Coast Digital Blog

Microsoft and Yahoo have just announced that they’ll be teaming up in an effort to grab market share from Google.

The deal centres on a ten-year contract, which will see Yahoo listing Bing’s organic results on its SERPs (search engine results pages), and placing adCenter ads instead of Yahoo Search Marketing (YSM) adverts. The deal also offers Microsoft the opportunity to incorporate any of Yahoo’s search technology into its own platform.

Good News
It’s good to see that Google’s competition hasn’t given up. I’d hate to think that Google would start getting complacent (*cough cough*).

Yahoo and Microsoft know that they won’t be able to compete against Google unless they join forces. This merger will mean (at current rates anyway) that Microsoft’s search market share could be over 5%. This is still chicken feed compared to Google’s 85%+ slice of the market, but it’s almost double what it was achieving before.

It’s also worth remembering that Bing has some really nice features...

The ‘related search’ feature returns a greater number of interesting and useful links than Google’s similarly-named feature, and Bing’s desire to include (nearly) live search data (by implementing Twitter into its SERPs) is admirable.

But I’m not convinced though that these features will be enough to take users from Google, even if it does show they’re giving it a good shot.

Another good point is that YSM will become irrelevant. Personally, I always found YSM a bit of a chore, so I’m glad that we’ll be able to reach Yahoo with Microsoft adCenter. At least it has a desktop campaign editor.

Conversion rates on adCenter are also generally better than YSM, so seeing increased volumes here will be very welcome.

Bad News
Although the news has just been announced, the roll-out could take up to 24 months to complete — and it won’t even start until it has regulatory approval.  As usual with these things, the US will get the implementation first. In the UK, we’ll have to wait and see how things unfold in the States before we get to test it out.

Also, as anyone who works in or around the web will tell you, two years is a very long time. One of my favourite things about this industry is the speed at which it moves, and how adaptable we need to be to keep up. I can’t help but wondering if this integration plan is so long that, by the time everything’s in place, it will be too late for the Microsoft/Yahoo partnership to start its fight-back.
 

Take a look at this YouTube clip. It's amazing.

I spent ten years living in London, and whilst I got to know the centre, the East End and chunks of Islington and Camden very well, I'd always get lost in the West and South of the capital. An iPhone application like this would have been a godsend, and a lot less bulky than a pocket A-Z.

I moved out of London in April, but I like this iPhone technology so much that I've been thinking of other uses for it. I thought it would be brilliant for self-guided trails - a tactile, attractive project that civic societies or local councils could use to pull in visitors to their town. Brilliant digital marketing for the heritage sector.

Similarly, I reckoned it would be great for restaurant guides, utilities companies that wanted to map manholes and fire hydrants, newsagents wanting to attract customers, theatres and ticket outlets. The possibilities for using GPS to give people directions in this way seem limited only by imagination and development costs.

However, the idea that most struck me was creating an application to map the country's pubs. I'm always ending up in unfamiliar towns and villages (I like cycling), not knowing where the nearest good watering hole is. An iPhone application like the one above could surely help me out?

Things are never as simple as they seem, though, so I asked Fancyapint's Gordon Butler whether the technology could help his company's directory of UK pub reviews. His answer: yes - if it worked much better than it does now.

The video looks like a great idea and one that would work very easily for our kind of information - the biggest drawback, as far as I can see, is perceived accuracy versus the real accuracy of the app.

Handheld devices are notoriously inaccurate where you need them to be most accurate - in built-up areas. GPS accuracy is likely to be 30-50 metres in cities with current technology, mobile cell triangulation is a few hundred metres, and the compass will be influenced by metallic objects around it. (What kind of case does your iPhone have, does it have a magnetic catch?) 30-50 metres sounds good, but in a place like Soho, you could be way off the mark when it comes to finding your way around - you could be a couple of streets off.
 

And that's not good. You could mean to visit the Red Lion in Crown Passage, just off Pall Mall, and instead end up in the Red Lion in nearby Duke of York Street. They're both good, but you might well miss out on one of the nicest pubs out there.

I've also spotted another problem that might happen. If you head out into the countryside, the GPS can place you a good mile or two from where you actually are. This afternoon I stopped in a small Essex village and checked my location on Google Maps. It seemed to think I was a mile over the border in Suffolk, in a hamlet that I know has no pub. Thirsty travellers can't afford a mistake like that, so it looks like the hospitality industry would do well to wait for the technology to catch up with the ideas.

Even though I understood the power of Twitter for marketing, I have managed to stay away from Twitter for much longer than I had Facebook.  About a month ago I gave in and signed up for my Twitter account and fortunately managed to get my full name which was pleasing.

It took a while for me to get my head around using @ and D + username + message (direct messaging), but I was amazed how quickly I could follow people of interest and found a whole new selection of blogs, material and have made some great contacts on there.

Last week I was attending a music festival abroad as to which I had not received my ticket for.  I would admit I did leave it till the last minute to  chase for my ticket, but I thought that I would be able to login to my  account and resend ticket - this was not the case.  I found the call centre number from the website.  I rang the number where I was transferred overseas.

I spent 20 minutes explaining why I had not got my ticket and requested they emailed it over which they could not do.  I was advised to send an email a specific department which I did - 2 hours later no response.

I decided to be sneaky and call head office where I was transferred overseas again and this time I was advised to make the email "important" in the header and mark "urgent" in the subject line - 3 hours later no response.

Getting rather annoyed and desperate for my ticket I ranted my anger on Twitter using the companies name as a hash tag.  At around the same time I received a an email  requesting I complete a customer satisfaction survey to a query that had not  been resolved, so once I again I headed to Twitter and voiced my opinion on  there.

Within 3 minutes of my second moan on Twitter I received a phone call from  the companies head office in the UK, who apologised, emailed my ticket whilst  on the phone to them and the issue which had taken over 5 hours, 2 phone  calls and 2 emails had been resolved using the power of Twitter.

Obviously companies (like us) actively monitor online reputation, but I was extremely surprised at how quickly the company reacted and full credit for doing so.

For those who are wondering what company I am referring to, I am sure you know how to find me.

Working for an online marketing agency as successful as Coast Digital is very demanding, if incredibly good fun. But it's good to have a break now and then, so we shut the offices and headed off to Henley Regatta for the day on Thursday 2nd July.

It was amazing. The sun was so bright, and the temperature so hot, that only the most dedicated and foolhardy paraded in their striped club blazers. And our hospitality tent was amazing: great staff, chilled champagne, plenty of Pimms, and delicious canapés. The lunch will be remembered for years.

Everyone in the team had the chance to motor up and down the river in a punt, and there were - of course - plenty of boat races going on. None of us knew a massive amount about rowing, so we had plenty to learn - such as why teams competing for "Ladies'" trophies were, in fact, men.

We were based at the starting line, so we got to see every race begin, and could see the umpires' boats chugging along behind the competitors. Just like the one above.

In all, a wonderful treat that has fired us up for a successful summer back at the office. Many thanks to James for organising it.

It was too tough a choice to select only a handful of photos from the day. So, if you'd like to see a gallery of the Coast Digital team having a great time, please check out Michael's photo gallery.