Note: Monday is Memorial Day in the US; we’re taking the day off. We’ll be back next Wednesday. Have a great weekend. Report: Ads Drive ~20% of US Economy Advertising is great for the economy. That’s the conclusion from an extensive analysis of ad spending and its economic impact. Of course the sponsor of the research is…

Note: Monday is Memorial Day in the US; we’re taking the day off. We’ll be back next Wednesday. Have a great weekend. Report: Ads Drive ~20% of US Economy Advertising is great for the economy. That’s the conclusion from an extensive analysis of ad spending and its economic impact. Of course the sponsor of the research is…

New Google Ads: In-Store Goals, Video, AR — Google I/O led with local and announced numerous changes, updates and improvements to search. Yesterday’s Google Marketing Live was a kind of parallel event for Ads. But there were too many announcements to discuss here. Of specific interest, Google is updating Performance Max to support in-store sales goals/optimization. New “burst…

Google Shows ‘Local Ad Pack’ — Because there can never be too many ads, Google appears to be testing a Local Pack consisting entirely of ads. It was discovered last week, though Google subsequently told Barry Schwartz it’s not a new test. I was not able to recreate the results on my own. Examples found by…

Part 1 Video start 0:13 — Bill Slawski, mentor & friend, passes away Part 2 Video start 10:11 — My Ad Center — will people use it or is it just another data harvesting tool? Part 3 Video start 18:16 — LocalSEOGuide demonstrates how user click throughs impact rank…

New Apple, DDG Ads Market Privacy — Two effective new ad campaigns market privacy and take aim at online tracking. One, from DuckDuckGo (below), is specifically aimed at Google, while Apple’s new spot promotes App Tracking Transparency and email privacy protection. The DuckDuckGo campaign, called “Watching You,” features a person looking over the shoulder of several internet…

Yelp’s ‘Request Call’ Leads Option — Yelp continues to build out new non-advertising lead-gen capabilities for businesses. The latest is “Request a Call.” It’s an extension of Yelp’s “Request a Quote” tool, which is free to claimed profiles. Request a Call will be added to any Yelp page participating in Request a Quote (available in most…

My Ad Center: Will People Use It? — In Google’s “100 things we announced at I/O” blog post, My Ad Center is number 90. It’s a privacy tool that will roll out later this year, intended to give users (more) control over ads on YouTube, Search and the Discover feed. It gives Google another way to do ads…

Part 1 Video start 0:13 — SMB more successful with content, typical looks at SMBS often undercounts total Part 2 Video start 8:07 — Google I/O Grand Visions for HW and a Local push Part 3 Video start 15:26 — Multisearch & Lens + Near Me Reference Articles: Homegrown Content: Local…