How to Make Money Online | Affiliate Marketing Tutorial

Online Video Views are Not “Lost” on ABC.com

SEO Master — Mon, 08 Feb 2010 22:32:19 +0000

Last Tuesday, the season premiere of the hit television show "Lost" aired, and not only was it watched by over 12 million people, but it drove record online viewing at ABC.com the next day, with over 580,000 episode starts on the site. That's over 34% more than last season's premiere. ABC shared some details with us.

When asked why they think this particular episode of Lost had such an impact on online views compared with other episodes and other shows, a representative for ABC told WebProNews, "Lost has been a top performer in terms of online viewing since we began making episodes available online several years ago. Fans of the show tend to be very tech-savvy and also tend to watch episodes more than once. They also frequently go online to review specific scenes."

On Tuesday, leading up to the airing of the show, ABC.com saw over 1.8 million unique visitors and delivered over 7.4 million page views, a 5% and 43% increase, respectively over the previous year’s premiere date, based on data from Omniture. Visitors to ABC.com logged more than 2.2 million video views of "Lost"-related short-form content on Tuesday, an increase of over 32% compared to last season.

ABC gives viewers more than just the videos though. This season, ABC.com offers interactive, community-driven features including user-created Top 5 lists which allow fans to arrange, rank and share their personalized lists of show-related favorites; and Episode Commentary where fans can access commentaries created by series' insiders, and create and share their own for each episode.

The site will also soon unveil a Fan Art Wall, an interactive area for fans to upload, view and rate "Lost"-themed art created by fellow fans, and also give fans the opportunity to participate in a promo contest, providing users a "mash-up" tool to create and share their own "Lost" promos with a winning promo to be featured on-air.

There has been some talk about just how well TV shows will perform online in the future as Nielsen makes data available about the viewing of commercials that run in particular shows, whether they are viewed on TV or online. This could lead to online TV shows getting more ad-heavy.

"ABC.com's full episode player features interactive video advertising," ABC tell us. "Lost episodes currently feature a single national sponsor. They have 4 30-second spots which can't be skipped; additionally the local ABC affiliates sell one local spot per episode."

We won't be able to compare Lost episodes from this season with episodes after the Nielsen stuff goes down, because this is the final season of the show, but it is going to be quite interesting to see how advertising on popular shows changes, if it does in fact do so.

Spanish Telecom May Seek To Charge Search Engines

SEO Master — Mon, 08 Feb 2010 22:25:05 +0000

The CEO of Spanish telecom company Telefonica might soon try to obtain some money from Google and its rivals. Cesar Alierta said today that search engines' popularity creates something of a burden for his organization, and that he'd like Telefonica to share in their profits.

As reported by John W. Daly, Alierta told Spanish newspaper El Pais, "Search engines use our network, without paying anything for it." Installation, maintenance, and customer service costs are among the things for which he'd like to be compensated.

Considering that Google, Yahoo, and Microsoft are sure to ignore (or perhaps laugh off) this idea, it's necessary to consider where Alierta will go from here. Lawsuits always seem to represent an option, of course, or Telefonica could try to employ some traffic shaping techniques (which might well outrage consumers and cause the search engines to file their own suits).

Or - we're not trying to sensationalize anything - the whole issue could get dropped if Alierta finds that his proposal doesn't have any traction. Daly wrote, "El Pais reports Alierta is the first CEO of a carrier to openly declare he wants to send bills to content providers."

So far, neither side's hinted at making another move.

Have You Read This?

> Cambodia Lambastes Google Over Border Portrayal

> Justice Department Objects To Google Books Settlement

> How Many Spiders Does Google Have?

TuneWiki Lands Investment From Motorola

SEO Master — Mon, 08 Feb 2010 22:14:00 +0000

Social media music player TuneWiki has received an undisclosed amount of funding from Motorola Ventures, the strategic investment arm of Motorola.

Other new investors of TuneWiki include Intellect Capital Ventures, a venture fund initiative of TeliaSonera, HillsVen Capital, and Novel TMT. TuneWiki's previous venture capital investor, Benchmark Israel, also participated in the round.

"Teaming up with a global company like Motorola is very exciting for us," said Rani Cohen, CEO of TuneWiki.

"We are passionate about connecting people through music, and having our applications running in many countries with different languages will allow our users to explore the world of music and better understand its meaning as part of a vibrant and engaged community."

TuneWiki said it will use the investment to expand and improve its product offerings fro mobile platforms and the Internet. The company says it plans to focus on new features found in recently released smartphones, including stronger CPUs, larger displays and high-resolution screens. TuneWiki said it will also continue to focus on the use of song lyrics in new ways that connect music fans with new products, including an upcoming mobile game.

"Music is rapidly emerging as a key feature for smartphones, and TuneWiki is changing the experience of listening to music from a solitary experience to a social one," said Reese Schroeder, managing director of Motorola Ventures.

Have You Read This?

> Motorola Offers Baidu Search To China Mobile Users

> Motorola Slates 20-30 Android Phones For 2010 Release

> More Than Half Of Holiday Shoppers Relied On Cell Phones

TuneWiki Lands Investment From Motorola

SEO Master — Mon, 08 Feb 2010 22:14:00 +0000

Have You Read This?

> Motorola Offers Baidu Search To China Mobile Users

> Motorola Slates 20-30 Android Phones For 2010 Release

> More Than Half Of Holiday Shoppers Relied On Cell Phones

Reasons to Have a Facebook Page and Ways to Make it Better

SEO Master — Mon, 08 Feb 2010 22:06:40 +0000

I don't have to tell you that Facebook can be a tremendous source of web traffic. There's a good chance that most of the people you know are on it, and the ones who aren't may be eventually. The social network is consuming more and more of people's time, and thanks to mobile devices, it is always accessible. If you don't have a Facebook Page, you may be missing out on not only traffic to your site, but a chance to engage with customers and ultimately help your brand's reputation.

One of our blog partners, Jay Baer, of Convince&Convert wrote a great piece about why you need Facebook for your company. He highlights "11 things you need to know." These things include how Facebook has 350 Million global users and counting (100 million in the U.S.), and how the average Facebook user spends 55 minutes per day on Facebook. Nearly 80,000 sites use Facebook Connect.

Editor’s note: If you have a blog related to online business, search, or social media, and are interested in becoming one of our blog partners, you may submit here.

He also notes that the Facebook Fan Box is becoming more pervasive, the average Facebook user has 130 friends and fans 2 pages per month. His statements are backed up by various reports and studies.

Perhaps you have a Facebook Page, but it's not performing how you'd like. You feel it's a waste of time. "If your Facebook fan page is a bit of a ghost town, you're not alone. A fantastic study by Sysomos of 600,000 Facebook fan pages shows that only 4% of pages have 10,000 or more fans – and only .76% have 100,000 or more," says Baer. "That’s why it is so critical to focus your Facebook strategy on activating the fans you have, not just collecting fans like baseball cards."

"The Sysomos study also found very little correlation between how frequently the Facebook page admin posted to the wall, and total number of fans. However – and this is important – there is a strong correlation between amount of other content (notes, links, photos, videos) and number of fans," he says. "Thus, if you want to grow your Facebook fan base, it is imperative that you move beyond simple Wall posts and add photos, videos, links and other content."

Another one of our blog Partners, Dave Taylor, offers some tips from Patrick O'Keefe, author of the book Managing Online Forums, on making a Facebook page more interesting. Among these are:

- Participate and make it routine
- Ask questions
- Host events on your page
- Highlight contributions from others
- Go beyond just text
- Integrate your other online presences
- Take it easy with apps, boxes, etc.
- Run offline events, if you can

One thing you want to do is pay attention to your Facebook analytics. Pay attention to stats. Pay attention to changes Facebook makes in this area. For example, recently it was discovered that some admins were starting to see impression counts for each post, as well as the number of likes and comments for each impression. Like Baer says, test content types to see what works best.

Does your Facebook Page drive traffic to your site? Does it engage customers? Discuss your strategy.

Have You Read This?

> Content Can Now Go Viral More Easily With Facebook

> Pingdom Names Facebook "Most Engaging Social Network"

> Facebook Can Drive More Traffic Than Google

Facebook Version Of “Madden” Game In The Works

SEO Master — Mon, 08 Feb 2010 21:08:45 +0000

The most popular video game franchise of all time is heading to Facebook. The end result probably won't boast the lifelike graphics and complicated controls to which longtime fans have become accustomed, but Peter Moore, the president of EA Sports, has promised that some sort of "Madden NFL" tie-in will occur.

"You'll see us on Facebook going forward," he said in an interview with Bloomberg. Unfortunately without giving too many more particulars.

Still, it's possible to speculate about a couple of details. Moore said, "We have to make 'Madden' more accessible," so the final product will probably be less of a faithful reproduction of the Xbox and PS3 versions than an appeal to people who like Facebook's mafia- and zombie-related games.

Also, since this move presumably comes as a result of EA's acquisition of Playfish, it might even be safe to guess that the Facebook version of Madden will bear some resemblance to Playfish's games (which include Pet Society and Restaurant City) in terms of look and feel.

One last prediction: since about 63 million copies of Madden games have been sold over the years (according to NPD Group, which Bloomberg contacted), whatever debuts on Facebook is almost sure to get a big following.

Have You Read This?

> Super Bowl Viewers Spend Game Time On The Web

> More Than Just A Redesign Going On With Facebook This Week

> Will Publishers Let Facebook Become The Web's Biggest News Source?

Facebook Version Of “Madden” Game In The Works

SEO Master — Mon, 08 Feb 2010 21:08:45 +0000

Have You Read This?

> Super Bowl Viewers Spend Game Time On The Web

> More Than Just A Redesign Going On With Facebook This Week

> Will Publishers Let Facebook Become The Web's Biggest News Source?

Is Google Launching a Competitor for Facebook/Twitter?

SEO Master — Mon, 08 Feb 2010 20:39:45 +0000

Google is rumored to be working on a Facebook/Twitter-like feature for Gmail. According to the Wall Street Journal, who cites "people familiar with the matter", the feature, which would "make it easier and faster" to share status updates may launch as soon as this week.

As I've written about a number of times, Google is really one big social network with a bunch of features, and integration is the key to harnessing that social power. A product like this could be just the ticket, because according to these same sources, it would integrate content shared through YouTube and Picasa. Who knows what else could be worked in?

Gmail currently has status updates of a sort. In the chat section, it has a menu of your contacts who also use Google, and shows their current status of they have one set. You can set one easily at any time.

Google has not yet responded to requests for comments, but if we learn more, we will keep you updated.

If Gmail offers its own Facebook/Twitter-style timeline, would you use it? Should Facebook and Twitter be worried? Share your thoughts.

Have You Read This?

> Google Luring More Account Users with New News Feature?

> Is Google Bad at Social Media or Really, Really Good at it?

> Is Gmail Google's Real Social Network?

Is Google Launching a Competitor for Facebook/Twitter?

SEO Master — Mon, 08 Feb 2010 20:39:45 +0000

Have You Read This?

> Google Luring More Account Users with New News Feature?

> Is Google Bad at Social Media or Really, Really Good at it?

> Is Gmail Google's Real Social Network?

Android’s Market Share Growing By Leaps And Bounds

SEO Master — Mon, 08 Feb 2010 20:14:26 +0000

In many ways, the last traces of the 2009 holiday season have disappeared - you won't find many decorations up, presents out, or leftovers refrigerated (we hope). comScore's just released a report concerning the mobile market, though, and the stats are well worth examining.

comScore's report covers the changes that occurred between September and December of last year. During that time, RIM stayed on top in terms of smartphone platforms, but it lost a little bit of ground. Apple, meanwhile, gained a similar amount, and so the gap between the two was effectively narrowed by a couple of percentage points.

Sadly (for them), Microsoft and Palm also wound up losers. Then - and this is arguably the most interesting part - Google made quite a leap.

Looked at one way, Google's improvement of 2.7 percentage points is the biggest change comScore recorded during the September-to-December timeframe. Which is impressive enough. Yet looked at another, Google more than doubled its market share over the course of three months.

That's quite a growth rate for Android. If it keeps up the pace for another three months, it'll pass Palm by. And from there, it could be just a year or so away from catching up with Microsoft.

These statistics will definitely bear watching in the months ahead, even if they're a little slow to be published.

Have You Read This?

> Global Mobile Broadband Traffic Up 72%

> Motorola Making Another Direct-From-Google Phone

> Google Voice Makes Way To iPhone, Palm WebOS

2010: The Year of the Display Ad for Google?

SEO Master — Mon, 08 Feb 2010 19:56:04 +0000

This could be the year of the display ad. That's not to say that display ads aren't prevalent every year, but Google has only been involved with that for a little while, and if analysts' projections are accurate, this will be the year that Google's display ad business tops $1 billion in sales.

Last summer, Google CEO Eric Schmidt suggested that display ads would be Google's next big billion-dollar business. According to BusinessWeek, a Barclays Capital analyst says display ads will account for about 4% of Google's total sales in 2010. This would be a 40% increase from their contribution in 2009. BW's Douglas MacMillan reports:

Sales of video and banner ads on YouTube, the world's most popular video site, are expected by analysts at Barclays to contribute the bulk of Google's display revenue this year, about $700 million. And with DoubleClick, Google acquired a technology that handles the placement of display ads on sites across the Web. "Display is now a key business for us," says Susan Wojcicki, Google's vice-president of product management and one of the company's earliest employees.

Neal Mohan, the executive in charge of Google's display business, says Google will draw on its strength in search-related advertising to expand in display. It became the leader in search by using algorithms to help it know which ads to place where. "Our goal is to bring the science of search to the art of display," Mohan says.

Advertisers will probably not be shy about getting on board with that. "Research has shown that exposure to both search and display ads from the same advertiser results in a 22 percent increase for conversion rates over search alone," Rich Kahn, CEO of display ad provider eZanga told WebProNews last year.

Back in November, Google announced its acquisition of Teracent, a provider of "intelligent dynamic display advertising". It provides machine-learning algorithms, which can create customized display ads based on thousands of different creative elements.

Google says the one on the right was created with Teracent's technology.

"Teracent's technology can pick and choose from literally thousands of creative elements of a display ad in real-time — tweaking images, products, messages or colors," Google said. "These elements can be optimized depending on factors like geographic location, language, the content of the website, the time of day or the past performance of different ads."

Before that announcement, Google launched a tool to measure the impact of display ad campaigns across the Google Content Network called Campaign Insights, which Google says can give reliable data about how a campaign has raised brand awareness or active user interest in a particular product or service. Google has also repeatedly added new templates for advertisers to use when constructing their creative.

Have You Read This?

> Does Size Matter in Display Advertising?

> Google Launches New Display Ad Measurement Tool

> Google Launches New Templates for Display Ads

Super Bowl Ad Tweets Determine Brand Effectiveness

SEO Master — Mon, 08 Feb 2010 18:31:46 +0000

As WebProNews reported, Mullen and Radian6 partnered to launch BrandBowl2010, a Twitter/Super Bowl event that allowed users to see near real-time ratings of the Super Bowls commercials. The two companies have now released the results.

They determined that Doritos was the most effective brand to advertise during the Super Bowl, and that Budweiser Select55 was the least effective. The results were determined from 98,656 Tweets collected. The results from BrandBowl2010 were as follows:

The Top Ten Most Effective Brands on BrandBowl2010

1. Doritos
2. Google
3. Focus On Family
4. Snickers
5. Budweiser
6. Bud Light
7. Hyundai
8. Kia
9. GoDaddy
10. Coca-Cola

The Five Least Effective Brands on BrandBowl2010

1. Diamond Foods’ – Pop Secret
2. Honda
3. Teleflora
4. Michelob Ultra
5. Budweiser Select55

The top brands were judged on volume of tweets, and after the top three, the firms say there was a sharp drop-off. "Doritos won the title by virtue of dominating the sheer volume of tweets," the firms say. "That was enough to keep them ahead of Google, which had a higher percentage of positive tweets."

The BrandBowl site provided an overall ranking of the brands advertising on the game based on a composite score that takes into consideration both volume of tweets and sentiment (positive or negative).

Have You Read This?

> [WATCH] Super Bowl 2010 Commercials

> Google Runs First Super Bowl Commercial

> View Twitter Reaction Of Super Bowl Ads

Super Bowl Ad Tweets Determine Brand Effectiveness

SEO Master — Mon, 08 Feb 2010 18:31:46 +0000

Have You Read This?

> [WATCH] Super Bowl 2010 Commercials

> Google Runs First Super Bowl Commercial

> View Twitter Reaction Of Super Bowl Ads

Global Mobile Broadband Traffic Up 72%

SEO Master — Mon, 08 Feb 2010 17:23:59 +0000

Worldwide mobile data bandwidth usage increased by 72 percent in the second half of 2009, according to a new report by Allot Communications.

Applications such as YouTube and Skype are driving this continued momentum in mobile broadband growth. APAC leads the growth with 86%; EMEA posted 70% growth and the Americas 59%.

The report found video to be the single most influential factor driving the need for increased mobile network capacity. P2P remains the biggest cause of cell congestion in the top five percent of cells, mobile broadband networks are still facing the same issues as fix networks-- growing bandwidth demands, congestion, as well as finding ways to improve the user experience and to lessen the negative impact of a few subscribers on the network.

Highlights from the report include:

HTTP streaming continues to be the fastest growing application with a 99% increase; its global mobile broadband share grew by 50% between Q2 and Q4, 2009.
YouTube accounted for 10% of global bandwidth during Q3 and Q4, 2009.
FaceBook experienced tremendous growth of 180% during the second half of 2009.
Skype is the undisputed VoIP traffic market leader, accounting for 77% of the global VoIP bandwidth; VoIP and IM applications have increased significantly by almost 47%.
HTTP downloads grew by 73%, and have become a feasible alternative for massive file sharing.
P2P is the single largest factor leading to cell congestion which accounts for 34% of bandwidth utilization in the top 5% of cells.

Have You Read This?

> Best Buy Now Installing Google Mobile Apps On Smartphones

> Google Launches Analytics for Mobile Apps

> Usage of Mobile Web and Apps Doubles in 2 Years

Google May Invest In Chinese Media/Ad Firm

SEO Master — Mon, 08 Feb 2010 17:04:19 +0000

A little less than a month ago, Google announced that it might shut down Google.cn and its offices in China. The search giant may not be giving up on the country entirely, however, as a new report has indicated that it's part of a group attempting to invest in a large Chinese media and advertising company.

According to George Chen and Melanie Lee, Disney is leading a consortium that includes Google, and said consortium would like to buy a 30 or 40 percent stake in Bus Media for about $100 million. Negotiations are supposed to be in progress right now.

Such an investment could be a smart move, considering that notable entities like CCB International, China Renaissance Capital Investment, IDG, and the Yangtze Fund have all put some money behind Bus Media.

Bus Media apparently enjoys the support of China's government, too, as it's "the exclusive partner of state broadcaster CCTV and the official Xinhua news agency for in-bus media content and advertising."

But that brings us back to the touchy issue of Google, China, and censorship. Whether Google's changing its attitude or has found some solution that complements its moral stand remains to be seen.

Have You Read This?

> Google Partners With NSA On Cyber Attack Analysis

> China Won't Stand In The Way Of Google's Android Business

> Bill Gates Sides With Ballmer, MSFT On China

[WATCH] Super Bowl 2010 Commercials

SEO Master — Mon, 08 Feb 2010 16:05:08 +0000

Super Bowl XLIV had numerous memorable moments: the onside kick, the missed field goal, the Garçon drop, and the truly horrendous half-time show to name a few. But, for many viewers Super Bowl commercials leave the same lasting impact as the game itself, as they should with a price tag of $3.01 million per 30 seconds.

This year we saw a plethora of the same companies advertising: Budwesier, Bud Light, Coke, Go Daddy, Doritos, Monster.com, Snickers… etc. Last night we wrote about a newcomer to the Super Bowl advertising scene, Google. One company that normally would’ve been in that list, Pepsi, decided to forgo a Super Bowl commercial this year and focus their advertising budget on Social Media.

In case you missed any of the commercials, you can view them below. Be sure to leave a comment telling us which one was your favorite. (Please note: I've omitted movie trailers and TV show commercials)

Monster.com Fiddling Beaver Ad

Google: Parisian Love Ad

Late Show Ad (featuring Letterman, Oprah and Leno)

FLO TV: My Generation Ad

VIZIO Ad (featuring Beyonce)

Emerald Nuts "Awesomer" Ad

Motorola Ad (featuring Megan Fox)

GoDaddy Ad (featuring Danica Patrick)

GoDaddy "News" Ad

Boost Mobile Ad

Cars.com Timothy Richman Ad

VW "PunchDub" Ad

Intel "Lunch Room" Ad

Coca-Cola Simpsons Ad

Skechers Shape-ups Ad

Doritos "House Rules" Ad

Doritos "Casket" Ad

Doritos "Anti-Bark Collar"

Doritos "Tim's Locker" Ad

Michelob Ultra "Little Bumps" Ad

Snickers "Betty White" Ad

Hyundai Sonata Ad

Hyundai Sonata "Brett Favre" Ad

Budweiser "Clydesdale Fence" Ad

Budweiser "Human Bridge" Ad

Budweiser "Select 55 Ice Bottle" Ad

Bud Light "Asteroid" Ad

Bud Light "House" Ad

Bud Light "Lost Parody" Ad

Denny's "Chicken Birthday" Ad

Denny's "Chicken Warning" Ad

Homeaway (featuring the Griswalds)

Dr. Pepper Cherry "Little Kiss" Ad

So which Super Bowl commercial was your favorite? Talk to ArisYulianta and Friends....

[WATCH] Super Bowl 2010 Commercials

SEO Master — Mon, 08 Feb 2010 16:05:08 +0000

So which Super Bowl commercial was your favorite? Talk to ArisYulianta and Friends....

eBay Launches Series of Seller Events

SEO Master — Mon, 08 Feb 2010 15:19:25 +0000

eBay is starting a new series of events to help small businesses and part-time eBay sellers "accelerate their businesses" on eBay, which has 90 million active users. The series is called eBay: On Location, and has dates set for Atlanta, Dallas, Chicago, and San Jose.

"eBay sellers are creative entrepreneurs who understand that eBay’s global reach and dynamic marketplace offer the ideal setting to start and build a business online," says eBay Marketplaces President Lorrie Norrington. "We invite our sellers to eBay: On Location to connect with each other and to take the next step in making their eBay businesses even more successful."

The goal of the series of events appears to be to let sellers network with one another and share ideas for maintaining a successful eBay business. There are also courses on "top seller secrets", productivity to boost sales and reduce costs, and utilizing social media to drive sales.

"eBay sellers have become savvier about how to use eBay in ingenious ways," says Jim Griffith, eBay senior manager, Seller Strategy and Dean of Education. "eBay: On Location is a great way for the seller community to come together and share those strategies—and learn something new from experts."

They are only letting in 500 people per event, and registration is offered on a first-come, first-served basis. It costs $45 to get in.

Have You Read This?

> eBay to Make Changes to Seller Fees

> eBay Fined $2.6 Million Over LVMH Sales

> eBay Previews Possible Geotargeting Feature For Sellers

Google Sets Target For Real-Time Translator Phones

SEO Master — Mon, 08 Feb 2010 14:55:54 +0000

If you think about it, it'd be slightly inaccurate to say that phones let people all over the world communicate with each other; current tech just transmits sounds, not their significance. But Google's looking to knock down language barriers with devices that will perform translations on the fly.

This isn't some poorly sourced rumor or random conspiracy theory. Chris Gourlay interviewed Franz Och, Google's head of translation services, and Och said, "We think speech-to-speech translation should be possible and work reasonably well in a few years' time."

Incredible as that might seem, the building blocks are already in place. Android allows users to perform searches by just saying terms out loud. Google Translate deals in 52 languages at the moment. Google only needs to integrate everything in order to be in business. Maybe.

The sentence "I am going to eat lunch at 12:30" becomes "I'm going to lunch at 12:30" after Google Translate takes it from English to Spanish and back. That's enough of a difference to create confusion (suppose someone's trying to distinguish between stuffing his face and stepping out to run errands), and it's not like Spanish is a rare dialect or the original phrase represents a curveball.

Toss in imperfect speech recognition, and it's hard to imagine anyone trying to conduct important business or even chat for fun.

Nonetheless, it should be very interesting to see how this project works out for Google.

Have You Read This?

> Google Analytics, Chromium Receive Language Upgrades

> Google Announces Unicode Progress

> Google Launches New Transliteration Tool

Barnes & Noble Nook Now In Stock Online

SEO Master — Mon, 08 Feb 2010 14:49:03 +0000

Barnes & Noble said today its nook e-reader is now in stock online and will be rolling out in the majority of its stores by mid-week.

Barnes & Noble sold out of nook stock online over the holidays due to high demand, which exceeded the bookseller's expectations. Since then the company has ramped up production and is shipping stock to most of its stores this week. Customers can visit the Barnes & Noble nook In-Store Locator to find local stores with the device in-stock.

"nook is the perfect Valentine's Day gift for anyone who loves reading. Demand for nook continues to be very high, and we're pleased our customers will be able to try and buy nook in our stores and online and enjoy it in time for the holiday," said William J. Lynch, President of Barnes & Noble.com.

"In Barnes & Noble stores, nook owners will enjoy exciting nook-only content from their favorite authors and other valuable offers, along with fast and free in-store Wi-Fi, which nook customers have been accessing in droves over the last few weeks."

Have You Read This?

>Barnes & Noble Says No Nook For Holidays

> Consumer Interest In E-Readers Mixed

> Sony Can't Guarantee E-Reader Holiday Shipments

Online TV Shows May Get More Ad-Heavy

SEO Master — Mon, 08 Feb 2010 14:18:43 +0000

For the most part, online video has been much less ad-heavy than television programming. It is this very fact that has likely been a large part of the medium's popularity. Things may be changing, however.

According to Advertising Age, Nielsen is planning on making data available about the viewing of commercials that run in particular shows , whether they are viewed on TV or online. The data would start being available in September, and the publication says it will become the basis for ad negotiations next February.

"But here's the catch: For Nielsen to be able to provide the commercial rating, shows seen online will have to have the same group of commercials that run on TV," says AdAge's Brian Steinberg. "If this system were adopted en masse -- and it's not clear that it would be -- online viewing might be crammed just as full of commercials as the more traditional TV-watching experience."

"Indeed, viewing programs on Hulu, the online video site owned by NBC Universal, News Corp. and Walt Disney, means encountering significantly fewer ads than one would see watching TV. And Disney's ABC.com has met with some success by running ABC shows with just a few ads, often from a single advertiser," he adds. "But many TV executives say these methods don't bring much, if any, profit -- and therefore cannot continue."

Online video has enjoyed tremendous growth over the last several years. In December, 178 million Americans watched 33 billion videos online, according to data from comScore. About 40% of that was at Google sites (like YouTube). The second largest amount of market share went to Hulu, at just 3%.

YouTube isn't necessarily the place people go to watch full episodes of television shows. Hulu is. If videos at sites like Hulu become more ad-heavy, the market share gap could just increase even greater. It could also have an impact on both paid TV show downloads and piracy.

Have You Read This?

> Google To Get More Interactive With Mobile Video Ads

> IAB Releases Ad Unit Guidelines Updates

> YouTube Videos In Adsense Could Drive Clicks

Google Runs First Super Bowl Commercial

SEO Master — Mon, 08 Feb 2010 02:10:00 +0000

With millions watching, Google ran their first Super Bowl Commercial entitled "Parisian Love". If it looks familiar, that's because it's one of their "Search Stories" ads which was uploaded to YouTube back in November. You can check it out below...

What did you think of the commercial? Talk to ArisYulianta and Friends....

Did you think you'd ever see a Google Super Bowl Commercial? Talk to ArisYulianta and Friends....

Google CEO, Eric Schmidt, tweeted yesterday..."Can't wait to watch the Superbowl tomorrow. Be sure to watch the ads in the 3rd quarter (someone said "Hell has indeed frozen over.")"

Well, it appears as though Hell has frozen over.

View Twitter Reaction Of Super Bowl Ads

SEO Master — Sun, 07 Feb 2010 20:00:00 +0000

Mullen and Radian6 have partnered to launch BrandBowl2010, a Twitter/Super Bowl event that combines tweeting, ad reviews and a number of rankings that will allow users to see near real-time ratings of the TV commercials airing during the game.

Users can log on to BrandBowl2010 using their Twitter ID, tweet directly from the page, view tweets using the hashtag #brandbowl and see how other Twitter users are rating Super Bowl commercials.

The site will provide an overall ranking of the brands advertising on the game based on a composite score that includes both volume of tweets and positive or negative feedback. The Top 10 most popular brands will be featured on the site, with second tier brands displayed in a sub-section called the Locker Room.

"The ads have always been as big a part of the game as the game itself," said Edward Boches, Mullen's chief social media officer.

"And with the emergence of social media and platforms like Twitter, everyone wants to talk about them the moment they run. This should be a lot of fun for anyone who loves ads, Twitter and data."

Have You Read This?

> Go Daddy Back In The News For Super Bowl Ads

> Pepsi To Skip Super Bowl For Social Media

> Vote For Your Favorite Super Bowl Ads Online

Google Suggests Competitors for Local Business Searches

SEO Master — Sun, 07 Feb 2010 13:19:20 +0000

Google is offering suggestions for "nearby places you might like" on Google Maps when you look up a place that you do like. So if you like a particular bakery, you might be presented with other places within the same vicinity that Google thinks you might also be interested in trying.

"When you live in New York City, everyone has an opinion on where to eat," says Tammy Stern of the Google Maps team. "And usually, telling someone a place you love will lead to a long conversation of a string of other places you should try. For example, one of the more interesting restaurants I've eaten at in NYC was recommended to me by someone who knew I loved a different restaurant by the same owner. And, when I told a friend I was heading to the Lower East Side to get some yummy knishes for lunch, he told me to make sure I checked out the famous Guss' Pickles right around the corner and that I might consider picking up some smoked fish at Russ & Daughters down the street."

"You'll notice that we do not limit these suggestions to places sharing any specific characteristic; instead, we use a broad set of signals to come up with what are hopefully the most interesting suggestions," says Stern. "We're still working on refining these signals, so bear with us if your serendipitous discovery of a new place is even more unexpected than you'd anticipated."

This feature could have both positive and negative effects on local businesses. On the one hand, it could give established customers ideas to go to your competitors. On the other hand, you could be the competitor and benefit from that.

The suggestions are just the latest feature in a recent slew of local business-related features from Google. The company is clearly focusing a great deal on this aspect of search.

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Super Bowl Viewers Spend Game Time on the Web

SEO Master — Sun, 07 Feb 2010 13:00:40 +0000

Last year, 12% of Super Bowl viewers used the Internet while watching the game according to data from Nielsen. Those that used the web spent an average of 24 minutes online during the game. It would not be at all surprising if those numbers increased significnatly this year.

"Nielsen found that simultaneous users were most engaged in general interest, e-mail, and online social networks," the firm says. "Sports sites, which might be more directly associated with the game itself, were visited by 18% of simultaneous users."

According to Nielsen, about a quarter of simultaneous users spent time during the game using Facebook at an average of 15 minutes. Google and Yahoo Mail also received significant use during game time.

The game takes place this evening of course. Will you be watching? Will you be watching and using the web? How do yo plan on using the web during the Super Bowl?

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> GoDaddy Back in the News for Super Bowl Ads

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Super Bowl Viewers Spend Game Time on the Web

SEO Master — Sun, 07 Feb 2010 13:00:40 +0000

The game takes place this evening of course. Will you be watching? Will you be watching and using the web? How do yo plan on using the web during the Super Bowl?

Have You Read This?

> GoDaddy Back in the News for Super Bowl Ads

> Vote For Your Favorite Super Bowl Ads Online

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Is Google Bad at Social Media or Really, Really Good at it?

SEO Master — Sun, 07 Feb 2010 12:31:37 +0000

Google often takes a lot of flack for not being incredibly successful with its social media efforts. Most recently, Caroline McCarthy and Tom Krazit tackled this subject in a CNET article claiming that "Google struggles with social skills." I would not go so far as to say that I completely disagree with them. They make plenty of factual points that are simply undeniable. Orkut hasn't set the world afire. Jaiku and Dodgeball didn't work out. YouTube was pretty much established by the time Google bought it, and even since it has not been the financial success many would have assumes it would be, despite its enormous popularity.

Is it that Google doesn't do well with social media or is it that Google is doing better at it than most people even consider. First, you have to ask yourself: what is a social network anyway? What is social media? Is it Facebook? MySpace? Twitter? Is it a network of connected people? Google Profile users can look at their "social circles" and quickly realize that Google has them connected to people.

If you look at the definitions for social media, you get things like "content created by people using highly accessible and scalable publishing technologies," "a category of sites that is based on user participation and user-generated content." I think Google has done pretty well at indexing and monetizing user-generated content (that is if user means user of Google, which essentially makes the majority of all content user-generated).

When you compare Google to Facebook, wouldn't it be fairer to break down Google by its various offerings? Wouldn't it be fairer to compare Google itself to Facebook? You can say, well, Google Friend Connect isn't as successful as Facebook. Jaiku wasn't as successful as Facebook. Wouldn't it make more sense to chalk each of these offerings within Google as features of the broader Google network, for all intents and pruposes?

Most of Google's products require one account. You log in to your Google account and there are a lot of different things you are able to do, and it's all because of that one account. You can email people, chat, write documents and spreadsheets, use webmaster tools, etc., etc., etc. Is Google not just a social network with a lot more features than most others (not to mention what many would consider to be a better search tool than most other social networks)?

Is Google's "failure" at social media due to not having a proper Twitter-like stream (which Facebook essentially took and ran with by the way)? Maybe Google doesn't have the best feature in every social media category, but I think they've pretty much taken the cake in some categories, and last I checked, Google is pretty successful.

I write this not as some kind of Google fanboy, but each day, I see Google launching new products and features, finding new things for users to do, and particularly for those who have a Google account. A lot of what you can do with various Google products requires you to be logged in. A lot of it is very social (profiles, social search, real-time search, document sharing, Google reader sharing and commenting, emailing, chatting, Google latitude...just to name a few). Maybe we should consider the sum of all users across all of the company’s products to determine just how successful it is at this so-called “social media”. Google makes money. Crazy money. I wonder how many people have Google accounts.

Note: For the record, I understand that nobody's saying Google itself isn't succesful.

Is Google really not good at social media? I'll ask again, what is social media really? We tend to put these labels on things, but I don't think it's so black and white.

Have You Read This?

> Google Luring More Account Users with New News Feature?

> Integration - The Key to Google as a Social Network

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Cambodia Lambastes Google Over Border Portrayal

SEO Master — Sat, 06 Feb 2010 20:30:00 +0000

The governments of France, Germany, and Italy are all arguably annoyed with Google. China's not thrilled with the search giant, either. And now, because of the way in which Google's portrayed a disputed border, Cambodia's quite mad at it.

According to Reuters, Svay Sitha, the secretary of state of Cambodia's Council of Ministers, wrote a letter to Google complaining about its interpretation of the area where Cambodia and Thailand touch.

"(The map) is devoid of truth and reality, and professionally irresponsible, if not pretentious," Sitha said. "We therefore request that you withdraw the already disseminated, very wrong and not internationally recognised map and replace it.

Google probably won't just swap in Cambodia's favorite map and call it a day, of course; that would upset Thailand. This isn't the first time Google's been caught up in a border dispute, though (China and India have involved it before, and so have India and Pakistan), meaning it's possible to guess how this will play out.

The odds essentially favor Google coming up with three maps. One will be for users in Cambodia, another will be for users in Thailand, and the last will be for everyone else. The first two will show borders favoring their respective countries, while the third will use dotted lines to illustrate the dispute.

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Ways to Get Fresh Links to Old Content for Better Search Rankings

SEO Master — Sat, 06 Feb 2010 10:31:23 +0000

You may have gotten some good links in the past, but don't count on them helping you forever. Old links go stale in the eyes of Google.

Do you still get links to old content? Talk to ArisYulianta and Friends... why you think that is.

Google's Matt Cutts responded to a user-submitted question asking if Google removes PageRank coming from links on pages that no longer exist (for example, GeoCities pages that have been shut down). The answer to this question is unsurprisingly yes, but Cutts makes a statement within his response that may not be so obvious to everybody.

"In order to prevent things from becoming stale, we tend to use the current link graph, rather than a link graph of all of time," he says. (Emphasis added)

Now, this isn't exactly news, and to the seasoned search professional, probably not much of a revelation. However, to the average business owner looking to improve search engine performance (and not necessarily adapting to the ever-changing ways of SEO), it could be something that really hasn't resonated. Businesses have always been told about the power of links, but even if you got a lot of significant links a year or two ago, that doesn't mean your content will continue to perform well based on that. WebProNews has discussed the value of "link velocity" and Google's need for freshness in the past:

Link velocity refers to the speed at which new links to a webpage are formed, and by this term we may gain some new and vital insight. Historically, great bursts of new links to a specific page has been considered a red flag, the quickest way to identify a spammer trying to manipulate the results by creating the appearance of user trust. This led to Google’s famous assaults on link farms and paid link directories.

But the Web has changed, become more of a live Web than a static document Web. We have the advent of social bookmarking, embedded videos, links, buttons, and badges, social networks, real-time networks like Twitter and Friendfeed. Certainly the age of a website is still an indication of success and trustworthiness, but in an environment of live, real time updating, the age of a link as well as the slowing velocity of incoming links may be indicators of stale content in a world that values freshness.

Do you think link freshness should play a role in search engine rankings? Talk to ArisYulianta and Friends....

So how do you keep getting "fresh" links?

If you want fresh links, there are a number of things you can do. For one, keep putting out content. Write content that has staying power. You can link to your old content when appropriate. Always promote the sharing of your content. Include buttons to make it easy for people to share your content on their social network of choice. You may want to make sure your old content is presented in the same template as your new content so it has the same sharing features. People still may find their way to that old content, and they may want to share it if encouraged.

Go back over old content, and look for stuff that is still relevant. You can update stories with new posts adding a fresher take, linking to the original. Encourage readers to follow the link and read the original article, which they may then link to themselves.

Leave commenting on for ongoing discussion. This can keep an old post relevant. Just because you wrote an article a year ago, does not mean that people will still not add to it, and sometimes people will link to articles based on comments that are left.

Share old posts through social networks if they are still about relevant topics. You don't want to just start flooding your Twitter account with tweets to all of your old content, but if you have an older article that is relevant to a current discussion, you may share it, as your take on the subject. A follower who has not seen it before, or perhaps has forgotten about it, may find it worth linking to themselves. Can you think of other ways to get more link value out of old content?

Do you get fresh links for old content? Why do you think that is? Share your thoughts.

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Yahoo Mobile Blog Launches

SEO Master — Fri, 05 Feb 2010 22:25:17 +0000

Yahoo may be doing a lot more in terms of mobile before long. Or at least telling us more about its current cell phone-related efforts. Either way, it launched the Yahoo Mobile Blog this week for the sake of keeping everyone up to date.

Irv Henderson, who's Yahoo's Vice President of Global Mobile Products, wrote the introductory blog post, and explained, "You can expect to learn about new product launches and enhancements, quick tips and tricks, our take on market trends, and predictions for where we see the market is heading."

Henderson also hinted, "So what's to come in 2010? Three developments will play a key role in shaping the mobile industry: Powerful browsers, the OS as a launching pad, and local content."

It should be interesting to see where Yahoo comes into that list. "Local content" seems like the best bet, but at the same time, Henderson's reference to browsers and operating systems makes it more likely that the company has irons in those fires. Execs tend not to admit that they're ignoring two-thirds of a major growth opportunity, after all.

We'll see what happens. Hopefully Yahoo won't wait too long between blog posts.

Have You Read This?

> Firefox Finally Goes Mobile

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