The Big Wave Blog

Google Earth and a rather festive family from the Easthampton, Massachusetts area, that is:

View Larger MapPeople have been having fun with Google Earth since it was introduced, and fortunately, much of that fun has been of the good, clean variety. This past June, even Disney introduced, in a partnership with Google Earth, a 3-D tour that lets users zoom-in and get an up-close view of the Disney World theme parks, including rides, attractions, and shops. It’s a small world indeed, as captured by this expert Google Earth navigator and blogger, Frank Taylor. I happen to like the cheesey Disney music, but for those of you who don’t, consider yourself warned:

Google Earth has also captured some not-so-savory moments, including a recent image of a 36-year-old Australian man named “Bill”. Having passed out cold on his front lawn after a night of binge drinking (Bill was drowning his sorrows after losing a good mate), Bill became an unwilling internet sensation in the land down under, and, although he never filed a formal complaint, the image has since been taken down from Google Earth.

You never know when the Google Earth van might be coming through your neighborhood, so be prepared.  Wearing a t-shirt that reads “meta name=”robots” content=”noindex, nofollow” won’t stop you from being filmed (my attempt at SEO humor), so watch yourself.  On that note, I’ll close with one of my favorite Google Earth images, the Morris Mini “parked” on the side of a building in Westenbergstraat, Netherlands.  The head and tail lights light up at night:

View Larger Map

Google Announces Project 10¹⁰⁰

In honor of Google’s 10th anniversary, this past Monday they announced a call for submissions of world-changing ideas.  Pronounced Project 10 to the 100th, Google is searching for up to five original ideas that they will help bring to fruition by donating $10 million.  Google is making an investment in these five winning ideas that will bring about real change, improving the lives of as many people as possible.  They made a YouTube video to promote the project, and, although the video doesn’t really explain what the project is about, it’s cute and the song is kind of catchy:

The categories for idea submission, as taken from the contest web site www.Project10tothe100.com, are:

Community: How can we help connect people, build communities and protect unique cultures?
Opportunity: How can we help people better provide for themselves and their families?
Energy: How can we help move the world toward safe, clean, inexpensive energy?
Environment: How can we help promote a cleaner and more sustainable global ecosystem?
Health: How can we help individuals lead longer, healthier lives?
Education: How can we help more people get more access to better education?
Shelter: How can we help ensure that everyone has a safe place to live?
Everything else: Sometimes the best ideas don’t fit into any category at all.

With the criteria being:
Reach:  How many people would this idea affect?
Depth:  How deeply are people impacted?  How urgent is the need?
Attainability:  Can this idea be implemented within a year or two?
Efficiency:  How simple and cost-effective is your idea?
Longevity:  How long will the idea’s impact last?

Submissions are due by October 20th, 2008, and public voting on the top 100 selections begins on January 27th, 2009.  Out of these top 100 submissions, 25 will be chosen by the voters (that’s us), and an advisory board will choose the winning five entries.

I for one will be following this contest, and am looking forward to seeing all the submissions.  Thanks, Google!

No, it’s not a riddle.  I’ve just been thinking lately that pay per click marketers and heavyweight boxers face some striking (no pun intended) similarities in their professions.

Fight Is Always On!

Professional boxers and PPC marketers never get a break. For fighters, constant physical and mental conditioning is required. With PPC, you are always on the lookout for new ideas, niche markets, budgets, trends. The campaigns are on 24/7 and you are matching your wits with Google every day, looking for openings and conditioning yourself for the win.

Gritty Road to Glory

Fighters train hard, almost every day, in preparation for the big fight. Eight hours a day, for weeks and months leading up to a match-up. Great PPC campaigns also demand plenty of preparation. Dedication and focus are required to create a strategy and meticulously implement it. PPC setup includes creating ad groups, aligning bids, writing and testing ad copy, making budgeting decisions… All  leading up to the day the campaign goes live. Nobody truly appreciates the hardships our PPC guys sustain in setting up a glorious campaign.

You’re Only as Good as Your Last Win

Fighter or PPC specialist: you’re only as good as your last fight/good month. PPC marketers have a tough time explaining why clients sometimes have a “bad” month. Business owners don’t understand that “you can’t win them all.” A slump is poised to happen even in the best laid and managed campaigns. ROI depends on so many factors that are outside our control: like seasonality, the economy, changes in competitors’ strategies, etc. It’s really sad how eager business owners are ready to pull the plug on a widely successful campaign just because ROI fluctuates.

We Are the Champions

When you look at your next pay per click report, don’t forget the hard work it takes to run and manage a campaign.

It would be great if businesses would understand that PPC does more then fill up your shopping cart…it builds your brand! The new dynamics of Quality Score introduced by Google should signal to you that PPC is not a 100M dash anymore… it’s a marathon. You cannot judge a marathon in the first few minutes. People basing their search marketing decisions on anything less than 1 year of data are fooling themselves. It takes months to build a good Quality Score until, one fine day, a client pulls the plug and sends the campaign tumbling to the ground.

So the next time you see Ronnie or Kyle working on one of our client’s campaigns, don’t hesitate to shout out…

“Yo Adrian!”

I had a great time in San Jose delivering the session on Advanced Search Engine Strategies at the Northern California Lodging Conference and Expo. In this fast-paced session, I was able to cover a lot of new and cutting-edge topics and was able to share some amazing new facts with the attendees.

The session was very well received. One of the best parts was the attendance of students from the George Washington High School. Jim Abrams, the outgoing president of CHLA and one of the most respected visionaries of the hospitality sector, summed it up for me this way: it’s very crucial for the next generation of hoteliers to get familiarized with how search engines work and influence our daily lives.

CHLA sessions are always a pleasure to deliver. Their commitment to educating their members is something I have rarely seen with hospitality sector state associations. And it’s always great to catch up with the CHLA team and contribute to Search Engine education.  Special thanks, Lynn and Jennifer, for the wonderful support and for putting together these awesome events.

For those of you interested in attending one of my 90-minuted advanced sessions on search engine marketing strategies, CHLA has invited me to two more of their programs in Southern California in October. Here are the details:

San Diego
October 21, 2008   9:00 am – 12:30 pm
Handlery Hotel & Resort
Print and Fax to Register Now

Santa Barbara
October 22, 2008   9:00 am – 12:30 pm
Fess Parker’s Doubletree Resort
Print and Fax to Register Now

See you there!