Attack Of The Killer Google Zombies!Written by Michael Cheney
I was walking along beach front this week with warm sunshine in my face. You would think I'd be happy right? Wrong! I was absolutely raging mad!Why? Because I can't stop thinking about people world over who are turning into Killer Google Zombies! Don't share this with people of a nervous disposition because I really can't restrain myself any longer. Picture scene if you will... [A conversation last week though it could be this week or next - it happens all time...] Anon: "We want lots of people to find our website but it doesn't seem to be happening for some reason." Michael: "Can you tell me some of methods you've been using to market your website?" Anon: "Well really we're just waiting for Google to update and then we'll be fine. Once that happens our problems will be over." Michael: "What else are you doing to market your website?" Anon: "There isn't anything else you can do is there?" [Michael slaps head..] **In Search Of The Holy Google Grail Yes - it's attack of Killer Google Zombies. People that think Google IS Internet. Google is not Internet. Google is not search engines. Google is one search engine. That's all. There are millions of Killer Google Zombies out there right now just staring at Google looking to see whether they are ranked on page 124 or 125. Wasting their energy, efforts and life in pursuit of Holy Google Grail - The Number One Ranking...
| | Google Adwords and the Lost Art of Copywriting.Written by Neil Street
Tens of thousands of businesses, large and small, use Google Adwords and Overture Match (from Yahoo!) to advertise their products and services on Internet. An entire industry, loosely known as “Search Engine Marketing” (SEM for short) has grown up to support this new advertising medium. To date, very little independent analysis (as opposed to analysis by industry players) has been published to demonstrate effectiveness of these vehicles to advertisers. Still, businesses seem to be using Adwords and Overture in droves. Briefly stated, Adwords and Overture enable you to run advertisements on search engines and other websites, display of ads being triggered by “keywords.” Hence, if you sell “red widgets,” you would choose “red widgets” as one of your keyword phrases. When a computer user enters “red widgets” as their search term on Google or Yahoo!, your ad may appear in or adjacent to unpaid search results. How high up on page, and how frequently your ad appears, depends upon your “bid,” or how much you are willing to pay for a user to click on your ad (which leads back to your website). Administering your campaign can get a whole lot more complicated than this, but it gives you idea in a nutshell. What makes an effective campaign? There are many variables, but SEM professionals have focused heavily on importance of “keywords” – to extent that entire sub-industries have sprung up to show clients how to create lists of keywords! What has been overlooked, in our estimation, is good old art of copywriting itself – how you write ad. After all, an ad is an ad whether it appears in a newspaper, a magazine, or on Google or Overture. You’ve got space for a short headline and a brief description – briefer on Google than Overture, but at least Google doesn’t truncate your listing, as Overture does. Given how little space you get to work with, and fact that you have no visual opportunity, it is crucial to create compelling, snappy ads. Unfortunately, vast majority are nothing of sort. Most of them look like badly written classified ads – and that’s main reason most of them will deliver poor click through rates and disappointing results. Here’s an example: as a test, I typed “business website promotion” into search box on Yahoo! With all of those internet marketing types placing ads, I figured that I’d definitely see some short, exciting text that would really make me reach for mouse. Wrong. What I saw was just a list of “me too” ads that, with rare exceptions, were indistinguishable from each other. Out of 8 ads on screen, most just displayed headlines such as “website promotion services,” or “affordable website promotion,” or “internet marketing services.” Why would anyone click on one of those ads, especially when there are literally thousands that say same thing? The answer is – they wouldn’t.
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