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Why Apple’s iAd Didn’t Steal 50% of US Mobile Ad Spend

posted on June 8, 2010

While the hype may have surrounded the oh-so-cool iPhone 4 announcement, Apple CEO Steve Job’s also revealed that its recently announced iAd mobile ad platform was doing quite well.

Not only has Apple secured big-name advertisers–such as AT&T, Best Buy, GE, JCPenney,  Nissan, Sears, State Farm, Target, and The Walt Disney Studios–but, according to a press release, has secured more than $60 million in iAd commitments.

Apple has iAd commitments for 2010 totaling over $60 million, which represents almost 50 percent of the total forecasted US mobile ad spending for the second half of 2010.

However you slice it, that’s a pretty impressive number for an advertising platform that’s not even live yet. However, I’d like to slice it this way: that $60 million does not, in fact, represent 50% of the mobile ad market!

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Yahoo Trims Search Staff

posted on June 8, 2010

With the September integration of the bing / Yahoo getting closer, Yahoo is making moves to prepare for its taking a back seat in the search function to bing’s engine and the team who handles it.

TechCrunch reports that there are no details on numbers but they did hear from Yahoo with the following

“Yahoo! remains focused on innovating the overall Search experience over the long-term, and the Yahoo! Search group is hard at work on some new experiences that we believe will convert Yahoo! users to Yahoo! searchers. To accomplish our new product objectives, we have decided that we need a different combination of talent and are making changes within the search group in order to more deeply invest in other areas of the group. “

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Facebook Will Have Plenty of People to Put in Front of Marketers

posted on June 8, 2010

In the last month there has been more than a little discussed regarding Facebook and privacy. There have been reactions that range from industry famous folks deactivating accounts to some deleting their accounts and everyone, including myself, having an opinion. Facebook CEO and founder Mark Zuckerberg has become everyone’s favorite whipping boy. It’s been a dog pile on Facebook as of late.

Well, how about a dose of reality? The chart below shows that even though it seems like everyone has tried to paint Facebook as the privacy devil incarnate, people keep coming to the site. Everyone including those crazy people who actually use Facebook but wouldn’t know a social media expert, guru or whatever if they tripped over one because they don’t read nor care about the industry prattling on about this and that.

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Join Me at PubCon Masters Group Training in Austin this July!

posted on June 7, 2010

I love PubCon. You love PubCon. We all love PubCon!

But, let’s face it, sometimes PubCon can feel, well, a little overwhelming. After all, there are so many great sessions, so many parrellel tracks, that it can be hard to figure out just where you need to be.

So, PubCon founder Brett Tabke has come up with the solution. Smaller workshops. One day only. Just two tracks to choose between. And nothing but the very best training.

PubCon Masters Group Training comes to Austin, Texas on July 21st and will provide in-depth training for both search engine optimization and social media marketing.

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Dear BP: Fix the Oil Leak First, Then Your Reputation

posted on June 7, 2010

“BP: Stock rises after it reports oil spill progress”

That’s the headline from a CNN story today.

And that’s the bottom line for BP executives. They can run all the TV ads they want, take-out all the full page print ads in the world, pour money into Google AdWords, and tweet until their heart is content, but it really all boils down to this:

Fix the oil leak, before you try to fix your reputation.

Even BP’s shareholders understand this simple concept. News that the oil company is making progress on the Gulf of Mexico leak, leads to an increase in share price. Fix the problem and shareholders will fix your stock price.

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Yahoo Looks to “Create Central Hub for People’s Online Lives”

posted on June 7, 2010

The headline comes directly from Yahoo’s Yodel Anecdotal blog. Sounds ambitious and it is. The cornerstone of this effort is the full integration of Facebook into Yahoo’s social “system”. The announcement of this update is the biggest change to come from Yahoo after making an agreement with Facebook back in December of 2009. Here is a look at what you can expect when you turn on this feature in Yahoo.

Yahoo says

Social networks have seen explosive growth in recent years. As the place that 600 million people visit every month, Yahoo! is in a unique position to bring together different social experiences from across the Web to a single place. This vision has been our guiding principle since we kicked off our Yahoo! Open Strategy (Y!OS) initiative in 2008 and started to rewire Yahoo! to be more open and social.

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Bing’s Cashback Program Shuttered

posted on June 7, 2010

Believe it or not, it has been just about one year already since bing was brought to life by Microsoft. Out of the gate there was significant buzz and plenty of hopeful Microsoft folks and industry pundits who thought that maybe, just maybe, there was a threat to Google’s search dominance. In many ways, bing has made some inroads. One program that was started during the MSN Live search days that there was some hope for was the bing Cashback program . We say was some hope because Microsoft has shut down the program.

The bing Community blog tells us:

One of the principles we have here at Bing is to constantly experiment and learn. We do this to ensure we are keeping pace with new social and technology trends, and can continue to deliver great value for our customers and advertisers.