Analytics fraud for fun and profit
It is ridiculously easy to use Google's personalisation features to 'trick' analytics and bid management packages. If you believe shady folk make money in outsourcing click fraud activity to low wage economies then it's easy to believe the same workforce can be used to make money with this technique.
What will Facebook's acquisition of FriendFeed mean for online reputation management?
Facebook is a little like Las Vegas. I don't mean that you get pulled in by what seem harmless little games at first, only to become dangerously addicted and then unable to leave the place.
Google's eBook hypocrisy
Google runs the risk of a serious and potentially damaging investigation into monopolistic or anti-competitive practises. The search engine has been careful not to fall foul of the strict American rules but will a careless slip with eBooks cost them dear?
Challenges from next-generation URL Shorteners
Digg recently released a URL shortener that doesn't take customers to your website. It wraps your website in a Digg frame instead. This presents a number of challenges.
Those websites Google does not like
While discussing the type of sites Google does not like some people may think of the (allegedly) leaked quality rating guidelines that (allegedly) came from the search engine. However, Google does publicly discuss the type of site it dislikes.
There is a document in circulation in the search industry which people claim to be a copy of Google’s 2007 guidelines to their quality testers. Google does use humans to rate the quality of the search results. Google argue they do not use humans to change the search results.
Taking your US search campaign to Europe
There are a number of common pit traps that American companies risk falling into as they start to push their search marketing campaigns out into Europe.
Is Google's First Click Free a blow to Facebook and Twitter?
Google News publishers know all about the wonders and horrors of First Click Free.
Google News wants to include prestigious newspapers and let users click through to the stories which matched keyword searches.
Some newspapers still want to operate on a subscription model.
Jargon I'd like to ban: Seeding
It seems like a hundred years ago when a client first asked me: "What's Usenet and should we be seeding it?"
I don't know who they had been speaking to but whoever it was should be locked away in a room with angry toddlers.
Is your search marketing campaign legal any more?
On the 26th of May there was an update to The Consumer Protection from Unfair Trading Regulations Act.
There's certainly been coverage of the Act on the likes of the BBC but the focus has been on buzz marketing. Search marketing campaigns could be affected as well.
SEO Wars: Alt Battles
There is no such thing as the 'alt tag' in HTML. There is, however, the alt attribute which is applied to the image tag.
The alt attribute is designed to provide alternative text for an image. I've seen it create wars within marketing departments.
Social media: the best and worst of 2009
Email marketing: six steps to improving customer engagement in 2010
Web 2.0
Graham Charlton
Strategy & Planning
