Click Fraud & In Your Face FaceBook

Perhaps it was a coincidence that both front page of the New York Times Business section ran the same story that Business Week profiled on the front page of its weekly edition--which came out one day earlier--Click Fraud--Internet Advertising biggest achilles heel. I'm arguably one of the first that started using Google Adwords--and promoted its use to clients....but throughout that time, I've been shouting about instances of click fraud, and experienced several very costly instances. When complaining--and pointing to the abberational activity, Google's support analysts kept replying with excuses and explanations that made no sense... That caused me to cancel ad programs---and warn my clients about best practices for click advertising.

Are advertisers losing millions, tens of millions, hundreds of millions or Billions??? Probably some where in the middle to upper end of the guestimates---and let's face it, no matter what Google or Yahoo! have evangelized, their incentive to take progressive steps to stem this problem is outweighed by the fact that these companies are direct beneficiaries of click fraud.

Its really simple--Google will distribute the placement of your ad through a daisy chain of networks, and get a slice of the pie every time the ad is clicked on. Unless the advertiser specifically configures his advertising program to only display ads within the Google search engine return page, that ad is displayed on upwards of thousands, if not tens of thousands of individual websites..

Now, from the advertiser perspective, that's the goal---presuming the third-party sites fall within the targeted demographic profile.. Which is what Google's recently recent platform 'content network' is supposed to achieve.. (The content network charges based on impressions, not clicks---the old fashioned method...Which is doubly troublesome...) And I have first have experience testing all of the different approaches.... And I can tell you that click fraud is a MAJOR problem...despite what Google or Yahoo! would like you to believe...

By the way, MSN has a new program that purportedly places your ads within sites that conform to the advertiser's demographic target zone---but again, wrought with potential for fraudsters to run up your ad spending with impressions and/or clicks being generated by those looking to get a piece of your ad spending, not access to a product or service that you are advertising.

If you want to limit your exposure--you can simply configure your adwords setting so that your ad only displays within the Google search network. This means your ad will only display when someone does a google search using one of the keywords that you are bidding for.. And this will also make it easier for Google to track those nasty competitors that are clicking on your ad hundreds of times so that they buy up all of your air time-

The downside is that you will get alot less exposure (figure 1/10 of what you are getting now if your ad setting includes both "Google search' and 'network partners')---the upside is that your ad will be displayed to a qualified audience that are specifically looking for results based on the Google search...But it will cost you more (figure 2x-3x) to get your ad displayed on the first or second return page.

Or we can all vote with our checkbooks and inundate Google Support with emails telling them we're refraining from advertising until they address the problem to our satisfaction... Sounds crazy?...

Not if you appreciate what happened over the past two weeks after FaceBook's users revolted when that company started publishing 'newsfeeds' profiling every single activity and posting of its members... That was a really stupid idea put into production by the brash 22 year old Harvard dropout that runs FaceBook --- 200,000 or more of its college student users revolted in mass, prompting FaceBook's pimply-faced genius to realize how much he screwed up. And his plan to open the network to anyone with a valid email address (as opposed to limiting it to college students/teachers---and more recently high school students) is perhaps the last goose that will kill his golden egg. This kid should have finished his coursework in Harvard--he might have been exposed to a few case studies that documented what happends to a company when they expand to quickly and disenfranchise the customer base that made them what they are..

This kid should hit whatever bid MSN has put on the table---take his $100 million in cash and call it a life...FaceBook is never---repeat NEVER--going to become a global social network---it was perfectly designed to cater to one very narrow audience---but if I'm allowed to have a page, my college daughter would puke---and immediately turn off her own page.

Enough said.

Embracing The Web: Better Late Than Never

Today's announcemente that the largest theatre owner in NYC (Nederlander Organization) has launched a web site aimed at prompting more people to buy show tickets on line (and helps them to compete with the third party on-line resellers) is hardly a stroke of genius.. BUT illustrates that its never too late to play on the web---maybe they'll ultimately embrace new media applications (displaying audio/video clips) as a means to really do it right...

The New Meaning of Privacy--Thank you HP!

One of the leading corporations in the world (Hewlett Packard) has helped us to really understand the new millenium's definition of privacy...other than perhaps in bathrooms, there is no such thing as privacy... so you can all take it out of your vocabulary.

Should we really be shocked that the Board of Directors of a Fortune 100 company authorized illegal surveillance one of its peers?.. Of course not...Led by George W. Bush, we're in a whole new world...the concept of ethics disappeared a long time ago...and as we continue to struggle in the war against terrorism and "Islamic Facism", our government and corporate leaders have no qualms about embracing the same hypocritical ideals of our enemies... It would seem that laws are interpreted as we see fit...and its okay to break them if a few people think its for the greater good..

HP Board Members include CEO's of companies that control and adminster private information of tens of millions of Americans. If these people see fit to invade the privacy of one of their peers, why would we think any one of them would hesitate to illegally leverage or exploit the information databases of millions that are immediately available to them.

And why would we think any of us are safe.... George Bush is setting an example for us all...so the message for all you marketers: enjoy the party...do whatever you want with whatever databases you can peak into...everything is fair game now...just keep a good lawyer on hand...or someone that merely knows how to keep good news clippings and can cite what is taking place in America today as your defense.

The Basics of Email Marketing

Ok...taking a light moment from heavy topics and just re-visiting some very rudimentary tacts for those that are trying to leverage the power of email marketing--without making a nuisance of yourselves.

Click on the link and take some sage and practice advice from Janine Popick..she's the CEO and founder of VerticalResponse. Profitable and 20,000 customers strong, VerticalResponse is a leading self-service direct marketing provider to businesses of any size...and a platform that I use on behalf of several tier 1 clients

Marketing Made Smart-Advertising on Blogs

I've been preaching about the power of blogs for more than three years, and even though I pressed clients to embrace blogging as a key ingredient to viral marketing, 80% pooh-poohed the notion. Until recently. .

(The funniest part is, the technology-centric clients didn't think it would be a smart way to chatter up their offerings--- "too secret to talk about"...which otherwise means : "don't want to get egg on our face and don't feel secure enough about about our product".....if you're targeting a mass audience, you must be advertising in some shape manner or form. If nothing else, you have a website, so your competitors are going to find out about you anyway... so, hesitating to beat your chest, opine, inform or solicit comment via a blog for fear of competitors learning about what you are doing is a critical mistake...and thinking that your secret sauce will be discovered via your blog posting only means that you aren't operating in the real world.

OK, with that said...the link to MarketingProf's provides a great insight --and points to the fact that everyone is blogging now (or at least those that have the time)---and the interesting blogs are attracting exactly the audience you want to reach....which makes it obvious that these are the best channels to advertise on...its a combination of viral marketing blended with demographic zoning.....and its a fraction of the cost of any other advertising application... So why wouldn't you try it? Duh.

BetOnSports Exec Arrested: Feds Running Out of Things To Do:

If I didn't confirm the front page story on the NY Times by visiting the Wall St. Journal and several other papers, I wouldn't have believed it.

Bombs are literally flying across every inch of the Middle East, Israel is under attack, we're facing the biggest international crisis since the Bay of Pigs...and the morons at the Justice Department can't think of any better use of their resources than to sit and wait at the Dallas airport so they could arrest the UK ceo of BetOnSports, a publicly traded internet gambling company that was backed by Goldman Sachs and Fidelity. The charge??? Racketeering conspiracy for participating in an illegal enterprise.

Do I care that the company's shareholders lost their CEO to the wunderkinds at the FBI? And that all of the other execs of this UK, publicly traded company with thousands of shareholders can expect the FBI to wake them up at the crack of dawn and cart them off? After all, didn't these guys learn from Jay Cohen's experience? How stupid could these guys be to believe that its safe to set foot in this country when Congress just voted in favor of cracking down on internet gambling?? After all, the FBI and Justice Department don't have anything else to do...they killed off Ken Lay (he deserved it)...they've upended Martha Stewart (she deserved it too).....so now its Internet Gambling...--perhaps the most vile crime in the world...certainly worse than distributing child porn...after all...it takes NBC news to track down child porn promoters and abusers...the FBI is too busy chasing CEO's of internet gambling companies!

Hey George---loved your use of the word "shit" when the microphones picked up your chatting with Tony...what kind of shit is going on inside our own borders....and by the way...why hasn't the CEO of Goldman Sachs (now the Treasury Secretary been arrested on the internet gambling case---after all, they floated the stock on the UK exchange---isn't that aiding and abetting?..and how about arresting the portfolio managers from Fidelity---they bought a bunch of it in the IPO and still own it?...Isn't that aiding and abetting???
Can anyone spell P-R-I-O-R-I-T-Y ????

Fair and Unbalanced Business Week?

I'm on the receiving end of a newsletter published by Leadership IQ--a very intriguing boutique that occupies the leadership training sector. Not your typical 'talking head'--the firm's principal is a guy named Mike Murphy--solid background for being a hired gun in the "turn-around management" world, and now provides seminars, training sessions etc for a formidable list of Fortune clients. I've attended one of his seminars--and this isn't jibber jabber stuff...Its tood bad his firm was launched after I was CEO of a public company...I could have used his insight on a number of challenges.

Murphy polls his subscribers every once in a while i.e. interesting topics of the day--the May canvass created lots of stir "What do you think of George Bush's leadership talents"...Forbes and WSJ reported on those results..... Anyway--Murphy polled us on Wed in the aftermath of Ken Lay's death...We all know who Ken Lay was.. Per the link on the title of this posting, it seems that Business Week reporter Jon Fine took exception to the poll thinking it was in poor taste. No big deal. Apparently a few of the receipients of the poll thought the same.. Murphy did a follow up and said he got two death threats...

But, reporter Fine, purportedly an accredited news hound thought it was so distasteful when Murphy's PR firm suggested BW write an article about the poll--he retalitated and sent an email to gawker suggesting that they should write a piece profiling Murphy as a grave dancer. (The front page of BW carried a story by Mark Morrison that pounced on Ken Lay's grave..so it seems that Jon Fine has some internal editorial issues that he can only vent through third party platforms)

Who cares? Probably nobody.. just a reminder for anyone that reads Business Week (and of course the NY Times)...and the hundreds of other "objective news channels" ..to be wary of the slant..and that we can really only expect 'fair and balanced' reporting from pre-schoolers (From the mouths of babes...)

NYSE's Thain To Circumvent Wall St.

NY Times ran interesting update i.e. John Thain's plan to invite institutional investors to trade directly into the NYSE--and bypass the Wall Street firms that have traditionally facilitated order execution. Not that many don't already do this via electronic trading platforms, but Thain is clearly suggesting to alter the entire landscape of the secuities industry---and cut out the middle men... wow

I said this 3 months ago! Wall Street & Casinos

Excerpt from Institutional Investor...Proud to say that I made this observation months ago...read the whole article.....No doubt fodder for George W. and wannabe's like E. Spitzer to distract everyone from real problems in society.

Led by the likes of Goldman Sachs, Merrill Lynch, Morgan Stanley, JPMorgan and Fidelity, big-name financial firms have invested hundreds of millions of dollars in the shares of online casinos, even though the practice is considered illegal according to U.S. law. Most of these companies trade on the London Stock Exchange and are licensed in remote locations like Malta and Antigua that are more than friendly to Internet gambling. But, most of the users are Americans. There are fees to be made, however, and that apparently trumps the other concerns.

Incentivizing Your Sales Force

Brick & Click, Brick and Mortar, B2B; B2C--its always about Sales. Always.
With that said, resident guru Jay Berkman opines " the biggest challenge every enterprise has is keeping their salespeople incentivized and inspired. The commission carrot only works so far--and if someone else is dangling a more tasty carrot in front of your sales force, you're at risk of losing a valuable foot solider."

Today's WSJ profiled Snowfly--an interesting company that provides a game-based platform to help motivate anyone whose job is based on meeting regular goals or quotas. Visit the link--but here's some advice: don't let your employees access the game platform during normal working hours--let them use it at pre-defined times (you can create the platform so that its only accessible at certain hours of the day/night)