This Week’s Industry News

Compiled By Rocket Clicks

Google AdWords Behavioral Targeting Gets The Star Treatment This Week

AdWords ads can now target users based on their interests and past browsing history. The ad is also targeted based on the types of pages visited, and how recent and frequent those visits have been. Users can opt out of this feature if they want, which seems logical given the obvious concerns over personal privacy and ad targeting.

Source: Search Engine Land

‘Knock, Knock,’ ‘Who’s There?’ ‘The FTC, To Fine You Indescribable Amounts Of Money’

It’s never good news for a large company when the Federal Trade Commission is serving you, and I don’t mean in a cool dance flick or “how may I help you?” way. The FTC is readying subpoenas for Google in an anti-trust investigation that alleges Google has given preferential treatment to their own advertising and business interests when determining search engine rankings. Uh oh.

Source: The New York Times

Facebook Dominates Display Ad Revenue Rankings

According to new findings from eMarketer, Facebook is set to pull in $2.19 billion in U.S. ad revenue this year, which is $1.04 billion more than Google’s projected revenue and $.57 billion more than Yahoo!’s estimates. TV ads absorb 16% of the industry’s business, while the Internet comprises 7% of advertising. However, Facebook’s increasing dominance in ad revenue stands to continue because of their ability to reach the majority of searchers that use long tail, high conversion keywords.

Source: Ad Age

ICANN Gives New Top-Level Domains The Green Light

It’s been three years since the Top-Level Domain expansion plan was announced by ICANN, and on Sunday it was given the full approval of implementation by the board. To put it simply, this allows companies and organizations the chance to brand their name in a domain extension. For example, Ford could create a web site under the domain of .Ford, and any other brand could do something similar with their name.

Source: Circle ID

LinkedIn Unveils Personalized Ads Based On User Data

A recent LinkedIn blog post announced that the business-minded social network will feature personalized advertising for potential job opportunities and standard ads catering to your potential interests.

Source: LinkedIn Blog

Apparently, YouTube Video Ads Count As Views

Movie trailers are often some of the fastest YouTube videos to reach 1 million views and beyond. But in a very meta-like way, these ads also include 15-30 second product ads at the start of the video that are counted as an additional view in the total count.

The example used in this article indicates that the statistics box next to a Conan the Barbarian view count reveals that 4.98 million of the 5.49 million views belong to the preview ads. A YouTube spokesperson explained that this isn’t always the case with promoted videos, and all ad views that are counted only become so when it’s clear the viewer is going to watch the actual video.

Source: Tech Crunch

Google Sets Another Traffic Record

In May, Google did something no other Internet company has done in a single month: reach a billion unique page views. Google has averaged an 8.4% increase in unique visitors per month over the past year, according to comScore data. Microsoft’s 905 million unique views in May were up 15% from April, and fall just behind Google’s impressive total.

Source: Wall Street Journal

April Showers Did Not Bring May Sales

For the first time in almost a year (11 months), retail sales in May declined by .2%, according to the U.S. Commerce Department. This was actually a lower drop than expected, and the area hit the most include electronics and appliances (-1.3%) and building materials and garden equipment supplier sales actually increased (+1.2%).

Perhaps not so coincidentally, those industries are correlated to Mother’s Day and Memorial Day, when flowers, gift cards, women’s clothing, building materials and grilling equipment are popular. June’s commerce forecast is a bit ambiguous right now, but with Father’s Day and July 4 approaching, it’s reasonable to expect building equipment, men’s clothing, and recreational tools and accessories to experience increased sales.

Source: Google Retail Advertising Blog

Japan Owns The World’s Fastest Computer

There’s a new king on top of the computer power rankings, and its name is “K.” Japan’s supercomputer, housed at the Institute of Physical and Chemical Research, unseated a Chinese computer for the first time in seven years. The “K Computer” is so powerful, it beats out the capabilities of the next five fastest computers combined and conducts three times as many calculations per second as the second-ranked computer. Read through the article to learn some of the more astonishing facts about the “K Computer.”

Source: Wall Street Journal

Notable Commentary

That Beats The Panda Update

Moving On From Google Panda

Eric Bjorndahl, co-founder of TravBuddy, details some trial-and-error updates to his site as they adjust to the Google Panda algorithm update. Bjorndahl admits many of the changes are “duh” moments in hindsight, and many SEO changes/tests may be needed before things return to normal. Still, this is essential reading for people that want to know what does and doesn’t work in the new age of Google.

Analysis By: Eric Bjorndahl, TravBuddy

Tech Crunch’s Crusade Against Groupon Continues

Tech Crunch has a running string of articles exposing many unpleasant things about Groupon, their business model, and unethical practices. This piece especially goes right for the jugular, and at one point offers advice for legally scamming Groupon.

Analysis By: Rocky Agrawal, Tech Crunch

Don’t Even Consider Writing Off Schema.org. Seriously.

Brian Flores explains why your web site simply can’t afford to get on the Schema.org bandwagon as early as possible. You should have already submitted your site and its content to this useful tool before finishing the previous sentence.

Analysis By: Brian Flores, Search Engine Journal

How Does Google Keep Their Sales Agents Constantly Up To Date?

Fast Company was privileged enough to spend some time with Google to learn how the company keeps its thousands of sales agents in line with the most recent updates in the always changing world of Internet marketing. This is a rather interesting read for anyone interested in learning how a multi-billion dollar company stays well oiled on a day-to-day basis.

Analysis By: E.B. Boyd, Fast Company

Various Ways Top Optimizing Landing Pages For Social And PPC Traffic

SEOmoz (PPC) and Unbounce (Social) provide a few tips for optimizing landing pages for entrance traffic sources other than standard organic search. The reputation of both sides

Analysis By: Oli Gardner, Unbounce

Analysis By: Salar Salahshoor, SEOmoz

Rebuttal From The Angry Duke Nukem PR Firm

Remember the Radner Group’s threatening tweet in response to a negative review of the new Duke Nukem video game? Well their one-man PR team wrote a response article explaining and defending his position. Basically, it’s a lot of “I made a mistake airing my grievances in public, but…” statements throughout five pages.

Analysis By: Jim Redner, Wired

Mom And Pop Marketing That Could Even Withstand A Kramer Faux Pas

Outside-the-box thinking is the theme in this piece of analysis that details how smaller businesses can still remain competitive even as a bi box store (Wal-Mart, Target) moves in next door.

Analysis By: Martin Lindstrom, Fast Company

Some Reasons For The Rise In Banner Ad Spending

Banner ad spending has reached record levels this year, but their click-through rates are extremely low. Todd Wasserman likens their success, despite a low tangible ROI, to TV ads in terms of building brand awareness.

Analysis By: Todd Wasserman, Mashable

How The iPhone 5 Could Temper Android Popularity On Verizon

Since Verizon added the iPhone to its smartphone repertoire, Android device popularity has steadily decreased. This article provides some historical perspective on why that could actually be reversed in the near future.

Analysis By: MG Siegler, Tech Crunch

Amazon.com Founder Aims To Make 10,000 Year Clock A Reality

It’s worth reading the article and visiting this web site to get a good idea of what Amazon.com founder Jeff Bezos wants to become of his 10,000 year clock project. Something tells me none of us will be alive when the clock finally runs out, either from the natural life cycle or the inevitable robot takeover.

Analysis By: Dylan Tweney, Wired