Google dominates both the click and the spend in paid search!

Efficient Frontier released its Q3 Digital Marketing Performance Report. The document covers a range of trends from search marketing to Facebook and display advertising to mobile and tablets. However the report is primarily focused on paid search trends.

According to Efficient Frontier Google controls roughly 82 percent of both the click and the spend in paid search. The company also said “the first quarter that Google has gained more spend share from Yahoo/Bing across sectors since the Yahoo/Bing alliance  . . . [as a partial] result of improved CTRs on Google.” In addition, it “can also be attributed to the shift in marketers looking for more volume as they head into the Q4 retail peak.”

Efficient Frontier also added that marketers will get greater visibility into conversions where users are signed into Google:

The ability to attribute conversions across devices (mobile, tablet, desktop) is now possible with the development of the Google+ network that keeps users logged in to the Google ecosystem. Advertisers should prepare for this trend by investing time into looking at tablet traffic and conversions, while optimizing websites for mobile.

Google: Testing Circulars Ad Format!

Bloomberg reports Google is starting to test a new search ad format that looks like web based online circulars.

The ads will be a new search ad format that supposedly will open up an interactive online circular for the store, instead of a standard ad that simply takes you to the seller's web site.

Nick Fox, Google's vice president of product management, told Bloomberg:

“Retail in general is a large category for us. They're trying to understand what the answer is in the digital age to the offline print circular. They're trying to understand how to get their online visitors into their stores. And this is our answer to that.”

Bloomberg explained, "Web surfers will find the circular-style advertising, which shows multiple pictures and large type, by clicking on search ads. The service will automatically craft the promotions based on factors such as query topics and the location of users."

Google said the click through rate will increase from 15 percent to more than 50 percent on some of the ads.

'Our Mobile Planet' – New Free Smartphone Data Analysis Tool from Google!

Mobile user’s data can now be analyzed in a much better and accurate manner. Google has rolled out a new data and analysis tool – Our Mobile Planet, that will provide access to anyone to the data and research on smartphone usage.

This site has an interactive tool that lets people create custom data analysis charts from Google’s “Global Mobile Research: The Smartphone User & The Mobile Marketer” report, that came out early in 2011. This new tool lets webmasters do extensive research on consumer behavior with regard to search, video, social and more.

The tool will let you sample data based on-

• Penetration of consumer adaption of smartphones (The reach)
• The reason for which people are using these devices (The Why?)
• In what way are consumers are using these devices (The How?)
• What activities are people taking up on their smartphones. (The Activities)
• What is the purchasing patterns on smartphones (The Commerce)
• How are people responding to promotions (The Advertising)

You can get highly specific on any research, as every data set has subsets.

AdWords now have the ability to report calls placed from mobile pages!

Google AdWords will now let you track calls made from mobile devices to your business after users have tapped the phone number on your website.

As Google said, “Today, we are introducing a new conversion tracking metric to help advertisers and agencies do just that: all AdWords accounts will now have the ability to report calls placed from mobile pages.”

Most businesses don't want to pay for marketing they can't measure. With this feature, you'll be able to track clicks on your phone number by AdWords campaign, ad group, or keyword, which puts you in charge of some valuable data. This is essentially the Holy Grail of marketing metrics: figuring out the ads that made customers calls you.

Google Trusted Stores!

Google inspires trust among internet users, and this trust is what Google has planned to extend to ecommerce sites too.

Google has launched Google Trusted Stores, a program that will award verified ecommerce sites with a Google badge, to assure people that the online store can be trusted to put their money in.

The Google Commerce Team explained the working of the trusted stores program, “The Google Trusted Store badge is awarded to e-commerce sites that demonstrate a track record of on-time shipping and excellent customer service. When visiting a qualifying store, shoppers can hover over the Google Trusted Store badge and see metrics on the store’s shipping and customer service performance.”

Webmaster Tools integration with Google Analytics!

Earlier in June Google released a limited beta of Webmaster Tools integration with Google Analytics, where you can view search query data from Webmaster Tools directly in Google Analytics.

Yesterday, Google announced this feature is now available to everyone!

You can find the new reports under the “traffic sources” > “search engine optimization” section of the new Google Analytics. The new reports there include:

• Queries: impressions, clicks, position, and CTR info for the top 1,000 daily queries
• Landing Pages: impressions, clicks, position, and CTR info for the top 1,000 daily landing pages
• Geographical Summary: impressions, clicks, and CTR by country

Following is a sample screen shot:

Google: Quality Improvements In AdWords Globally!

Google have been steadily promoting the importance of landing pages for the past few years. In its attempt to provide for the best user experience, Google rolled out a new algorithm that will give more consideration to landing page quality when it comes to AdWords Quality score. This new algorithm has been quietly tested in Spain, Portugal, Brazil and other parts of Latin America.

As Google says, “August, we announced trials in Brazil, Spanish-speaking Latin America, Spain, and Portugal1that increased the weight given to relevance and landing page quality in determining Quality Score and how ads are ranked on Google. The goal was to improve the user experience with search ads. Based on the results we’ve been seeing, we’re now rolling these changes out globally over the coming weeks.”

It goes without saying that this tweak in the AdWords will impact quite a few campaigns. There will be variations in keyword quality scores and typical ad positions.

 However, Google is assuring that things will be stable within a couple weeks, and most campaigns will not feel any remarkable or worth noticing alteration in their performance.

Google launched a paid version of Google Analytics- Google Analytics Premium.

In an attempt to provide webmaster with more insights and support, recently Google launched a paid version of Google Analytics- Google Analytics Premium. For a flat rate annual fee, the new analytics will process higher volumes of page views and also will provide additional support.

In Google Analytics Premium, the features and the user experience are the same as in general Google Analytics. It has more capabilities, than that of the regular analytics. And it will benefit the organizations that want dedicated services and support. Also the sites who desire to process data more frequently (without sampling too!) As the Premium package says for itself- “Now you can share more valuable information than ever throughout your enterprise – from the back room to the boardroom-for better decision making.”

The main categories of the services of the Premium Analytics are:

• Extra processing power - increased data collection, more custom variables and downloadable, unsampled reports
• Advanced analysis - attribution modeling tools that allow you to test different models for assigning credit to conversions
• Service and support - experts to guide customized installation, and dedicated account management on call - all backed by 24/7 support
• Guarantees - service level agreements for data collection, processing and reporting

As of now, the Google Analytics Premium is available to US, UK and Canada based companies. Their sites may be located globally. The search engine giant hopes to expand soon.

Google has added “site health” view to the Webmaster Tools home page!

Recently, Google has added a new “site health” view to the Webmaster Tools home page.

With this change, the next time you visit Webmaster Tools, Google will show the sites in your account sorted with Health check status. Those in need of work will be at the top.

Currently Google is using three issues/concerns to determine when a site is in poor health:

• when malware has been detected
• when important pages have been removed via Google’s URL removal tool
• when important pages are blocked in the robots.txt file

Google said in its announcement, that “important pages” are currently being defined by the number of clicks that pages get; other factors may be added in the future.

Google also says it hopes to expand the health check beyond the three issues listed above.

Google AdWords Changes Policy!

Recently Google made a change in their adwords policy. This policy change results an expansion in the inventory of Google ads, where AdSense network will display gambling-related ads on the websites of its publishers.

Google has said that it has espoused this change in AdWords policy in response to feedback received from advertisers and publishers. In a mail it has said-

"We’re constantly reviewing the categories of ads available to our AdSense publishers in order to provide access to a wide range of possible advertisers. Towards this goal, beginning on 11 October, we’re expanding the inventory of Google ads eligible to show on the AdSense network to include gambling-related ads from trusted advertisers."

However, this change in rule will be strictly country-specific, in the sense that such ads will be displayed on the websites of (or websites targeted to) only those countries where online gambling is legal.