A new search advertising opportunity

While Industrial Quick Search and Thomas Register duke it out with similar formats and goals, others continue to try to horn-in to profit from search engine ranking. Globalspec seems to be getting better at getting high in the listings.

But now comes along Article Insider, launched by Traffic Logic. The actual sites you'll find in the search engine result pages (SERPs) are market specific, like www.materialstestinginfo.com.

What Article Insider is doing is having experts write articles describing certain products and processes. The experts, from what I can tell, are probably experts in search-engine optimization (SEO). The articles I saw weren't much better than WebPosition Gold produces. Article Insider may improve these articles with better content as this project develops. But original content ranks well with Google. For being very recently launched, there is a significant amount of content and sites published.

Each site then has two sources of advertising. Google AdSense ads are at the top, probably a smart move. Of course the person landing on this site has probably just seen the same ads on the SERPs.

The second source of ads is loading the site with links with for a specific sponsor. This gives more keyword relevance to the sponsor, as well as benefiting from any click-thrus.

This is what Traffic Logic says in its code of ethics, which also stands to help define their business model:
1. SEARCH ENGINE USERS - by providing useful, relevant content which helps people find what they're looking for
2. SEARCH ENGINES - by contributing high quality, helpful content for their users
3. ADVERTISERS - By delivering highly targeted leads to their site

And pricing is fixed but based on one of three performance measures:
* Cost-Per-Click (CPC) - Account is debited each time a visitor goes to your site.
* Cost-Per-Lead (CPL) - Account is debited after a form or application is completed.
* Cost-Per-Acquisition (CPA) - Account is debited after the visitor makes a purchase.

My analysis:
Search engine results: great
Helpful to searchers: low
Value to sponsors: low

I hated Industrial Quick Search for years because they were cutting in on my turf. But they do provide a convenient service to searchers, so I've come to accept (and use) them. ArticleInsider is going to have to work harder to get me to accept them. More importantly, they will have to get the search-users to find their sites useful. A two or three paragraph article loaded with sentences as bad as this "The organization takes pride in identifying the needs of their customers. They offer comprehensive service to many industries" isn't going to engage the user. And the links to sponsor's sites needs to be convincing, too.

And I don't think that they have enough room to post articles of significance for surfers...and if they are searching for suppliers, this kind of article isn't something they are going to want to stop and read.