The Google Ad Manager beta program has just been unveiled for publishers who want another avenue in which to monetize their websites and blogs. Google Ad Manager offers publishers a free, web-based service to manage banner ads supplied by third parties or by Google.

The free Google Ad Manager is similar to other third party ad servers who charge a fee for their services or is similar to a free open source ad server such as OpenAds. But, the advantage of the Ad Manager program is that a publisher can also use Google’s vast network of inventory to fill in ad spaces that the publisher is unable to sell elsewhere.

The tour of Google Ad Manager shows there are six basic parts to the program. The first is defining the ad space on the page. The second is generating HTML or javascript code to place on the web page. The third is checking inventory availability.

The fourth is uploading the creative banners for sold ads. The fifth is running performance reports to track CTR, CPM and other data. The sixth is either signing in with an invitation in hand or applying for an invitation into the Google Ad Manager beta program.

Since the U. S. and European Union have both given the thumbs up on the Google acquisition of DoubleClick and Ad Manager will no doubt be integrated into this display ad serving technology, it remains to be seen how big of an impact this will have in the online advertising marketplace.

One thing is for sure and that is with Ad Manager, Google is trying hard to keep publishers from straying to other resources on the Internet. And, if the past is any predictor of the future, Google will be very persuasive in doing just that.

Filed under: Google | 1 Comment »

For those Web businesses that are running Google Adwords campaigns along with having a well SEO’ed website, you may be receiving a penalty if your landing page is too slow in loading. Google has announced on their Adwords blog that slow loading landing pages will negatively impact an advertisers Quality Score.

Quality Score is used to determine an advertisements position on the Google Network. The way it generally works is that those ads with a high Quality Score will receive better position in the network with lower minimum bids. The opposite is true for ads with low scores.

So, why is Google implementing a penalty for slow loading landing pages? It comes down to the user experience on that page. With slow loading pages, the user is more likely to get frustrated or leave before the page has finished loading. This leads to low ad conversions and disgruntled potential customers.

According to Google this penalty will be rolled out within the next couple of weeks. So, Google advertisers beware. You’re ads may just sink in prominence and be a bit more expensive than in the past if you offer up slow loading pages to your customers.

Filed under: Google | 1 Comment »

Yahoo Search Monkey will be debuting soon, coinciding with the Weather Report outlined on the Yahoo Blog. Yahoo Search Monkey is a new open-source application programming interface (API) that will enhance the search experience for visitors as well as website owners.

Website owners will be able to ratings, reviews, images, deep links and other data directly to the Yahoo results pages through the company’s Machined Learned Ranking technology. For instance, a restaurant may include data such a photos, reviews and location in the search engine results pages making the SERPs much more visually appealing and offering more in-depth information.

Gone will be the days of the simple title, abstract and link, unless of course the user wants this simplicity. According to Yahoo, its Search Monkey features can be turned off or on at will, giving visitors a choice of how much information they want to see on the results pages.

One important aspect of Search Monkey that Yahoo hasn’t addressed yet is the real estate on the SERPs pages. With all the new data, will each listing be larger and if so will the top 10 rankings fall into the realm of a top 5 or top 8 perhaps? No matter, perhaps, Search Monkey is just what Yahoo needs to get out of the money doldrums and back on track to take on Google in a more meaningful way.

While the jury is still out on whether visitors will go ape over Search Monkey (or whether they will just throw pooh at it), one thing is for certain and that is that Yahoo needs to make some bold moves to get back into the search game. Perhaps Search Monkey is such a bold move.

Filed under: Yahoo | No Comments »

Many small business owners try to learn search engine optimization in order to avoid the high costs that some SEO firms charge. This is understandable since many small businesses don’t have thousands of dollars of extra cash to spend at any one moment.

But, those who are new to SEO run the risk of picking up bad habits or adopting misinformation about search engine optimization that is prevalent on the Web. The two biggest mistakes I see when someone comes to me after SEOing their own website and are disenchanted with the results are keyword stuffing and keyword repetition throughout their web pages.

Keyword stuffing at one time was a useful gray hat technique of placing multiple keyword phrases in the source code and / or on the visible parts of a webpage. Keywords can be stuffed into all different areas of a page in the source code including title, meta tags, comments area, table names and image alt tags to name a few.

Over the past few years, the search engines have gotten pretty good at detecting keyword stuffing and have penalized web pages that practice this technique, which has the sole aim of popping the page up in the rankings. But, alongside keyword stuffing is keyword repetition, which is the second bad habit of newbie SEOs.

Repeating keywords in the title tag, keywords meta tag, descriptions meta tag and image alt tags can drop a page down the SERPs faster than wearing a pair of lead shoes. Now, it must be mentioned that keyword repetition in these areas does not affect all web pages equally.

Just a quick Google searches will tell you that there are some web pages at the top of the SERPs that repeat keywords in their title tags and meta tags ad nauseam and many sites that don’t are found farther back in the rankings.

The sites that generally get away with doing this are generally older sites with lots of back links and little competition. My experience has been that newer sites generally don’t get away with repeating keywords in these key areas.

In fact, I’ve seen many newer websites achieve higher search engine rankings within days of removing the repeating keywords from the areas that I’ve mentioned. This had led me to believe that there is a small, but significant penalty involved for web pages that partake of this particular technique.

So, my advice is, that if you have a newer website that isn’t performing well with keywords repeated in the title tags, meta tags and alt tag areas, then cut out the repetitions and see what happens. Test just a page or two first to be prudent. Also, expect that it may dip in the rankings temporary. Generally, though, the page will bounce back, stronger than before and ranking higher than it was previously.

Filed under: SEO Tips | 2 Comments »

Keyword research is arguably the most important element for both SEM and SEO campaigns. If one does not pick the right set of keywords for either, then one can fail miserably.

But, cannot the keywords for SEM and SEO be used interchangeably? The answer is sometimes yes and sometimes no. It is true that many times the keyword phrases will overlap when doing a PPC campaign as it does for organic SEO, but other times the same keyword phrases will not work for one or another.

For instance, if someone uses the Google Adwords Keyword Tool to investigate keywords for an SEM campaign, they will see a column for Advertiser Competition. This represents the number of advertisers signed up with Google who are bidding on this same keyword phrase.

Some people make the mistake of thinking that this number has some correlation with the number of web pages competing for a keyword phrase in the organic search engine rankings, which it does not.

When investigating SEO keyword competition, one has to look at how many web pages have the same keyword phrase in the title tag and link text pointing to a web page. This competition number may be relatively the same as Google’s Advertiser Competition or in vast contrast to this number.

Those who do SEM through a PPC program like Google or Yahoo are competing solely with a pool of advertisers in the sponsored section of each site. Those who do SEO do not compete directly with SEM’s, but rather other SEOs who build pages for the organic rankings.

These two distinct spaces on each search engine results page lends itself to two different search advertising models and thus two different methods of analyzing keyword competition.

Filed under: Keywords | 1 Comment »

Those who already know this will agree that SEO and SEM are two very different animals. But, I still get customers who are still confused about these two methods for acquiring search engine traffic, so I will clarify the differences here.

SEM is like a racehorse and SEO is like a plow horse. With SEM, you have a lot of control of the results and you get them very quickly. Within a week of a successful SEM campaign, the racehorse may be prancing around the arena accepting congratulations. Feedback is immediate.

The SEO plow horse, on the other hand, does his job slowly and methodically and the results may not be apparent until months later, when the crops start to come in. The SEO plow horse has less control that the racehorse since the plow horse has to depend upon the richness of the soil, the rain and other factors outside of his control.

Overtime, however, the SEM racehorse is far more expensive than the SEO plow horse. The SEM racehorse requires more money spent in quicker bursts to keep the SEM racehorse in the race. Once he’s out of the race, no money is being spent or made.

The SEO plow horse on the other hand, keep plodding along, climbing the hills of the organic listings and getting more visitors to jump onboard. Over time, less money is spent on the SEO plow horse, though he keeps going like the energizer bunny.

It is important to note that some businesses prefer racehorses while others prefer plow horses. Each kind of equine will serve its purpose for some business models. There are even companies the feed and care for both SEM racehorses and SEO plow horses, garnering the best of both worlds.

Filed under: SEO | 1 Comment »

Link building has been a controversial issue over the past few years. Some SEO’s are now focusing exclusively on social networking sites to the exclusion of all else. There are SEO’s that claim that directory links and reciprocal links are dead.

But, if you believe in the theory of link building as if the search engines didn’t exist, then you’ll also believe that reciprocal links and directories still have some value. If the search engines did not exist, then webmasters would use the following resources for link building:

• Directories with small targeted categories
• Reciprocal links with relevant sites
• Creating quality content
• Link baiting
• Article writing and distribution
• Press releases
• Blog comments
• Social networking
• Message boards

Of course, not all links hold equal value and links from directories and reciprocal partners may not hold the wallop that they used to, but to say they are of no value, across the board, is missing the point.

There are some directories like Yahoo, Dmoz and some niche directories that still offer targeted traffic to websites. Also, reciprocal links from similar or complimentary websites also can offer targeted traffic. So, it only follows that these resources still hold some value in the search engine algorithms.

The best linking strategy, however, is to cover all the bases. If a person links using all of the resources listed above, then a website will generally do well in the search engine rankings. Of course there are exceptions, but why limit yourself to just one linking strategy when casting a wide net can be beneficial to both direct traffic and the search engine rankings?

Filed under: Link Building | No Comments »

It’s no secret now that Microsoft has put in a $44.6 billion stock bid to take over Yahoo. This bid was made to presumably compete with Google in search and for advertising dollars. This move will most assuredly benefit many companies who use display advertisements.

Microsoft’s MSN and Yahoo can leverage their large networks to show display advertisements. But, will this merger benefit publishers? Right now, Google dominates the market as even the smallest of Web publisher who wants to make money online can sign up for and start displaying Google AdSense ads.

I’ve also talked recently about Microsoft’s ContentAds program for publishers, which is still in beta testing as well as the Yahoo publisher program, which is likewise still in beta testing. With the merger, the future of both of these programs comes into question.

Will these programs be merged or will they operate independently of each other? Will the merger cause so much confusion that it delays the rollout of either of these programs to the public significantly? Publishers have now been waiting three years for Yahoo to open up its beta publisher program to the public and this merger could cause yet another unbearable delay to those waiting in the wings.

Another issue is how will the merger affect the search results for both MSN and Yahoo? If both companies combine resources and algorithms and ultimately deliver the same results to users, most likely users will opt for one search engine over the other, hurting the lesser of the two. If the search results are not improved significantly for one or both of the search engines then Google continues to dominate the field.

The merger and acquisition of Yahoo by Microsoft if it happens at all is expected to take a very long time, with many hurdles to jump in the U. S. and in Europe. In the meantime, will many of the programs for both search giants be on hold, waiting for the outcome of the merger? If progress is delayed, then Google may take this opportunity to gain even more ground and become even more dominant in the search and online advertising arena, and this isn’t exactly the results that Microsoft and Yahoo are after.

Filed under: Search Engines | No Comments »

Many clients come in having experienced the drive-thru window results of a pay-per-click (PPC) program and the expense of a 5-star restaurant. In other words, a PPC program such as Google Adwords will get a client immediate results and will over time cost a lot of money.

Many times a client will start with the PPC model, learn that it is too expensive over the long haul and then turn to SEO to cut down on costs. Having started with PPC, these clients have the expectation that SEO and ranking well in the organic results will also work as quickly as PPC.

I’ve had clients in mid-November tell me they need to rank well in the organic listings within the next two weeks to capitalize on the Christmas selling season. These clients are disappointed to learn that SEO does not have as quick of a turnaround time as PPC. Sometimes these clients go off in pursuit of another SEO who will promise quick results (and not deliver) telling the client what they want to hear.

It is important for clients to realize that they can do both PPC and SEO. Companies that offer SEO services, like this one, need to manage the expectations of the client so they know that PPC is a short-term situation and SEO is a long-term goal.

A PPC program may need to be continued for some time until the organic results start to pay off. At this time, some companies will scale back their PPC programs or eliminate them altogether. Over time, that 5-star restaurant (SEO) will achieve the costs of a fast food restaurant when compared to most PPC programs.

Managing client expectations in this area is crucial when dealing with new clients who have “grown up” on PPC and who are now willing to mature as a citizen into their place in the organic listings.

Filed under: Clients | No Comments »

MSN AdCenter has been going on for a while now, but many people are asking when the MSN publisher program called ContentAds (I’m calling it MSN PubCenter) will go live? In 2005, people at SEO Roundtable started talking about the Microsoft contextual advertising program going into beta, but MSN at this time was mum about the possibility of this program.

In 2006, the word leaked out that ContentAds was not only in beta but going live that year and like many unofficial deadlines, the time-frame for the beta slipped and then slided again in 2007. Will this be the year that MSN ContentAds goes live or is Microsoft watching Yahoo struggle with its beta publisher program and drafting them in this race?

The recent word is that the ContentAds closed-beta is still a work-in-progress as only a few select publishers have been asked to join. Their ads are appearing on the Microsoft properties such as Windows Live, MSN Money and MSN Real Estate.

With Google AdSense dominating the field and raking in billions of dollars in advertising revenue, it’s only a matter of time until MSN, Yahoo and even Ask.com open up their publisher programs to the public. Then again, perhaps the invitation-only publisher model is attractive to the search giants right now as they have more control over the quality and content of where the ads appear.

But, from a publisher’s perspective, the more alternatives there are to AdSense the more control they can have over the ads being served on their sites and the more potential earnings are to be made.

Filed under: Ad Programs | 2 Comments »