http://blog.contextcontrol.com Observations and rants from a human who works in search marketing Thu, 29 May 2008 21:00:48 +0000 http://backend.userland.com/rss092 en Can't believe it's been months since my last entry. Busy, busy, busy... I wanted to mention how important it is to keep a vigilant eye on your accounts at all time. We had a recent experience where a team member goofed a bid. Big goof. Overnight, we ... http://blog.contextcontrol.com/keep-your-eye-on-the-ball/ Today, I received, in a completely wasteful plastic wrapper, a "magazine" from a company that claims to determine the top SEOs. (Yes, it's TopSEOs.com, aka eVentures, LLC) You, too, can be chosen by this arbiter of professional ability for the simple sum of $5000. Well, that'll get you in ... http://blog.contextcontrol.com/beware-rankings/ The reaction to my first report after launching a new PPC campaign, particularly one intended to drive sales, is often... anger. How could we have spent thousands of dollars and not produced anything in the way of sales? I thought PPC was supposed to pay itself. Do ... http://blog.contextcontrol.com/mining-for-gold-aint-cheap/ Up until just a few minutes ago, I ran AdSense ads on my blog. I had visions of making millions simply by virtue of the quality of my blinding insights. Well, that didn't really work out. But this put me over the edge. This ad showed ... http://blog.contextcontrol.com/want-ringtone/ A follow up to my earlier post on customer satisfaction surveys. I mentioned that I was cynical about the MSN customer satisfaction survey I'd filled out. It was one in a long line, typically with the same result: nothing. This time, though, I actually got a call from a ... http://blog.contextcontrol.com/dont-ask-if-you-dont-care/ Imagine you're trying to sell something that people can get for free. For instance, you've got a copy of the Constitution. It's not THE Constitution. It's a copy. You can get them for free just about anywhere (maybe the President should check that out?). Anyway, ... http://blog.contextcontrol.com/selling-whats-also-free/ I know, everyone says that. I mean it a little differently. One of my clients is switching from one analytics package to another. The process of doing so requires that we retag every one of the many thousands of keywords that we maintain for them. This would be ... http://blog.contextcontrol.com/talk-to-your-customers/ This has nothing to do with PPC.  Let's say it does in that lawyers suck.  And... they use PPC sometimes. I was just included, by no action on my part, in a class action lawsuit against Equifax.  We won!  Yippee! So, what does he win, Chuck?  Well, Rian gets at least three ... http://blog.contextcontrol.com/class-action-lawsuits/ Say you're called into a big marketing meeting to talk about why things aren't going well. The real answer is "we're not doing a very good job of providing a compelling choice to our customers." You can't say that, though. That implies a lot of hard work ... http://blog.contextcontrol.com/dissatisfaction-with-satisfaction-surveys/ This isn't really related directly to PPC, but it is related to running a small business and more generally to our government's creeping incursions into the privacy of its citizens. I applied for a line of credit with the SBA for reasons that escape me at the moment. I think ... http://blog.contextcontrol.com/big-brother-has-your-number/