publishers | Internet Marketing Blog

Blocked! Google takes a page from Blekko

Recently, Google has stepped up its effort to improve the quality of its SERPs. But despite its effort, which seems as concerted as it is genuine, one thing is clear: there's only so much that can be done.

Google can't uncover every paid link, and even after cracking down on content farms, there are those who think it hasn't done enough.

by Patricio Robles 11 March 2011 13:40pm 17 comments

Developers, publishers beware: everywhere is nowhere

iOS, Android, Windows 7, the App Store, Android Market, Windows Marketplace, Facebook, Twitter, Quora, Google TV, PS3...

The number of channels and platforms on the internet and mobile internet is astounding. And it's growing practically every single day. In many ways, this is a blessing, but it's also a curse for developers and publishers.

by Patricio Robles 15 February 2011 13:01pm 4 comments

Murdoch's The Daily: can it work?

Yesterday, News Corp. made what many publishing executives hope will be one of the most important announcements in the annals of digital publishing: the launch of the much-anticipated iPad publication, The Daily.

But while subscribing to The Daily is probably accurately described as 'affordable' at 99 cents a week, or $39.99/year, producing the publication isn't. News Corp. has confirmed that its investment to date is already a whopping $30m, and that The Daily will have a weekly overhead of $500,000.

by Patricio Robles 03 February 2011 09:32am 5 comments

Google, Mozilla jump on the Do Not Track bandwagon

The U.S. Federal Trade Commission doesn't think advertisers are doing enough to respect the privacy of consumers online, so it recently proposed the creation of a Do Not Track system for the web that would give consumers the ability to opt out of ad tracking.

There's just one big challenge: making that happen technically.

by Patricio Robles 26 January 2011 09:32am 1 comment

Google: Doubleclick Ad Exchange growing, boosting CPMs

It has been nearly three years since Google acquired Doubleclick for $3.1bn and despite the fact that Google's largest cash cow is still far and away AdWords, the search behemoth has quietly built up a very strong presence in the display advertising market.

If the numbers from Doubleclick's ad exchange are any indication, that presence will only be getting stronger.

by Patricio Robles 18 January 2011 09:26am 0 comments

Is online advertising really failing content?

Online content may be sexy, but even on the internet, turning a profit as a publisher isn't always easy, particularly if you rely on ad revenue to pay the bills. After all, today's advertising market has come a long way since the 1990s.

Advertisers have a seemingly unlimited array of advertising options, and the proliferation of ad networks and technologies such as retargeting mean that many publishers have seen their CPMs decline.

According to an AdAge opinion piece by Tom Hespos, who runs a digital marketing firm, advertising is failing publishers.

by Patricio Robles 17 January 2011 16:18pm 4 comments

Facebook's new registration tool: the good, the bad, and the ugly

In Facebook's non-stop push to dominate the world by making its service the social fabric of the web, it has courted developers and publishers with a platform and suite of tools.

Most of these tools give developers and publishers the ability to tap into Facebook's vast audience and its social graph, which is attractive for obvious reasons. In return, Facebook's footprint on the web grows as users are exposed to its functionality almost everywhere they go.

by Patricio Robles 20 December 2010 08:57am 15 comments

The real problem with magazine iPad apps

Prior to the launch of the iPad, many magazine publishers hoped that the iPad might do for them what the iPod and iTunes did for digital music: provided a viable marketplace for them to sell their wares. Operative word: sell.

Getting consumers to pay for content has, of course, proven challenging for many magazine publishers. And despite the warm reception the iPad has received from consumers, it hasn't exactly meant overnight success for publishers that have rushed to develop iPad versions of their magazines.

by Patricio Robles 11 October 2010 08:53am 9 comments

Publishers get the short end of the stick with ad-supported content

Despite the fact that many publishers have struggled to transform ad-supported content into profit, many publishers have opted to keep the ad-supported content, and forgo a paywall.

And there's a good reason why: it's entirely unclear to many publishers whether a paywall will be profitable or not, and once a paywall goes up, a publisher's audience will almost certainly drop. For many publishers, ad-supported content and a large audience is still more attractive than paid content and a smaller audience.

by Patricio Robles 22 September 2010 09:22am 1 comment

Is Tumblr important, or just a distraction?

Tumblr, which has been described as a publishing tool that's somewhere between Twitter/Facebook and a full-fledged blog, is a fast-rising star in the crowded world of social media. It recently passed the one billion post mark, and it counts some pretty prominent publishers, including The Economist and Newsweek, as users.

The latest recognizable name in publishing to jump on the Tumblr bandwagon is The Atlantic. It doesn't know what to expect from its Tumblr experiment, but it's getting involved with Tumblr nonetheless.

by Patricio Robles 01 September 2010 09:04am 4 comments