Google dominates the search world, however others still want to play in the game.  Yahoo seems to have proven that by rolling out the upgraded version of their web analytics tool.  DMNews points out that Google may dominate the “game”, however Yahoo gets the “most improved” award.

Being successful with your online marketing campaigns you must be able to understand details such as demographics of your visitors. If you are reviewing a report and not fully understanding what you are reading, then that reporting lost it’s purpose. Yahoo seemed to understand that and now has updated their web analytics so it is not only good at providing a lot of data, but good at clearly analyzing that data so the average person can understand it. For instance, a successful lead generation campaign with one of Leadpile’s publishers will not work if they don’t understand what they are reading in the reporting. However, if they do understand what they are reading, that PPC campaign will be that much more successful for ALL parties involved. Great job Yahoo!

I know it is tough going for many people and companies right now.  So, I am writing about the major search engines.  Let’s take roll call… Yahoo are you here?  Good.  How about you Ask.com?  Ok…maybe a little louder next time.  Google, I’m sure you are here… of course you are, you are everywhere.  Lastly, MSN are you out there?  Ok, everyone is accounted for. 

Now, let’s have everyone who increased their market share during this tough year take one step forward.  Ok, anybody else?   If anyone lost market share, please sit down.  Well, as you may have guessed there is only one search engine standing.  Times are tough, but there is only one company weathering the storm, and their dominance is growing.

In February, over 72% of all search queries were done on Google.  An 8% increase from a year ago.  The other three major players (can we call them major anymore?) accounted for over 26% of search activity.  Yahoo accounted for 17% of the search activity (down 17% from a year ago) and isn’t really trying anymore.  Ask.com is also shrinking (down 10%) with little effort to improve.  MSN (down 20%) is at least trying, and may still acquire Yahoo to a form a decent second option to Google.

When we assemble this same group a year from now, will Google have over 80% of the search market?  Don’t bet against it.

DMNews offers some helpful suggestions on maintaining your pay per click campaign (PPC) on a strict budget.
1.  Distribute your efforts- Utilize all search engines for advertising, not just Google
2.  Use Negative keywords
4.  Choose when your ads are “live” wisely
5.  Geo target
6.  Analyze your reports regularly

When starting out not everyone has all the knowledge and money to do advertising effectively.  Therefore, researching and trying to listen to other expert’s advice is probably the best way to roll out a new PPC campaign.  Many publishers I deal with at Leadpile Lead Exchange have an ability to have a large ROI, but not if they are not running their PPC campaign effectively.  No matter what network you are doing lead generation in, utilize the search engines reporting AND your affiliate manager to help you fine turn the pay per click campaign.  REMEMBER:  A successfull PPC is also beneficial to the network you are doing lead generation with.  Therfore, it is in the best interest of both sides to make the PPC campaign work effectively.

Microsoft to take over Yahoo’s Search – Microsoft want to close the deal sooner than later! The search side of Yahoo is one of the most profitable component of their business, and MSN will have a huge advantage with this addition. 

From the advertising perspective, Yahoo and MSN are significantly less expensive than Google Adwords, and even their algorithms are different, which, for some Advertisers, makes the advertising more inexpensive. 

I wanted to follow up on a previous post where I had brought up some great websites to download some coupon codes.  Being that the holidays are here and people are trying to save as much much as possible, I thought I would point out an interesting article I found.

According to Yahoo, “In October, 27 million people visited a coupon site, according to comScore Media Metrix, up 33 percent from a year earlier.” However, Yahoo also states, “Generally, companies prefer limited discounts, e-mailed to a select group of customers or sent inside packages with a purchase. When the coupons get wider exposure, retailers lose control, potentially costing them more money than they expected.” In tough times, retailers are probably saying they were would rather not make as money on their sales, versus not having the sales at all. This is all great for the consumers who are doing the shopping.
A great tip that is offered on this article suggests, “searching the name of an online store and the word “coupon” and compare the promotions, because bigger sites are often able to negotiate better offers; if you find a coupon for an offline store, call the Web site and ask it to match the price; and insist upon free shipping, even if it means calling the manager and asking for a coupon code.”. This will allow you to pull up any sites that might contain a coupon for what it is you are looking for. A couple other coupon websites listed in this article: couponcode.com, couponmom.com, and couponcabin.com.
Leadpile Lead Exchange unfortunately has no coupons to offer you for certain products you are looking for, but we do offer the ability to match you up with companies that are able to provide services that are very much needed.

It is official, Yahoo has released it’s 2008 top 10 searches for various industries.  The searches that probably apply the most to Leadpile Lead Exchange and it’s affiliates, are the top 10 “economy” searches.

2008 TOP 10 “economy” SEARCHES  

IRS Stimulus Checks
Oil Prices
Gold Prices
Gas Prices
Dow Jones
Sallie Mae
Stock Market
AIG
Foreclosures
Debt Consolidation

This shows that there is a great opportunity for advertisers and publishers to optimize this by matching up the people needing help in these areas, with the companies that will provide the services they are looking for. Leadpile is the place for both of these parties to come together and truly help the consumers doing all these TOP 10 SEARCHES.

According to DMNews, Yahoo was rated the preferred search engine for US Hispanics in October 2008.
Knowing this popularity, Yahoo has launched Yahoo Publicidad. This is Yahoo’s answer to reaching the large Hispanic population.  Yahoo’s Hispanic America Marketing director says, “Yahoo is the only marketing platform to integrate display, performance or search and mobile advertising.”  This site is a marketing platform for advertisers to reach US Hispanics, Latin American and South American consumers.  Many lead generation companies are fucusing on the Hispanic market.  This might be a good indication that companies like Leadpile Lead Exchange should focus more on this market.  

Yahoo has an eye wide open for targeting the hispanic population, maybe we should also take note too!

Running an effective business you now have to have a website to help promote it worldwide. However, creating a good website is not enough, you have to have it promoted in the internet’s search engines. This is something easier said than done. Creating a Search Engine Optimization (SEO) strategy is very important on getting that desired traffic to your website. I thought this was a good basic article about some things to really pay attention to.

1. Most prospects to your website will be coming from search engines (Google, Yahoo, MSN, Ask etc).
2. Well known search engines work the best.
3. Most prospects use phrases, not single words, to do a search on the search engines.
4. Track the prospects experience on your website.
5. Optimize using more than just one search engine.
6. Check and analyze the results of your tracking/reporting.
7. Use results from tracking to update your site where needed.
8. Prospects rarely go beyond the first or second page of in the search engine results. Work to get on those pages in order to benefit from your SEO strategy.
9. Keyword density is a major part of the ranking of your website.
10. Successful keyword placement.

Having our website, and our publisher’s websites, ranked high in the search engines is key to getting the traffic to get leads. Leadpile Lead Exchange believes quantity is not necessarily the key to success, but quality is.

Ever wonder what search engine terms are used the most? I know I do, and search terms also tell a little bit about what is going on in the world around us. According to dmconfidential, eBay gets the award for the top terms (eBay and eBay.com)in the month of August. People trying to find bargains, or sell items they have I would say is partially responsible for this. Home depot was the next highest term used, followed by mapquest. The shopping/office supplies category received 43.15% of all paid search traffic. The fortunate thing is that this is an 8% increase from July’s 39.81%. Maybe people are staying home and doing more of their shopping online to try and get the best deal, without driving store to store. Business telecommunications and pharmaceutical & medical traffic was slightly up. However, travel and business/legal traffic was down for the month of August.
Another interesting fact, yet not surprising, is that Google accounted for 71% of all US searches in the month of August. In a distant second place was Yahoo with 18.26% followed by MSN (5.32%) and Ask (3.45%).
To truly be effective with lead generation, knowing this kind of information and detailed information about the verticals you are promoting is key to being successful. For instance, someone who is doing PPC for payday loan will loose a lot of money if they are not first aware of everything there is to know about payday loans, and also if they do not understand search engines.
Here at Leadpile, I am going to do everything I can to help publishers know what buyers are maybe looking for in a particular lead type. This helps with how the traffic is driven to the website and ultimately helps with conversions and payouts. Communication with your affiliate manager or account manger is key to running a successful lead generation campaign.

I could not believe my eyes when I saw this article on Yahoo. According to the Associated Press, a Michigan home sold to a women for $1.75 on Ebay. There were 8 others that had a bid on this home, however this Chicago women won out with her under $2.00 bid. It appears there is some work to be done on the home and some back taxes, however no matter how you look at it, it is a GREAT deal.
The sad thing in all this is that someone lived in this home and unfortunately lost their home. The women that purchased the home has not even seen the home, and has no intentions on living there. With what is happening in today’s economy, this is bound to be happening more. At one point or another hopefully Ebay will be more known for it’s bid environment on products, not homes. Time shall tell.
Leadpile Lead Exchange is also a bid environment where we match the buyers and sellers of leads. Fortunately, we will not be matching up someone who lost their home to a buyer for $1.75.

How many of you have been approached to get a life insurance quote from your insurance agent? Let me guess, you said I am too young to buy life insurance. Any successful life insurance sales person will tell you the key to life insurance is really “understanding” it. There are a lot of misconceptions out there regarding life insurance. There really are a lot of specific reasons consumers take out a life insurance policy, besides just to “be covered” when they pass away.

1. Business owners can take out policies to take care of their key employees, so the business can run smoothly if the business owner passes away. Is the deceased person’s spouse really going to be able to run the business if they passed away? Probably not.
2. Spouses take out a policy to cover their spouse so they can try and maintain a similar lifestyle, if their spouse passes away.
3. Some take out policies for a short period of time to cover loved ones, because they took out some extra debt and they want their beneficiaries to not incur this debt if they pass away.
4. Some take out a life insurance policy because they want to have their loved ones to not have to take care of paying for their burial expenses.

Overall, there are so many reasons why a person has to consider taking out a life insurance policy. The most common types of life insurance policies are whole life and term life.
Whole life insurance generally is more expensive because it generates cash value, and it remains with you till you pass away. However, term insurance is an insurance policy that generally lasts for 10,20, or maybe even 30 years only. These policies expire at the end of their designated time frame. Unfortunately, if you take out a policy and then cancel it or don’t pay, it can expire and if you wanted another one, you then will be rated on the age you are now. Buying life insurance at a younger age can have some long term benefits for individuals, because life insurance premiums are based on your age (and health condition too).
According to Yahoo.com, 94% of life insurance that is sold is sold over the kitchen table. This means that most consumers who get life insurance have chosen to get it while meeting face to face with their insurance agent. 4% of consumers feel comfortable getting a life insurance policy over the internet. This is where Leadpile Lead Exchange comes in.
We work with some of the best publishers out there, and they are ready to embark on generating more insurance leads. Not only will we want our publishers to bring in auto and home insurance, we will ask them to bring in life insurance. This is a very important lead type that is a very important insurance for every American. We ALL need life insurance at some level. Just like in any loan you take out… do your research with life insurance. Ask a lot of questions.

In recent years, more and more people are going to college and taking out student loans. These loans were once looked at as “good debt”, however there are students that are graduating with $100,000+ in debt. This is equating to $500-$1,000/month in payments for students. Good debt? ALOT of debt!
The excitement of graduating from college is overshadowed by the idea that within 6 months of graduating, you will begin paying back these debts. How can you really get excited about the fact that you have spent the last 4-6 years going to school, and to be finally done?
According to Yahoo, there are students graduating and becoming affected by the high level of stress, because they know that they are going to have to pay this money back. The first stress should be finding that job that they have been going to school for, however with the outstanding debt, it is hard to really focus on getting that “right” job.
This is a very common type of situation that is happening around the country. This makes me wonder if maybe student loan debt should be somehow waived by the government, or some other options being available? Taking on student loan debt is not the same as going out to the department store and charging up credit card debt. Something to think about… any other way to potentially handle student loan debt? We want young adults to WANT to go to college.
On a final note, student loans/student loan consolidation lead type is minimal in our Leadpile Lead exchange. However, I do know there are a lot of students that are out there wanting to consolidate their student loan debt, because of the exact reason of the payments being out of control.