Barry at SEL reports: MSN UK put a prefill in a search box, touting The Apprentice on BBC. Ouch!
Lately I've been in on quite a few, shall we say, monetization strategy meetings. Those newest to the 'net often think you can "stick in" advertising not just in ad slots, but by performing a takeover of common navigation devices - let's make this search turn into a search for a certain vendor's products... you name it. I think users disagree!
Then again, I wonder how far you can push this - and so do many - as evidenced by the MSN experiment.
For example, on the "example queries" published below the search box on a site like Yelp, what if it said, instead of:
"Example: Tacos, hair salon, English pub"
it said: "Example: cafe, Anchor Bar, physiotherapy"
And on a major vertical search site, would an example query using a national advertiser, in that little line, like "Walgreens," be way out of line? What's your take? That's one of the topics I hope Danny and I discuss today in the Daily Searchcast at 11:30 ET.
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About the author:
Andrew Goodman is Principal of
Page Zero Media, a marketing consultancy which focuses on maximizing clients' paid search marketing campaigns.
In 1999 Andrew co-founded Traffick.com, an acclaimed "guide to portals" which foresaw the rise of trends such as paid search and semantic analysis.
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