Marketing Pilgrim

Thanks to everyone that entered to win a copy of "Always Be Testing." Our three winners are listed below today’s Picks.

• Google uses Democratic convention to pitch products to governments.
• Add BackType to your list of reputation monitoring tools. Enter a keyword (your company name) and BackType’s results include any blog comment that includes that keyword.
• Market Motive has added Search Marketing Certification to its online courses.
• Proof that incorrect information can be published about anyone. Bloomberg accidentally published an obituary for Apple’s Steve Jobs!

Here are the contest winners:

• Chris Bartow (wins the grand prize of three books)
• Steve Cospolich
• Joanna

If your name is listed above, please contact me for details on collecting your prize. Thanks to everyone that entered. Look for another book prize package soon!

There’s a classic comedy skit from Eddie Izzard about England getting taken by surprise by the Germans in World War II. He suggests that Germany had a head start on building weapons, and England? Well, I’ll let him explain:

"Get the tanks out! Get the…we haven’t got any tanks? Then get that ice cream van out there! Get it out there! Kill! All right, f*** it. ( mimes making ice cones and throwing them ) F*** off! Everything! Just throw everything at them! Just…that’s not…harder! Orange fruities! And Zooms! Throw the Zooms! F*** off, you b***ards! Pots and pans! Get pots…just throw the pots and pans at them!"

It’s a very niche style of humor.

Why am I a bringing this up? Well, forget any comparison of the battle between Google and Microsoft, with WWII. My point is that Microsoft is throwing whatever it can lay its hands on, at Google. The latest evidence is the upcoming Internet Explorer 8–being built with a few tricks to try and knee-cap Google.

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As a paying Google Apps customer, the lack of communication during recent outages left a bad taste in my mouth.

I’m pleased to report that I just received an email from Google with details of many improvements coming our way. These are much needed and welcomed.

We’re committed to making Google Apps Premier Edition a service on which your organization can depend. During the first half of August, we didn’t do this as well as we should have. We had three outages – on August 6, August 11, and August 15. The August 11 outage was experienced by nearly all Google Apps Premier users while the August 6 and 15 outages were minor and affected a very small number of Google Apps Premier users. As is typical of things associated with Google, these outages were the subject of much public commentary.

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Today I wish I were a political blogger. I supposedly had a ticket to the Democratic Convention, which fell through. Then I had the misfortune (in this situation) to live in a state that didn’t get a lot of tickets. Some lucky bloggers – one from each state – were also part of the State Blog Pool or Corps (here’s a list of the bloggers by state).

I have a feeling, that while it would be fun to attend the parties and see the speeches, I would want to hang out in the Big Tent. That’s where the bloggers are. It’s not air-conditioned, and you’re not as wined and dined, but from the looks of it, you’re in good company. Google and Digg set it up and sponsored it. If you’re Republican they’re sponsoring a tent at the Republican convention too.

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Today’s Picks are just too good, so let’s jump right in.

• Researchers used Google Earth to study the alignment of 8510 cows around the world and discovered they tend to align themselves with Earth’s north-south magnetic fields. Sounds udderly ridiculous to me!
• Maybe a better use of Google Earth from Olympic gold medallist Kristin Armstrong. She used Google Earth to help her train for the varying elevations in China.
• Mozilla has announced Ubiquity–a new browser interface that brings useful information to your fingertips.
• Two internet security researchers demonstrate just how easy it is for hackers to intercept your web activity.
• Who spent the most money on internet display ads in June? That would be Microsoft. The top display ad publisher for the same period? Fox Interactive Media.
• Google Ad Manager has left beta. Actually, it’s still in beta, but at least now everyone can sign-up for it.

Don’t mess with the UK’s Advertising Standards Authority! Pedantic is its middle name and it’s well versed in the ancient art of filament-slicing.

According to the Guardian, it took just two complaints about an Apple iPhone TV advertisement (watch it here) for the watchdog to take action and ban the ad.

The Advertising Standards Authority received two complaints that the claim was misleading because the iPhone did not support Flash or Java, which are both integral to many web pages.

Apple said the aim of the ad was to highlight how the iPhone can offer access to all websites…and that the line “all parts of the internet” meant website availability, “not every aspect of functionality”.

I’m not sure what’s more incredible. That the ASA thought the ad was misleading–even my Firefox browser can’t access all of the internet–or, that it took just two complaints to see the ad banned.

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Yesterday, we talked about the importance of A/B and multivariate testing. Google offers Website Optimizer (for free) and now we learn just how much the search engine eats its own dog food.

Here’s an A/B experiment that Google has conducted. See if you can spot the difference.

Page 1:

Page 2:

Yeah, I didn’t spot it either, but apparently there is slightly more white space around the first listing, in page 1.

Should you be that granular with your A/B testing? Maybe not, but Google explains just how subtly it’s messing with your mind testing your preferences each day.

In case you’ve not yet bought a copy of Radically Transparent, or perhaps you just need a reputation management refresher, you can check out an interview I did recently with MarketingSherpa.

Consider it a mini-guide to managing an online reputation crisis. In it, I discuss the following seven steps in detail:

• Tip #1: Perform an honest self-analysis
• Tip #2: Control communication
• Tip #3: Monitor online conversations about your company
• Tip #4: Analyze complaints before reacting
• Tip #5: Strategize responses
• Tip #6: Control the conversation
• Tip #7: Don’t shoot yourself in the foot

You might want to bookmark it and pray that you don’t actually have to use it.

UPDATE: Winners announced here.

Usability guru and best-selling author Bryan Eisenberg is back with another great book. Always Be Testing: The Complete Guide to Google Website Optimizer sees Eisenberg team up with John Quarto-vonTivadar, and Lisa T. Davis to deliver the definitive guide to Google’s web page multivariate testing tool.

I’ve just finished reading Always Be Testing which finally opened my eyes to just how easy Website Optimizer is to use and just how valuable it is for any web site owner. Following Eisenberg’s advice, I’ve not only set up the perfect multivariate web page test, but I also know which variables to test.

If you rely on your web site to generate even just a few pennies in revenue, you must pick up a copy of this book! And, in case a new book purchase is not in your budget, Bryan Eisenberg has graciously offered to give away some copies to Marketing Pilgrim readers.

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If you’re following me on Twitter, you’d have read my reaction to news that Google Suggest had finally made its way to Google’s homepage search box.

Turns out, that’s probably the biggest news of the day. Today really is a slow news day. I’ll keep digging for something worthy of your brilliant mind, but in the meantime consider these Picks an amuse-bouche for the day.

• I’ve not checked the accuracy of the data, but you have to be impressed with Khalid’s attempt to provide the "Ultimate Rank" of SEO blogs. Yeah, it’s linkbait, yeah he’s massaging the egos of those on the list–wohoo, we’re #8 –but it looks like a lot of work went it to compiling the list.
• Before Google, there was no such thing as a 4-year beta. Seeking Alpha suggests Google’s beta label is a free pass to ignore glitches.

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The Olympics is over and US advertisers should be pleased with the results. Not only did we take home a lot of gold from athletes, this Olympics brought record web site traffic – and an experiment in online video advertising. The two weeks long Olympics was a test in how video advertising would play out.

According to eMarketer – NBC – the lead sponsor of the games, gets a bronze for their work. They brought in $5.75 million for running video ads. The Wall Street Journal reported NBC made only a quarter of what CBS Sports made streaming a college basketball tournament earlier this year.

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There’s only one thing on my mind: Football!

Yep, the college football season gets underway this week and I’m hoping NCSU can pull off an upset down at South Carolina on Thursday.

I need a distraction-to keep my mind off football–and these Picks will do nicely!

• AdAge reports on rumors that Microsoft and WPP might do a deal that involves the exchange of Avenue A/Razorfish and 24/7 Real Media.
• Want some creative ideas for your site’s "Add to Cart" button? Linda Bustos takes a look at a bunch of before and after designs for popular etailers.
• Daniel Jacome makes his argument for why Google’s entry to the web measurement space won’t hurt comScore.
• Real estate search engine Trulia announces a bunch of new features including an interface for mobile devices.
• Google adds geolocation to its Gears offline plug-in.