Total Marketing Solutions

What does MSN’s announcement of cashback for users of its live search mean for PPC advertisers and online marketing consultants?
In a previous post, I mentioned advertisers who spend significant amounts with Google Adwords but do not use Yahoo Search Marketing or Microsoft AdCenter. The main reason for this is that, for most companies, neither Yahoo nor MSN deliver enough volume to make the effort worthwhile. (It’s also worth saying that neither has an interface as easy-to-use as Google’s.) And in the volume game, MSN finishes a poor third for UK advertisers.
So hats off to MSN. This is an innovative attempt to shake up a market that is at risk of becoming a monopoly. Anyone who is familiar with Affiliate Marketing will recognise the concept immediately – but instead of the advertiser paying the commission to the affiliate, the search engine will pay commission to the customer. It will only work if searchers like the concept, and more of them defect to MSN – and stay with MSN, increasing their share of the market. And they will only stay with MSN if the search results, and in the case the paid results, deliver relevant results. So it’s back to square one, because most searchers use Google because they believe that the results it delivers are more relevant. For my part, I think this cashback initiative is just the first step in the next phase of the search war, following Microsoft’s failed bid for Yahoo. I believe that Yahoo and Google will fight back, and at this stage my money’s still on Google to keep its lead in the battle.

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