Today I noticed a job posting at Search Engine Watch where the Obama campaign was looking for an internet marketing specialist.   I’ve provided a copy of this job opening for an SEOs out there that want to support the Obama campaign by doing a little SEO work for them.

Barack Obama has amassed an army of people to support him financially and politically online.  This is a stark contrast to what the other candidates have been able to do.  Check out this some-what dated graph of myspace and youtube figures.

Earlier this year more than $54 million in February was raised for the primary election.. His combined January and February totals nearly matched was he raised last year. The campaign said it raised $45 million through the Internet in February and had 385,000 new contributors for a total of more than 1 million donors. Continue reading →

Today is an important day. Not just because it’s May 1st, but also because we get to share with the world all the goodness and time saving features that RSS provides.

Feedburner recently reported that they track around 60 million RSS subscribers. Even if we bump that number to 70 million RSS users (counting people that use RSS with other applications or platforms) this would still convert to a meager 5,4% of the Internet users around the world, as of today.

What is the takeaway message? Only a very small percentage of the Internet population is aware of the RSS format and its benefits, and that number is growing slowly over time.

We’ve seen many bubbles over the last 2 years and we’re really starting to see the bubble pop in regard to the housing market.  When buyers can’t get financing that means there are fewer buyers to drive up prices.  I’ve been watching my local market pretty closely here in Portland, and while house prices have not dropped the whopping 40-50% that other areas of the country has seen, we’re starting to see them slip. Continue reading →

Starbucks’ stock is down nearly 11% today and the primary reason is that the $4 cup of coffee is being cut out of a lot of people’s daily routine.  One of the first thing that personal finance strategists tell people to cut things like Starbucks out of their budget.

Starbucks, in the midst of rolling out new initiatives aimed at luring more customers into its vast network of stores, pegged fiscal second-quarter earnings at 15 cents a share, below the consensus analyst target of 21 cents, according to FactSet Research.
Continue reading →

It looks like sports.si.cnn.com was cached by Yahoo and still has the cached page up from this attack.

Here are details and a full story from Yahoo:

After being called off Friday, the on-again, off-again cyberattack against CNN’s Web site again picked up steam early this week, according to network security analysts.

At its peak, the attack has sucked up 100MBps in bandwidth, enough to slow the news Web site for some visitors. “That’s a decent-sized attack,” said Jose Nazario, a senior security engineer with Arbor Networks. “Globally speaking, it’s probably garden-variety.” Continue reading →

Hiding a ring in a bouquet just wasn’t enough when a computer programmer decided to pop the question.

Bernie Peng reprogrammed Tammy Li’s favorite video game, “Bejeweled,” so a ring and a marriage proposal would show up on the screen when she reached a certain score.

Li reached the needed score — and said yes.

The word of the romantic feat last December filtered out after Peng, a financial software programmer, posted details on his blog. The reprogramming was a tricky task and took him a month.

“I thought it was pretty cool, in a nerdy way,” Peng told The Star-Ledger of Newark.

The couple plan to marry over Labor Day weekend, and PopCap, the Seattle company that makes “Bejeweled,” will fly the couple to Seattle as part of their honeymoon.

“Most video game companies would frown on people manipulating their games,” said Garth Chouteau, a spokesman for PopCap.

“But it won him a woman. As a bunch of geeks we have to say, ‘Bernie, hats off to you.’”

The company is also supplying copies of “Bejeweled” to hand out as favors to the wedding guests. In the hugely popular game, players score points by swapping gems to form vertical and horizontal chains.

I was doing some research today and cruised over to MSN.com to see what site ranks in the top results for “lawyers”. Surprise! Surprise! It’s Lawyers.com.

However, what I didn’t expect was, to see subdomains dominate the next 90+ results, essentially giving lawyers.com a monopoly in MSN’s search results. You really have to look closely to find a site that isn’t a subdomain.

Now, I thought they would have fixed this by now, as it’s no secret…

Barry Schwartz: “Subdomains work very well at the moment. No doubt about that. I can take a prominent, old, domain, set up a brand new subdomain, add one link from the original domains front page, throw up whatever content I want and within days have plenty of traffic. These days it seems that almost all linkpop value from the original domain is transfered - and I see this happening in both MSN and Google. “

There’s a lot of room right now to take advantage of this if you have a domain that is powerful enough to command not just the top 10 results, but the top 100 results.

Maybe they’re waiting until they buy Yahoo to help them figure out how to fix this. =)

Earlier I showed you an email that DoubleClick sent to clients when they were taken over by Google.  Then I showed you the email that they sent to Performics Clients that stated very clearly that Google would be selling the “Search Marketing” arm of the business.

Now it has become apparent that Google will be letting go about 300 DoubleClick employees.  Continue reading →

I got this email last night, the bolded section tells me that they are up for sale.

As you are aware, Google closed its acquisition of DoubleClick on March 11, 2008.  Since that time, we have been actively involved in integration planning for each of our products and business units.  We have recently completed this process for the DoubleClick Performics business.

Thank you for your continued support of DoubleClick Performics.

Got a passion for buying sneakers? It could be a good sign, with a poll finding that people who buy three pairs of sneakers or more a year are far more likely to be a leadership type that other people.

Mindset Media, a media company that examines personality traits of different consumers, found that people who buy more than three pairs of sneakers a year are 61 percent more likely to have the qualities of a modern leader.

These qualities were defined as having ideas and vision, and a style with others that is both inclusive and decisive.

The survey of 7,500 people, using market research group Nielsen’s online panel, found multi-sneaker buyers were 50 percent more likely to be very assertive and 47 percent more likely to be spontaneous.
Continue reading →

Yahoo! Inc. today announced the launch of Yahoo! Shine (http://shine.yahoo.com), a new website for women that aims to provide the information most relevant to their daily lives. The site offers nine categories ranging from Fashion & Beauty to Parenting, and will feature content from many of the most popular lifestyles publishers, including Conde Nast Publications and Hearst Corporation. Additionally, a new editorial team will develop original stories on a daily basis, and hand pick the best user blog posts to feature prominently on the site. Yahoo! Shine creates a single destination for the approximately 40 million women between the ages of 25 and 54 who already come to Yahoo! each month, making Yahoo! a more relevant starting point for this audience.

The new site will help create a better experience for women on Yahoo!, while providing Yahoo! advertisers with a single lifestyles destination to reach this coveted demographic. Yahoo! Shine brings together the resources of several existing Yahoo! sites, including Yahoo! Food and Yahoo! Astrology, and will incorporate content from Yahoo! Health. Bringing these resources together is an example of Yahoo! Media’s focus on building larger category sites for mass audiences, rather than focusing on niche topics and smaller audiences.

“We’re executing on Yahoo!’s starting point strategy by ensuring that women who start their day with Yahoo! are offered a more relevant experience,” said Scott Moore, senior vice president and head of Yahoo! Media. “Yahoo! Shine adds an important piece to our Media portfolio, which already includes sites that are number one in the News, Sports, Finance and Entertainment categories.”
Continue reading →

Could Barack Obama’s NCAA championship pick have something to do with an upcoming primary?

No, he was leaning toward North Carolina because of its 6-foot-9 star.

The Democratic presidential candidate and avid basketball player selected North Carolina, Kansas, Pittsburgh and UCLA in his Final Four bracket, and is counting on North Carolina to beat UCLA in the championship game.

North Carolina, with 115 delegates at stake, holds its primary May 6.

During his short flight Wednesday from Fayetteville to Charlotte, N.C., Obama began working on his NCAA basketball tournament bracket. The campaign staff is competing in a $10 per person pool.

Pressed in an interview with the Charlotte Observer on Wednesday about his picks, Obama said he was swayed by the Tar Heels’ 6-foot-9 star Tyler Hansbrough, not politics.

“That’s a big boy, there,” he said. “So I’ve got to fill it out, I’ve got to do a little bracketology before I make a final decision.”

As reported here…

The controversial 700-MHz spectrum auction has closed, raising $19.59 billion, a record for a spectrum auction in the U.S., the Federal Communications Commission said Tuesday.

Continue reading →

SI.com is creating a free database of all the old issues and they are doing so because of the high value that the new content will create and the tremendous traffic that it will create via search.

“The real hidden value of this is what it does for search,” said John Squires, executive vice president of Time Inc., the Time Warner subsidiary that publishes Sports Illustrated. The move quadruples the site’s volume, he said. “We’ll have to work our way up the search algorithms over time, but eventually, someone searches Johnny Unitas, and SI.com is going to pop up.” Continue reading →

The 2008 RTP Resort Automation Conference & User Group Meeting at the Vail Marriott Mountain Resort.

RTP announces the 2008 Resort Automation Conference (RAC), being held April 9 – 11, 2008 at the Vail Marriott Mountain Resort and Spa in Vail, Colorado.  The RAC is RTP’s User Group Meeting designed to educate and inform you about web, software and technology trends in the resort and recreation industries.

This year’s event theme, “Optimizing the Guest’s Experience Online and On Location,” will focus on how to leverage technology through all aspects of your business to optimize the guest experience throughout the guest lifecycle both online and on location.
Continue reading →

On the heels of the Bear Stearns Failure…here’s a few news items that are being thrown around tonight.

Reuters: Bush, Plunge Protection to Hold Emergency Meeting Monday
President George W. Bush plans to meet on Monday with top U.S. financial
policymakers, the White House said, at a time of increased strains in credit
markets and fears of a recession. The White House said on Saturday Bush
will meet members of the President’s Working Group on Financial Markets,
and a spokeswoman said Bush will get a status report on the markets.

Wall Street Journal: Judgement Day Has Arrived
The U.S. is at the receiving end of a massive margin call: Across the
economy, wary lenders are demanding that borrowers put up more
collateral or sell assets to reduce debts. The unfolding financial crisis
appears to be broadening further. For years, the U.S. economy has been
borrowing from cash-rich lenders from Asia to the Middle East. American
firms and households have enjoyed readily available credit at easy terms,
even for risky bets. No longer. The growing crisis of confidence now
extends to the credit-worthiness of borrowers across the spectrum . . .

SF Chronicle: We’re Perilously Close to a Total “Financial Lockdown”
It started with subprime mortgages, spread to the rest of housing, moved
on to stocks and worked its way into virtually every corner of U.S. financial
markets. Now, seven months after the housing bust ushered in a period of
fear and loathing on Wall Street, the downward spiral has pushed the U.S.
financial system perilously close to a lending lockdown. That means big
trouble not only in the nation’s money centers, but also on Main Street,
where a credit crunch is eating away at jobs, spending and investing.

Wall Street Journal: Fed Aims to Prevent Panic with Direct Borrowing
In an unprecedented Sunday night announcement that underscores the
depth of the market fears, the Fed said it has created a new lending tool
to help its network of primary dealers — securities firms that interact with
the Fed daily but don’t fall under its direct banking supervision — provide
financing in securitization markets. Growing worries about securities backed
by mortgages are exacerbating the market upheaval and threatening the
overall economy.

Financial Times: Wall Street Braces for Cascading Failure Wave
Analysts said it was almost impossible to know what impact Bear Stearns’
problems would have on its clients, its counterparties and other investors
holding securities or derivatives that Bear is trying to liquidate. “The ripples
could be widely felt because Bear Stearns has so many points of contact
with everyone else in the financial industry,” said Matt D’Amico, partner in
the banking business at law firm Bryan Cave.

UK Independent: Wall Street Fears a Second Great Depression is at Hand
Wall Street is bracing itself for another week of roller-coaster trading . . .
One UK economist warned that the world is now close to a 1930s-like Great
Depression, while New York traders said they had never experienced such
fear. A Goldman Sachs trader in New York said: “Everyone is in a total
state of shock, aghast at what is happening. No one wants to talk, let
alone deal; we’re just standing by waiting. Everyone is nervous about what
is going to emerge when trading starts tomorrow.”

Financial Times: IMF Says Now is the Time to “Think the unthinkable . . .”
The IMF called for “decisive policy action” to strengthen the global financial
system, buffeted by fallout from the subprime crisis, noting that
authorities worldwide must also “think the unthinkable” so that they can
better anticipate and react to potential global economic risks.

L.A. Times: Several Major Financial Institutions Are Going to Fail
Some experts say Bear Stearns’ woes warn of potentially larger calamities
that will severely test the Fed, the economy and, ultimately, taxpayers as
the government gets more deeply involved in fixing the markets’ troubles.
“We will lose, in some form, several major financial institutions before this
is over,” said veteran economist Allen Sinai of Decision Economics Inc.

Just four days after Bear Stearns Chief Executive Alan Schwartz assured Wall Street that his company was not in trouble, he was forced on Sunday to sell the investment bank to competitor JPMorgan Chase for a bargain-basement price of $2 a share, or $236.2 million.

The stunning last-minute buyout was aimed at averting a Bear Stearns bankruptcy and a spreading crisis of confidence in the global financial system sparked by the collapse in the subprime mortgage market. Bear Stearns was the most exposed to risky bets on the loans; it is now the first major bank to be undone by that market’s collapse.

The Federal Reserve and the U.S. government swiftly approved the all-stock buyout, showing the urgency of completing the deal before world markets opened. The Fed also essentially made the takeover risk-free by saying it would guarantee up to $30 billion of the troubled mortgage and other assets that got the nation’s fifth-largest investment bank into trouble.

“This is going to go down in very historic terms,” said Peter Dunay, chief investment strategist for New York-based Meridian Equity Partners. “This is about credit being overextended, and how bad it is for major financial institutions and for individuals. This is why we’re probably heading into a recession.”

JPMorgan Chase & Co. said it will guarantee all business — such as trading and investment banking — until Bear Stearns’ shareholders approve the deal, which is expected to be completed during the second quarter. The acquisition includes Bear Stearns’ midtown Manhattan headquarters.

JPMorgan Chief Financial Officer Michael Cavanagh did not say what would happen to Bear Stearns’ 14,000 employees worldwide or whether the 85-year-old Bear Stearns name would live on after surviving the Great Depression, two World Wars and a slew of recessions. He told analysts and investors on a conference call that JPMorgan was most interested in buying Bear Stearns’ prime brokerage business, which completes trades for big investors such as hedge funds.

At almost the same time as the deal for control of Bear Stearns was announced, the Federal Reserve said it approved a cut in its lending rate to banks to 3.25 percent from 3.50 percent and created another lending facility for big investment banks. The central bank’s official meeting is on Tuesday. Before the emergency move to lower the discount rate, which is the rate at which banks lend each other money, the Fed was widely expected to again cut its headline rate by as much as a full point to 2 percent.

“Having taking Bear Stearns out of the problem category, and the strong action by the Federal Reserve, we would anticipate the market will behave quite differently on Monday than it was Thursday or Friday,” Cavanagh said.

Some analysts expected it to be a brutal day for global stocks, nevertheless. Shortly after the news broke, Japan’s benchmark Nikkei stock index plunged more than 3 percent in morning trading.

A bankruptcy protection filing of Bear Stearns could have heightened anxiety in world financial markets amid a deepening credit crunch. So far, global banks have written down some $200 billion worth of securities slammed amid the credit crisis — more write-downs could come. Last week, a bond fund controlled by private equity firm Carlyle Group faltered near collapse because of investments linked to mortgage-backed securities.

JPMorgan’s acquisition of Bear Stearns represents roughly 1 percent of what the investment bank was worth just 16 days ago. It marked a 93.3 percent discount to Bear Stearns’ market capitalization as of Friday, and roughly a 98.8 percent discount to its book value as of Feb. 29.

“The past week has been an incredibly difficult time for Bear Stearns,” Schwartz said in a statement. “This represents the best outcome for all of our constituencies based upon the current circumstances.”

Wall Street analysts say the bid to rescue Bear Stearns was more than just saving one of the world’s largest investments banks — it was a prop for the U.S. economy and the global financial system. An outright failure would cause huge losses for banks, hedge funds and other investors to which Bear Stearns is connected.

After days of denials that it had liquidity problems, Bear was forced into a JPMorgan-led, government-backed bailout on Friday. The arrangement, the first of its kind since the 1930s, resulted in Bear getting a 28-day loan from JPMorgan with the government’s guarantee that JPMorgan would not suffer any losses on the deal.

This is not the first time Bear Stearns has earned a place in Wall Street history. A decade ago, Bear Stearns refused to help bail out a hedge fund that was deemed “too big to fail.” On Friday, the tables had turned, with the now-struggling investment bank in need of the same kind of aid.

Bear Stearns was founded in 1923 and in recent years was best known for its aggressive investing in mortgage-backed securities — and what was once a cash cow turned into the investment bank’s undoing.

In June, two Bear-managed hedge funds worth billions of dollars collapsed. The funds were heavily invested in securities backed by subprime mortgages. Until that point, subprime mortgage-backed securities were immensely popular with investors because of their profitability.

The funds’ demise and subsequent problems in the credit markets called into question Bear Stearns’ ability to manage its own risk and the leadership ability of then-Chief Executive James Cayne. Critics of the company said Cayne spent too much time away from the office last year playing golf and bridge as the problems unfolded.

Cayne is the same executive who refused to let Bear Stearns provide support as part of a Federal Reserve-led plan to rescue Long-Term Capital Management in 1998. His reticence was said to deeply anger some of his fellow Wall Street CEOs, and the episode came up every time Bear was reported to be in trouble in recent months.

Cayne took over from the legendary Alan “Ace” Greenberg in 1993. Greenberg joined Bear Stearns as a clerk, working his way up through the ranks to eventually take over as CEO in 1978. Greenberg was known for his irreverent style, and his regular memos to employees were turned into a book called “Memos from the Chairman.”

Before Greenberg’s ascendancy to CEO, Bear Stearns began to expand from its New York roots throughout the 1950s and 1960s, opening international offices and expanding its U.S. operations.

The NineInchNails were recently on the Alexa Movers & Shakers with a 930% increase in traffic.  Their traffic wasnt the only thing increasing, so are their online album sales…to the tune of $1.6 million during only the first week of being released.

The new album, , sells for just a few bucks, $5 to be exact.  800,000 eager fans have snapped up the album in the first week of its release, even through Trent Reznor encouraged P2P Sharing of the album.

Loyal Fans + Great Music = a Win for Musicians (even in a “free music” world)

Gold hit $1000/oz today and the DOW is at the exact same price as it was 1 year ago, and oh yea, in case your missed it, Oil passed $100 and then $110 yesterday. If you invested in Google on Jan 2007, you’re at Par. If you bought WashingtonMutual Stock in 1997, you’re at Par. Homeowner equity in the US is the lowest since 1945.

So what does this mean and what can you do to preserve your buying power? Continue reading →

Time Warner’s AOL to Buy Global Social Media Network Bebo for $850 Million in Cash

NEW YORK (AP) — AOL said Thursday it will pay $850 million to acquire the online hangout Bebo, giving the struggling Internet company a foothold in an expanding business.

Bebo is one of the largest social networks in Britain, is ranked No. 1 in Ireland and New Zealand and has a global membership of more than 40 million, according to AOL. In the United States, however, it ranks third behind MySpace and Facebook.

Ron Grant, AOL’s president and chief operating officer, said the deal should help AOL expand internationally and Bebo grow in the United States. The all-cash deal, expected to close in a month, also should give AOL an engaged audience from which it can generate additional advertising revenue.

AOL has been looking for ways to boost its advertising revenue to offset steep declines in dial-up Internet subscriptions. After several quarters of strong growth, AOL’s advertising expansion has been slowing, putting pressure on the company’s parent, Time Warner Inc., to sell off the Internet unit.

The deal is an acknowledgment that AOL still needs to seek additional outlets for expanding its audience and its advertising opportunities. But it also underscores the growing value of social networks such as Bebo to media companies as potential gold mines for online advertising dollars.

News Corp. bought MySpace for $580 million in 2005, but has estimated the network is now worth more than $15 billion. News Corp. also owns the Fox television and movie studios in addition to its newspaper and Internet holdings.

Facebook Inc., which owns the Internet’s second-largest social network behind MySpace, now arguably has a $15 billion market value, based on Microsoft’s purchase late last year of a 1.6 percent stake for $240 million.

“Bebo is the perfect complement to AOL’s personal communications network and puts us in a leading position in social media,” said Randy Falco, chairman and chief executive of AOL.

AOL said current Bebo president Joanna Shields will continue to run the company, reporting to AOL President and Chief Operating Officer Ron Grant.

The acquisition is part of AOL’s shift from a subscription-driven business to a public Web site that generates income from building traffic and selling advertising, similar to rivals Yahoo Inc. and Microsoft Corp.’s MSN. AOL, which has launched 17 international Web sites over the last year and expects to expand to 30 countries outside the U.S. by the end of 2008, said Bebo plans to launch in five countries this year, and will be “featured prominently” in AOL’s international expansion efforts after the deal is closed.

For only $9,999,950 you could have bought Fund.com - but someone beat you to it!

Clek brokered the sale for  nearly $10 million dollars for arguably one of the best, short domains out there that is related to the investment field.    The company that bought the name is Meade Technologies Inc, now named Fund.com, which is a New York Law Firm.  Continue reading →

The Google and DoubleClick has finally closed and has received approval by the important overseeing organizations.

Here’s the email that they sent to clients Continue reading →

In Portland, there are tons of entrepreneurship groups that are quickly leaving their mark on the city byway of investment into small start-up companies in Portland. Here’s a few NorthWest and Portland Entrepreneurship groups that I have found helpful in learning and networking.

Oregon Entrepreneurs Network
The Oregon Entrepreneurs Network is one of the larger public groups where any entrepreneurship in Portland should start spending some time. This is a great group of idea holders and investors that meet up every month to network and share new ideas. If you have an idea that is barely off the ground, there are tons of people that can help you out with putting together a business plan that will lay the foundation for success. The OEN has a goal of sharing information and allowing people to network in ways that will let them run their companies better, smarter and more profitably. The OEN Startup Services are a great place to start if you want to work on your business plan while the OEN Executive Series is the program that teaches your how to deal with financial anaylsis, market analysis issues and build leadership skills. Both of these programs will take your ideas to the next level.

PAN & WIN - OENs Answer to the Angel Community
With the Portland Angel Network (PAN) and the Women’s Investment Network (WIN), you will gain acess to active Angel investors that are looking for a great idea to invest in. Discussing ideas and selecting the best business model are what the PAN and WIN groups are PROs - submit an idea and present in front of both of these influential groups.

The Northwest Entrepreneur Network
This non-profit organization has a goal of helping entrepreneurs succeed past their wildest dreams. Not only is this group promoting entrepreneurship in Oregon, but they are expanding far into the northwest. The group started in 1985 and currently boasts over 700 members that are eager to network and share idea.
Each year the Northwest Entrepreneur Network puts on the largest investment forum in the Northwest. This year is no different. This year’s 8th annual Early Stage Investment Forum promises to be the best one yet. Highly qualified screeners and coaches will be selecting and vetting 20+ early stage companies to pitch to investors on May 9 at the Washington State Convention & Trade Center.

Details for Entrepreneurs that would like to participate:
Submit your business plan to present at ESIF 2008.
Non-Refundable Application Fee: $22 for NWEN members, $88 for non-members
Application Deadline: March 7, 2008

More NorthWest Investment / Angel Investor Groups

Alliance of Angels
Bellingham Angels
Boise Angel Alliance
Keiretsu Forum (Seattle Chapter)
Portland Angel Network
Puget Sound Venture Club
Seraph Capital Forum
Tacoma Angel Network
Zino Society
Oregon Sustainability Angels
Keiretsu Forum (Portland Chapter)
Portland Venture Group
Womens Investment Network

I saw this article on Yahoo today and, while I dont have much time to write about it, I thought it was worth noting since there was a big push in FEB to raise money for Obama online.

Here’s some important stats (skip to the jump for the full article):

• Obama had 385,000 new contributors for a total of more than 1 million donors.
• All told, Obama has raised $193 million during his yearlong bid for the White House.
• The Obama campaign said it raised $45 million through the Internet in February ($55 M total).
• Clinton reported raising $6 million online, and a total of $34 million for the primary in February.

Continue reading →

What Kind of Advertising Do You Do?
There are millions of ads online every minute of the day that are pounding your eyes and your pocketbook with messages to try and persuade you.

As an advertiser you have to decide how to get through all that noise and put the story of your product in front of potential consumers. Here’s a list of the different types of ads that people are using right now to sell their products. Some of these may be new to you, consider them, they may lead to the bulls-eye that you’re looking for.

Page Takeover Advertising – I love these! Myspace was one of the first large advertisers to really use these and they were highly effective. Gawker Media also offers these type of ads across all of their properties. So why do these ads do so well? – simple, they’re a brand play. In the advertising world, we like brand plays because they the simply need to catch your attention and make an impression on your to be successful. They cant be ignored unless you surf off of the site that you’re visiting, which may be a drawback, but again, if these ads are targeted well, they will do well.

Audible Advertising – These are some of the most annoying but the most attention gaining ads that you will encounter online. We’ve all surfed onto a site and within a few seconds we find out speaker blaring a song or an advertiser’s message. I would stay away from these ads since they tend to give users a horrible experience… unless you can find a creative way to use them. Yes, they may seen temping, but using audible ads is a really good way to have your end-user fire-up their ad blocker.

Animated Flash Advertising – These ads bring in a huge amount of revenue for advertisers, simply because they are so eye catching. But does that make these ads any less annoying than other ads such as audible ads? The ads that jump onto your screen and seemingly float around your browser are of course some of the most difficult ads to close or stop. Again, these ads can be very effective, but only if highly targeted and not intrusive.

Advertorials Advertising – These ads are really good for SEOs to consider. There has been all kinds of controversy surrounding paid links in the last few years, but at the end of the day, there are many companies that pay another company to feature content on their site. Yahoo Finance, for example partners with content providers such as Forbes.com and CNN.com. This is a large partnership, but there’s other opportunities out there to put your company’s story in-front of a site owner and have them write about your site and give you several links. Yes, you may have to pay for it, donate a few $s, send them a product or 2, or other tricks, but at the end of the day, these are really good ways to promote your brand and company.

Video Advertising – This growing market is basically going straight up. Since Google bought YouTube, advertisers have been itching to get into video ads and content publishers are answering their interest. Video ads have 2 different types, pre-roll or interstitial ads. Yahoo uses a lot of pre-roll ads whenever you click a video on their network, while the CW TV network uses a lot of interstitial ads when you watch old episodes of your favorite TV show. There are also text ads that are starting to show up in videos. Google announced in February that advertisers can now do AdSense with ads. Launch participant Brightcove said in a release that “Publishers and content providers can control which videos get which ads and when the ads play in each video.”

Pay Per Click Advertising – these ads are the bread and butter of Google’s market share and there’s a reason that they are – its because they work! PPC ads can be some of the most targeted and trackable ads online. My company offers PPC Management as one if its services, and with that service you get an entire team of people optimizing your campaign. One of the nice things about PPC ads is that they can be tested and tested and tested. I’m talking about all kinds of things such as…GEO targeting, broad keywords, negative keywords, A & B testing, landing page optimization, arbitrage and many other strategies that can lead to your success.

Affiliate Advertising – This is an amazing concept…take your product and give it to 100s of people who want to promote it and then give them a small percentage of the sales that they bring in. Now, that’s a powerful concept and its one that is a win-win situation for the advertiser and the affiliate. Granted, there are ways to inflate affiliate earnings ( I just did a quick talk about this to a company in Oregon last week!) but if managed correctly, you can minimize your risk by using an affiliate program to have other people promote your product. Affiliate programs shift the risk and the capital ($) investment that would normally be spent on an advertising campaign.
Lots of Options!
I hope you have some ideas brewing in your head after reading this post. More than anything, I just wanted to get my readers thinking about how to tap into the consumers that need their products in a different way.

Some additional reading:

3 Types of Advertisng Users don’t like
Types of Ads that people block
An Interview with Friendster Marketing VP