General Internet

Coldplay.com Sees Huge Boost in Traffic
Taking a page from Radiohead's playbook, Coldplay decided to release a single, off of their upcoming album, online for free. More...

Beijing Olympics Sparks Online Attacks
Recent figures released by MessageLabs shows that spam (which turned 30 on May 3rd) was found in 1 of every 1.36 e-mails, or at a rate of 73.5% in April, a 0.3% decline from March. More...

Africa is Far Behind in Internet Progress
Pingdom, which monitors Web sites' uptime, recently posted figures shedding some light on the state of Internet connections in Africa on its blog. Traffic and penetration were focused on. More...

Yahoo Answers is Popular
Among Yahoo!’s many products and services, Yahoo! Answers is undoubtedly one of its best, and users around the globe seem to be riding the wave. More...

Online Banking Going Strong, but Still Seen as Risky
While online banking continues to become more prevalent, the general perception seems to be mixed. This stems from the fear of having critical information hijacked online, and the subsequent potential for unauthorized withdrawals from bank accounts. More...

Get Hired
In this week's other article on the job market, "You're Fired," we talk about the potential that the job losses that have hit other industries could hit ours, despite the often rosy picture painted by many of the technology... More...

You're Fired
Judging by the recent run up in the stock market and the better than expected earnings reports from previously battered tech stalwarts Apple, Amazon, Google, and Yahoo, you might start to think the worst has... More...

iPhone, Internet Explorer Lead Browser Markets
Ireland-based StatCounter recently released browser market share figures. The iPhone (and iPod Touch) is the most popular mobile browser used for Web access in the U.S., increasing its market share by 64%, from 0.14% to 0.23% between December and March More...

U.S. Online Advertising Spending Grows Almost 19% in 2007
Recent figures released by Nielsen Monitor-Plus reveal that while U.S. Advertising Spending grew just 0.6% in 2007, Internet ad spending grew 18.9%, making it the strongest category for the year. More...

Recession Survival Guide
Depending on whom you ask, the United States economy has already entered a recession or sits on the precipice of one, with even the most bullish not willing to say no such recession will occur. Our stock... More...

China Blocks Google News and YouTube
China is no stranger to blocking online content, and it has had a history of fickle attitudes towards Google and its various Web services in particular. More...

Power to The People - Part 1
As we wrote last month during our analysis of the Writer's Guild of America strike, the 101 day work stoppage led to "$1.3 billion in lost revenue by Hollywood-dependent businesses and $750 million in lost... More...

Internet Audience in the U.S. is on Upward Path
There were 188.1 million Internet users in the U.S. during 2007, according to eMarketer. This reflected a growth of 3.4%. In 2008, the audience is expected to grow another 3.1% to 193.9 million, which is approximately two-thirds of the country’s total population. More...

The Bubble Is Bursting
We'd joke and say that you'd have to be Osama bin Laden to not know of the housing crisis stemming from a complete meltdown in our credit system, but then again, bin Laden probably knows more about it than we... More...

Is it 2009 Yet?
When talking about the stock market, a friend of mine recently joked, "So I take it, you too are now a long-term investor?" He joked, because as two non-savvy investors, we have lost so much since the start of this year that... More...

China’s Online Population Reaches 210 Million
According to the China Internet Network Information Center (CNNIC), the online population in China has reached 210 million, a whopping 53% increase from last year’s 137 million online population. This puts China on pace to... More...

WSJ.com Gives a Free Peek
Media mogul Rupert Murdoch has publicly expressed the possibility that the online version of The Wall Street Journal could offer the online public its content for free. As it stands, a year’s subscription to WSJ.com costs $79, while a dual subscription to both the site and the print version costs $99 for a year. More...

U.S. Internet Audience Grows in November
Of the 10 countries that Nielsen Online tracked in November, eight saw increases in their active Internet home user audience. More...

AOL Bids Farewell to Netscape, Pushes Firefox
In addition to bidding 2007 farewell, AOL will be thrusting the fallen Netscape Browser out the door in 2008. More...

DM Predictions for 2008
Hard to believe that only a few days separate this year from last. By now, the office ghost towns have once again returned to their former selves as bodies again fill the cubicles, and while productivity hasn't fully returned... More...

The Changing Performance Landscape - A Retrospective
The press, the VC money, all of it has seemingly followed the rise of social media sites. Interestingly enough, though, the largest of the Internet advertising shows seems to have the least representation from the... More...

Credit Crunch Fears Reappear
Travel back to Thursday, July 19, 2007. The Dow broke 14,000 for the first time ever, ending the day at 14000.71. On Friday, it retreated 150 points, though, and closed just above 13850. Days later on Monday, July 23... More...

Top U.S. Local Markets
Recent figures released by Nielsen//NetRatings show a glimpse into the top U.S. local markets both in terms of total unique visitors and time spent online per visitor. More...

AOL Shedding More Jobs
Last fall, AOL laid off 5,000 of its workers as it made significant strides towards an online advertising-based business model. Starting this past Tuesday, AOL will begin laying off a fifth of its worldwide workforce, or 2,000 employees. More...

Recession Planning
The question currently being debated is whether the economy is heading for a recession, which loosely defined is a sustained period where the economy does not grow. The housing market which drove much of the... More...

Small Businesses to Spend Big Bucks Online
According to JupiterResearch, total online spending by small businesses was $47 billion in 2006. However, according to the firm’s recent report titled “US Online Small Business Market Category Forecast, 2007 to 2012,” this figure... More...

In Search of Angels
Let's say that you wanted to get into mortgage lead generation. Given the current market conditions, we should change this to debt consolidation lead generation. If you wanted to become a lead generator in this field, you could as... More...

Beckham Bends MLS Web Traffic
Regardless of whether or not David Beckham can boost soccer’s popularity in the states, it appears that his boost in Major League Soccer’s Web popularity is the real deal. According to recent comScore figures, Beckham has... More...

E-Commerce Going Strong in 2Q07
The most recent numbers released by the Census Bureau of the Department of Commerce show that retail e-commerce in the U.S. had a strong second quarter this year. On a not-adjusted basis, sales totaled $31.82 billion, which... More...

American Youngsters Must Have Their Internet
"You simply cannot separate young people from technology; it is part of who they are." This was the conclusion that eMarketer senior analyst Debra Aho Williamson came to in... More...

Disneyland Tops List of Travel Destination Search Terms
July is the month that sees the most traffic to travel related Web sites. According to recent numbers released by Hitwise, all but one of the top 10 most visited travel destinations in July was a theme park. More...

WWE, Yahoo Take Leader Positions in June
According to the latest comScore Media Metrix numbers, the WWE Web site was the top gaining property from May to June 2007, while Yahoo! maintained its leadership position in the list of top 50 overall Web properties for June. More...

News, the Broken Variety: Dick Cash
This episode of Broken News is brought to you by our trusted industry insider, Cauldron Larynx. Cauldron utilizes deep knowledge, deeper skills and deepest relationships to make up the most breaking and relevant news in the Affiliate Marketing sector. More...

iLegal - To Comply or Not to Comply...That is the Question
As a participant in the world of online advertising you are subjected to many laws, rules and regulations. State, Federal and local government agencies want you to comply, every time, all the time. Much is at stake. And yet, we all... More...

U.S. Adults Have Widespread Broadband Access
According to recent numbers released by the Consumer Electronics Association (CEA), 72% of adults in the U.S. have access to a broadband connection, and more than half of households in the U.S. have broadband subscriptions. More...

Stockapalooza
Every so often, we do a different type of analysis. Instead of looking at the state of mobile marketing or the current strategies of pay-per-click arbitragers, we look at a completely different market. With the second... More...

Nielsen Forsakes Page Views
Nielsen//NetRatings has decided that it is finally time to bid adieu to the longtime metric staple of page views. The aesthetically appealing and experience enhancing programming technique called Ajax is partly to blame... More...

Firefox Continuing Its Climb
Apple’s Safari Web browser might be getting a lot of attention nowadays thanks to its presence in the hugely anticipated iPhone, but everyone knows that Microsoft’s Internet Explorer and Mozilla’s Firefox browsers are still the... More...

Broken News: Michael Moore new documentary "Sicko"
This episode of Broken News is brought to you by our trusted industry insider, Cauldron Larynx. Cauldron utilizes deep knowledge, deeper skills and deepest relationships to make up the most breaking and relevant news in the Affiliate Marketing sector. More...

Online Advertising in U.K. Is Expensive
According to a recent study titled "Pan-European Online Advertising Spend" conducted by the Interactive Advertising Bureau (IAB) Europe, $10.08 billion was spent in online advertising in the 13 countries included in the IAB Europe... More...

Apparel Sales Top Computer Sales Online
For the first time ever, apparel sales exceeded computer sales online in 2006. According to a study titled "The State of Retailing Online 2007" conducted by the National Retail Federation’s online arm Shop.org, U.S. consumers spent... More...

Broadband Users Spend A Lot of Time Online
According to Media-Screen’s "Netpop|Play" report, broadband users in the U.S. spend almost half of their spare time in an ordinary weekday online. This means that a broadband user spends about an hour and 40 minutes of their... More...

Asian Sites Get Most Visits Per Visitor
Data recently released by comScore Networks revealed the top worldwide Web sites in terms of visits per visitor in February 2007, and neither Google, Yahoo!, nor Microsoft were in the top three. More...

Firefox Is Popular In Europe
According to recent data released by French research firm XiTi, 24.1% of Web users in Europe browsed on a Firefox browser during the week ending March 11, 2007. This is a large jump from the week ending April 14, 2006, when... More...

Dealing With Negative Web Publicity
In comparison to the way things were even five years ago, it’s amazing the relative ease with which one can put up a website or a blog these days. This is true communication democracy. The cost to entry is low and so everyone with... More...

Do No Evil. Google Gets Back to Roots.
Over the years, Google's mantra of "Do no evil" went from an unorthodox, out of the box approach to capitalism to the butt of many jokes dealing with their lack of transparency. They have even been accused of having an unpredictable, unexplainable, almost dictatorial behavior. More...

Yahoo! Top Search Engine In Terms of Downtime
Google may have a stranglehold on the search market, but they can’t take anything away from Yahoo! when it comes to downtime in 2007. More...

E-Commerce Conversions Stagnant
Besides a few stellar exceptions, online merchants are seeing very few conversions. According to two studies, conversions for retail e-commerce sites mostly fall in between 2% to 3%. More...

The Future of Online Security - Be Aware
Part of what I do here in the iLegal column is attempt to assist affiliates who might not have the resources to hire their own counsel. That means directing them to resources they can use to keep themselves educated and out of... More...

No .xxx TLD
At the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN)’s 28th International Public Meeting in Lisbon, Portugal last Friday, the possibility of a .xxx top-level domain (TLD) was shot down by the organization for the second... More...

Broadband Excels Around Globe, Americans Apathetic to Internet
Broadband connections are covering the globe at a rapid speed. The growth that speedier connections are seeing is not just confined to reach, but to actual speeds as well, as countries like Japan and South Korea are seeing faster... More...

Does Small Business Rule?
In the mid 1800’s John D Rockefeller founded Standard Oil, which later became the foundation for almost the entire oil industry. He created the first real national corporation, and later, the first international corporation. There... More...

Big Four Portals Dominating Online Ad Spend
Though March is dominated by predictions of possible Final Four match-ups, the big four Internet portals leave no room for uncertainty when it comes to online advertising dominance. More...

Online Holiday Spending Jumped High in 2006
For the 56 day period ending on December 26, holiday e-commerce sales reached $23.11 billion, a 26% jump from last year’s $18.28 billion figure. This is according to information released by comScore Networks. More...

E-Commerce Sees Big Black Friday
According to numbers released by comScore, spending on online retail sites soared high on Black Friday this year, seeing 42% growth over last year’s post-Thanksgiving shopping frenzy. More...

Security Fears Were a Big Downer for 2006
According to the research firm Gartner, e-commerce lost almost $2 billion in 2006 thanks to security concerns that consumers feel when they shop online. About half of this figure ($913 million) was due to consumers who avoided... More...

Reputation
One of the more interesting consequences of today’s information society is not just the abundance of information, but the potential permanence of it. I remember companies advertising for browser cleaning products. Before today’s registry cleaning... More...

“Web Conditioning: Get Your Site in Shape”
It’s not talked about much, but woodland animals are notoriously unresponsive to advertising. That’s why you don’t expect to see many billboards when camping. The website of a brick-and-mortar business acts... More...

For Buzz or Money
In the Internet advertising world today, there is buzz, and then there is money. Buzz is what we see with the latest Web 2.0 site that seems to offer something cool, one that looks to make it's return sometime in the future. Buzz sites ranges... More...

Newspapers Can Thrive Online
Numbers alone might lead one to think that the end of days is almost here for newspapers, but there’s also my personal observation, too. I could go a week without reading a newspaper or seeing one lying around the offices of... More...

Search Engine Success Lies with Keywords
Webmasters mustn’t be daunted by overarching powers the search engine sometimes seem to have over websites on the Internet. Search engines need to be considered, after all, simple and efficient machines - ascribing them... More...

Google’s Platypus is GDrive
About two weeks ago Google’s rumored “GBuy” was finally unveiled in the slightly varied form of Google Checkout. Now it appears that Google’s rumored “GDrive” is also materializing right before our eyes in the form of a... More...

Gmail Slightly Enhanced
Deleting all of the spam that accumulates in your Gmail “Spam” folder has always been a bit of a hassle. Users of the Google e-mail service would have to “Select All,” and then click the “Delete Forever” button. Just recently, Google... More...

Online Ad Spend to Reach 7% of Global by 2008
ZenithOptimedia, a media services agency, recently modified its estimate of the portion of the global ad spend that would be held by the Internet by 2008. In April the agency estimated that the Internet would make up 6.5% of global ad... More...

World Cup Gaining Popularity Online
America has always been reluctant to embrace the world of soccer, but recent findings by Nielsen//NetRatings seem to indicate a possible change in this trend. The official World Cup site, FIFAWorldcup.com, saw 149% growth in... More...

Exitcution: The “150/100” Challenge, Part 1
In The Tipping Point, Malcolm Gladwell writes, “There is a concept in cognitive psychology called the channel capacity, which refers to the amount of space in our brain for certain kinds of information.” Channel capacity helps explain why... More...

Invest Wisely in a Business Geek
Business is like a game of poker—a few careless moves will have you trading in your designer clothes for a barrel with suspenders. New business ventures, particularly Internet ones, present thrilling opportunities; we come... More...

Sony BMG Strengthens Online Video Offerings
On Monday, Brightcove announced that Sony BMG Music Entertainment will be utilizing its broadband technology to further its Web music video arm.Sony BMG has already launched an ad-supported music video site called... More...

Shout it: Save Our Net Neutrality!
Working in online advertising has familiarized me with some of the larger issues that affect our industry and, ultimately, the way we use the Internet. Not the least of which is the subject of net neutrality that’s been in the news... More...

Eyes Wide on the Internet
How could I get tired of advertising seminars or conferences? Not only can I count on scoring enough pens, pads, and doo-dads to last me until the next one, but I usually end up learning my field of work, too. The Eyes on the... More...

Online Advertising Revenue Continues Growth
According to the most recent report from the Interactive Advertising Bureau (IAB) and PricewaterhouseCoopers, Internet ad revenue climbed to $3.864 billion for the first quarter of 2006. This is a 38% increase from last year’s first... More...

Hardware Makers Against Net Neutrality Laws
Software and Internet firms have voiced their strong desire to see legislation regarding the issue of Net neutrality, but this has not changed what hardware makers think about the matter. Last week, a group of major hardware makers... More...

Now I see it
I went to the Optometrist for an eye exam and to get a new prescription for contact lenses (exciting start to an article, I know). I decided to get a six month supply from my doctor, and get a six month supply from the Internet... More...

Internet Land Grab: Part II
Talking about the domain name industry today is really talking about the Internet land grab, and in many ways it paralleled the expansion of the US. Pioneers went out and laid claim to settled a large chunk of the land. When More...

The Internet Land Grab
When you are making a lot of money, you probably don’t care whether the Wall Street Journal covers your industry or even your company. The validation might be nice, but whether they cover it or not doesn’t impact the success of the... More...

Microsoft to Enter Social Networking with Wallop
Microsoft began spreading the word about its social networking venture, Wallop, in late 2003, but has since been very quiet about its dealings with the project. After some renewed buzz about Wallop in recent weeks, Microsoft... More...

Web 2.0, Build On It
In 1999,our company opened up shop as an online advertising agency and we viewed our chosen milieu, the Internet, as a limitless possibility - there was no talk of bubbles, no clouds on the horizon. In fact, conversations in the... More...

Earnings Showcase Showdown
Every three months, public companies release their performance for the previous three months. Those with an interest, often a vested interest, in the stock market tend to follow these events closely - both the lead up to the actual... More...

Streaming Video and Music to Achieve $27B by 2011
According to a report released by Insight Research, streaming video and music seen and heard through the Internet and mobile gadgets will reach $27 billion in revenue by the year 2011. And this is what Insight president Robert... More...

Advertisers Urged to Perform Due Diligence
Have advertisers become disconnected with their online ad campaigns? According to the chief of Internet Bureau in the Office of New York Attorney General Elliot Spitzer, Ken Dreifach, the answer is an alarming and... More...

Hey, It’s Your Domain, Your Future
Establishing your business or organization online is critical to business planning. And a good starting point is to establish your own domain name. Since the registration process is a snap and its benefits undeniable, there’s... More...

Google and Nike Team to Launch Joga
Up until now, Google’s one obvious weakness was the absence of a strong social network in their arsenal. Though they do have Orkut, a community site that is invite-only, it has done poorly in any country not named Brazil. However... More...

Google Unveils Google Finance
Google finally has an answer to Yahoo and MSN’s financial sites in its new beta version of Google Finance. It takes advantage of Google’s long-reaching access to resources such as news and blogs, and offers unique features that... More...

Datran Reaches $1.1M Settlement
After a six-month investigation by the New York State Attorney General, Eliot Spitzer, Datran Media was required to pay $1.1 million in penalties, disgorgements, and costs. The New York City-based company is a marketing... More...

AIM Now Open
On Monday, AOL announced that it would make its popular instant messenger service open to software and service developers, who will now be able to create new and customized versions of AOL Instant Messenger (AIM). AOL will... More...

Increase Your Traffic For Free
Okay, you have your website and now you want more visitors. Don’t think you’re the only one, bub, but you can learn from the experience of others. More...

Web Two Point Uh-Oh: Life in a syndicated world
Were Internet advertising like wines, then Vintage 2004 would be considered a good year. The drought that plagued the online ad market for most of 2000 through the end of 2002 is now just a blip on the radar, a slight false start, not... More...

Inbound Links and Traffic
Most people already know that getting inbound links is one of the most important aspects of generating traffic to your site. Obtaining links from sites outside of your own will not only generate traffic for you, but it will also spread... More...

MySpace Going Mobile
MySpace is a hugely popular social networking site for teens and young adults in their twenties, which is also a very lucrative demographic for wireless phone companies. This common denominator clearly indicates why MySpace has... More...

New Report Forecasts $23.5B for Digital Ads by 2010
Analyst firm Parks Associates released a new report indicating that there will be growth in digital media segments with new categories such as in-game and mobile advertising to offer the highest gains. More...

Be Your Own Network
It was the mid 1990’s and, being a fresh college graduate, I was talking shop with friends in the middle of the night in a half empty bar. The stranger beside us let us know that he was an executive from CBS, even though no one had More...

Web 2.0: For the User, By the User
I still remember the thrill of my father bringing home our first VCR. The features were dizzying - would it really record television shows in the middle of the night when we were fast asleep? Finally, just what we needed! Or did... More...

Buying versus Renting
iTunes changed the music landscape by allowing a user to buy a song for $.99, instead of having to buy an entire CD (record, 8 track, cassette) as in the past. A new model has emerged, but has yet to catch on. This is buying the... More...

Mortgage Information is Money Power
You’ve heard the saying, “Information is Power”. But have you heard the one that goes like this…”Not having the right mortgage information to match your particular circumstances can wind up costing you tens of thousands of... More...

Online Retail Sales: Online Loyalty Equals Retail Gold
As an employee of an online advertising agency, I’ve got a sweet vantage for observing the latest online retail numbers tumble in - and they’re spectacular. Third Quarter online retail sales were up almost 27% from the same period... More...

How Search Engines Have Changed Public Relations
When it comes to Public Relations, the driving philosophy that underlies even the most minute aspect of a campaign is that perception equals reality. This is as true as ever in the Interactive Age because anyone with Internet access has the ability to... More...

The Year That Will Be
Despite the rocky beginning and the ultra-competitiveness foreshadowing times to come, 2005 once again made Internet advertising history, not to mention making more than 1200 millionaires. We’ve already presented our take on Internet Advertising... More...

Internet Advertising 2005 - The Year That Was
In 2004, our industry grew 32.5% to roughly $9.6 billion, a record for Internet advertising, and higher than expected. While the number for 2005 hasn’t been reported, most expect it to easily exceed $12 billion, which would equate to a second year of 30+%... More...

Search and Online Ad Spending Increased in 4Q05
A survey of 60 media executives conducted by Deutsche Bank indicated that 65% of the respondents said that paid search spending increased during the last quarter, which spanned from October to December 2005, compared to the third quarter of last... More...

Record Number of Music Downloaded During Holidays
During the holiday week starting on Christmas Day and ending on New Year’s Day a record 20 million songs were downloaded, according to Nielsen SoundScan and E-Commerce Times. This number is more than twice the record amount of 9.5 million songs downloaded the... More...

Diigo: Another Del.icio.us?
Diigo (pronounced “deego”) is a brand new social annotation site. Social annotation is “a superset of social bookmarking,” the site (www.diigo.com) says. It is similar to del.icio.us in that it is a social bookmarking tool, and even uses the del.icio.us API... More...

User-Influenced Social Networks in 2006
Social networks have grown in prominence in 2005, and have found a powerful ally and supporter in Yahoo!. The Internet giant began this focus by acquiring the social photo sharing and tagging site Flickr, and followed up by later purchasing the social... More...

Three Important Marketing Technologies in 2005
As technology continues to be an important tool for online marketing it comes as no surprise that 2005 was an active year for affiliate marketers. Whether there were new challenges, improvements, or opportunities, 2005 brought about many interesting events and... More...

Online advertising to grow 10% annually through 2010
JupiterResearch, a division of Jupitermedia Corp., forecasts that online display and search advertising spending will grow at an average annual rate of 10% between 2005 and 2010. The automotive and travel industries are projected to show the strongest... More...

News Highlights of 2005
News concerning products, services, and events that are changing the face of online marketing were riddled all across news headlines in 2005. To the surprise of no one, Google was part of many of them, but not all... More...

Telecommute - NY Transit Strike
On Tuesday, December 20th a key component of New York City’s infrastructure gave out in the way of a massive transit worker strike and left most of ICMediaDirect.com’s staff stranded along with millions of others in Brooklyn, Queens, Long Island and... More...

Accountability Online
People blog for a variety of reasons, for many, it offers a chance to be heard, to be discovered, and to network. If you are really good you can even make money along with making an impact. I started blogging for a similar reason, vanity, or better said... More...

AT&T, Bell South Unveil Revamped Yellowpages.com
Last year, BellSouth and SBC Communications, now part of AT&T, partnered to purchase Yellowpages.com and join their respective telephone directory services in order to further this online service. On December 1st, BellSouth Corp. and AT&T Inc. officially... More...

The Local Internet
The weekend before Thanksgiving, I moved into a new apartment. Besides marking the first time I have lived outside of downtown Los Angeles, the move also signified another first, my using Craigslist to sell stuff. The results truly speak for themselves... More...

Online Ad Revenues Soar To $3.1 billion
Online ad revenues for the third quarter of 2005 rose to a record-setting $3.1 billion. This is a 4.7% increase from the second quarter’s $2.9 billion, and a 33.9% increase over the $2.3 billion in online ad revenues for the third quarter of last year... More...

New Orleans to Get Free Wi-Fi
On Tuesday, New Orleans Mayor Ray Nagin revealed the city’s plan to offer a free, city-run Wi-Fi system that will be available to the entire city within a year. It has already begun operating in the city’s French Quarter, New Orleans’ central business district. More...

Match.com and Yahoo! Have Dates in Court
Earlier this month, on November 10th, a racketeering lawsuit was filed against Match.com, a popular online dating service. Match.com, a division of IAC/Interactive, is being accused of trying to lure customers into renewing their subscriptions... More...

Mountain View Accepts Google’s Free Wi-Fi Internet Proposal
The Mountain View City Council on Tuesday night gave Google the green light to begin building a wireless network in their city, in which the search giant is based. The City Council unanimously ratified a five-year property lease required for the construction... More...

Thinking about Leadership, Part Two
In Part One, we highlighted the importance of leadership in any economic environment but especially in an ultra-competitive one such as ours, and we mentioned how strong leadership doesn’t guarantee success but it will be... More...

Thinking about Leadership, Part One
Next week, it’s our big conference, and what we will see are the results of a hot and growing Internet advertising market - more exhibitors and attendees, more press, more bankers, and most importantly, more competition. None of these, especially the... More...

Warning: Adults are Letting Children Become Adults, Proceed With Caution
I’m a regular lurker of http://www.Adrants.com - a site that spoofs advertising and all its zaniness and generally allows for casual social commentary, some good, some bad, and more often than not, shows an inordinate amount of boobs, which I’m certain... More...

Digital Thoughts - The Gap
Eleven months ago at Ad:Tech New York 2004, everyone had smiles on their faces. The crop of acquisitions harvested this year had yet to fully ripen, but the relief from having weathered three and a half years of bad weather was more than evident. As we approach... More...

Ad-Tech London: A Look at the European Market
You know a market is on fire when a trade show covering that market closes at 5 and at 6:30 organizers are still chasing attendees & exhibitors out. Ad-Tech London was not just about the UK market, but also about the European market in general... More...

State of the Union
The latest figures released this past Monday by the Interactive Advertising Bureau (IAB) and PricewaterhouseCoopers (PwC) underline the growing trend of marketers spending more of their total advertising budgets online. Online advertising... More...

PopUp Blocker Solution
Is PopUp Blocking Affecting Affiliate Earnings? Not anymore! There are products and services out there using DHTML to get the popup to pop. For example, “Instant Attention” is a service that you can use... More...

The Critical Coupon Code Step
Affiliate marketing is becoming as competitive (and more affordable) as Pay Per Click marketing, Media Buys, email and other methods of marketing online. However, it takes more ingenuity and commitment from the merchants to make their affiliate... More...

Digital Thoughts - Hurricane Katrina, Part Two
Anyone who has not been in a cave without any form of media has seen the almost incomprehensible destruction the waters have had on parts of Louisiana and Mississippi. For many reasons, this tragedy is unlike any other most of us have ever experienced... More...

Digital Thoughts - Looking For Katrina, Part One
This week saw one of the more unexpected and larger transactions of the year. After two week’s of little news on the acquisition front, one of Japan’s largest internet firms, Rakuten, announced its intent to purchase affiliate network pioneer and last... More...

Trends Report - Internet Real Estate
The housing market isn’t the only hot real estate segment...internet real estate is also reaching its peak. Like a marketing company that has figured out how to convert low value PPC keywords or an affiliate that has figured out how to create SEO... More...

Digital Thoughts - Far East
It’s not often that deals in our industry top nine figures, and it is even rarer when those deals involve Internet ventures outside of the United States. Such a transaction occurred this week when Yahoo announced its intent to purchase a stake in China’s... More...

Who Can You Trust?
The other day I was talking to a sales manager at a large e-tailer when they said something that stuck with me- how do you trust a company you’ve never worked with, particularly in the online arena? More...

Designing For Your Demographic
When designing a website, one must take the intended audience into careful consideration. Whether the website is business-to-business or business-to-consumer the design will require a format which caters to the desired type of visitors... More...

Digital Thoughts - State of the Union
Arbitrage is a word that gets bandied about freely these days; it’s an activity that has transcended the financial world where it began to become the de-facto means for making money online. At its core, the activity describes the absorption of... More...

Trends - The Fab-Four
Writing about major acquisitions is among the best topics to cover. They provide a great opportunity to research companies in order to better understand the factors behind the sale. One such sale was Intermix, a company snatched up by Rupert Murdoch’s... More...

Digital Thoughts - The CEO Handbook
Rupert Murdoch is here, and his entry is a sign of more purchases to come. No such event happened in time for this week’s publication, a fact that remedies itself, though, next week with coverage of Experian’s purchase of... More...

The DirectTrack Aggregate Index - DTAI - June
The DirectTrack Aggregate Index (DTAI) will show you trends in the industry across categories in the Networks we power. The DTAI will be updated monthly to show you trends in the industry. More...

Trends Report - MGM v. Grokster
Once again Google captured headlines this week. However, their new product feature and $300 per share sustained closing price was not enough to command the majority of the internet advertising related media. Something close to the heart of any... More...

Digital Thoughts - McEducation
Last week, Boston played host to a small education related conference. Attended by mainly universities interested in trends in the post-secondary market, it remains largely unattended by those in our space. Similar to Ad:Tech, the show... More...

Trends Report - The Convergence
Almost six months have passed since the Super Bowl, but one marketing trend that surfaced heavily during the game continues today, and that is the use of non-internet mediums to drive interest to a web site. While not the first company to do so... More...

Trends Report - Are You Multilingual?
When it comes to email, co-registration/hosted lead generation, incentive promotion sites, and search arbitrage, arguable no other group collectively knows more than those operating in our space. One of those specialties, co-registration/hosted... More...

Top Ten Reasons You’re Not Advertising Online (But Should Be)
Digital advertising is proving to be a valuable complement to the traditional media mix. Do you have cold feet? Here are ten reasons that may be holding you back, and ten reasons why you should jump in. More...

Beer Bongs and Keg Stands
Hoards of Elvis impersonators, Pedro’s from Napoleon Dynamite, and all the people you don’t want to see naked marched through the streets of San Francisco this past Sunday. An annual Bay Area tradition, the Bay to Breakers is one of the largest footraces... More...

The DirectTrack Aggregate Index
The DirectTrack Aggregate Index (DTAI) will show you trends in the industry across categories in the Networks we power. The DTAI will be updated monthly to show you trends in the industry. More...

Developing a Successful Online Brand Protection Strategy
Most companies recognize that their domain names are vital to establishing their brand identity on the Internet, and that they are valuable business assets, whether they manage them in-house, use an outside vendor, or use some combination of the two. More...

Stored Karma: Better Than
Simply put, stored Karma is exactly as it sounds. I helped out a bunch of reporters. Why? Because I could. What did it get me? Nothing, right away. Or did it…? In fact, it got me a TON. More...

Trends - Think Week
Last week’s DM Confidential included an article discussing the impacts of rapid growth, something many in our industry have experienced both in terms of revenues and people. With that growth, though, come many often-unanticipated challenges... More...

Priorities...
This industry is taxing… Let me just say that to begin my weekly rant. There are never enough hours in the day, days in week, or weeks in the month. I find that time races on and time not spent in front of my screen is money lost. More...

Digital Thoughts - Growing Pains
While not directly connected to the topic discussed in this week’s Trends Report, the purchase of CDT by 180 Solutions touches upon a topic that I would wager many in this space have faced - growth. With the successes of 2004, many in our space found themselves rapidly hiring... More...

Oz Behind The Curtain
In an industry that at times appears to be completely anonymous and automated I find it rather relieving when I receive the “So and so has moved on to pursue other interests and so and so will be your new account rep” email. I tend to get so entirely caught up with... More...

Digital Thoughts - Five Rules Of Hardball
Most of the companies in our space did very well in 2004. Some of them did so well that unanticipated but certainly desired exit strategies were realized. 2005 brings more promise but most likely not the easy gold of 2004. More...

Trends Report - Look Internaly
Traditionally, this section of the DM Confidential looks externally at the market. Topics range from capital markets activity to insights gleaned from watching Yahoo and Google indirectly and directly compete for dominance. This week’s article takes a step back... More...

Successful Baseball Strategy In Our Space
Billy Beane, General Manager of the Oakland Athletics and protagonist of Michael Lewis’s Moneyball, had a problem: how to win in the Major Leagues with a budget smaller than that of nearly every other team. More...

Trends Report: Saturation
I’m flying back to the East Coast via Chicago and realizing there is nothing more beautiful than a lightning storm this high up. I’m crammed into a small plane and the air condition doesn’t work More...

Digital Thoughts - Billion Dollar Netiquette
Google has done an amazing thing in creating a non-stop self perpetuating media storm over their initial public offering. More...

Digital Thoughts: Working Hard Not Just for the Money
Why do we work so hard in this industry? Surely, other industries are composed of individuals who work long hours and take little personal time. More...

Would you like fries with that?
Competition is good. Free markets are good. Censorship and monopolies are bad. More...