Kikabink News

Last Thursday I closed my Facebook account. No, it wasn’t out of protest against the new Facebook design… or because I don’t like my Facebook “friends”… or because I have anything against Facebook.

It was simply because… I just don’t use Facebook!

And rather than continue enduring that nagging thought, “I’ve gotta do something on Facebook to promote my business”… I realized I had fallen into the same trap so many Internet marketers fall into: thinking we need to do EVERYTHING to promote our businesses.

Having worked with both small Internet businesses and large corporate Internet marketing departments, I am yet to meet an individual OR an entire team that is able to pursue every single avenue for promoting their business, product or service. Everyone has limited time and resources. And with the Internet evolving all the time, it’s hard enough to stay on top of one aspect of Internet marketing, let alone several.

I’m not saying anything you probably haven’t heard before, but let this article serve as a gentle reminder: it’s better to do a few things really well, than do a lot of things half-baked. And just because you hear some guru preaching about how you MUST get involved in social networking… or blogging… or article marketing… or podcasting (see above!) or anything else… it doesn’t mean you have to at all.

Jay Abraham - a true marketing genius and guru in my opinion - wrote a book called “Getting The Most Out Of All You’ve Got” and that’s really what we should focus on as entrepreneurs. We should do what we can to get the best possible results based on what we have in terms of time, money, skills and other resources. This principle should guide us in deciding what we do in our businesses, and if that means stopping or cutting back on certain things - or closing a Facebook account we never use - so be it.

Of course, let me say that closing my Facebook account doesn’t mean I don’t see value in social networking. Or that you should do the same. It’s just not where I can get the most out of what I’ve got right now. You may find that it DOES work for you, while other things don’t.

P.S. One social network I AM loving at the moment is Imeem. Not sure about a business angle yet (if ever), but I just LOVE creating playlists and listening to music while I work. Check out my Imeem profile here: http://www.imeem.com/annaj/ I also use Twitter. You can follow my “occasionally regular” ramblings at http://www.twitter.com/annajohnson

On Monday, David Morin, Facebook’s Senior Platform Manager, announced that Facebook had reached 100 million users.

This was subsequently confirmed by Facebook founder and CEO, Mark Zuckerberg in The Facebook Blog.

Actually, that’s 99,999,999 users. I closed my Facebook account last Thursday. See today’s feature article for why…

Source: Marshall Kirkpatrick, “Facebook Hits 100 Million Users”, Read write Web, August 25, 2008, Mark Zuckerberg, “Our First 100 Million”, The Facebook Blog, August 26, 2008

Last Thursday, Google announced improvements to its Quality Score, which it introduced in July 2005 to vary minimum bids for keywords based on relevance.

Google is making three key changes to Quality Score:

1. Quality Score will now be calculated at the time of each search query. On that basis, Google will evaluate an ad’s quality each time it matches a search query. Consequently, Quality Score will vary according to such factors as where an ad displays (Google, search partner, content site) and where the searcher is located (country, state).

2. Keywords will no longer be marked ‘inactive for search’. Rather than be deemed inactive for search due to low relevance and/or searches, all keywords will be able to have ads shown on Google and the content network (unless you’ve paused or deleted them).

3. “First page bid” will replace the “minimum bid”. First page bids are an estimate of the bid it would take for your ad to reach the first page of search results in Google, based on the ‘exact match’ version of the keyword, the ad’s Quality Score, and current advertiser competition on that keyword.

So what do these changes mean?

Well, as far as a more dynamic Quality Score goes, it probably just confirms the need to keep keywords relevant. The good news is that, theoretically, YOUR ideas over what is relevant can be borne out by the behavior of your target market, rather than be deemed by Google. Provided, of course, that you get it right.

The lifting of the ‘inactive for search’ restraint is, I think, good news. Again, provided that you know more about your market than Google’s algorithm.

As for the replacement of the “minimum bid” with the “first page bid”… this sounds suspiciously like an excuse to make Google Adwords advertisers pay more. Hopefully not, but we won’t know until Google rolls out these “improvements” over the next few weeks.

Source: Trevor Claiborne, “Quality Score Improvements”, August 21, 2005