Oliver Thylmann’s Thoughts

If you are working with the AdWords API I’d read the new Terms because there is some very restricting information in there called Co-Mingling:

III 2 (c) Co-Mingling of Campaign Management Data. This Section III(2)(c) does not apply to End-Advertiser-Only AdWords API Clients.

i. Inputs Fields. The AdWords API Client must not show in the same area of a page, or otherwise visually or functionally associate, any input fields for collecting or transmitting AdWords API Campaign Management Data with the content of Third Parties or input fields for collecting or transmitting data to Third Parties. For example, an AdWords API Client must not (a) use the same input field or button to collect or use data that will be used as both AdWords API Campaign Management Data and also as data or instructions for a campaign on a Third Party advertising network, or (b) use input fields or buttons to collect or use data for AdWords API Campaign Management Data which are visually adjacent to input fields or buttons that are used to collect or use data or instructions for a campaign on a Third Party advertising network.

ii. Functional Separation. Any information collected from an input field used to collect AdWords API Campaign Management Data may be used only to manage and report on AdWords accounts. Similarly, any information or data used as AdWords API Campaign Management Data must have been collected from an input field used only to collect AdWords API Campaign Management Data. For example, the AdWords API Client may not offer a functionality that copies data from a non-AdWords account into an AdWords account or from an AdWords account to a non-AdWords account.

iii. Campaign Management Data Storage. All AdWords API Campaign Management Data must be stored separate from Third Party advertising network data. Additionally, AdWords API Campaign Management Data may not be stored in a manner that is associated (through relational data structures, links or otherwise) with Third Party advertising network data.

(d) Co-Mingling of Reporting Data. AdWords API Report Data may be displayed in the same area of the screen as, or adjacent to, non-Google data for the then-current end user, as long as it is labeled as Google data. Also, an AdWords API Client may display aggregated data that is calculated in part or in whole based on data or information from a Third Party. This Section III(2)(d) does not apply to End-Advertiser-Only AdWords API Clients, except that all AdWords API Clients may not display non-Google data in a manner that would lead any person to reasonably attribute such data to Google or an AdWords account.

On thing is important here. This does not apply to End-Advertiser-Only AdWords API Clients, but anyone that resells SEM Management systems, will have a problem. If you have your own network for example, and resell that network plus AdWords management to a client, you cannot really do that. Well you can, but you need to do it fully separately, without the two systems learning from each other. If you run a service provider for SEM campaigns, this is important to you.

Technorati Tags: AdWords, API, Google, SEM, WebService

Bud Gibson, fellow Corante Web Hub member, posted a nice short comment entitled How much Internet can small businesses digest? He says:

The real problem with harnessing the Internet is that it takes too much time. For instance, if you’re going to try to make a name for yourself blogging, you have to learn a blog software, you have to understand how search engines work, you have to dig up conversation partners, you have to invest in learning to measure performance.

And that’s just the start. I like AdWords and they are pushing for small businesses to use AdWords but it is way too complicated for them to do that. Just imagine some of the things they have to do: They need a web site, a good web site, optimized for sales or whatever they need, good bidding strategy, time to monitor their AdWords account, SEO knowledge, SEM knowledge, … there is lots of stuff. A small business has enough on their hand. Running a small business does not mean that you have huge amounts of time on your hand. Not all of them need to go to the internet.

Technorati Tags: adwords, bud gibson, small business

Now PodShow will have to have a very clear business model. Google has bought (or is about to) dMarc Broadcasting, a company that has a technological solution to handle advertising on radio. Very well and congratulations. I haven’t looked closely at the company yet but one thing seems clear. Add Google’s expertise, dMarc’s access to customers and radio expertise and you have a powerful AdWords driven Podcasting ads engine. Seems like Podcasting might get itself a very cool player. Looking forward to see how this unfolds.

Update: Here is somebody not believing in the podcasting bit. my short rebuttal. Google is doing this for the customer access, the technology behind it, the potential to do radio advertising AND to have good assets with large insight from radio advertising to be able to play well in the podcasting market once it starts to grow, which it is already doing.

Technorati Tags: Advertising, dMarc, Google, Google AdWords, Podcasting, PodShow, Radio

John Battelle has a very nice article entitled Thinking About Google and The Turning Point and I can relate. I still remember when Microsoft came out with Passport and what all the rage was. Now we are a lot more quiet and it is getting weird what kind of stuff I happily have on Google. Google tracks my web site (not for long, as it’s not good for a blog, more on that another time), handles my ads, does my eMail, is my search, runs small adwords campaigns for me (did run very big ones at my previous job and will likely again), has my account at Google Answers (and even gave me a blanket for being a researcher from the start :)), a bit of my network in Orkut, tracks me wherever there are AdSense ads, … the list could go on. Remember DoubleClick? When they bought a company that would potentially connect their clickstreams to personal identifiable data, all hell broke loose. HELLLOOOOOOO!!! Google has AdSense, the biggest advertising network ever invented, because it is a sales network and because its integrated effortless and works to a good degree.

Whenever they you see a Google ad, they know what it should be about, what the time of day is, what your country and provider is, what kind of conversion some of the ads have in the ad, what you search for when not surfing around, that you get lots of eMails (they likely don’t “know” what you get as eMail), and lots more stuff. So all in all Google is really approaching a size that makes it sound like the player out there but hey, you can switch. Go somewhere else. Things are hotting up out there and it will only get more interesting.

Technorati Tags: AdSense, AdWords, Clickstream, Google, Doubleclick, Battelle

Some new updates from Google. Inside AdSense is reporting that they enabled a new feature call Online Advertiser Signup. John nails it in saying that this is really good for the smaller publishers out there and I’d like to elaborate a little bit on this.

The thing is that publishers need a banner server for their site, in general, but this costs them money, something like 10 cents CPM for example if you are big and have several million ad impressions. This is if you go with some of the big guys like Doubleclick’s DFP (dart for publishers) or Falk eSolutions AG or lots of others. But if you are unsold, then this is just a cost you are adding up and a small site is probably unsold for the most part. Thanks to AdSense you can now be always (almost) fully booked. This is good, because advertising inventory is perishable inventory, and as long as your prices are not inflated, being fully booked should be good, driving up the prices in the end. With this new feature you can go AdSense only! Yes, you will forgo the margin that Google takes out but you will not have the “hassle” to make sure that you are making more money with that new advertiser. For bigger publishers that sucks because they might want to have a good relation with a customer and want to give him a few clicks extra, but that doesn’t work with the AdSense model (which is why Publishers, the big ones will need to go another route, also more on this another time).

So now all you need is an AdWords WebService Bit over which you can manage your own Customers, through your own interface. Sounds very likely and would allow AdSense to further eat itself into the publisher world.

Very fitting to this update JenSense.com is reporting that AdWords publishers can now bid separately on the search and content network of Google. Good stuff happening out there.

{Advertising, Google, AdWords, AdSense}