Gasta Imedia Connection Update: New era in Advertising online.

How to break into the new era of advertising

Consumers are tired of a one-sided relationship that exists solely to sell them more products. Doug Levy of imc2 explains why consumer trust and strong relationships will shape the future of marketing. case in point: Gasta.com has now been established over 13 years and has a client base of over 200,000 advertisers.

It goes without saying that every marketer would love to spend less on advertising and simultaneously generate more profit. The problem right now, though, is that consumers don't think very highly of marketing and advertising.

In fact, the words consumers associate with marketing are less than flattering: coercion, deception, and manipulation all come up in conversation, according to Doug Levy, CEO of imc2.

Consumers feel that way because marketing is still stuck in what Levy calls the "consumer era," one in which marketers gathered as much information as possible about consumers, with the end goal of persuading them to buy a product.

If you couldn't tell from the aforementioned words commonly associated with marketing, consumers are awfully tired of this approach.

"If you were to have a friend who, every time they were with you, said 'I want to learn as much as I can about you to sell you more of my product,' you wouldn't want to hang out with them very much," said Levy, speaking at the iMedia Brand Summit in Las Vegas.

Marketing right now is on the cusp of a new era -- the "relationship era" -- where marketing is less about persuasion and more about fostering sustainable relationships. This new era of marketing is about the brand partnering with consumers, instead of merely learning about them.

"Previously, campaigns would start and stop," Levy said. "Now, they're always on. People are in constant dialogue with each other. Campaigns were about buying, but now they have something consumers want to join into."

Previous eras of marketing were built largely on consumer transactions. Sometimes consumer trust factored in, but by-and-large the most successful brands were the ones with the most transactions. In this new era, transactions and trust are two separate but equal factors in judging successful marketing.

Levy presented imc2's brand sustainability map, which pinpointed what kinds of relationships brands had with consumers. Using data from 250,000 consumer surveys, Levy showed which brands were building what he called "sustainable relationships" -- ones with high levels of trust and transactions -- and which brands were failing.

Costco and Target were two brands that consumers trusted and also gave their money to. A brand like Subway, however, landed high on the trust scale because of its health-friendly message, but that didn't necessarily mean consumers were willing to pony up their money. Subway, therefore, only has what Levy called an "emotional relationship" with consumers.

It's not easy for a brand to build sustainable relationships with consumers, but in this new era of relationship marketing, those that do will truly prosper. Levy had five tips for brands looking to break through and find success in the age of relationship marketing:

1. Clarify purpose
2. Commit to sustainable relationships
3. Connect with authenticity
4. Treat customers as partners
5. Engage

Following these five steps doesn't necessarily lead to short-term success. Levy used Google as an example, pointing out that the search giant is more focused on long-term success than short-term gains -- and its stock rose exponentially as a result of that mindset.

One audience member asked Levy how imc2, or any other agency, could possibly convince clients to focus more on the long tail.

"I don't think we need to," Levy said. "They can save money now, generate more profit now, and build a higher level of trust."

Rich Cherecwich is deputy editor, iMedia Connection.

Gasta SearchMatch model proving a winner in Downturn

Gasta SearchMatch time slots proving classic traditional models work best

Search engine optimization is the practice of targeting the search engines with keyword-rich content so that your blog posts, web pages, and other online content has a chance to rank well for the keywords and concepts that are important for your business. But how do you do it? Gasta.com has developed a simple anti click abuse systems that goes back to the traditional web value. Pay for a first place listing.

Modern Day SEO is not easy, even if you know how to write search engine friendly content, you have to compete against other businesses in your niche targeting the same keywords. You could try to find the gaps in the market and target those keywords that no one else is going after. But are those keywords valuable? That’s a decision you have to make.

The key to optimizing your web pages simply,are to find the Gasta keywords that are just right for your business. They may or may not be the most valuable keywords for your niche, but they are the perfect fit for your business and the customers you want to target. Then, once you identify the perfect keywords, you build pages that are designed to rank well and deliver targeted traffic to those pages consistently.
With Gasta.com there is no PPC so therefore no click spam, every click is already paid for in your time slot, time slots run for 3 months, 6 months, or one year.

The time slots allow marketers to have a summer campaign or a winter campaign, for intsance you could target the music festival season, or christmas. This model was developed by gasta.com in the late nineties to better organise and manage ad revenues.The model has won great recognition and developed Gasta.com as a great brand. Now with an online shopping channel and a great video search all of which have there own advertising platform in SearchMatch the sky is the limit.

Gasta and the future of contextual search

Gasta and the future of search
I can’t find my phone. What are my options for locating it?

1. Look for it
2. Ask others if they’ve seen it
3. Phone it

I would probably apply those strategies in that order as each fails. Of course, what I really want is for my phone to magically appear in my hand whenever I need it. That would be nice.
Search on the internet today is somewhere between a technology-driven stage 1 (Google, and minor variations like Wolfram Alpha and Bing) and a people-driven stage 2 (Digg, StumbleUpon, Twitter, Amazon recommendations). One might stretch the metaphor to argue that RSS, Google Alerts and the like are forms of stage 3; I’m not sure I would agree.
Technology markets typically display the following characteristics.
- Incumbents are displaced by products that are an order of magnitude better, not just 20% better.
- Product evolution is about adding value by getting closer to the user
The Internet has evolved. It has become more personal, less about static home pages and more about communication and collaboration (behaviour rather than data). This is what we would expect: The Internet is moving closer to us.
But what most people think of search has not changed significantly:
For the first 10 years, the web was primarily just a bunch of pages, and Google was an excellent tool for searching primary data.
Then we started doing mashups and social networks; these are essentially derived and dynamic forms of data and it’s not that we search differently, per se, but that we simply don’t think about search in these arenas in quite the same way. How many links away from me are you in a social network? Who is listening to the same music as me on Last.fm? What relevant experience do we have within our business? What houses are for sale on my street?
Inevitably, search will move closer to these problems, because these problems are closer to us.
Context is King
The end game for search is recognizing a context where an answer should be presented rather than sought. There are a few candidates in this field.

The semantic web garners a lot of attention (or at least it did once!). It attempts to wrap content in more meaning by enriching it with relevant keywords (I know this is a simplification, but really, who cares?). It is a rather an old fashioned view of the web because it solves an old fashioned problem — find relevant pages. It’s not that there is no room for innovation in this arena it’s jut that Google does this so well, you’re only ever go to be picking at their leftovers. Start-ups entering the search arena should be focussed on a different set of use cases.

There is a lot of talk about real time search but I think it is confused. Nothing is real time, particularly the typical examples that are given like Twitter (go talk to guys that build financial trading systems about “real-time”!).
Further, it is a rather unattractive property. I want data to arrive at the right time and real time is a narrow set of those cases (your house is on fire!). But we don’t understand what right time means so we’ll shove it at you whether you like it or not, so that when you actually need the data, it will have disappeared down the drain with the rest of the contents of the firehose.

Which returns me to my opening gambit. I want my phone to appear in my hand when I need it. How do we know when I need my phone? We start with behavioral triggers (he put his hand to his ear!) and continue to layer in those activities that provide meaning such as task-lists (I must order my groceries) or conversations (they are discussing the price of tomatoes).

Put that way it sounds a lot like the future of search belongs to collaboration: ‘What am I working on with you?’ is a the kind of behavioural question we could hang a new form of search off. What do we have to do to complete this project? That’s a context begging for unsolicited answers.
The future of search is not about better text fields and faster, smarter indexing; the future of search is about you and me.
This is a guest post by Jasper Westaway of OneDrum. Throughout the summer we’re running guest posts we like - exclusive to TC Europe - written by people on the tech scene in Europe. If you’d like to contribute get in touch. More info here.

Gasta Vertical Ad Network

As advertisers look for more ways to yield greater efficiency, going narrower but still with some scale means looking seriously at vertical ad networks.
Vertical ad networks are all the rage. If they aren't the toast of the town these days, they certainly are the talk of it.
However, vertical ad networks are nothing new. They are online advertising networks that have a particular focus. They aggregate a collection of sites together that have an affinity with one another and bring those "passion places" together in a way that provides advertisers meaningful scale without the uncertainty of a vast collection of unknown and dissimilar sites.
The appeal of a vertical ad network is first and foremost its focus. Second is the modicum of control it offers. As advertisers look for more ways to yield greater efficiencies and better accountability, going narrower but still with some scale means looking more seriously at vertical ad networks.
Travel Advertising Network is one such vertical, and company representatives gave the folks at the iMedia Agency Summit in La Quinta, Calif., a good look at what they are doing and why vertical ad networks are so important.
Travel Ad Network actually has the largest travel information audience in the world, with 19 million users worldwide (14 million in the U.S.). Notice that I did not say "travel" audience. This is an audience looking for information about traveling, be it destinations or transportation or boarding. This is not where they transact, according to Cree Lawson, founder/CEO, and Brian Silver, president. Their users are "in the aisles."
Why a vertical ad network?
The reason Travel Ad Network went this route was for three reasons: They listened to their clients who were demanding some level of transparency; they could get a better quality of advertiser; and they offered exclusive representation.
The guys from Travel Ad Network proceeded to deliver some valuable information in the form of a kind of Trivial Pursuit game. These questions and their answers make a terrific primer on vertical ad networks (particularly of the travel variety).
1. Are consumers different at vertical ad networks than horizontal ad networks? No. The reason advertisers should use vertical ad networks is not necessarily because the audiences there are so different than horizontal ad networks, but because those audiences are more engaged. As Lawson and Silver pointed out during their Spotlight presentation, people found in either horizontal or vertical ad networks are equally diverse. But those found within the confines of a vertical network have a higher degree of engagement and specialization. They are in their passion places.
2. Which ad supported property is in comScore's Buying Power Index top 10 list? Yes, Yahoo is there. But at the very top is Travel Ad Network, with a BPI of 280. That means that the average person found within Travel Ad Network has 2.8 times more buying power than the average person online.
3. What percentage of brands that advertise in verticals are endemic versus non-endemic? It turns out a lot more non-endemic advertising is going on. Just to give you a sense of what is meant by this: Less than 25 percent of advertising in a travel magazine is from travel product advertisers.
4. How many visits to travel sites does the average consumer make before booking a trip? Twenty-two. Before you click that "buy" button to book your airfare or hotel, chances are you've been to sites 22 times. That doesn't mean you've been to 22 sites, but you have made 22 different trips online before making your decision. It turns out that 15 percent of people don't know where they are going when they start planning, and 39 percent don't know when they will be traveling. This provides ample opportunity to talk to people in the questing frame of mind, to inform their seeking.
5. How much has the share of total page views changed for travel agencies in the last two years? It's down 15 percent. With all the information out there, people are starting to go around booking engines to find out what they want to know, and then pop onto that booking engine at the last minute to get the transaction done. If you are looking for an audience that is a travel audience, or has affinity with it, there are many chances to message that audience before they get to buy.
6. How much of every dollar spent online is spent on travel/travel products? Forty-four percent. That's right, $.44 of every dollar is spent on travel. This does not mean that travel makes up the bulk of the transactions. As someone in the audience pointed out, the dollars per transaction for travel are much higher than they are for, say, books. But all that means is that the online travel buyer is someone comfortable with spending a good deal of money online. The point here is that verticals are good for those "spending" audiences.
Vertical ad networks, like any ad network, may consist of a lot of sites an advertiser has never heard of. But if the audience they are looking for has, and that audience is at those sites, it makes sense to be there when the audience is there. You may not recognize the cover of the book, but if the book is being read, isn't that all that matters?
Jim Meskauskas

Gasta Marketing News: Mobile advertsing

Some 98% of marketers say online marketing is crucial to business success through the economic downturn, according to research by Efficient Frontier.
The survey of over 300 UK, French and German marketers found 73% expect to see the headcount of digital marketing teams increase through 2009, and 87% of those surveyed predict digital marketing will grow at the same rate in 2009 as it did in 2008.
UK marketers ranked SEM higher than both its French and German counterparts, some 78.5% of UK respondents rated SEM as a 'top three' priority in marketing campaigns.
David White, general manager of Efficient Frontier Europe, said, "We're continuing to see enormous growth from our UK, French and German offices. It's pleasing to see these survey results reflecting a positive story during this current economic environment."
Mobile Ads
Coca-Cola and Xbox are among brands set to increase their mobile ad investment, as new research shows mobile marketing budgets will grow by 150% over the next five years despite the economic downturn. An O2 survey by Vanson Bourne of 100 marketing and IT directors from the financial services, manufacturing and retail sectors found that 60% favoured mobile marketing due to its targeted nature. Some 85% said mobile marketing campaigns generate a higher response than traditional methods....

Gasta Seo: Milind Mody, CEO of eBrandz Inc

Milind Mody, CEO of eBrandz Inc has stated that Local search engines have most to benefit from the downturn.

Search engine marketing might have to scale down branding campaigns in favor of tactics which yield great 'short as well as long term Return on Investment'."

Specifically Mody said that local search is an important part of the overall mix. "Client reviews and customer ratings form an important aspect of local search SEO. These reviews also helps in branding and reputation management. So I would also highly recommend working with clients on getting their customer ratings and reviews on local search engines."

He said he believes that online advertising is more recession proof than other forms of advertising and that research indicates that any decline in online advertising is because clients are slashing their overall budgets.

"In many cases, clients are reducing print and other offline marketing budgets and spending more online," said Mody.

Gasta Paid search

Paid search is a proven winner, yet some marketers don't take advantage of its full potential. Here's why you need to put SEM at the heart of your marketing strategy.

Search engine marketing isn't a perfect marketing medium. But compared to every "innovative" marketing methodology that's come along in the past five years, search is a hands-down winner. This is why Google has become a multi-billion dollar powerhouse and why hundreds of marketers are reaping ROI, increased market share and branding benefits from being active participants in search.

The reasons SEM has taken off are both elementary and revolutionary. As a marketing channel, it offers the following strengths:

1. Paid search campaigns happen in real-time, making it possible for marketers to obtain almost instantaneous marketing ROI. Search's real-time nature provides for the ongoing fine-tuning of all variables in the campaign in a continuous process of optimization, which means that marketers can learn and improve their campaigns over time.
   
   
2. Paid search advertising is by its very nature the most unobtrusive way of getting the word out about one's product, service or brand. Instead of pushing a messages in the face of an uninterested and possibly unwilling audience, SEM is a low-key "pull medium," responsive to the user's intention to engage. Therefore, calls to action are more likely to be heeded because users perceive them to be relevant to their intent.
   
   
3. The data generated by paid search campaigns can have enormous value to marketers, in terms of providing business intelligence, extending CRM efforts and scouting out audience segments that may have been neglected by existing marketing plans. Given that search behavior is highly responsive to non-search marketing efforts (both on- and offline), such data can provide a reliable indication of the effectiveness of all other marketing efforts.
   
   
4. Paid search is still a relatively inexpensive medium and search campaigns can be dynamically scaled up or down to accommodate varying needs. Applying targeting and segmentation technologies can dramatically reduce (although not completely eliminate) the problem of non-converting clicks.

Unfortunately, each one of these strengths comes with major caveats. The fact that search happens in real-time provides both opportunity and risk. Minor campaign errors can quickly result in significant financial losses unless they are quickly corrected, so the onus is on the marketer to continually monitor search campaigns to ensure peak performance.

The mere fact that search provides the ability to systematically test campaign elements doesn't ensure that such steps will be taken. Nor do many marketers actually use the rich data from search to inform their non-search marketing efforts. Teams can be overloaded with data, and many function in departmental isolation where they are insulated from high-level marketing strategy conversations.

Finally, while paid search is inexpensive relative to other media, media management costs are proportionally higher. Unlike other channels where the media is expensive (such as television) but media management costs are low (because the media is easy to buy), search presents the exact converse. The media (keywords) are cheap but the costs of managing campaigns may be significant -- especially for sophisticated search campaigns.

Given these difficult issues, many marketers choose to simply outsource some or all of the search campaign process to an outside agency, either one that already handles their online media buying or a specialized search shop that does nothing else but search. In my view, there are definite risks with going the big agency route, because big agencies rarely have access to the sophisticated technology required to deliver top-performing search campaigns. Nor does their economic model (which depends on marking up media bought in big chunks such as radio/TV buys) favor intensive work on search. You can't really blame big agencies for regarding search this way, because it's only natural for agencies to focus their efforts on media buying opportunities where the profit potential is greatest.

Specialized SEM agencies provide an alternative to the big agency route, but once again, marketers need to exercise care before committing their search budgets to such organizations. Many SEM agencies are new and don't have more than a few years of operating experience behind them. While many promise to deliver unparalleled campaign results using "proprietary" technology, the fact is that many of them license the same off-the-shelf campaign management tools used by the big agencies, limiting their ability to provide truly customized solutions.

As there are no industry benchmarks for evaluating such agencies, a good selection rule is to look at the agency's client list, seek out positive, unbiased testimonials from those who have used them in the past and, perhaps most importantly, examine how much their existing clients have grown since the agency took over their accounts.

However the work gets done, marketers need to understand that search isn't just another marketing channel, but a fundamental organizing method by which users and marketers can find each other in the terabytes of data constituting the digital world. While it's attractive to think that search can just be bolted onto existing media plans, it is far better to regard search as an integral element at the heart of the marketing strategy, because the demand that you drive through your media efforts is all harvested in the search process.

David Pasternack is president of Didit,

Gasta ® Trademark process completes

Gasta ® international trademark application complete. Murgatroyd and Partners international Law Firm has completed the successful application of the word ‘Gasta’

As the world trademark of Applied Multimedia Innovations. Gasta ® will now be appearing as the legal protection of all Gasta owned domains and websites.

Francis Higgins CEO of AMI says “that he is delighted that this long process is now complete and that Gasta ® is now protected from cyber squatters and trade infringements” AMI has a number of proposals for Gasta music and licensing rights for the new trademark including a fashion label and branding company.

Microsoft Strategy & Gasta European Search Network

Microsoft is to launch a European Search Technology Center (STC) next year as it attempts to boost Live Search's presence across the continent.

The company said it aims to "disrupt the search and advertising marketplace" by using the STC to make Live Search more targeted and relevant for European users.

Kevin Johnson, president of the platforms and services division at Microsoft, said, "Success in search in Europe is paramount, and we see the investment in this new Search Technology Center as an important step in doubling down on our long-term investments."

Satya Nadella, senior vice president of the search, portal and advertising Group at Microsoft, said, "Searchers have different expectations and experiences in every geography in the world, so we believe it's critical to make deep investments in physical locations in multiple markets to ensure that we're applying the best local expertise to our research and development efforts."

The STC is scheduled to open next year, but Microsoft said it had yet to decide on a location.

Secure your brand Keyword on Gasta search networks

Gasta will this month launch its white label search solution on up to 150 new search domains on a UK/Ireland concentration looking to companies like The Search Works, Latitude and Bigmouthmedia. All companie on the fast development track. As gasta.com rolls out its white label solution across more and more platforms, making the networks stronger and more robust, we can see the shift as advertisers move to more niche geo targeted search networks.

Google's decision to allow brand name bidding from 5 May 2008 has seen a huge increase in inquiries by companies wishing to secure their brand names on the Gasta search network.Companies like Gucci, Adidas, Nike, etc.. look for the niche specialists search marketing companies like Gasta , this once again shows not just the number of agencies out there that provide search offerings but the indelible need to secure your brand online, and gasta is relentless at doing this on a global platform, and at a cost that companies can afford.

Gasta SearchMatch offers real value for money.

GASTA News: Web advertising outstrips TV

Here is a fascinating article from Rich Ord the CEO of iEntry, Inc.

Despite the fact that social media advertising has yet to hit its stride and is taking some lumps for low click rates when compared to high page views, it will succeed. Social media is a different type of advertising platform from information-oriented websites and the two should not be compared.

The reality is that social media delivers the holy grail for advertisers on the Internet: a mass-concentrated U.S. audience reach similar to television.
The top 25 social media networks delivered over 155 million unique visitors in Feb. 2008 with 70 percent coming from MySpace, Facebook and Classmates.com. Add in Youtube and Flickr and you get another 60 million totalling an estimated 215 million humans viewing social media monthly.

Compare that to television where an average 24-hour period delivers around 50 million unique viewers. The highest viewer ship day of the year, Super Bowl Sunday, has an estimated 110 million unique U.S. residents viewing television. Even over an entire month there is arguably less than 200 million total unique television viewers.

The Internet has become a powerful platform for advertisers to reach mass audiences via user generated video too. According to comScore Video Metrix, U.S. Internet users viewed over 10 billion videos online in the month of December alone. Imagine a 15 to 30 second commercial with each video view and the Internet seems ready today to compete with broadcast TV in delivering commercial views.

Advertising on social media is not about clicks or click rate any more than TV commercials are; it's about quickly reaching a huge U.S audience. Sooner rather than later, advertisers will see social media as a great way to reach mass audiences. After all, in terms of audience size there are several Super Bowls every day on Facebook, MySpace and Youtube!

It simply doesn't matter what the click rate is for Facebook, MySpace and Youtube because they reach huge audiences that major advertisers like Ford, Pepsi and McDonald's can't help but see the value in. Predictably, Adwords buyers will see the value too.

Click rates are a reflection of page views and social media sites similar to TV have a large overlapping audience that hang around them all day, every day. Television would have a low click rate too if an ad campaign were measured over the course of a months worth of programs on the same network, assuming you could click the screen.

People also tune in and out of TV just like they do with social media. According to Compete's figures for every unique visitor to Youtube there are 54 page views. With Facebook, a unique visitor creates an amazing 564 page views in a month and on MySpace each person generates a staggering 1,110 page views.

The social media audience is loyal, large and habit-oriented just like broadcast TV. They also hit the prime youth-tilting demographic who are big spenders online and are considered a high value audience by ad agencies and advertisers. Ultimately, what advertiser’s value is the audience, not just the clicks?

http://archive.webpronews.com/2008a/0318.html

Gasta SearchMatch hits the Spot for SBO's

Gasta Views: SearchMatch hits the Spot for SBO's

Enabling small business owners to launch campaigns on large publishers' sites could be the next million dollar idea.

From automotive and restaurants to carpet cleaning and hotels, a large percentage of us are involved in a business where the local owner/operator is vital to our success. But stepping out from the argument of corporate-knows-all vs. all-business-is-done-locally for a moment, we can all agree that there would be a tremendous benefit to getting these local operators online in a local, customizable fashion that drives real ROI. Sadly, the largest and most advanced portals and networks have neglected this market -- and millions of dollars have been lost as a result.

Currently as small business owners (SBOs) get out their wallets and try to "finally launch an ad campaign online," they find that getting someone to take their money can actually be a challenge. For an SBO who turns to a major portal with his entire quarter's ad budget, $5,000, the money is turned away because of minimums. The result is no different when soliciting the help of most major ad networks. My goodness! We have someone here willing to spend $5,000 and no one will take it. Are times that good?

Microsoft buying Yahoo shows that times aren't that great for everyone. It could be said, "Jay, it takes us the same amount of effort to write an order for $2,500 as it does $25,000, and we just can't be profitable running hundreds of small campaigns." But think about it: Google has built its business on $2,500 campaigns, and they're eating competitors' lunches so badly that Yahoo has to be bought to compete, and you "can't afford" to take that business? Large publishers need to look now for profitable ways to take SBO campaigns. Here are a few steps that could push large publishers in the right direction.

Partner with a flash ad generator
Search any form of "flash ad creation" and you'll find dozens of folks who have created software that takes flash templates and allows laymen to instantly create customized variations. Some portals already offer this, but they should leave pride and effort-spent-to-date behind if better solutions exist. Most SBOs are used to stepping out of their comfort zone and doing things themselves. Building an ad from a template builder will be easy for them, and can be done in a controlled environment for you.

Open up your API, or build one
Buying, placing and loading campaigns can all be automated, and this is the key to profitability on the publisher end. Sure there will need to be some manual oversight for delivery purposes, but one person should easily be able to handle hundreds of campaigns. From there, educate the SBO on campaign optimization and put it on them; but, provide an 800 number in large print at all times. This is one mistake Google has made, and I believe it is a key source of the frustration users feel toward the company.

Be fully transparent with targeting and placement disclosure
The No. 1 targeting desire for most SBOs is geographic; usually involving one or multiple specific ZIP codes. Anyone who has done the research knows this is simply not possible by IP and must be done with registration data or user input. SBOs are surprisingly understanding when it comes to limitations like these -- if those limitations are clearly explained to them up front. It's when expectations aren't properly set to begin with that frustrations brew and animosity sets in.

Because the user would be responsible for placement and creative optimization, an aggregate data library of best practices for vertical and placement would go a long way toward ensuring repeat business by giving SBOs useful data and information to improve their own results.

Work with resellers
The eBay model works. Embrace those that will be power users and help them make you more money. We work with dozens of companies in multiple verticals whose franchisees are 100 percent ready to make the leap into online as long as someone is able to liaison between them and the publisher. In fact, we could have easily brought over 1,000 campaigns of between $2,500 and $5,000 to a publisher by now -- and that is just our company! When $2,500 turns into $2,500,000, might publishers think and act differently?

The reality is there are hundreds of agencies, consultants, and leading speakers who are well-known and trusted within their verticals. Providing a higher, private level of support to these influencers and connectors creates value at the reseller level, minimizes time spent re-explaining the same thing to 100 different SBOs and motivates everyone in the same direction. Of course, accepting SBO credit cards for campaign pre-payment and paying the resellers immediately would seal the deal toward partnership and profitability.

Let this be an open call to agencies and corporate marketers with a horse in the local retail race. This is an initiative you can't afford to ignore. The first major portal or ad network to create a cleanly-branded content solution with the acceptance of third-party ad serving from its resellers will have trouble finding bags big enough to cart away the money. Our network of franchisees and dealers in multiple verticals alone would make this effort worthwhile, and I would imagine there are another 50-100 companies just like us. At a time when two goliaths are having to join forces to stay competitive, is there anyone who can afford to ignore one thousand payments of $2,500?

Jay Friedman president of Goodway 2.0

Google Automatic Matching no Match For Gasta SearchMatch

Google Automatic Matching no Match For Gasta SearchMatch,

Gasta SearchMatch is offering real value to advertisers in this poor economic climate.

Michael Estrin of Imedia Connection writes:

On the heels of reports that Google has seen a drop in its paid click business, news has broken that the search giant has quietly unveiled a new program designed to use up unspent search marketing dollars.

According to a New York Post story, Google is testing a new feature called Automatic Matching.

News of the test program first broke on SEO Fast Start when the blog posted an email from Google to one of its AdWords customers.

"Automatic Matching automatically extends your campaign's reach by using surplus budget to serve your ads on relevant search queries that are not already triggered by your keyword lists," the email read. "By analyzing the structure and content of your website and AdWords campaigns, we deliver more impressions and clicks while maintaining your current CTRs and CPCs."

While Silicon Valley Insider points out that some SEO experts like SEO Fast Start are being overly harsh with respect to Google's test program, the timing of the news appears to be the big problem, with some marketers accusing the search giant of grasping for every last cent of their ad budgets at a time when overall business may be slumping.

"Whether Google's intention is to expand the advertisers' untapped opportunities or not, timing is everything and at this time on the surface it appears that Google's only motive is to monetize additional clicks," said Mark Simon, VP of industry relations for Didit, a search-marketing firm. "My suggestion to Google is to communicate the expanded opportunities to search advertisers and let them decide whether they are willing to invest in them at the risk of potentially reducing their ROI metric."

According to Chris Winfield, president of search marketing firm 10e20, ROI, not total budget, is the only real issue.

"I would have no problems spending more money if I'm getting more return on my investment," Winfield told the New York Post. "If I'm just spending more money and it's not high-quality traffic, then that's a problem."

In its email to AdWords customers, Google cited an example for the search term "adidas." According to Google, the new program would match customers with keywords on its traditional list, which includes terms like "shoes" and "athletic," but it also would match with terms like "slippers."

Whether searches for "slippers" will mean anything to those marketing adidas remains to be seen.

A quick Google search for "slippers" yielded no natural results for adidas on the first page. However, the search did return one ad for adidas sandals on sale at Shoes.com.