On a recent Backwards Gang episode of the Gillmor Gang (hard to tell which one eh?), Jason argues about AdSense being more like Direct Marketing and that it will be the incumbent form of marketing for next few decades. He also touches upon the YouTube/AdSense relationship at his blog
Well, he’s partially right but he’s missing one important part of the recipe.

I agree that AdSense is more like Direct Marketing than advertising and  it’s way more efficient than prior forms af advertising given that it’s pay-per-click.
The important piece of the puzzle that Jason is missing is the quality list, something of a cornerstone for Direct Mail or Email advertising.
A better list is a better open-rate, and a bigger ROI.

The fact that AdSense is only contextual is a shortcoming, and for both Google and the advertisers, making it more efficient will make more money for each respectively.

Despite it being pay-per-click, more click-throughs mean more revenue for both Google and the advertiser.

Where is the quality list in AdSense?

You could argue that it’s in the context of the web page, but this is only superficially true.

To rev things up, or “press on the gas,” as Jason would say, a bit of behavioral targeting needs to be added to the mix.

Get more of these ads in front of people who really want them, or are at a particular point of the buying cycle and your CTRs will go up, and revenue will follow.

This can all work in conjunction with contextual data, but will enhance contextual delivery immensely.

So while I agree with Jason’s prediction that AdSense will dominate for years to come, I think Google must improve upon it, or else risk losing marketshare to a behaviorally enhanced version of adsense that may provide a similar ROI, but in a condensed amount of time, which equates to money.

If Jason thinks that Google will rise to Microsoft levels of dominance in this space, they are going to have to address the quality list or lead, in this case, by the use of behavioral targeting.

I think they will. In fact, I think  it will be an integral part of their Cost-Per-Action experimentation that began when the rumblings about click-fraud were at a peak.

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Steve Gillmor and meta-meta-data. It reminds me of the recent report on Powerset, a new search engine that uses natural speech.

While Google counts books “for” children, books “by” children, and books “about” children similarly, Powerset does not.

And just like facial and tonal gestures which change the meaning of something we say, so will the meta-meta gestures change the information we receive when we ask for it, or simply imply the need for it.

But Steve is still talking aboutexplicit gestures, recorded from a keyboard and mouse.

I refer to a point I made some time back about passive, negative gestures.

And the best examle I came up with was geo-location. By virtue of the fact that I am in Texas, I provide a passive, negative gesture to my local saloon that I am not interested in a happy hour special which is happening in twenty minutes.

Despite the fact that thus far, every explicit gesture I’ve ever recorded indicates that I should be.

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Jeneane Sessum with some thought-proking ideas about Attention.

. . .anyone concerned with what you’re paying attention to is out to make money off of you. Trying to paint attention monitoring or tracking or trust or what have you as anything other than that is dishonest.

Hmmm. . .

I think there are exceptions, though rare.

But there are also differences in the way people make money off of their customers.

Providing a valuable service is a lot different than war-profiteering, no?

Thanks to Kent Newsome for the link.

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My big push this week was for full-text feeds in the RSS feeds from all Tribune newspapers sites.

Not a new argument by any means but . . .(cue up quotable excerpt)
In the light of the blogosphere going apeshit over Dave’s “mobile river of news,” I think it’s more critical than ever that media companies stop clinging to the out-dated page-view model and begin offering full-text feeds.

Added: See what I mean? If we concentrate on relationships and not traffic, we will get paid more. Huh? The doctor uses a scalpel not a cave-man club. Whuh? The graduate student studies The Battle of Gettysburg, the 8th grader studies American History (And never gets past World War I). Is it clear now?

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Einstein asked in 1954, “Can we visualize a 3D universe which is finite yet unbounded?”

Steve Gillmor answers a resounding yes, unleashing a Big Bang that may mark the moment in history when the uncleansed masses bought their liberation from the “man who sold the world”, Nick Carr.
Did he pull a rabbit from his hat? Or has the rabbit died, signifying the conception of a new web.

One where gestures rule over links, where metadata outshines data.

Nothing left here boys, but an empty silk hat.

“Now Frosty, being made of snow, was the fastest bellywhopper in the world.”

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Kent, Kent, Kent!! I love ya buddy but slow down here , I think.

And Tom Morris concurs, I think.

I suppose by linking to them , I can’t also support the idea of gestures, but I don’t think that’s the case.

I’ll just put one half-baked thought out there for now. The discussion really needs a podcast, and I’m trying to get motivated on that one OPML gang. I’m just busy.

Links are dead. Long live Links.

Right, now links are the king of how we get information. Google PageRank, Technorati rank, etc.

Okay we agree.

But wait. We filter out Spam Blogs and SEO sharks so that we get better results.

But wait. We add context and history and dare I say “Attention” data to get better results.

But wait. We add the wisdom of the crowd to get better results.

There is so much additional metadata that is, could be, and will be added to the tools we use to get and give information, that you must at least agree the link is overrated.

As I’ve said before. If I write a good post reviewing a new cell phone and engadget writes nonsense and mentions that same phone, who do you think will show up higher in a Google search.

That indicates a system that is broken. But it doesn’t yet want to fix itself, because links are the basis of it’s economy.

Now, you may have heard about Google’s talk about pay-per-action as opposed to pay-per-click.

In that case, the point isn’t to get as many click-throughs as possible, but to entice the right person through the door. One who has the right intentions.

The way you do that is by examining what they have been paying attention to and what gestures they have implied.

I agree all of this can be rather silly sounding, but I have one real example that I gave to Steve Gillmor. and maybe you think this is as ridiculous as Scoble’s example (I’m not linking).

It’s happy hour and a local pub wants to draw a crowd in with a beer special.

You’ve been a patron there before and payed with your GoogleWallet. They know you like Guiness.
Fine, send out a text message to all who bought Guiness in the last year during the hours of 5 to 8, offering a free cascading treat.

But wait. The web service polls for my geocode and realizes my cell phone is in Austin, Texas.

I have just made a implicit negative gesture that I don’t want that message.

Damn, and I was thirsty.

A link is one of the most useful tools we have in the bag right now., but it doesn’t always have to be that way.

Me, I’m counting on the teleport to be the winner.

“Kosso had 500 people teleport to the RSS platform. Must be a an authority Flissl!” ; )

Don’t bother filing a patent on Pay-Per-Teleport. I already did.

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