO. As you can imagine, the reaction in the SEO community was swift and concerned. How could webmasters force the removal of backlinks from sites they do not own? And on the flip side, site owners began charging for link removal. The message quickly set off a firestorm of reaction on many levels. Panicked yet? Don’t be. My first rule of SEO has always been to remain calm and keep a clear head during any changes. See what the results are, consult with others, and then create a plan of action. It may seem impossible with your job on the line, but remain calm -- there’s always more change brewing. The reality with Google (as well as other engines and platforms, like Facebook) is that they will often change course if they see public sentiment strongly in another direction. If a change negatively affects users, they may change course, as Google did with this follow-up message: We've detected that some of the links pointing to your site are using techniques outside Google'sWebmaster Guidelines.We don't want to put any trust in links that are artificial or unnatural. We recommend removing any unnatural links to your site. However, we do realize that some links are outside of your control. As a result, for this specific incident we are taking very targeted action on the unnatural links instead of your site as a whole. If you are able to remove any of the links, please submit a reconsideration request, including the actions that you took.If you have any questions, please visit our Webmaster Help Forum. While this message still mentions “reconsideration request,” it’s a bit more toned down from the original. Matt Cutts also followed up with a message posted to Google Plus: If you received a message yesterday about unnatural links to your site, don’t panic. In the past, these messages were sent when we took action on a site as a whole.Yesterday, we took another step towards more transparency and began sending messages when we distrust some individual links to a site. While it’s possible for this to indicate potential spammy activity by the site, it can also have innocent reasons.For example, we may take this kind of targeted action to distrust hacked links pointing to an innocent site. The innocent site will get the message as we move towards more transparency, but it’s not necessarily something that you automatically need to worry about.If we’ve taken more severe action on your site, you’ll likely notice a drop in search traffic, which you can see in the "Search queries" feature Webmaster Tools for example.As always, if you believe you have been affected by a manual spam action and your site no longer violates the Webmaster Guidelines, go ahead and file a reconsideration request. It’ll take some time for us to process the request, but you will receive a followup message confirming when we’ve processed it. Before reacting too swiftly, it’s also prudent to see how the changes will shake out for your website. In some cases, changes may benefit you and hurt your competitors, which actually is a very positive result for your site. And honestly, is this really anything new? Between algorithm changes and more, Google’s always making our lives more challenging. But that’s what keeps SEO interesting.
When's the last time you went online to find an ad? A panel of industry experts at the OMMA Premium Display Digital conference in Los Angeles on Tuesday discussed the state of digital storytelling to create emotions. Traditional story telling doesn't allow viewers to jump to the middle or the end of the tale, but search and social do, making digital storytelling non-linear. Marketers need to learn how to integrate search and social media. Don't just tell consumers about the product, but what the brand stands for and how they fit into that story.