Massive Inc., comScore Announce New In-game Advertising Research Methodology

Through a new methodology developed by the two comScore and Massive, Inc. (a Microsoft company), advertisers will get an inside look at the degree to which in-game ads motivate gamers to visit Web sites, conduct brand-related search queries and engage in other online actions, something that previously had gone un-measured.

“We know from 80-plus independently verified post-campaign studies that in-game advertising increases brand engagement,” said JJ Richards, general manager of Massive Inc., the creator of a leading network for dynamic video game advertising. “But what we didn’t know was the correlation between in-game ads and consumer action. Through this partnership with comScore, we will also now be able to measure those consumer actions that result from in-game ads. We think this has the potential to literally ‘change the game’ for both advertisers and publishers who want to improve the effectiveness of their in-game ad efforts.”

Ad Effx Action Lift for Gaming matches in-game console ad serving data from Massive with comScore’s third-party, post-campaign panel data to track and measure in-game advertising effectiveness. By combining Microsoft’s proprietary, non-personally identifying Anonymous ID data, which is common across Xbox LIVE and Microsoft Web properties (known as Windows Live IDs), with user data from comScore’s panel of two million Internet users worldwide, comScore can determine if panelists who saw in-game advertising subsequently visited a brand’s Web site, searched brand-related terms or engaged in other online behaviors important to advertisers.

Experian® Hitwise® announced today that Google accounted for 70.60 percent of all U.S. searches conducted in the four weeks ending Oct. 31, 2009

Experian^® Hitwise^® announced that Google accounted for 70.60 percent of all U.S. searches conducted in the four weeks ending Oct. 31, 2009. Yahoo! Search, Bing and Ask.com received 16.14 percent, 9.57 percent and 2.62 percent, respectively. The remaining 52 search engines in the Hitwise Search Engine Analysis Tool accounted for 1.10 percent of U.S. searches.

Percentage of U.S. searches among leading search engine providers
Domain	September 2009	October 2009	Month-over-month percent change
www.google.com	71.08%	70.60%	-1%
search.yahoo.com	16.38%	16.14%	-1%
www.bing.com*	8.96%	9.57%	7%
www.ask.com	2.56%	2.62%	2%
Note: Data is based on four-week rolling periods (ending Oct. 31, 2009, and Oct. 3, 2009) from the Hitwise sample of 10 million U.S. Internet users.
*This includes executed searches on Bing.com, Live.com and MSN Search but does not include searches on Club.Live.com.
Source: Experian Hitwise

Longer search queries, averaging searches of five to more than eight words in length, increased 3 percent between October and September 2009. Searches of eight or more words increased 4 percent. The same time period showed that shorter search queries - those averaging one to four words long - decreased 1 percent from month to month. Searches of one word comprised the majority of searches, amounting to 24.03 percent of all queries.

Percentage of U.S. clicks by number of keywords
Subject	September 2009	October 2009	Month-over-month percent change
One word	24.32%	24.03%	-1%
Two words	23.55%	23.13%	-2%
Three words	20.52%	20.53%	0%
Four words	13.69%	13.83%	1%
Five words	7.94%	8.13%	2%
Six words	4.30%	4.42%	3%
Seven words	2.33%	2.43%	4%
Eight or more words	3.35%	3.49%	4%
Note: Data is based on four-week rolling periods (ending Oct. 31, 2009, and Oct. 3, 2009) from the Hitwise sample of 10 million U.S. Internet users.
Source: Experian Hitwise

Search engines continue to be the primary way Internet users navigate to key industry categories. Comparing October 2009 with October 2008, Automotive, Business and Finance, Entertainment, News and Media, Online Video, Social Networking and Sports categories showed double-digit increases in their share of traffic coming directly from search engines.

AdMob publishes its Mobile Metrics Report (September 2009)

AdMob examined the rapid and global growth of mobile Web and application usage over the past two years in their September 2009 AdMob Mobile Metrics Report. This month marks the second anniversary of the Mobile Metrics Report and the growth in traffic since September 2007 demonstrates that mobile data usage is a truly global phenomenon. In September 2009 AdMob received more than 100 million ad requests from 14 countries, and more than 10 million ad requests from 64 countries.

The report also highlights the rapid growth in usage of mobile Web sites and applications on new devices in the past year. In September 2008, the Motorola RAZR was the top device in the US, and the iPhone was the only touchscreen device in the Top 10. In September 2009, the list of the top 10 devices includes five with touchscreens, six with Wi-Fi capabilities, and six with application stores. These devices are responsible for a much higher percentage of mobile usage than their share of handsets sold. However, feature phones like the Samsung R450 and Motorola RAZR V3 still represent 60 percent of ad requests in the US. The strong mobile Web usage on these feature phones is likely driven by unlimited data plans. Download this new report via AdMob's portal by clicking on the title to this article

Contactology and ClickTale Integrate Post-Click Analytics with Email Marketing

Contactology announced a first-of-its-kind technology partnership with ClickTale, a recognized pioneer and leader in web analytics and customer experience optimization. The partnership represents the first time post-click analytics based on actual subscriber behavior has been integrated with email marketing technology. Marketers can track web movements of opt-in email subscribers through recorded video of visitors’ actions on subsequent visits to a web site based on collected demographic data that is “tagged” in an email campaign. This insight provides marketers with a solid understanding of how recipients respond to campaign efforts post email click. Marketers can optimize both email campaigns and landing pages based on certain behaviors or demographic segments within their subscriber base. For example, online retailers can now compare how men in their forties are engaging versus men in their thirties and adjust web and landing page strategies to maximize future user engagement.

“This level of integration is very different from anything else available in the marketplace,” said Drew Adams, president, Contactology. “We are bringing together the best of web analytics and email marketing to drive a more integrated approach to valuing interactive marketing campaigns.”

The joint solution is quick and easy to implement, requiring only an active Contactology account and a ClickTale account to access this feature. In addition, a simple ClickTale code must be inserted into each webpage to be recorded.

“This partnership takes the integration between email marketing and web analytics to the next level, providing unprecedented post-click analytics insight into email campaigns,” said Dr. Tal Schwartz, ClickTale co-founder and CEO. “These combined capabilities will provide immediate value for any integrated marketing campaign.” Visit Contactology's blog for complete partnership and integration details

Omniture and Havas Digital Launch SearchCenter solution to Optimize Paid Search Marketing Campaigns

Omniture,and Havas Digital, the interactive arm of Havas Media, today announced a global partner relationship in which Havas Digital will become Omniture Certified and roll out Omniture SearchCenter across its Fortune 500 clients. This announcement will span the agency's holdings globally via the Media Contacts, Lattitud and iGlue brands and will leverage the existing Omniture and Havas Digital client base in those markets.

Havas Digital will train its global search teams through Omniture to use SearchCenter. The application helps simplify search marketing by providing a common interface to manage search campaigns and campaign metrics integrated with Web analytics and optimization across marketing programs in order to marry paid search campaigns with sales and marketing data for better profit optimization and increased ROI. The agency will integrate its media consulting expertise with Omniture's best-in-breed paid search and bid management technology to better manage paid search advertising spend for clients and integrate clients' search campaigns with all marketing initiatives, both online and offline.

Havas Digital is present in more than 40 countries with more than 400 clients offering expertise in interactive, direct, CRM and mobile marketing. The agency encompasses the digital media division of Havas and is one of the top-ranked interactive communications consulting companies worldwide. Omniture SearchCenter is part of the Omniture Online Marketing Suite, an integrated suite of applications that enables marketers to unleash the power of their customer data to optimize ad spend and conversion while delivering customers relevant, personalized experiences. The Omniture SearchCenter solution portla offer complete feature details