Getting Granular: The DigitalGrit Blog

IAB Introduces Lead Gen Transfer Best Practices

The IAB has established standard for safely transferring leads generated by online marketing efforts. According to their press release, there are two important issues covered by the best practices document:

Nielsen//NetRatings Changes Metrics

Nielsen//NetRatings has entered the new Web, at long last. Instead of measuring site popularity by page views alone, Nielsen//NetRatings will now factor in how long users spend on sites and the total number of sessions per user on each site. “Total Minutes” and “Total Sessions” will better measure the how users interact with Web, whether they’re spending a few minutes searching on Google or a few hours watching videos on YouTube.

Statsaholic is Alexaholic (or vice/versa)

If you're addicted to Web stats (especially yours v. your competitors'), you've probably had Alexaholic bookmarked for the last year, too.

Believe it or not, I've always thought this geekily fun tool was owned by Amazon...but it seems I was wrong. According to TechCrunch, Amazon has tried more than once to put an end to the fun. To avoid further trouble, Alexaholic has changed it's name to Statsaholic.

TechCrunch suggests the service would be wise to beef up its  offering with even more third-party stats. Mmmm. More yummy stats. Yes, please.

Yahoo/HotJobs in deal with local newspapers

Yahoo's struck a deal with seven major newspaper publishing groups will use its technology to sell ads and offer search on the Web sites of over 150 daily papers across 38 states. Ads placed in these papers will also appear on Yahoo HotJobs.

According to Reuters:

Yahoo aims to expand its reach into local markets, viewed as a key growth channel for the newspaper industry as it faces circulation declines and a migration of readers to the Internet and other media...

..."We believe the local segment is largely untapped and provides significant opportunities to expand audience engagement and subsequently grow local advertising," Yahoo Chief Executive Terry Semel said.

Local search is just getting hotter by the day. If you haven't started thinking about this as part of your marketing plan, START.

Lycos Aims To Be "Cool Again," Launches Lycos Cinema

Lycos, one of the granddaddies of Internet portals, is heading in the right direction.

The site, which started out as a Yahoo competitor, touting its strength in search (remember the "Go fetch!" ads with the black labrador?) ultimately became a popular hangout for teens online. Absorbing community sites like Tripod and Angelfire, they were really on the cutting edge of stickiness, drawing young people in to build their own content and connect via online communities.

(The portal itself was purchased by Terra Networks in 2000, then shortly after by Daum.)

But the gloss of Tripod and Angelfire died down as sites like MySpace and LiveJournal gained popularity with the cool kids.

Now, in an effort to regain their place among the "in crowd", Lycos is launching Lycos Cinema. The new service adds a level of interactivity to the portal that may just return it to its former glory:

Lycos said it is using proprietary technology to enable viewers to watch synchronized videos on the Web. The company compared its ability to offer such a service with massive, never-ending online games such as Warcraft and Second Life, which host hundreds of thousands of players.

Lycos users will be able to watch films and create public chatrooms to invite other potential viewers. Viewers in any one particular viewing room can type comments on the window, while watching the movies that are streamed at the same time.

Sounds like a plan. And just in time for the new year -- hear that, media buyers?

Unlike YouTube, by the way,  Lycos Cinema will accommodate full-length feature films. Uploading capabilities will be live by later this year/ early next.

Read more about the launch here.

MarketingSherpa Acquired by MarketingExperiments

Yesterday, 237,000 marketers received an email announcing that MarketingSherpa is now part of MEC Labs, better known as MarketingExperiments.

It's a good pairing. MarketingSherpa has always been known for its Case Studies -- formulaic interviews with client-side marketers sharing campaign goals, tactics and results (for better or for worse!) across verticals and channels. Marketing Experiments' Dr. Flint McLaughlin had a similar goal of discovering effective online marketing tactics, but took a more scientific approach to the topic.

I can only imagine what crazy-usefuly content the 72+-inches of caffeinated marketing know-how that is Anne Holland could accomplish in Dr. Flint's lab!

Snoozin' at the Keyboard: Interactive Marketing Wrapup for Last Week

Where did the time go? The week ending Friday the 13th has ended -- and without a peep from DG.

The big news of the week was, beyond a doubt, GoogTube. There was no missing that one.

But we'll refer to some of our favorite blogs for coverage of everything else that happened while we were dozing off.

• The week's posts from Search Engine Watch
• Blog Herald's October Posts
• From Search Engine Journal -- a post about the launch of Work.com (by our friends at Business.com) and the return of small biz portals
• Debbie Weil's Corporate Blogging Book plastered all over TypePad (It's the book of the month!)
• And to make sure you haven't missed anything on the more technical (yet still amusing) side, The RSS Blog's October archive covers it all.

Hopefully, that covers everything...

Windows Live Search -- Open for Business, Officially

The "beta" has been removed from WindowsLive Search. With a sleek, celan design that makes Google's look old and clunky, the new Microsoft Search is certainly attractive.

Now let's get some feedback on the results! (Jeremy Zwadony has already weighed in on speed and relevancy, with a review that's mixed overall, but notes that the Web search has "greatly" improved. Read his commentor reviews, too.)

Also, now in beta: QnA -- Microsoft's newest community effort, similar to Yahoo! Answers.

Marketers Respect 9/11 (Links)

With memories of five years ago today as fresh and raw as ever, many of us aren't seeing this beautiful Monday as day to launch press releases or market via email.

The blogosphere -- and even my inbox -- are overflowing with reflections of 9/11, thankfully free of the images that are still glaring across widescreens everywhere today. 

Here are a few links:

• Online Spin (MediaPost)
• Blog Herald (and many other posts)
• Micro Persuasion
• Diva Marketing
• MarketingSherpa
• Bloggers' Blog

Until 9/11 officially becomes a National Day of Remembrance, this feels appropriate for many of us Marketers. We can go back to "business as usual" tomorrow.

Peace to all.

Marketers Respect 9/11 (Links)

With memories of five years ago today as fresh and raw as ever, many of us aren't seeing this beautiful Monday as day to launch press releases or market via email.

The blogosphere -- and even my inbox -- are overflowing with reflections of 9/11, thankfully free of the images that are still glaring across widescreens everywhere today. 

Here are a few links:

• Online Spin (MediaPost)
• Blog Herald (and many other posts)
• Micro Persuasion
• Diva Marketing
• MarketingSherpa
• Bloggers' Blog

Until 9/11 officially becomes a National Day of Remembrance, this feels appropriate for many of us Marketers. We can go back to "business as usual" tomorrow.

Peace to all.