Disqus - Latest Comments for Vinny Lingham

Re: Google’s sneak attack? Adsense for Facebook

Vinny Lingham — Tue, 16 Oct 2007 09:40:46 -0000

Good to know that Google reads my blog (http://www.vinnylingham.com/facebook-platform-g...)

I wrote about this Trojan horse two months ago :-)

Re: 4 Free Full Conference Tickets Giveaway to Sold Out Affiliate Summit Valued at $8000

Vinny Lingham — Sat, 08 Jul 2006 17:43:07 -0000

Sorry, it's going to go as part of one of the tickets. See you at the conference though!

Re: Affiliate Summit Orlando 2005 : Straight Talk on SEO

Vinny Lingham — Tue, 11 Jul 2006 18:28:55 -0000

I gave him my card - I'll post the link here when he emails it to me.

Re: Clicks2Customers Wins CJ UK 2006 Award

Vinny Lingham — Fri, 14 Jul 2006 11:59:14 -0000

Thanks guys - much appreciated!

Re: Google Landing Page Algorithm Changes

Vinny Lingham — Wed, 26 Jul 2006 07:54:11 -0000

So, the bottom really is that Google has constructed a Lexicon about what they believe best practise is for web design, layout, information and relevance. As far as they are concerned, this matches the majority of their users and they tweak it for various market segments. If your particular site does not match closely enough to their web intelligence, you will get penalised, whether or not it's deserved.

I think the end result will be that people focus on smaller campaigns, which are more manageable for them, and conduct a lot more web analytics with products like Urchin.

The main impact of this landing page quality score was on Click Arbitrage sites, and these have largely been dealt with.

We need to understand that Google deals with problems of quality by writing algorithms. Sometimes the law of unintended consequences take place. These algorithms are by design, meant to remove a certain "genre" of sites, but given the way it is written, it always has a further reaching effect.

Google does not want to deal with quality issues manually - it's not scaleable for them.

As an aside, our company has been largely left unaffected by the changes - in fact our revenues are up this month, given our focus on relevancy - even with the 20m+ keywords that we are currently bidding on Google.

Re: Google Releases Click Fraud Reporting to Advertisers

Vinny Lingham — Thu, 27 Jul 2006 14:26:19 -0000

Absolutely! I do agree with the statistical variations being within the acceptable range. Greed & Fear drives pretty much all markets. I can totally understand why Google is not too concerned - they do give refunds when due, and are very professional about it at that. Some people are just very anal about small fluctuations - when sometimes the conversions drop because of their server issues or changes to their site, which is out of Google's control (another reason why CPA is challenging).

Re: Affiliate Summit Orlando 2005 Session : Affiliate Marketing Legal Issues

Vinny Lingham — Thu, 27 Jul 2006 23:00:34 -0000

Eek! My bad - didn't spot that typo! This was earlier this month, so 2006 is correct, not 2005. Thanks for that Ash.

Unfortunately, this is all the info I have from this session.

Re: The Best Business Books of our Paradigm

Vinny Lingham — Sat, 05 Aug 2006 02:18:09 -0000

I'm very surprised that there are no comments here! This post attracted a few thousand pageviews and has been my most popular post, ever!

Re: Google Releases Click Fraud Reporting to Advertisers

Vinny Lingham — Sun, 06 Aug 2006 16:58:33 -0000

ClickTracks can definitely help with Click fraud detection. I recommend Quirk (www.quirk.biz) as a ClickTracks authorised partner who can help with setup, installation & analysis.

Re: 2006 is the year of WebServices (API’s)

Vinny Lingham — Tue, 15 Aug 2006 15:53:59 -0000

This pic was taken at CJU 2005 in Santa Barbara

Re: Web Browser Comparison Study

Vinny Lingham — Fri, 25 Aug 2006 12:58:14 -0000

Thanks Jeremy. I've also found that Pocket IE is terrible - but I've had problems installing Opera Mini on the JasJar I just bought.

Re: Blog Comments now open to public

Vinny Lingham — Wed, 06 Sep 2006 11:38:16 -0000

Pleasure - jus tan FYI - in the past 90 minutes since making this post - I have had no fewer than 18 spam comments - unbelievable!

Re: TechCrunch Profiles Synthasite

Vinny Lingham — Thu, 07 Sep 2006 11:32:08 -0000

Hi Felix

We will be including some of the users from our previous Beta in the new one, particulary very active users. You are on that list, I'm happy to say - keep an eye in your inbox later next week!

Cheers,
Vinny

Re: TechCrunch Profiles Synthasite

Vinny Lingham — Fri, 08 Sep 2006 05:37:09 -0000

And don't worry Erik (WhiteAfrican) you're on the list too :-)

Re: Revenue Magazine Profile

Vinny Lingham — Thu, 14 Sep 2006 15:09:13 -0000

Hey Arthur

Without knowing your specific background, I can't really comment. The digital agency thing is so overdone - I'd stay clear of that. Maybe try to find a nice new startup with some good technology and be a "rainmaker" for them?

V

Re: CJU 2006 Session : Web Services

Vinny Lingham — Wed, 20 Sep 2006 01:13:35 -0000

Thanks Carsten. Been very busy today, and didn't get a chance to cover any more sessions, but the C2C blog covered the other one I spoke at today at http://blog.clicks2customers.com.

I'm looking forward to having Synthasite integrated into CJ Web Services soon!

Re: links for 2006-09-23

Vinny Lingham — Sat, 23 Sep 2006 17:27:55 -0000

Thanks Rhianna! I appreciate it! Keep posting comments!

Re: Super Affiliates in Highly Competitive Markets - Pubcon Boston 2006

Vinny Lingham — Mon, 25 Sep 2006 15:13:29 -0000

Hi Rhianna - thanks for your approach and comments - it's very much appreciated!

Hi David - I can definitely confirm that Rhianna does not work for incuBeta or any related parties. In fact, she has only recently started posting on this blog.

To answer Rhianna's question:
If the vendors are supposed to “follow” the money, where do they turn for trend specifics? Just because “season X” or “holiday X” is coming doesn’t necessarily mean that the flow will follow last “season X’s” patterns — or does it?

Typically, ceterus paribus (all things remaining equal), seasonal trends are typically very large numbers, and large numbers tend to behave very well and can be used as a predictive measure.

Re: Super Affiliates in Highly Competitive Markets - Pubcon Boston 2006

Vinny Lingham — Mon, 25 Sep 2006 23:20:39 -0000

Hi Rhianna

Your comment was stuck in moderation, not sure why. I approved it and changed your email address to your Gmail one.

Sorry about that!
V

Re: links for 2006-09-27

Vinny Lingham — Wed, 27 Sep 2006 00:55:20 -0000

Hey Rhianna

I know...I'm on holiday in Hawaii at the moment - trying to keep posting work related stuff low... ;-) I was skimming some of these links, and I just added them to my bookmarks. Also, Del.icio.us cuts off my posts quite early, so I can only add quick notes. Remember, this is also my personal del.icio.us account, so it's stuff that I want to keep and read later on.

Happy reading and thanks for posting!

V

Re: Special Offer: 3 Free Full Conference Tickets - Las Vegas Affiliate Summit Jan 2007

Vinny Lingham — Wed, 27 Sep 2006 13:10:09 -0000

Yes it does :-)

Re: links for 2006-09-28

Vinny Lingham — Thu, 28 Sep 2006 14:20:28 -0000

I just read Rich Dad's Prophecy - scary book, but basically says we're going to have another (or rather, the biggest) bubble, before it all really goes pop!

Re: links for 2006-09-28

Vinny Lingham — Thu, 28 Sep 2006 15:40:55 -0000

His books are definitely geared at the more financially illiterate, but some of the arguments and conclusions that he presents are very interesting. Overall, there's probably a few chapters worth reading, and some become really repetitive - but I would definitely say that I would have rather read what he, than to have not.

He does do a lot of shameless self plugs to his other books and materials - and in terms of investing, he is very conservative - overall though, it's a nice primer and an easy read for people looking to understand financial economics (sic).

Re: Web 2.0 Business Strategies

Vinny Lingham — Tue, 03 Oct 2006 20:18:56 -0000

Hey Scott

Sure, but there is a market for all types of people, those who want the software and those who don't. Most of the time, the software is just a drawcard and not the actual product, and even if you don't want it, you will get it for free, and most likely, it won't affect the sales price (but that depends).

All I'm saying that is that by being seen as not just an Internet pipe, but as a value adding services partner, they can tap into more markets, including SME's, etc.

V

Re: Back in Action

Vinny Lingham — Wed, 04 Oct 2006 01:05:12 -0000

Hey Rhianna

Sign up for a del.icio.us account and just go to the settings tab. It's quite easy to setup and they give you all the tools to use and how!

V

Re: Vinny meets Vint Cerf, the founder of the Internet!

Vinny Lingham — Thu, 05 Oct 2006 00:44:17 -0000

Trust me, this is one of the higlights of my Internet existence! :-) I have another pic I'm going to post as soon as I get it, let's just say that this guy is more famous than Vint.

Re: Vinny meets Vint Cerf, the founder of the Internet!

Vinny Lingham — Fri, 06 Oct 2006 01:30:20 -0000

Don't worry Nash - there are lots of you lurking around. My server stats record around 2,000 unique visitors per day - scary thought that so few post comments, but thanks to you, Rhianna and bunch of others, it's changing!

Re: links for 2006-10-07

Vinny Lingham — Sat, 07 Oct 2006 03:23:27 -0000

No problem - that's a great report - I'm quite impressed with the guys over at e-Consultancy!

Re: Google acquires YouTube for $1.6bn

Vinny Lingham — Tue, 10 Oct 2006 11:34:53 -0000

Thanks Rafiq - it's fixed now. There are lots of views on this deal - I really think it was a great deal for Google, but time will tell.

Re: Vinny meets Vint Cerf, the founder of the Internet!

Vinny Lingham — Wed, 11 Oct 2006 03:35:27 -0000

I met Al Gore too - picture coming soon :-)

Re: links for 2006-10-06

Vinny Lingham — Wed, 11 Oct 2006 03:37:22 -0000

Thanks Rhianna - with some luck, I'll see you at Affiliate Summit!

Re: Google Docs launches ahead of Office 2.0 convention!

Vinny Lingham — Thu, 12 Oct 2006 00:38:38 -0000

After attending a few sessions today, I've realised that blogging this show is going to be quite impractical, as it's mainly panels discussing questions, and also the nature of the show is slightly outside the focus of my blog in that it is more centered around Enterprise Applications. I'm going to give the blogging a skip here, but I'm looking forward to demo'ing Synthasite tomorrow.

Re: Special Report : Profit Sharing - The Performance Marketing Model of the Future

Vinny Lingham — Thu, 12 Oct 2006 09:41:05 -0000

Sorry about that Carsten - my comment spam filter caught it - it's been released, above. Thanks.

Re: Special Report : Profit Sharing - The Performance Marketing Model of the Future

Vinny Lingham — Thu, 12 Oct 2006 09:44:48 -0000

Don't get me wrong, managing a small keyword set for an average SME (10,000 keyword +-) is easily achieved by using the Google interface, and will most likely be about 80% efficient if there is at least 1 person dedicated to the campaign. The issue is managing hundreds of thousands of keywords. Also, if a merchant sells more than 1000 items, it no longer becomes feasible to have only 1 person in-house. We find that our best campaigns are ones where the merchants have either under-resourced their paid search team, or allocated to an agency that does not have enough people or their own technology to manage the load. That's where performance marketing becomes supplemental..

Re: How I navigate around Silicon Valley…

Vinny Lingham — Fri, 13 Oct 2006 14:30:07 -0000

Hey Todd

I just bought an iMate and a Blackberry is too much of a pain for me, given that I travel internationally so much and as far as I know, my local South African Blackberry service plan does not work outside SA. My iMate can run the maps using Google WiFi - but admittedly, I didn't think of that as I was already logged onto the my Laptop before I started driving :-)

V

Re: Special Offer: 3 Free Full Conference Tickets - Las Vegas Affiliate Summit Jan 2007

Vinny Lingham — Tue, 17 Oct 2006 02:35:34 -0000

I'm located on Virgin Atlantic, most of the time :-) I'm actually based in Cape Town, South Africa at the moment, but all over in general. I will be announcing the winners as soon as I have confirmed them (they have been notified, but need to confirm attendance).

Re: Special Offer: 3 Free Full Conference Tickets - Las Vegas Affiliate Summit Jan 2007

Vinny Lingham — Wed, 18 Oct 2006 05:09:35 -0000

Actually, it wasn't just the people on this thread that qualified - many more emailed in with comments on other threads :-) Enjoy The Palms :-)

Re: Web 1.0 vs Web 2.0 Roundup

Vinny Lingham — Mon, 23 Oct 2006 05:55:15 -0000

Ok - Jeffrey Zeldman got it right :-)

Re: Vinny meets Al Gore

Vinny Lingham — Mon, 23 Oct 2006 09:24:34 -0000

BMW M3 Convertible for Sale

Owner Now Regrets Purchase

of Fuel Inefficient Vehicle

www.vinnylingham.com

</div>

Re: links for 2006-10-30

Vinny Lingham — Mon, 30 Oct 2006 05:03:03 -0000

It's actually not about catching it, because our strategy involves bidding on millions of keywords (Long Tail of Search), we don't rely on certain keywords for our volumes. To impression fraud us, you'd basically need to access our entire database and then run lots of search queries through Google for all those keywords! Good luck! :-)

Re: Now with a New Custom Wordpress Template

Vinny Lingham — Mon, 06 Nov 2006 04:57:26 -0000

Hey Ramenos - thanks for the honest feedback! What is the "blink" message you are seeing and referring to?

Re: Now with a New Custom Wordpress Template

Vinny Lingham — Mon, 06 Nov 2006 04:57:53 -0000

And thanks to everyone else for the feedback :-)

Re: Sekamo.co.za - Powered by Google Co-Op

Vinny Lingham — Mon, 06 Nov 2006 04:59:09 -0000

Hey Rafiq - you're approved as a contributor to Sekamo now - I've also added your blog into the index - check your rankings now... We don't control the rankings, just which sites get prioritized as more or less relevant to South Africans...

Re: Sekamo.co.za - Powered by Google Co-Op

Vinny Lingham — Tue, 07 Nov 2006 02:28:06 -0000

Thanks Robby - already emailed him - I'm working on it.

Re: Now with a New Custom Wordpress Template

Vinny Lingham — Mon, 13 Nov 2006 15:48:50 -0000

I'm currently experiencing some problems on the homepage - please excuse me!

Re: Vinny Lingham’s Top 10 Blog Posts of 2006

Vinny Lingham — Wed, 15 Nov 2006 01:31:22 -0000

Unfortunately, I had to withdraw from Pubcon due to the Technology Awards in South Africa that we are finalists for - I forgot to post that. It's being held tomorrow - hold thumbs!

Re: incuBeta Wins Technology Top 100 Awards

Vinny Lingham — Sun, 19 Nov 2006 14:38:37 -0000

Thanks Carsten - I appreciate the comments!

For those of you who are interested, here is a quick snippet from the event that my brother recorded on his cybershot camera:

 <embed src="http://videos.sekamo.co.za/flvplayer/flvplayer.swf" flashvars="config_url=http%3A%2F%2Fvideos.sekamo.co.za%2Findex.php%2Fmain%2Fvideo%2FshowPlayerConfig%3Fid%3D2407866%26x%3DjlYqOluLWDzmHUZ0dt5KueJ44ZWPAbR1& &fullscreen_btn=off& &app_link=on&" width="450" height="390" scale="noscale" wmode="window" bgcolor="cccccc" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" pluginspage="http://www.macromedia.com/go/getflashplayer"> </embed>

Re: incuBeta Wins Technology Top 100 Awards

Vinny Lingham — Mon, 20 Nov 2006 09:50:49 -0000

Thanks for all the congrats! Rafiq - let's hope the Man upstairs reads our blogs and agrees :-)

Re: Google Landing Page Algorithm for PPC - Feedback

Vinny Lingham — Tue, 21 Nov 2006 01:59:40 -0000

Hey Rhianna,

It appears that Dynamic Keyword Insertion itself, per se, does not reduce Quality Score, however, the impacts of using it means that there is backup ad copy that gets used and also your keywords are often not in the ad copy itself, which means that in effect you will have a lower quality score.

Check our Brad Geddes' recent Pubcon presentation:

http://www.ewhisper.net/blog/adwords-quality-sc...

V

Re: incuBeta Wins Technology Top 100 Awards

Vinny Lingham — Thu, 23 Nov 2006 09:28:09 -0000

More coverage on this award on Yahoo News. Thanks to everyone for all the congrats!

Re: Downtime

Vinny Lingham — Mon, 04 Dec 2006 17:10:37 -0000

Thanks - I will!

V

Re: Downtime

Vinny Lingham — Sun, 10 Dec 2006 02:26:20 -0000

Eric: Give me a call! Definitely available!
Carsten: Man - you know me too well! I was in the office like 3 days this week already. I'm going to have to try to resist the temptation - but if I don't, I'll try to follow your advice! :-)
Johnny: Just because I'm Indian by origin doesn't mean I operate a click fraud farm :-). Did you ever read that article?
Michelle: The count is on 3, I guess - hehe
Felix: You said it!
Rhianna: Thanks - I will try!

Re: links for 2007-01-03 (aka - Vinny Lingham Sucks)

Vinny Lingham — Wed, 03 Jan 2007 02:29:26 -0000

You mean this ad that was running along side his? (Which has subsequently been taken down.)

<div style="font-family:arial,sans-serif;font-size:90%;">

I do not suck, Rich Jerk

Vinny Lingham’s blog does not sell

sell anything. I am a victim here.

www.vinnylingham.com

</div>

Re: links for 2007-01-03 (aka - Vinny Lingham Sucks)

Vinny Lingham — Wed, 03 Jan 2007 15:38:38 -0000

Ok - his ad is still up, just not in South Africa

Re: Yahoo Loses the Plot with Quality Score & Panama

Vinny Lingham — Fri, 23 Feb 2007 02:37:10 -0000

I heard it was like 25%-30% - but that number is yet unconfirmed.

Re: The World is Flat

Vinny Lingham — Mon, 26 Feb 2007 01:09:02 -0000

Thanks Guys.

It's a little more tricky, because of content duplication issues. I've email Matt Cutts from Google, let's see if he can shed some light on the issue.

Thanks for the Book recommendation Pranav.

Re: Betfair, HSX and the Oscars

Vinny Lingham — Mon, 26 Feb 2007 10:12:27 -0000

# BEST PICTURE - "The Departed," Graham King, producer
# BEST DIRECTOR - Martin Scorsese, "The Departed"
# BEST ACTOR - Forest Whitaker, "The Last King of Scotland"
# BEST ACTRESS - Helen Mirren, "The Queen"
# BEST SUPPORTING ACTOR - Alan Arkin, "Little Miss Sunshine"
# BEST SUPPORTING ACTRESS - Jennifer Hudson, "Dreamgirls"
# BEST ORIGINAL SCREENPLAY - "Little Miss Sunshine," Michael Arndt
# BEST ADAPTED SCREENPLAY - "The Departed", William Monahan
# BEST DOCUMENTARY FEATURE FILM - "An Inconvenient Truth", Davis Guggenheim, director; Laurie David, Lawrence Bender, producers
# BEST FOREIGN LANGUAGE FILM - "The Lives of Others", Florian Henckel von Donnersmarck
# BEST ANIMATED FEATURE - "Happy Feet", George Miller, director
# BEST ORIGINAL SCORE - "Babel," Gustavo Santaolalla
# BEST ORIGINAL SONG - "I Need to Wake Up" Melissa Etheridge (from "An Inconvenient Truth")
# BEST ANIMATED SHORT FILM - "The Danish Poet", Torill Kove, director
# BEST ART DIRECTION - "Pan's Labyrinth" Eugenio Caballero, art direction; Pilar Revuelta, set decoration
# BEST CINEMATOGRAPHY - "Pan's Labyrinth", Guillermo Navarro
# BEST COSTUME DESIGN - "Marie Antoinette," Milena Canonero
# BEST DOCUMENTARY SHORT FILM - "The Blood of Yingzhou District", Ruby Yang, Thomas Lennon
# BEST FILM EDITING - "The Departed", Thelma Schoonmaker
# BEST LIVE ACTION SHORT FILM - "West Bank Story," Ari Sandel, director
# BEST MAKEUP - "Pan's Labyrinth", David Marti, Montse Ribe
# BEST SOUND EDITING - "Letters From Iwo Jima", Alan Robert Murray, Bub Asman
# BEST SOUND MIXING - "Dreamgirls," Michael Minkler, Bob Beemer, Willie Burton
# BEST VISUAL EFFECTS - "Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man's Chest," John Knoll, Hal Hickel, Charles Gibson, Allen Hall

Re: Adobe Releases Online (Web 2.0) Version of Photoshop

Vinny Lingham — Fri, 02 Mar 2007 12:54:44 -0000

Thanks John! Here are some more commentary on Adobe and their plans:

http://www.sauria.com/blog/2007/03/01/adobe-wan...

Re: New Algorithm Discovered: Natural Search & Paid Search Confluence by Google

Vinny Lingham — Fri, 02 Mar 2007 12:56:02 -0000

I agree with John's points. Chris, it's definitely not personalized search - I checked on my PC and it wasn't the one running the campaign, and the search volume was quite high on that keyword so I don't think it was impacted. We did check links back and there were not any.

Re: My Yahoo hits the sweet spot!

Vinny Lingham — Sat, 10 Mar 2007 16:38:58 -0000

I actually use NetNewsWire to download feeds when I'm travelling, and read them on the flights - that's the only reason I'd use an offline reader.

Re: My Yahoo hits the sweet spot!

Vinny Lingham — Sun, 11 Mar 2007 01:55:20 -0000

I actually only use My Yahoo to subscribe to feeds, any pretty much nothing else.

Re: My Yahoo hits the sweet spot!

Vinny Lingham — Sun, 11 Mar 2007 09:04:15 -0000

The view on Apple Mac is simply this: "You're going to do it sooner or later, you may as well do it now."

I recommend the NetNewsWire - not sure if they have a PC version.

Re: My Yahoo hits the sweet spot!

Vinny Lingham — Sun, 11 Mar 2007 11:57:15 -0000

Haha - yeah, honestly, I agree. The previous wasn't as cool, gave lots of server timeouts (one weekend, a few months ago, it refused to load any feeds!), and it just looked too simple.

Then they added the mouseover content blurb and eventually migrated to this version which I love! Simply, Elegant, Quick & Easy all in one!

Re: My Yahoo hits the sweet spot!

Vinny Lingham — Sun, 11 Mar 2007 12:19:32 -0000

Funny thing is that Steve Rubel disagrees with me!

http://www.vinnylingham.com/2007/03/my-yahoo-hi...

Re: My Yahoo hits the sweet spot!

Vinny Lingham — Sun, 11 Mar 2007 15:12:22 -0000

Good question, Owen! I do know that Yahoo tends to do a lot of user-agent sniffing (for example, it tells people to change the search box from Google to Yahoo!). I don't think it's a bad thing overall, as in many cases it improves the user experience, but I would say that in your case, if they don't have a custom page for your browser, they should serve a default Mozilla page as it is Mozilla based.

Re: How to shoot yourself in the foot

Vinny Lingham — Mon, 12 Mar 2007 07:46:47 -0000

Hi Tuchinca

Thanks for your comments. I do understand that the market perceives Ananzi to compete with Google, but in reality, Yahoo is more of a competitor, should they enter the local market.

What causes confusion though, is articles such as this: http://www.itweb.co.za/sections/internet/2007/0...

Where the headline news is "Ananzi not scared of Google"

Also, given the response rates from users, I would question whether advertisers want to attract users by irritating them in order to attract their attention - just a thought!

Re: How to shoot yourself in the foot

Vinny Lingham — Mon, 12 Mar 2007 08:18:41 -0000

Agreed - the other search engines locally are more comparable. One caveat though is that Alexa's statistics are not accurate to a large degree - I wouldn't place too much emphasis on it. I suggest that more of the local engines join the OPA, in order to get a better idea of where you all sit.

Re: Top Commenters

Vinny Lingham — Thu, 15 Mar 2007 14:41:22 -0000

Sorry, I forgot that! http://www.pfadvice.com/wordpress-plugins/show-...

Re: Synthasite & My Venture Capital Blogroll

Vinny Lingham — Thu, 15 Mar 2007 19:52:20 -0000

Actually, it's becoming a global trend!

http://nerdtwilight.wordpress.com/2006/08/12/ne...

Re: Financial Planning for Startups (Planning Tool)

Vinny Lingham — Fri, 16 Mar 2007 12:52:57 -0000

Fixed now - sorry about that guys.

Re: Amatomu.com Launches

Vinny Lingham — Tue, 20 Mar 2007 20:41:35 -0000

Great - thanks Matt! I'm really impressed with what you guys have done! Looking forward to seeing it grow steadily!!

Re: Travel Plans for the next 2 weeks

Vinny Lingham — Tue, 20 Mar 2007 21:09:46 -0000

Hey Chris! I was really trying to - just couldn't swing by that part of the world on this trip. I just realised that I also have to go to Milan on the way back - it's an endless plane ride for me!

Re: Google Launches Pay Per Action (CPA)

Vinny Lingham — Wed, 21 Mar 2007 21:42:05 -0000

Techcrunch has some coverage on this as well:

http://www.techcrunch.com/2007/03/21/digesting-...

Re: Synthasite & My Venture Capital Blogroll

Vinny Lingham — Fri, 23 Mar 2007 01:39:34 -0000

A really good one that I forgot to mention is Feld Thoughts: http://feld.com/blog/index.php

Re: incuBeta New Client Launch: ADT

Vinny Lingham — Thu, 29 Mar 2007 05:44:16 -0000

Thanks for the feedback. The guys are looking into it.

V

Re: Top Commenters

Vinny Lingham — Thu, 29 Mar 2007 11:37:56 -0000

Actually - it appears that it does. Also, Chris - the URL is triggered by the URL you first used when you posted a comment. I can change it for you.

Re: incuBeta New Client Launch: ADT

Vinny Lingham — Thu, 29 Mar 2007 19:35:42 -0000

Turk:

Search engines can now easily index both PDF & .Doc files as if they were HTML - in fact PDF's often rank a lot better than web pages.

Often when taking on a new site, there is a lot of legacy content in many formats. I believe that SEO is an ongoing process and it's better to get all the content out there quickly, and then work on optimizing it, especially with a new website project.

V

Re: Google to drop CPC and revert to CPM

Vinny Lingham — Sat, 31 Mar 2007 21:53:00 -0000

Hehe - I'm currently in London at the moment :-)

Re: Google to drop CPC and revert to CPM

Vinny Lingham — Sun, 01 Apr 2007 04:13:58 -0000

If you haven't already - please digg this post! (Click the digg link at the bottom of it)

Re: Google to drop CPC and revert to CPM

Vinny Lingham — Sun, 01 Apr 2007 18:39:38 -0000

Thanks for all the comments everyone! Spread the word and watch the panic for the rest of today anyways! :-) This has been great fun! I'm glad everyone can sit back and have a good laugh on April Fools day! I'm going to find it hard to top this one next year!!

Re: April Fools Day Jokes!

Vinny Lingham — Tue, 03 Apr 2007 12:21:08 -0000

Shh..it's a secret, that's my next blog post!! :-)

Re: My Top 10 Most Read Posts of Q1 (Jan-Mar)

Vinny Lingham — Tue, 03 Apr 2007 20:19:06 -0000

Thanks Jay! It took me about 6 months to go from 500 to 1000!

Re: My Top 10 Most Read Posts of Q1 (Jan-Mar)

Vinny Lingham — Tue, 03 Apr 2007 20:19:48 -0000

What I mean to say is that it's just hard word, and steady growth - nothing astronomic.

Re: New Google Metric: Impression Share

Vinny Lingham — Thu, 05 Apr 2007 11:59:41 -0000

As an afterthought, this would give rise to a new metric for Search Affiliates & Agencies - Revenue/Impression Share and could assist in seeing which channel is more effective at converting impressions to revenue.

Re: New Google Metric: Impression Share

Vinny Lingham — Fri, 06 Apr 2007 07:53:13 -0000

With pleasure, Chris!

Re: Top Commenters

Vinny Lingham — Tue, 10 Apr 2007 17:40:25 -0000

Yeah, I know. It wasn't working properly! I'll try to find the latest version, but I remove it for now. All comments still have the no-follow tag removed, so people will still get link credit.

Re: AOL Only Adwords - Marketplace & Revenue Impact

Vinny Lingham — Wed, 11 Apr 2007 05:53:34 -0000

Thanks guys!

Two other posts of interest relating to this topic, which would add some additional strategic background logic (in my opinion, anyway!):

(MSN/Yahoo/Google)

http://www.vinnylingham.com/2006/05/the-clash-o...

(Return on Effort)

http://www.vinnylingham.com/2007/03/return-on-e...

Re: Yahoo! announces Affiliate Advisory Board

Vinny Lingham — Wed, 11 Apr 2007 16:49:26 -0000

I will try my best! Thanks for the well wishes!

Re: Yahoo! announces Affiliate Advisory Board

Vinny Lingham — Thu, 12 Apr 2007 12:42:55 -0000

Thanks guys! I appreciate the words!

Re: Synthasite & My Venture Capital Blogroll

Vinny Lingham — Thu, 12 Apr 2007 12:43:25 -0000

Not sure yet. We're going live on 1 June, based on how much traction we get, it may be a permanent move!

Re: Can parasite affiliates massively affect other affiliates?

Vinny Lingham — Sun, 15 Apr 2007 11:36:18 -0000

Hey Kellie

Ok - let me clarify some things very quickly:

1. I was responding on the basis on mid size loyalty sites like uPromise & eBates with smaller groups of thousands of toolbar users - not those with millions - I think that sort of practice would definitely affect everyone's business.

2. The cookie report was referenced on the basis that there was panic in our sector, and the numbers just didn't add up. I'm not comparing apples with oranges, but I am saying that often - the paranoia is unfounded.

3. Your views are greatly appreciated, and I'm no expert on this subject. If in fact there are toolbar players with 20 million users that are overriding our cookies, then we have a more serious problem than I anticipated, and I will raise it with the appropriate industry representatives!

Thanks again!

V

Re: Can parasite affiliates massively affect other affiliates?

Vinny Lingham — Sun, 15 Apr 2007 12:48:36 -0000

Hey Kellie,

This is a very interesting report!

http://www.affiliatefairplay.com/contextual_adv...

V

Re: CJ Publisher Advisory Board Finalised

Vinny Lingham — Tue, 01 May 2007 11:17:47 -0000

Thanks guys - I appreciate all the support! Going to try my best to contribute to the industry!

Re: Offline Print Journalist calls Bloggers “Wackos who gun down their fellow students”

Vinny Lingham — Mon, 07 May 2007 16:06:59 -0000

Thanks for all the comments guys!

Gary:

Your point could equally be directed at Vincent Maher. The fact of the matter is that Bullard has a huge audience and significant influence, and given the nature of the different segments that we target, less than 1% of his readers will ever see the blogosphere challenge him.

His post was obviously meant to evoke emotion and incite the sort of posts that I have just made, however, the other 99% do not have the ability to discern and will read, absorb and believe much of what he writes.

The sad truth is that for the average consumer, print media is still more trusted than online - but that is the changing face of media. That said, doesn't Bullard have an interest in maintaining that edge and if he is in this position of power and influence over his readers, does it mean that he should abuse it?

On a balanced view, I think he was definitely trying to incite the blogosphere, but also, deep down, he really did get his beliefs across.

Such is the nature of free speech - you have my views and responses, simply because I am free to give it as I see fit...

Re: Offline Print Journalist calls Bloggers “Wackos who gun down their fellow students”

Vinny Lingham — Sun, 13 May 2007 04:49:20 -0000

David Bullard launches his Blog today:

http://www.sundaytimes.co.za/Columnists/DavidBu...

Re: Offline Print Journalist calls Bloggers “Wackos who gun down their fellow students”

Vinny Lingham — Sun, 13 May 2007 11:49:36 -0000

Sweet Violet:

In case you think I don't remember you, if I remember correctly, you were the person who spoke at a conference in Joburg, got hold of a list of the speakers email addresses and spammed all of us (including myself) with commercial advertising for a friend of yours. I lashed back at you via email to that list (which includes some of the people who are blogging about BullardGate) for your blatent disregard for any form of etiquette and, along with Rob Stokes from Quirk, you labeled us "Online Bullies", proceeding to put up a hate page about myself and Rob on Blogspot. Anyways, the only reason I published your comment above is because I think that you have no credibility in the local blogosphere (and probably won't be able to acquire any with the comments that you make) and especially with the people that were on that mailing list.

As a second point, if you were unable to connect the dots and see that my comment on David Bullard's blog post was simply a Quasi-Bullardesque response to this entire issue, which he virtually begged for with his comment into today's Sunday Times:

"I was hoping for a general exchange of moderately insulting banter, but I have to say that the majority of the comments fall way short when it comes to intelligent invective. "

I basically gave him what he asked for, with the most humorous slant I could conjure up. If you honestly think that my response was serious as the emails I sent to you about spamming, then you need to spend more time socializing and less time blogging!

Anyone who has met me will tell you that I try to be jovial at all times and this entire BullardGate issue is just a whole lot of fun! Lighten up!

Re: Offline Print Journalist calls Bloggers “Wackos who gun down their fellow students”

Vinny Lingham — Sun, 13 May 2007 12:24:08 -0000

Oh, and if you're not the same person as per the first paragraph, my apologies, but at least the second point still applies.

Re: The Road Ahead for Yahoo…

Vinny Lingham — Wed, 16 May 2007 15:30:35 -0000

As far as I am aware, the merger is off, from what I've read publicly.

Re: The Road Ahead for me…

Vinny Lingham — Wed, 30 May 2007 02:34:17 -0000

Thanks guys - I appreciate all the sentiments!

Re: New Custom Wordpress Blog Theme

Vinny Lingham — Tue, 12 Jun 2007 15:03:02 -0000

Thanks everyone!

Ken: Thanks for the referral to them! They are a great team!

Re: Affiliate Marketing gains Sex Appeal

Vinny Lingham — Mon, 02 Jul 2007 16:59:49 -0000

That could also be said for you, me and just about every other Web 2.0 startup :-)

Re: Affiliate Marketing gains Sex Appeal

Vinny Lingham — Fri, 06 Jul 2007 15:39:03 -0000

Bill,

I would argue that even for the best affiliates, not every campaign is successful - hence the presence of risk. I agree that risks can be mitigated, but not removed, IMHO.

Re: Would you like some FaceBook with your coffee?

Vinny Lingham — Tue, 10 Jul 2007 13:08:33 -0000

Hey Tristan - I have an easy formula:

1. Is it worth $1bn? Probably not.
2. Is it worth $3bn? Probably.
3. Will Zuckerberg sell for $3bn? Probably not.
4. Would Google offer $5bn? Probably
5. Would Microsoft double Google's offer? Probably...

$10bn is therefore the magic number :-)

Re: Would you like some FaceBook with your coffee?

Vinny Lingham — Tue, 10 Jul 2007 13:32:44 -0000

No no, there is a lot in it, but there is no fundamental analysis as to why Facebook is worth "X". This is War and war is not rational!

It's value is very much dependent on who is buying it!

Re: The Rise of Social Media

Vinny Lingham — Sun, 15 Jul 2007 17:23:24 -0000

John - he just launched it today...give the guy a break!

Have a look at my first ever blog post, and the skin I used:

http://web.archive.org/web/20040916174623/www.v...

Re: Blackle.com - A Google Custom Search Engine

Vinny Lingham — Thu, 19 Jul 2007 16:46:31 -0000

Obviously, this is NOT associated with Google, as the viral email indicated.

Re: Top Commenters

Vinny Lingham — Fri, 20 Jul 2007 11:59:39 -0000

I actually removed it because people were making short and meaningless comments in order to get ranked :-)

Re: Google Earth

Vinny Lingham — Fri, 20 Jul 2007 12:01:13 -0000

Hey Mark

Use my contact form and send me your details - let's catch up!

V

Re: Entrepreneur Magazine Feature

Vinny Lingham — Sat, 04 Aug 2007 06:35:52 -0000

Seriously Andrew, would I ever campaign for vote? Don't answer that! :-)

Re: Corporates Blocking FaceBook

Vinny Lingham — Mon, 06 Aug 2007 09:31:58 -0000

Hi David

This is a great example. The person in question, should receive the respective warnings from the company for poor performance. Facebook certainly is a distraction and if anything, it points out inefficiencies in the way we manage our staff. They need to be goal orientated, and if they're not getting their work done, then the necessary action should be taken. Facebook is not an excuse.

Re: Corporates Blocking FaceBook

Vinny Lingham — Tue, 07 Aug 2007 04:17:53 -0000

Hi Chantelle

If what is are saying is true - then as an employer, I would have no problem with that. However, Mike did say "spent the rest of the day finding proxies by which to access her favourite site." - which led me to believe that you had wasted a day of company time.

Again, if the work is done, no one should complain. Fair usage should apply to all corporate Internet policies - abuse should be penalised.

Re: Attention Corporates …

Vinny Lingham — Thu, 09 Aug 2007 04:55:38 -0000

Thanks for the comments guys - keep them coming.

I think my point is getting across :

Corporates that are ineffective at managing work performance tend to make prohibitive decisions based on their own inabilities. Companies such as incuBeta recognize the problem, advise staff accordingly, behaviour gets adjusted and sites remain unblocked. That's how the problem should be dealt with. Internet browser usage should not be a privilege - it should be a necessity for anyone who uses email.

If we start trying to control it's usage however, then it's basically saying that we are not willing to empower our staff within the organisation to think and work according to whatever is most effective for them. This is contrary to all the most effective management techniques, including Google's 70/20/10 rule.

Miguel - you are quite correct - this issue is exposing the lack of performance management techniques that are being implemented successfully within corporates. I'm singling out corporates here, because small businesses tend to not be concerned with things like Facebook, as many staff put in enough work to "Get the job done", and in corporates, the mentality is often to coast along.

Corporates often also don't actually understand how to harness the power of the Internet, both for internal customers (staff), and external.

It's a process, but they'll wake up from their cocoon's, eventually. Some already are, and kudos to them!

Re: Attention Corporates …

Vinny Lingham — Thu, 09 Aug 2007 14:14:04 -0000

Hey Mike

Actually, it indeed is. I was using South Africa, as that was the reference for my original post - Facebook blocking is happening around the world at the moment - the stats I saw from Alex is showing a decline in pageviews this past week...

V

Re: Attention Corporates …

Vinny Lingham — Sat, 11 Aug 2007 11:41:24 -0000

No clutter on this blog - this conversation is fascinating me, and others - I'm sure! Please guys, do continue! :-)

Re: Attention Corporates …

Vinny Lingham — Sat, 11 Aug 2007 13:27:09 -0000

Definitely Vincent - all these extra pageviews are just hurting my server :-)

Re: SpeedPPC

Vinny Lingham — Sun, 12 Aug 2007 08:22:36 -0000

Unfortunately, my Windows PC is in for an upgrade - so I personally haven't tested it. I can say that the Clicks2Customers team are quite impressed and have purchased a copy of it.

Re: Mail & Guardian to launch ThoughtLeader

Vinny Lingham — Tue, 21 Aug 2007 04:49:30 -0000

Yeah, like with Amatomu...you can only keep things secret for so long Vincent :-)

Re: Synthasite to launch Beta on Guy Fawkes Day!

Vinny Lingham — Thu, 23 Aug 2007 15:41:25 -0000

Stefano : What do you mean by Standalone?

PublisherZilla : Thanks for the suggestion! I think we're going to go with Gargamel next!! Nice one!

Re: Synthasite to launch Beta on Guy Fawkes Day!

Vinny Lingham — Sun, 26 Aug 2007 15:41:36 -0000

Thanks Ian - good point. Stefano - as Ian pointed out, we don't believe in Desktop applications anymore :-)

Re: Synthasite to launch Beta on Guy Fawkes Day!

Vinny Lingham — Sun, 26 Aug 2007 16:44:00 -0000

Ahh, I see. What I meant was that, after the website is built, you can edit and change it. We are not going the Wordpress model and allow Synthasite to be installed on one's own server - but instead allowing the websites to be published externally. There are numerous reasons for this, some of which relate to our business model.

Re: Why is Facebook worth $10bn?

Vinny Lingham — Mon, 27 Aug 2007 08:36:43 -0000

Thanks Louise!

I don't disagree that it's a business tool, but all I'm saying is that it's primarily a social tool, and business usage is an application thereof.

I use Facebook to recruit people - and it's working quite well, actually!

V

Re: Why is Facebook worth $10bn?

Vinny Lingham — Mon, 27 Aug 2007 11:44:35 -0000

Hey Chris

Your comment got truncated somehow - email me the balance, and I'll finish your comment.

My thoughts:

1. Agreed on the TAC. I'm using illustrative figures, but I till believe that a revenue multiple of 10x is probably fine.

2. You're talking about Facebook ads ON Facebook - I'm speaking a different language here - I'm talking about off site - 3rd parties.

3. My focus on this post is the value TO MSN/Yahoo/Google relating to owning the consumer data that Facebook has built up, and therefore the valuation has to be in line with what Facebook could POTENTIALLY earn from the contextual marketplace if it had a go it alone strategy.

I would argue that it would be relatively easy for Facebook to build a $1bn revenue business within 3 years, on the back of it's growing consumer data. Surely, that's worth $10bn in today's digital arms race?

Re: 1,000,000 Free Shares in Synthasite up for grabs

Vinny Lingham — Fri, 07 Sep 2007 23:14:18 -0000

Jacques - read the fineprint - the shares will only be transferred if we go public, or else the company is sold and the proceeds paid out. We're investigating using a trust as well, which means that we can have 1 shareholder, in the trust, and multiple beneficiaries.

Re: CJU Session 2007 : Social Networking and the MySpace phenomenon

Vinny Lingham — Mon, 10 Sep 2007 22:22:34 -0000

Corrected - Thanks Shawn.

Re: The Dunning-Kruger Effect and Search Engine Marketing

Vinny Lingham — Wed, 12 Sep 2007 13:04:01 -0000

Thanks everyone. I'm glad you enjoyed the post - I'm getting lots good of feedback on it. The reality is that there are too many people out there, who honestly believe that 12-24 months search engine experience makes them an expert. This is unfortunately not even close to the case. I've had employees joining and within 3 months, they believe they know everything, so I understand first hand how this syndrome works. For those of you who are experts of your own domain, I'm sure this rings true to most any other subject matter. True insight and experience takes many years, not months to perfect, and using service providers that are "new" to the game for any business, is risky.

Re: CJU Session : The Pulse of the Affiliate Market

Vinny Lingham — Fri, 14 Sep 2007 09:54:38 -0000

I find that Affiliate Summit is great, and obviously CJU. Linkshare's summit is also pretty good. I don't really have a preference - conferences are really what you make of them.

Re: MC Hammer Launches DanceJam - Its Hammer Time!

Vinny Lingham — Tue, 18 Sep 2007 18:29:32 -0000

I forgot to mention that! I had to use IE on Windows using Parallels - painful, but it was worth it!

Re: The Evolution of Search Affiliates

Vinny Lingham — Fri, 21 Sep 2007 11:06:45 -0000

Yup - that's what we're doing.

Re: Why is Facebook worth $10bn?

Vinny Lingham — Tue, 25 Sep 2007 16:15:53 -0000

It looks like I was right after all :-)

Re: Facebook IS worth $10bn - says Microsoft

Vinny Lingham — Wed, 26 Sep 2007 05:27:44 -0000

Thanks Eve - things went very well. Hold thumbs! :-)

Those who know me, know that I LOVE "I Told You So"'s :-)

Re: S&P Vista Research Appointment

Vinny Lingham — Thu, 27 Sep 2007 10:33:50 -0000

Hey Sugandh

They're pretty good - the flow of work is low though - but they pay on time! Good luck!

V

Re: Why is Facebook worth $10bn?

Vinny Lingham — Sat, 29 Sep 2007 02:13:27 -0000

Get Serious:

Firstly, I can only wish I had Facebook stock! The truth is that I don't.

Facebook's 10bn valuation is based on a PE of 300 - as they are making $30m in profits this year - not bad for a 3 year old company.

Let's work out some projections going forward if they continued to grow at a 100%/year - which is what Google achieved for the first few years after launching Adwords. Facebook have enough impressions and off a small base, can definitely grow quickly:

2007 - $30m
2008 - $60m
2009 - $120m
2010 - $240m

Basically, in 4 years, if they can achieve moderate growth in their user base, but improve monetization - getting to a $240m/annum profit base - at a PE of 40 - which is pretty common - the company can easily be valued at $10bn - it's not a bubble - there are revenues, discounted cash flows, and a steep growth curve ahead. The reality is that Facebook will probably grow at more than 100%/year.

Remember Metcalfe's law, and you will understand why their network is so valuable!

Re: RapidShare

Vinny Lingham — Sun, 30 Sep 2007 03:48:49 -0000

Well, based on the Alexa chart I've just linked to the post, they barely started a year ago - it may have been longer, but doesn't look like it.

Re: BlogRush

Vinny Lingham — Sun, 30 Sep 2007 10:32:27 -0000

Just posted the YouTube Video. I believe that BlogRush is going through a lot, due to the unprecedented takeup - I'd give them a chance on the customer support, Chris.

Rob: What's wrong with Widgets? I thought my content was pretty good?!

Re: Facebook valued at $15bn - raises $240m from Microsoft

Vinny Lingham — Thu, 25 Oct 2007 16:54:37 -0000

John - I do agree - $10bn was probably more realistic :-)

Jokes aside - that valuation has subsequently been ratified by another $500m in investment from some hedge funds - although I do believe that they played Microsoft off against the others and wound up with a higher valuation - which was smart.

Re: Clicks to Customers Book announcement

Vinny Lingham — Wed, 31 Oct 2007 04:32:09 -0000

Thanks everyone!I'm going to be spending December holed getting this out!

Re: Open Social : The FaceBook Killer?

Vinny Lingham — Wed, 31 Oct 2007 18:11:34 -0000

Ryan - I think it's a great idea and that the need to adopt it for the sake of developers like us, but realistically, it's not going to happen any time soon, because they don't need to right now.

Re: Open Social : The FaceBook Killer?

Vinny Lingham — Fri, 02 Nov 2007 09:22:18 -0000

Anand - I really think that Facebook have lost the edge on their developer platform with Open Social - the news just keeps getting better - even MySpace has joined - Facebook will have to follow suit, and then Microsoft arguably did overpay - remember that there are other investors following Microsoft's valuation - that was part of Facebook's plan - and I think the may be reconsidering the valuation.

Re: Synthasite Beta

Vinny Lingham — Mon, 05 Nov 2007 09:04:40 -0000

Thanks Poya - let me know how it goes!

Rob: Unfortunately, not - but that's the dream of Synthasite - we're trying to evolve it to the point where this blog can be built using Synthasite...

Re: Synthasite raises $5m Series A investment round

Vinny Lingham — Tue, 20 Nov 2007 02:15:01 -0000

Hey Rob

It's coming. We're just making some changes on the backend - will be early Q1.

V

Re: Synthasite raises $5m Series A investment round

Vinny Lingham — Sun, 25 Nov 2007 17:40:10 -0000

Thanks everyone for all the well wishes!!

Re: Synthasite raises $5m Series A investment round

Vinny Lingham — Mon, 26 Nov 2007 05:19:53 -0000

Thanks Richard. I can't discuss the valuation, unfortunately :-).

Re: Happy New Year

Vinny Lingham — Fri, 11 Jan 2008 14:04:34 -0000

Hey Chris

I doubt that these big web companies can effectively be acquired - far too many cultural problems and philosophical differences, not to mention technology challenges.

eBay should probably look to sell Skype and spin off PayPal instead. I'd hate to see it acquired.

V

Re: GlobalScholar.com

Vinny Lingham — Sun, 20 Jan 2008 04:28:13 -0000

Thanks Jon - keep me posted and I certainly will.

Re: Top Commenters

Vinny Lingham — Mon, 21 Jan 2008 13:32:36 -0000

Hey Jayson - unfortunately so....

Re: Bobby Fischer RIP

Vinny Lingham — Tue, 22 Jan 2008 10:13:36 -0000

Hey Keith! Thanks for the vote of support - we won't let you down :-)

Re: Endeavor Entrepreneur Network

Vinny Lingham — Thu, 07 Feb 2008 00:42:19 -0000

Hey Jason. It's only for emerging markets - where are you based? Check out www.endeavor.org

Re: Wordpress SEO Plugins

Vinny Lingham — Tue, 12 Feb 2008 03:06:12 -0000

Hey Skye

I'm not sure I understand and I've tried searching and can't find what you're referring to. I can't find any nested results. Could you post a link to a screenshot?

Thanks
Vinny

Re: Wordpress SEO Plugins

Vinny Lingham — Tue, 12 Feb 2008 10:01:36 -0000

Hey Glen

Thanks - sorry, we were moving servers yesterday, hence the fact that the site was down. Just fixed the problem.

Thanks
Vinny

Re: Wordpress SEO Plugins

Vinny Lingham — Tue, 12 Feb 2008 17:37:19 -0000

Hey Jan

You should be using 301 redirects, to redirect any links to the location of the old posts, to the new location, using the redirection plugin, based on the old file structure. I hope this helps?

V

Re: Thoughts from Affiliate Summit West

Vinny Lingham — Sun, 09 Mar 2008 19:36:29 -0000

Agreed Pranav! And in defence of Jeremy Shoemoney - he is has done a heck of a lot for the industry, and has helped many people achieve their "Nirvana"!

He should be given a medal, not be called pathetic!

Re: Online Reputation Management

Vinny Lingham — Tue, 11 Mar 2008 15:26:50 -0000

@David

It's all relative to currencies. In the UK, many small businesses will pay $750/month for this type of serve (given the weak dollar/pound exchange rate). Quirk has offices in the UK and are targeting that audience. I'm sure some businesses in the US will pay but for example, in India - I doubt many small businesses could afford it.

I hope this gives some perspective.

Re: Online Reputation Management

Vinny Lingham — Tue, 11 Mar 2008 15:39:40 -0000

I tend to agree. I think our definitions of Small Businesses is too narrow, and given what you're saying, I agree that BrandsEye focuses on a higher market segment than Trackur.

Re: SEO Copywriter

Vinny Lingham — Thu, 20 Mar 2008 18:54:08 -0000

Hey Pranav,

Unfortunately, we can't sponsor any Visa's for this position.

Thanks!

V

Re: SEO Copywriter

Vinny Lingham — Tue, 25 Mar 2008 17:55:45 -0000

Martin - I welcome your staff at any time :-) Tell George I send my best!

Re: A dream come true

Vinny Lingham — Tue, 22 Apr 2008 14:19:24 -0000

Thanks guys!

@Andy - look forward to grabbing a beer with you in this part of the world!

Re: 7 Steps to increasing email productivity by using Gmail only!

Vinny Lingham — Mon, 12 May 2008 11:26:23 -0000

Thanks Steve! Hope it makes life easier!

@ Louise

I don't store passwords per se, but sometimes email confirmations with passwords are left in my account and I need to retrieve them whilst not at my computer - makes it pretty handy.

Re: 7 Steps to increasing email productivity by using Gmail only!

Vinny Lingham — Mon, 12 May 2008 13:06:44 -0000

@Jared - thanks, glad I could help!!

Re: 7 Steps to increasing email productivity by using Gmail only!

Vinny Lingham — Mon, 12 May 2008 13:07:05 -0000

And could someone please Digg/Slashdot this post? :-)

Re: 7 Steps to increasing email productivity by using Gmail only!

Vinny Lingham — Tue, 20 May 2008 10:48:25 -0000

Hey Peter!

That's the one thing that I haven't figured out to do quickly yet. I had to delete them one by one. Painful, I know. Congrats on the move - here is to a more efficient email system! :-)

V

Re: User Generated eCommerce / eCommerce 2.0 / We-Commerce

Vinny Lingham — Wed, 04 Jun 2008 20:32:32 -0000

@CT: You make a great argument. I suppose the honest answer is that we don't know. I'm willing to bet though, that with data portability rife, there will still need to be a central repository for your life online...

Re: User Generated eCommerce / eCommerce 2.0 / We-Commerce

Vinny Lingham — Sun, 08 Jun 2008 13:14:00 -0000

@Elias

Thanks for your comment. My argument is simply that although your data can and will be stored at many different services, what is the central collection point that *you* as the consumer, chooses to release it as public information and share it outside a walled garden, such as Facebook. Obviously you won't share everything, but you will want to have a place where people can see your latest photos, movies, Twitter, etc.

Re: User Generated eCommerce / eCommerce 2.0 / We-Commerce

Vinny Lingham — Tue, 10 Jun 2008 02:17:35 -0000

Hey JP

I think the notion of an "App" really has a lot of people confused as to the value of social networks. The value lies in the data as an aggregate ("Vinny has 1,500 friends, and therefore he is a trusted entity"). That tpe of logic and usefulness of social networks make much more sense to me. The idea of the social environment, is that it allows trust to be transferred, from offline to online.

And I agree, most of those apps are rubbish... :-)

Re: What will Google do with Yahoo Search?

Vinny Lingham — Fri, 13 Jun 2008 01:56:27 -0000

Agreed - especially with point 3. The key strategic differentiator between Yahoo & Google is that Google allows advertisers to segment the userbase they want to target, Yahoo believes that by creating a mix of inventory, they will make more money - thereby cross-subsidizing (poor partners with good ones, for example). The mortgage example you posed is more in line with your partner/distribution point, than global markets - but the same principle applies. Advertisers are not willing to pay a premium for a blend of good and poor traffic. Yahoo also can't offer an alternative to good partners, because their international traffic yields are so poor - hence the cycle perpetuates...

I hope I'm making sense :-)

Re: What will Google do with Yahoo Search?

Vinny Lingham — Fri, 13 Jun 2008 02:51:40 -0000

s'true... :-)

Re: Free Software is the Future

Vinny Lingham — Wed, 17 Sep 2008 17:48:38 -0000

Funny enough - Mark Shuttleworth seems to agree with me:

http://news.zdnet.com/2424-9595_22-221128.html

Re: World Wide Web Application Conference in Cape Town

Vinny Lingham — Mon, 22 Sep 2008 03:16:44 -0000

Hi Preggy - sorry for the delay in responding (been travelling like crazy). GHOST is more like Windows or Linux. SynthaSite is merely an application, it does not require GHOST, but it does require a browser - check out Ghost and SynthaSite and you will see the distinct difference.

Re: TechCrunch Elevator Pitch

Vinny Lingham — Mon, 22 Sep 2008 03:30:27 -0000

Hey Dave

Thanks very much - I'm really proud of what we have to offer, especially when talented engineers like yourself "get it". The best way to get 3rd party widgets into SynthaSite, is to use Widgetbox - our users have access to Widgetbox via the remote gallery. If your app is popular or we think it has enough value, we can pull it into one of the main categories. Drop me a mail using my contact form on this blog and I can have a look at it!

We're obviously looking at adding more blog platforms in the future, but Widgetbox is our first one and hopefully it can help you do the job!

Thanks again!
Vinny

Re: blog

Vinny Lingham — Mon, 21 Jul 2008 22:06:38 -0000

hfKjhfkzjfhz

Re: SA Blogger Elite? Just who are the A-list bloggers?

Vinny Lingham — Fri, 16 Mar 2007 12:40:25 -0000

Neville, couldn't agree more with you on that.

End of the day, it's about traffic volume and influence in both the local and international markets. An A-List blogger is someone that is a thought leader in a particular industry. Generally, though, most industries are very niche and therefore reach and penetration is compromised, although, that wouldn't make them not an A-List blogger.

Re: SA Blogger Elite? Just who are the A-list bloggers?

Vinny Lingham — Fri, 16 Mar 2007 12:40:25 -0000

Re: Is Facebook Advertising Effective?

Vinny Lingham — Sun, 18 Nov 2007 13:42:05 -0000

As I wrote in my post way back in August (in Facebook time, that's like a year) - I predicted that demographic & 3rd party site advertising would be the only way to really justify the valuation.

http://www.vinnylingham.com/why-is-facebook-wor...

Re: 2007/04/01/gmail-paper/

Vinny Lingham — Sun, 01 Apr 2007 08:23:44 -0000

I think the Gmail Paper was a bit of a blunder! It ACTUALLY happens in India!

http://www.vinnylingham.com/2007/04/massive-goo...

Re: JimDo: not your father’s FrontPage

Vinny Lingham — Sun, 29 Jul 2007 15:51:12 -0000

Hey Robert

Have you checked out Synthasite yet? (www.synthasite.com).

Vinny

Re: Outspark Raises $8.3 Million Third Round For Casual Games

Vinny Lingham — Tue, 14 Jul 2009 21:00:56 -0000

$50/user/month = $200m per month and $2.4bn per year...somehow those numbers don't look right...