Will 2012 be the year of the sock puppet Olympics?
The Olympics certainly are a double edged sword when it comes to marketing.
The rules and regulations are heavily enforced but not always widely understood.
In the UK there's even the Olympics Symbol etc. (Protection) Act 1995 which means making mistakes with Olympic marketing may have very serious consequences.
Seven changes Search plus Your World brings to PPC
Search plus Your World is well underway in rolling out for English language Google.com searches.
The new evolution of Google is effectively live in the States and for many people in the UK, like myself, who search on the .com site by default rather than the .co.uk.
Search plus Your World impacts PPC just as it impacts SEO. Let’s look at seven reasons why your PPC strategy might need changes due to Search+
The AdWords which could give you a criminal record
In 2012 the Olympic Games are coming to London. They bring one of the most strict and heavily enforced set of trademark restrictions, sponsorship and marketing rule sets in the world.
Using Google image search for affiliate recruitment
A good affiliate marketing campaign is one that has a fair spread of affiliate types. It is not all desirable to have too few driving too high a percentage of the earnings.
What if you were to lose one of those key affiliates?
Has Google just patented behavioural quality signals?
Google scored a new patent this week. Does it indicate a change in direction behind the search giant’s logic or even pose yet another problem to Google’s competitors?
Four ways the SEO industry could rule the world
SEO has changed beyond recognition over the last ten years. At one point SEO was an obscure hobby for geeks chatting to one another over Usenet. Then it became a cottage industry. Then SEO became a career prospect.
Now it’s a huge industry that commands the attention of CMOs and CEOs of multi-national companies.
Four ways the SEO industry could kill itself
Generally speaking, it is a good time for search and for those who work in the sector. Many agencies are bucking the economic climate, budgets for SEO continue to grow and pretty much every decision maker on the client-side understands and appreciates the value of natural search.
The SEO industry, however, is not immortal. There are times when I genuinely worry whether it will shoot itself in the foot.
On that cheerful note, let’s look at four ways the sector could kill itself...
Exploding screen strategies
Conversations about three screen strategies became conversations about four screen strategies this year. It looked like tablets would be used concurrently with PCs and mobiles, at least for a while, so fashionable jargon received an update.
Where are we now? Five screen strategies? Five and half screen strategies? The number of screens may explode in the not too distant future.
The rise of the reverse affiliate
Affiliate marketing is one of the stalwarts in the digital marketing landscape. It seems to benefit from change as much as it benefits from a lack of change.
For example, over the years CPM prices in non-premium inventory have dropped and yet CPA rates and network overrides have remained largely unchanged.
That has allowed some savvy arbitrage players, like lead brokers or performance agencies, to make a whack of cash. It has also contributed towards the rise of the reverse affiliate.
The ASA will investigate SEO practices
The Advertising Standards Authority in the UK has a wide remit. In March 2011 this remit further expands, with backing from Google, to look at claims and sales practises on websites. It’s already possible for the ASA to investigate PPC campaigns.

