Forum Moderators: martinibuster
How many webmasters would *not* switch in an instant?
This lingering question grows even more valid as google prepares for IPO with a monoculture revenue model.
How many webmasters would *not* switch in an instant?
Me for one and that's not just because I'd rather contribute to the bottom line of companies other than MS. Like all of my business decisions, I'd base a decision to join a Microsoft offering on a number of criteria. Even if it was the best thing since sliced bread I doubt I'd abandon AdSense, affiliate promotion, direct advertising and other ways to monetize my content.
100% True...
This is the only reason contextual advertising will be sucessfull only by google or yahoo/overture , nobody can beat them how technologially superior their product is ...
If Msft offered a similar product with the same payouts but under the microsoft name, i would switch overnight. Google has shown its poor ability to deal with clients like us and provide no sense of security for quality adsense publishers. Microsoft has soldified its name all over the world. I trust Microsoft for support and quality produts. Google has not earned this trust yet, and does not appear to be trying very hard to gain any.
i would have to disagree.
if MSN offered and OV/adwords type service on their portal directly, they could get 100,00 advertisers to sign up within 6 months b/c of the non-existing bid competition.
After 6 months, they would have enough advertisers in their PPC network AND market value bids to launch their own competing adsense product.
MS could offer all kinds of incentives and freebies to lure advertisers over and it would take just a short while for them to surpass Google in the number of ads being served. Billions in the bank could outmaneuver hundreds of thousands on the client list, I'm sure.
Never underestimate the power of a fat wallet coupled with the determination of a man whose net worth is probably more than the GDP of most of the nations on the face of the earth.
right on. You hit it on the head. Msft can do whatever it wants.
I have not a single doubt that when msft enters into this market, it will be at the top in a matter of a couple years. No way can a poorly organized (and very very poorly managed) company like Google take on the leader of technology, msft.
Microsoft has the programmers, the assets, the market share, and then worldwide brand name recogntion that would make it very easy to drive serious traffic to a new search tool very quickly. Sure google is well known, and widely used, but Microsoft certainly has more means to make a better product.
Google is scared, very scared of the threat. A rushed IPO at obscene initial prices that no one in my field would go near is proof. They need to raise a ton of capital very very fast to get working 24 hours a day to try to keep up with what Microsoft is doing.
I do think google is trying to fight a battle they will lose no matter what, and it is coming at a huge cost not only to current private investors, but soon to millions of people around the world.
Google will not win any large scale battle for marketshare with a giant like Microsoft, it is just not possible.
I have to disagree on MS producing quality products.
They do have the money and a strong marketing network in each country but I would stay with Adsense.
Birdstuff & ChrisKud5 make great points about a wallet size that could drive an almost immediate succes into the hands of a new player, but that newly found competition could put Google into overdrive on how to make their programs better.
I'll reserve judgement on who is better once that day comes & we can evaluate them side-by-side.
I eagerly await that day where a viable competitor exists... not becuase I want to jump ship, but for what that competition would most likely mean for us as publishers.
This is the only reason contextual advertising will be sucessfull only by google or yahoo/overture , nobody can beat them how technologially superior their product is ...
gopi, not to be contrarian...what makes any current contextual advertiser "technologically superior"? I could setup a contextual advertising program in a few weeks. It seems all I'd need is a system to spider the publisher sites, a system to serve ads, and a system to buy ads. Where's the technical superiority (except, perhaps, in being able to scale it to so many users)?
I think with a competitor to adsense, the things will change a lot.
But i don't know why microsoft is slow on such things.
And as birdstuff said that microsoft has lot of cash to woo new advertisers, i think the cash of microsoft will help it get ahead of google very soon.
You are right, anyone can start such a system with small requirements like spider and account management scripts.
I think an example is ****,
I would join your network, if you start one day and pay us higher cpc.
So I think every program will differ, and the advertising market will become diversified for diffrent segments of publishers in the up comming ad war.
Contextual advertising without a search engine is going to be financially difficult, and I doubt Msft is going to beat Google. In order to win a search engine war, they would have to be much better than Google, unless they come up with a better way of using meta-information (and I don't mean meta tags).
Without a search engine, there are hardly enough hits to justify our signing up as advertisers- and without enough advertisers, there's no sense signing up as publishers.
Even if Msft managed to build a better search engine, they would need to build better infrastructure for their contextual ad program. Seeing as how MSN Messenger and Hotmail don't exactly stellar records for availability, I have doubts as to whether they can really build cost-effective, scalable, highly-available systems. (I realize if more money was involved they would devote more resources to the problem.)
Finally, the one big advantage Msft has for the web is their browser dominance, and it is slowly eroding. I think most of the searches I have done with MSN have been by mistake while using IE- and Google is the default on Firefox.
Msft does not have a history of innovation: the only way that money would help them is if they bought someone else's technology.
True, MS doesn't have a rich history of innovation, but they're the king when it comes to buying someone else's technology. They have bought up more companies over the years than virtually anyone, often paying millions and then simply shutting the virtual door simply to get rid of the competition.
IMO Microsoft's success in ANY online venture is determined by one thing and one thing only: how strongly Bill wants to win. If he has a fire in his belly the cash is there to make it happen.
As far as other browsers are concerned, when I look at my visitor logs I see around 93% using IE, and I haven't seen any evidence that that percentage is dropping.
To most web surfers the terms "Internet Explorer" and "web browser" are one and the same. And why not, they buy a new computer, open the box, and there is IE. Most people never switch an many never even become aware that there are alternatives to switch to.
When Microsoft gets around to integrating MSN web search into a future generation of Windows, it's gonna be boom!, dominant SE market share within just a few months. Count on it.
Most people don't use what is best (which in the case of search engines is debatable anyway), they use what is covenient and what they are already familar with, not to mention what gets the largest marketing budget. IMO, the not so distant future of search engines and all things related looks brightest for Microsoft.
When Microsoft gets around to integrating MSN web search into a future generation of Windows, it's gonna be boom!, dominant SE market share within just a few months. Count on it.
I don't care whether that's MS or G or CJ or anyone else. Just get your cheque books out and show me the colour of your ink.
TJ
1 Go after high volume sites only ( less overhead costs per publisher )
2 Vet all sites seperately for inclusion
3 Make a statement as per the starting percentage of revenue i.e 5% higher than Google
4 Allow advertisers more flexibillity on where to show or not show adds
5 Provide more and stronger support for both publishers and advertisers
5 Allow advertisers the ability to bid differently for search / content ( not like current fudge advertisers need to use for adsense )
6 Provide greater flexibillity for advertisers to run campaigns by day / time etc. automattically
If you read the above most requirements are designed to please advertisers and exploit current weaknesses in adwords , by providing advertisers with a reason to jump ship the rest will fall into place
Combine that with MS money and advertising budget big G could very well have a battle on their hands they will have trouble defending
steve
I don't see search-in-the-OS happenning any time soon. Google will have computer-wide searching long before Windows does. When's Longhorn due- 2006? There are still some people using Windows 95! Will it be 2010 before people switch to Msft's latest OS?
Things will change dramatically before that. Msft still won't have a search engine that kicks Google's behind. Also, OpenOffice should be in 2.0 by early 2005, Firefox at 1.0 by later this year. In 4 years from now, the Linux desktop could very well be a reality.
