While comparison shopping is nothing new, the way shoppers conduct their research is. Years ago, shoppers combed through retail shelves in pursuit of the perfect deal, an effort that took time, effort and gas. Today, the web fills the gap between time and space with an array of comparison shopping sites that offer customer reviews, large selections and access to prices from well-known stores.
According to ComScore, of the 167 million Americans online in February, almost 53 million of them visited at least one of the top comparison-shopping sites. And, while many of those consumers bought online, many others used the information to purchase the desired product in a retail shop as well. Competition is indeed fierce in cyberspace and in the store; but, the good news is it is consumers who are getting the great end of the deal.
Among the list of popular sites that allow visitors to contrast and compare are Yahoo Shopping, Shopzilla, Froogle and NexTag. In addition, there are at least another ten price comparison sites that boast the best tools and technology to help consumers make smarter choices. Each has distinct features, advantages and, unfortunately, disadvantages. Still, the popularity of such sites and technology means that entrepreneurs and dot-coms will continue to devise ways for consumers to research and buy goods, ensuring that competition among online and offline retailers will remain stiff.
In fact, the top price comparison sites are already getting some tough opposition from companies that take advantage of the other guys’ shortcomings. Frucall, which according to the company spokesperson was inspired by frugal shoppers everywhere, for example, is one of the newest services targeted to value-minded shoppers and boasts a quick and convenient way for bargain-hunters to get the best deal, even without the use of a computer.
Launched in March as the first price-comparison mobile service, Frucall allows shoppers to compare retail store prices with prices for the same products on Amazon.com, directly from their cell phone. It’s a simple solution that sidelines many sites that offer price comparison results to be sent via text message to a consumer’s cell phone but fail to offer immediate access to price comparisons when the shopper sees a product he or she didn’t research ahead of time. Even better, is that consumers can actually buy the product directly from their mobile phone, assuming they have registered and have a valid credit card in their profile.
Touted as the easiest and quickest way to price compare, Frucall enables shoppers in the midst of surveying retail aisles to call a toll-free number (888-FRU-SHOP) and input the product’s UPC or ISBN number. Within a few seconds, the caller gets a confirmation of the product name and the price of the item as listed online. Currently, the service compares prices for products from a variety of categories including automotive supplies, books, electronics, jewelry, movies, music, tools and pet supplies. In the future, Frucall says they will generate best price information through Internet-wide e-commerce searches.
Seems the online price comparison wars will rage on.
February 14, 2010
Keyword Finess, Broad, Phase Or Exact
Yes is the short answer. But lets take a closer look at keyword match options and examine why using all three types is one of the best ways to ensure a higher CTR, as well as a strong Google Quality Score.
Google has defined the three-keyword match options in a fairly understandable way. You need to know what each match type is, how Google uses them and how you can use them in your keyword selection process.
BROAD MATCH is the default option Google will use in determining the relevancy of your keywords to a users search. If you don’t specify, your keywords will be matched using this option. Broad refers to the span of keywords Google will consider when determining the placement of your ad. Plurals and other variations of your keywords are automatically included. Broad matches are the least targeted of keyword matching.
infant carseats will show your ad when a search for both words are used, in any order, or when either is used separately.
PHRASE MATCH refers to entering your keywords using quotation marks. Google will show your ad when a user searches for the phrase, in the order you placed it within the quotation marks, as well as other possible terms.
“infant carseats” will show your ad when a search for the complete phrase occurs. This allows a more targeted audience than broad match.
EXACT MATCH occurs when you surround your keywords in brackets. This will show your ad only when the exact keywords, in the exact order are searched, and will not include any other possible words. This is the most targeted search and should produce a higher quality (although a lower quantity) of clickthroughs.
[infant carseats] will show your ad when a search for infant carseats appears. It will not appear if the search has included any other words. The traffic you attract will be the most targeted to your keywords.
NEGATIVE KEYWORD gives you the opportunity to exclude words. For example, if you do not want the word used to trigger your ad, you may place a negative sign, -used, and your ad will not appear if that word appears anywhere in the search. This is helpful if you are trying to target specific traffic and there are certain very popular words that often accompany your keywords, but are not related to your ad.
So which option is the best to use? The very best option is to use all three, broad, phrase and exact matching for every keyword in your ad group. Doing so will result in impressions being calculated for every variation of your keywords. This produces a greater click-through ratio. Google will calculate statistics for each keyword, allowing you to track performance. Having a high click-through rate is a key element in raising your overall Google Quality Score, meaning your ads will appear more frequently than someone whose score is lower.
A standard recommendation of 25 unique keywords per Ad Group is then changed to 75 when all three-match options are used.
It may seem very redundant to include the three different match types, and it certainly means more data entry per ad group. But you are increasing the chances of the right people clicking on your ads. The quality of the traffic and your overall Google Quality Score are worth the extra effort.
Google has defined the three-keyword match options in a fairly understandable way. You need to know what each match type is, how Google uses them and how you can use them in your keyword selection process.
BROAD MATCH is the default option Google will use in determining the relevancy of your keywords to a users search. If you don’t specify, your keywords will be matched using this option. Broad refers to the span of keywords Google will consider when determining the placement of your ad. Plurals and other variations of your keywords are automatically included. Broad matches are the least targeted of keyword matching.
infant carseats will show your ad when a search for both words are used, in any order, or when either is used separately.
PHRASE MATCH refers to entering your keywords using quotation marks. Google will show your ad when a user searches for the phrase, in the order you placed it within the quotation marks, as well as other possible terms.
“infant carseats” will show your ad when a search for the complete phrase occurs. This allows a more targeted audience than broad match.
EXACT MATCH occurs when you surround your keywords in brackets. This will show your ad only when the exact keywords, in the exact order are searched, and will not include any other possible words. This is the most targeted search and should produce a higher quality (although a lower quantity) of clickthroughs.
[infant carseats] will show your ad when a search for infant carseats appears. It will not appear if the search has included any other words. The traffic you attract will be the most targeted to your keywords.
NEGATIVE KEYWORD gives you the opportunity to exclude words. For example, if you do not want the word used to trigger your ad, you may place a negative sign, -used, and your ad will not appear if that word appears anywhere in the search. This is helpful if you are trying to target specific traffic and there are certain very popular words that often accompany your keywords, but are not related to your ad.
So which option is the best to use? The very best option is to use all three, broad, phrase and exact matching for every keyword in your ad group. Doing so will result in impressions being calculated for every variation of your keywords. This produces a greater click-through ratio. Google will calculate statistics for each keyword, allowing you to track performance. Having a high click-through rate is a key element in raising your overall Google Quality Score, meaning your ads will appear more frequently than someone whose score is lower.
A standard recommendation of 25 unique keywords per Ad Group is then changed to 75 when all three-match options are used.
It may seem very redundant to include the three different match types, and it certainly means more data entry per ad group. But you are increasing the chances of the right people clicking on your ads. The quality of the traffic and your overall Google Quality Score are worth the extra effort.
Internet Marketing Strategies That Won't Hurt Your Savings Much
Your new business will benefit a lot from various Internet marketing methods. But you don't have to spend millions of dollars just to get some decent exposure for your company. There are ways to make your business be seen and felt without doing overkill with your advertisement expenses.
Make use of your online power - through Internet marketing. Here are simple methods that you may employ to boost the visibility of your business without shelling out more than what you can afford. However, these techniques need patience and some footwork to produce agreeable results.
Firstly, you need a website before you can make use of these low cost Internet marketing strategies. So go create one or hire a web developer. It will display your products and services. This will be used in employing the following Internet marketing techniques.
1. Affiliate Marketing
This is the process of recruiting a network of smaller websites known as affiliates to drive targeted traffic to a website. Ad copy and links will be provided by the advertisers. You will have to pay a certain percentage of the sales profit to your affiliates.
2. Links
One of your goals should be to attain a good ranking with search engines. One way to do it is through link building. This could be done through trading links to other businesses that are related with yours.
3. Newsletters
Sending out newsletters to your subscribers (those who signed up for your newsletters) will help greatly in establishing a good working relationship with your customers or prospective customers. It has to be short, sweet, consistent and written for a general audience.
4. E-mail Marketing
As one of the best cost-effective Internet marketing tools, it stays as a very important method of keeping your customers aware of your products and services. Just make sure to avoid spamming or soon enough you will have to close down you business due to complaints.
5. Articles
If you put quality content in the form of articles in your website along with your products and services, search engines will have to index your website. Getting you website indexed by popular search engines means more traffic for you.
6. Forums
Expand your Internet network is through joining forums that mainly discusses stuff regarding or related to your products and services. Actively posting responses or answers and asking relevant information will build your reputation as that forum's member and boost your company's visibility through your signature files. These signature files are those that go with your every post. Links to your website could be included in this signature.
Make use of your online power - through Internet marketing. Here are simple methods that you may employ to boost the visibility of your business without shelling out more than what you can afford. However, these techniques need patience and some footwork to produce agreeable results.
Firstly, you need a website before you can make use of these low cost Internet marketing strategies. So go create one or hire a web developer. It will display your products and services. This will be used in employing the following Internet marketing techniques.
1. Affiliate Marketing
This is the process of recruiting a network of smaller websites known as affiliates to drive targeted traffic to a website. Ad copy and links will be provided by the advertisers. You will have to pay a certain percentage of the sales profit to your affiliates.
2. Links
One of your goals should be to attain a good ranking with search engines. One way to do it is through link building. This could be done through trading links to other businesses that are related with yours.
3. Newsletters
Sending out newsletters to your subscribers (those who signed up for your newsletters) will help greatly in establishing a good working relationship with your customers or prospective customers. It has to be short, sweet, consistent and written for a general audience.
4. E-mail Marketing
As one of the best cost-effective Internet marketing tools, it stays as a very important method of keeping your customers aware of your products and services. Just make sure to avoid spamming or soon enough you will have to close down you business due to complaints.
5. Articles
If you put quality content in the form of articles in your website along with your products and services, search engines will have to index your website. Getting you website indexed by popular search engines means more traffic for you.
6. Forums
Expand your Internet network is through joining forums that mainly discusses stuff regarding or related to your products and services. Actively posting responses or answers and asking relevant information will build your reputation as that forum's member and boost your company's visibility through your signature files. These signature files are those that go with your every post. Links to your website could be included in this signature.
How to Blog: Is it for Fame or Fortune?
Blogging as we all know has become an outlet allowing most people to express, unwind and unleash the things that goes around in a persons mind for everyone to see. While not most people would appreciate it, this form of activity makes a person expand his knowledge and entertain new insights coming from current events, personal interaction and actual experiences. Most people of today will not waste their time reading what a person blogs or writes but for sure many would be surprised at how informative such composed blogs contain and how people can be able to express their grief or joy from everyday endeavors.
As I have said before, blogging is a therapeutic form of rehabilitation. It allows a sigh of relief in most cases, allowing people to get a load of their shoulders. Blogging has been limited to people who are Internet exposed people, most of which are the yuppies of tomorrow. Some professionals, particularly in the great areas of the United States and Europe have taken this up and most of them have two things on their mind: for personal distinction (fame) or as another source of income (fortune).
Many have claimed that people are earning millions by the day from blogging alone. Some are just in it to gain the exposure they are longing for, something that they fail to achieve in the competitive world of today, particularly in journalism and article writing tasks. It is not hard to distinguish which blogs or compositions are authentic and the purpose of which is to spread information and become sources for future people who blog. It is the content, hence why people say “Content is King”. If it is just money for the sake of placing keywords in a particular article, then writers and bloggers may as well be given a negative attention towards people who search the web for quality written content or blogs. This is a rarity today, the reason being, all they want is to attract people to visit their sites and raise their page ranks as analyzed by Google which will raise the stakes for possible pay per click advertisements. This gives article and content writing a bad name. It deprives the people who really pour out their heart and minds towards sharing towards people what their opinions really are. Blogging should not be treated solely for making money, it should be about a person’s viewpoint, something that is surely different from that of others.
For fame itself, people who love to read what a person writes is more than enough to give due recognition to the author. Quality should never be sacrificed for keyword density as they say. It is not easy to spot a poorly written article. Repetitiveness of words, and totally out of sync compositions are the immediate noticeable marks. So the next time you see such things, expect the blog or composition to be full of non-sense and just go back to the previous page and look for that quality written composition that is worth the time reading. Besides, everyone values their time, hence make good use of it and spot the low quality content right away.
As I have said before, blogging is a therapeutic form of rehabilitation. It allows a sigh of relief in most cases, allowing people to get a load of their shoulders. Blogging has been limited to people who are Internet exposed people, most of which are the yuppies of tomorrow. Some professionals, particularly in the great areas of the United States and Europe have taken this up and most of them have two things on their mind: for personal distinction (fame) or as another source of income (fortune).
Many have claimed that people are earning millions by the day from blogging alone. Some are just in it to gain the exposure they are longing for, something that they fail to achieve in the competitive world of today, particularly in journalism and article writing tasks. It is not hard to distinguish which blogs or compositions are authentic and the purpose of which is to spread information and become sources for future people who blog. It is the content, hence why people say “Content is King”. If it is just money for the sake of placing keywords in a particular article, then writers and bloggers may as well be given a negative attention towards people who search the web for quality written content or blogs. This is a rarity today, the reason being, all they want is to attract people to visit their sites and raise their page ranks as analyzed by Google which will raise the stakes for possible pay per click advertisements. This gives article and content writing a bad name. It deprives the people who really pour out their heart and minds towards sharing towards people what their opinions really are. Blogging should not be treated solely for making money, it should be about a person’s viewpoint, something that is surely different from that of others.
For fame itself, people who love to read what a person writes is more than enough to give due recognition to the author. Quality should never be sacrificed for keyword density as they say. It is not easy to spot a poorly written article. Repetitiveness of words, and totally out of sync compositions are the immediate noticeable marks. So the next time you see such things, expect the blog or composition to be full of non-sense and just go back to the previous page and look for that quality written composition that is worth the time reading. Besides, everyone values their time, hence make good use of it and spot the low quality content right away.
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