September 2006 - Posts
Podcast & Portable Media Expo,
an industry event bringing together influential podcasters, media, corporate
executives and device makers to cover the complete range of business objectives
for podcasting and portable media, today announced the winners of the "Best of
Show" awards for the 2006 event taking place this weekend. Here are the
winners:
Best "All-Inclusive" Podcasting Software:
Podcast Station from Audion
Laboratories
Best PC Podcast Audio Editing Software:
Adobe Audition
Best Mac Podcast Audio Editing Software:
Bias Peak Pro 5
Best Audio Capture Software:
Audio Hijack Pro from
Rogue Amoeba
Best Mobile Podcast Recording Device (under $500 category):
M-Audio
MicroTrack 24/96
Best Mobile Podcast Recording Device (over $500 category):
Marantz PMD670
Best Podcast Voice Processor: Aphex 230
Master Voice Channel Processor
Best Microphone for Podcasting (under $250 category):
Samson C03U Multi-Pattern USB Studio Condenser Microphone
Best Microphone for Podcasting (over $250 category):
Shure KSM27
Best Mobile Listening Application for Audio and Podcasts:
spodradio
Best Mobile RSS Reader for Podcasts:
FeederReader
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podcasting, podcasts, rss, portable media expo, portable media, podcast expo, video podcasting
NotePage, Inc. has released a new php script that allows users to convert MySQL
databases to RSS feeds. This new SQL2RSS script allows users to easily convert
information that is stored in a database into an RSS feed, for syndication and
distribution. When using SQL2RSS the publisher has complete control over the
content in the resulting RSS feed. Administrators and publishers control the
database query which allows them the flexibility to determine what data is
inserted into the RSS feeds from the database. Additional details related to the
SQL2RSS can be found at:
http://www.feedforall.com/sql2rss.htm.
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sql2rss, sql, mysql, rss, feeds, rss feed, rss, feeds, syndication, databases, database, programmer
Advertising budget stretched to the max? You are not alone. With report after
report this week of online advertising spend topping eight billion in the first
six months of the year, some are wondering if online advertising can sustain in
an environment where click fraud statistics are tossed around like candy at
Halloween party. Lately however there have been several releases of alternate
online promotion solutions which move away from the pay-per-click model that has
caused so much industry strain. One such service is CREAMaid.com, an online
word-of-mouth marketing platform that provides bloggers royalty for
contribution.
Officially starting its beta service today, CREAMaid helps companies start and
carry on word-of-mouth marketing campaign instantly with help from bloggers.
Using CREAMaid, companies (advertisers) can actively seek out early adopters who
will participate in the Conversation by introducing their product on their
blogs.
The site is currently open for both bloggers and companies. Bloggers can
directly participate in some of the suggested Conversations, and companies are
allowed to sign up to create and test Conversations.
As an opening event, CREAMaid plans to demonstrate its possible usages by
actually promoting sites they have selected. Throughout the next month, they
plan to continuously release various campaigns where bloggers can participate
and earn royalty payment instantly. For more information, visit
www.creamaid.com.
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marketing, business, internet marketing, online marketing, web 2.0, blog, advertising, promotion, syndication, widget
comScore Releases U.S. Video Metrix Rankings
comScore Media Metrix released an enhancement to its U.S. Video Metrix service to accomodate for Flash video content as part of the monthly rankings for streaming video sites. Video Metrix is the first and only service to track actual online streaming video behavior among U.S. Internet users, offering publishers and advertisers valuable insights into the emerging Internet video universe.
The results of the announcement may surprise you.
Via the press release:More than 106.5 million people, or about 3 out of every 5 U.S. Internet users, streamed or downloaded video during the month of July. In total, nearly 7.2 billion videos were streamed or downloaded by U.S. Internet users for an average of 67 streams per streamer, which means the typical video streamer viewed an average of more than two streams per day.
Yahoo! Sites ranked as the top property by unique U.S. streamers with 37.9 million, followed very closely by MySpace, which attracted 37.4 million U.S. streamers. Fast-rising Youtube ranked third with 30.5 million U.S. streamers, followed by the Time Warner Network (25.7 million U.S. streamers) and Microsoft Sites (16.2 U.S. million streamers).
MySpace fared particularly well in U.S. user engagement. The site ranks first among all sites in individual video streams initiated by U.S. users with nearly 1.5 billion streams, which represented 20 percent of all videos streamed by U.S. Internet users in July. The typical U.S. streamer on MySpace initiated an average of 39 streams during the course of the month, or slightly more than one per day. Yahoo! Sites ranked second in total streams initiated by U.S. users with 812 million, followed by Youtube with 649 million.
I'm a true believer in the power of the Internet to help companies large and small generate exposure for their business. When it comes to the local marketplace on the Web however, I have not yet been completely sold on the idea that the average Mom and Pop store (
that is not supported by a global brand) can make a positive impact on their bottom line by engaging in online marketing. There are many inexpensive yet powerful tools to help you achieve at least a modicum of exposure in the local Web scene, the latest of which caught my eye and my attention this morning.
Insider Pages and Fast Search today announced that Insider Pages has deployed the FAST Enterprise Search Platform to power
www.insiderpages.com. As a result, the site delivers faster and more relevant information on local businesses and services by enabling those on the local level to go online and share their word-of-mouth wisdom about local businesses.
"
With every enhancement we make to the site, we are singularly focused on providing the very best member experience possible," said Mark Smallcombe, vice president of engineering for Insider Pages. "
By deploying newer, smarter and better technologies such as FAST ESP, we can continue to help our members find the information they need more quickly and with greater accuracy. Additionally, as our site continues to grow in popularity, we now have a search platform that can grow with our success."
Pronto.com, an operating business of IAC/InterActiveCorp (owners of Ask.com) announced its beta launch and enters the market as the Web's most comprehensive comparison shopping service. With Pronto.com, consumers can now find and compare prices for 45 million products directly from 50,000 merchants in an unbiased and easy-to-use display. Pronto.com's search, according to the release, includes five times more merchants than most leading comparison shopping sites and covers products available from the largest and most popular online retailers to smaller, niche merchants with unique and hard-to-find items.
There is very little information available for merchants interested in getting started with Pronto, but by the looks of it, merchants will only pay for the results they receive (
whether that is on a cost per sale/lead/click basis is anyone's guess). On the partner side however there are some big names, including Performics, Commission Junction and Channel Advisor.
Learn more at ...
Isobar today announced the global roll-out of its proprietary, search engine bidding agent, iSEBA (
note - iSEBA was originally created by iProspect - a leading interactive firm in the SEM space). What is different about using this pay per click advertising campaign management tool is that iSEBA manages (and optimizes) a paid search marketing campaign on a portfolio basis rather than using the keyword by keyword approach offered by other providers. iSEBA achieves these objectives by determining the most productive keyword, position, price, time of day and day of week combinations to bid on for the best possible results. This assessment is re- calculated constantly, 24 hours a day, 365 days a year. What is so interesting about this release is that you will probably start to see a shift in how advertisers go about advertising (or in this instance how agencies advertise their clients). That means there will be less focus on the ROI of specific keywords and more on the overall conversion of a specific campaign.
Learn more about iSEBA at Isobar.net
In a statement that will surely have SEO's up in virtual arms,
WebSideStory, a provider of digital
marketing and analytics solutions, today announced the results of a study
that shows paid search has a nine percent edge in conversion rates over organic
search. I can hear the furious typing of a million outraged SEO bloggers at this
very minute.
Via the news release, "In a study of leading business-to-consumer (B2C)
e-commerce sites during the first eight months of this year, paid search --
keywords bought on a pay-per-click basis at search engines such as Google, Yahoo
and MSN -- had a median order conversion rate of 3.40 percent at
business-to-consumer e-commerce sites using the company's award-winning HBX
Analytics technology. This compared to a conversion rate of 3.13 percent for
organic search results, defined as non-paid or natural search engine listings,
during the same January-to-August timeframe, according to the WebSideStory
Index, a compilation of e-commerce, site search and global Internet user trends.
The study analyzed more than 57 million search engine visits. Order conversions
occurred during the same session.
"For both paid and organic search, you have highly
qualified traffic that converts far above the overall conversion rate of about 2
percent for most e-commerce sites," said Ali Behnam, Senior Digital
Marketing Consultant for WebSideStory. "In the case of paid search, marketers
have better control over the environment, including the message, the landing
page and the ability to eliminate low-converting keywords."
Technorati Tags:
webside story, conversion, seo, sem
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Online video-enabling platform VideoEgg, Inc. announced at the MIXX
Conference and Expo the launch of the Eggnetwork which offers advertisers the
ability to place advertisements within user-generated video. The platform could
allow advertisers to reach millions of viewers via partnerships with leading
online social networks and vertical communities including Bebo, Dogster, hi5 and
Tagged. It gets better from there in that the Eggnetwork allows publishers to
generate advertising revenue just by integrating video into their site
experience.
"The Eggnetwork provides a solution for advertisers who want to capitalize on
the brand-building power of user-generated video without the worry of
associating their brand with offensive content," said Troy Young, chief
marketing officer of VideoEgg, Inc. "At the same time we are enabling online
communities of all sizes to add superior video functionality that facilitates
growth and drives the profitability of their sites."
Technorati Tags:
video, video advertising, video for publishers
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According to a J. D. Power and Associates report on Wednesday, broadband has finally surpassed dial-up for internet access - accounting for a 56% share of residential ISP customers.
Steve Kirkeby, executive director of telecommunications and technology research at Power and Associates said in a press release, "Although high-speed Internet is still considerably more expensive than dial-up, bundling high-speed with other products, such as telephone and video service, has made it an increasingly attractive option."
This is good news for advertisers and marketers. With more people having broadband connections, there are more options to choose from. Streaming video, audio, Flash and complex pages will be able to reach a larger audience than before - those whose connections could not handle the content, or were simply too impatient to wait for content to load.
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Internet advertising provider Adzooga announced today a new method of text link advertising via E-mail taglines and a custom text link advertising method. The solutions certianly look appealing as they give websites the opportunity to utilize ad space that many would not have considered previously.
"Even many sites are sending out large amount of plain text emails, they might have included their own advertisement at the end of each email, but haven't yet took full advantage of utilizing this advertising space to get new visitors. Lot's of web chats and other internet-connected services exists but their advertising potential is unused," says Jan Karlsson, Director.You can read the PRWeb release on
Adzooga here or learn more about the service at
www.adzooga.com/.
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adzooga, advertising, online advertising, internet advertising
Hat tip to Dotster - September 22nd is the last chance for trademark holders to reserve .Mobi domain names before open registrations begin. Following a four day halt to registrations after that date, the .MOBI registry expects hundreds of thousands of .MOBI domain names to be secured once registrations open to the public. If you own the trademark on your company's name, now is the best time to act.
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mobi, mobi domains, domains, domain names, mobile domain names
SugarCRM Inc., a popular provider of commercial open source customer relationship management (CRM) software, today announced the availability of
Sugar University, an educational resource for SugarCRM end-users and administrators. Sugar University offers online, self-paced training as well as personalized, instructor-led web-based learning sessions.
"
With the rapid adoption of SugarCRM around the globe, it is important that companies have the tools and knowledge to get the most out of their SugarCRM system," said Clint Oram, Co-Founder and General Manager, Sugar Online. "
Sugar University offers an extensive set of learning materials to ensure business and technical users understand, adopt and succeed with SugarCRM."
The Online Library allows individuals to learn at their own pace by accessing online learning guides as well as instructional videos demonstrating key application functions. Learning guides offer detailed step-by-step instructions on how to complete key activities within Sugar Suite and educational videos provide audio and visual overview demonstrations to show users how to complete a task or activity within Sugar Suite.
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DirectoryM and TheStreet.com, Inc., a multimedia provider of proprietary business, investment and ratings content, are co-publishing a business directory to create an effective platform for promoting local businesses throughout North America.
TheStreet.com's readers will be offered a selection of relevant directory services and products that cater to their professional and personal lifestyles. Categories include: accounting firms, advertising agencies, architects, financial planners, graphic design, mortgages, life insurance, staffing, IT solutions and web design. If you fit in one of those categories, run off now and get yourself a
free listing on TheStreet business directory.
"
DirectoryM's partnership with TheStreet.com reinforces our reputation as an innovative provider of online advertising solutions for small and medium-sized businesses," said Blair Heavey, CEO of DirectoryM. "DirectoryM continues to offer prestigious business directories in partnership with key business and financial publications such as The Wall Street Journal Online, BusinessWeek Online, the Financial Times and ZDNet," Heavey added.
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InfoNow Corporation, a provider of channel visibility and location service solutions, and high-profile
salesforce.com, a provider of on-demand business services, today announced that InfoNow's suite of on-demand channel visibility solutions are now available on salesforce.com's AppExchange and can be integrated directly by customers into their Salesforce implementations.
"
Companies that struggle with inaccurate or incomplete channel sales data are severely limited in their ability to forecast sales and manage their business. Channel Insight solves this problem by delivering actionable data on end customers, partners and product sales," said Mark Geene, CEO of InfoNow. "Salesforce.com's AppExchange provides an ideal platform for Salesforce users to leverage the benefits of Channel Insight directly into their CRM system."
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salesforce, infonow, CRM, AppExchange, channel visibility
If you're struggling to keep your website up with the
Jones' in terms of functionality, fear not dear readers, there are millions of free tools that you can use to provide some real tangible value to your website visitors. But you probably already knew that. The answer for many (if you want to be like one of the real players such as the NYTimes.com) might just be in Answers.com.
via
PRNewswire -
Answers.com(TM), today announced an agreement with The New York Times Company for the integration of certain Answers.com reference content into NYTimes.com. The agreement includes direct access from NYTimes.com to Answers.com's patented 1-Click Answers(TM) technology. Applying this feature, users can hold down the "Alt" key and click with the mouse on any word or phrase on a NYTimes.com article to see a popup window replete with concise and direct reference information from a collection of reference material, carefully selected in consultation with New York Times editors, without ever leaving the current Web page. So you want to be like the New York Times? Answers.com Webmaster Tools offer an easy way to integrate definitions just like the NY Times. Explanations and fast facts from reliable sources can be integrated into your site content - ranging from a "Look-Up Box" to "AnswerLinks," your website visitors can enjoy free, instant answers through a design you prefer.
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answers, nytimes, website services, web features, blogging, bloggers
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answers, nytimes, website services, web features, blogging, bloggers
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No, a keyword chaser isn't a drink for search engine marketers (although maybe it could/should be), it's someone who stays abreast of the current buzz and builds search marketing campaigns around terms which describe that trend for the purpose of monetizing their own websites. There are a few valuable places to find the content that people are reading most often and the keywords they use to find it. In the past my preferred souce has been
Yahoo Buzz, but my favorite at this very moment has to be
BlogPulse, a service of Nielsen BuzzMetrics. Each and every morning I get a list of the most popular key phrases via RSS. It provides incredible insights into what Web users are actually searching for. BlogPulse also features nine other categories (
NewsWire, Spotlight, Top Links, Top Blog Posts, Top News Stories, Top New Sources, Key People and BlogBites) to stay on top of what's really hot in the blogosphere and across the 'Net. You can learn more at
BlogPulse.com or obtain the
RSS feeds here.
Del.icio.us Tags:
keywords, keyword, key phrase, ppc, buzz, blogpulse, yahoo buzz
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keywords, keyword, key phrase, ppc, buzz, blogpulse, yahoo buzz
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Hands down, one of the most popular blogging platforms is WordPress. Via the
BlogHerald this morning, bbPress indicated that they are nearing a public release of bbPress and that by the looks of the situation this morning there will be easier integration with WordPress. Database integration, cookie integration, registration integration and function integration will be available once the software comes out of alpha.
Stay tuned.
In addition to WSM's RSS feed, now there's another way to keep up with the content we provide each and everyday on our site!
Subscribe to WSM email summaries and receive the content in digest form once a day.
No fuss, no muss, just us - courtesy of FeedBurner.
Omniture has released SiteCatalyst. It's a tool designed to maximize social media optimization, or SMO. SiteCatalyst tracks a site's incoming links to see how the content is spread, what day and time most likely to get attention from socail media sites and blogs, and determine when a link stops generating interest.
With social media sites exploding in popularity among traditional users and business users alike, it could be a very valuable tool.
From their website: "As companies struggle to improve their online businesses through the use of emerging technology, they are challenged to find the means to optimize the effectiveness of such nascent Web site components such as blogs, rich media, social networking and more. To overcome this, Omniture is introducing Web 2.0 business optimizations ..."
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Via the Center for Media Research, Harte-Hanks Postfuture Index of comparative email metrics reports January-June 2006 saw restaurants enjoying the highest email open rate at 167.7% and the highest click-through rate of 57.5%. The lowest open rate was retail at 35.3% and the automotive sector had the lowest click-through rate of 5.7%
The 13 industries featured in the study and their click-through rates:
Restaurants (57.5%)
Publishing (55.6%)
Pharmaceutical (23.8%)
Travel and hospitality (23.4%)
Conference events (14.2%)
Financial services (11.0%)
Technology (10.9%)
Government (9.5%)
Insurance (9.5%)
Consumer packaged goods (8.6%)
Entertainment (8.1%)
Retail (6.0%)
Automotive (5.7%)
One large retailer saw an impressive 74.2% open rate, 24.1% click-through rate and 0.1% opt-out rate. According to Harte-Hanks this was achieved by behavorial targeting messaging. One easy way to accomplish this and increase the effectiveness of your email marketing campaign is by using Sequential Autoresponders.
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Announcements from Google and Yahoo show that the already competitive search space is heating up.
In a strategic multiyear distribution deal Yahoo will feature its Internet search services on ACER PCs (the fourth largest PC maker). The start page (featuring Yahoo products and service) will automatically appear when an Acer customer opens a Web browser on a new laptop or desktop computer. Yahoo also announced the release of a prototype web-based e-mail servive featuring some slick "Web 2.0" technology.
Yahoo rival Google Inc. announced a competing deal in which Web search and advertising services will be featured on QuickBooks software from Intuit Inc. aimed at small business users. In the past few months, Google entered into deals with major PC makers such as Dell Inc., software makers like Adobe Systems Inc. and media giants like News Corp..
What does this mean to you as a someone interested in Web success? More opportunities - across the board.
Technorati Tags:
google, yahoo, acer, search engines, yahoo mail, quickbooks
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google, yahoo, acer, search engines, yahoo mail, quickbooks
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RSS is immature - there is simply no other explanation for people including thirty buttons on their site to satisfy the various feedreaders that come with this type of promotion. As a website owner you don't want to miss out on a possible RSS subscription so you (and every blog you visit) include access for every feed reader. If you're thinking that there has to be a better way - then you're right - and there is one.
FeedButton is a free, easy to install, dynamic widget that allows your blog or site visitors to subscribe to your RSS feed via most popular readers. While it doesn't include every known feedreader, it includes the most popular ones and with the slow adoption of RSS that should be enough. WSM will be testing FeedButton on our sidebar and will report on the performance in the near future.
Universal Music Group CEO Doug Morris is claiming that YouTube and MySpace owe Universal millions of dollars for copyright infringement. It seems to stem from short music video clips that Universal uploads to AOL and Yahoo for users to download for free. Those portals pay a fee for the videos, but MySpace and YouTube get the same content for free, via user uploads. The companies are currently in negotiations, but a lawsuit has not been ruled out.
Clearly these booming social media sites contain content from all corners of media, including television programming, movie clips and music. MySpace seems to be catching on to the issues surrounding all of this free content by recently announcing they will start selling music. NBC recently ventured into the business by announcing NBBC, where entire television shows will be broadcast online. This was partly in response to the hugely popular Saturday Night Live skit "Lazy Sunday" that NBC feels YouTube made a killing from.
It's should be very interesting to see where this goes. Will the major networks, movie and music studios follow NBC's example? Will users of YouTube and MySpace jump ship to these new sites? Two things are for certain: First, social media sites are here to stay and the big boys are threatened. Second, the quality of video from the major network and studios' sites will be far better - and more enjoyable - than the grainy, jumpy videos served up at YouTube and MySpace.
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Social networking sites, such as MySpace and Facebook have been tabbed by young Internet users as a place to socialize. It's also a place where the young crowd can speak their minds, without much interference from "the man." But that is changing.
Many companies are logging in and creating pages for one sole purpose - to market their products. What some fear is that pushing ads to the MySpace-type community will actually do damage to the product instead of draw new customers. For many users, the allure of these sites is that they don't have to be constantly bombarded by corporate marketing messages. It can feel like an intrusion. So, the savvy marketers need to find the right balance.
Burger King seems to have done just that. They created a MySpace page for the King, their largely popular and somewhat creepy non-speaking spokesman. As of this writing, the King has amassed more than 127,000 "friends." The King offers free downloads of popular television shows. In this way, users are getting something they want and socializing with the King while promoting Burger King - all without feeling like they are being targeted by a big corporation.
What is interesting to note, is that a company's "friends" get something out of it as well. For example, with a