Omar Kattan - search in a nutshell

In yet another direct attack on Microsoft’s core business, Google has acquired the assets of Zenter, a company that specialised in a providing software for creating online slide presentations.  This is the latest addition to the ever growing segement of Google’s empire, Google Docs and SpreadSheets.

The price wasn’t disclosed by Google but I’m sure we can all guess the ball park figure ($$,$$$,$$$).

I must say, I’m a bit perplexed by the mixed signals we’re getting from the big G these day.  I mean on the one hand, CEO Eric Schmidt openly says that Google is not competing with Microsoft, actually, this is his exact words in a recent press conference in Paris:

“We keep saying we are not doing that and no-one believes me. We don’t position them as competitive–it is a sharing paradigm,”

And on the other hand, we hear news like this.  So what is it Eric, are you or aren’t you competing with Microsoft?  Actually, don’t answer that, we all know you are so best of luck taking on MS Office.  Although, I’ll have you know, I won’t be replacing my favourite slide presentation application anytime soon, sorry mate.

Google has expanded its Pay-Per-Action model for Google Adwords.  Starting today, Google Adwords advertisers -with more than 500 conversions from their pay-per-click and pay-per-impression based campaigns in the past 30 days- will see an alert in their Adwords admin panel informing them that they are able to start creating pay per action campaigns.  

The Pay-Per-Action pricing model was initially launched in March 2007 with positive feedback from participating ppa advertisers.

What is Pay Per Action?

Pay-Per-Action (PPA) is a pricing model that allows advertisers to pay only when a pre-defined action is completed on their site, examples of actions include:

• Purchasing a product or service
• Delivering a lead
• Signing up for a newsletter
• Filling out an application form

What are the benefits of PPA?

The main benefit of PPA is that advertisers only pay when a potential customer performs an action as opposed to the traditional model of advertising on the internet -Pay Per Click or PPC - where advertisers agree to pay when someone clicks on their adverts (either on Google’search result pages or on content sites that carry Google adverts.)