Over the past few weeks Google has released data on top search and YouTube video watching trends, highlighting what issues, entertainers, events and figures most powerfully captured the attention of the Internet population.

We here at the Agency Ad Solutions Blog have also compiled our top stories list of 2010, which show that the topics most relevant to our agency partners are the evolution of ad platforms (such as display and mobile), the need for powerful data and tools to manage accounts at scale, and the desire for resources to navigate the increasingly complex display ecosystem.

Below are the top stories of the year, as reflected in your readership:

New programs for agencies - We heard from you that you need relevant training at scale, cost-effective AdWords API pricing, and a centralized way to acquire new clients. In late April, we launched 3 programs to meet these needs -- a new Google AdWords Certification program for those managing AdWords accounts on behalf of advertisers; Google Partner Search, an online, searchable directory that helps advertisers identify Certified Partners to help with AdWords account management; and preferred AdWords API pricing, which gives qualified Google AdWords Certified Partners who manage client AdWords accounts free use of the AdWords API based on managed client spend.

Display advertising - While we didn't officially bring sexy back to display until September, you all expressed your interest and enthusiasm for display opportunities throughout the year. Hot topics included remarketing, the introduction of the Google Display Network, and the four-part Google Display Network series.

Managing accounts at scale - As agencies, the core of your business is effectively managing media spend across many clients. With the media landscape becoming increasingly complex with every passing day, it can be a challenge to keep up-to-speed on the latest opportunities, and incorporate them into client strategy. The need for effective account management tools was clear in your preferred blog topics -- broad match modifier, which balances reach with control; the updated Keyword Tool, with increased functionality; the Ads Multiplier plug-in for Docs to create templated ads at scale; and Google Ad Innovations, a single home for all of the latest and greatest ads launches.

A home for planners - Different roles within agencies need resources specific to their day-to-day responsibilities. This was none more apparent than for Account and Media Planners, who crave the latest data and insights to develop targeted and innovative strategies. For this role we partnered with our friends in DoubleClick to keep content fresh on Ad Planner, including the launch of the Ad Planner 1000 and integration with AdWords, the availability of Audience Interests, and a carry over from 2009 -- enhancements to Ad Planner and DoubleClick for Advertisers.

The year of mobile - It has been coming for years, but in 2010 it finally arrived. The year of mobile. You voraciously read tips and tactics shared in the 3-part "Going Mobile in 2010" series, as well as took advantage of training opportunities for mobile optimization best practices. With the launch of the Google Mobile Ads Blog, we'll have even richer mobile ads content for you in 2011, courtesy of our friends in the Google blog community.

The blog could not succeed without you, our loyal readers -- thank you. We look forward to continuing to bring you the content you need to be successful in 2011.

Posted by Katie Wasilenko, Agency Team

[Cross-posted from the Google Retail Blog]

Do you know “The Smart Shopper"? The Smart Shopper is constantly connected and always mobile. The Smart Shopper values on-line information, researches on-line then shops in-store, and uses a smartphone while shopping.

You can see the smart shopper in action by watching the first two videos in our Smart Shopper series.

The Smart Shopper: Constantly Connected
An exclusive look into consumers’ research and purchase process.



The Smart Shopper: Always Mobile

A clear snapshot of how smartphones are changing the way consumers research and shop.



Use these Smart Shopper insights to help formulate your 2011 marketing plan. Engage the smart shopper by creating compelling video and display ads, developing a cohesive mobile strategy, and using an integrated multi-channel marketing campaign.

Posted by Heidi Spector, Google Retail Team

It’s no secret that video consumption is growing. Fast. As more devices find their places in people’s homes and pockets, more video consumption is happening across live and time-shifted TV, computers, tablets, and mobile phones. What is most interesting, is while online video consumption has exploded, time spent watching TV has in fact also continued to grow, with the average US adult clocking in 158 hours of TV time per month.*

People are simply consuming more content than ever before and TV is still the center of that experience, remaining an effective way to broadcast your message to a national audience of engaged viewers. What's more is the link between TV and online behavior continues to emerge and strengthen, especially considering that nearly 60% of people now watch TV and surf the internet simultaneously.* If you're rolling your eyes at the prospect of spending media dollars on a mass medium like TV, hear us out because we believe that television advertising is still relevant and has become better targeted. Whether you’re a seasoned TV buyer or just beginning to think about offline media, a strategic approach to integrating TV into your larger media plan is absolutely critical. When planning, consider the following: marketing objectives, target audience, and seasonality.

Identifying marketing objectives is the first, most crucial step. What are the outcomes you’re anticipating from TV advertising? Is the goal of your campaign general branding or to increase sales of a specific product? As you can tell, different objectives lead to a very different budget allocation, core message (approach to creative), and campaign success metrics. For example, if your TV campaign goal is to sell 1,000,000 units of product X, your creative should contain specific production information, direct calls-to-action and at least one sales outlet (i.e. 1-800 number , a specific website URL, in-store coupon code, or all of the above). Using trackable mechanisms brings a new dimension to ROI measurement in TV, especially with innovations like Google's call reporting feature.

What about targeting? Increased viewership fragmentation within the TV universe (more program/network choices in any given time slot) has actually make it easier to pinpoint your target audience on TV since programming has become so interest specific. For instance, to reach females 25-54 who enjoy cooking and gardening, networks including Food Network and HGTV immediately come to mind. What’s great about Google’s TV Ads platform is that we’ve taken targeting even further by introducing technology and search-based targeting tools to the TV buying process. Google TV Ads allows you to choose specific networks, programs and even defined audiences based on demographics and interests. These features allow you to find and target your audience across 100+ networks reaching nearly 35M homes in the US, or almost 1/3 of the US population through one single platform.*

Lastly, timing and seasonality are of key importance. If your product or service is impacted by seasonality, it’s important to plan well in advance. For example, New Year resolutions bring finances, weight loss and fitness to people’s minds – a perfect opportunity for advertisers in these spaces to increase marketing efforts and reach consumers at this critical time. Planning in advance will allow you to have the required budgets and a sense of which media targets to hit as we ring in the New Year. To learn more about Google TV Ads and how to launch a targeted TV campaign in minutes, please visit www.google.com/tvads.

*Source: The Nielsen Company., Three Screen Report Q1’2010
*Google TV Ads will offer nearly 35M homes in 2011 with the integration of new cable partners DIRECTV and Verizon FiOs.

Posted by Chris Henrotin and Neha Mandel, TV Ads Team

Long lines at the shops got you down? Dreading yet another ugly sweater party or family cookie exchange? Kicking yourself for not becoming Google AdWords certified in 2010?

No need to fret, there’s still plenty of time left in the year. To become Google AdWords certified, you simply need to pass the Google Advertising Fundamentals Exam plus one of the three advanced exams (offered for Search Advertising, Reporting and Analysis, and Display). You can register for exams here, and take them from the comfort of your own office or home -- the perfect activity to do while sitting in front of a cozy fire waiting for mysterious, magical home invaders to bring you gifts. As an added bonus, you’ll be able to give your company the holiday gift of an additional certified individual to add to its profile page!

In addition, we’ve made it easy for you to prepare for the exams. The AdWords Learning Center offers text lessons (some with interactive modules) for each topic on the exam, which you can review at your own pace. In addition, if you can’t quite squeeze in training this year, we have AdWords Seminars for Success in early 2011 in a number of major cities throughout the US.

For more information, please visit the Google AdWords Certification Program homepage.

Posted by Katie Wasilenko, Agency Team

We posted additional information about upcoming changes to the way our third party partners should provide reports and information about AdWords to their clients, including a document outlining what advertisers should expect when working with a third party partner and how to notify us at Google about violations of our policies.

We believe that most of your already provide this information to your clients and won't need to make any changes to your systems. Visit the Inside AdWords blog to learn more.

Posted by Jason Shafton, Product Marketing Manager

Roy’s Restaurants has landed on a recipe for success with Google Mobile Ads. By using hyperlocal advertising and creating mobile-only AdWords campaigns, Roy’s was able to drive 40% more calls and ultimately more customers to their stores. Visit the Google Mobile Ads Blog to learn how Roy’s and its agency, G&M Plumbing, have implemented mobile best practices to achieve an 800% ROI.

Posted by Dai Pham, Google Mobile Ads Product Marketing

We're pleased to share another tips and tools update from our friends at the Inside AdWords Blog. We hope you find it useful for optimizing clients' keywords.

- The Agency Ad Solutions Blog Team

We want to thank you for all the feedback you’ve given us on the Keyword Tool. The first thing you told us is that you want more keywords that are better targeted to your account and searches, and we’ve made improvements in this area. We’ve also added features such as better filters, the ability to star keywords, and copy them as text. And we’re not done yet! You can help us understand what’s important to you by continuing to provide us with feedback. Below is a more detailed look at some of our new features.

There are three new ways to filter and refine your keyword list. With our new updates, you can:

1. Choose specific terms to include or exclude from your keyword list.
2. Use the ‘More like these’ button to search for terms that are similar to the specific keyword ideas you've selected from the table.
3. Get only results that include the exact words or phrases (and their close synonyms) you’ve typed in the search box.

Adding stars to keywords
Add stars to keywords that you'd like to save while you're still searching for new keyword ideas. You can review your starred keywords in the "Stars" panel on the left side of the tool.

‘View as text’ button
View your selected keywords in text form, so that you can easily edit them and paste them in a spreadsheet or AdWords Editor.

Posted by Alexandra Kenin, Product Marketing Manager

Today we announce a new family of ad formats called TrueView Video Ads. TrueView Video Ads give viewers choice and control over which advertiser’s message they want to see and when. And we charge advertisers only when a viewer has chosen to watch your ad, not when an impression is served.

Why are we offering cost-per-view video ads? We believe this model creates wins for everyone: consumers choose ads that are more relevant to them; advertisers more precisely find the audiences they want; and content creators continue to fund great content with an ad experience that is less intrusive.

In the end, it will also be the creativity of agencies and advertisers who will win. It’s not about being funny or clever – it’s about delivering the right message to the right person at the right time. And TrueView Video Ads can help get you and your client there, combining the brand engagement and reach of YouTube with the conversion tracking and optimization of online advertising.

Our first available cost-per-view format is TrueView Video Ads - InStream format. Viewers can choose to skip a video ad after 5 seconds or watch the ad. An advertiser only gets charged when the viewer has watched the full ad or 30 seconds, whichever is shorter.

If you’re interested in trying out TrueView Video Ads, contact your account manager today. This ad format is available for customers in the US and Canada and in limited testing for advertisers in the UK. We are working to add availability in additional countries.

For the complete announcement, please visit the Inside AdWords Blog.

Posted by Phil Farhi, Senior Product Manager, The YouTube Team

DoubleClick Ad Planner just made it easier to plan media buys for regional ad campaigns through two important upgrades.

First, the product has been localized to support 15 languages. In addition to American English, Ad Planner can now be displayed in British English, Russian, simplified Chinese, traditional Chinese, Japanese, Korean, Thai, French, German, Italian, Spanish, Dutch, Portuguese and Turkish.

Second, the Ad Planner team has published lists of the top 100 sites in each of 22 regional markets. Named the “Ad Planner 100,” these lists provide a quick reference to identify the most popular sites by country. Check out the Ad Planner 100 lists for the countries you advertise within:

Australia Belgium Brazil Canada China France Germany Hong Kong

Italy Japan Korea Netherlands Poland Russia Spain

Switzerland Taiwan Thailand Turkey United Kingdom United States

Posted by Sally Cole, Product Marketing Manager

[note: this post has been reprinted from the DoubleClick Blog]

Hi Agency Blog readers! I am back for year 2 of my Black Friday tips. Enjoy!
~ Ben

It may be hard to believe (and a little scary), but Thanksgiving is next week and Black Friday is only 8 days away! (Momentary pause while the shock settles in) With this daunting thought in mind, there are two things to consider that should make the holiday shopping weekend go as smoothly (and hopefully as profitably for clients) as possible -- holiday promotion ads and a Black Friday placement pack.

1. When it comes to the holiday season, one of the clearest trends we have picked up on is that ads with promotions perform better than ads that don’t (seems that consumers like deals. Strange, I know). If clients have any upcoming promotions (free shipping, a percent off, sales, etc.), all ads should be promoting these. This is especially true if they have Black Friday specific sales. If this is the case, make a point of saying “Black Friday Sale” or indicate that this is a limited time only (“Fri – Sun”, “This Weekend Only”, etc.).
   
   If you plan on creating and implementing ads specifically for Black Friday and the shopping weekend after Thanksgiving, be sure to implement them in the account by the end of day Tuesday (11/23) to give them enough time to make it through the ad approval process.
   
   
2. Some of your clients may want to do a bit more than just create new ads for next week. If you have a client that would like to target users actively looking for Black Friday deals, then you may want to create a display campaign targeting sites that aggregate such deals. Using the Placement Tool in your AdWords account, search for words such as ‘black friday’ and ‘black friday sales’ to identify sites that would be good to target. With this list, there are two possible ways to use it:

• Create a campaign to target only managed placements and have a single ad group that contains all of these placements.
• Create a campaign with the same settings, but have multiple ad groups with keyword themes and set them to target these placements, creating an Enhanced Online Campaign. For example, if you have a cosmetics client, you might want to have a few ad groups with themes like “makeup”, “hair products”, “ cosmetics”, etc. Then, targeting these Black Friday placements, you will be in a better position to place ads in front of consumers looking for deals around products your client sells.

For either of these, set it to run starting this Friday (11/19) through EOD Sunday (11/28). If clients have deals carrying through cyber Monday, then extend it another day.

As always, with all of your clients, make sure that your budgets and bids are adjusted for this busy weekend. With the increase in traffic, budgets can get depleted more quickly (resulting in campaigns stopping ads from being shown) and competitors bid more aggressively. Make sure that budgets are set to keep campaigns running throughout the day and increase bids to maintain positions.

These can be stressful times in the online advertising world, but if you plan ahead by implementing things early and position your clients in front of customers looking for deals around their products, you can help to make this a great season!

Posted by Ben Sheldon, Agency Team

[This has been cross-posted from the Inside AdWords Blog]

As part of our Google Images redesign this July, we introduced Image Search Ads, which include a thumbnail alongside your ad text. We learned that on Google Images, image-based ads provided great results for our advertisers. They are also a highly useful format for users because they show commercial content directly related to the user's query.

Today we're expanding the image ad formats available on Google Images by testing rich media leaderboard units that appear above Google Images search results and invite you to try new products and services. With the introduction of this display ad format on Google Images, you now have a great opportunity to reach users with engaging ads, whether your goal is to build brand awareness, or to drive clicks and conversions.

Advertising on Google Images allows you to reach hundreds of millions of users around the world who use the site to find relevant photos and images every week. Today display ads on Google Images are available on a small fraction of queries in the US and UK only. Over time, we hope to make display ads on Google Images available on more queries globally.

Display ads on Google Images work the same as they would on other sites in the Google Display Network. They're triggered by the content on the page - in this case, that’s defined by the category of the search term that the user enters. If, for example, you target your ad to appear on Google Images on travel-related content, your ad may appear on Google Images if a user searches for related terms like [travel], [vacation], [beach] or [summer holiday].

It’s easy to start running display ads on Google Images. Just use the AdWords placement targeting tool to target Google Images like any other site on the Google Display Network, and choose the type of content you want to advertise alongside. You can upload your own leaderboard format ad or create one using Display Ad Builder. Pricing can be either CPM or CPC, depending on your goals. If you want more information about the advertising options on Google Images, visit the Help Center.

We’re invested in making display advertising work better for both users and advertisers. We look forward to introducing new, innovative placements and formats on the Google Display Network to help you reach your advertising goals.

Posted by Nathan Beach, Product Manager

YouTube provides a creative canvas for anyone with the gumption and a video camera to build an online marketing campaign that can reach millions. Orabrush is a company founded by a dentist to sell a tongue brush that would fight bad breath. After attempts to use traditional marketing channels failed, Jeffrey Harmon thought up a marketing campaign built around a YouTube video to spread the word about this new product. That first video cost $500 and has since earned the company over 13 million views, setting it on the path as an innovator in online video marketing.

Join a live Webcast with AdAge on Tuesday, November 16th at 11amPST / 2pmEST to hear Jeffrey Harmon and Abe Neiderhauser share their thoughts about what works and what doesn’t with online video advertising.

Posted by Serena Satyasai, YouTube Marketing

Our friends on the German Agency Team just launched Google Business Map, a new resource on business opportunities in 21 emerging markets.

Google Business Map provides details on each country's advertising market, Google search data and useful info bites to help you understand the unique panorama of emerging markets around the globe, spanning from the Atlantic Coast through Central and Eastern Europe around the Mediterranean Sea down to South Africa and, naturally, to China as one of the fastest growing economies worldwide. In addition, it offers unique contacts with local people who are pleased to help you explore and encounter these new and exciting places.


All of these countries have in common fast growing markets, rising middle classes, an ambitious younger generation, a high level of literacy and technology penetration and, last but not least, a “can do spirit” that characterizes every striving business person all over the world.

For more information, see the complete announcement on the Google Barometer Blog, or download Google Business Map here.

Posted by Agency Ad Solutions Blog Team

[This has been cross-posted from the Google Mobile Ads Blog]

Usage of m.youtube.com is exploding and mobile consumers watch hundreds of millions of video views on YouTube Mobile each month. To better understand these users and their browsing and video consuming behavior we recently ran a survey of users on m.youtube.com and received >16,000 responses. Some of the results may surprise you:

• 75% of respondents say that mobile is their primary way of accessing YouTube
• 70% visit YouTube Mobile at least once a day
• 58% spend more than 20 minutes per visit to YouTube Mobile
• 38% feel that YouTube Mobile is replacing their desktop YouTube usage

However, these results may not be as surprising when you learn that, according to Nielsen, YouTube Mobile is the #1 video viewing mobile website in the US, with more than 7.1MM monthly unique users. Advertisers can now own 100% share-of-voice on YouTube Mobile (m.youtube.com) by purchasing a daily roadblock and owning all available ad impressions for 24 hours. Ads run on the Search, Browse and Home pages of the mobile website. Here’s an example of a recent Diet Coke campaign:


Advertisers from a range of verticals have successfully run roadblocks on YouTube Mobile including autos, CPG, entertainment, retail and others. Many advertisers choose to time their YouTube Mobile Roadblocks to coincide with product launches, sales events, or other days they are making a big media push. Purchasing a roadblock of YouTube Mobile is an excellent complement to campaigns you may be running on YouTube’s desktop as you can reach users as they interact with YouTube from their device of choice.

We’ve launched this opportunity in the US and we’re excited to roll it out in multiple international markets soon.

Posted by Johanna Werther, Advertiser Lead PMM, Google Mobile Display Marketing

As agencies, you face the unique challenges of mastering the suite of Google media solutions and account management tasks across many accounts. Knowing that you often have questions specific to managing multiple client accounts at scale, we've created an Agency Help Center to provide you with easy access to answers for your most common questions, as well as useful resources to help you strategically manage your businesses.


We also know that many different sites exist that offer support to agencies for account management, product adoption, media planning, and identifying best-in-class examples. To make life a little easier, we've added links to the Agency Help Center for the most frequently used resources -- including Google AgencyLand, the Agency Toolkit and the Google AdWords Certification Program -- so that you only need to go one place to find everything you need.


To date, the Agency Help Center is available for the US and UK. Over the course of Q4'2010, we'll be localizing this resource across multiple languages, as well as continuing to incorporate new agency-centric resources into the site.

Posted by Katie Wasilenko, Agency Team

We would like to invite you to 3 upcoming webinars targeted towards retail clients and the agencies that support them -- YouTube Holiday Planning, Intro to Mobile Ads and Mobile Best Practice. These sessions are designed to help you incorporate video and mobile ad strategies into clients' holiday campaigns and beyond.

YouTube Holiday Webinar
Thursday, November 11, 2010, 10amPST / 12pmCST / 1pmEST
During this session you'll learn how to capitalize on holiday shoppers browsing video content, including customization tips for your YouTube Channel, innovative strategies for sales focused YouTube campaigns and more.
Register here

Introduction to Mobile Ads
Friday, November 12, 2010, 11amPST / 1pmCST / 2pmEST
Learn about the opportunity mobile presents to your business, the mobile advertising products offered by Google and how you can get started.
Register here

Mobile Best Practices
Thursday, November 18, 2010, 11amPST / 1pmCST / 2pmEST
Learn how to measure and optimize your mobile campaigns to increase your mobile ROI.
Register here

Posted by Agency Ad Solutions Blog Team

As we just announced on the Inside AdWords blog, we’re celebrating AdWords’ 10th birthday this month by asking our advertisers to submit stories of how online advertising has played a role in their businesses -- and then sharing their submissions with the world via a global map of the stories.

Think you can create something special by telling some of your best client stories? Let your clients know that you can help them capture the story of how you’ve partnered to reach their goals with AdWords (of course, you can also submit the story of your own agency business). When you’ve produced the videos, you can submit them on our birthday website.

We can’t wait to see your work -- and share it with the world!

Posted by Jason Shafton, Product Marketing Manager

What if you found out that your AdWords campaigns were bringing you more customers than you realized?

Zac Stafford, Senior Search Strategist at Nina Hale Search Marketing in Minneapolis, MN, recently discovered that this was true for his client, modern furniture retailer Room & Board. Stafford saw some encouraging results as an early beta tester of AdWords call metrics, a new feature that automatically includes a unique phone number in your ads to measure the calls that you receive from AdWords.

“By cross-checking our call metrics reports with our sales records, we saw that half the people who called the toll free number in our ad purchased online but the other half purchased in a store. Before using call metrics, we determined our ROI just by looking at the online sales numbers. Now we have proof that online search ad campaigns drive in-store purchases.”

Today we're announcing that AdWords call metrics is available for more advertisers, making it easier than ever to measure the phone calls that AdWords generates for your business. Using the technology behind Google Voice, call metrics assigns your campaign a unique phone number which is automatically inserted into your ad on both desktop and high-end mobile devices, where the number is clickable.

When a user calls the number in your ad, the call is automatically routed to your business, and AdWords notes that this call took place. Then, when you look at your AdWords reports, you’ll see the number of calls generated by each campaign, call duration, and in the near future, caller area code. You'll still only pay for clicks on your ads, but we intend to charge for call metrics in the future.

Once you know where your calls are coming from, you can refine your marketing strategy to make sure you’re getting the most out of your ads. For example, you could test different ad text variations to see which results in the most calls or reallocate budget to campaigns that truly bring you the highest ROI.

Currently, call metrics is only available to a limited number of US advertisers. We plan to make the feature available to more advertisers in the coming months. To find out if call metrics is available in your account and to learn more about the feature, visit Google Ad Innovations.


Additionally, if you want to see call metrics in action, watch the video above.

Posted by Surojit Chatterjee, Senior Product Manager, AdWords

YouTube reports that it has served its 500,000,000th Promoted Video view this week. This ad product combines the branding capabilities of video with the direct response action of search advertising, allowing advertisers to promote their videos against search results or related videos on YouTube. Additionally, with the Promoted Videos API, agencies can now more easily manage complex campaigns across multiple clients. For additional information, please see the full story on the YouTube blog.

Posted by Jay Akkad, Product Manager, YouTube

Congratulations, you have made it to the final installment of the Google Media Solutions series! We get frequent questions about Google TV Ads, whether it's the right platform, how much it costs, how it works. Here’s your crash course.

Google TV Ads is an online marketing place that allows anyone to launch national TV campaigns and measure their success with timely reporting. Google TV Ads allows you to buy the programs that you want without bundling, pay only for impressions delivered and access viewership data from a sample of millions.

Ready to jump in? Let’s dispel a few myths that your clients might have heard:

• Does TV advertising fit into my marketing mix?: Television advertising allows you to reach a wider audience than any other advertising medium. Generate brand awareness and demand through sight, sound and motion. It’s also a great supplement to any online strategy - read how ooVoo used TV to drive a 500% increase in site traffic!
• We want to get started, but we don’t have a commercial. Can you help?: Of course! You can use the Google Ad Creation Market Place to connect with professional ad production houses for as little as $200. Creating compelling, effective TV ads at relatively low costs has never been easier.
• But is TV Measurable?: If you have a website, we recommend tracking and comparing website visits with your TV campaign metrics using Google Analytics. Google Analytics can track TV campaign metrics like TV impressions alongside daily web traffic volume.

What does it take to get started? Create a video ad, log into AdWords, choose targets and shows and see your ad on TV within 48 hours! Visit the Getting Started Guide for more tips.

This post concludes our Google Media Solutions series. Over the past four weeks, we have reviewed Google AdWords, the Google Display Network, Remarketing, YouTube and Google TV Ads. Hopefully you have learned some tips and tricks along the way.

Posted by Laura Salzberg, Agency Team

Are you getting ready for the holidays? With the holidays less than 2 months away, we wanted to share some seasonally-focused resources and tips with you from our friends at YouTube. They've prepared some marketing strategies to help you and your clients take advantage of this time of the year on the top online video destination.

Tip #1: Customize a YouTube Brand Channel
Just as a retail store would dress up its window during the holidays, take advantage of enhanced features to customize clients' channels. For example, you can showcase their products with the 300x250 display ad; integrate all of their social media efforts with the channel banner that appears at the top of your channel page; and help them stay connected with customers with a remarketing campain that targets users who have visited their YouTube channel.

Tip #2: Show off products through video this holiday season
YouTube is the second-largest search engine after Google. Your clients probably have a search engine strategy for the top search engines—is YouTube included in that plan? Videos are a compelling way to feature products, services, and brands. When clients' target audiences are searching on YouTube make sure their videos are surfaced with promoted videos.

Tip #3: Place holiday creatives against relative videos
Help clients reach their audience in a ‘lean forward’ media platform where people are seeking video engagement and information. Find videos or video categories that resonate with their brand or target audience and pair holiday display ads against them.

Tip #4: Bring holiday TV ads online
In 2009, people spent more time watching online video than checking their email! Use TV creatives or online videos to run as preroll before videos on YouTube and get in front of this tremendous audience. Engagement rates are also compelling with an average CTR of 1.9%. An ad format that answers your holiday wish.

Tip #5: YouTube Video Gift Guide
Now consumers have a place to watch and shop on YouTube! This holiday shopping video hub is open to all advertising partners with video assets. Our guide provides consumers with the opportunity to watch and shop and provide advertisers with one destination to showcase their holiday video ads. Contact a sales representative to get started.

We’ve made your list, now check it twice and have a great holiday season!

Posted by Jen Wasson, YouTube Team

Close your eyes. Envision a US boomer. What comes to mind? How old is he/she? Are you having trouble envisioning what a boomer looks like? Now think about the last advertisement you may have seen targeted to a boomer. Having trouble thinking of one?

Boomers are defined as adults aged 46-64. 1 in 3 US adults is a boomer. When asked "how old do you feel?", at least 1 in 5 boomers responded that they feel at least 10 years younger than their age. 30% of them say they feel at least 5-9 years younger. More than 74% of boomers say that advertising these days are intended for someone younger than them.

Can advertisers really be missing the mark on hitting America's largest and most wealthy demographic?

Join Google and Nielsen on Tuesday, October 26th at 3pm EST for an eye opening webinar that will change the way marketers think about boomers forever.

Through clickstream, survey data and online testimonials, we will learn The Four Truths about Boomers and Media:

• Boomers are sponges for content and media. Even more so than the younger generations.
• Boomers sit on an aided adoption curve with technology. With the help of family and friends, they have the ability to ramp up on technology quickly and proficiently.
• Boomers are most comfortable straddling what's familiar and what's new. We'll see where they are traditional in their behaviors versus where they are open to new ways.
• Boomers are a curious and thoughtful group that value quality and family.

Date:
Tuesday, October 26, 2010

Time:
3pm EST/2pm CST/12pm PST

Register for this webinar today.

Posted by Jenny Liu, CPG Marketing

We've announced September's list for the Ad Planner 1000, a list of the top 1,000 global sites on the web by unique users as measured by DoubleClick Ad Planner. The September edition offers annual fall trends as students across the northern hemisphere have returned to school, TV networks release their new shows, and the NFL season kicks off.

• As the school year got into full swing, homework and school projects influenced usage of reference sites, such as reference.com, thesaurus.com, wiktionary.org, merrian-webster.com and thefreedictionary.com.
• The return to school did not bode as well for online gaming and entertainment sites as we observed a decline in site traffic with many of them, such as Battle.net, 4399.com, duowan.com and pcgames.com.
• Thanks to the new television season, network sites re-entered the Ad Planner 1000: nbc.com at #679, cbs.com at #712 and abc.go.com at #748. Tvguide.com also benefited with enough of an increase to site visitors to crack the list at #820.
• In the U.S., football fervor is underway and the biggest beneficiary is nfl.com with a whopping 61% increase in unique visitors to their site. However, as playoff contenders emerge in the baseball post-season, the narrowing field of teams to follow seems to have affected mlb.com.

For the complete update, visit the DoubleClick Advertiser Blog and the Ad Planner 1000.

Posted by Agency Ad Solutions Blog Team

Please join us for two upcoming webinars:

• My Client Center (MCC) Reporting
  Friday, October 22nd, 8amPST / 10amCST / 11amEST
  Learn more about updates to the MCC Client Reporting interface. Topics to be covered include: Why this change to MCC Reporting? What exactly is changing? How do I create a report in the new interface? Where did my templates go? What are email-only users?
  Register here
  

• Remarketing optimization and advanced strategies
  Wednesday, October 27th, 11amPST / 1pmCST / 2pmEST
  Features of the webinar will include:

List Strategies: Does your current remarketing campaign consist of just a list of all site visitors? Or all site visitors excluding purchasers? By segmenting your lists and tailoring your messages, you can get much better results. We’ll discuss some creative list strategies that will help you think outside the box to expand and improve your remarketing campaigns.

Case Studies: Green Mountain Coffee, InterContinental Hotels Group, and BidCactus used smart remarketing strategies and saw big success. Hear about these case studies to gain insights for your own campaigns.

Implementation: We’ll review how to set up remarketing in your account by placing pixels on relevant pages and using simple commands to create custom audience segments.

Register here

Posted by Agency Ad Solutions Blog Team

Welcome to the third installment of the Google Media Solutions series. In this post, we will review the Google Display Network. The Google Display Network is a large group of websites and blogs that display AdWords ads and allows advertisers to scalably reach their customers at moments of relevance. Clients are using it for direct response, web engagement as well as driving offline conversions.

We have rolled out many new features for the Google Display Network. One that we would like to highlight is remarketing. Google remarketing uses custom technology to reach potential customers who have previously visited your clients’ websites. Implementing the remarketing tag is very easy; you simply add a pixel to the clients’ sites. After adding the pixel, you can use remarketing to help capture additional sales or leads by re-targeting users who have already visited the site, and generally convert better and at a lower CPA. To learn more about remarketing and other innovative targeting options on the Google Display Network, you can check out this post from the Google Display Network blog series.

We frequently hear some common misconceptions from advertisers about the GDN that we’d like to clarify:

• I’ve tried the GDN before - what has changed?: The Google Display Network has changed a lot in the past few years. Today, the median advertiser gets approximately 20% of their conversions from the GDN at a CPA that is comparable to search.* To drive results like these, we are investing heavily in many new features that make the GDN an effective platform for advertisers with any marketing objective. Examples of features we've introduced over the years include site exclusions, above the fold targeting, frequency capping, and consolidated view-through conversion reporting.
• The Google Display Network only works for branding: Contextual targeting and remarketing are just a few examples of great tools that direct response marketers can use to reach potential customers in the later stages of the buying cycle, like consideration and decision. The Conversion Optimizer can also help you generate additional conversions at an attractive cost-per-acquisition (CPA). With powerful tools like these, you can make sure you are capturing all your potential customers as they spend time across the web.

Thanks for reading the third part of the Google Media Solutions blog series. Next week, we will discuss how you can use Google TV to drive results for your clients.

Posted by Laura Salzberg, Agency Team

*Internal analysis of North America advertisers advertising on both search and content, with conversion tracking enabled, from Dec. 2007 – Nov. 2008

Every week we’ll be providing a brief update on the latest Google product and feature updates relevant to our agency partners. To see past updates, look for the “This Week in Product Updates” label.

October - a time for changing leaves, and changing temperatures...followed closely by colds and flu. If you need a flu shot, use Google’s flu onebox to find health tips from the Department of Health and Human Services, as well as nearby locations to get the vaccine.

To keep your clients’ accounts healthy, see our new and updated landing page guidelines, a back-to-basics blog post on search marketing, and the update on Ad Sitelinks for Mobile Ads.

Tip of the week:

• Have questions on landing page quality? Be sure to visit the Help Center for new and updated landing page and site policy guidelines.

Search:

• Google Media Solutions Series: Part 1, Back-to-Basics with Google AdWords and Search Marketing: Over the next four weeks, we will be sharing tips and tricks for positioning Google products to your clients in the "Google Media Solutions Series", starting with Google’s search marketing product, Google AdWords. Visit the agency blog for the scoop on common AdWords myths.

Display:

• Upcoming remarketing webinar for agencies: Wednesday, October 27th 11amPST / 1pmCST / 2pmEST. This webinar will provide an overview of remarketing with Google, implementation and optimization best practices, and case studies. Register here
• The Creative Process -- Illustrated on YouTube: YouTube Show & Tell, the home for the best creative marketing examples on YouTube, recently interviewed the creative minds behind Old Spice, Dynomighty, and Axe to give you a peek into the creative process behind campaigns that have earned millions of video views. Visit the YouTube Blog for the complete interviews.
  

Mobile:

• Mobile Ads + Sitelinks = Love: We are excited to announce that Mobile Ads are now eligible to show Sitelinks. Clients whose campaigns are opted in to show on "iPhone and other mobile devices" and whose ads have strong quality scores can take advantage of this new mobile ad format. For a one-two punch, use both Ad Sitelinks and Phone Extensions together. If both are enabled, when your ad appears on mobile devices a single Sitelink will appear along with a phone number. See the complete update on the Mobile Ads Blog.

TV ads:

• Fall line-up for Google TV Ads. Episode 3: Efficient Reach: For the next 4 weeks, the TV ads team will be sharing tips and resources on AgencyLand and in the Agency Weekly Update. In this week's episode: With 95+ channels from DISH Network, direct partnerships with 9 National Cable Networks, and upcoming inventory from DirecTV, Google TV Ads reaches up to 55 million homes. Audience targeting tools can help you identify where your target demographic is watching TV, while our in-depth reporting tools show how well your ads performed against your target audience. See how Google TV Ads delivered Coldwell Banker 150M viewers at extremely efficient rates.
  

Reporting & Analytics:

• This Week in Report Center Migration ...: This week, we're wrapping up our final key step in the migration of Report Center reports to the Campaigns tab. All key reports will now be available on the Campaigns tab. In the coming weeks, we'll also be removing scheduled reports from the Report Center. But don't worry, your templates have been copied to the "Reports" section of your Control Panel & Library. Here, you can manage saved templates and email options for reports.
• Google Analytics update - Status Dashboard launch: Have there been moments when you've asked yourself, "Is Google Analytics down or is it just me?" With the launch of Status Dashboard, anyone can check on the current status of components of the Google Analytics system including data collection, web report and GData API. See the Analytics Blog for the complete announcement.

Industry Resources:

• Think Holiday 2010 Webinar: Consumer Shopping Intentions: Wednesday, October 20th, 11amPST/ 1pmCST / 2pmEST. During this webinar we will discuss consumers' holiday shopping plans (what, where and when will they purchase?), key shopping dates you don't want to miss, and new strategies for holiday 2010. This webinar is most appropriate for Tech / Consumer Electronic Retail clients, but is open to attendees from all industries. Register here
• Multicultural Spotlight: Reaching US Hispanics: Our friends on the US Hispanic sales team shared best practices for reaching US Hispanic users, as well as dispelled common myths affecting client's Hispanic-targeted efforts. Visit the agency blog for the complete post.
  

Did You Know?

• Google Docs Adds Color-Coded Revision History: Hunting down who changed your doc just got easier with the new revision history interface now available in Google documents. To see it, go to File > See revision history. In addition to color-coded changes by collaborator, we’ve baked in a fancy time stamp. For more details, hit up the Docs Blog.
• Stay Flu Free, Get Vaccinated: We have again partnered with U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) and other agencies on Flu Vaccine Finder. Just search for terms like flu or flu shot and you’ll see a onebox with tips from flu.gov as well as the flu vaccine finder box noting nearby locations for getting the flu vaccine. HHS Secretary Kathleen Sebelius gave us a shout out in her recent public address and you can check out the Google.org blog post for more.
• Google Phone Gallery: Overwhelmed by the onslaught of awesome new Android phones and wondering which one is right for you? Enter the Google Phone Gallery -- a showcase of some of the best Android phones available on the market today. Now you can find out which Android phones are available in your country or on your carrier of choice, view photos and tech specs, and compare features side-by-side.
  

Posted by Katie Wasilenko, Agency Team

Editor's Note: This is being cross-posted from the Inside AdWords Blog

One of our key goals is to help you drive better performance with your display advertising campaigns.

Thanks for joining us for the second installment of the Google Media Solutions series. We switched things up and will be sharing a YouTube update this week, with the Google Display Network and Remarketing post coming next week.

Online video represents a huge opportunity to reach potential customers with new, compelling formats. YouTube is the perfect platform to reach these customers, drive sales and enhance branding initiatives.

There are many benefits to advertising on YouTube. It is a unique platform which allows your clients to reach potential customers who are engaging online. You can set up YouTube campaigns through the AdWords interface. With our new YouTube Video Targeting Tool, you can target specific audiences based on interest, demographic or specific video content. Your clients can create their message and share it with consumers with their videos or display ads. Additionally, after running a campaign, you can use YouTube Insight to learn how potential customers are interacting with your clients' videos.

There might be some confusion around YouTube ad formats, so here’s some clarification:

• I am not sure if my clients' audiences are on YouTube?: Your clients' audiences are watching YouTube videos. YouTube has users of all ages and 32% of users are between the ages of 35 and 54*. In fact, if the YouTube audience were a country, it would be the 3rd largest country in the world with over 420 million unique visitors every month.
• Our clients don’t have video content. How can we use YouTube?: You don’t need to have video content to advertise on YouTube. You can target your clients' audiences on YouTube with display, text or video ads. Our recommendation, since YouTube is a visual medium, is to test out display ads.
• Is there professional content on YouTube?: YouTube has over 3,500 content partners, including CBS, TV Guide, Fred and JuicyStar07. Our partners are actively uploading content and the video landscape is constantly changing. As this is the case, your clients' target audiences are returning to see new, updated content on YouTube!

Check in next week for the third post, which will be on the Google Display Network, Remarketing and great tips for reaching your customers while they browse the web!

Posted by Laura Salzberg, Agency Team

* comScore MediaMetrix, September 2009