The Google AdWords API Blog announced that advertisers who use the v2009 API can now use up to two dynamic parameters in the ad copy. The ad parameters include numbers such as prices, discount percentages, quantities, and so on. For example, if you run an airline and you want to display the latest prices for a trip from New York to Los Angeles, you can do so using the API. The ad copy can read something like, "Fly from NY to LA for $249, Act Now, Only 3 Seat Left." See the power in running an ad like that? Here is an example of the dynamic parameters in an ad and how it might show: [...]

Related Topics: Channel: SEM | Google: AdWords | Google: APIs | Top News

The Google Mobile Blog announced that the new Google movie search features which launched a couple weeks ago on Google.com, is now available on mobile smart phones. The best way to show you the various features is to share screen shots and a Google made movie demo on how it works. Now, if I can only convince my wife to let me go see that movie. [...]

Related Topics: Channel: Mobile | Google: Mobile

Search Week is an exclusive weekly newsletter for Search Engine Land premium members that recaps stories covered on Search Engine Land over the past week. Below are top stories organized by topic that happened over the past week. Each topic (or Search Engine Land column) is also a link, where you can click through and drill into the Search Engine Land members library to find other stories in that area. Because some stories are listed in more than one category, you may see them repeated. Top News Google Fast Flip About To Jump Into Google News? Google Experiments With Paid Inclu [...]

Related Topics: Channel: Other | Search Week

Search Week is an exclusive weekly newsletter for Search Engine Land premium members that recaps stories covered on Search Engine Land over the past week. Below are top stories organized by topic that happened over the past week. Each topic (or Search Engine Land column) is also a link, where you can click through and drill into the Search Engine Land members library to find other stories in that area. Because some stories are listed in more than one category, you may see them repeated. Top News Google Acquires AdMob, Mobile Display Ad Company Google To Murdoch: Go Ahead & Block [...]

Related Topics: Channel: Other | Search Week

Search Week is an exclusive weekly newsletter for Search Engine Land premium members that recaps stories covered on Search Engine Land over the past week. Below are top stories organized by topic that happened over the past week. Each topic (or Search Engine Land column) is also a link, where you can click through and drill into the Search Engine Land members library to find other stories in that area. Because some stories are listed in more than one category, you may see them repeated. Top News Google's Fading Home Page Tests Continue Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer to Keynote SMX W [...]

Related Topics: Channel: Other | Search Week

The governments of Canada and Australia have given their okay to the proposed Microsoft-Yahoo Search Deal. The Australian Competition and Consumer Commission (ACCC) has published its findings, which say that "the proposed agreement was unlikely to result in a substantial lessening of competition." The ACCC points to an existing deal in which Microsoft is using Yahoo's paid search platform in Australia, and says that the two companies' "share of online paid search advertising queries in Australia was limited." (Ouch.) The Canadian Competition Bureau has not yet published its findings, but [...]

Related Topics: Channel: Industry | Microsoft & Yahoo Search Deal | Microsoft: Business Issues | Microsoft: Partnerships | Yahoo: Business Issues | Yahoo: Partnerships

In response to a report about pricing discrepancies in its Bing Cashback service, Microsoft says it has tools to prevent the problem from happening and the case in question was a mistake on the merchant's part. The Bountii blog wrote Monday about a pricing inconsistency for the Canon Vixia HV40 camcorder. In Bing Cashback, the price from retailer Butterfly Photo is listed as $758 with 2% cashback, for a final price of $742.84. But skipping Bing Cashback and going directly to the merchant's site leads to a price of $699. After becoming aware of the blog post, a Microsoft spokesperson blam [...]

Related Topics: Channel: Retail | Microsoft: Bing Shopping & Cashback

Below is what happened in search today, as reported on Search Engine Land and from other places across the web. From Search Engine Land: Google’s ‘New’ Search Ad FormatsThe Google Blog formally announced the new search ad formats Google has been showing in the search results. The new ads include the relatively old AdWords video ad, AdWords Sitelinks, local AdWords, product AdWords, comparison ads and more. The product ads are now available to all U.S. advertisers. Here is how to get started: [...] Hold On: Are More Papers Really Joining Murdoch’s Google Blo [...]

Related Topics: Channel: Other | SearchCap

The Google Blog formally announced the new search ad formats Google has been showing in the search results. The new ads include the relatively old AdWords video ad, AdWords Sitelinks, local AdWords, product AdWords, comparison ads and more. The product ads are now available to all U.S. advertisers. Here is how to get started: First, log in to Google Merchant Center and add your Adwords customer ID to your account. Then, simply visit the campaign settings tab in your AdWords account, find the 'Ad extensions' heading and select the option to "Use product images and information from my Googl [...]

Related Topics: Channel: SEM | Google: AdWords | Top News

Bloomberg has a story out suggesting that the publishers of the Denver Post and the Dallas Morning News may be joining Rupert Murdoch's coalition of the willing to block Google. But I don't think that's what going on at all, and I'm trying to clarify things. Dean Singleton, CEO of MediaNews Group, which publishes the Denver Post and many other newspapers, is quoted saying: The things that go behind pay walls, we will not let Google search to, but the things that are outside the pay wall we probably will, because we want the traffic. OK, I'm fairly sure that Singleton is simply unaware tha [...]

Related Topics: Channel: Content | Google: News | Top News

At a recent international search marketing conference in London the most frequent question asked by the audience was "How do I get my content found and indexed by global and local search engines?" During the breaks I talked to a few people who indicated little or none of their local market content was being indexed by the major engines. Close examination of these sites revealed that they were all using some form of language detection. In two cases they were doing language detection because they saw Google doing it and assumed that this was the best approach. However, if you are like m [...]

Related Topics: Channel: SEO | Multinational Search

Paid search marketing is complicated enough, and several long-held industry myths aren’t helping make your job any easier. Debunk these SEM tall tales once and for all, and your campaigns will be well on their way to higher ROI.

Related Topics: Channel: SEO | Google: AdWords | Industrial Strength | Search Ads: General

In October TheStreet reported a rumor that Google was building its own mobile phone. That was repeated again recently by TechCrunch, which said emphatically that Google was building a branded phone -- despite Android founder Andy Rubin's denials that Google was going to design its own hardware. Now we get the Times of London with lots of alleged detail about the device and the way it would work: The Googlephone promises to be one of the most advanced smartphones, with a large touchscreen display and a processor almost twice as fast as the one powering Apple’s iPhone 3GS. It will probab [...]

Related Topics: Channel: Mobile | Google: Mobile

Yahoo has announced a new set of features for its Search Assist service that makes the Yahoo search box a lot smarter. Perhaps the main innovation here is the inclusion of content and information right inside the Search Assist dropdown. For example, do a search for a company's stock symbol, and Yahoo will show real-time stock prices and a couple related links before you even execute the search. Yahoo says similar features are available for queries related to sports, travel, and movies. Search Assist can now also help users reach other Yahoo properties more quickly. For certain qu [...]

Related Topics: Channel: Consumer | Search Features: Shortcuts | Yahoo: Search | Yahoo: Shortcuts | Yahoo: User Interface

Google is doing some very interesting things in TV and video advertising these days. Not long ago it licensed Nielsen's PRIZM audience segmentation data for enhanced audience targeting through TVAds. Google also recently introduced "skippable" pre-roll ads on YouTube. The idea is to find willing audiences and make advertisers (potentially) only pay when someone watches the entire ad or a substantial portion of it. Now Google has done a deal with TiVo. According to Variety: TiVo will give highly detailed data never previously reported to Google TV ad clients. Google also has a deal with Dis [...]

Related Topics: Channel: Video | Google: AdWords | Google: TV

Forget PageRank, at least if you're a news publisher looking to do well in Google News. Google's news service doesn't rely on the same algorithm used by "regular" Google, of which PageRank is a part of. Instead, Google News taps into its own unique ranking signals, which include user clicks, the estimated authority of a publication in a particular topic, freshness, geography and more. In this, the third part of a wide-ranging interview I held with Josh Cohen, business product manager of Google News, a look into how Google News ranks content. Also be sure to read the first two install [...]

Related Topics: Channel: SEO | Features: General | Google: News | How To: SEO | Top News

I reported at the Search Engine Roundtable that Google AdSense is displaying ads with weird characters in the titles and ad descriptions. The characters seem to be broken HTML entities of some sort, where the HTML is not escaping properly. Here are screen shots from the ads on this site and my personal blog: Google is aware of the issue and is working on fixing it. [...]

Related Topics: Channel: Display | Google: AdSense

The Google AdWords API blog reminds us that version 200906 of the beta AdWords API will be shut down on February 2, 2010. Replacing that is version 200909, which has been available since October. Also, as a reminder, version 13 of the API is closing April 22, 2010. I keep reminding AdWords advertisers and developers, because these dates are incredibly important to keep your campaigns, reporting and tools up to date. [...]

Related Topics: Channel: SEM | Google: AdWords | Google: APIs

In this crazy digital era where even people like my poor old gospel-singing father look online for almost everything (usually guns and cashews), you really need to understand how to use as many types of advertising as possible in order to improve your efforts and expand your reach. Since link building is all over the SEO news right now, it's being touted as the "fix" that will open the doors of the site to vast wealth and bring loads and loads of converting traffic. However, like with any form of marketing, nothing should truly stand alone. If you're just doing paid ads, you should consider [...]

Related Topics: Channel: SEO | Link Building | Link Building: General | Link Week

I've just had a rather surreal afternoon, having been asked (at very short notice) to appear on Channel 4 News (the main news show on one of the UK's 5 terrestrial broadcasters.) I was invited on the program to to discuss Rupert Murdoch's reported plans to link up with Bing at the same time as pulling News International's content from Google. Video of the discussion on Channel 4: Whatever happens, what can't be disputed is that the print news business is facing a number of serious challenges as it tries to work out how to update business models that have been around for hundreds of yea [...]

Related Topics: Channel: Social | Search & Social