Go to Google and type in “automatic matching” and you will find hundreds of articles and blog postings. Ever since Google announced they were adding a new type of keyword matching to select clients’ campaigns, the industry has been abuzz with feedback…. Mostly of the negative variety.

An example used in many articles says that automatic matching would allow for a sneaker company’s ad to show up for a somewhat related word, such as ‘slipper.’ Is this quality traffic?

After a rough start to 2008, it’s easy to see why this would be a benefit to Google. This new match type will almost certainly increase revenue from ad spend.

So this leaves one question, why would anyone want to use this type of keyword matching? Well, it actually could be a good thing for some companies that bid on very competitive terms and find it hard to compete. This could be a good opportunity for them to get more exposure or attract a new audience. In the end, only time will tell how this all pans out for Google, marketing agencies, companies and searchers.

I’m sure everyone heard the news a few weeks ago that Microsoft made an offer to buy Yahoo for $44.6 billion. Here’s a quick recap. Soon after the announcement, Yahoo’s stock went up, then Yahoo declined Microsoft’s offer, saying that they would like to hold out for better suitors. Is Yahoo holding out for more money, or do they just not want to sell to Microsoft? Yahoo said they would decide by March 14, but time is ticking.

Other suitors have expressed interest during Yahoo’s delay, including Time Warner Inc.’s AOL and News Corp.’s MySpace.com. Yahoo claims that they are not delaying the Microsoft deal in hopes they will come to a deal with either AOL or MySpace, but that they are trying to elect board members to the Yahoo committee to decide on the impending deal. They could also be waiting for a better offer from Microsoft, which some analysts say will probably happen.

Another issue has arisen since the delay in the deal, the U.S. economy. There are concerns about how well the online advertising market will fare in this lackluster economy. The economic worries have contributed to a twenty-one percent decline in Internet search and advertising leader Google Inc.’s stock price since Microsoft pounced on Yahoo. An alliance with MySpace.com looked like Yahoo’s most likely escape route a couple weeks ago, but talks with AOL have recently heated up. Hopefully a conclusion to this deal will happen soon, but it does look probable to me that Microsoft will purchase Yahoo.

I recently came across an interesting site which is dubbed the “Anti-Google”. Daniel Brandt has been running his own search engine called Scroogle for just over three years. Scroogle carries no advertising and relies on small donations from users. Scroogle’s traffic has doubled every year and now attracts over 100,000 visitors a day. The popularity and growth of this search engine has been attributed to one factor: Privacy.

Scroogle keeps no record of who is using its site or what they are looking for. Within an hour of using the site, the search terms are gone forever. Many of the big search engines have taken notice and have been tightening up their privacy policies. Ask.com has recently offered a new service called “Ask Eraser” which will wipe out a searcher’s queries within hours.
Google has often been criticized for collecting and storing personal user information. Google and MSN’s search engines both store personal information for 18 months. Yahoo and AOL retain search requests for 13 months. This information can be used in a court of law. Storing this info has proved useful for catching online criminals, but often times the personal information is exploited. Divorce lawyers have been known to subpoena search-engine firms looking for dirt on warring spouses. This is why many searchers have become savvy and have chosen to use search engines that keep this personal information private.

The increase of Scroogle and similar proxy type search engines is a concerning issue for SEM and Google advertisers. The search results on these engines do not show any ads. While only a small number of people currently use these engines, the number is apt to increase unless Google and the big engines start to take user privacy into more serious consideration.