Disruption Tour --- Run To Survive

Microsoft's "Cash Back" Google Search Killer: Great Idea, Won't Work

Microsoft will announce its Hail Mary attempt to stave off a Google search monopoly this morning: It will give some searchers some cash back when they make a purchase after using Redmond's search too. At first blush, the plan sounds as though it will turn the industry on its head, forcing Google to implement a similar plan or go bust. So why won't it?Three reasons: 1)Microsoft will not likely offer enough "cash back" on each purchase to make the service worth using for most users. 2) The program only covers "participating" retailers and "participating" products, at least initially. Although the initial names involved are impressive, right away you have concerns about breadth of coverage and objectivity. 3) If necessary, Google can always respond with a similar plan--and its economics will always be far better than Microsoft's.

The Evolving Web

from the ecommercetimes.com

Click here for the entire interview on Meebo

TechNewsWorld: How do you think widgets are changing the Web?

Martin Green: I think they're changing it in a huge way. I think the major thing is that the Web is undergoing a little bit of a transformation -- like the PC industry did, maybe 20 years ago -- where it's going from vertically integrated to specialist. In the PC industry, it went from the vertical integration of chips and software and assembly [to] specialists.

The Web is doing the same thing. There are specialists in ad sales, and you see even the big guys like Microsoft (Nasdaq: MSFT) , Platform A at AOL, and Google (Nasdaq: GOOG) excel at that. Then you see specialists in aggregation of audiences and content, and you see people like social networks -- as well as portals -- do that.

Widgets is an interesting specialty in and of itself. It provides content out into the Web, and you see people like RockYou -- which emerged over the last two years to reach one in five people on the Internet . They have done it by providing content into the social networks and portals ... and they're a specialist in doing that.

TechNewsWorld: What do you think is the next phase for widgets?

Green: We have a horse in this answer, in this game. One of them is for them to be rich applications -- not just display -- but to have true interactivity. That could be like Facebook applications, where widgets morph more into applications than, say, just a slideshow with glitter text. Then, I think the next phase after that is that they go live.

TechNewsWorld: Are you describing something similar to Google Gadgets?

Green: Google Gadgets is a step in that direction, but I think the next phase after that is that they become true applications where people can interact with the widget, make it into something else, and be doing it at the same time. The Web has traditionally been organized into billions of pages where there are a couple of people at any given point in time on a different URL (Uniform Resource Locator). These rich Internet applications using Ajax and Flash that are distributed throughout the Web can aggregate audiences so that they are there together.

For example, we work with record labels, and one of them, Universal, launched Kanye West's album in the second week of September. They had a listening party online and at their label, where people could stream the entire album, check it out, talk with other people who were listening to it at the same time. They did that for a week. All of the broadcast networks are doing the same type of listening- or viewing-party thing, where people are coming together for a shared experience.

DoubleClick Performics Releases 13 Searcher Mom Vertical Reports for Top Industries as Advertisers Fine Tune Holiday Shopping Search Engine Marketing Strategies

These reports coincide with the completion of a holiday shopping study with Opinion Research Corporation. The findings of this study shed light on the holiday shopping plans of men and women with children less than 18 years of age, factors stymieing consumer spending, and differences in planned holiday spend by product category and consumer demographics. A summary of the findings is available through DoubleClick Performics upon request, but some of the study’s highlights include:

• When asked how toy recalls and lead paint dangers would impact their shopping, more than half of respondents (58 percent) said they plan to go online to research and eliminate dangerous products from their shopping lists.
• Sixty percent of respondents who researched a product online went offline to make a purchase.
• Once in the store, 35 percent bought the item they researched online as well as additional items.
• Men plan to spend an average of $893 on holiday gifts this year, significantly more than women ($673), but age and income also have a strong impact on intent to shop.
• Only 28 percent of shoppers younger than age 35 plan to spend at least $600; while 39 percent of those age 35-44 and 40 percent of those older than 45 plan the same.
• Fifty-five percent of households with income in excess of $75,000 will spend at least $600; while 30 percent of respondents earning $35,000 – 49,999 and 15 percent earning less than $35,000 will spend at least $600.

 

“In addition to toy recall concerns, consumers reported a wide range of factors impacting their holiday spending in 2007,” added Larkins. “Gas prices, the top limiting factor among respondents, will limit shopping for 52 percent of consumers. Twenty-eight percent of consumers reported feeling the effects of the housing/mortgage crunch, and another 25 percent listed unemployment as a limiting factor. All of these issues have implications for advertisers trying to balance the online/offline mix.”

 

With a longer holiday shopping season this year and three full weeks remaining until Christmas, plenty of time still exists for marketers to adjust search campaigns and reap additional benefits. Search is a dynamic channel that can even be refined many times a day, and DoubleClick Performics recommends marketers take a step back now and review their performance to date to determine what has worked so far, what has not, what’s missing, etc.

 

 

About DoubleClick Performics

Since 1998, DoubleClick Performics has delivered consumers to our affiliate and search engine marketing clients. Our structure provides high-level strategic planning and integrated services resulting in a deep knowledge of consumer behavior. As committed industry leaders, our innovative approach to digital performance marketing enables us to anticipate and shape the future while ensuring our clients’ marketing investments are efficient and effective.

Mark Cuban’s Radical Idea: Facebook Classifieds that Pay You to Sell

from mashable.com

Mark Cuban’s latest radical idea: classifieds. His latest Facebook application, Radical Buy, lets you buy and sell items through the popular social network. It doesn’t sound all that radical, but it has an interesting twist. Borrowing from the affiliate advertising model, sellers can offer a commission for users that help their items get sold. That means you can post Jimmy’s “Wild Animal Trofees” listing on your profile, and if a sale is completed through you, then you earn the commission.

 

Sellers get to choose the commission percentage (if they offer commission at all). If you peruse through the listings of this application, you’ll see that the selling price and the potential commission are both displayed. This should get your juices flowin’. The more you promote other people’s items, the more money you stand to make. It’s a simplistic attempt at a self-regulating marketplace where referrals do the promoting, and the incentives are staring you in the face.

And because Cuban has chosen Facebook to launch a classifieds system like this, it takes advantage of the fact that you might be more comfortable buying something from Sally that lives in MoJo Hall instead of the nameless man on Craigslist. Many classifieds sites approach college campuses in the same manner, because it’s comforting to buy things from people you know (or know where you can hunt them down if they sell you a piece of crap). Lending Club has taken a similar approach to its peer-lending system both inside Facebook, and as integrated services with universities across the nation.

Fanista - Bringing Amway into the 21st Century

from mashable.com

It would seem Amway, that company the brought the term “pyramid schemes” to a whole new light in the 1980’s, has decided to have a go at the 21st century by backing a new site named “Fanista“. With a focus on CDs and DVDs for now, Fanista will later be adding books and digital downloads. And, yes, there is a pyramid scheme involved. Now named “Common Interest Commerce” (or CIC), the idea is that you bring in your friends and you earn 5% of what they buy, and then you get 5% of whatever their referrals buy. You will earn “insider perks” and “achieve social status” for being a “tastemaker”. Gee… this sounds so much like one of those Amway pitches I got trapped in to listening to every few months in the late 1980’s. While it sounds loosely like an affiliate program that we’re all familiar with nowadays, it’s the active recruitment that hearkens back to the old Amway business model. Considering the bad taste that the name Amway leaves in most people’s mouthes probably won’t help this site gain much momentum, if any.

Moola Opens "Massively Multiplayer Rewards Game" to Public

Readwriteweb.com

Toronto, Canada-based Moola has been operating an invite-only beta for a little over 18 months and will on Friday open their site to the public (they'll be officially launching at the TechCrunch Meetup in Boston). Moola has created a multiplayer online game network in which people compete head-to-head for real money. That's nothing new, but Moola's hook is that the site is completely free. You can't deposit money into Moola, instead you earn your starting funds by looking at ads before playing games. Moola is calling their creation a Massively Multiplayer Rewards Game (MMRG).

Here's how it works: Moola fronts users a penny to start, which puts you at the bottom rung of a thirty step ladder. Every time you win a game, you double your money, every time you lose, you fall all the way to the bottom and start over with a penny. If you win 30 times in a row, you walk away with $10.7 million (though you can cash out at any time, so risking a few thousand in an online head-to-head game at the middle levels is probably not that smart).

Moola has grown to 175,000 users since it launched the invite-only beta in 2006. Moola CEO Arlen Ritchie told me that recently the site has been getting a lot more traffic to their home page than they have registered users, which indicated that there is interest from people who don't have invites. So, now seemed like the perfect time to open the doors to the site.

Ritchie acknowledged that it is unlikely anyone will ever win the $10 million prize because most people wouldn't be crazy enough to risk $5 million to try for it -- in fact, two people would have to be that crazy. Of course, you don't have to wager it all on each game. You can play in any bracket below your account balance, and Ritchie told me that most people keep a positive balance rather than wagering all their cash at once. And even if winning the big one may never happen, a lot of real money is being made on Moola. The top player right now has over $8,000 and the highest cash out was in the $5,500 range. Users on the site have exchanged over $4 million so far (though that figure may count the same money being traded back and forth between users multiple times and doesn't represent the amount paid out).

Because it is unlikely anyone will make big money from the games, most users will either stay in a low game bracket (a few cents), which the ads will cover for Moola, or they will make money via Moola's other options -- at which Moola always makes money.

Other Ways to Make Moola

In addition to games, Moola enables users to make money by searching on their Moola Search page. Powered by Google Custom Search, Moola employs an algorithm that measures how much people search, weeds out illegitimate searches and clicks, and then shares ad revenue with searchers. You might only make a few pennies per day, but that money can be used to play Moola games and bump you into a higher playing bracket.

Moola also lets people make cash via what they call "Boosters" -- or, a cash back program based on affiliate marketing. Shopping at any of Booster's affiliated online stores results in cash deposited in your account. Moola supports a lot of major online retailers including Hotels.com, Buy.com, Travelocity, Skype, Old Navy, and NewEgg.

The final way Moola enables users to make money, is via a 4-level referral program. Refer friends, and take a cut of anything they do on the site, whether that's search payouts, Booster Zone payouts, or game winnings.

BoosterBar

Along with opening the site to the public, Moola will be announcing a toolbar that is really centered around their shopping and search revenue streams. They've built the Moola search into the bar, which makes it more convenient for people. It is the slick shopping integration, however, that will garner more interest. Any site you visit on the Internet that is a Moola affiliate will register on the bar and allow you to log into your account so your shopping is eligible for cash back. That lets people shop on the web as normal, rather than have to first page through the site's directory of affiliates -- something Moola expects most people aren't keen on doing.

If an ecommerce site is not a Moola partner, the BoosterBar will suggest an alternative that is in their affiliate network. Ritchie tells me that initial feedback from partners on this feature is tremendous. They love being able to steal visitors away from competition right at the point of sale.

Eventually, the game playing side of Moola will be integrated into the toolbar, allowing users to set up games and then surf the web while waiting for an opponent -- which can take longer at the higher levels where competition is more thin. Ritchie told me that the plan down the line is to add social features, such as chat or messaging, to the toolbar to augment the community that has grown up around Moola. Apparently, some users have taken to organizing their own tournaments based around Moola's games (you can set up one-on-one matches with specific players on the site).

The Games

For the cornerstone of the site, the games are rather weak. Moola has created three proprietary games for the site, with a fourth currently in development. Moola's line up includes a rock, paper, scissors game (*yawn*), Hi-Lo (*yawn*), and a bidding game where you try to out smart your opponent (not the most thrilling experience, but it held my attention longer than the others). But, Moola is in the planning stages of an API that would allow third-party developers to add games to Moola. They're currently in talks with two unnamed developers to create additional content prior to the release of a public API. (And they are soliciting queries from other interested game developers at gamedev@moola.com.)

Moola developers would be able to make money from both the advertising on the games, as well as take a cut of the money that changes hands between players. Ritchie also told me that the plan is to allow developers to "Moola-ize" their games outside of the site. So, for example, Microsoft could add Moola functionality to Halo 3 on XBox Live and then Moola members could organize Halo matches and play each other for cash.

Conclusion

Nothing at Moola is very revolutionary. Cash back shopping? Seen it. Competitive gaming? Seen it. Revenue share on search? Seen it. Multilevel referral program? Seen it. But they appear to have packaged everything up in a tidy manner, and the coming API for games is exciting. Winning money playing online games without putting any of your own cash up makes it a lot more fun (I'm up to $0.22 -- time to retire!), and the prospect of less snooze-worthy games from third-party developers sounds great.

It took Moola members 10 months to play for the first $1 million. The last million took about 4 months. The next million is on track to cross through Moola in just 55 days. Once the site opens up, those millions will probably be flying about at a more rapid rate.

WidgetBucks Giving You $25 to Register

From mashable.com

WidgetBucks is a shopping widget that you can place on your website or blog. You earn money every time someone clicks on it.

Launched through mpire’s affiliate widget program, the widgets’ content is contextually based according to your site’s content. From there, readers and site visitors can see various information regarding certain products, such as the lowest price available, and from which online retailer.

There are about 5 or so different widget sizes to choose from, and they are all fairly customizable in terms of color, to be better matched with your existing website. As with Proximic, a “grab it” option will soon be made available for its widgets, enabling visitors to take the widgets to be placed on their own site.

In order to encourage you to sign up or the WidgetBucks program, it’s offering you a $25 credit, meaning you’ll only need to earn another $25 to get your first check. The shopping widgets are a bit flashy and very much resemble an ad. I imagine that some web users could easily overlook these shopping widgets if they’re placed too far out of context on a given website.

Affiliate Marketing Swells in UK, 78% of Brands to Increase Spend

from marketingvox.com Affiliate marketing in the UK has been growing - and will continue to grow - in the next few years, per a survey from E-consultancy sponsored by buy.at, a UK-based affiliate network, writes MarketingCharts. Some 78 percent of respondents (239 merchants "working in the UK for a company which sells online through the affiliate channel" were surveyed) reported increasing their spend on affiliate marketing since '05. 78 percent said they plan to increase spend in the next two years. (Note: Those responding "don't know" not included in chart.) Additional growth-related findings from the study: Nearly a quarter of those who are spending more in the channel said they have doubled their spend in the channel in the past two years, and a further one in 12 said they had increased spending 200 percent. Two-thirds of respondents said the number of sales generated by affiliate marketing has increased over the past two years. Some 40 percent of respondents have more people employed to manage their affiliate marketing activity compared with two years ago, and half of those surveyed expect this team to grow over the next two years. Half of responding organizations expect to have more people managing this channel in 2009; only 4 percent who expect to have fewer people. "As broadcast advertising has started to decline, performance marketing has emerged as the silver bullet of the marketing industry. Within that, search marketing has reached its peak, but affiliate marketing is still in a high-growth phase," said Kevin Cornils, CEO of buy.at. "This represents a huge opportunity for both affiliates and marketers that understand the channel and appreciate the benefits of true pay-for-performance advertising."

Google Gets Tough on Quality

By Janet Meiners

Andy Beal Marketingpilgrim.com

Advertisers who want to keep their costs down must keep the quality of their landing pages up. Nothing new. But Google recently reiterated their policies on the Inside AdWords blog.

What does Google reward? In both natural and paid search the answer is quality - from a customer point of view. Google rewards landing pages that are easy to navigate and transparent. I will add trust and credibility. Create landing pages and sites that provide a good experience (quality content) for searchers and customers and Google will be happy.

Google was clear about what is not considered quality. They will:

• get rid of squeeze pages designed to collect a name and email

• penalize arbitrage sites that are simply pages of ads

• eliminate sites that knowingly or unknowingly install software (malware)

Google specifically mentioned they discourage “get rich quick” sites, comparison shopping sites, and travel aggregators. This is where affiliates marketers gasp.

Google is serious about the issue. If your landing page gets complaints you could be kicked out of AdWords for those sites. Google also noted that they will no longer warn advertisers of updates, but they will be ongoing.

Affiliate marketers were hit especially hard. They are kings of landing pages. If affiliate marketers or any advertisers hope to survive the Google updates, they must add more content. Simple landing pages that are essentially just another advertisement will be penalized.

Why the changes? Customers are complaining and that could mean losing money. Google makes money when people click on ads so if people don’t click, Google doesn’t make money. Low quality advertisements cost more. If your Google Quality Score is low, you’ll start getting minimum cost per click at $10 just to show your ads.

However, the opposite is also true. Provide good quality sites and your cost will go down while your ads will start rising to the top of the list.

About Janet Meiners

Janet Meiners always wanted to be a reporter but prefers the immediacy of blogging. Known as Newspapergrl, she has freelanced for newspapers, City Search, and business magazines. She reports on internet marketing and online trends.

MuseStorm Launches Widget Syndication & Analytics Platform

MuseStorm is known for its distribution of content widgets for companies like the Washington Post, and other publications and businesses with an online presence. At Demo today, MuseStorm is launching its Content Engagement Platform, which is a way for publishers and marketers to author and syndicate MuseStorm’s multimedia widgets across the web, mobile phones an desktops in order to reach a wider, yet more targeted audience.

The new platform offers one-click options for adding widgets to various web pages, social networks and blogs. In an approach that hasn’t become standard yet, MuseStorm will also be offering enterprise solutions for publishers to track and optimize their widget strategy, delivering metrics on how successful widgets are for various markets. Also included in MuseStorm’s analytics report will be video playback, rollovers, clickthroughs, and a measurement for the level of interaction with any piece of content contained within the widget.

Partnering with MuseStorm for the launching of its widget along with the announcement of the new platform is Simon & Schuster for BookVideos.tv. This widget will let you watch videos of an author, preview and purchase books. Halo 3, CBS and Bobby Valentino are also launching widgets on MuseStorm’s new platform as well.