So it looks like Marchex is now using thumbnails next to PPC ads on their parking pages as well. I first reported seeing this new feature rolled out on some of Frank Schilling's parked domains in this observation a few weeks ago: Frank Schilling is at it once again... Looking to innovate domain parking setup and tap into more effective optimization and monetization but few days later once I published the story the thumbnails were gone, in other words taken off of the parked domains. Now I come across some domains owned by Marchex and noticed that they are using the same setup but it's done a lot better.
I wrote two month's ago about this updates getting rolled out sooner than later this year: The next big thing to happen in the domain parking game... Can you guess what it is? So anyways, Frank Schilling just had six of his own static images rotate next to PPC ads #1 through #5. Marchex has a better and smarter setup. They are using the image inventory by Worth A Thousand Words from a company called Image Advantage, which is Yahoo's partner. The thumbnails matched up to PPC ads are actually relevant and compliment the PPC advertisements quiet well. It looks very nice overall and creates a more engaging and appealing user experience. We all like "pretty things" right?
The top five sponsored results are PPC advertisements from Yahoo's search marketing system. The last three are from Marchex own powered "Adhere" program where Marchex has signed up their own advertisers. So they are mixing up the ad inventory which is very interesting because I do not recall seeing top tier Yahoo or Google PPC ads ever getting mixed together with tier 2/3 ads on parked pages. Marchex has a large portfolio of domains though and tons of traffic so it looks like they were able to work this out somehow. Nice!
Also another interesting thing I noticed about Marchex parked pages is that if you search on them for a phrase that is trademarked such as "amazon" or "facebook" they redirect you to a Google parked page. Nothing too fancy... Just the standard adsense-for-domains lander. The same thing happens if you search for porn related queries or just totally irrelevant ones such as "dsfksdjkjdsf" it seems. So what does this mean? Well, instead of showing a 2-click category based lander as they normally would they are now using Google's system to backfill the ad inventory that Yahoo cannot monetize. This is very smart and will ensure they squeeze out as much profits as possible.
Yahoo is more strict on trademarks when compared to Google who is pretty loose and also Google has of course a larger PPC ad inventory overall which is no secret because they have many more advertisers participating in Google AdWords. I don't know if this Google backfill is new or not but I just thought I'd mention it while we are talking about Marchex. The thumbnails next to PPC ads are definitely a new development. Overall it does look like Marchex is trying to make the most of what they got and not afraid to experiment with new features. My predictions are coming true.. Slowly but surely this feature will be rolled out to all the rest of the domain parking feeds that are powered by Yahoo. Give it a few more month's. I hope the rest of my predictions will come true... Come on Yahoo, listen to me. I know what I'm talking about. Do it! :)
Observations at WannaDevelop.com
02/23/2010: Dozens of Amazon affiliate stores for sale.. Developed by DomainMassDevelopment.com 01/11/2010: Wanna be part-owner of DomainState.com with myself and a few others? Ok, read this now... 11/02/2009: FS gets it on with WP... It's about time, no??!?! 08/24/2009: If all else fails... Who is gonna pay the bills?!! 08/22/2009: Frank Schilling has the winning formula $$$$$$
