MSN adCenter bulk Management Upgrade
Just got this email from MSN:
This weekend, Microsoft adCenter will upgrade with new features that make it easier to bulk manage your budgets and bulk submit ad groups. During this upgrade, your ads and keywords will remain live and continue to run as normal.
New bulk management features
- bulk manage budgets. Now you can update multiple campaign budgets simultaneously.
- bulk submit ad groups in Draft status. When importing campaigns, submit your ad groups at once to go live.
This is good news, I like the thought of shortening the amount of time I spend in adCenter being frustrated. My account rep has been on vacation this week, which was even more frustrating. For the record he is awesome and I do not hold any adCenter short comings against him personally.
Currently working in adCenter is almost as pleasant as walking into a brick wall repeatedly. The conversion rates that I see from MSN are why I even bother coming back. I know that if I plan to work on an adCenter account that I must meditate and become one with my Chi. I also accept the fact that twenty minutes into working in adCenter I will begin to sound like Yo Sammity Sam.
So hoo-ray! Now if they could just figure out how to get more traffic. Maybe a free toaster oven for every unique visitor that does a search?
School Fundraising Web 2.0 Style
This week my oldest child came home with the yearly school fund raising packet. You know the little catalogs with all kinds of things you can buy, over priced candles and coffee mugs with cat pictures on them. The catalogs are pretty much the same every year.
One huge difference this year though is online purchase capabilities. That’s right, far away family and friends are no longer safe from the guilt and pressure of children trying to sell and win prizes.
This also makes the selling process much easier on the parents. No more stalking co-workers when it’s time to collect money for the promised purchases. No more having to ask people in person to buy stuff from my child, just a simple short email with no pressure involved. You can spam your entire email address book in one quick swoop. The internet once again brings people closer together and also allows us to annoy masses all at one time.
Local Search Moving Full Speed Ahead
One can almost visualize the chess board as R.H. Donnelly and Idearc Media make strategic moves to become the leader of the local search market. All the experts are all a buzz as the local landscape is forecasted to be “the next big thing”.
The percent of local internet searches will grow from 5% to 25% from 2007 to 2017, according to the Marchex’s release of ‘Unlocking the Potential of the Local Internet’, a 12-page primer that details an overview of the local search market opportunity.
Here is an at a glance timeline of press releases from R.H. Donnelly and Idearc Media just over the last few months.
June 2007 – R.H. Donnelley Launches DexKnows.com
July 2007 – Superpages Launches Local Video Ads
July 2007 – R.H. Donnelley to Acquire Business.com Inc.
July 2007 – SuperPages Taps 1-800-Free411 For Mobile Distribution
August 2007 – R.H. Donnelley and Yahoo! Local Expand Relationship
September 2007 – Superpages Acquires ‘LocalSearch.com’ Domain
September 2007 – R.H. Donnelley Introduces 1-800-CallDex
September 2007 – Superpages Parent To Acquire InfoSpace Directory Sites
Only time will tell where the local search landscape is taking us and who will be the defined leader. As a former Idearc Media employee I have had a close inside view of local search and I can definitely tell you that the internet marketing industry as a whole has barley hit the tip of the ice berg that local search opportunities hold.
Some advice to those who are ready to run off into local search with clients in hand, learn the important differences in search engine paid campaigns and directory paid campaigns. The rules of the game are very different and you may run into unsuccessful campaigns with little to no ROI.
