The Week in Review

Cross-PPC Platform Strategies Using Negative Keywords

Negative keywords have been an annoying area of incompatibility between PPC networks, but the realm is a bit tamer these days. Here’s a rundown of how the process works on Google AdWords and Microsoft adCenter. (Search Engine Land)

Is Link Relevance as Effective as Anchor Text?

You don’t need to obsess over anchor text with the keywords you want to rank for. Find relevant links on directories, blogs, social mentions, image links and link requests. “Surprisingly, the websites that are building links (or gaining them organically) with primarily brand name anchor text are ranking well for their main keywords while only using them as anchor text maybe 20 percent of the time.” (Search Engine Watch)

How to Successfully Create a PPC Ad

If you’re interested in diving into the world of pay-per-click (PPC) ads, this post is a good place to start. Read about how PPC ads work, what PPC can offer that other forms of marketing can’t and, of course, how to create a killer PPC ad. (Search Engine Journal)

Yahoo-Bing Insights

Efficient Frontier has observed some trends in the Yahoo-Bing transition. Thanks to the cutting out of lower-quality traffic, impression volume has dropped significantly, though click share has only declined by 2.5 percent. Spend share hasn’t been impacted in a tangible way. Revenue per click, which was 20 percent worse than Google at the start of the transition, has pulled to even with Google at the end of December. Cost per click has also caught up with Google’s CPC by the end of 2010. (Efficient Frontier Insights)

2 Simple Productivity Tools for Link Building

Send Tab URLs and Copy Fixer are two Firefox add-ons that will make your life as a link builder a lot easier. They’re both free and deserve at least a try. (Search Engine Land)

12 E-mail Marketing Mistakes to Avoid

Here’s the “Dirty Dozen” of e-mail marketing – 12 mistakes you should absolutely avoid this year. Among them are blatant lack of permission, lame “welcome” messages, institution-to-one messaging and repeating ad types. (HubSpot)

What the Verizon iPhone Means for the U.S. Mobile Market

Verizon is expected to announce tomorrow that it will be offering Apple’s iPhone on its network. What does this mean for the U.S. mobile market? Besides a heated battle between AT&T and Verizon, it spells tougher competition for Android, a boost for mobile ads (and iAds in particular), and another gold rush for iPhone apps. (Econsultancy)

6 Steps for Improving Your Facebook Page

If you’re a small business that’s looking to improve your Facebook page, here are six simple steps to take: add the Static FBML app, set up your tab, add your content, make it the default landing page, make your page more interactive with FBML and promote your page. (WebProNews)

Behavior Targeting is a Matter of Control

Despite the pushback against behaviorally targeted ads, spending on the medium is expected to surge in 2011. Marketers who want to tread safely should keep in mind that what consumers really dislike about these ads is the lack of control they have over how marketers are using their personal data. (eMarketer)

Twitter Gets Slapped by the UK

The UK’s Office of Fair Trading has launched a crackdown on deceptive Twitter endorsements after it found “serious problems” with the amount of nondisclosure taking place. While this bit of news might seem to be bad for Twitter’s prospects of monetizing its service, it might actually be the opposite. After all, sometimes “a little push from the government turns out to be just what businesses need.” (GigaOM)

What Does the Facebook/Goldman Deal Mean for Marketers?

Goldman Sachs invested $450 million in Facebook – so what? For marketers, this is a clarion wake-up call. If you’re not already doing things on Facebook, you’d better get started. (eMarketer)

Google Stepping Up Its Fight Against Web Spam?

There are indications that the biggest search engine in the world is ramping up its efforts in its fight against Web spam. We’ll have to see if Google’s efforts will actually confront the issue of sites that use Web spam and other forbidden techniques to boost their rankings. (Econsultancy)

Reputation Conversations Starts with Search Results

Online reputation management already has momentum. Your goal should be to come out “sparkling clean” in the first 30 search engine results. Nevertheless, you should have a crisis plan in place. Listed here are a few reputation management resources for starters. (Search Engine Land)

Bing’s Next Vertical: Sports Tickets?

Bing is offering its users a helpful tool for finding sports tickets in the U.S. It gleans information from more than 50 leading ticket-sales sites and shows you views of seats. (Bing Community)

8 Tech Companies to Watch in 2011

StumbleUpon, Amimon, Skype and Clicker are among the eight tech companies you should keep an eye on this year. (Mashable)

Mobile Commerce Thrived During the Christmas Season

UK retailers experienced doubled traffic from mobile phones during the Christmas period, with a peak observed on Boxing Day. The main takeaway is, of course, that retailers should have a mobile presence. Also, store locators in mobile sites and apps are crucial. (Econsultancy)

4 Predictions for Social Media Metrics in 2011

Social media measurement will rapidly mature this year thanks to the big loads of money being spent on the arena; government regulation will help improve social media tracking; offline marketing and social media will merge; and predictive value will emerge. (MediaPost)

Mobile Ads Outdo Online Ads

According to a study from InsightExpress, "From November 2007 to December 2010, mobile has posted better results than online across key measures including aided and unaided awareness, ad awareness, message association, brand favorability and purchase intent." (MediaPost)

Quality is What Matters for Exchanges

Transparency was the issue last year for exchange-based buying, but this year the No. 1 concern is quality — not regarding porn and other objectionable content, but "the endless list of properties that seemingly exist for no other reason than to serve ads." The quality movement has three steps: treat publishers like partners, better tools and a third-party ratings system. (ClickZ)

How Crawl Budgets Might Work

Crawl budget ("the number of pages a search engine will crawl each time it visits your site") is a big factor for SEO success. So how is it determined? Read on for this nerdy look at a possible answer to this question. The bottom line is that crawl budget is your currency, and how you spend it is up to you. (Search Engine Land)

5 Things to Test in Your PPC Campaign for 2011

You know what the new year means? Time for more testing. Improve your PPC campaigns at the start of 2011 by testing ads, landing pages, ad extensions, automatic bidding and experiments. (Search Engine Journal)

Amazon Introduces Android App Store

Amazon has finally unveiled its Amazon Appstore for Android, which offers Android users a trusted venue to find apps. This is a big opportunity for Amazon, though it does bring some confusion. Developers get their $99 fee waived for the first year. (GigaOM)

4 New Year’s Resolutions for Conversion Optimization

Make these four conversion-optimization resolutions for 2011: get fit (fast site), spend more time with loved ones (live usability tests), learn something new (test new site elements), and don’t make resolutions — make goals (set specific, measurable goals). (Search Engine Land)

25 Ways to Increase Sales and Lead Generation

Generating traffic only gets you halfway to increasing your site’s profitability. Among the 25 ways to turn traffic into conversions are being clearer about what you’re offering, using images instead of just text, emphasizing the benefits of the offer and limiting the number of images in your e-mails. (HubSpot)

5 Payment Trends for 2011

While 2010 was an interesting one for payments, 2011 seems set to be even more intriguing. Watch out for the continued rise of mobile payments, "T-commerce" and social shopping, among other trends. (VentureBeat)

Tracking Google Places Traffic in Google Analytics

If you want to better justify your client’s money being invested in Google Places, you’re going to want to read up on how to use Google Analytics to track traffic specifically from Google Places. Here are four methods. (SEOmoz)