Articles of the Day
WSJ looks at Microsoft’s ‘behavior targeting’ advertising efforts - The company is making a global push to sell ads geared towards the interests and demographics of individual users of its Hotmail service, msn.com site and other sites. The push is based around the information provided when a user signs up for Hotmail and then the searches they perform, and the results they click on, when using MSFT’s Live Search. The company hopes to grab a bigger piece of the online advertising market by using the information from the 263M worldwide users of Hotmail. The system was launched in the U.S. in September and MSFT plans to roll it out worldwide. The company says it has about 100 advertisers signed up so far.
Monster.com Replaces CareerBuilder At St. Pete Times - Continuing its drive to align with traditional newspapers, career site Monster will replace CareerBuilder as the online recruitment service for the St. Petersburg Times next month. Monster and the 300,000 daily-circulation Times will launch a co-branded job site that will include career-related advice, a resume builder and salary information in addition to national and local job listings.
Jewelry, Video Games Propel Online Retail Past $21B - E-commerce spending surged in the week before Christmas, according to comScore Networks. For the three days from Dec. 18 through Dec. 20, non-travel retail spending online climbed to $1.55 billion, marking a 35% increase from last year.
Report: Wikipedia Founder Readies New Search Engine - Wikipedia founder Jimmy Wales plans to launch a new search engine, according to a recent report in the Times of London. The newspaper reported that the project, dubbed Wikiasari, could launch as early as the first quarter of 2007.
YouTube Adds Features - Video-sharing site YouTube is now offering users the ability to instantly record videos by using Flash software and Web cams, as part of a site upgrade. The site also is offering a new user interface that cuts the number of tabs at the top of the screen down to four–videos, categories, channels and community.
comScore: Google Passes Yahoo in Global Traffic - Google has displaced Yahoo as the world’s second most-visited Web site–although not by much–according to November figures comScore Networks. Google’s sites brought in 475.7 million visitors, compared to Yahoo’s 475.3 million. Both trail global leader Microsoft, which attracted a whopping 501.7 million visitors.
Web Ad Prices Keep Rising - The cost of buying ads on the Internet is going up, and it’s going to continue. The Web has proven to be the cheapest, most effective means of reaching a targeted audience. As such, more advertisers are shifting dollars to the Web, which places the supply of quality Web sites and ad networks at more of a premium.
