|
| Recent Articles |
E-commerce:
The Bop Approach
For centuries and most of the decades in the 20th century (i.e when computer was
invented) access and communication was the tool of rich and ultra rich people,
prohibitively expansive to ‘not so rich' and...
Google
Snatching Real Estate Business From Newspapers
Two new real estate reports were released Wednesday by Classified Intelligence and Borrell Associates. Word is that Google is trying to lure real estate ad money to Adwords, and away from classifieds.
The
Hybrid Blog and Ping
For the past two years, one of the best SEO inclusion tactics was the use of blogs. Blogs have become a base standard in SEO marketing, but as times change, so does the efficacy of any tactic.
Utilizing
Backend Inventory Solutions for E-commerce
The advent of the internet has opened the door for e-commerce, which not only includes B2C businesses but also supports B2B business relationships.
Companies like Amazon and eBay have made billions, and millions of internet-based businesses have been spawned in the last decade.
Legal Downloads? 180 Million Of Them
The International Federation of the Phonograpic Industry (IFPI) said on Thursday
that the number of legal, paid downloads had tripled during the first half of
2005. This is great news for the RIAA and MPAA...
|
|
08.01.05
Cost-Per-Action In The Near Future
 By Chris Winfield
To say that the search engine marketing industry is booming would be an understatement. And Pay-Per-Click (PPC), the method by which advertisers pay each time a searcher clicks on their sponsored link as a result of a search query using relevant terms, is a large part of that industry.
But PPC is not without its faults, and rivals such as Snap.com's Ad System could give PPC programs such as Google Adwords and Yahoo's Overture a run for their money.
Ten years ago practically no one knew what a search engine was, much less what PPC was. With Google and Yahoo now household names, pioneers such as Bill Gross who introduced the Pay-Per-Click approach at GoTo.com, which turned into Yahoo's Overture, are cashing their checks all the way to the bank.
Write 10,000 lines of code in 10 minutes!
Iron Speed Designer – Free Evaluation |
|
But Gross is currently backing a redesigned version of PPC - CPA. Through Snap.com,
a relatively new search engine which utilizes the Snap.com Ad System - currently
in beta phase - Gross is essentially proposing a new era of search marketing unlike
any currently being offered on the market. With the new search engine and Ad System
service, advertisers would only have to pay for click-thrus after a visitor completed
a sales-related action such as filling out a form, purchasing a product, signing
up for a newsletter, etc. Hence, the term CPA, or Cost-Per-Action.
The implications this holds for the search marketing industry are huge. Mainly this would help to combat click fraud, one of the biggest flaws in PPC advertising. It's estimated that between 10-20 percent of all click-thrus are a result of click fraud, costing advertisers millions per year. While the new service would serve as a deterrent for spider programs that either accidentally or intentionally click on paid ads but never complete an action, the service would also make it virtually impossible for competitors to run up a rival advertiser's CPA without increasing that rival's revenue because in many cases the competitor might actually be forced to make a purchase on the website therefore causing his rival to profit, not costing him one.
The service would also pose a threat to Google and Yahoo's paid placement
programs. But the two online advertising giants have at least one thing going
for them that Snap.com or any search engine trying to take a bite out of the market
will have to combat - popularity. Google handled 1.8 billion U.S. searches last
month, giving it a search market share of around 37 percent, while Yahoo came
in second with 1.5 billion U.S searches giving it about 30 percent of the market.
Since its debut 9 months ago Snap.com has only generated 16.4 million searches.
However, Snap.com recently received $10 million from Mayfield, a California-based
venture capital investment firm. We will probably be seeing a non-beta version
of the Snap.com Ad System in the near future, as well, and then we can determine
if CPA lives up to expectations.
About the Author:
Chris Winfield is the President and Co-founder of 10e20.
He has written for various organizations in the past and frequently speaks with
the media. |
|
