Internet Business Daily

Finally, after years with the Adsense product, Google finally reveals how much it takes from the revenue. The secret number: 32% worldwide. This means that publishers keep 68% of revenue generated from running Google Adsense on their site. You can read more about this from the Google Adsense blog post here.

Google has always been a black box when it comes to their cash cows: Adsense and Adwords (the two sides of their advertising product). I think this a great step towards transparency for Google, since for years they held the idea that as long as their stock price keeps going up, investors should be happy even if they had no idea how Google actually calculates revenue.

The 68% revenue is for Adsense for content publishers. Google’s search partners get less coming in at 51%. Google does go on to say that revenue from different products they offer differ because of costs to operate those products, which is understandable. Hopefully over time they will be even more transparant with their products since without partners (content publishers), Google would lose a lot of business.

I just did a Google search and a different look came up. This is the most significant change I’ve seen Google do at one time. I’m not sure if this new page has been rolled out to everyone, or is just being tested. The Google logo is now bigger and crisper. The search bar seems to be more 3D. Even the fonts look different. Check it out (click image to see bigger size):

I just noticed that Google has finally implemented their Search Wiki. I am not sure if this is just for a select number of users for now, but it seems like a pretty cool feature. Basically, it is like a Digg (ratings) system for Google’s search results. I see a lot of potential for manipulation however. I have a feeling Google’s ratings system doesn’t hold too much value in the overall formula but rather it is more for personalized search. Instead of the ratings results affecting the overall rankings, I think it just affects the individuals. Below is what it looks like. Just to be sure, is everyone else seeing this?

I was doing some quick research into how Google determines the best colors, fonts, sizes, placement, images, and everything else they do on their search results pages to optimize them the best and I came across this image. A while back, Google did an experiment to test where people’s eyes move on a results page. The results of the experiment are pretty obvious but it is still cool to see how people’s brains work. This image also demonstrates the importance of having the #1 spot for a keyword. The difference between #1 and #2 is astonishing. Check out the image below:

A little over a year ago I made a post to try to get my name, Matthew Berman, to the number 1 position in Google for my search term. When I started I was at #7 and there were at least 3 .edu domains ahead of me. Since then I haven’t put too much effort into it but I have made the move to #2.

Today, my friend Skwerl informed me that he saw my site in position #1. When I took a look, I still saw #2. Now the first thing people will think is: sure, if you’re in different locations you are going to get different results. This is not the case since Skwerl works at the same company as I do. He is on the same IP address as me. He then sent me the screen shot shown below:

Skwerl then noticed that when he went to the search results page in Firefox, I was actually in position #2. I checked it out myself and to my surprise, Firefox was showing different results than Safari. Here is what the same exact search results page looks like in Firefox:

So basically what we see here is Google’s thought process that people who use different browsers want different search results. I wonder how they came to the conclusion that people using Safari wanted to see more of me than people using Firefox. Since I’m a die-hard Firefox user, I must say I’m a little offended.

Someone on the WickedFire forums pointed out that Google’s Keyword External tool now had actual search volume data. Before all it had was a green bar, which didn’t give any useful information. Now it gives the actual number of searches per month (estimate), which is exponentially more valuable. Take a look:

This is definitely one of my favorite keyword/research tools and is listed in the research section of my Internet Business Guide. If you haven’t used this tool yet I highly suggest taking a look. You can get everything from keyword suggestions to CPC prices and now relatively accurate search volume.

I am a huge fan of Google Maps. I use it almost every day for everything from finding a place to eat to checking traffic before I head home. I even use it on my iPhone on a daily basis.

Today, right before I left work, I went to check the traffic reports and noticed a very cool upgrade to their traffic system. Normally they only have red, yellow, and green to signal volume of traffic. Now they have added another indicator: red and black. Whenever traffic is between 0-15mph it is signaled by a red and black line. This is great news.

Sometimes when I would check traffic reports and it would say red (which was 0-30mph before) I would sometimes risk taking the freeway. Now with red and black I can really tell if it’s closer to 30mph or more like a parking lot. Here’s what it looks like (yes, this is what LA usually looks like):

Source: Search Engine Journal

True….oh so true…

Cloud Computing Basics
Google’s newest service it is offering is access to its “cloud.” Cloud is short for cloud computing, or distributed computing. Basically, how the cloud works, is by making lots of everyday home computers act like one giant supercomputer through the use of software, also called virtualization. This software, named MapReduce, is one of the main reasons why Google is so far ahead of its competitors. Instead of having to buy and maintain an expensive server that can support millions of users, cloud computing allows for lots of low cost machines to accomplish the same task. Whenever a machine breaks, it can be replaced without disturbing the cloud.

Cloud as a Service
Now that Google is offering its cloud as a service, everyone will be able to tap into the same machines that power such products as Gmail, Google Search, and Google Docs. There are both positives and negatives associated with this. Firstly, we will be giving Google even more information about ourselves and our websites. Like they need any more competitive data. Second, there will be limits on the amount of processing power each developer can use. To being, Google will offer 500mb and up to 5 million pageviews as part of its web app engine. Another negative is that there will most likely be little customization possibility.

On the positive side, developers will have the peace of mind to know their apps and websites are running on the most stable servers in the world. There will be virtually zero down time, and speed will be off the charts.

What Does This Mean?
Google is far from the first company to have this type of offering. Amazon already has a very similar and successful cloud service called EC2 (Elastic Compute Cloud). From a business aspect however, this is still a very smart move by CEO Eric Schmidt. Google already has the “biggest” cloud on earth, and a transition from the desktop windows system to a fully online computer network is imminent. The money will be in which computer network all the information sits on. If I am Google, and I am hosting all of your information and applications, I can charge you to use it. Although Google says its purpose is to index, sort, and make easy to find all the information in the world, they want to be the gatekeepers and charge for access. Whether the charge is direct, or through the viewing of ads, Google still profits.

I was just adding a couple entries into Google Calender and found something that I believe is an April Fool’s joke. There is now a button when adding an event that says “I’m Feeling Lucky.” This is just like the button on the Google.com homepage.

I don’t remember ever seeing this button there before, so immediately I thought “April Fools” and clicked the button. Clicking “I’m Feeling Lucky” entered an event into my calender. Here are some examples of the “lucky” events added:

All of the events were dates with famous people. Not Google’s best prank, but funny none-the-less.