We are close to 60 days from the formal transition of most advertisers to the Bing platform as part of the Yahoo-Bing search results merger. Over the next two months a lot of ink will be spilled about the expected impact, with prognostications about the ability of the combination to challenge Google and what could go wrong (which would make the former topics moot). In advance of this, I want to give you one early indicator why this combination is something different from what most in the search space are used to seeing.

Over the past few weeks representatives from Yahoo and Bing have visited search marketing agencies with a series of updates on the transition. These updates include status items such as progress reports, timing and checklists of things to do before the big switch. As these visits were taking place, a formal release was made public with appropriate quotes from each party. With the pending shift less than two months away, the knowns are finally outweighing the unknowns. And that brings me to an important revelation that matters for advertisers today, but may also be significant in the search marketplace for tomorrow.

Yahoo and Microsoft are listening to advertisers and their agencies. In this business it is common practice to hear what advertisers have to say, but then listen to consumers. Google built its highly successful search business by putting nothing above the consumer experience and providing the highest relevance possible to those individuals who use the service. This has created consistent friction with advertisers, who want to find a more productive way into the process than just cutting a check to show up when Google decides it best for the end user. Unfortunately for advertisers, while the Google model has been successful, historically it has not produced the kind of game-changing innovation in ad formats or opportunities that get advertisers to make dramatic shifts in how they allocate budgets or think about a channel.

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Tonight, LeBron James, the basketball superstar and marketing machine, will announce where he will play his home games in the future. For the first seven years of his NBA career, The Chosen One has played for his hometown team, the Cleveland Cavaliers. Now, King James, as he is also known, will chose to either stay with Cleveland or move on to another team, possibly Miami, Chicago or New York. The brand of LeBron is significant. For 2009, James’ estimated endorsement deals totaled $28MM placing him third among all athletes and the #1 basketball player globally. With his pending decision the brand should be growing stronger, more beloved and inching LeBron closer to the hallowed territory of His Airness, Michael Jordan. Jordan, the first great Nike-engineered superstar had a brand that was unsurpassed and still, to this day, is the gold standard for athletes.

This move was to signal the second coming, if not on the basketball court, then certainly across homes around the world of what a superstar athlete can deliver from a personal brand to corporate brands. With that as the backdrop it is staggering to look at the complete airball that LeBron is shooting in the social space leading up to this decision. Let’s break down how the Brand of LeBron has fared poorly in furthering his brand.

Even personal brands don’t get that social media is about the community
On Tuesday, LeBron James officially joined Twitter. Within 24 hours nearly 24,000 people were following @KingJames. So far there have been 2 tweets, one announcing LeBron’s arrival on the platform and the second wishing everyone a good Wednesday morning. In one sense this sums up the value exchange and worth of Twitter for many. On the other hand it paints a stark contrast to the efforts by companies like RadioShack together with athletes like Lance Armstrong and his @livestrong work. Armstrong is LiveStrong and through that support and affiliation with select corporate brands people are now associating him with his Team RadioShack cycling efforts and their combined efforts against cancer. Could this become LeBron’s future on the platform and in a  broader social way? Sure, but the Brand of LeBron is clearly about just that – LeBron at this moment. When the value exchange is so cheap, a follower on Twitter is making no emotional or financial commitment and you often get back what you put in, which is nothing. The brands that have figured out Twitter and other key social platforms are the ones putting more into the community than just themselves.

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“The user interface on Google has changed very little since its inception,
and I think it’s their core vulnerability.”
- Irwin Gotlieb, Global CEO, GroupM

Irwin Gotlieb was quoted in an article for India’s The Economic Times discussing the future competition that would challenge Google’s dominance. Gotlieb suggested that the challenge was likely to come from an unknown in a garage somewhere; he doubted the it be on the algorithm front but rather the user-experience side.

The timing of this article had a fabulous intersection for what was one of the most memorable sporting days in U.S.-England history. Simultaneously, the USA and England soccer (futbol, if prefer) teams were playing for their lives in the World Cup. England carried through with a 1-0 win over Slovenia only to see their pesky afterthought competitors from the U.S. score a stoppage time goal from Landon Donovan to win the Group over England.

As remarkable as the U.S. outcome was, it was not even close to the most amazing U.S.-England sports outcome of the day – and an interesting example of how the commentary about Google’s blind spot could eventually be exposed.

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This article was written by Chris Copeland, CEO, GroupM Search – The Americas, and published on MediaBizBloggers, Tuesday, June 22, 2010. Follow Chris on Twitter – @SearchBoss.

In preparation for this column, I asked the head of my research team at GroupM Search to find a few data points about the difference between true search engines and places where people can search, in addition to other things. The subject line for his reply was “Top ‘Search’ Properties.” His reply provided some of the data I’ll cover in this column, but it also highlighted a major challenge we are now facing in the search space.

Consumers express their intention throughout the digital graph, and our ability to position brands as a proper response is the key to success for advertisers. Today we focus on how much share of voice we can buy in traditional search locations. Every year, studies come out showing the lack of success major brands have in the SEO realm. This bodes ill if they are to take the premise of this column forward into their business. Because whether you consider YouTube or Facebook a “search” property or not, the reality is consumers’ expression of intent is being facilitated through searching and selection on every major site from FourSquare to Twitter to Digg.

The brand opportunity is no longer determining how a brand lives and is found through the sole volume of Google or the full search engine landscape. Rather, the opportunity for brands exists in a broader, more complex group of sites with vastly different approaches to optimization and exposure. Take a look at the chart below from comScore for top “search” properties, noting the volume on sites beyond the Big Three engines:

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Almost a year after launching Bing and revitalizing their Cashback program, Microsoft is bringing an end to their Bing Cashback Shopping and Bing Cashback Search rewards programs, effective July 30. Cited reasons include less than desired profitability and lack of adoption. Microsoft hoped the program would change user behavior of Bing usage by getting users to use Cashback habitually to incent purchases. The official announcement is available on Bing’s Search Blog.

This news is disappointing in terms of the opportunities Cashback presents for advertisers and the needed differentiation a program like Cashback brings for an engine to be competitive in the marketplace. On the heels of Yahoo’s end of the Paid Inclusion program at the start of 2010, this is now two key variants in the marketplace gone from challengers to Google.

Cashback was introduced as a differentiator for Bing when it launched and took significant work on the part of their advertisers and agency partners to implement. Advertisers who invested in IT developments to support site integration for Cashback’s premium program will surely feel a sense of wasted long-term opportunity. Ultimately, this program felt partial baked upon launch, and with significant changes to the Bing focus and leadership, it is safe to say it never released its full potential and thus went the way of many “differentiating” products brought to the search market. Continue reading »

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