Micro Persuasion

Is the Google Cookie Tracking Everyone's Surfing Habits?

Photo: Google Cookie by Massless on Flickr

Note update from Google at the end of this post.

Google tonight made an important change to the Google Ad Planner that - at least as I read it - means they are now tracking every site you visit via a Google cookie and serving the aggregate data up to advertisers. If I am wrong I hope someone will tell me. (If this post is wrong I will correct it - but this is how I am interpreting what Google has put out there so far.) 

Let's take a look at the facts. 

First, Google yesterday made some subtle changes to its privacy policy. Coincidence? Maybe.

Second, according to the Google Adwords blog, the search engine has now added a new site traffic metric in Ad Planner called Unique Visitors (cookies). This, according to Google is a new cookie-based metric that "help(s) you cross check and compare metrics, similar to Google Analytics unique visitor metrics."

The help page goes a little bit further, saying that unique visitors (cookies) is "the estimated number of unique cookies on a site. The unique visitors (cookies) metric is more similar to data from server logs, analytics applications, and ad servers."

Google does not provide any additional details on how they are gathering the data from cookies. Is it possible that this means that as long as you have visited Google once and get cookied that they are now tracking every single site you visit, even if you didn't get there via a search? It's unclear. But it sounds like it. I hope they will be more transparent.

However, if this is true, given the huge number of people that have done at least one Google search (e.g. everyone) that sounds like they are collecting a staggering amount of data. And something that might alarm privacy advocates while at the same time creating the largest consumer panel on the web - e.g. everyone, except those who delete their cookies.

UPDATE 1/30:: A Google spokesperson emailed in the following statement in response to my post... 

"Google does not track users in the manner described in the article. We do not track every site every Google user goes to, nor do we have the capabilities to track in this manner.

The updates to our privacy policy made on Wednesday refer to data collection only for the purpose of detecting and preventing fraud or other misconduct; Google Ad Planner is not using any of this data in our enhanced features. There is no relationship between our updated privacy policy and our updated Ad Planner features."

Seems to make sense. However, it doesn't explain where the cookie data comes from. Others point out in the comments that Google has a lot of cookies sprinkled across the web through Doubleclick, etc. and that - in theory - they could triangulate the data. I have emailed Google to see what I can find out.

links for 2009-01-24

• Future Banking Blog
  Corporate blog of BofA.
  (tags: bankofamerica blogs finance)
• Problems With Your Checking Account? Try Twitter - NYTimes.com
  Bank of America is using Twitter as a customer service tool.
  (tags: CustomerService customerexperience twitter financialservices finance bankofamerica)
• TypePad -Tutorial: Build a Professional Blog and Online Resume
  (tags: blogs careers personalbranding)
• Global Internet Audience Surpasses 1 billion Visitors, According to comScore
  APAC accounts for 41% of Internet users; China has the largest Internet population in the World.
  (tags: china stats global comscore asia)
• Wah - Marketing Execs Struggle with ROI Measurement - MarketingVOX
  Conference Board: Marketing executives are under increasing pressure from CEOs to show ROI.
  (tags: marketing ROI conferenceboard trends)
• A Quarter of Americans Aren’t On the Web
  (tags: stats USA 2009 pew)

Friendfeed is the Next Great Blogging Platform, Here's Why...

Friendfeed continues to astonish me. While so much attention is focused on Twitter lately, particularly by the press, Friendfeed is the little site that could. And quietly it's poised to become the next great blogging platform.

Don't believe me? Then keep an eye on what Robert Scoble is up to on Friendfeed. Like him or hate him, he's a trend setter. 

A few times a day he will post thoughts on Friendfeed, often followed by the phrase "here's why" and then he'll expand on it with the first comment. These little thoughts generate hundreds of subsequent comments, often in minutes plus lots of "likes."

Yesterday I essentially blogged on Friendfeed on this topic and generated a level of engagement you just don't see anywhere else - with the exception of Twitter. But I find Twitter increasingly frustrating because the conversation is so hard to follow. These days, I would rather post to Friendfeed and let Twitter scoop it all up. I love that I can more easily follow the conversation, moderate it and contribute to it via IM. Also, I l can add photos to my Friendfeed postings, which brings in even more people.

It seems to me that if Friendfeed adds a few features - longer posts, custom domains, and design tweaks - it's basically a blogging platform... on steroids. It will be attractive to bloggers for at least two reasons.

First, we will be able to use it to build a branded presence (and thus SEO) just as we can now with TypePad or Wordpress. This is something you can't do now on Friendfeed - or Twitter for that matter.

However, more importantly, we will be able to instantly plug our full blog posts right into a fervent, real-time community that attracts a highly engaged audience. It's blogging on speed thanks to the real-time web. Why try to get the conversation to come to your site when you can go to it?

I also think that Friendfeed can add an optional Adsense program make it easy for people to monetize their Friendfeed blogs.

Stay tuned.

IBM Turns Old NYT Editorial and PR Into Ads

What the Internet does - and quite well - is blur lines.

Where once there was social media and media, that's no longer true. All things social are media and all things media are social. Where once there was PR and advertising, the lines of influence today are grey thanks to new paradigms. And where once there was display advertising and editorial, today things are not so black and white anymore. 

Here's one example that certainly got me thinking.

Last night when I was on the New York Times web site, a new ad campaign from IBM jumped out at me. It was startling not because of its imagery or messaging but for its unique approach.

The campaign is different in that the ads curate archived editorial on the environment from the Times and displays it right in the unit itself. The reader doesn't need to leave the page he/she is on to peruse the articles. Branding is light and the focus is on content. Needless to say, since all of the articles are by star columnist Thomas Friedman, the writing is strong. 

As you can see from the screen grab below, the Times calls the program "Sponsored Archive." Some of these articles highlight IBM media coverage. So in effect, IBM is turning positive PR it generated with the Times - in some cases two years ago - into fresh advertising.

Disclosures make sure the campaign is indeed totally ethical. At the very bottom of the ad unit, you'll note, that the Times clearly says that the units are ads, that the reprinting was paid for by IBM and that the editorial staff was not involved.

Now you can argue this isn't anything new. For years magazines have featured advertorials that are written by journalists on staff but paid for by advertisers. Still, this feels different to me. It opens the door to future where earned media becomes effective paid media.
It essentially takes PR and recycles it into a paid format that is quite effective. However it competes with more current editorial a reader is likely visiting the site to consume.

Like similar programs from Google, efforts like these unlock the hidden value in thousands of articles deep inside archives. It takes what's old and makes it monetizable. All of it has me thinking that this could be the beginning of a new era where archived content is turned into a form of advertising that's more credible than static, generally poor-performing banners.
More importantly, it takes the work that PR professionals do - earn media - and gives it even stronger legs than before and for years to come. And that's exciting.

links for 2009-01-23

• Digital Impact Conference
  The following links are all for events where I am scheduled to speak in the first half of 2009.
  (tags: nyc Speaking 2009 pr events)
• iMedia Connection: Breakthrough 09
  (tags: 2009 Speaking USA marketing events iMedia)
• :: Disruptive Media ::
  (tags: Speaking europe 2009 stockholm)
• next09
  (tags: europe Speaking 2009 events Germany)
• Ad Age Digital Conference
  (tags: Speaking events 2009 nyc)
• Overview: BRITE '09 conference on branding, innovation, and technology
  (tags: events 2009 Speaking nyc)

Frustration with PR Sites Kills Media Stories, Usability Studies Say

In his latest newsletter, usability guru Jakob Nielsen studies corporate newsrooms and found that, generally, they aren't doing a good job to say the least.

"As 3 studies of journalists show, they use the Web as a major research tool, exhibit high search dominance, and are impatient with bloated sites that don't serve their needs or list a PR contact."

The most fascinating passage in Nielsen's report, though, is this one...

Another journalist described what he'd do if he couldn't find a press contact or the facts he needed for his story: 

"Better not to write it than to get it wrong. I might avoid the subject altogether."

The press, much like consumers with customer care reps, want to be able to get a hold of corporate PR contacts quickly and easily, otherwise they won't bother doing business. That should be a wake up call for most. Bloggers, meanwhile, all expect us to be present in their spaces and I suspect don't even bother going to our immaculate corporate PR sites. So PR pros increasingly need to be present and available all around.

If you think it's just big companies that are at risk here of being forgotten, Nielsen debunks that myth. Startups, he says, pepper their sites with buzzword-filled, fatty text. Also, he makes it clear most newsrooms are built for push not pull.

In the near future all corporate media/PR sites will need to emulate the more progressive customer service sites. They will need to showcase how someone can get a hold of you in a hurry, either via IM or Twitter and not just email or phone.

I bet we'll see IM boxes like the one below from Google Talk making their way into corporate newsrooms. Access to humans begets trust and many companies are not prepared to engage 24/7. SImply put, that's the way we increasingly need to operate in a globalized world.

links for 2009-01-19

• Oh, the Humanity! - The Boston Globe
  If you've ever wondered what happens to the championship garb they don't give out to the losers (eg shirts that say Patriots 19-0), read this great piece.
  (tags: sports marketing football)
• Why Are Bloggers Writing Shorter And Shorter Posts? - Web Development Blog
  Go short or long?
  (tags: writing blogging)
• userfly
  Run instant usability studies for your website using your real users.
  (tags: usability)
• The future of eyewitness journalism
  The US Airways is called an example of "witness media and pro media cooperation"
  (tags: CitizenJournalism journalism twitter)
• Retweetist
  Tracks the most retweeted URLs and people on Twitter.
  (tags: retweet twitter zeitgeist trends)
• New tricks: 10 tips for Tweeting as your news organization | Old Media, New Tricks
  (tags: journalism twitter)

links for 2009-01-18

• So you want to trust your workflow to the web – good luck with than plan
  I should have linked to this before. Great post.
  (tags: cloudcomputing webapps)
• inauguration - Icerocket Buzz Search
  This will be a cool place to track the news Tuesday now that Icerocket has an automatic refreshing mode.
  (tags: icerocket search socialmedia)
• FT.com - Social networks threaten advertising growth
  This is clearly the PR industry's time. We will adapt faster than the ad agencies.
  (tags: advertising socialnetworking trends research pr)
• The Demise of “Dead Tree Media” and the Future of PR
  "the days of daily deadlines are also coming to an end"
  (tags: pr journalism tangiblemedia newspapers media trends)

Inside Obama's Social Media Toolkit

Edelman's Digital Public Affairs team in DC has authored an awesome white paper that takes you inside the Obama campaign. You can download it here (PDF). The white paper imparts several lessons: start early, build to scale, innovate where necessary and more. You can find other Edelman white papers on our site. This includes 9 on 9 - key consumer trends for 2009 (also in PDF format).

Bloodbath in the Clouds Continues as RSS Email Service Shutters

Every day it feels like I am hearing about another cloud computing service that is shutting down. This time it's RSS FWD, a neat tool that let you read RSS feeds in your email account. The site just rolled out an upgraded offering in September.

They won't be the last. Beware, there's a bloodbath in the clouds!

In the months ahead we're going to see a slew of web apps fold. Many won't be spared. I suspect the massacre will claim some high profile sites. This will include apps that are VC backed, ad-supported and/or available only via a paid subscription. The good news is that those that do survive will be players for the long haul.

Years ago I used an awesome time tracking app called Red Gorilla. It went belly up in 2000. Since then I have been very careful about where I keep data that I care about. I even scrutinize tools from big companies.

As we saw with Google this week, you always need to keep an eye on the ball. I feel confident that Gmail is going to be around so I am glad that I have adapted my workflow to make it fit. However, even Gmail is slowing the amount of storage they are adding to its free service. So you never know.

This is exactly why I won't invest time or energy in a lot cloud-based apps today like Remember the Milk or Evernote. Yes, both are awesome and they have income. Evernote got funded and has paying subscribers. Remember the Milk too charges for many of its best services (like its iPhone app). However, I suspect many stick with the free versions - especially nowadays. And that could be problematic in a year or two if things continue. The good news is that these sites make it easy to sync or export your data. 

I do think, however, that strong players like Salesforce.com and 37 Signals will be around. Basecamp, for example, has tons of paying customers. Time will tell if 37 Signals can keep some of its weaker services going.

Beyond the bigs, however, you can be sure that if a service is home-spun it will fold, just as co.mments and now RSS FWD did. The founders are wisely focusing on their careers and/or more viable opportunities.

My advice to everyone is look for high ground. Think hard about where you store data that you care about. If you don't care about the information, then you're fine.

links for 2009-01-17

• Everything TypePad: TypePad and Twitter: @sixapart
  Good overview of one company's Twitter communications strategy.
  (tags: twitter CustomerService pr sixapart CaseStudies)
• Official Google Blog: 100,000th knol published
  (tags: google googleknol wikis)
• Dale Carnegie and the Social Media. -- Hoover’s Business Insight Zone
  Good advice never ages.
  (tags: socialmedia dalecarnegie)
• MediaShift . Experimentation (Not Stagnation) Should Flourish at J-Schools | PBS
  The same can be said for PR students and anyone in a PR career as well.
  (tags: education journalism)
• More Adults Than Ever on Social Networks - ReadWriteWeb
  "The share of adult internet users who are involved in social networking online has more than quadrupled in the past four years "
  (tags: socialnetworking stats 2009 adults pew)
• Twitter Power 150
  A ranking of Twitter users in advertising/marketing.
  (tags: twitter marketing advertising)

PR Pros to Get a Database of Twitter Users by Mid-Year

PR Newser reports that Cision, a very respectable company that runs a media database used by thousands of public relations professionals, will expand its reporter and blogger data to include Twitter user handles by mid year. It's unclear if they will only link existing profiles to their Twitter handles or if Cision will also replicate the broader set of tools that Twitter already offers.

Regardless, while this is hardly unexpected given Twitter's growth (and it's the right move for CIsion and the industry), it may mean changes for the more influential users of the micro-blogging service. For starters, Twitter users may soon see an influx of in-bound pitches from PR pros. Most likely these could come in the form of 150-character direct messages (DMs) since most Twitterati don't usually post their email address.

My advice to those of you in PR is to participate first, pitch later (this is counsel my colleague Phil Gomes regularly teaches). Ideally I would love to see everyone in PR be on Twitter but only if we add value. This means that we must transparently and openly participate in conversations, always respect the community and build relationships. Do this (and do this well) and most everyone will be happy to hear our pitches. 

Hopefully when Twitter data arrives on PR professionals' desktops by mid-year it won't encourage us to pollute Twitter with DM pitches. Rather, we'll use the info to be smarter. Then again, alot of this data is already out there so maybe this is all moot.

links for 2009-01-16

• Tweet by Snail Mail
  (tags: snailmail twitter fun)
• David Pogue - Twittering Tips for Beginners - NYTimes.com
  (tags: twitter tips)
• Tweet Replies / Get notifed when someone @replies you!
  (tags: twitter)
• Brief Obama With Salesforce.com’s Idea Generator
  (tags: Politics obama crowdsourcing ideastorms Collaboration)
• Enterprise RSS - the State of the Industry - Newsgator
  "RSS in the enterprise is not about 'reading feeds.' It’s more about enterprise integration, search, feedback, etc."
  (tags: RSS newsgator enterprise2.0)
• YouTube Blog: Coming Up Next... YouTube on Your TV
  (tags: youtube TV TV2.0 video)

IceRocket Live Web Search Rolls Up Twitter, Blogs, News and More

IceRocket is a jewel of a site that has slowly been improving. I highlighted it recently in my post on the state of blog search. Today they unveiled a cool new feature that blends tweets, blog posts, news stories, videos and images. The feature is called Ice Rocket Big Buzz. Founder Blake Rhodes pinged me about it earlier today. (A larger view of the above image is here)

IceRocket Big Buzz fills a void that we desperately need - a real-time view of news events and memes. This feature gets us closer to such a utopia by pulling together live web sources into a single page. Take, for example a newsy search for plane crash. As I write this post it's filling up with lots of very current information all about today's top news story. This includes videos from YouTube and images from Flickr. Plus you can track all of it via RSS with a link at the top right. Sounds like a dream for journalists.

This is a great first start. I would love to see the page automatically refresh and have a mobile version. In addition, an open API would be helpful too. That way, should I wish, I can add a feed from Friendfeed for items that users are only sharing there. 

Still, I am glad to see that someone is out there trying to solve the live web search problem because, as Scoble shows today with the plane crash story, it's where the action is. Google is sleeping at the wheel here.

With Google Killing Products, Is Reader Next?

UPDATED 1/15/09: Google exec Jeff Huber says there are no plans to shut Google Reader. However, I think the monetization issue is still out there for fodder. 

In a move that's been rumored for awhile, Google tonight said they shutting down or ceasing further development on five products: Google Video, Catalog Search, Notebook, Jaiku (once a promising Twitter competitor) and Dodgeball. None of these products makes Google a dime and it has me wondering what the future is for Google Reader.

In tough times, even the most stable Internet business focus on their core products. I recall back in 2000 or 2001 that Yahoo in its heyday shut down a bunch of products that weren't performing. Now Google is doing the same. If the products don't drive the big G's core businesses -  search, apps and ads - then they're at risk. These five clearly are in that boat.

Enter Google Reader, one of my favorite products and by far the best RSS reader on the market. However, Google Reader is completely un-monetized. Further, RSS adoption aint exactly a robust growth market. It's still for geeks. So I wonder if the economic storm intensifies what Reader's future is. My bet is that they will either shut it down, cease development or start to monetize it the way they are doing with Google Finance. More likely it's the latter. Even Google Maps now has ads.

If Google chooses to run ads in Google Reader, that creates an issue. Lots of publishers run ads in their feeds. If Google is competing against these with its own contextual ads in in Reader then what? It might just be easier for them to shut it down. Thank God for OPML exporting. 

All I am saying is: don't bet that Google Reader will stay the same.

links for 2009-01-14

• 7 Reasons for Social Media Marketing Campaign Failures, and How to Fix Them
  (tags: socialmedia marketing bestpractices)
• PR In A Jar: How to Blog - Part 1 - 'The Original Article' by Nathan Smith
  Looking forward to the rest of the series.
  (tags: Blogs tutorials)
• The Printed Blog: Bringing Online Content Offline | PSFK
  The Printed Blog aims to bring hyper-localized blog content to newsstands
  (tags: Blogs PDF media startup)

Google Adds Time Stamps, Inches Closer to Real-Time Web Search

(UPDATE: Note comments from Google's Matt Cutts, which came in after I posted. It appears none of this is new but it is certainly worth watching and perhaps more noticeable to me than it was before.)

Google has quietly started posting a small time stamp next to news stories and blog posts that have been recently added to their main index. In the screen grab below note how one such search lists the hours that have transpired since my recent blog post and Robert Scoble's were first indexed. The same holds for news-related searches too, as you can see here.

As of right now you can't sort Google results by time. From the advanced search page, however, you can limit results just to those that have been indexed in the last 24-hours. You can't get more granular - at least yet. Date-filtered advanced queries are not a new feature but I believe the time stamps are.

 

As Louis Gray notes, the real-time web is going to be a critical trend to watch this year. As more content is generated from social networks, Google is going to feel heat from Friendfeed, Twitter and Facebook as they beef up their algorithms. Already, lots of people go to search.twitter.com to search for breaking news just as we did first when Google News launched a few years ago.

Real-time Google search is something I have been predicting would come for almost four years now. I think we're finally just about there. This will have a major impact on PR as companies recognize that Google is the primary lens by which they are judged.

Pluck Launches On-Demand Content Service for Web Sites

Got a web site but wish it had more fresh content? You should since it will help you with SEO. Pluck has launched a new service that can solve this issue.

Using Pluck On Demand you can find relevant content from blogs and other sites that can easily be plugged into your own via a javascript widget. The library includes content from their Blogburst network, which syndicates blog posts to major media sites. Pluck On Demand also spans to include videos and articles from properties like Encyclopedia Britannica. (Note: I am a member of the Blogburst network but I empower them to donate any earnings to charity.)

You can try the service on for size here by entering your URL or keywords.

links for 2009-01-13

• Sally Jenkins - Dungy Retires a Champion of Decency - washingtonpost.com
  A class act all the way. We should all aspire to act the same.
  (tags: NFL Football leadership)
• Logic+Emotion: Priceline's Rapid Response Prevents A Groundswell
  "Priceline may have stopped a negative groundswell against them, before it ever had a chance"
  (tags: PR CustomerService customerexperience twitter CaseStudies)
• PSFK: LA Times Online Revenue Covers Cost Of Whole Newspaper Operation
  (tags: LATimes Newspapers media Journalism)
• Sony Electronics Blog
  Corporate blog from Sony.
  (tags: Blogs sony CaseStudies)
• BUZZ 2.0 | PR 2.0 | SOCIAL MEDIA | WEB 2.0
  Neat aggregation site focusing on the above topics.
  (tags: Marketing PR digitalcurators curation Web2.0 socialmedia)
• Blogs making a bigger impact at the point of purchase, study finds - PRWeek US
  "Consumers are more frequently basing their buying decisions on information gleaned from shopping Web sites, blogs, and social networking sites"
  (tags: Blogs SocialNetworking purchasingcycle commerce b2c)
• 49 Amazing Social Media, Web 2.0 And Internet Stats
  (tags: stats socialmedia 2009 Web2.0)

Why Text Remains King of the Web

My friend Robert Scoble has a problem. He produces terrific videos on technology companies for Fast Company. They're a little long sometimes, but they're almost always interesting.

So what's Scoble's problem? Well a lot. The videos don't generate a lot of in-bound links from bloggers, conversations on Twitter or mentions on aggregators like Techmeme. "None of my 1,000+ videos has ever made it to Techmeme," Scoble said. 

He's right. A quick analysis reveals some get no links, others get a couple. However, when he surrounds them with text, it's a different story. Why? Text! It provides context and I suspect for many it's a proxy for the video.

I am starting to believe that despite all the hype around online video, text remains King of the Web. Why text? There are at least five reasons...

• It's scannable - according to Jakob Nielsen users have time to read at most 28% of the words during an average site visit and 20% is more likely

• Three letters: SEO - For all that Google Universal Search has done to elevate video, search results are still largely made up of text and everyone wants better SEO

• The workplace - It's much easier for cube-based workers to read text on the screen and get away with it vs. watching long videos. Watching videos (even work related vids) screams "slacker"  

• Mobile Devices - Yes, of course you can put a video on an iPhone. But it's work and requires planning. Text is easier to pull up in a nanosecond  

• Distribution - Nothing flies like text. It's so easy to cut and paste it and send it somewhere or to clip and re-syndicate it via email, RSS or social networks

I don't know about you but I love text. Now I have always been a reader. Today I am a scanner. So for me it comes natural.

Still, think about just how much of what you consume and share online remains text-based. Twitter - it's all text. Friendfeed - mostly text, but augmented by images. Facebook - a mix but certainly a ton of text. Even what makes YouTube hot is the metadata and commentary around the vids. So I don't see any big threat to King Text. 

So what does this mean? Well, if you're creating video you better pay attention to the text you put around it. Without text, you're dead. You won't be found. Further, if you want to influence you must have a command of the English language and know how to write for the web in sound bites. More on that in a subsequent post. I believe marketers and PR pros are well positioned to succeed.

What's your view?