Thursday, July 24, 2008

Anythinggoes? The Impact Of New ICANN Vanity Top-Level Domains

From the Search Insider Newsletter

Anythinggoes? The Impact Of New ICANN Vanity Top-Level Domains


AS IF MARKETING ON our little Worldwide-Interweb / Series of Tubes wasn't already wild enough, the governing body over all Internet domain names just held a vote to ensure that things will get a little wilder. Or at least a bit more confusing for users, IT departments, marketing departments, enterprise natural search marketers and trademark interests. The Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers ( ICANN) voted at its June meeting in Paris to open up root level generic Top-Level Domains to private entities. In addition to commonly known extensions -- such as .com, .net, and .org -- individuals, corporations and non-profits may apply for .anything, or literally any word or phrase not taken that contains three or more characters. This decision will allow major corporations to own and host their Web presence off their own root level domain, such as .google, .apple, .search, and also control sub-domains (search.google, iphone.apple, bob.smith, etc.). Applicants would have their choice of running a hosted sited on the Top Level Domain (TLD), or opening up the TLD for registrations.

Though it will likely be 18 months before we see the first rollout of a vanity TLD, there will be many implications for marketers and consumers, particularly with the threat to natural search engine presence that accompanies moving a legacy domain name. It also appears to be yet another headache for brand and trademark monitoring, except these defensive registrations come at a much higher price tag.

The lure of a vanity TLD is great for some marketers, so over the next two columns I will discuss some of the challenges that the new TLDs might bring, covering fees and registration process, and the search implications of maintaining a top level domain.

A few examples of the possibilities

So what does the concept of a vanity TLD mean to marketers and major corporations? Fundamentally, it means the following domains could exist as a location for a corporate Web presence:

http://www.dallascowboys.nfl/

http://www.home.nbc/

http://www.breakingnews.cnn/

iPhone.Apple

http://www.searchinsider.mediapost/

http://www.mail.yahoo/

Search+Keyword.Google

http://www.blog.nytimes/

Or these generics:


http://www.dallas.hotels/

http://www.health.news/

http://www.news.finance/

http://www.goldendelicious.apple/

From here, you can let your imagination run wild. The possibilities have left many corporate marketers and IT professionals chomping at the bit to get in line for the application process.

The problem with maintaining positive search equity in a gTLD move

Moving a Web site from a .com or other legacy TLD to a new extension such as www.Domain.Brand has many implications from a natural search optimization standpoint. Many of the same rules for moving between secondary domains (ex. acmewidgets.com to acme.com) apply to moving from a secondary domain to a managed vanity TLD (ex. mediapost.com to home.mediapost). Accrued search indexing history, domain age (with a live Web site running), and the legacy inbound back links pointing to the existing domain are just a few considerations for maintaining positive search equity.

Major brands with a positive search legacy on their Brand.com are at a great advantage over direct and indirect competitors in natural search, based on the authority that search engines have granted to their domains. While newer or less authoritative sites may take months or years to obtain a ranking or any significant flow of traffic from search engines, a legacy domain can obtain competitive rankings within days, or sometimes hours or minutes, simply by deploying keyword-themed content.

If you are considering moving to a new .Brand or .Generic TLD, there is potentially a great risk to search history and positive natural search engine optimization performance. If you are considering creating a new architecture on many different secondary domains banked on a vanity TLD, ask yourself the same questions as if you were considering re-architecting a site on all sub-domains (for example, see Microsoft.com subdomains).

Wednesday, July 23, 2008

SFIMA Video from the July Event on Local Marketing



If you missed the meeting or would just like a visual review of what went on, check out this video and learn a little bit about targeting local customers and clients through online marketing.

Tuesday, July 22, 2008

Google Study: Search Marketing Increases Brand Value

Google Study: Search Marketing Increases Brand Value
by Gavin O'Malley, Friday, Jul 18, 2008 7:00 AM ET
Kevin Kell of GoogleMore than merely a direct-response tool, search marketing is a great brand-building vehicle for consumer packaged goods advertisers. That was the key finding from a new study just released by Google entitled "Brand Value of Search."

"Typically, ROI models for search don't give any value to a search impression, but this study finds that there's brand value in a search impression, particularly in top-of-mind awareness and purchase intent," said Kevin Kells, Google's CPG Industry Director.

About 2,400 survey respondents were exposed to one generic search term such as "drinks," or "make-up," followed by a brand survey designed to measure brand impact in the areas of aided brand awareness, unaided brand awareness, purchase consideration, and purchase intent.

Most surprising, according to Kells, was the decrease in awareness when a brand did not appear in one of four key product categories-- beverage, cosmetic, food/snack, household cleaning/laundry--and its competitor did.

The findings, said Kells, support "the need for ROI models of search to include the impression--not just the click--to value the effectiveness of a search campaign in CPG."

Overall, brand presence anywhere on a search results page positively impacts key brand metrics, Google found, while marketers have greater control over their message with paid search--especially on a generic search term.

As a branding vehicle, paid search strives for top-of-mind awareness for clients' brand, and negatively impacts awareness for their competitive set, while impressions provide "free" brand lift, without the CPC investment.

Going forward, one of the areas that is ripe for further exploration is "media mix modeling that includes search and a look at the impact over time--two weeks out, one month out, etc." according to Kells.

Gavin O'Malley can be reached at gavin@mediapost.com

Monday, July 21, 2008

SFIMA Welcomes New Member: The Buyer Group

Lisa Buyer of the Buyer Group Joins SFIMA

Deerfield Beach, FL (PRWEB) July 16, 2008 -- Florida Interactive PR agency President and CEO, Lisa Buyer (http://www.thebuyergroup.com/lisa-buyer)has joined South Florida Interactive Marketing Association (http://www.sfima.com/about.asp) (SFIMA), South Florida's largest forum for online marketing and PR professionals. As founder of the interactive public relations (http://www.thebuyergroup.com/public-relations) and branding agency The Buyer Group, Lisa brings her search engine savvy expertise to the group as well as her knowledge, experience and resources gained as the co-founder of three previous corporate communications agencies.

Joe Laratro (http://tandem-interactive.blogspot.com/), President of SFIMA, says, "We welcome The Buyer Group to SFIMA. It is essential for the continued success of our organization to gain more influential members in the digital marketing space to compliment our other vendors and client side marketers."

SFIMA hosts monthly events designed to encourage networking and communication among professionals from South Florida's most progressive companies. Additionally, annual social events are held to help members to build client bases.

Topics discussed at SFIMA meetings include: Email marketing, Ad exchanges, Web 2.0 trends and stats, Paid search, and Online video marketing.

"This is an exciting time to be in the world of online media," said Lisa Buyer. "I look forward to the knowledge exchange opportunities and meeting other professionals interested in this ever-expanding field of interactive marketing."

Monday, July 14, 2008

Upcoming August SFIMA Event is an eMarketer Dinner

The next SFIMA event is just one month away! Save the date and mark your calendars! This is not one to be missed!

Thursday, August 14, 2008


eMarketer -- Web 2.0 Trends and Stats: Separating the Hype from Reality

This will be SFIMA's largest educational event of the year. Sponsored by Gunster Yoakley.

Join 300 other South Florida marketers for a sit down dinner, networking, and an insightful presentation by an extremely relevant and important figurehead in our industry. The FDMA and AMA South have partnered with SFIMA for this event. Seats are limited!

Between social networking, online video, podcasts, widgets, viral campaigns, the latest search techniques and a renewed interest in mobile advertising, marketers today are plenty busy – and plenty confused – about which online trends are important and how to best leverage them for their brands.

e-Marketer Presentation

eMarketer CEO Geoff Ramsey will cut through the clutter of contradictory statistics to give you clarity and insight about how to optimize your interactive marketing programs. Be prepared to step outside your day-to-day comfort zone and get a 30,000-foot view of the digital marketing landscape – all supported by hard numbers and case studies from a wealth of researchers and industry trend leaders.

This presentation will answer tough questions that will save you time and help shape your marketing strategies this year, and beyond:

  • The business and trade press are going gaga over widgets, but what are they really and how can they do a marketer's bidding?; Do they represent a big marketing opportunity, or a small blip for a select few advertisers?
  • Is it true that word-of-mouth techniques can serve as a powerful tool to extend your reach and bolster your credibility, and at a far less cost than traditional media?
  • Why is that if you only invest in paid search, you are missing 75% of your online marketing opportunity?
  • What are the best practices today for leveraging social network sites?; What are the mistakes to avoid?; Why is travel an ideal category for using social network techniques?
  • Is the rush to online video marketing a fad, or a fantastic opportunity?; Which kinds of products and services will benefit most?
  • Should you be investing on virtual worlds like Second Life, or sitting this trend out?

Speaker
Geoff Ramsey

Geoff Ramsey, Co-Founder, CEO

Geoff Ramsey is one of the Internet's most exciting digital marketing visionaries. As CEO and Co-Founder of eMarketer, Geoff is on the cutting edge of new research statistics, trends and best practice, covering every aspect of marketing in the digital age. He is frequently quoted in The Wall Street Journal, Forbes, CNN, BusinessWeek, Business 2.0 and Advertising Age.

A highly regarded speaker with an engaging presentation style, Geoff speaks at major industry and corporate events around the globe, including ad:tech, the Interactive Advertising Bureau (IAB), the Conference Board, the Economist Conferences, Yahoo!, Google, OMMA and the Direct Marketing Association (DMA). Prior to starting eMarketer, Geoff worked at several large New York ad agencies, including TBWA and Ogilvy & Mather, where he ran multinational accounts for brands including Procter & Gamble, Kraft General Foods, M&M Mars and AT&T.

Event Sponsor
Gunster Yoakley
From conceptualizing dreams and putting them on paper, to expanding the capabilities of traditional bricks-and-mortar companies, Gunster Yoakley attorneys provide responsive and diverse counsel to businesses at all levels of growth. The Technology and Emerging Growth Company Practice Group of Gunster, Yoakley & Stewart focuses on building value for our clients in technology-related matters, issues and transactions.
Learn more about Gunster Yoakley

http://recp.mkt32.net/ctt?kn=10&m=2016441&r=MTcwNjMzNTg1S0&b=0&j=OTY0ODc5OTUS1&mt=1


Event Details

Time/Date: 6:30 pm
Thursday, 8-14-2008
Place: Riverside Hotel
620 East Las Olas Blvd

Fort Lauderdale, FL 33301
Contact: membership@sfima.com
Member Cost & Registration $0
Non Member Cost &
Registration
$45 pre-reg for non-members; $55 at the door

Event Sponsors





Sunday, July 13, 2008

Search Online to Help Your Favorite Charity

GoodSearch: You Search...We Give!

I just recently was told about www.GoodSearch.com. It is sponsored by Yahoo! and returns regular Yahoo! search results, however, the great thing about it is that you can set it up for any number of charities to receive donations every time you search - one penny at a time.

I am sure most of you, like me, perform dozens of searches per day, being online all the time; and I cannot think of a better way, or an easier way to raise funds for my favorite charity. Have more than one charity you would like to donate to with your searches? No problem, you can change your charity or leave the default and GoodSearch.com features a different charity every day.

Maybe you already knew about GoodSearch? I just researched it and found out they have been around since early 2006, raising money for charities one search at a time! I just heard about it and thought I would pass on the word.

Maybe you are not a big searcher? That's ok, they also have GoodShop.com, which has many different online retailers that donate a percentage of the sale to your chosen charity.

There are many ways they have listed that you can get involved and help the charity of your choice with GoodSearch.com.

Video from the June SFIMA Meeting



I am a little late this month on posting the video from the June event on Reaching the Hispanic Market. Since the event was in Miami, lets just say I'm on "Miami time" for posting the video! It was a great event in Downtown Miami with an extremely informative and knowledgeable panel. This video really highlights the event, so if you missed it, check out the video and see what you missed. You can also see my review of the meeting on the SFIMA blog as well.

Saturday, July 12, 2008

Review of the July SFIMA Event: Local Marketing Mix


Thanks to our event sponsor Centro!

All I can say is WOW! The SFIMA event this past Thursday night was a great one! There seemed to be so much positive, high energy in the room, maybe that is due to the over 130 people that attended, making it a packed house event! There were lots of familiar faces and many new ones as well, so it was a nice mix of people to network with.

The moderator for the panel: Joe Laratro of Tandem-Interactive and your SFIMA President.
The panel members:
Dave Carberry of Platform-A
Shawn Riegsecker of Centro
John Ferber of USO Networks
Owen Weed of Ingenio & YellowPages.com

Joe asked the panel several questions. Here are a few of the questions and a few of the answers:

Q: What sites are best for local search?

All panelists mentioned that Google, MSN & Yahoo! were imperative, but each one discussed some more niche engines and directories that can be targeted for local marketers:

Dave Carberry spoke about Google 1 Box, retailers can customize local listings, upload photos, etc. And supplied the list of directories and engines below.

John Ferber agreed that the major portals are critical, especially Google's Universal search which is now at 60%.

Owen Weed cited YellowPages.com as a great resource for local and it is very user focused. he also pointed to the Google other links at the top left of Google results, such as images, news, shopping and more.

Shawn Riegsecker mentioned that besides the directories and major portals, to look at social media sites to promote your local business.

Q: What are some tips to rank for local search?
Owen Weed suggested making sure that you have different ad content for each search engine.
John Ferber suggested a Wiki entry, web based press releases, and to make sure you appear in the Yahoo! Directory.
Dave Carberry suggested Yahoo! Paid Inclusion. Its the only opportunity you have to control the organic listings and you have a 48 hour turn around for changes, updates, or seasonal sales, etc.

Q: What changes have you seen over time?
Shawn Riegsecker said "search is incredibly important".
Owen Weed talked about Pay Per Call being a new and innovative way to reach local customers.
Live Support online is a great tool to reach your customers and give them that local, hands on feel.
Look for niche directories that would apply to your product or service.


Dave Carberry of Platform A (the company formerly known as Advertising.com) was gracious enough to supply us a list of local directories that your local business should be listed in:

Here are the companies that do directory listings

Localrollcall.com

Locallaunch.com

Localezecom

Here is a list of directories that should be targeted

4info.net

Addresses.com

Anywho

Areaguides.net

bdlocal.com

Boulevards Media

Comcast

Cox

Google

Homestore

InformationPages.com

informationpages.com

InsiderPages.com

Kudzu.com

MerchantCircle.com

Mojopages

Move

MSN Local

MSN YP

Openlist

pennysaver

Pricegrabber

Realtor.com

Simplymichigan

Smalltown

SuperPages.com

Tyloon

upnext.com

Welcomewagon

Yahoo

Yellow.com

YellowPageCity.com

YellowPages.com

Yokel

Yp.com

Yp.net


Here's what some of the event attendees are saying:

Zach Hoffman from SEO.cc said: "We are really big into local search at our firm so it was awesome to hear from key players in the industry."


Anyone else have a review or a comment? Please drop a quick line to shari at extremehalloween.com. Thanks!


A packed room at SFIMA's July Event in Ft. Lauderdale


Board Member Travis Berger of NBC6.net talks about her role as the sponsorship chair.
Our Local Advertising Panel from L to R:
Dave Barberry, John Ferber, Shawn
Riegsecker, Owen Weed


The panel spoke to a standing room only crowd!


Dinner & Drinks after the SFIMA meeting.