6 replies to this topic

[projectphp]

Do many people use trusted feed? Inktomi recently scaled back it number of resellers (http://www.inktomi.c...ch/connect.html, and I was wondering how people have found tehse services, and which of teh resellers is the best / better.

Cheers:

[MakeMeTop]

The majority of the resellers were cut due to the nature of the feeds they were submitting. Feeds are meant to submit one URL that then directs the surfer to that URL on the client site - not to the client home page (which was sometimes happening).

Remember that Trusted Feed partners are there to submit a feed. They will check it is valid (URLs and format) - but will not optimise the feed (normally) unless they are paid extra to do so. This is rather like other forms of PFI - where a page is submitted but ranking is dependent on on-page optimisation which you have to do yourself.

With a Feed - all is really dependent on the way the feed is optimised. The better it is done, the better you will rank.

I spend a lot of time re-doing feeds which have been submitted via direct partners in order to make them work better for the client. Frankly, the standard of feed data submitted is normally pretty poor.

Well optimised, Trusted Feeds can work exceptionally well (they can even work quite well when the data is incorrectly laid out).

So, in my case I don't really rely on the services provided by the Feed partner apart from submission services.

Personally speaking, I use PositionTech as they have relationships with all the main engines that accept feeds - INK, ATW, AV and AJ.

[projectphp]

Yhanx MakeMeTop.

Have you used any of the other trusted feed partners, or do you know much about any of them? Being down in Australia, it is hard to just pick up the phone to find out what each one is like.

Has anyone else used any of the other partners?

Cheers for the help

[Greystar]

Never used trusted feeds, but from what I gather, it's a flat rate PPC for big database sites...

I guess if you have decent terms, at a low enough CPC you should be OK.

MakeMeTop - what's your opinion on them (you are about the only person I've seen who seems to have used them a lot) Vs. PPC or PI ???

Thx

[MakeMeTop]

Trusted Feeds are just another part of the SEM mix and (IMHO) should not be used as a stand-alone solution (though they often are).

There are a couple of major problems with large database sites:

i) Getting stuff indexed.
ii) Working out what pages are going to receive the clicks!

The beauty of Trusted Feeds are that you can negotiate a flat CPC rate and not pay for submission. Like Overture, you only pay when someone clicks through - but unlike Overture you have a fixed price. So a feed can simply address problem #1.

Now, one would be silly to pay hundreds/thousands of $ per year in clicks to an individual page, when you could pay a few dollars for unlimited clicks for a year! So monitoring the feed will allow you to pull URLs that are getting multiple clicks and placing the URL (suitably optimised) in to standard flat-rate PFI.

Alternatively, you may identify particular terms/pages where bidding on Overture may be less than your cost on the feed and decide to go that route.

All-in-all though, Trusted Feeds are an excellent way of getting complex sites indexed properly without the client having to redesign their sites for search engines. Even better, feeds can really work well.

Traffic levels can be amazing when you have many thousands of URLs in a feed.

[Jill]

Now, one would be silly to pay hundreds/thousands of $ per year in clicks to an individual page, when you could pay a few dollars for unlimited clicks for a year! So monitoring the feed will allow you to pull URLs that are getting multiple clicks and placing the URL (suitably optimised) in to standard flat-rate PFI.

Ohhh...that's a good strategy! Very smart, Barry. (No surprise there. )

J

[Greystar]

Thx for the jargonless reply - Makes a change from "what's the site and your budget?"