Clix Marketing PPC Blog

I’m jazzed to report that my first PPC Rockstars broadcast/podcast “airs” on WebmasterRadio.fm this coming Monday, May 12, at 4:00 PM EDT, 1 PM PDT, 21:00 GMT.

The show will be broadcast live (or sometimes “taped”) every Monday thereafter, at the same time. My first guest is one of PPC’s brightest stars, Matt Van Wagner of FindMeFaster.

In each week’s show I’ll feature a current or future PPC Rock Star, and have a discussion about one particular aspect of PPC advertising. The goal will be to provide listeners with meaty tips and advice that they can use immediately to improve their PPC campaigns. Topics like conversion optimization, shopping process optimization, etc. are fair game.

Listeners are guaranteed to learn insider PPC advertising tips and secrets that will make (or save) them big chunks of money - or I’ll cheerfully refund the price of admission.

And I’ll sweeten the pot: listen to the first show (the live version or the podcast - available via Webmaster Radio and from iTunes) , and then send me advice for future shows using this blog’s Contact form, and I’ll send you a free Clix Marketing T-shirt and an opportunity to appear in The Clix Marketing PPC Blog Dry T-shirt Gallery.

Can’t wait till Monday? Listen to the subtle intro here.

<This roundup of Yahoo/Google/Microsoft-related articles was created for callers into a Collins Stewart investor call where I was one of the Industry Experts voicing opinions.>

Susan Decker (Yahoo president) interview:

http://finance.yahoo.com/tech-ticker/article/15050/Decker-Yahoo-Isn’t-Abandoning-Strategy-with-Google-Deal?tickers=yhoo,msft,goog,twx,nws

http://finance.yahoo.com/tech-ticker/article/15033/Decker-We-Never-Got-33-Offer-in-Writing?tickers=yhoo,msft,goog

Yang blog post:

http://ycorpblog.com/2008/05/04/ok-so-now-what/

Yahoo AMP press release:

http://yhoo.client.shareholder.com/press/releasedetail.cfm?ReleaseID=303352

Yahoo AMP demo:

http://advertising.yahoo.com/amp/

Ballmer letter:

http://www.microsoft.com/presspass/press/2008/may08/05-03letter.mspx

Kevin Lee’s analysis of Ballmer’s letter in Clickz:

http://www.clickz.com/showPage.html?page=3629426

Business Week on Microsoft’s ad straategy:

http://www.businessweek.com/magazine/content/08_20/b4084036492860.htm

Business Times:

http://www.biztimes.com/blogs/milwaukee-biz-blog/2008/5/8/internet-monopoly-would-be-bad-for-business

Silicon Valley Insider:

http://www.alleyinsider.com/2008/5/_1_billion_of_cash_flow_for_yahoo_google_search_deal_keep_dreaming

NYT:

http://bits.blogs.nytimes.com/2008/05/05/how-googles-checkbook-stymied-microsoft/index.html

Frank Watson’s take on Microsoft’s decision:

http://searchenginewatch.com/showPage.html?page=sew_experts/sem_crossfire

Today’s installment of my SEW Experts column shows you how.

Marty Weintraub started a provocative thread this morning with this blog post that has me and Danny Sullivan weighing in on whether PPC Contextual Advertising “deserves” to be covered by Search industry conferences.

According to this article in MediaPost, Yahoo may begin serving Google AdWords ads on a broader scale than their joint recent test - which could result in Yahoo eventually earning up to $1 billion per year. Besides being a good move for Yahoo and us AdWords advertisers, it’s possible the increased revenue projections will have an impact on the increasingly juicy-to-watch takeover battle Microsoft is mounting - rumored to “go hostile” today.

It’ll be interesting to see what this Google-Yahoo news/rumor will do to Yahoo’s stock price - and Microsoft’s bid…

Update: Microsoft has walked away from the Yahoo deal. But is this just a tactic that positions Microsoft to swoop back in when Yahoo’s stock price drops? Also, Yahoo’s move toward Google may have been the straw that broke the Ballmer’s back.

Microsoft released a nice number of new adCenter features today - see the summary in this PDF document.

The good news: the features represent some much-needed improvements, especially in reporting capabilities. But they really just bring overall functionality closer to the 2006 version of Google AdWords - and still a distant third behind Google and Yahoo, not just in traffic but in user interface.

It’s sort of surprising that software giant Microsoft still hasn’t released a competitive ad platform, having started development in 2005. Yahoo’s been adding spiffy features at a faster pace - check out their campaign optimization and ad generator tools, for example.

But as I’ve said before: never underestimate Microsoft. Version 3.x is usually the killer app.

Last Friday we started “taping” for my new weekly Webmasterradio.fm show, PPC Rockstars, which will be “broadcast” live every Monday from 4:00-4:30 PM EST (that’s GMT-5). I was very fortunate to have PPC icon Matt Van Wagner as my first guest, who dished up some golden nuggets about Dynamic Keyword Insertion (DKI). That show will be broadcast/podcast, and made available via iTunes and other channels, within the next few weeks.

In each show I’ll feature a guest and have a discussion about one particular aspect of PPC advertising. The goal will be to provide listeners with meaty tips and advice that they can use immediately to improve their PPC campaigns. Topics like conversion optimization, shopping process optimization, etc. are fair game.

There may be some interactivity involved – e.g. listeners may be able to call in to ask questions and/or give us urls to their landing pages for critique. In any event there is a page on this blog thatwill contain resources that my guests can refer to during the show – e.g. links to example pages, or embedded PowerPoint slides.

So, to all you PPC Rock Stars out there: First, apologies if you have not yet received a personal guest invitation from me. I may not have your email address, or I may have just screwed up. In any event, I’d really appreciate it if you would consider being one of my first guests. Our segment might be “taped” in advance or done live, and would take about an hour. You could participate from anywhere you have a good phone connection or a Skype phone. While the segments won’t be a sales pitch for your company, we will give out as much contact information as you’d like during the show, and also include links to your site on the PPC Rockstars page. Please contact me via the Contact Us page, and include a few suggested topics you might cover. Thanks!

If you liked my previous SEW Experts Content Advertising column on using software tools to create great Google AdWords keyword-targeted campaigns, you’ll love today’s installment describing a tool that will help you find sites that are perfect targets for your placement-targeted campaigns.

If you’re interested in the Google ad fraud class action suit, you might like my SEW blog post and my followup Search Day article. The PDF of the actual filed complaint is here.

Certain types of advice go without saying; eat your vegetables, listen to your mother, look both ways before crossing the street. In his new book Landing Page Optimization, Tim Ash reminds us of fundamental landing page design concepts that seem simple. But we all (at least occasionally) fall into the trap of forgetting them