The Digital Lookout

Reuters reported recently that the time has come for mobile search.  In their article, “the time has come for mobile search” they claim the mobile search industry could be worth $2.4 billion by 201.  The actual data has come from Mobile Content Networks Inc. (not that they would be biased!) who make their money from placing ads alongside mobile phone search screens, mmm, why would they be predicted good times ahead I wonder?

The future of not just mobile search but mobile Internet intrigues me, it has been touted as the next big thing for a while now and I have blogged about it in the past (here, here and here) but it still isn’t at a critical mass level or even near for me at the moment.  As the article states, and I have noted in the past, the search terms people are using through their mobile handsets are not for the products and services people search for online.  The Reuters article notes mobile specific search as being the highest volume, typically music tracks or games, where as porn is also a large search term in the mobile world.

My prediction is that mobile search will become a part of the digital mix in the future but not in a way which will see it mirror standard search.  It will require a different model and a different strategy if mobile search is going to become part of a valid digital strategy.

According to Search Engine Watch the Yahoo buyout of AOL may be back on with the Yahoo board approving talks with Time Warner.  The buyout/merger saga has been going on for an age now with many seeing it as the only way to get a true competitor to Google.  Is it finally going to happen? (previous post here)

Reuters has reported that porn is no longer the main past time on the internet with the world of social networking the new leading activity conducted online.  According to the findings not only do people spend more time on social sites than they do viewing pornography but also the number of searches for adult related phrases has dropped in recent years.  One quote from the article..

“My theory is that young users spend so much time on social networks that they don’t have time to look at adult sites.”

..is a little far fetched in my opinion.  If someone is interested in loooking at pornography online then they will find the time to do so!  My opinion is that is just the sheer volume of users now engaged in sites like Facebook and also the fact that they are enticing people who never used to spend too much time online to use the Internet a little more.

Interesting to see that the Internet is not as porn dominated as it once was but it is still pretty dominant as the second most popular online past time and will take some shifting.

While we were all sat about discussing when the changes to the Google quality scoring system would come in place and what impact they would have Google snuck in the release! Sneeky, sneeky.

It finally happened on Tuesday and we are now running on the live quality score system, first page bid estimates and quality score spectrum out of 10 (screenshots below). The first impressions of this change is that it should help search marketers understand the quality score system better and enable more changes for the better in terms of campaign performance. Having a quality score out of 10 allows for better understanding of this metrics and will help to see improvements on a more granular level. First page bids also allow you to see what you may need to spend to hit page 1 (and thus tempt you to do so as I blogged about previously!).  Conversely though, I did see a keyword which had a first page bid of £56! and wondered how this might affect advertisers, does it mean:

a. The system is still bedding in and is not 100% accurate

b. it is accurate and will dissuade some advertisers from using PPC altogether

It doesn’t seem to have affected the market significantly yet and on the whole I think it is a good thing for search engine marketers who are willing to put in the effort and use the changes to their advantage.

It was my birthday yesterday, and of the messages and cards I did receiev there was one from an unexpected source, Facebook!  This may not be new but as it would only occur once a year all I can say is that it wasnt in place last year.  A nice happy birthday message on my homepage when I signed in made me feel loved by the social network.

facebook remebered my birthday