Car Detailing: Areas to attack

Car Detailing: Areas to attack

Just posting a general reference of the areas on your car you need to clean and detail:

Exterior Detailing:

- Body
- Rims and Tires
- Wheel Wells
- Exterior Plastic Trim
- Windows
- Headlights and Taillights Plastic

Interior Detailing:

- Windows
- Dashboard
- Interior Plastics
- Leather
- Carpets

Have I missed anything? Leave a comment about what else you do to Detail your Car.

Regards,
Michael Kralj

Internet-Access For All - WCIT2006 in Austin

One big focus of Austin's WCIT2006 is to develop strategies to bridge the digital divide between "Us" (people who are able to read this blog) and "Them" (people who can't access the Internet).

I am an affluent middle-class, well-educated white-guy who lives in a big city in the USA... In a world of "haves" and "have-nots" I am definitely one of the "haves". I don't just surf the Internet's ocean; I swim in it, dive beneath the waves and explore the depths. Internet connectivity is pervasive in my world (desktop, laptop, PDA, mobile phone, public kiosks, etc.) and I feel lost without a good Wi-Fi signal.

Contrast my world with that of the large percentage of the worlds population who have yet to make a phone call. We really do live on different planets... and it's very hard for us to communicate.

Communication is the point. A low cost device that is within the reach of most people is important, but the communication infrastructure is the real problem. A computer by itself is not relevant to most people. A computer (communication device) connected to the Internet is relevant to almost everyone... AMD's Personal Internet Communicator (PIC) acknowledges this fact in its very name (without an Internet connection, it's just a nice looking brick).

The technical aspects of a bridge across the digital divide are challenging, but we're really good at solving technical problems. Given the dropping costs of hardware and the expanding presence of wireless networks, the goal of AMD's Hector Ruiz to provide Internet access to half the world by 2015 seems technically doable.

The cultural aspects of a bridge across the digital divide may prove to be the bigger challenge... bridges between cultures can be disruptive and even destructive.

Two close friends of mine moved to the Caribbean island of Nevis in the early 1990s to help build and open a Four Seasons resort. Nevis is a near perfect tropical paradise... a wonderful climate, fertile soil, and some of the friendliest and most beautiful people that you will ever meet. In such a climate, people's needs are simple, and the majority of Nevisians live in very modest dwellings... many don't have indoor plumbing and most are very small.

When my friends first moved to Nevis, few of the natives felt poor. A few "rich foreigners" had plantation houses, but the majority of the people lived pretty much the same. If you had a roof over your head and enough to eat, you were "middle class".

Then came the Television.

When Nevisians gained access to the outside world (via TV) they seemed poor by comparison; perhaps even poverty stricken. The effect on the culture was not devastating, but it was disruptive... and the level of "general happiness" dropped palpably for a few years.

Internet access has a profound impact on sheltered societies: Everyone can talk to everyone and nothing stays secret for long. This blurring of borders leads us to a whole new set of tricky cultural issues to contend with... Governments and businesses need to craft policies to prepare their citizens to become active players in the new digital economy (or they are likely to become victims of it).

WCIT2006 has assembled an impressive list of speakers to debate and discuss both the technical and cultural issues posed by the digital divide.

On Wednesday morning a panel will tackle questions related to the "global impact of digital access". The panel includes Steve Rohler (Accenture), John Gage (Sun Microsystems), James Goodnight (SAS), Teresa Peters (Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation), and Yeongi Son (Korean Agency for Digital Opportunity).

On Wednesday afternoon another panel will tackle the "impact of digital access on education throughout the world". This panel includes David S. Byer (National Coalition for Technology), Veronica Kgabo (Diepsloot School, South Africa), Guillermo H. Le Fosse (Competir, Mexico), Lorie Roth (California State University), and Dan Updegrove (University of Texas).

WCIT2006 is just a four day convention, so don't expect miraculous pronouncements that transform the world... But it should be very interesting to hear what everyone has to say.

(cross-posted at my java.net blog)

Car Detailing Guide

Car Detailing Guide

Welcome to my Car Detailing blog. Having created my other blog about Buying a Car, I decided to establish this blog in regards to Detailing your Car.

Once you have purchased a car, there is nothing like keeping it in Showroom floor condition. How can you achieve this while driving through every day conditions of dust, dirt, road tar and the ever dreaded bird droppings that get etched onto your car?

There are many steps and many products that will help keep your car looking wonderful. I will explore the different products you can find on the market, and give personal reviews of the products I have tried. Also, I plan to write some tips and tricks I use to detail my car, and also the steps you should take in caring for your cars exterior and interior.

Stay tuned and feel free to leave comments on anything I say to give an alternative perspective.

Regards,
Michael Kralj

Love Google Maps?

Show your visitors where you stand with the Google Maps API. The Maps API allows you to embed geographical information into your site using JavaScript. You can add overlays to your map including markers, polylines, and shadowed information windows. It's a great way to enhance your current site content, and best of all, using the Google Maps API is free.

To learn more, and to find out whether your site meets the terms of use, visit the Maps API FAQ.



Posted by Bill Kilday - Google Maps Product Marketing

The World (of IT) Heads To Austin

The World Conference on Information Technology (WCIT) is coming to Austin this year... and it should be a lot of fun. This event is held every other year in a different locale (this is the 15th edition). The last conference was held in Greece and the next (2008) will be held in Malaysia.

I've been volunteering for the event over the past week or so (doing some mundane tasks that just have to get done) and I will be helping out during the event itself. There is a tremendous amount of work that goes on behind the scenes... WCIT2006 professional staffers have been working on this event for two years and there are still a million little loose ends to tie up.

The logistics for WCIT2006 are being spear-headed by the brother and sister team of Lucas and Courtenay Daniels... they've got a handful of full-time staff to help them, and they've got an unruly band of volunteers like me to contend with (the phrase "herding cats" comes to mind).

Lucas and Courtenay have been in the convention business for many years, but Lucas confided in me that this event is in a league of its own... over 2,000 delegates are coming from over 80 countries.

The WCIT 2006 speaker roster includes the following:

• Steve Ballmer, CEO, Microsoft
• John S. Chen, Chairman, CEO and president of Sybase, Inc.
• Dato’ Seri Abdullah Ahmad Badawi, Prime Minister of Malaysia
• Michael Dell, Chairman of the Board of Directors of Dell Inc.
• Anne M. Mulcahy, Chairman and CEO, Xerox Corporation
• Professor Nicholas Negroponte, co-founder and chairman Emeritus, MIT Media Laboratory and Chairman, One Laptop per Child
• Paul Otellini, CEO of Intel
• Gen. Colin Powell (ret.), former United States Secretary of State
• Hector Ruiz, Chairman of the Board, President and CEO of AMD
• John W. Thompson, chairman of the board of directors and chief executive officer of Symantec Corporation

This is an impressive list of speakers, but what's really neat are the topics they will be focussing on:

1. Privacy and security in an increasingly un-private world
   
2. Digital access for everyone
   
3. Improved heathcare through IT

All three tracks are of interest, but I have to admit that the "coolness" factor goes to the "digital access" track: Nicholas Negroponte will be plugging his $100 laptop and (really cool) AMD is giving away Personal Internet Communicators (PIC) to every delegate.

(I'm hoping that volunteers get one too)

It is going to be a busy week... with many sessions, keynotes, and even parties to attend, but hopefully I'll be able to blog the highlights from down here in Austin ;-)

Choose a different account time zone

Here's the latest scoop from Jon D., a member of the campaign management team, about a much requested feature coming soon to all AdWords accounts:

Currently, all AdWords accounts are set to Pacific Time. However, in the coming weeks you’ll see a message in your account inviting you to set your account's local time zone. This means your entire account, including all ad serving, reporting, and billing, will be calculated and managed according to the time zone of your choice.

It’s important to note that your account time zone can be set only once, so please choose wisely! Also, if you don't select a different time zone, your account will remain on Pacific Time.

Posted by Judy, Inside AdWords crew

Import Export Business Fraud and Scams - Beware

Most of this information has been provided by the FBI but I intend to add my own Cautions and Beware of's at the end for both your personal and import export business.

Let me begin by CAUTIONING you - Cashier's Checks or Bank Drafts can and are often fakes - so do not believe for one minute that just because they tell you it is a Cashier's check or bank draft that it is safe to ship your item or import export merchandise.

If you can answer "YES" to any of the following questions, you could be involved in a FRAUD or you are about to be SCAMMED!

1. Is the CHECK you received for an item you sold on the Internet, such as a car, boat or jewelry, etc?

Ron Coble Note: (RC Note) Checks can take up to 21 days or more to clear USA based banks and up to 30 days or more if drawn on a foreign bank. With full color printers it is very easy to fake a check to appear like it is legitimate and it could take 30, 60 or even 90 days for a check to bounce back from a foreign bank. Do NOT ship any merchandise until you know funds are secure and I personally "would not" accept a check from out of the country as payment for anything.

2. Is the amount of the CHECK more than the item's selling price?

RC Note: This is a very common scam but not one that many people are aware of. The scammers prey upon the kindness of people to help 'them' get more US cash back into their country by using this method by telling them how difficult it is to do this otherwise. They are also always willing to pay you the full asking price for the item you are selling with no negotiation - clear sign this is a fraud/scam.

3. Did you receive the CHECK via an overnight delivery service?

RC Note: This is a method to try and close the scam/fraud as quickly as possible and to also impress you on how they are true business persons by using overnight delivery.

4. Is the CHECK connected to your communications with someone by email?

RC Note: Remember on the Internet that anyone can pretend to be anyone and thousands of web sites offer free email accounts. Always beware of someone who is using a free email account as their sole email communications when it comes to any import export business or personal financial transaction.

5. Is the CHECK drawn on a business or individual account that is different from the person buying your item or import export products?

RC Note: The buyer could be using stolen checking account information and the other part of the scam sometimes involves an actual person residing in the USA who delivers the check making the scam look even more legitimate.

6. Have you been informed that you were a winner of a LOTTERY, such as Canadian, Australia, El Gordo, or El Mundo, that you did not enter?

RC Note: Use a little common sense here my friends, it's time to wake up from watching too many (un)reality shows and dreaming of a generous millionaire/billionaire coming to your door with a check.

7. Have you been instructed to either 'WIRE', 'SEND' OR 'SHIP' MONEY, as soon as possible, to a large U.S. city or to another country, such as Canada, England, or Nigeria?

RC Note: This refers back to my note above about the scamsters having accomplices living here in the USA. I am going to repeat myself here many time, please forgive me, but please USE YOUR COMMON GOD GIVEN SENSE and UNDERSTAND that IF IT SOUNDS TOO GOOD TO BE TRUE - IT IS!

8. Have you been asked to PAY money to receive a deposit from another country such as Canada, England, or Nigeria?

RC Note: This scam has been going on for almost all of the 18 years I have been in the import export business, yet each year I read about some trusting soul who did not USE THEIR COMMON SENSE who falls for this scam.
They used to do this by registered letters. I don't know how many wasted trips I made to the Post Office to sign for a registered letter that was from one of these scamsters. Many of them could be accomplished authors if they tried since they write these compelling stories about their husband, father, uncle etc. who was part of their countries government and how he was brutally killed and now their relatives need "you" to help them get the money out of their country.

There are 1000 different stories, they used to only come from Nigeria, then they began coming from all areas of the world. They went from registered letters to sending fax messages and then the goldmine of fraud came along - Email - free easy, they can now blanket the world with their net and it costs them nothing to lure in some poor unsuspecting person who simply got overwhelmed with the prospect of instant, no hard work wealth. Please, don't let it happen to you.

9. Are you receiving or being offered to receive PAY or COMMISSION for facilitating money transfers through your account?

RC Note: First, giving out your account information to 'anyone' is very, very dangerous. Once a person has your bank account information to 'supposedly' put money into your account, guess what, they can take money OUT of your account.

10. Did you respond to an email requesting you to CONFIRM, UPDATE OR PROVIDE your account information?

RC Note: Even I, after all my advice to everyone else, fell for one of these fake emails supposedly about our Ebay account. It caught me off my usual guard. It was early one morning, I was not quite awake yet and the email appeared to be legitimate, had eBay's logo, everything appeared normal. I clicked on the link and logged in. Luckily I had that gut wrenching and sinking feeling immediately upon doing so that I had just been had.

I immediately went to eBay's site by typing it into my browser window and logged in and changed our password to a 15 letter/digit one and prevented any further problems.

I did learn later however, that by clicking on the link in that email, I may have planted a spyware program on my computer which could record every keyboard click (including my passwords, userids, account numbers, etc.) and send that info back to the scamster who planted it there. Using a free spyware recommended by Cnet's Download web site, I cleaned up my computer from any possibility of this. Here is a link to Cnet's site you can copy and paste into your browser window:
http://www.download.com/Spybot-Search-Destroy/3000-8022_4-10122137.html

MY PERSONAL FRAUD-SCAM PREVENTION REMARKS AND RECOMMENDATIONS

Now much of what you will read on the Internet is written by paid writers, who in most instances have little or no actual experience or life experience with their subject matter. They write based on research they do into the subject and usually their writing is lacking in real life experience.

When it comes to Fraud and Scams, the comments I have already provided and am about to provide are from my personal experiences and only represent a SMALL fraction of those experiences.

Let me begin by stating in the last 5 years, our small business has experienced an explosion of fraudulent orders. I personally stopped my tally when we went over $100,000.

It has become so bad now that we receive 5 times as many fraudulent orders as we receive legitimate ones. It is probably much higher than that. I will not get into all the details here that help us identify these fraud orders, but will cover most of them in later posts.

The most important issue for me to cover in this post regards how vulnerable you are to fraud and how you can help 'possibly' prevent 'some' of it from happening to you in your import export business or personal life.

This post is getting too long and I am getting tired. I will revisit this subject in my next post with even more information specific to you and your import export business. Stay tuned and keep checking back for the next post.

Ron Coble
Coble International Marketing Services
Import Export Business Help Center

Ads quality and you

Earlier this week we caught up with Nick, Product Manager for our ongoing ads quality initiatives, about a change to the AdWords system that you may notice in the coming weeks.

"My job at Google is to watch over the quality of the ads we deliver to our users and to design ways to increase the quality of those ads. We believe that ads provide valuable information when they are highly relevant to what users wish to find -- and that by showing high quality relevant ads, users will consider ads as a first choice when they're searching for products and services. At the end of the day, our users benefit from relevant ads and our advertisers get more qualified leads over time.

We constantly evaluate how our users interact with the ads we display and look for opportunities to show more ads when we think they'll be useful -- and fewer ads when we think that users might not want to see them. With this in mind, on queries such as 'car insurance' or 'flowers,' we try to show a wide selection of relevant ads to our users. And, for queries where users are most likely not interested in a product or service, such as 'dog friendly parks in Mountain View,' we may aim to show fewer ads.

Starting today, and over the coming weeks, we'll be implementing an ads quality change designed to show fewer ads on queries for which our users might prefer not to see them and more ads on queries for which ads are useful. The impact of this change will vary from advertiser to advertiser, so we wanted to give you a heads-up and suggest that you keep an eye on your keyword performance over the next few weeks.

If you notice a decline in impressions or clicks on some of your keywords, you may wish to ensure that your most important terms are each specifically entered as keywords in their own right, rather than relying on broad or phrase match to include them. Or, if you notice an unwanted increase in impressions or clicks for some keywords, consider adding negative keywords to more finely tune your targeting.

We're always looking for new ideas on how we can improve the quality of the ads that our users see, so please feel free to send us your suggestions -- we'll make sure they find their way to Nick.

Posted by Blake, Inside AdWords crew

Small change to scheduled report delivery

This just in! Read on for a quick service announcement from the AdWords Report Center team:

In order to provide global support for AdWords advertisers, scheduled report delivery will be shifted by about three hours starting this week. Daily, weekly, and monthly reports will become available at approximately 9:00 am PDT on Mondays, and daily reports will be available at around 6:00 am PDT the rest of the week. Please keep in mind that actual times can vary. This shift is temporary and part of an ongoing process to improve support for our global advertisers.

Posted by Arielle, Inside AdWords crew

Teaching Kids to be Thoughtful Programmers

Today's kids are amazingly creative technophiles... If you have any doubts about that, just check out some of the videos posted at sites like YouTube.

My personal YouTube favorites are Chips (by Brookers) and Hey (by Tasha)... Both of these videos demonstrate a significant grasp of the art and technology of film-making.

Given that these young people grew up with MTV and a wealth of cable channels, it is not completely surprising that they've mastered the basics of film-making so well... Learning by example (especially when there are so many good examples to choose from) is a time-proven method for mastering a skill.

With access to low-cost (and fun) film-making tools like Apple's iMovie, kids can now easily emulate the movies and music videos that surround them. Raw talent is quickly refined by contrasting their own work with the pervasive examples of "Good Film-Making" that they see every day.

We've got a seemingly endless supply of great want-to-be-Spielbergs on tap... which is really fun... but sadly we don't seem to have a supply of great want-to-be-Programmers (let's face it, film-making is sexier).

Given the relatively small number of want-to-be-Programmers, it is increasingly important that those who do accept the challenge learn their craft exceedingly well... Quality is going to have to make up for a lack of Quantity.

To teach these new programmers, we have to take our cue from the film-makers. Today's new film-makers are successful because they have access to great (and inexpensive) tools, and they have access to great examples to learn from.

Today's want-to-be-Programmers do have a wealth of great tools at their disposal, many of which are free. What they lack are pervasive examples of "Good Programming" to learn from. We are surrounded by some really great programs, but they are almost invisible... even when we are aware of them, it's hard to "see" how they work.

Do you have any idea at all how Google finds answers for you?

I think that our task (those of us who would educate these new programmers) is to seek out "Good Programs", and to discuss them and analyze them in the same way that film critics discuss and dissect movies. This has very little to do with specific computer languages or specific technologies... it has more to do with craft, style, and techniques.

There is science to programming, but there is also art... and the combination of the two is what really leads to Thoughtful Programmers.

(cross-posted at my java.net blog)

Mother's Day: it's not too early...

Mother’s Day is more than two weeks away which leaves you plenty of time to send a gift without having to pay for pricey rush delivery. And, with the gift taken care of, you'll have time to think about the intersection of Mother's Day and your AdWords advertising.

As we’ve mentioned in the past, holidays provide an excellent opportunity to capture additional qualified traffic. Therefore, you might consider creating a new Ad Group or campaign to focus on Mother’s Day, or any other upcoming holiday. Once the holiday has passed, you can pause it and save it for next year.

In addition to Mother’s Day, here are some other significant holidays and events for the retail industry:

January – New Year’s Day
February – Valentine’s Day, Mardi Gras
March – Spring Break
April – Easter, Passover
May – Mother's Day, Memorial/Victoria Day
June – Father's Day, Graduation, Summer Weddings
July – Independence Day (US), Canada Day
September – Back to School, Grandparents Day
October – Halloween, Thanksgiving (CAD)
November – Thanksgiving (US)
December – Christmas, Hanukkah, Boxing Day (CAD)

If your site or business doesn’t fall into the retail industry, don’t fret! The AdWords site offers a total of 12 industry profiles, each including optimization tips to help you improve the performance of your campaigns.

Posted by Judy, Inside AdWords crew

Referrals are a wiz with new wizard

Since we received positive feedback about the new AdSense for content and AdSense for search code generation wizards, we've created a referrals code wizard to help guide you through the process of implementing referral buttons on your site. Simply choose Referrals from the AdSense Setup page of your account and select the product of your choice.

And don't forget, now you can display referral buttons in a text link format as well.

Posted by Laura Chen - AdSense Publisher Support

See the bigger picture

There's good news for those of you who are partial to Square (250 x 250) and Large Rectangle (336 x 280) ad formats: Now they support image ads! This means that if you've opted to display image ads, the pool of ads competing to show on your site is about to expand -- and with more ads available, your revenue potential will also grow. Check today to make sure you're opted into image ads.




Posted by Suzie Dewey - AdSense Publisher Support

Export Financing - What Is It? How Can It Help My Import Export Business?

Export financing provides exporters who have procured orders from overseas customers with the financial backing they need to give their foreign customers the most competitive and favorable credit terms available.

Borrowers have a wide variety of export financing programs from through the wide range of funding options that can provide them with the flexibility they often require to decrease transaction costs and increase profits.

For more details, visit: Export Financing

Maintenance Saturday April 22nd at 10 a.m. PST

We'll be performing routine AdSense maintenance on Saturday, April 22nd at 10:00 a.m. PST. During this time, you may not have access to your account. However, please be assured that your Google ads will continue to display and stats and earnings will be recorded as usual.

Thanks for your patience!

Posted by Suzie Dewey - AdSense Publisher Support

Search results with the flavor of your site

You can already customize the style of your AdSense for search results. Now, you can customize the substance of them, using the new site-flavored search option available in your AdSense account. The learning technology used in site-flavored search offers a subtle flavoring of your results to match the themes and topics of your site. For example, if you've got a site about music, over time our search results might learn that when your users search for [bass], they mean the instrument - not the fish.

Interested in getting site-flavored search for your search results? Just visit the AdSense Setup tab, choose AdSense for search as the product, and generate your search code as normal, making sure to select the Flavor search results to my site checkbox in the process.

Since site-flavored search technology takes time to learn your site, you likely won't notice any changes right away -- but over time, you should see gradual improvements.

Posted by Julie Beckmann - AdSense Publisher Support

Save some trees this Earth Day

Ever since the first Earth Day in 1970, people around the world have celebrated our planet each April 22nd. Earth Day is equally about appreciating the beauty of nature and volunteering to help the environment. So while you remember to turn off the water when brushing your teeth and hopefully go out to plant a tree, keep in mind the small things you can do within your AdWords account to save a few trees as well.

Many advertisers print invoices or receipts for their AdWords account. Instead of printing these documents, just log in and view them. We'll keep your account history available online, so unless you need them for tax purposes, try to review this information online instead of on paper.

The same goes for reports. While AdWords offers the ability to print report graphs, you can always view the reports you create from the Report Center tab of your account, download them in different formats, or have them emailed to you.

And if you really have to have paper copies, print on both sides of the page. You'll use half the paper and half the trees. Have a happy Earth Day tomorrow!

Posted by Arielle, Inside AdWords crew

Announcing text links for referrals

In reading the feedback from publishers on the forums and in our support queues, the number one product request was the ability to use referrals in formats other than the current buttons. In particular, publishers asked us for the ability to refer via text links. So I'm pleased to announce that we now offer text links as a format option for AdWords, AdSense and Firefox referrals. You'll notice the new text link formats show up for US English; we'll be adding other languages shortly.

Please keep the suggestions coming.

Posted by Rob Kniaz - AdSense Product Manager

System maintenance Saturday afternoon

In case you were planning to log into your account this weekend, please note that on Saturday, April 22nd, the AdWords system will be temporarily unavailable from approximately 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. PDT due to system maintenance.

While you won't be able to log in or make any changes to your account during this time, your ads will continue to run as normal. We apologize for any inconvenience this may cause.

Posted by Arielle, Inside AdWords crew

What does 'Active' really mean?

We've noticed a fair amount of confusion regarding what the word 'Active' really means, as nicely illustrated by the following (slightly edited) post from the AdWords Help group:

My "Starter Campaign", my "Starter Ad Group" and my keywords are all listed as having a status of "Active" -- are you saying that even though they're all *listed* as "Active", they're not *really* running after all...?

To get to the heart of the question, let's first take a look at what 'Active' doesn't mean: in all cases a status of 'Active' is not meant to indicate (nor is it a guarantee) that one's ads are running.

Rather, in the case of campaigns and/or Ad Groups, a status of 'Active' simply means that the campaign (or Ad Group) is not paused or deleted. And, in the case of keywords, 'Active' means that the keyword has a minimum bid at or above the minimum required for that keyword to be eligible to show an ad.

This means that it's possible for a campaign or Ad Group to show a status of 'Active,' but for the ads within that campaign or Ad Group not to be running. Likewise, it's possible for a keyword to have an 'Active' status (meaning that it is eligible to show) but for no ad to appear. This might occur, for example, if a campaign daily budget is set lower than the recommended amount or if the ads are disapproved.

Reading other meanings into the status of 'Active' can lead to confusion, so we hope that we've been able to bring a little clarity to what 'Active' really means.

Posted by Blake, Inside AdWords crew

Narrow your account-wide searches

Ann-Lee, on the account management tools team, is back with another useful tip:

Starting this week, you'll see a new option to 'pick from list' when you access any of our suite of account management tools, such as the Find and Edit Ad Text tool. Let's say you want to update the ad text of certain ads for an upcoming promotional campaign. Using the 'pick from list' option, you can easily specify in which Ad Groups the tool should search. For broader searches, you can still use the existing filters to find keywords or ad text across your entire account.

If you'd like more information on our account management tools, please review our latest additions -- advanced search and the move or copy tool -- or get a refresher on the wide variety of tools available to enhance your success.

Posted by Sarah, Inside AdWords crew

The Newest OneBox

We launched a new version of the Google Search Appliance today with a feature called Google OneBox for Enterprise. Ever search on Google for a stock ticker or the weather and get the information right in the search results? Well, Google OneBox for Enterprise works the same way - giving you access to information from business applications such as your contact database, calendar, CRM or BI system. Check out Dave Girouard'’s blog post for more on how this works.

We're thrilled with the impressive list of partners (Cognos, Oracle, Cisco, Salesforce.com, SAS and many others) who have already created OneBox modules. Take a peek at this video to hear some of our partners talk about why they think a Google search box is a great way to reach their applications.

And last but certainly not least, the Google Mini grew up a bit today -- well, in a sense. The new Google Mini is half the size and weight of its predecessor but is chock full of features like unlimited collections, a continuous crawler and up to 25 queries per second query capacity.

TRAFFIC TIPS: Bring Traffic To Your Site Automatic Absolutely Free

By Luis Galarza

For most people, getting high-quality targeted visitors to their site is probably one of the "hardest" things to do ... unfortunately it's also the most important.

The reason it's difficult for most small businesses and online marketers is that the majority of popular site promotion strategies either take up A LOT of time, cost a lot of money, or are too risky. Right?

Well, I'm writing this for you today because I want to let you know about a new, fully-automated traffic-generation system that can send 1000's of targeted prospects to your site, every single day, absolutely FREE!

http://www.trafficswarm.com/go.cgi?469733

Would you believe that this new system is:
-> 100% Free! - Always has been, and always will be
-> Automated - 5 minutes to set it up, then forget it
-> Targeted - you'll get only real, targeted traffic
-> "Viral" - your traffic will increase exponentially

I thought it was too good to be true at first ... but after testing it out, the results have been extremely profitable. And the feedback so far has been great:

"Holy *#@% ... this is really amazing! I never thought something free could bring so much traffic. Truthfully, it seems to be working better than most of my paid ads."

Anyway, do us both a favor and check it out ASAP. It's still pretty new and you will benefit even more if you create your FREE account now before most people join.

http://www.trafficswarm.com/go.cgi?469733

Give it a try and let me know what you think ...

Sincerely,

Luis Galarza, a Business and Telecommunication Consultant & CEO of Cogni360 and Associates or http://www.Cogni360.com/ . For more Free or Low Cost marketing tips just stop by http://luisgalarza.blogspot.com/
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Making Sense of International Trade Treaties

As international trade grows more complex by the day, the rules for international business also grow in number and complexity. How can countries with limited resources adopt and spot all the major trade treaties? And how can they get their interests addressed when new trade rules are drafted?

Learn how this relates to your import export business, read the full story at: http://www.tradeforum.org/news/fullstory.php/aid/940/

Earnings: Your questions answered

Is there is a minimum number of impressions or clicks I need to get before I can start earning through AdSense?

No, there's no minimum number of impressions or clicks for generating earnings. You can start earning the very first time a user clicks on a cost-per-click (CPC) ad or views a cost-per-thousand-impressions (CPM) ad. Keep in mind, however, that you'll need to earn $100 before your earnings will be paid out to you.

If a CPM ad appears on my site, do I need to receive 1,000 impressions before I am paid?

No, with CPM ads you're paid for each impression, so if you receive 1 ad impression, you'll receive 1/1,000 of the CPM bid for that ad unit.

I received 57 page impressions. Why don't I have any earnings?

It sounds like the ads currently appearing on your site are probably CPC ads, so you'll be paid for clicks, rather than impressions. Our system will automatically display whichever ad or ads representing the highest revenue potential for you, whether they're CPC or CPM ads.

How much do you pay per click or impression?

We don't pay a fixed price for each click or impression - we pay you a portion of the amount paid by the AdWords advertiser. This amount varies based on the actual CPC or CPM paid by the advertiser. Each ad that appears on your site will most likely generate a different CPC or CPM.

Do I get paid when visitors use my search box?

With AdSense for search, you'll be paid when users click on the ads that appear on their search results pages, not from the search queries themselves. You won't be paid if a visitor uses your search box, but chooses not to click on the ads on the search results pages.

Do I get paid when visitors click on my link unit topics?

When a user clicks on a link unit topic, you'll be paid for clicks on the CPC ads that appear on the resulting page of highly targeted ads. However, you won't be paid for clicks on the initial topics themselves. Link units can siginficantly boost your overall AdSense revenue by providing even more relevant and monetized content to your users.

Posted by Theresa Chow - AdSense Publisher Support

AdWords 101: What’s in my account? (Part 1 of 3)

Your AdWords account is organized in a series of tabs that allow you to manage your campaigns, create reports, control your Analytics tracking, and manage your billing information and preferences. In the first of three lessons covering the various components of your account, we’ll go over what's contained within the first tabbed page known as "Campaign Management." The Campaign Management tab houses much of what you'll need to set up and run your AdWords campaigns, so it's important for you to understand all the different features and tools available to you on this page.

When you log in to your AdWords account, you are automatically taken to the main Campaign Summary page of the Campaign Management tab. You can think of this page as the main dashboard for your account—all of your campaigns are listed with summarized statistics (such as campaign status, impressions, and CTR, to name a few) for your quick perusal. In addition, you can also perform the following functions from the Campaign Summary page:

• Access your campaigns - click on any campaign name to be taken into the Campaign Details page.
  
  
• Search your campaigns – use the handy search box on the upper right corner to locate campaigns, Ad Groups, ads or keywords in your account.
  
  
• View alerts – messages will appear on your Campaign Summary page above the table when we have important notifications about things that may affect your account.
  
  
• Create a new campaign – use the links above the table on the left hand side to create a new keyword- or site-targeted campaign.
  
  
• Change campaign status(es) – need to pause, resume or delete one of your campaigns? Want to change your campaign settings? You can do this easily by clicking the check boxes beside the relevant campaign(s) and then select the appropriate action buttons in the first row of the table.
  
  
• Change the date range - select the time frame for which you'd like to see your statistics reported in the table, be it a pre-defined period such as "last 7 days" or "yesterday", or a custom date range which you specify.
  

Also within the Campaign Management tab are links to Tools and Conversion Tracking. You’ll find these links in the green tab directly under the words "Campaign Management." The tools you’ll find will help you better optimize your ads and analyze your performance. There are even tools to help you more easily modify your campaigns. Some of the tools that we’ve featured on the Inside AdWords blog in the past include the Keyword Tool, Copy or Move Keywords or Ad Text, and the Ads Diagnostic Tool. (We've listed the links to those posts below.)

Conversion tracking is another useful tool for those of you who want to better track the performance of your campaign. You can read more about conversion track in one of our previous posts listed below.

Homework: use the following resources to help you navigate and make the most of out of the tools and features found in the Campaign Management tab.

Learning Center
Navigating the Tabs
Campaign Management

Help Center – FAQ
Account Navigation Demo
Tools
Deciding whether to use Conversion Tracking

Previous Inside AdWords posts
Keyword Tool
Find / Edit Tools
Conversion Tracking

Next time, we'll discuss the next two tabs: Reports and Analytics. Until then, take some time to explore all the links and pages with Campaign Management—you'll be glad that you did!

Posted by Vivian, Inside AdWords crew

International Trade Treaties - Where Does Your Country Stand?

International Trade Commission has ranked 192 countries according to how many of the 205 major international trade treaties they have ratified. The treaties cover contracts, customs, dispute resolution, environment and products, finance, illicit trade, intellectual property, investment, transport, treaty law and WTO agreements.

For the complete story, visit the following web page:
http://www.tradeforum.org/news/fullstory.php/aid/939/

AdWords support -- making it simple and effective

Not long ago, over on the AdWords Help user-to-user forum, a member asked:

Could someone from Google publicly answer the question: what should we expect from Google customer service?...

Good question. And, since the answer written by our colleagues on AdWords Help proved helpful in that forum, we thought we'd post a (slightly edited) version here as well. With that, here is a brief overview of our email support, along with several tips for getting a timely and effective response from the AdWords support team.

• Let's start with response time. Our target for email turnaround-time is a maximum of one business day (Monday through Friday). We always aim to answer as quickly as possible, of course, and frequently beat the 24 hour time by a substantial margin. As some advertisers have noted, it may also occasionally take longer than 24 hours -- especially during peak periods, such as after the launch of new features/tools, during extremely active retail seasons, and so forth.
  
  
• The most common reason for an advertiser to not receive a response to their query is that their email program has been set to filter certain types of mail. In other words, a response is sent, but it ends up in the recipient's 'junk mail' folder. So, be sure to double check your email filters.
  
  
• The best way to contact support is by using the 'Contact Us' link from within the account about which you have questions. This link can be found on the top right of each page in your account.
  
  
• If you are not able to use the 'Contact Us' link in your account, then please use the 'Contact Us' link at the bottom of the AdWords Help Center home page.
  
  
• If you are contacting us from the Help Center, then please be sure to identify your account by customer ID and/or email address. A surprisingly large number of emails come in each day with no way to identify the account associated with the question. As you might imagine, this makes a meaningful response more difficult.
  
  
• Please note that sending your email by a means other than the above mentioned methods will slow down your response -- or possibly prevent it altogether, as the support teams can't answer an email that is never received.
  
  
• At present, customer service folks work Monday through Friday. So, for example, writing to support late on a Friday afternoon is likely to mean that your reply will not be received until at least Monday afternoon.
  
  
• Be aware of peak periods and slack periods. Highest volume of email occurs on Monday. Volume is lower, and turnaround-time is potentially quicker mid-week. So if your question is routine rather than urgent, take advantage of this and consider writing mid-week.
  
  
• Be as succinct and as specific as possible with your questions. If the support team has to make a guess as to what the question is, then the answer is likely to be longer in coming and less useful as well. And, in many ways, it is best to ask a single question (or very few) per email. Asking 5 or 8 questions in one email may slow your response down a bit.
  
  
• It is important to provide whatever background information will be required to answer your questions fully and quickly. For example, please include pertinent dates, campaign and Ad Group names, the keywords in question, etc.
  
  
• Finally, every email is answered by a real person. So, if you ever get a reply that doesn't meet your satisfaction, please reply directly to that email. This will send your response to the person who originally answered your email, who is already familiar with your account. This prevents duplication of research and speed things up. Also, be sure to explain what was lacking in the original answer.
  

That's about it! We hope these tips will prove useful -- and, as always, we welcome your feedback.

Posted by Blake, Inside AdWords crew

Spotlight on... GPSworld.com

Troy Peterson, Web Operations Manager of GPSworld.com, saw a 100% increase in AdSense ad revenue when he optimized with placement and format changes. Specifically, he added link units, increased the number of ad units per page, and matched ad unit colors to his site. Troy says of the program, "AdSense has become our standard means of generating immediate revenue ... and once other advertising takes off, AdSense continues to deliver a steady stream of income."

Read our newest case study.



Posted by Susan Taing - AdSense Product Marketing

An AdSense primer for AdWords advertisers

As you learned in AdWords 101, you have the option to target your ads to both search and content sites within the Google Network, and these sites are all part of our AdSense program. Most of you use AdWords to reach your audience across the web, but how many also provide visitors to your site with advertising that is relevant to the content of your pages?

Just like AdWords, AdSense is all about relevance. This program allows publishers of all sizes to earn money by displaying targeted Google ads on their website's content pages and earn money. You decide how to best complement the content on your page. If you're looking to provide your visitors with the power of Google search and relevant advertising, check out AdSense for search. Or, perhaps you've had trouble advertising on your site because your content often changes. With AdSense for content, ads are targeted to your pages in real-time to provide your visitors with content that applies to them.

We'd also like to mention that AdSense recently introduced a feature that many AdWords advertisers have been asking about: AdWords referrals. If you've increased your sales or awareness about your business through AdWords, you may have told a friend or neighbor that AdWords can help their business, and now you can let visitors to your site know as well. For each advertiser that you refer through the referral button who spends $100 with AdWords, you'll earn $20.

How can you participate? If you're interested in any of the above features, you can apply to the AdSense program. Make sure that you check out the program policies first.

As always, let us know if you have any questions about AdSense, or AdWords referrals, and we'll answer them right here.

Posted by Sarah, Inside AdWords crew

Meeting Small Firms' International Trade Finance Needs

Lending institutions in Asia and the Pacific are exploring how to meet small exporters financing needs in a new initiative spanning 27 countries. For the complete story visit the following web page:
http://www.tradeforum.org/news/fullstory.php/aid/935/

Wrapping Openly About the Google Search Appliance

It's always refreshing when a business creates something new and useful and then releases it to the open source community. So I'd like to take this opportunity to thank Inxight Software, one of our Google Enterprise Professional partners, for doing just that. The team at Inxight has created a Java wrapper for the Google Search Appliance's XML API and posted it as a project on SourceForge. Check out details (and download a copy).

AdWords Editor beta update

Following up on our past post, last Wednesday, we released version 0.9.3 of AdWords Editor. Recently, there's been some confusion about whether this means the application is now widely available.

According to Andrew of the AdWords Editor team:

AdWords Editor is still in beta and by invite only, but with the release of the latest version, we also invited 5,000 more advertisers to participate. We'll be inviting more users in the coming months, so stay tuned! We've received a lot of positive feedback from our beta participants so far. Please keep it coming -- your feedback is taken seriously.

Posted by Arielle, Inside AdWords crew

Woot's up (in revenue, that is)

Woot.com has built an online community around its unique ecommerce business model. Every day the site sells only one product and discussions revolve around that product in its blog and forums. For Woot, Google AdSense not only monetizes well but also complements the Woot community by providing useful information through relevant ads. When the product-of-the-day is still in stock, Woot users can compare to it to other similar products when making their purchase decisions. And after the product has sold out, they can find other places to buy it.



Through AdSense optimization, Woot has made significant increases to its revenue: optimized ad units saw increases from 5x and even up to 10x. The Woot team has opted into Onsite Advertiser Sign-up and now advertisers are creating site-targeted ads tailored specifically to their site with headlines like, "Like Woot? You'll love [us]. Save money at 1000s of stores."

Read their case study for more information.

UPDATED for accuracy

Posted by Susan Taing - AdSense Product Marketing

Are you search-centric?

(guarda sotto per la versione italiana)

IW Bank just launched a redesign of their website centered around their Google-powered site search. As one of the leading online brokerage firms in Italy, IW Bank recognizes that search is the easiest way for their visitors to find information.

In preparation for the launch of their new site, last week, they counted down the time to redesign. For those of you who aren’t fluent in Italian, ‘Investiamo nella ricerca’ means ‘We invest in search’ and ‘5 giorni 11.18.39’ is a countdown to their search launch – 5 days, 11 hours, 18 minutes and 39 seconds!

We really like their new layout and think it employs some design principles from another popular website.

...ed ora in italiano:

IWBank ha appena lanciato la nuova versione del sito web istituzionale interamente incentrata sulle funzionalita' di ricerca offerte dalla Google Search Appliance. Tra i leader italiani del trading online, IWBank dimostra come il motore di ricerca Google sia la modalita' piu' veloce e facile per permettere ai propri utenti di trovare le informazioni desiderate.

La scorsa settimana, preparandosi al lancio del nuovo sito, hanno fatto il conto alla rovescia in attesa del nuovo motore Google utilizzando il simpatico teaser "Investiamo nella ricerca".

Ci e' piaciuto davvero il loro nuovo layout e riteniamo che utilizzi egregiamente alcuni principi di design tipici di un altro famoso sito web ;-)

Meet Ivan the optimiser -- but please, no paparazzi

We caught up with Ivan Heneghan, a Dublin-based AdSense optimisation specialist, to learn how 'optimisation' differs from 'optimization'.



Why did you agree to let us profile you?

A brilliant story! After you featured Mike Gutner, a UK-based publisher who I've worked with posted to his own blog asking why I hadn't been featured, whether I even existed, and if I did, guessed that I was "a tall Russian man" with a check shirt and a moustache. Unfortunately, I'm sorry to say I'm quite nerdy-looking, and although I do have a moustache, I abhor check shirts.

Tell us an optimisation story... have you ever seen a publisher make a small change and see big results?

Oh yes, lots of them! But one of my favourites was a science website that was earning about $10 per day. They were using a 468x60 Banner at the bottom of their pages, but started experimenting with two 300 x 250 Medium Rectangles -- one placed just at the top of their content, and another placed directly under the main content on each page. They also tried using more blended colours. Things went crazy from there and earnings shot up to $700 per day. Finally, they moved one of the 300x250 Rectangles from the top of their page to a location more embedded in their content. After that, earnings went to over $1,700 per day!

What are the top 3 tips you like to tell publishers?

1. Use wide ad formats. Many publishers find the 728x90 Leaderboard outperforms the 468x60 banner by about 70%. I particularly recommend using the 728x90 Leaderboard, 160x600 Wide Skyscraper, and 300x250 Medium Rectangle.

2. Embed Google ads in your content, and place Google ads at the end of your articles, news stories and reviews. Placing a 468x60 Banner in the typical slot at the top of page, or a 120x600 Skyscraper along the right-hand side of page, work well for cost-per-thousand impressions (CPM) ads. However, for cost-per-click (CPC) contextual advertising, AdSense tends to work best when integrated with your content.

3. Blend your ad colours into your website. After running a test with a bright pink 728x90 Leaderboard on a black background, I learned that complementary colours often work better. Try blending the background and borders of your ads into your site, and use a text colour that stands out but already exists on your site. Blending decreases ad blindness and users are more likely to notice ads that interest them.

What websites are you reading these days?

I'm an avid soccer fan, so www.football365.com is my main haunt and I've recently discovered www.joga3.com. I revert to my nerd side on a regular basis by using www.gamespot.com to keep up with the latest computer game news. Google video also keeps me entertained.

Any other advice?

AdSense-related: Use link units. They are fantastic and give your users even more options.

Non-AdSense-related: When visiting European countries, always check which side of the road they drive on before crossing the main roads.

Posted by Suzie Dewey - AdSense Publisher Support

The Portrait and the Pixel

Have you ever seen the painting "Lincoln in Dalivision"?
From a distance, you see a portrait of Abraham Lincoln, but up close the painting is a strange collage that prominently features a nude woman.

I have a clear memory of the first time that I saw a print of Salvador Dali's painting of Lincoln...
I was at the home of a faculty adviser at Rice University, and being a rather sheltered boy from West Texas, I was stunned that my professor had a painting of a naked lady above his fireplace...
Imagine my surprise when I viewed the painting from a distance... What had been "shocking" was now almost patriotic.

This lesson of perspective is an important one for programmers to learn.
When we get immersed in details, we can lose site of the big picture, and the big picture might be significantly different from what we think we are working on.

International AdWords update: more promotional credits for Google Advertising Professionals

Once in a while, we like to tell you about what's happening with AdWords in other parts of the world. Today, we have an international update about the Google Advertising Professionals program. As you may remember, this program provides training and qualification for both individuals and companies who manage AdWords accounts for their clients.

One of the benefits of becoming a Google Advertising Professional is that you receive a number of promotional credits for your customers to try out AdWords for free. Starting this week, we’ve expanded the availability of promotional credits to 6 new countries: Australia, Canada, Israel, Poland, South Korea, and Turkey. Program participants from these 6 countries will now see promotional credits available in their Pro Center tab in My Client Center. If you want to find out more about the Google Advertising Professionals program, check out this site.

Posted by Vivian, Inside AdWords crew

FORTH and thoughtful programming...

While searching Google for occurrences of "thoughtful" and "programmer", I came across a nice essay by Michael Misamore entitled: "Introduction to Thoughtful Programming and the Forth Philosophy"

I don't fully agree with all of the points that Michael makes in his essay, but I am glad to find that the doctrine of "minimizing overall complexity" still has passionate and thoughtful proponents...

I love FORTH...

In the mid 1980's I worked for a company that manufactured high speed offset printing presses (such as those used to print magazines like National Geographic). Those presses were huge assemblages of rapidly rotating drums that could print thousands of full color pages in seconds. For those not familiar with offest color printing, only 4 colors are used to create the full palette, and each color is applied separately. The alignment of the paper is crucial, or the illusion of full color will fail... Unaligned or unbalanced drums could lead to ruined print jobs, or even catastrophic destruction of the press itself.

The company was very progressive, and developed a remote system to monitor the rotational vibrations of the presses and diagnose problems long before they became evident. This "remote tortional vibration system" was built using the FORTH programming language, and yours truly had the pleasure of writing a Fast Fourier Transform (FFT) algorithm in FORTH. I had a great time developing the code, and the resultant algorithm screamed.

One of my fond but sad memories from that time was the week of training that I received from Elizabeth Rather in Melbourne Florida.

A fond memory because Elizabeth was a great teacher, but a sad memory because our training class took place the week after the Space Shuttle Challenger exploded (you could see the recovery ships combing for wreckage from our hotel).

But back to the FORTH training... Elizabeth (following Charles Moore's lead) was adament that the only code that should be in a production system is code that absolutely, positively has to be there.

To emphasize her point, our final project was scored on how small the code footprint was. We actually removed unused code from the FORTH interpreter itself to get the size as small as possible... A very extreme, but strangely satisfying exercise.

These days, the hard part of my job has much more to do with refining requirements than with implementing solutions, but it's good to take a look back and remember just how clean code can be if you make the effort.

Why no pop-ups?

Over the years we've received more than a few emails asking the questions posed in the (paraphrased) advertiser email below:

I just got an email saying that my ad was disapproved because my landing page had a pop up when the ad was clicked on. Pop ups are very common, and I'm not sure why it is a problem. What's the big deal? Can you make an exception in my case? My pop up doesn't try to sell anything, I'm just giving my customers a chance to tell me what they want. That should be OK, right? - A pop-up fan

According to the AdWords Editorial Guidelines, "We do not allow links to landing pages that generate pop-ups when users enter or leave your landing page. We consider a pop-up to be any window, regardless of content, that opens in addition to the original window."

In other words, the guidelines refer not only to pop-ups, but also to pop-unders or any other new window which opens from your landing page. And, the policy applies regardless of the intent of the content. Even though the author of the above email has a pop-up intended to gather information rather than promote something, we do not make exceptions to these guidelines.

So, "what's the big deal?" Why does AdWords care so much about pop-ups? Well, we can sum up the answer to that in three words: bad user experience. Studies (such as the ones cited in The Most Hated Advertising Techniques by Jakob Nielsen) show that users truly dislike pop-ups, pop-unders and their ilk -- and (this is key to you as an advertiser) also tend to dislike sites that employ them. We want to ensure that our users have a very positive experience when they click on a relevant ad, and we suspect that you do too.

We hope that this brings clarity to a hot topic. To sum up, creating an advertising program that searchers trust (and therefore use over and over again) is to everyone's advantage -- and we think that not allowing pop-ups after clicking on an AdWords ads will keep users coming back and provide them with the relevant (and positive) advertising experience that they desire.

Posted by Blake, Inside AdWords crew

Product Architecture from a software perspective

I recently worked with an Enterprise Architecture team to develop a "holistic product architecture" to unify the design of the company's products.

When we began the effort, we quite frankly were not sure what "product architecture" meant, so with the help of Google I did some research and found the following:

An architecture has a two-part definition:

• The first part of an architecture is a decomposition of the overall functionality of a product into a set of defined functions and the component parts of the product that are going to provide those functions.

• The second part of the definition is the specification of the interface between the components, in other words, how components are going to interact together in the product as a system.

The specification of the interface is critical to the design of flexible architectures that allow you to substitute component variations within a product without having to make adjustments in other components."

- Ron Sanchez : Professor of Strategy and Technology Management at IMD

Ron also points out that product architecture is about more than creating a single product, it is about creating a product platform on which an entire product family can be based.

I like this definition for product architecture, but we need to clarify what we mean by "decomposition of the overall functionality".

A product's architecture straddles the boundaries between business and technical concerns, but it belongs to the business owner (typically a Product Manager). The functional components that the business is concerned with are components that can be assembled to provide new business functionality (new products).

With this business focus in mind, consider the popular Model-View-Controller (MVC) software architecture: Is MVC the basis for a product architecture?

MVC is a modular architecture that separates an application's data model, user interface, and control logic into distinct components so that modifications to one component will have minimal impact on the others. MVC is a very successful architecture, and one which every software architect should master... but it is not a meaningful basis for a product architecture for one simple reason: The component breakdown in MVC is not focused on business functionality.

In contrast to MVC; the component breakdown in Service Oriented Architecture (SOA) is focused on business functionality. SOA is a modular architecture in which applications are composed from distinct business-relevant services (hence the term composite application).

Let me hasten to explain myself... SOA is not by itself a product architecture any more than MVC is, but SOA is a useful tool for considering how an architectural model for a product family should be described.

Most software products automate business processes. The architecture of the product provides the framework for implementing the business processes. If the mapping from the process steps to the architectural components that implement those steps is clean, then the business owners will probably understand (and appreciate) the architecture.

So back to the phrase: "decomposition of the overall functionality"...
We can expand this to: decomposition of the overall functionality into distinct, business-relevant functions...

If you start with the right set of business-relevant functions, the resultant products will likely be easier to maintain and to adapt in the future.

I know, business-relevant is not exactly a precise term either... but the only way to pin that one down is for you to talk with your business owner. Start talking ;-)

---

(Cross posted at my java.net blog)

AdWords 101: Targeting the right customers (Part 2 of 2)

We hope you enjoyed the first half of our lesson on targeting. Today, in the second half of the lesson, we'd like to tell you a little bit more about targeting the search and content networks and explain the difference between keyword- and site-targeted campaigns.

Search? Content? Or both?
When you sign up for an AdWords account, your ads will automatically show on Google.com, as well as across the Google Network, which consists of both search and content partners. Displaying your ads on the search network means that, in addition to showing your ad on Google.com, your ad may be shown on other Google properties such as Froogle, or on a partner's search site such as AOL when a user types your keyword into his or her search box.

Ads on the content network are displayed when the content of a page is relevant to the keywords that you have chosen in a given Ad Group, so you want to ensure that each Ad Group revolves around a single theme. For example, your ad from an Ad Group with keywords relating to coffee makers may show up on a product review site that discusses coffee and coffee brewing tools. These ads are considered contextually-relevant, that is, they fit with the general context of the page on which they appear. Ads opted into the content network may appear on Google properties such as Google Groups or Gmail, or on our many partner websites. And, the content network supports ads in additional formats such as image ads or animated image ads.

Where should you choose to run your ads? The choice is up to you. If your ads show across the entire Google Ad Network, you can reach more U.S. Internet users than with any other web property or ad network.* So, if you're looking to expand your customer base, the Google Network provides you with an easy way to reach out to users who are looking for your product. To view or edit your current network preferences, go to Edit Campaign Settings, and check the appropriate boxes under Networks.

Keyword- or site-targeted?
To give you even more control over your ads on the content network, AdWords allows you to choose whether you want to target your campaign using keywords, or by targeting specific sites. Keyword targeting is probably the type of campaign you are most familiar with—choose your list of keywords, and your ads appear either when searchers type one of those keywords on Google.com or the search network, or on contextually-relevant pages within the content network. With site targeting, you can not only choose specific sites where you want to show your ads, but also take advantage of additional targeting options such as site sections or demographic site selection. Again, site targeting is available only for sites in the content network. For more details on site targeting, check out one of our previous posts on this topic.

Homework: to review and learn more about the two targeting options discussed today, be sure to catch up on some of these valuable lessons and resources.

Learning Center
Ad Distribution
Site Targeting

Help Center – FAQ
Google Network Overview
About the Content Network
Site Targeting Overview

Previous Inside AdWords posts
Search / Content networks
- Showing ads on Google properties
- Tracking search and content clicks separately
- A fireside chat on content targeting
- Introducing content bids
- 6 tips to optimize for the content network
- Advertising outside of the (text) box

Site Targeting
- Introduction
- CPM pricing
- Site Sections
- Demographic site selection

Well, there you have it: all the ways that AdWords allows you to home in and target customers wherever and however you want, be it by location, language, distribution channel or criteria. Until next time, we wish you much success in trying out all these targeting options.

*Source: Custom analysis conducted for Google by comScore Networks, November 2005

Posted by Vivian, Inside AdWords crew

Presenting... AdWords referrals

We're excited to announce that now, in addition to AdSense and Firefox, you can refer users to AdWords in countries and languages where AdSense for content is available. You'll earn $20 once the advertiser you've referred spends at least $100 with AdWords. To get started, choose 'Referrals' on your AdSense Setup tab and look for the AdWords sub-tab.

For more details on referrals, visit the AdSense Help Center.

UPDATED for accuracy

Posted by Mohammed Abdoolcarim - AdSense Product Marketing

It's baaaack: Single page code generation

After launching the new code wizard we received feedback that some of you preferred the previous one-page method for code creation. If you're one of these folks, you can now use the new single page option when generating your ad or search code. To use this option, just visit your AdSense Setup tab, choose either AdSense for content or AdSense for search as your product, and then click the Single page link toward the top.



Posted by Julie Beckmann - AdSense Publisher Support

Talkin' 'bout my (code) generation

A few weeks back, we announced our new AdSense for content code generation wizard. We're now happy to offer the same wizard for your AdSense for search code. The wizard guides you step-by-step through the process, making it easier to choose a search box, design your search results styles, and customize your search type. Try it out by visiting your AdSense Setup tab and choosing AdSense for search as the product.

Posted by Julie Beckmann - AdSense Publisher Support

Technology is easier to change...

It is much easier to change a company's technology than it is to change the way a company's employees do their work.

"Thoughtful Programmer" is not an Oxymoron

The words "arrogant" and "programmer" are often associated with each other. If you don't believe me, just ask Google.

Fortunately, Google also tells us that the words "thoughtful" and "programmer" can coexist.

I have been a programmer for many years, and I've been as guilty of arrogance as anyone else, but I have come to understand that the best (and happiest) programmers are thoughtful... both towards others and towards their craft.

Thoughtful programmers write better programs.