Google just announced the creation of an online marketplace for Google-related solutions released by 3rd parties. The site named “Google Solutions Marketplace” will organize 3rd party solutions built by using Google components. The aim of the site is to simplify match-making between the customers, products and professional services.
The Marketplace’s initial focus is to connect customers of communications and collaboration products like Google Apps and Enterprise search with 3rd parties that sell complementary products and services.
For users, the Marketplace has search, browse, and end-user ratings to make it easy to locate More»

Labels: online services, salesforce, Search and Marketplaces

Chinese search engine Baidu (NASD: BIDU) has captured 74.5% of the perferred search engine market share according to a survey by the China Internet Network Information Center (CNNIC). Baidu’s major competitor in China, Google has a market share of 14.3%.
Among, high-end users (meaning non-student users aged 25 or older, with a degree of bachelor, Master or PhD, as well as a monthly income of 3,000 yuan and above), the two search engines have similar market share, with 47.72% for Baidu and 42.32% for Google.
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Labels: Search and Marketplaces

There is the transcript of the statement made by David Drummond, Chief Legal Officer, Google on the proposed acquisition of DoubleClick by Google (GOOG).
It explains in simple english Google’s existing online advertising business and DoubleClick’s display ad technology and business.
David went on to say that “Google’s business model has focused on what’s known as the “long tail” of the Internet – the millions of individuals and small businesses that cater to niche interests and markets. We lower the barrier to entry for these small More»

Labels: google, Online Advertising, Search and Marketplaces, Search Engine Marketing, Search Engine Optimization

The Searchnomics 2007 Conference videos are now available. Here are the Keynote videos. Watch all the videos here.
Bill Tancer, General Manager, Global Research, Hitwise
Marissa Mayer, Vice President, Search Products and User Experience, Google Inc.
James M. Lamberti, Senior Vice President, Search and Media, comScore
Melanie Mitchell, Vice President of SEO/SEM, AOL
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Labels: Search and Marketplaces, Search Engine Marketing, Search Engine Optimization, Search Tools, Searchnomics

I recently wrote about the Paypal and CheckOut rivalries. It turns out Paypal in making some serious head way. Today, Southwest Airlines is letting travelers buy their plane tickets with PayPal.
Southwest said that customers buying tickets on its Web site can use debit and credit cards or bank accounts linked to their PayPal account. Southwest officials said offering PayPal as a payment option was a matter of convenience.
In addition to Southwest Airlines, Northwest Airlines announced a similar deal with PayPal last month.
PayPal was started in 1998 and purchased by eBay in 2002. It lets people send and receive payments More»

Labels: Search and Marketplaces

According to the Mercury, recent surveys found that less than one out of five users of Google’s Checkout online payment service were happy with it and eBay’s PayPal figure was more than double that (two out of five). In May, about 33 people visited PayPal’s Web site for each Checkout visitor, up from an 11-to-1 ratio in December, according to Nielsen/NetRatings.
At Searchnomics 2007, Google CheckOut claimed that 25% of all online transactions originate via search. Even if More»

Labels: Advertising, Local Search, Search and Marketplaces, Search Tools, Yahoo

Angry shareholders voted down proposals to tie executive pay to competitive performance and challenged the company’s human rights policies in China at their annual meeting. The meeting was focused on the past three years and a little about the how the company intends to respond to Google’s growing dominance.
“I am going to sell all my shares!” said Dotty Webber of Sunnyvale, CA. “He was talking about macaroni and cheese and how people like to eat it. There was nothing about their internet strategy. I went to the Google meeting and Eric Schmidt talked about how Google plans to help More»

Labels: Search and Marketplaces, Search Engine Marketing, Search Engine Optimization, Search Tools, Social Search

As the company realizes that it can no longer compete with Google, it is saying the future of web search is history. Yahoo says the model for getting information via the browser is outdated. In the future relevant information will be delivered directly to readers. “The future of the web is about personalization. Where search was dominant, now the web is about ‘me.’ It’s about weaving the web together in a way that is smart and personalized for the user,” said Tapan Bhat, VP, Yahoo!’s Personalised Home Page.
Interestingly, iGoogle is about personalization and Google has been making alot More»

Labels: Local Search, Mobile Search, Search and Marketplaces, Search Engine Marketing, Search Engine Optimization, Search Tools, Social Search, Vertical Search, Web Analytics

comScore, today released a study on the relationship between paid search marketing and retail e-commerce as of March 2007. The study revealed that e-commerce sites are the most frequent users of search engine marketing, with each of the top ten search engine marketers being either retail or comparison shopping sites. In March, nearly 20 billion sponsored links were served to U.S. Internet users from the top search engines, with eBay.com leading the charge as the top search engine marketer with 802 million (4.1 percent) of sponsored link exposures, followed by Smarter.com with 366 million (1.9 percent), and Shopping.com More»

Labels: Search and Marketplaces, Vertical Search, Web Analytics

Susan Decker, the former CFO of Yahoo has been replaced by Blake Jorgensen. He will begin his new job on June 4, 2007. Susan was famous for saying that “It’s not our goal to be No. 1 in Internet search.” and that is precisely the plan the company has been sticking to. Here is the press release from Yahoo.
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Labels: Search and Marketplaces, Search Engine Marketing, Search Engine Optimization, Search Tools, Vertical Search