NEW YORK (AdAge.com) -- Apple went big on TV for the new iPad with multiple spots during the Oscars telecast, but don't expect "Meet iPad" to do huge numbers on the web.

Last week, a client told me that they don't allow employees to access YouTube at work. "Do your employees carry cellphones?" I asked. The answer was yes, of course. Well then, most of them already have access to YouTube -- right in their pockets.

YORK, Pa. (AdAge.com) -- A growing number of consumers are using video chat in conjunction with social networking to keep in touch with family and friends to hold video conferences. All that activity has some forward-looking marketers and ad agencies exploring how they can use video chat for advertising directly to customers, market research, customer service and even branded interactive experiences.

NEW YORK (AdAge.com) -- Don't be surprised if the next time you're shopping on Target.com, Walmart.com or any other major retailer, you see ads -- sometimes for competing stores.

NEW YORK (AdAge.com) -- Last week Wieden & Kennedy's ad for Old Spice, "The Man Your Man Could Smell Like," made the chart for the first time, and we wondered if it would have staying power. This week, our answer: Yes, the video toppled Doritos and took the top slot with more than 2.1 million views last week.

NEW YORK (AdAge.com) -- This week's chart is a testament to the power of TV. Now that the Super Bowl is a fading memory, so are many of the Super Bowl ads that racked up 44.7 million views last week.

NEW YORK (AdAge.com) -- Welcome to the Viral Video Chart, Super Bowl edition. The week after the big game, all ten slots were taken over by spots that aired during the Super Bowl, racking up 44.7 million combined views and shoving aside some durable online campaigns like Evian's "Roller Skating Babies," Microsoft's Xbox Project Natal and DC Shoes' "Gymkhana Two."

The single biggest challenge marketers face in the next 10 years is attention scarcity. Bank on it.

Facebook easily has the brand equity to launch its own phone and marry it to your address book, photos, videos and events in ways that Google can never match because Facebook is more social.

Google's confrontation with China and the Great Firewall have been a hot topics lately for those looking at censorship, but the fate of Google.cn in has implications for marketing and perhaps even trade relations.

Can postcards be a new medium for advertising? In a marriage between old and new media, Canadian startup Hippopost offers a digital service that lets people create custom postcards using photos stored on their cellphones or desktops.

Taking wraparound video into real time, Immersive Media, headquartered in Canada, recently debuted streaming technology that lets viewers control their perspective in live video to look up, down or sideways.

When you think of successful consumer brands in the social media space, names like Dell, Zappos and Pepsi come to mind. Another is Ford. Last year the Ford Fiesta movement generated tremendous amount of awareness (and pre-orders) for a vehicle that wasn’t available to the public yet. (Great summary on Jeff Bullas’s blog) At [...]

As with many bloggers, we’ve been using royalty free images for many years.  Many bloggers make use of images from Flickr and we have too but you can’t always find the right image there. I’ve even made a point to take more photos of people, places and things while traveling for later use in blog [...]

From Facebook to Twitter to You Tube, there’s no limit to the number of social networking sites that can be leveraged to interact with customers and prospects, and build positive brand awareness. LinkedIn, however, stands apart from the crowd. The roots of popular sites like YouTube and Facebook are founded on the entertainment side of things. [...]

It’s a little ironic that I’m writing this post about iPhone apps using WordPress on a Motorola Droid (Devour actually), but it allows me a chance to experience how hard it is to blog, using a tiny tiny tactile keyboard and also finally get this post started. Ah, back to a full sized Logitech keyboard and [...]

“If you don’t eat your meat you can’t have any pudding. How can you have any pudding if you don’t eat your meat!” Pink Floyd, The Wall. That quote from Another Brick in the Wall reminds me of the cart horse situation with social media marketing:  If you don’t know your customers you can’t engage them. [...]

Relevant, Consistently Updated Content + Flawless Technical Functionality & User Experience = Perfect Blog Launch What’s missing from the equation above? You guessed it: blog promotion. Creating a glitch-free blog with informative content means next to nothing without attracting readers. Start promoting your blog today with these five effective tips: 1. Involve influential industry bloggers. By linking to [...]

Our agency TopRank Marketing has been working with Marketo providing SEO, content and blog marketing consulting services for about 2 years. I finally had the opportunity to meet Marketing VP Jon Miller in person today prior to his presentation at Online Marketing Summit: Marketo’s Secret Sauce for Demand Generation. Marketo is one of the fastest growing software [...]

TopRank ran a survey of journalists, reporters and editors on their use of search and social media in 2008. We found 91% use search engines like Google to do their job. 64% use social networks.  Published in Jan 2010, a George Washington University and Cision survey of journalists reports 89% use blogs and 65% use social [...]

Online Marketing Summit 2010 in San Diego is host to a smorgasboard of internet marketing topics and this afternoon I am priveledged to participate on a panel about Social Media. Panelists include: Chris Baggott, CEO, Compendium Blogware Lee Odden, CEO, TopRank Online Marketing Michael Senger, CEO & Founder, StoneMass Caitlin McCabe, Founder, WhiteLabel Marketing Ben Hanna, VP Marketing, Business.com That’s a [...]

[Last week, we shared some web analytics basics for small businesses or web site owners new to tracking website visitor data. Building on that, this post explores what you should do next to report that data.] It’s an exciting time to be a small business owner or communications professional. Why? We’ve never had [...]

Many business owners and managers are perplexed by the social web. The effect of customer participation with social media on brands is undeniable. The effect of employee participation with social media can be a bit of a quandary.  The range of acceptance for social web activity runs the gamut from IT blocking all internet connections to [...]

Without a doubt, one of the most popular shiny new objects of many social media marketing programs is Twitter. There are Twitter books, Twitter conferences, Twitter blogs and numerous articles devoted to Twitter marketing.  Unfortunately, there’s not enough time left over after reading all the promises of marketing nirvana from using Twitter to actually implement [...]

Dear “SEO Consulting Services New York” and you too “Starting A Home Business”, I have an admission to make: I don’t like comment spam. You are comment spammers. Our readers don’t like you. I don’t like you. You’re not welcome here. Our Akismet filter has been doing a good job of filtering out spam and our commenting [...]

Just about every business with a web site does something to market and promote it. When those companies are asked about web analytics, it’s surprising how many look back with a blank stare.  This isn’t the case with mature online marketers but it does happen a lot with new business web sites and blogs. For many [...]

The PR industry is in a state of flux with increasing importance on getting into the content and social web business. Consumers are spending more time with digital and social media. Advertising dollars are following. That means less budget to staff newsrooms and reporters, journalists and editors to pitch. Understanding the needs of their “customers’ customer” [...]

A friend of mine who is an experienced corporate marketer started a new business. The store just opened and being the good pal that I am, I was able to provide some advice regarding marketing on the web – specifically regarding blog marketing. This is a new small business, so considerations for what to do about [...]

Take a moment to think about, and count, the number of B2C social media success stories that pop into your head. I?ll venture to guess that you could immediately name five to 10, if not many more. From Ford to Dell to Zappos to Best Buy, B2C social media winners ? those organizations that caught on [...]

Recently I was invited to give a basics webinar on optimizing news content  for search.  The intersection of search and PR/communications are obviously something quite familiar and while I’ve done several such presentations with our client PRWeb, I had not done one with Search Engine Watch before. The outcome exceeded all expectations thanks to the excellent [...]

I know I did an upcoming events roundup last week but the upcoming Online Marketing Summit in San Diego is certainly worth a post of it’s own.  Besides, I get to announce that one of our clients from Zoomerang (MarketTools), won a free conference pass! Congratulations to Amy Lindahl! Last year OMS came through Minneapolis [...]

With search engine optimization, small businesses have two advantages larger competitors often can’t match: creativity and agility. By embracing these two philosophies as part of their digital marketing DNA, small businesses can carve out a search marketing strategy that runs circles around larger competitors. Today, we’ll briefly explore why creativity and agility are advantages small businesses have [...]