Friday, February 28, 2014

Optimizing Events Online and In-person: Smx, Pubcon, Google Hangouts and More

By Kristi Kellogg

Event Optimization

Optimizing Events Online and In-Person: SMX, Pubcon, Google Hangouts and More was originally published on BruceClay.com, home of expert search engine optimization tips.



Hot off the presses, it’s the event optimization edition of the SEO Newsletter. We dive into optimizing your experience at a live event — perfect timing, what with next month’s SMX and Pubcon conferences. Read on for a peak at what the February SEO Newsletter has in store.


FEATURE: Attend SMX West for Inspiration, Education and Network Building


In the feature article, longtime SMX attendee (and SMX Advanced presenter) Virginia Nussey shares many benefits you stand to gain from attending SMX West in San Jose, March 10-13. In Attend SMX West for Inspiration, Education and Network Building, Nussey breaks down those benefits, which include:



  • Catch up with all the latest in Internet marketing news, digital strategies and search engine developments.

  • Train with the brightest minds in boot camps dedicated to search engine optimization, social media management, paid search and digital marketing.

  • Listen to insights from the likes of Google Search Engine Vice President Amit Singhal and Search Engine Land Founding Editor Danny Sullivan.

BACK TO BASICS: A Social Media Guide to Event Attendance


In A Social Media Guide to Event Attendance, I let you in on my top tips for maximizing social engagement, specifically during live events. Those tips include:


  • Using and identifying the most relevant event hashtags.

  • Mentioning speakers, influencers and attendees whenever possible.

  • Taking advantage of 200% engagement increase sharing a photo can cause.

But Wait, There’s More …


In the Hot Topic, learn why Google+ is taking off. Once denounced as a ghost town among Internet marketers, it’s now the place to be thanks to SEO benefits, Google Authorship tie-ins, Hangouts on Air and more. In Education Matters, read up a new online course for copywriters looking to add B2B SEO work to their resume. The Success Works B2B SEO Copywriting Certification Course teaches writers the ins and outs of content creation for the web for B2B businesses specifically, focusing on keyword research, keyword discovery, competitive analysis in the post-Hummingbird era and much more. In addition to all this, you’ll get the roundup of February’s top developments in the Internet marketing space.


Bruce Clay, Inc. is committed to providing thought leadership and transferring knowledge to our many readers through the SEO Newsletter and the Bruce Clay, Inc. Blog (recently topping WebMeUp’s list of “remarkable” blogs from digital marketing agencies). Want the SEO Newsletter delivered straight to your inbox each month? Sign up here.



Source: Bruce Clay



Optimizing Events Online and In-person: Smx, Pubcon, Google Hangouts and More

Google Officially Announces Restaurant Menu Results

By Chris Crum

Earlier this month, Google was spotted showing new card-style menu results for restaurant searches for some users.


One tweeted a screenshot:




Woah, when did Google start pulling menu items into the Knowledge Graph? https://t.co/9SMqJ0QcL2 pic.twitter.com/aOCJ7UMI9s


— Allie Brown (@alliebrown89) February 11, 2014



Google has now announced the feature:






Google doesn’t go into specifics about where these menu results come from.


As others have pointed suggested, Google may draw menu info from Allmenus.com, given that this is the source for the Menu feature on the restaurant in the first example’s local result.


Either way, this is just the latest example of Google supplying more of the information on its own properties rather than sending traffic to other sites.


Source: WebPro News 2



Google Officially Announces Restaurant Menu Results

Ppc Tool Review: Inside the Free Adwords Grader

By Diana Becerra

AdWords Grader Wasted Spend Report

PPC Tool Review: Inside the Free AdWords Grader was originally published on BruceClay.com, home of expert search engine optimization tips.



Note from the editor: The free PPC grader tool reviewed here is a useful application for:




  • A small business owner who wants a report card for his AdWords campaigns. Get an easy-to-interpret report that compares the project to others in a like category with similar spend. Use it once and then again later to make sure your management of your AdWords campaigns is improving.

  • A PPC manager (agency, in-house or consultant) delivering progress reports to a client or manager. If a benchmark report card is taken at the outset of a project, later reports, delivered with compelling visuals, tell a story of your achievements and a smartly managed account.

  • A PPC manager assessing a potential new client. Get a quick-overview appraisal of an AdWords project’s strengths, weaknesses and low hanging fruit.

In the daily world of paid search, the analyst or marketing agency makes sure that they are providing their client with opportunities of growth and most importantly ROI. Yet, what tools do advertisers consider useful for PPC management? Just recently, Larry Kim, CEO of WordStream, invited me to a live demo of their new PPC auditing tool, AdWords Performance Grader Plus. Now as an analyst that considers herself an enthusiast when it comes to performance metrics and elaborate charts, I was intrigued to know what has changed or improved in comparison to their former AdWords Grader. Plus, any tool that might help with supporting my original analysis in efforts of providing the best results for my clients is okay in my book!


AdWords Performance Grader Plus


The new and improved features now available through the AdWords Performance Grader include:


  • Performance Tracker. Reports on your account performance every 30 days offering the advertiser another look at efficiency of their marketing efforts. Providing “overall performance and key metrics trending over time.”

  • Mobile PPC Readiness Score. Reports on your Mobile PPC efforts, identifying factors of mobile optimization and evaluation.

  • New and Improved Benchmarks. Reports on metrics, specifically “competitive benchmarks” where not only does it identify your current performance but also compares your PPC efforts with similar advertisers in your industry. Areas of industry comparison includes but not limited to: wasted spend, quality score, impression share, click through rate, account activity, a few other benchmarks.

Features of Interest


Now if you were to ask, what AdWords Grader features I found beneficial or worthwhile? Well, from the areas that Larry went over, the metrics / elements I found most interesting were, but not limited to:


WASTEFUL SPEND. Taking into account the negative keywords, how many were created in the last 90 days and how adding more negative keywords to your campaigns will help reduce the waste. Spend is also compared to similar advertisers.



Wasted Spend report in the WordStream AdWords Grader



TEXT AD OPTIMIZATION. Being that Ad Copy does play a factor when tying landing page relevance and contributing to quality score calculation, you want to know what has been working and possibly expand from its identified potential.



Text Ad Optimization report in the WordStream Google AdWords Grader



MOBILE PPC OPTIMIZATION. Confirming if all mobile optimization opportunities have been addressed, specifically mobile text ads, sitelinks, and call extensions.


PPC BEST PRACTICES. Offering additional insight for PPC experts to address if areas are missing or need improvement.


Would I Recommend AdWords Performance Grader Plus?


After reviewing what WordStream’s auditing tool has to offer, I do see myself using the grader as a supporting tool when running an in-depth analysis of an account’s performance. Yet, with real-time data and opportunities being offered through Google Analytics and AdWords, I would use the tool to confirm my reporting, like I would with other tools in my handy analyst toolkit.


What Are Some Areas to Take into Consideration?


Although, I do find the improved benchmarks great with its detailed feedback of a PPC experts marketing efforts, an expansion of discussion on comparison of “similar advertisers” within my industry is up for debate. As it can be agreed, our clients come at different sizes and with different goals, therefore, what “industry” is my performance being compared to?


Final Thoughts


Let it not be mistaken, as an SEM advertiser, I am not saying that this innovation replaces any tool, but to consider this auditing tool as another one to be added to our ever-growing bag. Google AdWords has many great features including the “Opportunities” tab and new interface, but with online marketing consistently changing, we can all agree that with marketing, specifically paid search advertising, the more tools we can use to support or confirm our methodology’s and analysis comes at great benefit, while achieving the ultimate client satisfaction.



Source: Bruce Clay



Ppc Tool Review: Inside the Free Adwords Grader

How Big is Majestic? It’s Big!

By Bas van den Beld

majestic-seo-size-infographic

This week, Majestic passed a total crawl of 2 TRILLION urls over the history of Majestic. These are the total urls crawled and includes recrawling of the same urls many times. The actual number can be seen here. Now these are big numbers, no correction, BIG numbers. Reason for Majestic to create the below infographic to give us some insight in how BIG Majestic actually is.



via


Post from Bas van den Beld on State of Digital
How Big is Majestic? It’s BIG!


Source: State of Digital



How Big is Majestic? It’s Big!

Googler Rachel Searles Writes Sci-fi Novel

By Chris Crum

Googler Rachel Searles has a new sci-fi book out called The Lost Planet. Matt Cutts points us to it, and has only good things to say about it:






Amazon has a pretty substantial preview.


Searles is from the search quality team. Here’s a video of her talking about reconsideration request tips, which we covered a couple years ago.



You can check out her blog here, where she talks about the book a great deal.


Image via Rachel Searles’ blog


Source: WebPro News 2



Googler Rachel Searles Writes Sci-fi Novel

Friday Commentary: Data Insights or Cornflakes – What Do You Base Your Decisions On?

By Sara Clifton

data-insights

An insight is actually a source of information and is not data points. It is obtained by the analysis of data that directly impacts the business. Analysts thrive on data; executives need insights.


Understanding the importance of an insight is critical to actually listen to it. The more cornflakes (data points) that get spread around, the less each one means to us. Delivering data is a very difficult task in today’s data noisy society. Headlines in the newspaper or magazines report statistics and forecasts to create powerful headlines and sell more. We buy papers with the headlines; “Lose 20% of you weight in only three weeks” or “40% of your tax money is wasted in bureaucracy”.




Delivering data is a very difficult task in today’s data noisy society.
Click To TweetPowered By CoSchedule



Whatever the data points are, they are there as a reference. They are facts to build a story on. The average person in the street actually trust data completely without checking the validity of the source on so many occasions that we forget that we are losing the control over the impact is has on us. A classic example is that we rely in Google to check facts and figures and it seems that the increase of info graphics have made us more interested in data as it looks cool and interesting, but we are still not checking the source of data points.


Often the general press serve us data points that match with what we wish to hear. Some companies even seem to buy research with the intention and hope to see a certain outcome and ask the research company to help us find the answers. Buying cornflakes of different data points and then stringing them together into a story we wish to read, is a very false way of doing business research and it misguides the end interpreter.


In my everyday work reports and data points surround me. Most of my clients want the story before they know if the facts are true or built on solid thinking foundations. It still amazes me how many large cooperation’s and global organisations want to run before they can walk. In some ways, they seem to think that it is better to report something than nothing at all. I have seen media campaign tracking studies and web analytics reports that miss-guide a client into spending millions of Euros in the wrong direction. It makes me wonder if this result is because the agency felt obligated to show some “facts” and findings just to keep the client happy, or if it was because the agency simply didn’t have enough knowledge and resource to look beyond the obvious headlines themselves. Interpretation of data takes deep thinking time, good analytical expertise, and a deductive reasoning and some agencies are struggling to perform on the level needed for accuracy and unfortunately many agencies or consultants are not brave enough to stand up and say that they might not have the answer.


A recent survey by InfoChimps of 300 IT professionals revealed “80% of respondents said the top two reasons analytics projects fail are that managers lack the right expertise in house to “connect the dots” around data to form appropriate insights, and that projects lack business context around data.” Reference: http://sloanreview.mit.edu/article/predicted-to-perform-how-to-hire-analytic-talent/.


My top 5 advice on what is critical for success for data insights:


1. Understand that insights need to be built on a data collection that is solid and have a longer perspective than just spending time looking at a week or a month in comparison. Data collection sometimes needs months to become comparable and statistically accurate before any insights and conclusions can be pulled from the source.


2. Managers and teams need to be able to understand the insight and reasoning behind it. Successful business leaders and marketers today are successful because they understand the reasoning and caveats that come with it. They listen to the story and don’t try to build their own wishful biases that are not there.




Managers and teams need to be able to understand the insight and reasoning behind data insights
Click To TweetPowered By CoSchedule



3. Always know what goal you have and define your KPI:s that can define the progress and/or success. For example, calculate the value of your customers (new versus existing) in order to understand the cost you are willing to pay per incoming lead.


4. Surround yourself with good data insights people (internal and out sourced) who understand the data points; and critically analyse them before they start any interpretation. That is, they are neutral to the outcome. Ensure these people have a leading role in the organisation and can influence decisions taken because of their data credibility.


5. Never trust data before you know its source, accuracy limitations (for example, the survey respondent rate) is and the purpose for it being sent to you – did you request it, or is there a sales pitch behind it? Critical management doesn’t mean that you are negative, it just means that you want to know the background before you start spending your time analysing the numbers.


Post from Sara Clifton on State of Digital
Friday Commentary: Data Insights Or Cornflakes – What do you Base your Decisions on?


Source: State of Digital



Friday Commentary: Data Insights or Cornflakes – What Do You Base Your Decisions On?

What a Marketer Must Understand from the Acquisition of Whatsapp

By Gianluca Fiorelli

Millennial Groups

Sometimes I think that people like me, the Generation X, is getting older and it is starting not understanding what is really happening around.


I love SEO, I love Search, I still communicate via email a lot and, and even if I do an excessive use of few Social Networks, I do it mostly for professional reason. The same Facebook, which I use, I use it more for chatting with professional peers than with my real life friends. But people younger than me, the Generation Y, approaches digital media in quite different way.


A week as passed from when the acquisition of Whatsapp by Facebook has been announced, and I have to sadly admit that almost everything I’ve read about it was disappointing.


I think the reasons are:


  1. Whatsapp is not so used in the USA (and in almost every English speaking country), where the biggest part of the thoughtful analysis where published, and many of them were unsuccessfully trying to understand why Facebook decided to spend such a bandwagon of dollars for a messaging app;

  2. Many journalists talk about Internet and Mobile marketing seated on a desk in a ivory tower, with no real knowledge of the daily life of the people, who really use mobile apps;

  3. Many of the analysts are older than 35 y/o… they belong to Generation X, and the gap between generations is huge in terms of everyday use of technology. Trying to explain what Generation Y/Millennials do with technology and how they think is not so easy for them.

So, for one day forgive me if I do not talk about SEO, Entities, Content Marketing and Link Earning, and let me try to explain the true lesson we, the Internet Marketers, should learn from the Whatsapp bought.


Background and few numbers



Whatsapp traffic signal in Spain



I live in the country – Spain – where Whatsapp has the highest percentage of users in the world (97%) and I live on my skin how it is massively used (did I say wife and friends and friends of friends?).


Whatsapp in Spain is the fastest growing private “social network” messaging system, and so popular that the RAE accepted “wasapear” (to send a whatsapp) as a verb. Last August, Jan Koum told that in Spain Whatsapp had 20 million users, the big part of them using the app on a daily base.


There are several reasons justifying this outstanding penetration:


  1. Paying less than 1 € for an app that let you send infinite messages, photos, videos and voice messages when SMS have a unitary cost of about 0,15 cents and one MMS can cost about 1 € was/is a great incentive to adopting it;

  2. Whatsapp could be considered very basic. You don’t have stickers like Line or buy things from the app as others messaging systems. But this simplicity, it’s being all centered in just one thing (messages), conquered the public. All the public, from the teenagers to their grandmothers;

  3. Spain is the country with the highest penetration of smartphones in Europe: 66%.

No wonder that when Whatsapp fall for four hours last Saturday, it was one of the opening news on TV… I don’t remember something similar for when Gmail falls.



Whatsapp outage message 22 02 2014

Whatsapp outage message 22 02 2014



But Spain is not the only country where Whatsapp is so dominant.


Just in Europe we can see these percentage of use (source Onavo via Techcrunch – in parenthesis the Facebook Messenger percentage):


  • Austria: 59% (26%)

  • Switzerland: 69% (17%)

  • Germany: 84% (13%)

  • Italy: 81% (32%)

  • Netherlands: 83% (12%)

There are exceptions as Great Britain (39% vs. 14% of FBM) and Ireland (31% vs. 15% of FBM), but even in those countries Whatsapp is the most used private messaging app.




WhatsApp’s penetration is biggest in Europe and emerging countries
Click To TweetPowered By CoSchedule



Oh, and France (14%)… but we know that French people are quite peculiar as we may expect from the inventors of Minitel.


Whatsapp user growth chart


Even more interesting is seeing how an app like Whatsapp is widely used in the so-called emerging economies. Here some examples:


  • In Brazil it has a penetration of the 71%;

  • In India 20 million people is actively using it. You may think that it’s a small number of users in a 1+ billion inhabitants country, but if we consider that the mobile broadband penetration is just the 5% of the total population… well, you should start think differently (smartphones penetration data from amazing study by We Are Social);

  • In Mexico, where smartphones’ penetration is about 31% (source The Competitive Intelligence Unit), Whatsapp is the most used mobile app (84%);

  • In South Africa, according to ITWEBAfrica there are more Whatsapp users than Facebook ones (10 mio vs. 9.4 mio.).

What all this numbers are telling us?


  1. That Whatsapp – which is just one of the many private messaging applications existing – is the silent emerging “social” platform in almost every side of the world;

  2. That in Europe, for costs and privacy reasons, it is considered the best communication channel between friends;

  3. That in the emerging economies, where Internet penetration is closely linked to the expansion of Mobile, users has naturally welcome Whatsapp has their first communication channel;

  4. That American analysts/marketers fail to understand the phenomenon. Somehow – looking at it from the point of view of an European SEO – they don’t understand it as they mostly don’t understand the growing importance of International SEO in a globalized world.

Facebook understood all this. And it is not that weird that the same Mark Zuckerberg told in his keynote at the Mobile Congress in Barcelona that the Whatsapp acquisition and the Internet.org initiative respond to the same strategy.


InternetOrg


Actually it is very smart of him trying to lead the expansion of Internet penetration in the emerging (Brazil, India, Indonesia…) and in the rising economies (Africa, Nigeria being the most prominent country, Vietnam…) via very low costs devices, which all will have installed Facebook and Whatsapp.


And don’t forget the Google’s Project Loon, which aims substantially the same thing.


Social Networks vs. Private Messaging Apps


Nothing lasts forever, especially in the digital space. Even when a medium is at its peak, it can suddenly fall. Myspace was the most striking example of this in the dawn of the era of Social Media.




Nothing lasts forever, especially in the digital space. – @gfiorelli1
Click To TweetPowered By CoSchedule



What last are the basic human needs:


  1. to communicate;

  2. to discover and search;

  3. to share knowledge.

Social Networks (and Google) know this axiom very well and – asap they saw how people was starting spending more time in using messages platforms other than their own – they reacted, at first offering their own private messages products.


Facebook is pushing people to install its Facebook Messenger app in their smartphones in a way that it almost hurts, even if you can private message someone from the same Facebook app.


Twitter has put the DM option quite in a outstanding position both in its mobile and desktop layout, added the opportunity of sharing photos via DM, but still it is limiting to 1:1 private conversations.


Google has merged GChat, GTalk and Google Hangouts (and, substantially, also Gmail) in order to offer one tool to rule all kind of messages: “public” and private, written, voice and video messages. And it pushed the separate Google Hangout app very hard, so much that it should be considered something separate from Google Plus, even if this one is needed but only for registration.


Apple, which is obviously not a Social Network but see its economy based on iOS adoption, enhanced and über promoted the use of iMessage, but has the limitation of being a not cross-platform.


Then the acquisition frenzy began, a frenzy that affected especially Facebook.



Millennial Groups



Why Facebook tried to buy Snapchat before and now has bought Whatsapp? Some of the reasons have been exposed previously in this post, but there’s one that particularly impacted the Facebook bottom line: time spent on Facebook.


In fact, even if the 76% of Millennials spend their time on Facebook, it is also true that Facebook is loosing younger users (especially what MTV has defined Younger Millennials, between 13 and 17 years old), as reported by many sources and studies and even admitted by Facebook execs.


In a (quite surprisingly) interesting article on Mashable, it is advanced that one of the reasons of the rising of the private messaging use could be explained with the Dumbar’s Number Theory, according to which humans are only capable of having up to 150 meaningful social relationships at one time.


That means that if we Like also people that we barely know on Facebook (or follow or circle someone in Twitter and G+), actually we will need to find other ways to talk and share social moments with real friends.


That is something easy to understand with a little of common sense even without disturbing brainy sociologic theories: there are friends and acquaintances, and Social Networks are for both, while private (and, better, gated) messaging is just for the first.


A friend of mine, Gustavo Entrala (one of the minds behind the @Pontifex twitter account) once said: Twitter is like being at the bar, Facebook is like arguing with people in a square, Whatsapp is talking with friends at home




Twitter is like being at a bar, Facebook arguing on a square, Whatsapp talking with friends at home
Click To TweetPowered By CoSchedule



Facebook strategically needed to be there where its former (and future) audience was going, apart setting the base for a further expansion in the emerging and rising economies, and for that reason it has bought Whatsapp.


The conspiranoiac theory


Definition of Conspiranoia


If you know me, you know also that sometimes I tend on the conspiranoiac side of interpreting things.


I must admit that I have also a conspiranoiac theory about Whatsapp and Facebook: data mining gold.


Whatsapp has 450+ active users, who – for registering – must use their phone numbers and you can use Facebook to populate your profile.


That phone number is enough for Facebook to match profiles between Whatsapp and Facebook (you can add a phone number in FB, remember?).


So, that it could easily data mine information from both platform for better profiling single users and set of personas to use in the Facebook Ad Platform and in the personalization of the news feed.


In this sense, Whatsapp should be considered the same as Gmail for Google in term of data mining.


On the other hand, Facebook could try to create specific campaigns with the purpose to move people using only Whatsapp on Facebook, or to return there if they previously abandoned.


I know that Jan Koum has declared that he has no intention to break the privacy of the Whatsapp users, but I told it: I tend on the conspiranoiac side of interpreting things…


The Facebook Whatsapp equation

The Facebook Whatsapp equation



How to use private messaging as a marketing channel


Do you remember SMS marketing, when Brands were asking you “Send OFFER to 1212” in order to obtain information, participating to a contest et al, if not they were directly spamming your old Nokia?


Right now the volume of messages carried by Whatsapp has probably overtaken SMS, and we should add to that number the volumes of all the other private messaging systems (Tencent QQ in China, WeChat, Line, Kakao Talk, Telegram…).


Whatsapp messages volume growth

Whatsapp messages volume growth via @BenedictEvans



Could we use the same SMS tactics in these application? In some cases yes, but in Whatsapp not really, as well explained on Venture Beat.


But I don’t completely agree with the statement of John Haro in that article, who substantially says that marketers should not care about the Whatsapp acquisition.




Marketing is not just selling a product or a service. We don’t buy a car, we buy a BMW or an Audi.
Click To TweetPowered By CoSchedule



Marketing is also – if not especially – “selling” a Brand, putting it in front of the users and – let me be romantic – conquer their heart, and private messaging can offer new opportunities for doing that:


  • Personalized Customer Care (which has also the advantage to pull off from more public social media delicate situations), with all the information we, as marketers, can obtain from all that information and knowing that in many cases we already have the cell number of our customers;

  • Reaching people “escaped from Social” creating private groups;

  • Using private messaging as a bridge to actions that take place in other channels (Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, but also our own site)

  • Enlarging the conversations opportunities with our audience, as very intelligently are doing many radio-show (sports ones particularly) here in Spain.

No, I sincerely believe that private messaging matters to marketers, because there’s a world of people that we aren’t able to target right now via all the other channels, and this is valid in every country.


Well, all but one: North Korea. Because I think that only the Supreme Leader Kim Jong-un can use private messaging. I wonder how…


Kim Jong-un private messaging

Kim Jong-un private messaging



Post from Gianluca Fiorelli on State of Digital
What a Marketer must Understand from the Acquisition of WhatsApp


Source: State of Digital



What a Marketer Must Understand from the Acquisition of Whatsapp

Thursday, February 27, 2014

Jelly Has the @jelly Twitter Handle Now

By Chris Crum


Remember when Biz Stone launched Jelly, but couldn’t get the @Jelly Twitter account? The company has it now:



Jelly had initially made the guy who had the account an offer, but he declined. All the while, he continued to have to point people to the @askjelly account, which Jelly settled for. I guess he got tired of it.


Stone Tweeted:




Aw, what a mensch, the guy who had @jelly gifted it to Jelly.co. Jelly inspires people to help! Thanks, @j_w_l_e


— Biz Stone (@biz) February 27, 2014



As of the time of this writing, @askjelly no longer exists.


We’ve reached out to the old @Jelly about the situation, and will update accordingly.


Image via Twitter


Source: WebPro News 1



Jelly Has the @jelly Twitter Handle Now

Google Takes Its Street Team to the Tundra

By Tariq Ali

In celebration of the International Polar Bear Day, which happens to be today, people around the world will be able to view these bear in their national habitat. Google took its street view team to Churchill last October 2013 to capture the a 360 degree view of the polar bears in their natural habitat before it disappear. […]


The post Google Takes Its Street Team to The Tundra appeared first on ISEdb.COM.




Source: ISEDB



Google Takes Its Street Team to the Tundra

Google Gives You a Form to Report Scrapers Ranking Higher Than Your Original Content

By Chris Crum

Google has a form called the Scraper Report for people to report when they see a scraper site ranking ahead of the original content that it’s scraping.


Head of webspam Matt Cutts tweeted:




If you see a scraper URL outranking the original source of content in Google, please tell us about it: http://t.co/WohXQmI45X


— Matt Cutts (@mattcutts) February 27, 2014



The form asks for the URL on the site where the content was taken from, the exact URL on the scraper site, and the Google search result URL that demonstrates the problem.


It then asks you to confirm that your site is following Google Webmaster Guidelines and is not affected by any manual actions. You confirm this with a checkbox.


Danny Sullivan asks a good question:




@mattcutts will you actually do removals with this form, or are you harvesting signals to try and prevent the problem algorithmically?


— Danny Sullivan (@dannysullivan) February 27, 2014



No answer on that so far, though Sullivan suggests in an article that Google will “potentially” use it as a way to improve its ranking system.


Hat tip to Larry Kim for spotting this one:




.@mattcutts I think I have spotted one, Matt. Note the similarities in the content text: pic.twitter.com/uHux3rK57f


— dan barker (@danbarker) February 27, 2014



Source: WebPro News 2



Google Gives You a Form to Report Scrapers Ranking Higher Than Your Original Content

Guy Pokes His Ex, Gets Two-year Internet Ban

By Josh Wolford

When I say poke, I mean Facebook poke–that’s, of course, what brings this story within my purview. How in the hell, you may ask, could a judge see it fit to dole out such a harsh penalty for the simple act of poking someone on Facebook?


Alas, I must admit–I’ve given you the end of the story.


Let’s back up.


Four years ago, Houston resident Justin Pressler, 25, was convicted of some pretty serious crimes: stalking, harassment, and burglary–all perpetrated against his ex-girlfriend. The relationship had gone sour after less than a year.


The conviction landed Pressler with a 6-month prison sentence and a 10-year probation. Obviously, the terms of said probation involved refraining from having contact with the ex-girlfriend.


Did you know that a Facebook Poke counts?


Apparently, Justin Pressler didn’t know that. Or he didn’t care. Either way, the simple act of poking his ex on Facebook–an act that’s literally as simple as clicking your mouse one time–forced a Brazos County judge to completely alter the terms of his probation. Spoiler alert, it was for the worse.


According to the Houston Chronicle, not only will Pressler be banned from unsupervised internet use for two years, but now he has to wear a tracking device for the next year.


Don’t poke your ex-girlfriend, whom you harassed and burgled. Don’t violate your probation. You know what, just stop poking. It’s 2014–if you’re going to violate your probation, go out with a bang. Send her a pic on Snapchat or something.


Image via Facebook


Source: WebPro News 1



Guy Pokes His Ex, Gets Two-year Internet Ban

Google Voice Search Built into Chrome Beta

By Chris Crum

At Google I/O last year, Google showed off conversational search on the desktop, including the now famous “OK Google” command. In November, this functionality became available via a Chrome extension.



Now, the functionality is coming directly to Chrome. Google announced today that it’s part of the latest Chrome Beta release. It will be rolled out to English (U.S.) users on Windows, Mac and Linux over the next several days. Support for Chrome OS and additional languages will launch soon.


“If you’ve ever tried to cook and search at the same time—say, when your hands are covered in flour and you need to know how many ounces are in a cup—you know it can be tricky,” =ref=”http://chrome.blogspot.com/2014/02/hands-free-google-voice-search-in-chrome.html”>says Google software engineer Ji Adam Dou. “With the latest Chrome Beta, you can search by voice on Google—no typing, clicking or hand-washing required. Simply open a new tab or visit Google.com in Chrome, say ‘Ok Google,’ and then start speaking your search.”


As I said when the Chrome extension was launched, the feature is kind of cool in a “wow, look what I can do” kind of way, but I’m not sure it’s entirely useful, considering that you have to go to the Google homepage or new tab page to use it. If you’re on another site, you have to navigate to Google, so you might as well just type in your search in the omnibox.


Let’s hope you have Google open at all times, especially when you’re cooking. Otherwise, you’re still going to have to do some amount of navigation with flour all over your hands.


The new Chrome Beta release also comes with some new parental controls.


“Supervised users makes it easy to help your family members explore the web in a managed environment,” explains Dou. “You can determine sites you want to allow or block, and manage permissions for any sites your family member has requested to view. If you create a supervised user, now you can let that user browse on any device in your home with the new ‘Import’ option. When you import a supervised user, all their permissions will then be synced across devices.”


To use this, go the Chrome menu, select Settings, click “Add new user” in the “Users” section, then click “Import an existing supervised user”. Select the user, and click “Import supervised user”.


This is supported on Windows, Mac and Linux with Chromebook support on the way.


Image via Google


Source: WebPro News 2



Google Voice Search Built into Chrome Beta

Google Showcases Government, Nonprofit & Business Maps with New Gallery

By Chris Crum


Google has launched a new Google Maps Gallery aimed at making mapping data from governments, nonprofits and businesses more accessible to the public.


Organizations can share and publish their maps online via Google Maps Engine, and have them appear in the gallery.


A Google spokesperson tells WebProNews, “Maps included in the Gallery make it it seamless for citizens and stakeholders to access diverse mapping data, such as locations of municipal construction projects, historic battlefields, population density statistics, deforestation changes and up-to-date emergency evacuation routes. Maps in the Gallery will be available in Google Earth, through the Maps Gallery website and in searches on major search engines, including Google.com.”



“Maps Gallery works like an interactive, digital atlas where anyone can search for and find rich, compelling maps,” says product manager Jordan Breckenridge in a blog post. “Maps included in the Gallery can be viewed in Google Earth and are discoverable through major search engines, making it seamless for citizens and stakeholders to access diverse mapping data, such as locations of municipal construction projects, historic city plans, population statistics, deforestation changes and up-to-date emergency evacuation routes. Organizations using Maps Gallery can communicate critical information, build awareness and inform the public at-large.”


Current partners include: National Geographic Soceity, World Bank Group, U.S. Geological Survey, Florida Emergency Mangagement and City of Edmonton. It should quickly grow, however, as it’s now open to organizations with “content for the public good.”


Image via Google


Source: WebPro News 2



Google Showcases Government, Nonprofit & Business Maps with New Gallery

The Rise of Content Scraping – is It Sharing or Stealing?

By Russell O’Sullivan

My Adwords Wishlist for 2014 - Haukur Jarl

For any writer or blogger out there that develops a piece of content, you know the drill – take a brief, do our research and write about a topic that’s not only of interest and value to the industry, but ultimately to the end reader. Once its published on the web, we share it amongst our social, email connections, watch it gain engagement and then enjoy it (whether the response is positive or negative) when we see people comment or share it further. Surely that’s one of the objectives of creating and publishing content, right?


Someone creates a piece that is relevant, compelling, offers insight, shares their own knowledge or opinion on topics and away we go. But what happens when that same piece of content is then posted on multiple sites, without consent or knowledge to the writer or the company paying for it? And what does it do the ‘credibility’ of that piece of content and the source publisher?


I have noticed a really sharp rise of recent of content that is being scraped off trusted sites and used elsewhere without any prior knowledge and the first time you know about it, is usually via Twitter or even in via search engine results, if you dig deeper you too will see lots and lots of instances of this happening.


Strange Appearances of State of Digital Content


Recently we saw two articles that had been published on State of Digital turn up on different sites. First off was Haukur Jarl who wrote a compelling piece on “My Adwords Wishlist for 2014” that had many of those who work in paid search nodding with agreement on his points covered (or wishing for).


The exact same piece of content appeared on another site with an hour, no change of content at all, apart from some very odd hyperlink style action over the top pieces.


Our very own Bas Van Den Beld was next up with “How MSN Travel Handles its Content Marketing”, where State of Digital has launched an excellent E-book with Linkdex around how to create compelling and inspiring content for online.


How MSN Travel handles its Content Marketing - Bas Van Den Beld


Again it appeared on another site within an hour, scraped and a slight addition to the title URL.


Many will think so what? It happens all the time, others may be incensed and some actually flattered that their content is be used by others. But having spoken to both Bas and Haukur and a few other authors, there’s a bit of a mixed response to what is happening and why.


What are the Pro’s and Con’s of Scraping Content


There are two sides to the discussion that have come back, firstly the pro’s:


  • The content has a wider audience reach than the publishing platform alone

  • Subscribers to the “3rd party” site can read and engage with relevant content

  • The 3rd party site has plenty of fresh content

  • They don’t have to pay to create content

  • They could be seen as an authoritative site

  • 3rd party site makes revenue through ad space on its site from visitors

And the con’s:


  • Creator and publisher has no control over the site its on

  • Site could be considered spam by search engines and create negative SEO when linking back (if nofollow isn’t added to links)

  • Confusion in search engine rankings showing multiple instances of same content

  • No consent from the author or host site

  • In some cases duplicate content – the originating site will be ranked #1, but SERPs will show the listings for all sites

  • Potential loss of traffic to the original hosting site

  • Cost and resource of creating the content sits with the original site

I would agree with most that overall the content being seen by a wider audience and potentially shared is a real benefit and an objective of why its created, but I also feel that scraping content like this can harm the integrity of the originator site, the author and the content in the long term and would really ask and welcome an answer, what’s the real value in doing this for the 3rd party site?


So if you are going to scrape content from a site please:


  • Make sure to clearly define the author, originator site within the post

  • Use best practice SEO for any links and search engines – so there is no chance of negative SEO

  • Content you scrap has relevance and context to what your site offers

  • Reach out and ask the author or originator if its ok to do it (you never know they may even offer to write some content for you)

I’m really interested in any one else who has feedback about this, whether you are for it or intensely against it, let me know. In the meantime I will check to see if this article gets scraped in the next few hours and contact the host sites.


Post from Russell O’Sullivan on State of Digital
The Rise of Content Scraping – is it Sharing or Stealing?


Source: State of Digital



The Rise of Content Scraping – is It Sharing or Stealing?

John Steinbeck’s 112th Birthday Celebrated with Google Doodle

By Chris Crum

Grapes of Wrath

Google is celebrating the works of author John Steinbeck with a doodle today, which would have been his 112th birthday. He died in 1968 at the age of 66 from heart disease and congestive heart failure.


Steinbeck is one of the most celebrated authors in American history, and his works are often required reading in schools.


Among Steinbeck’s most well-known works are Of Mice and Men, The Grapes of Wrath, Cannery Row, The Pearl, East of Eden, The Winter of Our Discontent, and Travels with Charley: In Search of America. Other titles include Cup of Gold, The Pastures of Heaven, The Red Pony, To a God Unknown, Tortilla Flat, In Dubious Battle, The Long Valley, The Forgotten Village, Seas of Cortez: A Leisurely Journal of Travel and Research, The Moon is Down, Bombs Away: The Story of a Bomber Team, The Wayward Bus, A Russian Journal, Burning Bright, The Log from the Sea of Cortez, Sweet Thursday, The Short Reign of Pippin IV: A Fabrication, Once There Was A War, and America and Americans.


A number of these titles were turned into movies.


The doodle is accompanied by five pieces of artwork, each representing one of Steinbeck’s works:



Cannery Row


Of Mice and Men


Each year, the Steinbeck Festival is held at the National Steinbeck Center in his hometown of Salinas, California. This year, in early May, it will celebrate the 75th anniversary of The Grapes of Wrath.


“In 2014, the National Steinbeck Center will celebrate the 75th anniversary of The Grapes of Wrath by convening a national dialogue, seeking out the experiences of individual Americans today and bringing them into the light,” the Center says on its website. “Steinbeck told stories of the human capacity to overcome bleak circumstances. At the National Steinbeck Center, we work every day to continue this legacy and highlight the humanity in each of our stories.”


Steinbeck sits atop a rock in a new statue – The Cannery Row Monument – that was uncovered this week in Steinbeck Plaza in Monterey. His friend Ed Ricketts appears at the bottom.



Images via Google, Instagram


Source: WebPro News 2



John Steinbeck’s 112th Birthday Celebrated with Google Doodle

Five Ways to Effectively Use Video Marketing Internationally

By Gemma Birch

YouTube Captioning

Video is BIG! 100 million internet users watch online videos every day and 100 hours of video content uploaded to YouTube every minute. Whether it’s a technical demonstration of how to use a microscope or a cat falling out of a tree, people around the world are the flocking to video sharing sites to consume content.


Whatever your target market and target audience, there is little doubt that video could be a valuable addition to your content portfolio, but I wanted to focus on how and why video is a particularly useful channel for international campaigns.


Add Subtitles and/or Voiceovers


Utilising subtitles and voiceovers enables you to take one video and use it multiple times. There are a wide of different options and levels, which unsurprisingly vary a lot in cost however it is likely to be cheaper and easier than reproducing a video in lots of languages. YouTube enables you to upload basic subtitle documents, with time coding, and users can then select their preferred language. So this is a great option to get started.



Of course, not all videos would be suitable for an international audience. A video containing lots of references to one country, or talking about something specific to a market such as laws, healthcare or education systems might not be relevant, and therefore interesting to all, but generally informational and entertaining videos can be appealing across multiple locales.


Be Visual


The great thing about videos is that they are very visual, and can be effective with few words. The type and purpose of the video will affect how feasible this is, but if your goal is to generate brand awareness, create a buzz around a product or generate social sharing why not be innovative with images and find a new way to share your message that breaks language barriers.


Go Beyond YouTube


When most of us think online videos, we think YouTube – understandably given that it is the second largest search engine in the world. And while it has users in pretty much every country on earth, it isn’t the only video site, nor is it the most popular in every country.


Investigate which sites are commonly used in your target market and utilise them to share your content. There is the obvious benefit that you will reach a wider audience, which in turn will increase the likelihood of your videos being shared on social sites and between users. It may also give you the edge over your competition – especially international competitors who might not have ventured beyond their familiar sites.


Here are just a few video sharing sites you should definitely check out:


Youku-Tudou: This is by far the most popular video site in China, with over 300 million videos viewed each day. And remember that YouTube is banned in China, so you have no choice but to find an alternative if you want to reach that audience.


RuTube: There are 30 million unique views on Russian video site RuTube each month.


NicoNico: Japanese site NicoNico also gets about 30 million unique monthly views.


Dailymotion: This video site was created in France but has spread globally to now be available in 35 countries, and 18 languages. In total, 2.5 billion videos are viewed here each month.



Be Visible in International Search Engines


You’ll know from your own searches that video is ever more present in search engine results, and this is the case across all of the global search engines.


You can upload titles, tags and descriptions for each language version of your video (and on each video sharing site you use) which can be optimised to contain relevant and popular keywords in that language. This is a great way to get fresh content into the local SERPs without having to create new written content.


Search engines Yandex and Baidu both have their own video sites, Yandex Video and iQiyi, which are also worth considering using as they are likely to perform well in search results.


Build Trust


When you’re working internationally, it’s likely that you will be serving a large proportion of your audience remotely. While that is increasingly easy in today’s world, building trust with that audience is still a challenge and can be a barrier to success. Video can be a useful tool to help you connect with that remote audience and build a relationship with them.


You could film your employees talking about your products/services – or even about themselves. Or how about making a video showing your offices/shops/warehouses? By sharing the real-life people behind your business and giving it some context, you give more credibility to it and help users in a different country to build up a picture of you and see beyond your logo.


And that’s definitely going to be cheaper than a global roadshow


Lights, Camera, Action!


It’s over to you now. There are opportunities to make videos for any product, services and organisation and to make these videos work on an international level, whether your budget is large or small. Video marketing is only going to increase in importance, so don’t get left behind.


Post from Gemma Birch on State of Digital
Five Ways To Effectively Use Video Marketing Internationally


Source: State of Digital



Five Ways to Effectively Use Video Marketing Internationally

Wednesday, February 26, 2014

Google: You Don’t Have to Dumb Your Content Down ‘that Much’

By Chris Crum

Google’s Matt Cutts answers an interesting question in a new “Webmaster Help” video: “Should I write content that is easier to read or more scientific? Will I rank better if I write for 6th graders?”


Do you think Google should give higher rankings to content that is as well-researched as possible, or content that is easier for the layman to understand? Share your thoughts in the comments.



This is a great question as we begin year three of the post-Panda Google.


“This is a really interesting question,” says Cutts. “I spent a lot more time thinking about it than I did a lot of other questions today. I really feel like the clarity of what you write matters a lot.”


He says, “I don’t know if you guys have ever had this happen, but you land on Wikipedia, and you’re searching for information – background information – about a topic, and it’s way too technical. It uses all the scientific terms or it’s talking about a muscle or whatever, and it’s really hyper-scientific, but it’s not all that understandable, and so you see this sort of revival of people who are interested in things like ‘Explain it to me like I’m a five-year-old,’ right? And you don’t have to dumb it down that much, but if you are erring on the side of clarity, and on the side of something that’s going to be understandable, you’ll be in much better shape because regular people can get it, and then if you want to, feel free to include the scientific terms or the industry jargon, the lingo…whatever it is, but if somebody lands on your page, and it’s just an opaque wall of scientific stuff, you need to find some way to pull people in to get them interested, to get them enticed in trying to pick up whatever concept it is you want to explain.”


Okay, it doesn’t sound so bad the way Cutts describes it, and perhaps I’m coming off a little sensational here, but it’s interesting that Cutts used the phrase, “You don’t have to dumb it down that much.”


This is a topic that we discussed last fall when a Googler Ryan Moulton said in a conversation on Hacker News, “There’s a balance between popularity and quality that we try to be very careful with. Ranking isn’t entirely one or the other. It doesn’t help to give people a better page if they aren’t going to click on it anyways.”


He then elaborated:


Suppose you search for something like [pinched nerve ibuprofen]. The top two results currently are http://www.mayoclinic.com/health/pinched-nerve/DS00879/DSECT… and http://answers.yahoo.com/question/index?qid=20071010035254AA…

Almost anyone would agree that the mayoclinic result is higher quality. It’s written by professional physicians at a world renowned institution. However, getting the answer to your question requires reading a lot of text. You have to be comfortable with words like “Nonsteroidal anti-inflammatory drugs,” which a lot of people aren’t. Half of people aren’t literate enough to read their prescription drug labels: http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC1831578/


The answer on yahoo answers is provided by “auntcookie84.” I have no idea who she is, whether she’s qualified to provide this information, or whether the information is correct. However, I have no trouble whatsoever reading what she wrote, regardless of how literate I am.

That’s the balance we have to strike. You could imagine that the most accurate and up to date information would be in the midst of a recent academic paper, but ranking that at 1 wouldn’t actually help many people.


This makes for a pretty interesting debate. Should Google bury the most well-researched and accurate information just to help people find something that they can read easier, even if it’s not as high quality? Doesn’t this kind of go against the guidelines Google set forth after the Panda update?


You know, like these specific questions Google suggested you ask about your content:


  • “Would you trust the information presented in this article?” (What’s more trustworthy, the scientific explanation from a reputable site or auntcookie’s take on Yahoo Answers?)

  • “Is this article written by an expert or enthusiast who knows the topic well, or is it more shallow in nature?” (Uh…)

  • “Does the article provide original content or information, original reporting, original research, or original analysis?” (Original research and analysis, to me, suggests that someone is going to know and use the lingo.)

  • “Does the page provide substantial value when compared to other pages in search results?” (Couldn’t value include educating me about the terminology I might not otherwise understand?)

  • “Is the site a recognized authority on its topic?” (You mean the type of authority that would use the terminology associated with the topic?)

  • “For a health related query, would you trust information from this site?” (Again, are you really trusting auntcookie on Yahoo Answers over Mayo Clinic?)

  • “Does this article provide a complete or comprehensive description of the topic?” (Hmm. Complete and comprehensive. You mean as opposed to dumbed down for the layman?)

  • “Does this article contain insightful analysis or interesting information that is beyond obvious?” (I’m not making this up. Here’s Google’s blog post listing these right here.)

  • “Are the pages produced with great care and attention to detail vs. less attention to detail?” (You get the idea.)

  • Maybe I’m missing something, but it seems like Google has been encouraging people to make their content as thorough, detailed, and authoritative as possible. I don’t see “Is your content dumbed down for clarity’s sake?” on the list. Of course that was nearly three years ago.


    If quality is really the goal (as Google has said over and over again in the past), doesn’t the responsibility of additional research and additional clicking of links rest with the searcher? If I don’t understand what the most accurate and relevant result is saying, isn’t it my responsibility to continue to educate myself, perhaps by looking at other sources of information and looking up the things I don’t understand?


    But that would go against Google trying to get users answers as quickly as possible. That must be why Google is trying to give you the answers itself rather than having to send you to third-party sites. Too bad those answers aren’t always reliable.


    Cutts continues in the video, “So I would argue first and foremost, you need to explain it well, and then if you can manage to do that while talking about the science or being scientific, that’s great, but the clarity of what you do, and how you explain it often matters almost as much as what you’re actually saying because if you’re saying something important, but you can’t get it across, then sometimes you never got it across in the first place, and it ends up falling on deaf ears.”


    Okay, sure, but isn’t this just going to encourage users to dumb down content at the risk of educating users less? I don’t think that’s what Cutts is trying to say here, but people are going to do anything they can to get their sites ranked better. At least he suggests trying to use both layman’s terms and the more scientific stuff.


    “It varies,” he says. “If you’re talking only to industry professionals – terminators who are talking about the scientific names of bugs, and your audience is only bugs – terminator – you know, exterminator experts, sure, then that might make sense, but in general, I would try to make things as natural sounding as possible – even to the degree that when I’m writing a blog post, I’ll sometimes read it out loud to try to catch what the snags are where things are gonna be unclear. Anything you do like that, you’ll end up with more polished writing, and that’s more likely to stand the test of time than something that’s just a few, scientific mumbo jumbo stuff that you just spit out really quickly.”


    I’m not sure where the spitting stuff out really quickly thing comes into play here. The “scientific mumbo jumbo” (otherwise known as facts and actual terminology of things) tends to appear in lengthy, texty content, like Moulton suggested, no?


    Google, of course, is trying to get better at natural language with updates like Hummingbird and various other acquisitions and tweaks. It should only help if you craft your content around that.


    “It’s not going to make that much of a difference as far as ranking,” Cutts says. “I would think about the words that a user is going to type, which is typically going to be the layman’s terms – the regular words rather than the super scientific stuff – but you can find ways to include both of them, but I would try to err on the side of clarity if you can.”


    So yeah, dumb it down. But not too much. Just enough. But also include the smart stuff. Just don’t make it too smart.


    What do you think? Should Google dumb down search results to give users things that are easier to digest, or should it be the searcher’s responsibility to do further research if they don’t understand the accurate and well-researched information that they’re consuming? Either way, isn’t this kind of a mixed message compared to the guidance Google has always given regarding “quality” content? Share your thoughts.


    For the record, I have nothing against auntcookie. I know nothing about auntcookie, but that’s kind of the point.


    Source: WebPro News 2



    Google: You Don’t Have to Dumb Your Content Down ‘that Much’

    Demand Media Earnings Continue to Suffer Google’s Wrath

    By Chris Crum


    Demand Media reported its financial results for Q4 and fiscal 2013 on Tuesday. The company continues to suffer at the hands of Google algorithm changes (it just so happens that this week marks the three-year anniversary of the Panda update).


    While things seemed to be going better for Demand Media after it navigated around its initial Panda obstacles, somewhere down the line, Google’s algorithm caught up with the company’s properties (specifically eHow) once again. Last quarter, the company reported revenue decline thanks to the lost of search referrals, and this report paints a similar picture.


    Revenue declined by 6% to $96.7 million for the quarter, and the outlook isn’t looking much better.


    CFO Mel Tang said, “We need to fix eHow.”


    On top of that, parking revenue and domain sales are down 33% for the year, compared to 2012.


    Interim CEO Shawn Colo said, “The fourth quarter was highlighted by solid performance from Society6, Content Solutions and our registrar business, offset by continued declines in the Company’s core eHow business. Additionally, we have made steady progress against key initiatives, such as product improvements on Society6 and relaunching the Livestrong.com website, while continuing to prepare for our upcoming spin-off of Rightside Group. I continue to be excited about long-term strategic opportunities within our large and growing markets.”


    Demand Media stock is down nearly 10% on Wednesday morning.


    Since the earnings call, the company has announced a new strategic advertising partnership with Healthline, which will see the latter creating digital ad solutions and exclusively representing key categories for LiveStrong.com.


    Here’s the release in its entirety:


    SANTA MONICA, Calif.–(BUSINESS WIRE)– Demand Media, Inc. (NYSE: DMD), a leading digital content & media and domain name services company, today reported financial results for the fourth quarter and fiscal year ended December 31, 2013.


    “The fourth quarter was highlighted by solid performance from Society6, Content Solutions and our registrar business, offset by continued declines in the Company’s core eHow business. Additionally, we have made steady progress against key initiatives, such as product improvements on Society6 and relaunching the Livestrong.com website, while continuing to prepare for our upcoming spin-off of Rightside Group,” said Shawn Colo , Interim CEO of Demand Media. ”I continue to be excited about long-term strategic opportunities within our large and growing markets.”


















































































































































































































































































































































































































































































    Financial Summary
    In millions, except per share amounts
    Three months ended
    December 31,
    Year ended
    December 31,
    20132012Change20132012Change
    Total Revenue$96.7$103.1(6%)$394.6$380.64%
    Content & Media Revenue ex-TAC(1)$55.4$62.3(11%)$230.4$227.01%
    Registrar Revenue38.634.512% 148.2 134.210%
    Total Revenue ex-TAC(1)$94.0$96.8(3%)$378.6$361.25%
    Income (loss) from Operations$(11.3)$6.1NA$(18.5)$8.7NA
    Adjusted EBITDA(1)$18.0$29.4(39%)$88.4$103.4(15%)
    Net income (loss)$(11.5)$4.7NA$(20.2)$6.2NA
    Adjusted net income(1)$3.0$10.8(72%)$23.2$34.3(32%)
    EPS – diluted$(0.13)$0.05NA$(0.23)$0.07NA
    Adjusted EPS – diluted(1)$0.03$0.12(75%)$0.26$0.39(33%)
    Cash Flow from Operations$9.7$26.0(63%)$76.2$91.0(16%)
    Free Cash Flow(1)$8.3$17.1(51%)$44.4$62.3(29%)







    ____________________
    (1)These non-GAAP financial measures are described below and reconciled to their comparable GAAP measures in the accompanying tables.

    Q4 2013 Financial Summary:


    • Total revenue ex-TAC declined 3% year-over-year, with 12% year-over-year growth in Registrar revenue offset by an 11% decline in Content & Media revenue ex-TAC. Excluding the acquisitions of Society6 and Name.com, total revenue ex-TAC decreased 15%.
      • Registrar revenue grew 12% year-over-year, primarily due to the addition of Name.com, which was acquired at the end of Q4 2012. Excluding the acquisition of Name.com, Registrar revenue increased 2%.

      • Owned & Operated revenue decline of 5% was driven primarily by reductions in search engine referral traffic, offset by revenue of $8.4 million from Society6, which was acquired at the end of Q2 2013. Excluding the acquisition of Society6, Owned & Operated revenue decreased 23%.

      • Network revenue ex-TAC declined 31% due primarily to $3.5 million less revenue from the Company’s YouTube Channels as well as declines in the Company’s Social Media and Network Monetization businesses, offset partially by growth in Content Solutions.


    • Adjusted EBITDA decreased 39% year-over-year, primarily reflecting the negative impact from search engine referral traffic on high-margin revenues and a mix shift to lower margin commerce and Registrar revenue.

    “We generated over $8 million of free cash flow in the fourth quarter and over $44 millionfor the year,” said Demand Media’s CFO Mel Tang . “We will continue to invest our free cash flow into our strategic content, commerce and new gTLD initiatives.”


    Business Highlights:


    Content & Media:


    • January 2014 US and Worldwide comScore Rankings:
      • On a consolidated basis, Demand Media ranked as the #19 US web property and Demand Media’s properties reached more than 88 million unique users worldwide.

      • eHow.com ranked as the #27 website in the US and reached more than 50 million unique users worldwide.

      • Livestrong / eHow Health ranked as the #3 Health property in the US, with more than 20 million unique users worldwide.

      • Cracked ranked as the #5 Humor property in the US, with more than 8 million unique users worldwide.


    • In Q4 2013, our Content Solutions business, which delivers custom and hosted content marketing services to partners, grew revenue ex-TAC 50% year-over-year to$2.8 million.

    • During Q4 2013, Society6 had a record $8.4 million of revenue and its sales on Cyber Monday increased 73% year-over-year. Society6 also expanded its product line-up to include mugs, baby onesies, kids T-shirts and a calendar created in collaboration with the artist community.

    Domain Name Services:


    • Launched our back-end registry platform in Q4 2013, powering the launch for over 60 new gTLDs and over 150,000 domain registrations to date.

    • Signed our first registry operator agreements with ICANN in Q4 2013, and have signed 14 agreements to date, including .dance, .democrat, .immobilien and .ninja, which are currently in their ‘sunrise’ launch phase.

    • Our registry entered into its first agreements with registrars to distribute our owned gTLDs, with over 40 signed to date.

    • Our eNom and Name.com registrar channels signed agreements with new registry operators to distribute new gTLDs and have launched over 80 new gTLDs to date.
























































































































































































































































































































    Operating Metrics:
    Three months ended
    December 31,
    Year ended
    December 31,
    20132012%
    Change
    20132012%
    Change
    Content & Media Metrics:
    Owned and operated websites
    Page views(1) (in millions)4,0543,35421%16,34813,19224%
    RPM(2)$11.38$14.55(22)%$11.96$13.53(12)%
    Network of customer websites
    Page views(1) (in millions)2,2454,530(50)%16,79318,989(12)%
    RPM(2)$5.30$4.3821%$3.03$3.58(15)%
    RPM ex-TAC(3)$4.12$2.9838%$2.08$2.55(18)%
    Registrar Metrics:
    End of Period # of Domains(4) (in millions)15.013.79%15.013.79%
    Average Revenue per Domain(5)$10.47$10.094%$10.36$10.192%



















    ____________________
    (1)Page views represent the total number of web pages viewed across (a) our owned and operated websites and/or (b) our network of customer websites, to the extent that the viewed customer web pages host the Company’s monetization, social media and/or content services.
    (2)RPM is defined as Content & Media revenue per one thousand page views.
    (3)RPM ex-TAC is defined as Content & Media revenue ex-TAC per one thousand page views.
    (4)A domain is defined as an individual domain name registered by a third-party customer on our platform for which we have begun to recognize revenue.
    (5)Average revenue per domain is calculated by dividing Registrar revenue for a period by the average number of domains registered in that period. Average revenue per domain for partial year periods is annualized.

    Q4 2013 Operating Metrics:


    • Owned & Operated page views increased 21% year-over-year to 4.1 billion, driven primarily by mobile page view growth on our core Owned & Operated sites, which more than offset significant declines in search engine referral traffic. Owned & Operated RPM decreased 22% year-over-year, reflecting the mix shift to lower yielding mobile page views as well as lower direct display advertising, offset partially by increased revenue from Society6.

    • Revenue per visit to our Owned & Operated Content sites was $0.05, up 25% year-over-year.

    • Network page views decreased 50% year-over-year to 2.2 billion, reflecting the Company’s decision in Q3 2013 to focus its monetization efforts on its Owned & Operated properties. Additionally, there were lower reported page views from its Pluck customers. Network RPM ex-TAC increased 38% year-over-year, reflecting higher monetization of our Social Media and Monetization page views.

    • End of period domains increased 9% year-over-year to 15.0 million, driven by the acquisition of Name.com, with average revenue per domain up 4% year-over-year, due to higher average revenue per domain on Name.com.

    Business Outlook:


    The following forward-looking information includes certain projections made by management as of the date of this press release. The Company does not intend to revise or update this information, except as required by law, and may not provide this type of information in the future. Due to a variety of factors, actual results may differ significantly from those projected. The factors that may affect results include, without limitation, the factors referenced later in this announcement under the caption “Cautionary Information Regarding Forward-Looking Statements.” These and other risk factors are discussed in more detail in the Company’s filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission.


    Due to the planned separation of the Company’s domain name services business and evolution of its content and media business, the Company is replacing quarterly and annual guidance with a discussion of expected short and long term trends.


    In 2014, the Company expects the following:


    • Slightly declining revenue year-over-year driven by the Company’s shift away from traditional branded display sales and continued declines in eHow coupled with product and ad format changes to improve user experience, offset partially by growth in Society6, Content Solutions and Registrar revenue.

    • Adjusted EBITDA margins in the mid-teens, reflective of the inclusion of $8-$10 million of annual gTLD operating expenses post the launch of our first gTLDs inFebruary 2014, $10-$15 million of operating expense related to content remediation and infrastructure ramp for Society6 and Content Solutions, and a revenue mix shift to lower margin commerce and domain name services revenue.

    • Significant free cash flow generation.

    Longer term, the Company expects the following:


    • Demand Media standalone revenue driven by a return to growth in eHow, as well as our growing Content Solutions and commerce businesses contributing a significantly higher percentage of total revenue.

    • Rightside revenue driven by growth in domain name services revenue from the new gTLD opportunity, partially offset by continued declines in domain parking revenue.

    • For both businesses, we expect margin expansion and to continue to generate significant free cash flow.

    Conference Call and Webcast Information


    Demand Media will host a corresponding conference call and live webcast at 5:00 p.m. Eastern time today. To access the conference call, dial 877.430.7751 and reference conference ID 51526222. To participate on the live call, analysts should dial-in at least 10 minutes prior to the commencement of the call. A live webcast also will be available on the Investor Relations section of the Company’s corporate website athttp://ir.demandmedia.com and via replay beginning approximately two hours after the completion of the call.


    About Non-GAAP Financial Measures


    To supplement our consolidated financial statements, which are prepared and presented in accordance with accounting principles generally accepted in the United States of America (“GAAP”), we use certain non-GAAP financial measures described below. The presentation of this additional financial information is not intended to be considered in isolation or as a substitute for, or superior to, the financial information prepared and presented in accordance with GAAP. For more information on these non-GAAP financial measures, please see the tables captioned “Reconciliations of Non-GAAP Measures” included at the end of this release.


    The non-GAAP financial measures presented in this release are the primary measures used by the Company’s management and board of directors to understand and evaluate its financial performance and operating trends, including period-to-period comparisons, to prepare and approve its annual budget and to develop short and long term operational plans. Additionally, Adjusted EBITDA has been the primary measure used by the compensation committee of the Company’s board of directors to establish the funding targets for and fund its annual bonus pool for the Company’s employees and executives. We believe our presented non-GAAP financial measures are useful to investors both because (1) they allow for greater transparency with respect to key metrics used by management in its financial and operational decision-making and (2) management frequently uses them in its discussions with investors, commercial bankers, securities analysts and other users of its financial statements.


    Revenue ex-TAC is defined by the Company as GAAP revenue less traffic acquisition costs (TAC). TAC comprises the portion of Content & Media GAAP revenue shared with the Company’s network customers. Management believes that Revenue ex-TAC is a meaningful measure of operating performance because it is frequently used for internal managerial purposes and helps facilitate a more complete period-to-period understanding of factors and trends affecting the Company’s underlying revenue performance of itsContent & Media service offering.


    Adjusted earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation and amortization (Adjusted EBITDA) is defined by the Company as net income (loss) before income tax expense, interest and other income (expense), depreciation, amortization, stock-based compensation, as well as the financial impact of acquisition and realignment costs, the formation expenses directly related to its gTLD initiative, net gains or losses on withdrawals of interest in gTLD applications, and any gains or losses on certain asset sales or dispositions. Acquisition and realignment costs include such items, when applicable, as (1) non-cash GAAP purchase accounting adjustments for certain deferred revenue and costs, (2) legal, accounting and other professional fees directly attributable to acquisition activity, (3) employee severance payments attributable to acquisition or corporate realignment activities and (4) expenditures related to the separation of Demand Media into two distinct publicly traded companies. Management does not consider these expenses to be indicative of the Company’s ongoing operating results or future outlook.


    Management believes that this non-GAAP financial measure reflects the Company’s business in a manner that allows for meaningful period-to-period comparisons and analysis of trends. In particular, the exclusion of certain expenses in calculating Adjusted EBITDA can provide a useful measure for period-to-period comparisons of the Company’s underlying recurring revenue and operating costs, which is focused more closely on the current costs necessary to utilize previously acquired long-lived assets. In addition, management believes that it can be useful to exclude certain non-cash charges because the amount of such expenses is the result of long-term investment decisions in previous periods rather than day-to-day operating decisions. For example, due to the long-lived nature of a majority of its media content, the revenue generated by the Company’s media content assets in a given period bears little relationship to the amount of its investment in media content in that same period. Accordingly, management believes that content acquisition costs represent a discretionary long-term capital investment decision undertaken at a point in time. This investment decision is clearly distinguishable from other ongoing business activities, and its discretionary nature and long-term impact differentiate it from specific period transactions, decisions regarding day-to-day operations, and activities that would have an immediate impact on operating or financial performance if materially changed, deferred or terminated.


    Adjusted Earnings Per Share (Adjusted EPS) is defined by the Company as Adjusted Net Income divided by the weighted average number of shares outstanding. Adjusted Net Income is defined by the Company as net income (loss) before the effect of stock-based compensation, amortization of intangible assets acquired via business combinations, accelerated amortization of content intangible assets removed from service, acquisition and realignment costs, the formation expenses directly related to its gTLD initiative, net gains or losses on withdrawals of interest in gTLD applications, and any gains or losses on certain asset sales or dispositions, and is calculated using the application of a normalized effective tax rate. Acquisition and realignment costs include such items, when applicable, as (1) non-cash GAAP purchase accounting adjustments for certain deferred revenue and costs, (2) legal, accounting and other professional fees directly attributable to acquisition activity, (3) employee severance payments attributable to acquisition or corporate realignment activities, and (4) expenditures related to the separation of Demand Mediainto two distinct publicly traded companies. Management does not consider these expenses to be indicative of the Company’s ongoing operating results or future outlook.


    Management believes that Adjusted Net Income and Adjusted EPS provide investors with additional useful information to measure the Company’s underlying financial performance, particularly from period to period, because these measures are exclusive of certain non-cash expenses not directly related to the operation of its ongoing business (such as amortization of intangible assets acquired via business combinations, as well as certain other non-cash expenses such as purchase accounting adjustments and stock-based compensation) and include a normalized effective tax rate based on the Company’s statutory tax rate.


    Discretionary Free Cash Flow is defined by the Company as net cash provided by operating activities excluding cash outflows from acquisition and realignment activities, including expenditures related to the separation of Demand Media into two distinct publicly traded companies, and the formation expenses directly related to its gTLD initiative, less capital expenditures to acquire property and equipment. Free Cash Flow is defined by the Company as Discretionary Free Cash Flow less investments in intangible assets and is not impacted by net payments for gTLD applications, which were $3.9 million and $18.2 million for the twelve months ended December 31, 2013 and 2012, respectively, or net proceeds from the withdrawal of interest in gTLD applications, which were $5.6 million for the year ended December 31, 2013. Management believes that Discretionary Free Cash Flow and Free Cash Flow provide investors with additional useful information to measure operating liquidity because they reflect the Company’s underlying cash flows from recurring operating activities after investing in capital assets and intangible assets. These measures are used by management, and may also be useful for investors, to assess the Company’s ability to generate cash flow for a variety of strategic opportunities, including reinvestment in the business, pursuing new business opportunities, potential acquisitions, payment of dividends and share repurchases.


    The use of these non-GAAP financial measures has certain limitations because they do not reflect all items of income and expense, or cash flows that affect the Company’s operations. An additional limitation of these non-GAAP financial measures is that they do not have standardized meanings, and therefore other companies may use the same or similarly named measures but exclude different items or use different computations. Management compensates for these limitations by reconciling these non-GAAP financial measures to their most comparable GAAP financial measures within its financial press releases. Non-GAAP financial measures should be considered in addition to, not as a substitute for, financial measures prepared in accordance with GAAP. Further, these non-GAAP financial measures may differ from the non-GAAP financial information used by other companies, including peer companies, and therefore comparability may be limited. We encourage investors and others to review our financial information in its entirety and not rely on a single financial measure. The accompanying tables have more details on the GAAP financial measures and the related reconciliations.


    About Demand Media


    Demand Media, Inc. (NYSE: DMD) is a leading digital media and domain name services company that informs and entertains one of the internet’s largest audiences, helps advertisers find innovative ways to engage with their customers and enables publishers, individuals and businesses to expand their online presence. Headquartered in Santa Monica, CA, Demand Media has offices in North America, South America and Europe. For more information about Demand Media, please visit www.demandmedia.com.


    About Rightside


    Rightside™ inspires and delivers new possibilities for consumers and businesses to define and present themselves online. The company, with its affiliates, is a leading provider of domain name services, offering one of the industry’s most comprehensive platforms for the discovery, registration, development, and monetization of domain names. This includes 15 million names under management, the most widely used domain name reseller platform, more than 20,000 distribution partners, an award-winning retail registrar, the leading domain name auction service through its NameJet joint venture and an interest in more than 100 new Top Level Domain registry operator agreements or applications through Rightside affiliate, United TLD Holdco Limited, trading as Rightside Registry. Following its planned separation from Demand Media, Rightside will be home to some of the most admired brands in the industry, including eNom, Name.com, andNameJet (in partnership with Web.com). Headquartered in Kirkland, WA, Rightside has offices in North America, Europe and Australia. For more information please visitwww.rightside.co.


    Cautionary Information Regarding Forward-Looking Statements


    This press release contains forward-looking statements within the meaning of the safe harbor provisions of the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995, as amended. These forward-looking statements involve risks and uncertainties regarding the Company’s future financial performance, and are based on current expectations, estimates and projections about our industry, financial condition, operating performance and results of operations, including certain assumptions related thereto. Statements containing words such as guidance, may, believe, anticipate, expect, intend, plan, project, projections, business outlook, and estimate or similar expressions constitute forward-looking statements. Actual results may differ materially from the results predicted, and reported results should not be considered an indication of future performance. Potential risks and uncertainties that could affect our operating and financial results are described in our annual report on Form 10-K for the fiscal year ending December 31, 2012 filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission (http://www.sec.gov) on March 5, 2013,as such risks and uncertainties may be updated in our annual and quarterly reports on Form 10-K and Form 10-Q filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission, including, without limitation, information under the captions Risk Factors and Management’s Discussion and Analysis of Financial Condition and Results of Operations. These risks and uncertainties include, among others: our ability to complete a separation of our business into two separate public companies and unanticipated developments that may delay or negatively impact such a transaction; the possibility that we may decide not to proceed with the separation of our business as previously announced if we determine that alternative opportunities are more favorable to our stockholders; the impact and possible disruption to our operations from pursuing the separation transaction; the expectation that the separation transaction will be tax-free; revenue and growth expectations for the two independent companies, and the ability of each company to operate as an independent entity, following the separation transaction; changes in the methodologies of internet search engines, including ongoing algorithmic changes made by Google as well as possible future changes, and the impact such changes may have on page view growth and driving search related traffic to our owned & operated websites and the websites of our network customers; the impact of product and ad format changes to improve user experience; changes in our content creation and distribution platform, including the possible repurposing of content to alternate distribution channels, reduced investments in intangible assets or the sale or removal of content; our ability to successfully grow adjacent lines of business such as commerce and content solutions as part of our growth strategy; the effects of shifting consumption of media content from desktop to mobile; our ability to successfully pursue and implement our gTLD initiative; our dependence on material agreements with a specific business partner for a significant portion of our revenue; changes in amortization or depreciation expense due to a variety of factors; potential write downs, reserves against or impairment of assets including receivables, goodwill, intangibles (including media content) or other assets; and our ability to retain key personnel. From time to time, we may consider acquisitions or divestitures that, if consummated, could be material. Any forward-looking statements regarding financial metrics are based upon the assumption that no such acquisition or divestiture is consummated during the relevant periods. If an acquisition or divestiture were consummated, actual results could differ materially from any forward-looking statements. The Company does not intend to revise or update the information set forth in this press release, except as required by law, and may not provide this type of information in the future.











































































































































































































































































































































































































































































































    Demand Media, Inc. and Subsidiaries

    Unaudited Condensed Consolidated Statements of Operations


    (In thousands, except per share amounts)


    Three months ended
    December 31,
    Year endedDecember 31,
    2013201220132012
    Revenue$96,661$103,142$394,598$380,578
    Operating expenses:
    Service costs (exclusive of amortization of intangible assets shown separately below)(1) (2)55,12748,865204,763181,018
    Sales and marketing (1) (2)9,58712,82346,44546,501
    Product development (1) (2)10,9209,71944,18740,708
    General and administrative (1) (2)18,67716,17173,27763,025
    Amortization of intangible assets13,6859,46044,40940,676
    Total operating expenses107,99697,038413,081371,928
    Income (loss) from operations(11,335)6,104(18,483)8,650
    Interest income582142
    Interest expense(668)(157)(1,642)(622)
    Other income (expense), net(12)(34)(61)(111)
    Gain on sale of assets1,666-4,232-
    Income (loss) before income taxes(10,344)5,921(15,933)7,959
    Income tax expense(1,177)(1,172)(4,241)(1,783)
    Net income (loss)$(11,521)$4,749$(20,174)$6,176
    (1) Stock-based compensation expense included in the line items above:
    Service costs$700$679$2,778$2,820
    Sales and marketing8511,5975,3286,118
    Product development1,0841,2835,1866,452
    General and administrative3,1203,823 14,09215,978
    Total stock-based compensation expense$5,755$7,382$27,384$31,368
    (2) Depreciation expense included in the line items above:
    Service costs$3,352$3,663$14,213$14,452
    Sales and marketing84108379453
    Product development2032388651,025
    General and administrative1,5271,0255,0443,728
    Total depreciation expense$5,166$5,034$20,501$19,658
    Net income (loss) per share – basic$(0.13)$0.06$(0.23)$0.07
    Net income (loss) per share – diluted$(0.13)$0.05$(0.23)$0.07
    Weighted average number of shares – basic90,31086,14088,53484,553
    Weighted average number of shares – diluted90,31088,44488,53487,237






























































































































































































































































































































































































































































































    Demand Media, Inc. and Subsidiaries
    Unaudited Condensed Consolidated Balance Sheets
    (In thousands)
    December 31,
    2013
    December 31,
    2012
    Assets
    Current assets
    Cash and cash equivalents$153,511$102,933
    Accounts receivable, net33,30145,517
    Prepaid expenses and other current assets7,8266,041
    Deferred registration costs66,27357,718
    Total current assets260,911212,209
    Property and equipment, net42,19335,467
    Intangible assets, net88,76691,746
    Goodwill347,382266,349
    Deferred registration costs, less current portion12,51411,320
    Other long-term assets25,32220,906
    Total assets$777,088$637,997
    Liabilities and Stockholders’ Equity
    Current liabilities
    Accounts payable$12,814$10,471
    Accrued expenses and other current liabilities34,67940,489
    Deferred tax liabilities22,41518,892
    Current portion of long-term debt15,000-
    Deferred revenue84,95575,142
    Total current liabilities169,863144,994
    Deferred revenue, less current portion16,92915,965
    Long-term debt81,250-
    Other liabilities13,0414,847
    Stockholders’ equity
    Common stock and additional paid-in capital611,039562,703
    Treasury stock(30,767)(25,932)
    Accumulated other comprehensive income50215
    Accumulated deficit(84,769)(64,595)
    Total stockholders’ equity496,005472,191
    Total liabilities and stockholders’ equity$777,088$637,997





























































































































































































































































































































































































































































































































































































































































    Demand Media, Inc. and Subsidiaries
    Unaudited Condensed Consolidated Statements of Cash Flows
    (In thousands)
    Three months ended
    December 31,
    Year ended
    December 31,
    2013201220132012
    Cash flows from operating activities:
    Net income (loss)$(11,521)$4,749$(20,174)$6,176
    Adjustments to reconcile net income (loss) to net cash provided by operating activities:
    Depreciation and amortization18,85114,49464,91060,334
    Stock-based compensation5,7557,38227,38431,368
    Gain on other assets, net(1,666)-(4,232)-
    Other6911,1343,0381,717
    Net change in operating assets and liabilities, net of effect of acquisitions(2,375)(1,722)5,237(8,612)
    Net cash provided by operating activities9,73526,03776,16390,983
    Cash flows from investing activities:
    Purchases of property and equipment(3,986)(5,283)(26,746)(17,708)
    Purchases of intangibles(3,509)(4,647)(16,772)(13,237)
    Proceeds from gTLD withdrawals, net2,740-5,616-
    Payments for gTLD applications, net(3,546)(16,200)(3,949)(18,202)
    Cash paid for acquisitions(397)-(73,626)(17,480)
    Change in restricted cash---(855)
    Other473-942-
    Net cash used in investing activities(8,225)(26,130)(114,535)(67,482)
    Cash flows from financing activities:
    Long-term debt borrowings50,000-120,000-
    Long-term debt repayments(3,750)-(23,750)-
    Debt issuance costs--(1,936)(144)
    Repurchases of common stock-(4,913)(4,835)(8,869)
    Proceeds from exercises of stock options and contributions to ESPP2531,4514,74612,467
    Net taxes paid on RSUs vesting and options exercised(834)(6,151)(4,575)(9,496)
    Other(180)(258)(620)(524)
    Net cash provided by (used in) financing activities45,489(9,871)89,030(6,566)
    Effect of foreign currency on cash and cash equivalents(17)(19)(80)(37)
    Change in cash and cash equivalents46,982(9,983)50,57816,898
    Cash and cash equivalents, beginning of period106,529112,916102,93386,035
    Cash and cash equivalents, end of period$153,511$102,933$153,511$102,933





























































































































































































































































































































































































































































































































































































































































































































































    Demand Media, Inc. and Subsidiaries
    Reconciliations of Non-GAAP Measures
    (In thousands, except per share amounts)
    Three months ended
    December 31,
    Year ended
    December 31,
    2013201220132012
    Revenue ex-TAC:
    Content & Media revenue$58,022$68,633$246,397$246,399
    Less: traffic acquisition costs (TAC)(2,644)(6,332)(15,989)(19,441)
    Content & Media Revenue ex-TAC55,37862,301230,408226,958
    Registrar revenue38,63934,509148,201134,179
    Total Revenue ex-TAC$94,017$96,810$378,609$361,137
    Adjusted EBITDA:
    Net income (loss)$(11,521)$4,749$(20,174)$6,176
    Income tax expense1,1771,1724,2411,783
    Interest and other expense, net6751831,682691
    Gain on gTLD application withdrawals, net(1)(1,666)-(4,232)-
    Depreciation and amortization18,85114,49464,91060,334
    Stock-based compensation5,7557,38227,38431,368
    Acquisition and realignment costs(2)1,8803146,113446
    gTLD expense(3)2,8751,0618,4282,650
    Adjusted EBITDA$18,026$29,355$88,352$103,448
    Discretionary and Total Free Cash Flow:
    Net cash provided by operating activities$9,735$26,037$76,163$90,983
    Purchases of property and equipment(3,986)(5,283)(26,746)(17,708)
    Acquisition and realignment cash flows(2)2,861254,58725
    gTLD expense cash flows(3)3,2399747,1522,198
    Discretionary Free Cash Flow11,84921,75361,15675,498
    Purchases of intangible assets(3,509)(4,647)(16,772)(13,237)
    Free Cash Flow$8,340$17,106$44,384$62,261
    Adjusted Net Income and Adjusted EPS:
    Net income (loss)$(11,521)$4,749$(20,174)$6,176
    (a) Stock-based compensation5,7557,38227,38431,368
    (b) Amortization of intangible assets – M&A3,8722,57213,16210,904
    (c) Content intangible assets removed from service2,3872372,4532,055
    (d) Acquisition and realignment costs(2)1,8803146,113446
    (e) Gain on gTLD application withdrawals, net(1)(1,666)-(4,232)-
    (f) gTLD expense(3)2,8751,0618,4282,650
    (g) Income tax effect of items (a) – (f) & application of 38% statutory tax rate to pre-tax income(632)(5,473)(9,962)(19,262)
    Adjusted Net Income$2,951$10,842$23,173$34,337
    Adjusted EPS – diluted$0.03$0.12$0.26$0.39
    Shares used to calculate Adjusted EPS – diluted90,91188,44489,42887,237















    (1)Net gains on withdrawals of interest in gTLD applications, included in gain on other assets, net.
    (2)Acquisition and realignment costs include such items, when applicable, as (a) non-cash GAAP purchase accounting adjustments for certain deferred revenue and costs, (b) legal, accounting and other professional fees directly attributable to acquisition activity, (c) employee severance payments attributable to acquisition or corporate realignment activities and (d) expenditures related to the separation of Demand Media into two distinct publicly traded companies. Management does not consider these costs to be indicative of the Company’s core operating results.
    (3)Comprises formation expenses directly related to the Company’s gTLD initiative that did not generate associated revenue in 2013 or 2012.































































































































































































































































    Demand Media, Inc. and Subsidiaries
    Unaudited GAAP Revenue, by Revenue Source
    (In thousands)
    Three months ended
    December 31,
    Year ended
    December 31,
    2013201220132012
    Content & Media:
    Owned and operated websites$46,127$48,796$195,546$178,511
    Network of customer websites11,89519,83750,85167,888
    Total Revenue – Content & Media58,02268,633246,397246,399
    Registrar38,63934,509148,201134,179
    Total Revenue$96,661$103,142$394,598$380,578
    Three months ended
    December 31,
    Year ended
    December 31,
    2013201220132012
    Content & Media:
    Owned and operated websites48%48%49%47%
    Network of customer websites12%19%13%18%
    Total Revenue – Content & Media60%67%62%65%
    Registrar40%33%38%35%
    Total Revenue100%100%100%100%

    Source: Demand Media, Inc.


    Images via Demand Media


    Source: WebPro News 2



    Demand Media Earnings Continue to Suffer Google’s Wrath