Marketing Pilgrim

The Interactive Advertising Bureau has released their 2010 IAB Internet Advertising Revenue Report for the full year of 2010. The survey was conducted by PricewaterhouseCoopers LLP and the findings don’t show any shocks. What they do show is that the Internet space has rebounded from a tough 2009, which saw a drop in overall revenue. It also shows that the Internet is ready to take over the top spot among media choices for advertising dollars.

Overall ad revenue for the Internet in 2010 reached $26 billion which is a 15% increase over 2009.

In breaking down the advertising revenue on the Internet, search is still the leader by far with display making some gains. Interestingly enough, sponsorships showed a significant amount of growth last year although they still represent a relatively small piece of the overall Internet picture.

What are you hoping to gain out of your social media efforts? If it’s a rise in traffic to your website, you better come up with a new plan.

According to a new report from ForeSee Results, fewer than 1% of website visits came directly from a social media URL.

Their report also says that 18% of site visitors reported being influenced by social media, which would mean that 17% of those folks visited the site in some way other than clicking on a social media link. This plays into the idea that social media is best used for brand awareness, but still, 18% isn’t that great.

When asked which trend has had the biggest impact on search marketing, 40% of business surveyed said it was the rise in mobile internet usage. Following closely behind that was the personalization of search results and behavioral targeting.

New tools aplenty, and yet 95% of the search marketing dollars are still being spent with our old friend Adwords. The Bing / Yahoo combo got 70% of the vote and a respectable 47% of respondents said they run PPC campaigns on Facebook.

The info comes from the new State of Search Marketing Report 2011, which is produced by Econsultancy. The results indicate a rise in social media marketing to the point where it’s nearly equal to that of paid search (74% vs 79%). Facebook usage alone has risen from 73% to 84% (that’s general Facebook for marketing, not just PPC).

There is a lot of buzz around new developments that go back to the early days of Facebook. No it’s not another movie but if the legal case being brought by a man who claims he should have 50% of Mark Zuckerberg’s equity is real, there may be a need to make another one.

Normally, this kind of case would be viewed as a get rich quick play by most because there are more than a few large question marks in the claims of a web developer in upstate, New York. He has already taken one swipe at claiming that an amended contract from 2004 between he and Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg entitles him to some serious cash.

The Wall Street Journal reports

Have you ever tried to explain Internet marketing to a relative newcomer (or even a relative for that matter)? Once you start talking about the area that you specifically work in (SEO, PPC, social media, etc) you find you have to start to explain to some degree the other areas because none of the disciplines of the Internet marketing world exist in a vacuum. To truly understand the effectiveness of Internet marketing one has to look at the picture as a whole but as we can all attest to, that is easier said than done.

If you believe the results of a recent survey by MGH, QR codes are making an impact on mobile users. Their new study says that “72% of smartphone users would be likely to recall an ad featuring a QR code.”

Nice results, but I’m not sure they asked the right question. It’s kind of like asking, “if you saw a pink elephant walk down the street, would you remember?” Okay, so QR codes aren’t as obvious as a pink elephant, but they do stand out because they’re new and perplexing. As we’ve discussed before, a QR code means nothing to the observer. They must interact with the code in order to see what it’s all about and how many people do that? Of the 65% of smartphone users who said they’ve seen a QR code, less than half have actually used one.