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Its all a gamble, but its not a game

Tis’ the way of the world now. Do it cheap, do it fast, — do it yourself. Technology -and more specifically Google- has put the tools of the trade in the hands of the business owner. This “everything you need to succeed” approach is simply fantastic, but is it SMART? Should a business owner who specializes in making widgets suddenly assume he/she is a marketing professional? Knowledge garnered by years of industry practice and various college degrees are suddenly rendered useless because of this unprecedented access. Thats what they want you to believe, but will you fall for it?

Lets imagine for a moment you, the business owner, are a gambler. Your company’s advertising budget are your chips and Google  is the Casino or “The House”. You see every gambler plays on a different level, but in the end the house always wins. However, the difference is in the details. Novice players use novice technique based on limited knowledge. Professionals use advance techniques built upon experience and skill. Both are present in the casino at any given moment and all are contributing to the house’s bottom line. One loses everything to the house and has nothing to show for it. The other walks away with free rooms, free dinners and sometimes still clutching chips.

It is in the interest of “The House” to keep it occupied with as many novice gamblers as possible for obvious reasons. Rookie mistakes are worth millions to the house. It is in the interest of the Business owner (or “gambler”) to give their money to the pros. Let the pros win you a jackpot by getting the best results at the optimum price.

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Happy 15th Birthday Yahoo (Yahoooooooooooooooo!)

With so much press going to Google each day, it’s easy to forget the impact that Yahoo has had on the Internet over the past 15 years.

The story of Yahoo’s founding is well known: Stanford graduate students Jerry Yang and David Filo created a directory of web sites originally called “Jerry and David’s Guide to the World Wide Web,” and later renamed to “Yahoo” in 1994.

(Whew! The Yahoo marketing team dodged a bullet there. I firmly believe the  branding and catchy jingle helped cement their success against rival Lycos in those early days.)

Yahoo’s transition from a simple search/directory site into a full fledged online portal hasn’t always been smooth, but in the end the original social networking community and powerhouse online media company  (OMG! is the top celebrity news and gossip site online) will prevail.  Yahoo’s stock price has climbed some 30 per cent during Bartz’s 14-month CEO tenure and profits were in excess of $40 billion last year.

A turnaround akin to Apple’s most recent decade or revenue comparable to search engine powerhouse Google could take years, but don’t count Yahoo down and out.  Happy birthday Yahoo!

What’s your favorite Yahoo feature?  Mine: Yahoo Answers.

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