Marketing Pilgrim

Mathew Ingram has evidence that suggests a voicemail service will soon launch for Google Talk and that a calendar will not be far behind.

A Google calendar – with the ability to share with co-workers – would rock! We’d be able to switch to OpenOffice and then use GMail for email and calendar. Fingers-crossed.

Via Sid.

Google has announced they’ll be hosting an Analyst Day on March 2nd. Presentations by Google’s management team are scheduled to begin at 10:00 a.m. PT and conclude by approximately 2:00 p.m. PT.

This event will be made available via Webcast at http://investor.google.com/webcast.

Well, well, well. What’s next? Quarterly guidance?

We promise, Jeeves is retiring, he’s just taking his time. Ask provides us with a humorous video of the butler’s departure.

Perfect 10 is suing Google because too many people are getting the company’s adult images for free via the search engine. Now comes news from the New Scientist that Google themselves have confirmed porn searches are popular on cell phones.

Computer scientists Maryan Kamvar and Shumeet Baluja analysed 1 million searches made using the firm’s mobile search software. They found that “adult” material constituted 20 per cent of the searches on cellphones, but only 5 per cent on PDAs. Just 8.5 per cent of searches on desktop computers are for adult material.

And there was I thinking these people were simply text messaging their vote for American Idol!

Via TD and Giz.

SEW reports that Yahoo is changing its editorial guidelines regarding the use of keywords containing trademarks.

Previously, we allowed competitive advertising by allowing advertisers to bid on third-party trademarks if those advertisers offered detailed comparative information about the trademark owner’s products or services in comparison to the competitive products and services that were offered or promoted on the advertiser’s site.

In order to more easily deliver quality user experiences when users search on terms that are trademarks, Yahoo! Search Marketing has determined that we will no longer allow bidding on keywords containing competitor trademarks.

Danny speculates that the policy wont completely prevent the bidding on trademarks – just competitor’s keywords – and is sparked by Mazda buying the keyword “Pontiac” to capitilize on Pontiac’s “Google Pontiac” TV ad.

Loren Baker visits the offices of Google Japan and posts lots of nice photos.

Valleywag proves that they’re not just interested in who has the hottest body in the Valley. They’re claiming they’ve confirmed some details about the rumored Google Wallet.

Basically, when a customer clicks on a Google ad, Google could handle any payments they make at the advertiser’s site. Google takes a cut of the purchase instead of money for the first click-through. Bang, no more click fraud.

Marketers have been pushing Google for a pay-per-performance model for years.