The Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (Icann) plans to open up possible domain name endings to almost any word in any language. This change is said to be one of the biggest game-changers to date. The application process right now is costly (it’s almost $200k to apply), but what does this mean for the future of internet marketing? The impact of this decision could change the way we see search engine results from now on.

Large corporations will be able to buy any domain name they can imagine (so long as they can prove they have the rights to the name in some manner). This could start a subdomain chain that could inevitably take over the first page of search engine results. Several companies have gone the route of purchasing several subdomains to influence and increase their listings on the first page of search engines as part of their search engine optimization campaign.

With the high cost of this process, for now one can expect that only corporations and organizations with million dollar budgets for internet marketing will be taking part in this movement. However, if this new development goes the route of all things internet, the price may eventually drop to something more affordable to the everyday business owner.

So what does this mean for webpage domain names? It means Apple can have the domain name “Apple.Computers” or Microsoft can be “Microsoft.Windows” or “Xbox.360”. This will take search engine optimization to the next level. Not only will you be able to relate specific keywords to a website, you’ll be able to mirror those keywords within the URL. If you could afford the hefty $200k price tag, what would you make your domain name for your business?

According to an article on ChicagoBusiness.com, two advertising executives attempted to use social networking sites Facebook and Twitter to acquire Pabst Brewing Company, makers of Pabst Blue Ribbon and Old Milwaukee beer. They set up a website (BuyaBeerCompany.com) and encouraged would-be investors to contribute funds to help them take over the brewing company. The only loop hole in their plan was that they did not register with the Securities and Exchange Commission.

The SEC is responsible for the laws that ensure sound stock market regulation. The two advertising executives, according to the SEC, did not follow those laws. The two men collected pledges worth about $200 million by guaranteeing partial ownership and an amount of beer equal to their investment value. However, the two men did not register with the SEC making it an invalid venture.

This story really illustrates the power of social networking sites in our society. By using Facebook and Twitter, both free to users, two men were able to raise $200 million. Representatives from the SEC said they have never witnessed anything like it. The social networking campaign was started in November 2009 and the money was raised in about 3 months (by February 2010). If each person invested the minimum amount of $5, that means that 40 million people participated in the viral Facebook and Twitter campaign.

Did people pledge the money because it was a novel idea, or was it because they had a chance to be partial owner in a brewing company for a minimum pledge of $5? What would this have meant for the future of mergers and acquisitions had this campaign been successful? I think the real question is what opportunities can social networking sites like Facebook and Twitter create for your business?

SEO Blog Tips

Many people are engaged in blog posting, but only a few bloggers practice effective blogging.  In order to make a blog post relevant, it is important that the post is optimized in the same fashion that web pages are optimized.  Keyword research, keyword tracking & content syndication are all mandatory if a blog post is to become relevant to search engines.

The first step is finding quality keywords that have a consistent amount of monthly traffic, but not an excessive amount of competition.  Once the research is complete, the blog should focus on one particular keyword, but 3 variations of that particular keyword.

Page optimization is critical as well, H1’s, titles tags and URL construction should all be taken into account before a blog is posted.

Social media syndication is also an effective tool to drive traffic to a particular blog post.  Sharing buttons such as the Facebook Like & LinkedIn share all contribute to building search engine relevancy.

The most important aspect of any SEO strategy is to effectively track what works and what doesn’t.  Paying attention to your page visits as well as leads from your chosen keyword is the best way to monitor effectiveness and make solid decisions in the future.

As pay-per-click campaigns on platforms like Google AdWords and Bing AdCenter continue to report success stories to CMOs it’s no wonder why enterprise level ppc budgets continue to grow. But as the budgets grow so should the management team and that’s where many ppc automation software developers are seeing dollar signs.

The pitch goes something like this… “with our proprietary automation software you’ll never have to log into your AdWords account ever again!”

I object! I guarantee you that a “set it and forget it” attitude towards your ppc campaigns will not result in better results than manual management by a well qualified ppc manager. Yes you may spend more time manually managing your campaigns, but the end result will be an overall more efficient allocation of your budget.

Granted there are efficiencies in using software, but full-automation is not something that I’ll be a fan of until computers truly learn logic. Human logic has not yet been replaced and logic will save your budget from being misallocated time-and-time again. Currently the most effective ppc managers that I’ve come across utilize a combination of software and some human touch points to review the software’s direction before it’s automatically implemented.

Just remember how close you keep your foot to the break pedal when your car is on cruise control.

While browsing YouTube, I came across a very unique Internet Marketing campaign based on the Social Media platform, Facebook. As a way to promote a new location, IKEA created a Facebook account for the future manager of this location. The first phase of this Social Media Marketing campaign was to add friends within the geographic region the store was opening in (dubbed “network” by Facebook). The next phase involved uploading pictures of “showrooms” or fully decorated and designed mock rooms.

Those two phases are pretty basic; add friends and post pictures on a Social Media platform of what you’re selling. The innovative part is what IKEA did with those pictures. As each picture was posted, it was labeled with a caption informing viewers that the first person to tag themselves on a particular object displayed in a showroom would win that object. They posted 12 pictures on this Facebook account within a two week span of time. The results of this Internet Marketing campaign and how they were able to use the Facebook platform is what is really notable.

Every time you are tagged in a picture on Facebook, that picture then shows up in your friends’ news feeds as well as on your actual profile page. It will come up in the “Photos You are Tagged In” category as well. Therefore, when one person would tag themselves in these photos, they were in turn exposing all of their Facebook friends to this picture and the caption informing their friends of the giveaway, too. Most people have Facebook friends that live in the same network so by exposing one person in that network to a new product or service in their area, you are able reach thousands more. The exposure to this Internet Marketing campaign increased exponentially with each person who participated by tagging themselves.

This model of Internet Marketing through Social Media is a fantastic way to gain exposure to products or services within a particular network of people. It’s also an Internet Marketing campaign that could easily be taken global. A side benefit of this campaign was that it spawned a life of its own. The participants began to request more photos and share the photos with their friends and this residual exposure was at no additional cost. The simplicity of this campaign compared to what is accomplished is applaud-able. Way to go, IKEA. Bravo!

Here is the video:

IKEA Facebook Marketing Campaign

You know the type. The friend who just has to post everything from what they ate in the morning to how much they like Justin Beiber. Perhaps they are just afraid of being ignored and forgotten by their Facebook brethren.

For a company who wants to remain top-of-mind with their fans, it begs the question of when a Facebook post begins to go stale and unnoticed.

According to a study by Visibli, on average, your company has an hour and 20 minutes before your Likes begin to sharply drop off. Facebook posts generally get 50% of their Likes within that narrow time frame. The study shows about 80% of Likes are achieved in the first 7 hours, giving Facebook posts far more staying power than Twitter.

Although posting every hour and 20 minutes would maximize your exposure, we don’t suggest it since you will start cannibalizing previous post engagement and probably bug your fans. For aggressive companies not looking to become the annoying friend, between every 4 to 7 hours would be optimal for engagement.

Check out the full study here to learn more about Facebook posts and engagement.

Broad match keywords programmed into Google AdWords have the ability to cover similar keyword terms in search queries.  Recently with the addition of “diagnose keywords” it is possible to review keywords being blocked by negative keywords.  However, this is limited to keywords programmed into the account (not broad match impressions).  Without a way to audit the impressions that have been blocked, broad match should not be used for negative keywords.

It is possible Google AdWords is aware of this and simply treats broad match negative keywords as phrase, not matching to similar keyword terms.  This would be simpler than removing the match type for negative keywords.  The benefits would be minimal adjustments needed to the system, interface and existing accounts.

Recently Google AdWords has introduced advanced broad match keywords.  Adding a plus sign in front of the keyword will prevent the matching to similar keyword terms.  This cannot be used for negative keywords.  Google AdWords will ignore the plus sign in this situation.

At the end of the day broad match negative keywords are not very useful.  Negative keywords should be set as exact and phrase match accordingly within the Google AdWords platform.

It is said that at any given time 60% of people searching on Google are being tested in some way.  Google is an ever-evolving beast that doesn’t show any signs of slowing down.  Recently, Google has begun testing a new “Voice Search” functionality and like many of Google’s latest tests, only select Chrome users will be able to give the new Voice Search a whirl.  Yesterday, I was fortunate enough to have Google Voice Search appear on my Chrome browser so I tested it out (once most people had left the office!)

If you have an Android phone then Google Voice Search probably isn’t anything new to you.  Most, if not all, Android powered devices come with the feature built in and it is very impressive in regards to how deadly accurate it is.  My first test for Google Voice Search on the computer was actually “supercalafragalisticexpialadoshus.”  I spoke the words slowly and as a result, Google spaced out my query like so – “super kala fragilistic expi ali docious.”  Not too bad.  I then tried singing the words just like you remember it from Mary Poppins and Google deciphered that much better, displaying it as one long word, properly spelled.  I tested a few more phrases and Google was spot on every time.  The only real trouble it had during my testing was figuring out names that are spoken with an accent.

While the idea of searching by voice at your computer sounds neat I can also imagine how that may become quite embarrassing.  I’m sure just about everybody will want to try out Google’s new Voice Search technology on their computers once it is officially rolled out but the novelty of it all will most likely die off soon after.  Don’t expect to see Google Voice Search go anywhere on the Android OS though.  That’s where it truly belongs.

Leave PPC to the professionals.  Inexperienced PPC advertisers can quickly run through a PPC budget with little ROI to show for it.  Common mistakes made by novice advertisers include bidding on overly broad terms, not testing ad copy or using advanced settings without data that rationalizes your decision.

Bidding on overly broad terms is a major mistake encountered in PPC campaigns that are not run effectively.  The competition associated with overly broad keywords make them an unrealistic target, advertisers are better off targeting long tail keywords.

Failing to test ad copy further diminishes the possibility of seeing any kind of results.  A good rule of thumb is to have at least two versions of your ad copy per ad group.  Capturing data in this fashion allows for better decision making in the future.

Making uninformed decisions about advanced settings is also a problem found in novice campaigns.  Dayparting PPC ads to weekdays for the sake of dayparting simply doesn’t make sense, unless data supports this type of this decision it should be made.

Common sense more often than not is not common practice, and one would think that common sense would lead individuals to engage in proper PPC management techniques.  Unfortunately, this is usually not the case and that is why you should leave PPC to the professionals.

We’ve all read reviews on touch screen mobile phones that describe said device as “iPhone-esq” or “similar to the iPhone.” There is no doubt that there is only one iPhone- but should there only be one App Store? Nokia, Microsoft, HTC and Sony Ericsson don’t think so. The two companies are challenging Apple’s trademark on “App Store” and “Appstore” because they feel the phrase is to general to belong to only Apple. Now, there are two sides to this argument.

Nokia, Microsoft, HTC and Sony Ericsson devices have apps and they have a store where these apps are purchased, but they can’t call this store an “App Store.” Microsoft in particular feels that the trademark “…limits competitors’ ability to describe their own application marketplaces.” If you could say “app store” instead of “application marketplace,” why wouldn’t you? It certainly is a lot easier to text.

Apple feels that their trademark, obviously, isn’t too general. After all, they were the first to come up with the whole idea of having apps. They were also the first to design a store in which these apps could be purchased. So why wouldn’t they have the right to the “App Store” trademark? Apple’s response to Microsoft’s claim is that if anyone is in possession of a trademark for a term that is incredibly general, it is Microsoft with their “Windows” trademark.

Should Apple have to concede their trademark on “App Store” to their competitors? Should they be faulted for developing the idea first? Is it fair that they must now share the spoils of war? What would the implications of a trademark reversal be long term? This is not how it usually works in American Culture. Our society would be a very different place if being first in line to develop a new product didn’t allow you to be the sole benefactor of all of its profits. No one would bother to develop the next revolutionary product. A company may as well save their resources and wait for a competitor to create something innovative and then use the existing model as a prototype.

Healthy competition will always produce the best innovations. By allowing “App Store” to be used freely by any company with an application market place for a mobile phone (or even a computer), the desire to be the first anything will die down. So what will happen in this landmark case? We’re all going to have to stay tuned to find out.