My my, how corporate crisis management has changed in the the last 10 years. The Prius recall is a great example of how quickly you really need to react in today’s Google, Twitter and Facebook world.

I queried “toyota recall” and “toyota prius recall” at Google.com to see how Toyota is handling their public-relations disaster via search.  Toyota.com has “Toyota Recall News” ad in first position to address what is being called the worst handled auto recall in history.

I didn’t see ad when I Googled “toyota sucks”, “toyota gas pedal”, “toyota investigation” etc, — which I think they should definitely be optimizing for as well.

Thought I’d pass along some simple tips for creating and optimizing content campaigns in Google AdWords:

1) Manage Content separately from Search:

While AdWords allows you to run Content and Search in the same campaign, it’s generally not advised. CTRs, CPCs and conversion rates vary between the networks, so segmenting Content and Search will allow you to manage each more effectively. You can find network settings under the Campaign Settings.

2) Small, Tightly Themed Ad Groups:

Unlike Google’s Search network, targeting on the Content network occurs at the ad group, not keyword level. This means Google evaluates all keywords within a specific ad group, in addition to the ads, in order to determine the websites on which to display your ads. Because of this, it’s important to have smaller ad groups (10-20 keywords) with keywords targeting a common theme.

3) Creative Ad Copy:

Due to the nature of the Content network, people engage differently with your ads and may have different intent than people searching directly at Google.com. People who see your ads in the Content Network were not actively searching for your product or service, so it’s important to understand how your ad text relates to the content on the webpage. Ads with clear, attention-grabbing headlines and strong call-to-actions will maximize your success.

4) Track Performance:

Use the AdWords Conversion Tracking pixel to track conversions at the ad and ad group level. By having several smaller, highly targeted ad groups you will see which themes are more relevant for your offer and also be able to pause or further optimize ad group themes that aren’t converting.

5) Run Placement Performance Reports:

The Placement report allows you to monitor performance for your ads by specific domains and URLs, including conversion rates. Use it to learn which sites to exclude.

Other things to keep in mind:

* It’s okay to use duplicate keywords in Content campaigns.
* Content doesn’t recognize phrase or exact. It considers everything as broad match (remember, it’s about ad groups “themes”, not specific keywords).
* Negative keywords are still important!
* Keyword level URLs are not trackable.
* Bids are managed at ad group level, not keyword level.
* Experiment with image ads.
* Consider testing different landing pages for Content vs Search.

Just got this email from Google AdWords today:

“We’re making a change to AdWords access levels that will affect your account. In the coming weeks, we’ll replace reports-only access with a new read-only access level. As a result, all reports-only users in your account will automatically become read-only users.
This change will give your reports-only users a clearer view of your account performance. As read-only users, they’ll have access to advanced reporting tools that are only available in the Campaigns tab, such as filters and data segmentation, which make it easier to spot performance trends and identify areas for improvement.

As with reports-only access, read-only access will be limited to browsing and viewing reports. Your read-only users will not be able to make edits to your campaigns. However, read-only users won’t be restricted to using the Reports tab only. Instead, they’ll be able to view performance statistics anywhere in an account, including the Campaigns tab.

We plan to make these changes within the next few weeks. If you’re comfortable with the changes, no action is required on your part. However, if you don’t want your reports-only users to see the Campaigns tab of your account, you can update your account access preferences by following these instructions.

We hope that these changes will help your business get more out of reports-only access to AdWords. Thank you for taking the time to read this email, and have a great start to 2010!”

TwitJobSearch.com is a real-time Twitter-based job search engine. Just type the job title and TwitJobSearch then scans Twitter for job postings. According to their blog:

“Twitter has tens of thousands of jobs being ‘tweeted’ every day from major companies and jobboards, as well as individuals, but without a way to properly sort and filter these tweets, they amount to nothing but noise.  TwitJobSearch   scours twitter; indexing tweets that are jobs, and filtering out the rest. Thus providing jobseekers with the tools necessary to find meaningful, relevant job opportunities amongst the noise.

TwitJobSearch is more than a simple search engine; it pulls and displays data found ‘Beyond the Tweet’, lets you follow and retweet twitter accounts and, via the TwitJobSearch QuickPitch function, allows jobseekers to attached their online identities (ex. linkedIn, twitter, video, etc.) to jobs they are qualified for.”

You can refine by job searches Salary level, Job Title, Job Type, etc. You could also just search by city or use their JobMap to search by location.

As per their official blog post, YSM has announced two important new tools for Sponsored Search advertisers:

1) Network Distribution: This new feature enables you to set up campaigns or ad groups targeting Yahoo! Search, Yahoo! Partners, or both. While your campaign objectives will determine the best use of network distribution, we recommend that advertisers target the Entire Network to maximize traffic volume, while retaining the ability to bid up or down on Yahoo! Partners. For more control and optimization capability, you may wish to duplicate key campaigns, with one targeting Yahoo! Search and the other targeting Yahoo! Partners.”

2) Import Campaigns: This new tool is designed to help you easily and efficiently convert your campaign data from Google AdWords into Yahoo! Search Marketing formats. Simply download your third-party file, then import it from your computer into the Sponsored Search interface. Once the import is complete, you’ll be able to view any errors and pause the campaigns for review. Learn more about converting and importing your third-party campaign data.

They will also have a webinar reviewing these features Thursday, February 4 at 11:00 a.m. Pacific Time.

I’ll be going in today to review them myself!

Well, at least it reminds ME of Minority Report. Remember the animated outdoor digital billboard advertising in the movie? Aquafina and Nokia stand out most to me. And then of course there was the scene where Tom Cruise is attempting to escape his own false “pre-crime” and an American Express ad targets him saying – “It looks like you need an escape, and Blue can take you there.”

Anyhow, a new Google patent will let advertisers bid on the rights to display ads on a specific location in Google Maps/Street View.

According to ReadWriteWeb:

“In this patent, Google describes how it plans to identify buildings, posters, signs and billboards in these images and give advertisers the ability to replace these images with more up-to-date ads. In addition, Google also seems to plan an advertising auction for unclaimed properties.

In Google’s example, the software could identify the marquee and individual window posters on a theater property and replace them with new information. Through this, a theater could promote a new play in Street View, even if the actual Street View image is completely out of date.”

Google has revised and clarified their display URL policy for AdWords.

“…All ads leading to sites on hosted domains will need to have display URLs that accurately reflect their destinations.

Incorrect:

Destination URL: http://adwords.blogspot.com
Display URL: blogspot.com

Correct:

Destination URL: http://adwords.blogspot.com
Display URL: adwords.blogspot.com

Visit AdWords Blogspot for more info.

Search Engine Journal posted “7 Overlooked Sources of Keyword Data” you may find useful.

Some of these I’ve mentioned in previous posts, however here are a few you may not have played around with yet:

Technorati Tags

“Technorati is a blog search engine – and a great way to research the blogosphere overall or just find some new sources. Their tag section represents ‘popular tags used on Technorati.com over the last month.’

Browsing here is a good way to find out what topics are buzzing in the blogosphere lately – and, more importantly, what language is being used. You won’t find volume data here, but it’s a great place to look when you’re brainstorming keyword lists.”

Twitter

“While Twitter isn’t exactly a microcosm of the online population (think demographics) the real time stream provides a good study of the topics of the day and the language people are using to discuss them.

There are quite a few Twitter tools out there that you can use to monitor the buzz surrounding keywords (or find new ones). Here are a few worth looking at:

TweetBeep – think Google Alerts for Twitter – monitors keywords for you and notifies you when they’re mentioned
Trendistic – allows you to track keyword trends in Twitter (with nice graphs that visualize the data)
TweetVolume – see how often your keyword(s) appear on Twitter”

I’d also add Twitterati and What the Trend to this list.

Happy keyword hunting!

Browser size that is! Visitors (potential customers) to your site sport an array of different sized monitors. And their browsers may not always be full-screen, especially when they have toolbars for bookmarks, navigation, search boxes (e.g. Google, Yahoo, etc.), virus alerts, etc.

Google has developed a free tool (Browser Size) to help you understand how to take browser sizes into account when designing your website and/or landing pages. Per Google:

“Google Browser Size is a visualization of browser window sizes for people who visit Google. For example, the “90%” contour means that 90% of people visiting Google have their browser window open to at least this size or larger.

This is useful for ensuring that important parts of a page’s user interface are visible by a wide audience. On the example page that you see when you first visit this site, there is a “donate now” button which falls within the 80% contour, meaning that 20% of users cannot see this button when they first visit the page. 20% is a significant number; knowing this fact would encourage the designer to move the button much higher in the page so it can be seen without scrolling.”

The Browser Size tool could be useful in determining the best placement of crucial content, call-to-actions, banners, sponsorships, etc.

Read more about how the tool came to be at this Google Blog.

Looking for a keyword suggestion tool specific to online video marketing? Try YouTube’s Suggest feature, similar to Google Suggest, released last year.

The function is on by default, and as you type your search query at YouTube.com a drop-down menu automatically appears with suggested keyword phrases:

When using WordTracker, Google Keyword Tool, KeywordDiscovery or other popular keyword suggestion tools, it’s important to note that they may not be the most popular search queries being performed on YouTube.com.

You’ll also want to check the additional list of recommended searches YouTube provides on the results page. These suggestions can be found next to “Also try” under the “Search Options” link at the top of the results page.