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Some SEOs aren’t getting the message about Google’s personalization of search results. Many are not seeing the writing on the wall: 2009 will likely see the end of the ranking report in SEO. In today’s organic search engine optimization column, “The Future of Google’s Search Personalization,” Mark Jackson advises SEOs to acknowledge traffic, conversions, and ROI as the important metrics for any form of marketing or business.

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So far, the majority of marketing budgets are not facing changes or cuts due to the economy, according to survey results released by eMetrics.

60% of respondents said their marketing budgets haven’t changed.

After that, the news gets a little discouraging.

27.6% said their budgets are being affected negatively, while 6.9% answered very negatively.

Only 3.4% said their budgets were being affected positively and a miniscule 1.7% answered very positively.

Don’t stay bummed for too long. The economy seems to finally getting senior management on board with those ever important analytics.

80.4% of marketers say interest in web analytics from senior management in the past 6 months has increased. On that note, it might be a good time to start pitching landing page testing as well.

So what advertising campaigns are specifically being affected? Check out this chart:

Some of the channels are being outsourced:

You can view the full report here (pdf).

What are your thoughts on the economy and marketing budgets? Leave your thoughts in the comments.

Today, there are more updates to Google products than you can shake a stick at. So intead of writing a bunch of short, little posts, I have consolidated them into one for you, faithful SEW reader.

Both my awesome husband and my awesome 11 year old son have pointed out to me the new changes to iGoogle. I personally don’t use my iGoogle page all that much (Keepin’ it real [simple]), but I did browse over to it and found some cosmetic changes (The Foo Fighters theme was already there.)

Notice the tab on the left hand side. It includes links to the widgets on your iGoogle page. When you click on one of the links, it switches to a screen with that widget. Some take up the whole page. Others present a list of similar widgets as suggestions. Still others make use of Google reader to present a feed.

Moving on to other Google properties….

Webmaster Tools now testing a Message Center warning that alerts webmasters to possible vulnerabilities with their Content Management Systems (CMS).

Google TV ads has announced new partnerships with COREMedia Systems and Harris Corporation. The COREMedia partnership allows CoreDirect customers to view their Google TV ads right along with their CoreDirect data. The Harris Corp. one adds more inventory for Google TV advertisers.

AdWords has separated the metrics for Google and search partners such as Ask, AOL, etc. This is probably in preparation for the implementation of the Yahoo search advertising partnership.

Last but most important is the changes to the Google algorithm regarding Adobe Flash. Brian Ussery has a writeup about it on his extremely minimalistic-looking blog. Basically, he finds that indexing of Flash still isn’t ready for prime time. I know there may have been some hope with recent news of Adobe working with Google to provide better indexing, but we’re just not there yet, folks.

And that concludes the flurry of Google updates for Friday, October 17, 2008. Leave your thoughts, impressions, etc in the comments!

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Web analytics provider Omniture today launched Omniture SiteSearch, a hosted site search product it picked up in its Visual Sciences acquisition, which closed in January 2008.

The SiteSearch product was an early entry in the software-as-a-service (SaaS) space. It was originally launched in 1999 as Atomz Search, part of its content management suite. Atomz was later acquired by analytics provider WebSideStory, which later acquired Visual Sciences. The entire company changed its name to Visual Sciences, and was then acquired by Omniture.

A few clients, including Verizon and BusinessWeek have been using SiteSearch as a standalone product, according to Jeff Minich, senior product marketing manager at Omniture. Today, it becomes an integrated part of the Omniture online marketing suite.

The biggest effect of this is the ability to impact site search results using data from Omniture’s SiteCatalyst analytics package. So on an e-commerce site, for example, a search for “shirts” could be made to return the most popular shirts of the season, or those that return the highest margin, or those that are converting highest, Minich said.

“You can set business rules to break ties, or to push a page higher in the results,” he said. “You can also combine metrics, and weight them relative to each other, and relative to the natural relevancy ranking in SiteSearch.”

Sometrics today launched “Social Ad Manager,” which was designed to help social networks manage their advertising inventories. The product aggregates both third-party networks and direct sales. Sometrics says Social Ad Manager will eliminate server costs and produce custom traffic reports.

“We’re making it possible for publishers to apply our social intelligence to their entire ad inventory, to optimize the delivery of their ads and increase revenue,” said Ian Swanson, Sometrics CEO and co-founder. “We’ve built a system that combines analytics, targeting and branding capabilities all designed to help developers and advertisers reach their audiences within the social web. Now our clients can apply this social intelligence to every ad they serve.”

Related Reading:
LinkedIn Launches Targeted Advertising Network
Location-Based Social Networking to Generate $3.3 Billion by 2013
AOL’s Platform-A to Offer Guaranteed CPM to Facebook, Bebo Developers
eMarketer Lowers Social Network Advertising Projections

Search Engine Strategies today named 43 search engine marketers as finalists for the SEM conference’s first annual SES Awards.

The 16 winners will be announced throughout SES San Jose during Orion and keynote panels, which are being held August 18-21 at the San Jose Convention Center.

The SES Award Finalists in the following categories are:

Best Search Engine Ad Platform
Call Genie’s CG Advantage
LookSmart AdCenter
SendTec - SearchFactz

Search Engine with Most Relevant Search Results
Expert System’s Cogito Focus (Shift Communications)
Local.com (Madison Alexander)
Yahoo!

Most Innovative New Search Engine
YellowBot (Young & Associates)
Expert System’s Cogito Focus (Shift Communications)

Technology Platform Search Marketers Can’t Live Without
Enquisite (Maven.com)
Covario, Inc. (JHG Townsend)
Kenshoo Search - SEM Platform (Kenshoo Ltd)

Best SEM Technology Platform for SMBs
LocalLaunch
Enquisite (Maven.com)
Marchex

Most Innovative Use of Search Engine Optimization
NikeStore (Range Online Media)
DoubleClick Performics
Where 2 Get It Search Locator

Most Innovative Paid Search Campaign
SearchAdNetwork
Building Blocks for LEGO’s Paid Search Media (iCrossing)
Four Seasons Hotels and Resort (Acronym Media)

Best Social Media Marketing Campaign
Alberto-Culver Nexxus (iProspect)
SEO-PR
Beaches of South Walton (USDM.net)

Best Business-to-Business Search Marketing Campaign
Microsoft Small Business Center (iProspect)
SEO-PR
Enquiro Search Solutions, Inc.

Best Multi-National Search Marketing Campaign
WebCertain
iCrossing Integrates Global Search Campaign for iCrossing
Acronym Media/SAP

Best Use of Local Search
The Container Store (Range Online Media)
Storage West Self Storage (Young & Associates)
US Small Business Administration-Business Gateway Initiative

Best Integration of Search with Other Media
SEO-PR
The Tudors/Showtime (Outrider)
Jaguar XF Oscars (MEC Interaction)

Most Effective Use of Web Analytics
World Travel Holdings - CruisesOnly.com (iProspect)
iCrossing Measures Results with Mazda Analytics (iCrossing)
Four Seasons Hotels and Resort (Acronym Media)

Best Web Analytics Platform
Omniture
Coremetrics (Lewis PR)

Most Advertiser-Friendly Search Engine
Call Genie Interact Voice
7Search.com
Matchpoint.com

Editor’s Choice
(The Editor’s Choice award winner will be selected
exclusively by the SES Awards editorial staff.)

Microsoft’s recently acquired Navic Networks has announced a new partnership with Mediabrands, a new group of four companies: Initiative, Universal McCann, MAGNA and IPG’s Emerging Media Lab. The media companies will have access to Navic’s Admira, a national media planning tool that includes audience behavior data and real-time viewership reporting.

“We are seeking new technologies to deliver unparalleled accountability to clients, and aligning with Navic was a natural fit,” said Nick Brien, CEO of Mediabrands. “By combining the power of television with the accountability of the Web, we’re able to offer our world-class clients cutting-edge technology to help them maximize the ROI for their advertising dollars.”

“Navic is fully committed to offering innovative technologies that provide one of the most effective and accurate metrics available,” said Chet Kanojia, CEO of Navic Networks. “The industry has come a long way from defining keywords for targeted clicks, and we’re excited to align with forward-thinking companies that make bold moves and, like Navic, are on the cusp of new trends and technologies.”

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