Ecommerce & Web Marketing Research: March 11 - 20 2005

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March 18 2005

Virus wars - spam gangs getting organized?

Eugene Kaspersky, of Kaspersky AntiVirus has given us food for thought in his latest The Analyst's Diary entry. Eugene makes the point that as more and more viruses, especially spam trojans, start needing to share the bandwidth of an infected machine; their effectiveness is limited. Eugene predicts that as spam gangs become more organized, there will be cyber wars developing for control over the rapidly growing spam market. 

There have already been a number of viruses released that upon infecting your computer, actually remove other viruses so that they can use all the bandwidth available to pump out spam.

Snotty nosed script kiddies vs. well organized spam gangs - I shudder to think of the consequences.

To add to that prediction, I offer my own "what if" for consideration. Aside from the negative effects of spammers in relation to legitimate email marketing - as any organized crime industry grows, people start getting killed as the battle for turf becomes more competitive. Could we soon see reports of virus writers and co-ordinators of spam gangs being assassinated in these turf wars?

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Marketing - capturing the attention of women

In this increasingly hectic world, there's so many more distractions. According to an article on Emarketer, it appears that the group most affected are women - hardly surprising given the many hats they wear; especially in a family situation. The article quotes some interesting figures regarding women and media consumption:

• 59% "rarely" or "never" read a newspaper from beginning to end
• 56% "rarely" or "never" read a magazine from cover to cover
• Only 51% "frequently" watch a television program from start to finish
• Only 47% "frequently" listen to the radio for more than 30 minutes straight

The article also quotes an earlier AOL survey that showed that 80% of US mothers who have have Internet access use it as a time saving device. Unlike traditional media, I see the web as more of an "on demand" medium which suits busy people much better than other forms.

Learn more about marketing to women on the web.

Parents increasing use of filters.

According to the latest study from Pew Internet and American Life Project, over 50% of families in America have filtering in place to decrease the amount of potentially harmful content that their teenage children may be exposed to. This is an increase of 65% over 2000.

Other findings include:

• 81% of parents feel that teenagers aren’t cautious enough when providing personal information while online. Surprisingly,  79% of teenagers agree
• 65% parents state that teens do things online that parents wouldn't want to know about. Not surprisingly, 64% of teenagers agree :).

Read more of the Protecting Teens Online report. (pdf 463 kb)

Microsoft unveils AdCenter

Steve Balmer, the CEO of Microsoft, has provided further glimpses of MSN's planned paid search marketing offering at a conference for advertisers. AdCenter's main difference to Overture or Adsense, according to Steve, is that it's designed to allow advertisers access to MSN audience information that Microsoft has gathered, therefore permitting advertisers to better target.

Microsoft will test the technology first in France and Singapore, and has not committed to a global rollout date. Steve also had a number of other interesting things to say about Microsofts "vision" of the Internet in the coming years including IPTV (Internet television).

Read/View Steve Balmers' keynote address

Steve, if you're reading this, call me - I got an idea :).

Related articles:

Introduction to Pay Per Click advertising

Minimizing the cost of pay-per-click advertising

PPC - anti fraud strategies

March 15 2005

MSN search to roll out  ppc ad network soon

According to an article in the LA Times, Microsoft will announce details of their own search marketing product on Wednesday. It's reported that they'll trial it in a few international markets and then dissolve their relationship with Yahoo (Overture) after their contract expires in June 2006.

Deleted cookies - an affiliate marketing nightmare

Jupiter Media has just release a report relating to inaccuracies of cookie based measurements.

Cookies are text files stored on your computer when visiting a site that record preference for that particular site's usage. Cookies are also common in shopping cart applications in order to remember visitors as they move throughout product pages. They may also contain referral information.

Jupiter Media states that in 2004 58% of online users emptied their cookie cache, with 39% doing so on a monthly basis - the main reason being security and privacy concerns.

If users delete or blocked cookies, it can be very difficult to gauge consumer behavior. Read more of the press release from Jupiter Media.

Something not mentioned in the press release but is also of major concerned is the effects of this cookie dumping trend on those who generate revenue by participating in affiliate programs. Most affiliate software works on cookie based information. Someone clicks a affiliate link, then a cookie is placed on that persons' computer when they visit a merchants' site. In that cookie will usually be an affiliate ID. The order form records the cookie information, the cookie is parsed by the affiliate software and the affiliate is credited with the click, lead or sale.

With consumers tending not to purchase on the first visit to a site, if they delete their cookies before making the "buy" visit, the affiliate loses out. Of course, the merchant wins by not having to pay a commission on the sale. But as word of this gets out, the "super" affiliates will no doubt be putting pressure on merchants to address the situation.

Related articles:

Stealware - software hijacking commissions
Successful affiliate marketing
Affiliate Marketing Survival Strategies 
Affiliate Programs - working with merchants

March 13 2005

New article - CRM software

CRM this and CRM that - it's one of those terms bandied about by jargon lovin' executives; but what actually is CRM software and of what benefit is it? Learn more in my new article and trial a free CRM application.

Over 800 million PC's in use

According to the Computer Industry Almanac, the number of personal computers in use at the end of 2004 topped 820 million and that number is expected to exceed 1 billion by 2007. China is expected to surpass Japan in terms of PC's in use by the end of 2007. 

Top 5 countries:

Yahoo to offer small publishers revenue opportunity?

Overture, owned by Yahoo, was recently renamed to Yahoo Search Marketing Services. Overture hasn't allowed small publishers as affiliates of their contextual ad services for quite some time, but that may be about to change very soon. Yahoo are inviting registrations of interest in their Publisher Network, which will provide "publishing tools, advertising products and access to our Yahoo! audience". It sounds a little like it may include something like Adwords, which really they already have in Overture, but perhaps *also*  it's companion, AdSense? Watch this space.

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March 11 2005

Consumers spend 1.8 billion dollars on online content

The Online Publishers Association has just released the Online Paid Content US Market Spending Report.

Consumer spending in the USA for paid online content reached the highest level ever in 2004 - 1.8 billion dollars.

2001 - 664 million dollars
2002 - 1.3 billion dollars
2003 - 1.6 billion dollars
2004 - 1.8 billion dollars

The leading sectors include:

Business/Investment, Community-Made Directories and Credit Help sectors experienced a downturn last year but Entertainment/Lifestyle sectors achieved a massive 90% improvement over 2003.

Read the Online Paid Content US Market Spending Report. (PDF 254kb)

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