After a year’s delay, Microsoft adCenter will start to power the PPC results on Yahoo UK in Q2 of 2012. Discussion of its potential for success aside, here are some useful links and an action plan for preparing UK campaigns.

Recap on UK Search Engine Market Shares

Yahoo/Bing face a major battle for market share in the UK – more than in the US. Google holds a dominant 91 percent of searches (Hitwise, 4 weeks to Jan 21st), with Yahoo and Bing at 2.28 percent and 3.83 percent respectively; less than the 4.80 percent of UK searches that take place on Google.com. There are more market share resources in this article.

Unsurprisingly, UK PPC campaigns on Yahoo and Bing receive less love than AdWords, although their combined research states their audiences are 41 percent more likely to convert than the “average” UK searcher.

Step 1: Shorten Your Yahoo Ads by February 1

Yahoo’s Panama system switched to ad lengths similar to Google some time ago – but they’re longer than those on adCenter. All new or modified ads on Panama are required to have an ad title of 25 characters (instead of 40) or less, and a display URL of a maximum 35 characters on February 1; ready for migration across to adCenter. Descriptions should also be shortened, from a maximum of 71 to 70 characters.

Existing ads that meet these requirements will migrate over to adCenter but will be truncated and paused – so I’d suggest editing all your ads sooner rather than later.

Step 2: Map Your Accounts

You may have accounts that live on Panama which are not on adCenter – take some time to compare and see which need migrating across, or what’s already in place. If you have a Yahoo or MSN rep, they’ll help with this process.

Best practice is to keep your adCenter account and build it out – not replace it by transferring over a larger Yahoo account; the systems are different.

Step 3: Know the Differences Between Panama and adCenter

The two systems work differently. This webinar explains how on the Search Alliance website – watch from 10:30 minutes onwards. There’s also a comparison guide.

You can view training videos as well and study for the adCenter exam.

Step 4: Allocate Time to Adjust, Expand Campaigns

After reviewing the above steps, there are several areas of your campaigns you will need to work on, including:

• Editing copy and display URLs 
• Expanding keywords 
• Reviewing negatives and the levels they are applied at 
• Adjusting match types 
• Adjusting geo-targeting 
• Reviewing dynamic insertion parameters

Consider spending time on campaigns already live on adCenter, too, as there may be keyword variations searched for on Yahoo than never had searches on Bing, and aren’t currently in your adCenter account.

There might be an opportunity here to improve targeting – adCenter has more granular targeting options than Panama down to city or metro areas, as well as region and country levels.

Step 5: Adjust Your Bid, Budget Strategy

AdCenter has higher minimum bids – £0.05 compared to £0.01 – and requires you to set a monthly budget (unlike Panama); you’ll need to incorporate this change into your workflow going forward.

Step 6: Review Your Landing Pages

This is always best practice – review your pages against the keywords driving traffic to them: are the keywords in the page, and is the content relevant? This is factored into rankings.

Step 7: Manage Expectations

Some U.S. accounts saw increases in performance post-transition; others saw the opposite. So communicate that there is a change coming and the waters may be choppy; not just because of the migration of accounts, but because of consumers seeing different ads and performance changing.

Watching Brief

Following the above steps, working closely with your search engine reps and maintain a watching brief should put you in a good position to cope with the change.

 @DuncanParry

I’ve been lucky enough to work at entrepreneurial companies, including forming an agency 6 years ago and selling it earlier this year. Occasionally I’m asked my advice for anybody starting their own business, so here are a few pearls of (what I hope is) wisdom.

Find a Mentor

If there’s one thing I could go back in time and tell myself in 2005, it’s that I should find a business mentor. You’ll have plenty of people around you who can give you advice as your business grows, but you’ll need someone outside of your colleagues and board for advice and to sound off to about your frustrations and concerns. Someone who has plenty of business experience and has seen it all before – half wise aunt or uncle, half teacher.

Manage Change

Digital is one of the fastest-changing industries in the world. We all know this, but having a deliberate strategy in place to cope with that fact is something I suspect many of us lack. Knowing how you’re going to detect the latest industry developments, understand their impact, and act accordingly is vital. You need to dedicate talented people, with time to think.

Be Flexible

You need to be flexible to adapt with the change that will be your constant companion – and not to fall into the trap of becoming an obstacle. It’s easy to get stuck in your ways when you’re constantly busy, under pressure, and stressed – but you’ll always have a competitor who is flexible.

Be Prepared to Fail

We all fail. We might not like to admit it and certainly don’t shout about it, but we all fail. Be prepared to – it’s part of learning. The trick is being able to fail fast, stand-up, dust yourself off, and try again. Most successful business leaders have failed before they succeeded.

Learn About Stress

Stress is the hidden enemy. The fast moving nature of digital means we’re often rushing from one meeting or project to the other, being interrupted by text messages, emails, social media, and people wandering over to our desks to ask a question.

All of these things add to our stress levels – and reduce our attention spans and ability to do our best work. So learning to spot when you’re becoming stressed and when to take a step back is important to maximize your own efficiency. Whether it’s listening to classical music, taking a walk around the block, or reading a magazine, learn how to clam yourself down and keep your focus when the pressure is biting.

Take Care of Yourself

Another deadline. Another late night. Another takeaway when you get home late.

It’s easy to fall into bad habits when you’re working every hour you can. But if you don’t take care of yourself, you’ll burn out or lose your passion – and make bad decisions on the way. Make sure you have downtime and exercise time.

Optimize You

Like a campaign, you can be improved – through a mentor, training, or a business coach. There are always things we can improve on – take time to understand what you can be better at, and addresses those weaknesses. The ROI might not be immediately obvious, but you’ll look back one day and be glad you invested in yourself.

Friends. Followers. Contacts. Circles. Social networks can be fun and productive for work or pleasure.

But social networks are also time consuming – more than most of us probably care to admit. With the average person reported to have 130 friends and growing on Facebook alone, the continuous flow of updates from individuals and organizations is overwhelming. From that page you liked on Facebook, to that industry pundit you follow on Twitter, and many others in between, everybody is updating, tweeting, posting, liking, checking in, sharing, +1ing…

Here’s the thing. It’s too much. Admit it. You’re overwhelmed.

I’ve declared a few times on Facebook and Twitter my plans to carry out a cull. A few people or pages get dropped. But…what if that person notices? What if that ex-colleague goes to work somewhere interesting? What if I miss that industry announcement or insider tip? Better not be too harsh, better stay connected.

I’m now on five social networks – four public ones and one closed network for work (Yammer). This week I’ve faced the truth: it’s too much. Time for a cull. But where to start?

Facebook

I know instinctively that Facebook is my personal space – it’s where friends and family share photos and post personal updates. It’s where I go to get away from work – not to blend the personal and professional.

Step one: un-friend work-only contacts and pages. Step two: move them to LinkedIn or Twitter depending on their social media activity; do I want to only keep in contact with them (LinkedIn) or read what they have to say (Twitter)?

Twitter

I maintain several accounts for myself and work, and the work accounts have clear objectives and strategies. My own, I freely admit, doesn’t. It’s a collection of personal and work interests, and I’m a generous follower.

Time for a change. This is the worrying bit – do I follow my instinct, and cull anybody I don’t regularly find useful? Will I miss out? What will happen to my follower volume? Should I care?

I’ve decide to not rush in here – analyzing hundreds of followers and then making bulk changes, whether un-following or adding them to lists, isn’t particularly easy and I’ve yet to find a tool with all the functionality I want to speed this up. Instead, I’m removing accounts I don’t find useful when I see messages from them – cleaning up my Twitter stream as I go.

LinkedIn & Yammer

LinkedIn is the easiest to keep under control – I’m cautious of adding anybody who approaches me (especially recruiters). Yammer, as a B2B network, is even easier to keep relevant – I have 100 percent control over groups and who I follow (OK, so I’m an admin, which helps.)

Google Plus

Now that’s a blank canvas. So how will I avoid repeating the mistakes I’ve drifted into on Facebook and Twitter?

Circles. I’ve immediately setup three – Work, Family & Friends and Acquaintances. I know I’ll add a further one for “Hobbies & Sports” when businesses and organizations have official pages. I might split my work circle up in future – but I’m keeping them small, and have already started consciously ignoring some followers who I don’t want in my circles.

Social Media Relevancy

If I used to be your friend on Facebook, or I no longer mutually follow you on Twitter, sorry. Relevancy has been one of the underpinning characteristics of the biggest success story of digital – search – and the same applies to social media.

Life’s too short, too busy, and too rushed for the irrelevant. For that attitude, I won’t apologize.

We previously covered how current browser settings didn’t offer consumers the level of control the law would require, and how businesses needed to be aware of the steps they need to take to work towards compliance. Here are the quotes from the Head of the ICO:

“It would obviously ruin some users’ browsing experience if they needed to negotiate endless pop ups, and I am not saying that businesses have to go down that road. Equally, I have to remember that this law has been brought in to give consumers more choice about what companies know about them.”

Brand Republic’s coverage goes on to state: “He added that although the Government is not expecting the ICO to enforce the rule on cookies straight away, “this does not let everyone off the hook” and those which do not take action will be taken into account when it enforces the law….Although it will not be taking enforcement action against business until technical solutions are developed at browser level to meet the requirements on using cookies, in a year’ time, it is willing to use the ability to impose civil monetary penalties of up to £500,000 for “serious breach” of the privacy and electronic communications regulation.”

Our advice: business still need to start taking steps to comply as suggested here – and the Head of the ICO is implementing a solution similar to the “accordion” units we suggested on their website.

The Information Commissioners Office has now (with less than 30 days to go) published some guidelines. They state some important points:

• The Directive applies to mobile devices and applications, as well as  “normal” websites; earlier EU/ UK government documents didn’t always explicitly state this, but it was widely assumed
• That the Directive applies to: “how you use cookies and similar technologies for storing information on a user’s equipment” which means future developments like Connected TVs will be covered by this
• That Flash cookies (i.e. Locally Stored Objects) are covered in case of any doubt
• Acknowledges (see our earlier posts) that browsers do not currently have the functionality to a) categorise cookies by purpose and b) offer consumers an easy way to control cookies by these categories (and therefore purpose)
• States that browser settings are currently not therefore suitable to “rely on” for getting consent from consumers, despite the Directive mentioning them
• That adding consent clauses to site Terms and Conditions is acceptable, but consumers have to be alerted to this change – they must know about it to therefore give consent
• That cookies set as a result of choosing to use a particular site feature also require consent (slightly contradicting earlier suggestions that any cookies required for site functionality were exempt). To be explicit: only cookies that are “strictly necessary” are exempt – e.g. a cookie that enables a shopping basket to work
• Further examples of how to gain consent for particular types of cookies might be issued in future by the ICO

Translating the ICO Guidance Into Action

So what do brands actually need to do? Here are our suggestions, replacing our earlier post on the topic – but of course, we also recommend checking with in-house lawyers, and keeping an eye on the ICO site and industry press. As we’ve commented before, the 25th is just the start.

1: Audit your cookies and tags

The first step is the obvious one – make sure you know which cookies your site drops across all of its pages and as a result of on-page functionality being used. We suggest you review the tracking tags on site, too – always a useful housekeeping exercise and a perfect opportunity to remove any that are no longer required, and to consider a tag carrier solution to make this process easier in future.

We can assist Steak clients with this and suggest a tag carrier and attribution solution that we believe is significantly more advanced that the current market leader – and is being  developed with privacy issues in mind. Please email your contact for more info.

It’s worth noting that redundant tags add to page load speeds – something Google started paying more attention to a few years ago – and slower loading pages will always impact negatively upon conversion rates.

2: Categorise your cookies and tags

As the Directive allows greater leeway for cookies that are vital for site functionality, it makes sense to categorise your cookies and treat different categories differently. We suggest adopting the DMA’s categorisation:

“Cookies necessary for the provision of service: In this case, you may continue to use cookies but you should explain to consumers why you are using them. For example, tell consumers who use an online banking service that cookies are there for security purposes and that they cannot use the service without them.

Useful but intrusive cookies: These cookies are useful to your organisation but are particularly intrusive from the consumer’s point of view. An example of this type would be third-party cookies which track a user’s use of the internet as they move from website to website. You will need to get consent for the use of such cookies and ensure that website visitors are fully aware of how the cookie will work in simple terms which they can understand.

Helpful non-intrusive cookies: Cookies which fall into this category would include cookies which track anonymously how visitors move through your organisation’s web pages. You will need to get consent for the use of such cookies in your privacy policy.

Obsolete cookies: There is no point in asking for consumers’ consent to the use of cookies if they are irrelevant. The audit provides a good opportunity to remove the use of such cookies from your website and will ensure compliance with the requirement in the Data Protection Act 1998 that personal data should not be kept for longer than is necessary.”

The ICO advice builds on this, and makes clear that cookies should be obsessed for how intrusive they are, and suggests one way to do this is to imagine them on a sliding scale – including 3rd party cookies.

3: Update Privacy Policies and Site Terms and Conditions

We strongly suggest brands add text to the existing privacy policy pages linked to from the site footer, or via a new footer link “Cookies” depending on in-house style. This should cover the different types of cookie as categorised above and clearly specify what they are used for and link to any 3^rd party information as relevant- the ICO documents states: “You must think also about giving people more details about what you do – perhaps a list of cookies used with a description of how they work – so that users can make an informed choose about what they will allow.” Remember that you should also provide links to any opt-out mechanisms that exist, too.

4. Decide how to tell consumers – and plan site changes

The ICO have (finally) been clear – brands need to tell consumers that they are using cookies and alert them to any update to Privacy Policies or site Terms and Conditions after the 25^th of May, including linking to information about the policies of third party cookies.

The ICO document discusses two options for informing consumers:

Splash pages or pop-ups which the ICO discount as possibly irritating, and they seem to miss that many browsers block most pop-ups as standard, anyway.

Text in the footer or header which highlights/scrolls when a cookie needs to be set – this could be a good option, or incredibly ugly – and the ICO seem to have missed that most consumers rarely see the footer of a site, as it’s below the fold.

Sites also need to make clear if any site functionality drops a cookie – e.g. ticking a “remember me” box when logging in.

This area is challenging – brands will need to alert consumers without scaring them, or ruining the aesthetic of their websites. No doubt we’ll see some good and some terrible attempts at this in the comings weeks; our initial suggestions are:

Consider a header “accordion”

This is something Amazon already do well – if you visit the.com site from the UK, a content “accordion” suggests you visit the .co.uk; Yahoo! do the same. It’s not hard to imagine these adapted to state something like: “This website uses cookies; under new EU law, we need your consent to use them – please click here” linked to the relevant information / opt out to gain consent (or not). Obviously this needs legal sign-off; but the mechanism is worth considering.

This could be set to only appear on first visit to the site after the 25^th (using a cookie, ironically) and then re-enabled for subsequent changes. This of course only applies if the user doesn’t need to give consent on every visit – but if that becomes requried, the industry is going to have wider issues to worry about, anyway.

The current usage of this technology by Amazon and Yahoo! is shown below:

Add text to functionality options

Where ever a site user takes action (click, ticks a box etc.) and enables site functionality that drops a cookie, add text telling them – e.g. “By ticking “remember me” you will set a cookie on your computer. Read more here” (linked to Ts and Cs/Privacy Policy as relevant). This of couse won’t be the easiest thing to integrate into site designs – another option might be a small piece of text “Uses Cookies – Hover for Info” which uses a hover-over tool tip to provide info and a link.

4: Monitor the Press

This will be the most important thing after the 25^th May – as further DCMS/ICO guidelines may be published and the attempts to enhance browser functionality succeed or fail, brands will need to adjust their cookie usage / site text accordingly.

We’ll post further posts and update this one as relevant.

UPDATE: we’ve posted a revised set of steps following the ICO’s guidance notes here – please read these instead.

In part one we outlined the EU Directive affecting cookies and some of the controversy and interpretations surrounding it; below we discuss the practical steps we suggest brands should take before the 25th May, drawn from our own reading and briefing notes from the IAB UK, DMA, IPA and other sources:

1: Audit your cookies and tags

The first step is the obvious one – make sure you know which cookies your site drops across all of its pages and as a result of on-page functionality being used. We suggest you review the tracking tags on site, too – always a useful housekeeping exercise and a perfect opportunity to remove any that are no longer required, and to consider a tag carrier solution to make this process easier in future.

We can assist Steak clients with this and suggest a tag carrier and attribution solution that we believe is significantly more advanced that the current market leader – and is being  developed with privacy issues in mind. Please email your contact for more info.

It’s worth noting that redundant tags add to page load speeds – something Google started paying more attention to a few years ago – and slower loading pages will always impact negatively upon conversion rates.

2: Categorise your cookies and tags

As the Directive allows greater leeway for cookies that are vital for site functionality, it makes sense to categorise your cookies and treat different categories differently. We suggest adopting the DMA’s categorisation:

“Cookies necessary for the provision of service: In this case, you may continue to use cookies but you should explain to consumers why you are using them. For example, tell consumers who use an online banking service that cookies are there for security purposes and that they cannot use the service without them.

Useful but intrusive cookies: These cookies are useful to your organisation but are particularly intrusive from the consumer’s point of view. An example of this type would be third-party cookies which track a user’s use of the internet as they move from website to website. You will need to get consent for the use of such cookies and ensure that website visitors are fully aware of how the cookie will work in simple terms which they can understand.

Helpful non-intrusive cookies: Cookies which fall into this category would include cookies which track anonymously how visitors move through your organisation’s web pages. You will need to get consent for the use of such cookies in your privacy policy.

Obsolete cookies: There is no point in asking for consumers’ consent to the use of cookies if they are irrelevant. The audit provides a good opportunity to remove the use of such cookies from your website and will ensure compliance with the requirement in the Data Protection Act 1998 that personal data should not be kept for longer than is necessary.”

3: Update Privacy Policies and Consider Site Ts and Cs

Until the full DCMS guidelines are published (sometime after the 25th May – see part one), knowing exactly how the DCMS and ICO will require websites to gain consent for dropping cookies is impossible. At the very least, we strongly suggest brands add text to the existing privacy policy pages linked to from the site footer, or via a new footer link “Cookies” depending on in-house style. This should cover the different types of cookie as categorised above.

We also strongly suggest talking to in-house lawyers at this stage, but especially on the point of consent. It may be that site Terms and Conditions will become the place to request consent in the DCMS guidelines. The theory is that by using the site the visitor accepts the site Ts and Cs (a standard mechanism now) and the Ts and Cs can be amended to include giving consent as a result of using the site. That may be a change worth making sooner rather than later.

4: Monitor the Press

This will be the most important thing after the 25^th May – as detailed DCMS/ICO guidelines are published and the attempts to enhance browser functionality succeed or fail, brands will need to adjust their cookie usage / site text accordingly.

We’ll add further blog posts as this develops.

UPDATE 6/5: Some government guidelines might be published before the 25th according to some sources; however how much time brands will then have to act is unclear; we still suggest following the steps above.

Fast forward to 2011, and on May 25th the five Directives are required to become national law across the EU – including the section relating to cookies. This has led to a lot of press coverage in the mainstream and digital industry press, with dire predictions of the death of web analytics, digital marketing, behavioural marketing and even sophisticated websites themselves.

This is nonsense – here at Steak we want to be very clear about that. To borrow a phrase from a well-known British sitcom – “Don’t panic!”.

As noted by the IAB UK in their briefing note to members, the ICO unfortunately fuelled this atmosphere with a press release entitled “’UK businesses must wake up’ to new EU law on cookies, Information Commissioner warns” despite the body of their release acknowledging the work the IAB and other industry groups have been doing to work with the ICO to turn theory into practical guidelines for business – work that will continue past the 25^th of May.

Further confusion was created when The Head of the ICO used the phrase ”explicit consent” in a Radio 4 Today Show interview: the IAB have subsequently received confirmation from the ICO that he was wrong to use this language – brands do not need to start asking consumers explicitly every time a cookie is dropped on their device.

The 25^th is not D-Day for Cookies

The DCMS (Department for Culture, Media and Sport) have been quite frank: the technical guidelines that lay out how brands should actually implement the directive into practical steps on their websites will not be complete for the 25^th May.

In addition, the Information Commissioner Christopher Graham said: “I cannot bark at the industry at the moment because I have not got the regulations.”

He did however add “My message is that this is not your ‘get out of jail free’ card” and continued to state that complaints would be judged against what brands had done to prepare for the 25^th.

The reality is that the 25^th May is not D-Day for cookies: rather it’s a milestone in a longer process that will result in guidelines from the DCMS that brands will need to follow; but they are expected to take some steps beforehand. Nobody in government has clarified exactly what they are – brands have been left to make their own interpretations.

The Browser Will Be Key?

Something that was missed in some of the early coverage of the 25th May was the preamble to the Directive. The IAB Europe stated in November 2009 that:

“For cookies, the legislation’s preamble specifically says that the control settings in a web browser such as Firefox, Internet Explorer, Chrome, Opera or Safari are sufficient to comply with the consent requirement in the legislation.”

The implication the IAB Europe was drawing in 2009 was clear: consumers are consenting to cookies by enabling them in their browser (and have always been able to block them overall or for individual sites, although this is time consuming not easy for the non-technical). It should be noted that some law blogs have questioned this interpretation, as the preamble was originally a part of a draft of the Directive and was rejected; and preambles have in the past been given less legal importance than the actual Directives themselves.

Thinking around browser settings has advanced since 2009, with the ICO and DCMS “pursuing” enhanced browser settings which “which will give website visitors more information as to how the website uses cookies. This will also give people understandable choices regarding any cookies being placed on their computers” according to the UK DMA (Direct Marketing Association). The DCMS guidelines published on the 20^th of April support this approach – it’s important to note that, overall, consent via browser settings is the mechanism supported by the UK government.

No browser updates have been made that introduce easier-to-use functionality for cookie control, nor has any browser manufacturer clearly stated they will do so specifically because of the Directive for the 25^th of May. It remains to be seen if the aspirations of UK government bodies will become reality with the global companies involved; and other EU governments have taken harsher stances – as Lewis Silkin note, the UK may face EU legal action in future.

Not All Cookies Are Born Equal

One significant point to note is that the Directive allows for the use of cookies in a way that makes sites function on an opt-out basis. To quote the DMA again: “This will mean website owners will not need consent from the user to place cookies on their computers where the use of the cookies is strictly necessary for a service provided by the website owner at the request of the user. This will cover, for example, the use of cookies in shopping baskets on e-commerce websites and security cookies on online banking websites.”

So brands do not need to worry that they will need to significantly re-engineer their online functionality as a result of the Directive and subsequent DCMS guidelines.

Behavioural Advertising and Cookies

Behavioural advertising will attract a lot of attention with regards to cookies and the Directive – there’s been plenty of previous coverage around the privacy implications. The IAB and industry bodies have been working directly with Brussels on this, and the EU has broadly supported the industry’s approach, including the consumer education websites linked to at the bottom of this article as well as an easily recognisable Internet icon, privacy policy notices, a single consumer control page, and a self-regulatory compliance and enforcement mechanism. This approach is still under development.

In part two of this blog post, we layout the steps Steak and industry bodies suggest brands need to take before May 25^th. UPDATE 16/5: we’ve posted a revised set of steps here following the ICO’s publication of guidelines.

UPDATE 6/5: Some government guidelines might be published before the 25th according to some sources; however how much time brands will then have to act is unclear; we still suggest following the steps in our second blog post.

Useful Links

ICO: Confidentiality of Communications Guide (Cookies)

DMA Newsletter Guidance on Cookies

Lewis Silkin on the DCMS and Cookies

All About Cookies from the IAB

Your Online Choices: IAB Guide to Behavioural and Cookies for Consumers

So, another day, another Google announcement that shakes the foundations of social and search strategies. Or does it? Here are our initial – and I stress initial – thoughts on Google +1. Right now we’re focusing on the search side of this as that’s the initial thrust of Google’s announcement, and where most consumers will encounter this functionality first.

What is Google+1?

Simply put, it’s Google’s equivalent of the Facebook “like” button – a way of saying “I like this” or “I recommend this”. Of course, Google aren’t using the word “like” anywhere in their PR.

Consumers can click it in both paid and natural search results – for the former, advertisers have to add it as an option. It’s very important to note that consumers need to be signed in to a Google account (AdWords, Analytics, Gmail etc) to see the button and click it. We have to wonder how many consumers are aware they have a Google Account as a result of using one of Google’s products – it’s not something Google have historically promoted.

If you are wondering about your own Google Account at this point, see this page and login to see which products Google associates with your login – and edit your Google Profile. Yes, you have a Google Profile too. Which brings to me to where Google+1 “likes” appear.

Your Google Profile

If you have a Google Account, you have a Google profile. It might not be public, you might never have filled it in, but you do. You can check yours here https://profiles.google.com/

When a consumer clicks the +1 button, this recommendation is shown in their public Google profile. As shown by Mashable’s example :

Will this Impact Search Results?

Yes. Google have stated this will affect SEO/natural search rankings. So, if your brand gets lots of +1 clicks, it could boost your position in results as Google views your site as “recommended” and therefore of interest to it’s consumers. No guarantees, as ever with Google.

Of course, there will be companies who try to “game this”. We already seen a brand encourage retweets as part of a competition, for example, on Twitter. Brands and their agencies will need to decide what they can do to encourage these clicks without crossing the line – and of course, Google will continue to develop their algorithm to counter such efforts; no doubt a sudden flurry of +1 clicks will be seen as of less value that a continual steam of them that suggest genuine “recommendations”.

This also means every time you click the +1 button you are effectively working for Google, helping them improve their results.

Paid Search and +1

PPC advertisers can opt to include the button on their ads. UPDATE: Google tell us will be enabled for all PPC adverts if the searcher is logged in. Then, when logged in consumers can click it and their friends (as determined via Google’s Profile system) will see they did so, as show in these two images from Google, where “Brian Walker” clicked to recommend an ad.

Will this Change PPC Quality Score and Rankings?

No. Google have clearly stated that unlike natural search, this won’t be used at the present time to determine rankings etc. No surprise – there’s an even clearer financial gain to gaming this if it did impact QS and therefore CPCs.

UPDATE: Whilst it might not affect Quality Score, it could increase CTRs and therefore have a beneficial advantage in PPC.

Beyond Search

Like Facebook’s “Like” button, Google will offer a version of this for brands to put on their websites – so start putting real estate on your site aside now.

This is when the +1 button will really take off – consumers may not be logged in, ignore it or not know what it is in search results. Engagement rates on features like “block site” and earlier feedback mechanism in search haven’t been high. On the websites of brands they like, however, they are much more likely to click the +1 button.

Big Brands Gain the Most?

One of our initial reactions to this here is that big brands will gain the most. They have the brand awareness, brand search volumes and onsite traffic levels to attract the most clicks via SERPs and more significantly via their websites when they’ve integrated the button – just like with Facebook’s button.

We’ll blog more and speak to our clients direct as we assess this more, but for now, here’s the initial action points we recommend:

1.     Educate your colleagues – they’ll start seeing the button on English language searches soon (send them this blog’s URL!)

2.     Warn your developers you’ll need some screen space in the future – unfortunately, date TBC from Google on the onsite button at the time of writing

3.     Discuss this for PPC with your agency – will your brand be recommended? Will this improve your CTRs – or a competitors to your disadvantage? Will Google’s Profile network actually connects your consumers and their friends? The penetration of Google in the UK at 90%, for example, won’t translate to that sort of penetration into consumer’s friend network via Google Profiles (did you know you could have one until today?) You can opt out – see the end of this post.

4.     Discuss your SEO and Social integration strategy with Steak. This is something we’ve been doing with clients for some time – in fact, we first engaged in the Yahoo Answers for brands awareness and SEO reasons for a client back in 2008. We’ve written about SEO and Social regularly on Search Engine Watch too.

5.     Open a Google Profile, and try this out for yourself – that’s the best way to understand it further.

Conclusion

This will be big – because it’s from Google. The real growth in +1 clicks will be once it’s onsite and not just in SERPs; but for search it is now part of strategies going forward.

In social, this could be the way Google finally manages to attract consumers to it’s social platform – whatever that will look like beyond a Google Profile – but it’s early days. It’s not a Facebook or Twitter killer, that is for sure; if anything, Google will try to be the place your profiles merge and connect across social networks and their product network.

The question is: do you actually want to connect those worlds? We’ll leave that hanging in the air for now…

We’ll post more search and social thoughts as our analysis of this develops.

Sources:

Google’s +1 Announcement
Mashable’s original post

UPDATE: We’ve just had an email from Google UK – sign-up to find out when the onsite button is available here.

UPDATE 2: It’s not opt in for PPC; it’ll be turned on as standard (above edited accordingly). AdWords customers can request an opt out here.

In January, Google introduced a useful addition to AdWords that potentially makes managing negative keywords across multiple campaigns a lot easier. Maybe it was because January is such a busy time of year, but it’s a feature that seems to have passed by many advertisers. Here’s a recap.

What are Negative Keyword Lists?

Simply put, a central place to store master list(s) of negative keywords and apply them to multiple campaigns. This is an improvement on the old way of doing this in AdWords, when you had to laboriously copy and paste negatives between campaigns – a process which can mean copying 1000s of words for a mature campaign that’s been built out over time.

Accessing Negative Keyword Lists

The lists are easy to access. In AdWords, simply click “Control panel and library” on the left of the screen, and select “Negative keyword lists”.

In the example above, you can see that I’ve already got a list in place of 127 keywords applied to 4 campaigns. You can create multiple lists and apply them to different combinations of campaigns. This is useful if you want to apply a master list of negatives to all campaigns, and another, separate list to only a select few – for example if your product range is limited in some regions, but not everywhere.

Creating new lists is easy – just click the “New negative keyword list button”, name the list and paste in the keywords. Of course you’ll need to spend some time consolidating existing lists across campaigns – more on that later – and then you’ll need to apply them to campaigns. That’s where I am afraid AdWords interface design provides something of an obstacle.

Applying Negative Lists to Campaigns

Using this feature, it feels like Google designed it without thinking through the workflow involved for existing campaigns – i.e. most of their customers. Once you have created lists, there’s no easy way to apply them to multiple campaigns. Instead, you have to go into every single campaign and then apply the lists(s) that are relevant to that campaign.

Here’s the process:

1. Click “All online campaigns” on the menu on the left of your screen
2. Click the campaign to apply the list to
3. Click the “Keywords” tab
4. Scroll to the bottom of this screen
5. Click “Negative Keywords”
6. On the right of the inflated lists that appear, click “Keyword Lists”
7. Click “Add”
8. Click “Add” next to the negative keyword list you want to apply
9. Repeat across multiple lists
10. Click “Save”

Unfortunately, you need to repeat these steps for every campaign – there’s no way at the time of writing to select multiple campaigns and apply the same list(s) to them all at once – which would have been a real time saver. There’s no way to apply them to multiple accounts within the same MCC, either, something that would help with enterprise level accounts like national retailers.

Negative Keyword List Deployment Steps

Interface gripes aside, negative keyword lists are a worthwhile addition to any AdWords campaign. Here’s some steps to follow to get the most out of them:

1)     Download your account via AdWords Editor;

2)     Sort the columns in Excel and delete all of the rows and columns with anything other that negative keywords and the keyword type in them;

3)     Use these to plan the lists you need – I’d suggest a “Whole Account” list of terms you’d never, ever want your ads to appear for, and then any more specific lists you need around those you have in AdGroups or only in some campaigns in the download;

4)     Re-arrange the negatives in the download to populate these lists and save them;

5)     Add any additional terms that spring to mind, or you can find via SQRs or keyword tools;

6)     Save the master list(s) and then start adding them via the procedure above;

7)     Update your campaign build out process to include applying these lists to any new campaigns in future.

Negative keyword lists will no doubt become a standard of AdWords campaign management – hopefully Google will improve the interface over time and add support via AdWords Editor and the API, too.

Many agencies, publishers, and advertisers across Europe have been sent documents by the European Commission (EC) recently, requesting detailed information about the online advertising marketplace — and about search marketing and AdWords in particular.

This is part of an investigation into Google and antitrust. While a response isn’t mandatory, questioning from industry bodies has elicited a response that suggests the commission can, if it wants to, make it compulsory.

I’ve been critical of Google’s market dominance in the past and still firmly believe strong competition in every area of their business is good for the industry and for consumers. But while reading and answering the overlapping questions in the two documents my agency has received, I feel a growing unease that the bureaucrats who will ultimately pass judgment on Google may do more damage than good.

The questions in the documents fall into several broad categories:

• Define the digital services you provide and therefore the marketplace.
• The extent to which campaigns need to differ per country and to what extent that poses barriers.
• Scenarios around when ad spend would be switch away from horizontal PPC ads (i.e. AdWords) to other platforms or ad types.
• A surprising number of questions around how easy it is to port data between AdWords and other platforms, how easy Google make this and if it could be done “by a programmatic tool.”
• Questions about the AdWords API, legal agreements with Google and anyway Google tries to restrict the use of other platforms.
  It’s the questions about porting campaigns and the API that worry me. This isn’t one question but a series, probing for details of current processes, in-house and external tools, and the time and money involved — all asking if Google makes this difficult.

We all know that a copy and paste of a campaign from Google into adCenter or any other ad platform won’t bring the best results — the systems have different campaign options, treat search strings and match types differently, have different consumer user bases, etc.

I wouldn’t want to use a “programmatic tool” to dump campaigns into other system from AdWords.

Do I want to download them, open them, edit them to fit each platform and then quickly upload them? Yes. We all know how to use the various search engine editors and Excel today.

This feels like a line of inquiry a competing ad platform would push hardest — we all know there’s been lobbying. I’m not accusing any one company and I trust the EC has processes in place to prevent bias. I’m just wondering aloud if this is the most useful direction for the commission to proceed in.

What worries me is this is exactly the sort of narrow-minded approach to the market that could lead to a ruling that’s bad for PPC — at an extreme, ordering Google to add a “port” button to copy campaigns to adCenter or other systems — with no reference to the poor performance that may follow. Knowing how to get the best out of different ad platforms is a skill in itself.

Hopefully the detailed answers being written by search experts will steer the commission toward more genuine areas of concern, such as Google’s practice of contacting big advertisers directly without telling their agencies (I saw an example of this the other day, unsolicited by the client) or locking-off top AdWords slots for its own products — and that’s before we talk about DoubleClick or their market share as a whole.

Martin Sorrell never said a truer word when he described Google as a “frenemy.”

This topic will be a slow burning one in Europe — and in all likelihood, by the time the bureaucratic wheels have finished turning, the marketplace will have changed again, anyway.