June 6, 2007 Archives

I had a chance this afternoon to speak to Yahoo! about my Concerns Over Yahoo!'s New Quality Based Pricing.

In short, I rationalized that since Yahoo! is using an advertisers (in aggregate form) conversion rate to decrease the price they pay per keyword. They can then logically use the same data to increase an advertisers bid.

I am glad to report that after speaking with Yahoo! about this, I am convinced whole-heartedly that Yahoo! would not go to this level. In fact, I could hear the distaste and disappointment in their voice over the possibility of even some advertisers thinking this.

Reggie Davis, Yahoo!'s vice president of marketplace quality, told me:

Yahoo! is dedicated to continually enhancing the quality of our marketplace so we can deliver better value to our customers. We've introduced quality-based pricing in an effort to provide our advertisers higher ROI from our sponsored search and contextual ad offerings and to encourage publishers to focus on the quality of their traffic if they want to take full advantage of our marketplace. This initiative is not about increasing the amount you pay for traffic from high-quality sites -- you will never pay more than your maximum bid amount. Our plan is to grow our ecosystem by delivering better value to advertisers, which we hope will encourage additional participation in our marketplace and in turn provide even more relevant results to our consumers – which, in the end, benefits both Yahoo! and its publishers.

Personally, I am happy with this response and I believe it sets a standard for Yahoo!'s bidding methodologies in the future.

Continued forum discussion at Search Engine Watch Forums.

I'm seriously wondering how they do it. As I write this at the airport (this is scheduled for publication for Wednesday morning), I know that Vanessa and Matt and Adam and a lot of Google's webmasters have been hanging out at SMX. However, today, Barry reported that Google has updated their Webmaster Guidelines.

To my Webmaster Central friends: how did you manage that and why now?! I guess Matt had some time on his hands since his fan base wasn't as big at SMX than at SES. Aww, shucks. I'll be there for ya next time, Matt.

In any event, here are some revised guidelines as posted by Barry:

• Avoid hidden text or hidden links.
• Don't use cloaking or sneaky redirects.
• Don't send automated queries to Google.
• Don't load pages with irrelevant keywords.
• Don't create multiple pages, subdomains, or domains with substantially duplicate content.
• Don't create pages that install viruses, trojans, or other badware.
• Avoid "doorway" pages created just for search engines, or other "cookie cutter" approaches such as affiliate programs with little or no original content.
• If your site participates in an affiliate program, make sure that your site adds value. Provide unique and relevant content that gives users a reason to visit your site first.

Both Cre8asite Forum members and WebmasterWorld members find that the new guidelines are much more explicit and clear. The change is, therefore, quite welcome.

Thanks guys!

Discussion continues at Cre8asite Forum members and WebmasterWorld.

Google has reached its all-time stock high at $519, closing today at $518.84.

DigitalPoint Forums members wonder "when Google will run out of fuel."

As it continues to buy out companies, it will be hard to say when and if there will be a downfall. However, some members suspect that it cannot sustain this growth for very long.

Discussion continues at DigitalPoint Forums.

A WebmasterWorld thread calls attention to a recent PC World article that states that Google will soon integrate AdSense into Google Maps, "meaning some push-pin graphics used at the maps site could be turned into mini-advertisements."

This has not been rolled out to the public yet. However, in the proposed implementation, a hotel can use a specific icon instead of the traditional push-pin design to increase visibility of the location on the map.

When launched, users will have "complete control" over what will be visible to them. They can turn off these sponsored results. Forum members suspect that this will be turned off indefinitely, so perhaps that won't be a long-term solution for Google.

Forum discussion continues at WebmasterWorld.

What will Google's acquisition of Feedburner tell us? At the end of the day, Google wants to make money. As such, a forums post on Search Engine Watch asks whether the acquisition had a goal for Google to expand the Google AdWords distribution channel.

It's entirely possible, and many people agree that this acquisition will also focus on getting more relevant results in the SERPs.

Rob aka evilgreenmonkey says:

It's a reasonable assessment that Google's acquisition of Feedburner simply increases their possible ad inventory (as well as offering some very juicy data). I think that it's highly unlikely that AdWords would be forced onto feeds though, especially without re-numeration. I can see a blogger style implementation happening, where they make it very easy (or maybe the default) to use AdSense in the feeds.

beau summarizes his hypothesis:

BOTTOM LINE: This acquisition increases reach and provides new opportunities for both AdWords advertisers and AdSense publishers. At the same time, it helps Google provide even better results in the SERPS.

I think that this is very true. It will be easier for bloggers to monetize their blogs with Google AdSense integration. I would not be surprised if many new blogs are established as it becomes simpler to monetize via RSS.

Shoemoney is concerned by the recent message on Feedburner's login page that pretty much gives all Feedburner subscribers an option to go with Google or terminate your agreement with Feedburner. I can't say I blame him. That wording is scary.

Forum discussion continues at Search Engine Watch.

While SMX appears to have to impressed most attendees and been a success for Danny and Chris as they re-invent the conference wheel, the impressions from the outside world are starting to filter in.

Two threads from Cre8asiteforums illustrate the curiosity from the SEO industry.

Why Were They Forbidden to Blog? (Registered Members only) asks about the one month embargo put on writing about one particular session. With no reasons to point to that were made public, some people are wondering why.

[Added by Barry]: Danny said the reason is because he didn't want any blogging on this at all. But he finally agreed to a one month embargo. It gives the attendees something a bit extra for coming to the conference, I guess. Danny actually wrote before the conference started that no blogging would be allowed at this session (I just can't find where he wrote that now).

What It Means to be a Conference Speaker hopes to explore the speaker world. With more conferences available, where to do you draw the line? Whom do you pitch to? Who wants you? Is anyone paid to speak?

The other night Yahoo! released a quality based bidding methodology to their ads. What that means, as I explained, is that Yahoo will give advertisers a discount on their bids based on several metrics, including how a publisher converts on the whole.

Converts? Yes, a conversion rate. Which means, Yahoo is tracking to see if a publisher's ad will ultimately lead to a conversion. Conversions include a goal (sales form completion, lead generation, etc.) or a sale on a site.

If a publisher produces lower conversions related to other publishers in a specific keyword marketplace, Yahoo will take notice. Then Yahoo will discount the bid price, and refund the advertiser money for those clicks. Many compare this to Google's smart pricing, but I have not seen Google come out and say they are using conversion metrics to determine a price of a click.

The discussion on how Yahoo is using a bit too much information to price ads has already begun at Search Engine Watch Forums. I admit, I kind of fueled the discussion, but I was honestly shocked and a bit concerned when I learned Yahoo was using such metrics.

(1) If Yahoo! is tracking conversions and admittedly discounting prices based on that, who is to say they won't do the opposite? Who is to say Yahoo wont look at higher converting publishers and up the price on those clicks?

(2) If Yahoo! will go that far, why not take it a step further and share in an advertiser's success. By that I mean, increase the prices of ads for higher converting and more profitable advertisers.

My list can go on. But these are just some of the initial concerns that came to mind when I first heard this announcement. I had four emails to Yahoo!, with five responses. If this was Google, the noise in the forums would be a lot louder.

Forum discussion at Search Engine Watch Forums.

Update: See Yahoo Addresses Concerns Over New Search Ad Pricing Model for an update to this article.

As I reported at Search Engine Land today with Google Updates AdSense Program Policies, Google AdSense is now allowing three link units per page.

So what does that mean? Well, I can have three of these on a page.

That is one, here is a second:

And the last, but not the least.

These link units are different from Google's normal AdSense units. If you click on them, they will take you to a page of ads, as opposed to an advertisers site. In a sense, two clicks are required to reach an advertisers site.

Forum discussion at WebmasterWorld.