Posts under ‘Observations’

Jeremy Palmer of “Quit Your Day Job” has launched a free training course called “The Black Ink Project” for beginning affiliate marketers. It’s a 4-week program consisting a 5 Webinars M-F each week with a week off between modules. The first module began this week and if the first 2 Webinars are any indication, this is going to be the definitive resource for anyone thinking about getting started with affiliate marketing.

I promise this will be the last post I make for a while regarding Google Slaps. However, I do want to summarize a few observations now that the dust has settled somewhat. Who knows, not that any of this is solid evidence of anything, but sometimes you can glean a bit about how the internals of a black box work by observing the effects of external stimulii on the behavior of the black box.

Since there really appears to be little consistency in how Google Slaps are administered, especially this last one, my theory (gut feeling) is that Google goes through these events to periodically clean out their advertising inventory.

Since we really have no way of truly knowing what Google wants with regard to their Adwords Quality Score, perhaps instead, we should find ways to make lemonade from the lemons Google has turned many of our campaigns into. What I’m proposing is pure opportunism, but that seems to be what a lot of online businesses are resorting to these days.

The latest Google Slap seems to be particularly bizarre in both the way it played out as well as what it has left in its wake. Granted, Google Slaps are nerve wracking events any way you slice them, but this one is giving me chills.

Like many Americans, I’ve been following the progress of the 2008 US Presidential campaigns. I’m probably spending way too much time with the likes of CNBC’s Chris Matthews (”Hardball”) and Keith Olbermann (”Countdown With Keith Olbermann) on the TV most week nights. But it’s all just too enthralling for me to tear myself away.

I can’t really say why, since none of the candidates on either side of the great political divide interests me much at all.

Well, the numbers are finally in and the US retail sector had its worst holiday season in 5 years. Economists had been predicting this even before the 2007 holiday shopping season kicked into gear. Actually, anyone paying any attention at all to the dire economic news — sub-prime mortgage mess, turmoil in the credit markets, and ever rising food and energy prices, could have seen this coming from way off

It was only a matter of time before the US consumer started putting a clamp on spending.