Marketing Pilgrim

See that? That is Google’s homepage today. For everyone…in the world!

When Google announced that it would let users upload images to its homepage, it was cute. It gave me the ammo to suggest that Google was copying Bing–which was the first big search engine to go with the background images.

That’s still a legitimate observation, but here’s another one that I’ve not seen mentioned.

Google wants you to add an image to its homepage because that is exactly what you do to the background of your desktop, right? You customize your desktop with an image that makes you happy, makes you smile….makes you want to see your desktop!

Yesterday, I had the opportunity to watch AOL’s CEO Tim Armstrong be interviewed by Slate’s Jacob Weisberg at the Interactive Advertising Bureau’s Innovation Days event during Internet Week in New York City. It was interesting to listen to Armstrong because he is an engaging guy. He comes off as very passionate about AOL and its efforts to re-establish itself as a leading brand in the Internet space. He talks about all of the things that people want to hear when it comes to the Internet and content generation.

It just so happens that this talk comes on the heels of AOL’s announcement that it is hiring hundreds of journalists to add to its current 500 staffers on the content side plus the 40,000 free lancers that are out there creating content about who knows what and God knows what.

Are you going to PubCon Masters Group Training in Austin?

Not your thing? Too far? Haven’t decided yet?

Or perhaps you’d like to double up on your small group training for that week?

Well, be sure to take a serious look at BlueGlass LA–two days of search and social marketing training from some of the smartest guys in the industry. A follow-up to their highly-rated Search and Social Summit, Chris, Tony, Loren, Dave et al are “putting the band back together” for what will likely be another great conference.

What else do you need to know? Attendance will be limited. It’s being hosted in Los Angeles, CA. Everything is included for just $495.

Austin, TX based Convio has released their 2010 “Online Nonprofit
Benchmark™ Study”. This study was released by Convio as a guide for nonprofit marketers to get a better understanding of their online marketing efforts and also includes some really interesting data.

According to Convio, nonprofit web traffic grew from 2008 to 2009, but at a slower rate of 6%. This was a sharp change from double digit growth in previous years. Convio also found that conversion rates for nonprofits (visitors to newsletter subscribers) fell to 2.12% and email click through rates were down during 2009.

You’ve made it to Wednesday! Give yourself a pat on the back, grab some coffee, and enjoy today’s Pilgrim’s Pick!

Google Maps Navigation comes to Canada and mainland Europe, remains free as a bird
The Truth About the Faces in Your Facebook Ads
Twitpic Launches Face Tagging
Twitter Now Has 190 Million Users Tweeting 65 Million Times A Day
New Product Launch by Acquisio at SES Toronto 2010
IAB Aims to Create Standards for Advertising on Tablets
Exalead, The ‘French Google’, Is Acquired For $162 million
Gmail Gets a New and Improved Chat Window
SMX Advanced 2010: You&A With Matt Cutts (Google Caffeine Index Live)

The third annual Online Measurement and Strategy Report, has been published by Econsultancy and it’s full of great news for the online reputation monitoring industry!

As someone that offers social media monitoring tools, this chart brings a little tear to my eye.

That’s right, there’s been a 9% increase in the number of agencies using reputation/buzz/social media monitoring analytics since 2009–the greatest increase across ALL types of analytics!

Next, we see exactly how companies are monitoring their reputation.

As you can see, there’s a broad mix here. Some are using free tools, others are using paid social media monitoring tools–with others either doing a mix or have yet to get started.