This, by itself, is only slightly interesting; as with any technology — dishwashers, automobiles, air conditioning, telephones, TV, cell phones — there are always folks who’ll find reasons not to use it, for reasons ranging from the pragmatic, to the quixotic, to the perverse. And inevitably, those refusers will diminish as the technology evolves from novelty to utility to necessity.

(Also, I note that some of the Facebook refusers profiled were merely lazy, since instead of taking a principled stance and quarantining themselves from the people and information transmitted via online social networks, they simply relied on their non-boycotting friends to relay the information for them.)

To me, the interesting bit is the idea that people who aren’t on Facebook exist in a kind of un-person / non-entity state of being, and how that represents a radical change in attitude from the pre-computer era — a paradigm shift, sea change, or gamechanger (depending on which era’s jargon you prefer), brought about by the dominance of digital media and interconnected networks in general, and the ubiquitious convenience of online search in particular.

My thinking goes a little something like this:

Previously, if something didn’t have a physical presence, it didn’t really exist. Now, if something doesn’t have an online presence, it doesn’t really exist.

Consider: In pre-Internet days, the only presence was physical, so we only really thought we knew someone or something if we could see, talk to, and touch it directly. Anything outside that model — early virtual relationships  like BBS, amateur radio, telephone party line, or pen pals — wasn’t quite “real.”

Nowadays, knowing something really means the ability to find, store, and send it online.

Looking at the example of the Facebook refusers, we see people who don’t participate don’t have presence, even in those platforms where the online interactions are strongest when reinforcing offline relationships. (I’ve mentioned a related theme before, “When you don’t post, you don’t exist.”)

More importantly, it holds true for goods and knowledge that exist as physical items in the real world — say, old books that haven’t been scanned in yet; a property record that isn’t in an accessible database; or an antique that hasn’t been documented online: Because they’re not findable via Web search or interlinked database, because they don’t have presence online, we can’t know then or even know about them unless we venture offline, so they don’t really exist.

Now, sure, there have are plenty of things that didn’t and don’t really “exist” — economies, trust, reputations, patriotism, love, etc. — but have always been convenient for us to act like they do. But here I’m talking about things that actually do exist as physical items in the real world, but because we’re cut off from them in our daily, digital, online lives, they’re out of the loop.

This is, of course, not due to any changes in intrinsic value (to the extent that such a beast exists), but represents a shift in attitude — it boils down to what we consider “visible” and “knowable.”

Anyway, just a thought. Please leave a real comment below.

Over the past 48 hours, the Internet world has been abuzz over Microsoft’s recent announcement that it was evolving the way search was happening. As a result, Live Search is no longer a player in the game. Enter Bing – the “decision engine”. Set to be formally unveiled on June 1, I have been privvy to a private screening by the folks at Microsoft courtesy of SHIFT Communications and based on what I’m seeing thus far, I’m thinking it’ll create a whole new environment on which search is based. But no…I do not think it will be the proverbial “Google killer”. It just opens a new way of thinking about how search is done.

During the webcast with the head of Microsoft’s search team, Stefan Weitz, he basically laid out the case for Bing. Apparently what search engines are dealing with is a lot of noise. People are searching for information and look for search engines to provide them an aggregate list of websites and resources. However, the tough part is separating all those links on the page – which ones are the good links and which are the bad ones? In the case with Bing, the goal is to propose more good links and help eliminate dead links. So if you’re looking for information on the cause of diabetes, for example, Bing would give you links for Mayo Clinic or the CDC or other more relevant websites rather than a pharmacy website that could be considered a “fly by night”. How is this done without doing a profile on you? Through Microsoft’s algorithms, it seems.

Microsoft has done some research into what they’ve created with their search engine and in order to make something that will stand out and become one of the leading search engines and position themselves as understanding the semantic web, this is what they’ve uncovered:

- Users are dissatisfied: Search results for 50 percent of the queries fail to meet the consumer’s needs (they are either abandoned or refined), and 35 percent of people express dissatisfaction with search today — and this percentage increases when they move into task-focused activities (such as getting local information or finding a product).

- Users want help searching: 72 percent of people surveyed said current search results are too disorganized, nearly half of all search queries are a repeat of a previous search, and half the searches are eventually refined.

- Users are focused more on tasks and decisions: 66 percent of people reported using search engines to make decisions, and long sessions are becoming more common, with more than 46 percent of searchers’ time being spent on sessions more than 30 minutes in length.

These startling statistics has led Microsoft to look at how to make search engines help form decisions for the users. And it seems that they have done just that, but unfortunately for businesses who wish to advertise on this new robust search engine, they’ll need to make their content and information that much more relevant. So brush up on your search engine optimization skills because you’re going to need it!

Based on my conversation with the Microsoft team earlier today, here are some additional tidbits on Bing:

From the standpoint of the end user, you’re allowed to do whatever search queries you want to do but also that you’re able to focus on three other vertical markets: local, travel and shopping. When you query something, keep in mind that you’re no longer subject to everything relating to that query being thrust at you in the very beginning. You can filter our the criteria. So if there are alternative forms of the search query, Microsoft Bing will provide that for you. If you’re looking for electronics to purchase, you’re able to get a shopping price list so you’ll know where the cheapest place is along with any reviews scoured across multiple websites – the same goes for restaurants if you care to dine out. The most interesting thing is that if you wish to travel, you’re going to encounter an interface very similiar to Kayak.com, but you’re still on the Bing website. You simply enter in your travel criteria and you’ll get a list of websites that show the lowest prices (Microsoft doesn’t get any money from any sale or ticket purchased, from what I’m told). However, what separates Kayak.com from Bing’s Travel option is the incorporation of Farecast, which Microsoft purchased recently that gives travel fare trends so you’ll know over the course of 7 days the odds of whether the fare will increase or decrease if you don’t buy right now.

A new feature that I think may have some use is their new “Save & Share” search feature. You can look back from a historical perspective at all of the search queries you’ve selected AND also the links that you’ve clicked and save them for others to look at or even share them with others by posting to Windows Live, emailing it, or using Facebook Connect to post to your Facebook page. But where’s Twitter or FriendFeed in the mix? There’s currently no plan right now to integrate them. Why? Perhaps because Microsoft doesn’t own a stake in any of those companies? I don’t know the answer, but it should be a good point to have them added to help spread the word.

So what does this do for businesses who think it’s another website? Well first of all it will possibly screw with your search engine strategy a bit, but most likely for the better. Yes, you can go through the motions and try and optimize your website, but this will also help people perfect their search engine marketing skills. Moreover, with Microsoft’s attempt at making this a relevant search for users, chances are that you’ll find that those engaging in covert SEO black hat ops will be found out through the search algorithms and therefore not appear high in the rankings since Microsoft does it through relevancy. Sure, you may still encounter them as you filter your search but the probabilities of having dead links will be low.

As for text advertising like you would see on Google or Yahoo, they still remain. Here’s something interesting though. If you are advertising a travel product, there may be a chance that you’ll have the benefit of appearing in the travel portion of Bing where people look for travel arrangements AND also if they conducted a regular travel search query. So two for the price of one, perhaps? Who knows…but rest assured that your ads will be seen. You just need to make sure that your content on that text ad and website is also relevant so work on that copy and spruce up that website!

If there’s one thing to say about Bing, it’s relevancy. Everything is ordered in a way that is easily accessible in this search engine “portal”. If you conduct the same search in Yahoo, Google, and Bing, you’ll see how things are organized. With Google, news relating to said subject would appear first and immediately you’re thrust into the search results. But with Bing, you’re going to see that the searches are pretty demarcated and you can filter your search from things like images, news, references, video, etc. The point of Bing is to make it so you don’t need to leave their site to play music, watch videos, etc that you might find off of the website, thereby reducing the number of clicks you encounter. You’re able to zoom past any irrelevant sites and go straight to where you’re most interested.

Ingenious? I’d say it’s getting pretty close to as relevant of information as I’d want. They’re set to go live globally fully on June 3, but you’re able to start using it on June 1 for some portions of search. Check out their product guide and also their tutorial video to get a glimpse at what awaits the world on Bing. Maybe now search makes some sense.

*All trademarks, service marks and logos (the “Trademarks”) used are registered and unregistered Trademarks of their respective owners.

Finding the best product lines is an art, and will likely evolve as your business grows. Some of the best places to find product lines are in trade magazines and at buyers market shows. Both provide access to a wealth of vendors and exhibitors and don’t require you to travel very far at all. Simply flip through pages or click and print booth lists. Also, size up your competition. Buy your competition’s products. Study them. Understand their key benefits and key downfalls. Evaluate the good, bad, and indifferent, and develop competitive product strategies accordingly.

Once you have your list of potential lines in-hand, how do you know which ones you should buy? If you source and buy the wrong products, you’ll likely end up with a bunch of dead stock that sits around in storage. If you paid for this with a credit card upfront, even worse, because you are paying interest on all that immobile inventory.

There are a lot of things to consider. These questions will help you narrow down the best product lines for your store, and should help you avoid those lines that will become worthless.

1.    Will this line compliment your existing offering? Will it be relevant to your target market? It can be difficult to decide which products to buy if you’re not looking at them sitting physically next to each other on a shelf. Imagine your ecommerce business like a brick and mortar store. If you were to put all of your products into one physical location, would they all fit together?

2.    How does this product or brand appear in search results? Look at the competition for paid search (Google or Yahoo). If there aren’t many ads or relevant pages, and you know this brand has a strong or growing following, then this is probably a good line for you to buy.

3.    Will the manufacturer allow you to use their brand name in your advertising? Surprisingly, the answer is not always yes.

4.    Are there seasonal buys? For example, to continue supplying this product for your customers, do certain amounts have to be purchased at certain times of the year? If the amount of product isn’t something you can hold or afford several times a year, then perhaps it isn’t the line for you.

5.    Do you have to stick to a strict MSRP to sell these products? If your site competes with others on price, then this probably isn’t the product for you. Conversely, the internet is one of the hardest places to compete on price. If your site has many strict MSRP brands, then you should emphasis other tangible assets like shopping ease of use or customer service.

6.    How quickly will you be able to get this product in to your hands? Delivery typically ranges anywhere from 2 weeks to 6 months, so you’ll need to plan accordingly.

7.    Will the manufacturer provide product flats, or will you have to take these photos yourself? ‘Flats’ are pictures of the single item on a white or grey background made just for the internet. The answer to this question could seriously affect how quickly you are able to get these products on your site, and therefore, how quickly you can sell them.

Finally, make a plan or calendar for product line buys and try to stick to it. Prioritize each line from most important buy to least important buy. Schedule the most important product buys first and the rest throughout the remainder of the year.

Above all, take your time and be patient with your product lines. The worst you can do is act too hastily and buy a stock room full of products you can’t sell.

Now, everyone (and I mean everyone) wants to know how they can get their stuff in the first view on the first page of search engines. Better search results positioning means more eyeballs, more eyeballs means more clicks, and more clicks hopefully leads to more customers and revenue.

There’s a lot of good SEO information that you, as the small business owner, can take away, but there’s also a lot of voodoo, handwaving, and hucksterism, too. When I take a look at SEO advice, I focus on things that help you present your information, in a way that’s clearer and better-organized… for both search engine spiders and humans. That way, you (hopefully) get better search results positioning, but you also get better engagement with customers and visitors.

Here’s what the four interviewees have to say about increasing your small business’s visibility through search:

Chris Baggott, CEO, Compendium Software: Branding really isn’t the goal of SEO — it’s how to get found. Blogging is a great tool for leveling the playing field for small businesses when it comes to SEO, especially in local search. Because most small businesses are local, that can be an advantage in search over a corporate behemoth that has locations all over the place — if they’re blogging.

David Berkowitz, Dir. of Emerging Media & Client Strategy, 360i: SEO is an opportunity for small businesses to get more of their content out there, and to build relationships that lead to inbound links. By engaging with the community, the community helps good sites bubble up to the top.

Jay Berkowitz, author, “Ten Golden Rules” Podcaster: SEO is really important, and you can help your SEO by doing some basic things; at the very simplest, add keywords to every page — pick 2 or 3 main keyword phrases to focus on for the site, add them to the title, and use them 3 times on each page (in the first paragraph, in the body, and in the bottom paragraph.)

Lee Odden, CEO of TopRankMarketing.com (looks like there’s a “d” missing in his name in the video caption, sorry about that, Lee): Find out what bloggers write a lot about and let them know if you’ve got something they’d be interested in by leaving comments.  Another tactic is using optimized press releases, which will drive inbound links. Search engine rankings will increase if they find the keywords on your site, and you get inbound links from sites that are also relevant to those keywords.

SEO is an entire industry, so there’s plenty of stuff to say about it. Leave a comment below if you have a thought to share about the ideas presented in the video, my characterization of them, or thoughts about SEO for small business in general.

Most of you know that Twitter became a force of nature and they decided to focus their energy on that product. In February 2007 it was up for sale and acquired by New York-based Sonic Mountain. In September that year, Sonic Mountain announced it had acquired the technology assets of FireAnt, an RSS video aggregation website and desktop media player, with plans to incorporate this technology into the Odeo service.

In March 2008, Sonic Mountain announced it had acquired Blogdigger, a search engine for blogs and RSS content, with plans to incorporate the technology into Odeo. This is where find Greg Gershman, former CEO of Blogdigger and now VP of Engineering at Odeo with the mission to re-launch a completely redesigned site with an expanded focus on search & discovery for syndicated audio and video.

Greg also runs the site NoMoreTV.com which is a web site he set up to perform an experiment. Give up cable and broadcast TV for a year to see how easy or hard it is get all of his TV content online.

I recently had a chance to chat with Greg about the re-launch and the future of Odeo. Here is the transcript of that interview:

Steve: You worked hard to build BlogDigger over the last few years. What were the reasons you decided to be acquired by Odeo?
Greg: I started Blogdigger in 2003 almost as an experiment; I had no intentions of making it into a business. Over time, the site picked up users and traffic and got to the point where I was able to work on it full-time. But it was only ever a one-man operation. I wanted to progress beyond that and working with Odeo was a good opportunity for me to see Blogdigger off in a nice way and take what I had learned and apply it in a broader context. The technology and the experience that I had gained by building Blogdigger was a nice fit with what Odeo was looking for at the time, so the acquisition seemed like a logical direction to take.

Steve: Many people use iTunes as their main podcasting directory because they have an iPod. Because Odeo has gone way beyond being just a podcast directory, how do you see as an alternative or a compliment to the iTunes podcast directory?
Greg: Podcasting has become almost synonymous with iTunes, which is not the case. You don’t need an iPod to listen to or watch a podcast. All you need is an internet connection and a browser. In addition, there are many channels of content that aren’t set up as podcasts, but you may want to track on a regular basis, like YouTube channels or TV shows on Hulu. iTunes is severely limited in this regard. In addition, iTunes only works with iPods and iPhones. But what about other mobile devices that have the capabilities to store audio and video? I have a Verizon phone that I use to watch video podcasts, iTunes can’t help me there. The guiding idea behind Odeo was that we wanted to embrace all users, whether online or on a mobile device, independent of what device they are using. If the content can only be viewed online, like a Hulu show, then Odeo can help you track and watch those shows; if the content is a downloadable video podcast, and you have a Blackberry, Odeo will let you watch that video where you want to. iTunes is never going to look beyond the Apple user.

Steve: Because Odeo has gone way beyond being just a podcast directory; what is the vision for Odeo going forward?
Greg: We’re really looking at two things: how can we help content producers better connect, track and measure their audience, and how can we help the content consumer better consume the content where they want to, when they want to. Everything we’re working on is focused around those two goals. For content producers, we’ve added tracking and statistics for episodes and subscribers, and opening up our stats for integration into other systems. For consumers, we’ve built a searchable, categorized digital media directory that includes audio and video podcasts, TV shows and web-based video, and we’re working on supporting mobile devices; our solution for syncing content to a mobile device should be coming out sometime in the next few months, and we’re working on native applications for popular mobile platforms like Blackberry and Android.

Steve: Since your expertise is in search, do you see the evolution of search in audio and video files becoming more important and more content like this grows on the web?
Greg: Absolutely. It’s relatively simple now to set up a basic search engine for a store of content. There are tools that can be used to do this quite simply. But that gets you less than half way there; with the tremendous growth of user-generated content, the quality of the content in your index quickly becomes a huge issue. So there has to be advanced tools and algorithms in place to ensure that the quality of the content being returned is high. This is what Google did for the web, back in 1998, and what is still being fleshed out now for various different audio and video search solutions. I have some pretty strong opinions about what works and what doesn’t, but it really all depends on the goal of the application. Odeo’s goal is to turn up reliable and reputable channels of content, or interesting/relevant pieces of media, in response to a user search; so we’ve put together an algorithm that reflects what we think will best approximates what our users are looking for.

Steve: Since Odeo has transformed itself from a directory to a real platform with social networking and search, how has this transition changed the culture and selling approach of Odeo to potential advertisers?
Greg: It does open up a new set of possibilities for us in terms of advertising. We still have display advertising throughout the site, but we’re now looking at ways we can use our search pages and the dashboard portions of the site to better help publishers grow and connect with their audience. Odeo’s user’s are mostly hardcore podcast enthusiasts and digital media early adopters, so it’s an excellent platform for content producers to market to dedicated audiences. We’re also looking at how we can partner with content producers to help them get better exposure to their shows, through features and other promotions.

Steve: Is there anything you can talk about for Odeo coming up on the roadmap over the 12 months we should be looking forward to?
Greg: We’ve got a lot going on over the next few months. I’m really excited about the updates we’ve got planned for the Odeo homepage. Right now, it’s really just a collection of featured shows/channels, but we’ve got some plans in the works for making it more dynamic and interesting. We’re also going to be rolling out our mobile device support to the public in the next few months. This will mean that you’ll be able to subscribe to a channel on Odeo and have the content show up on your mobile device, whether it’s a phone or a PDA or a video device. Things are starting to converge with the Web as the central component of a media distribution network that I think we’re well positioned to take advantage of.

Steve: According to Gartner, the hype has worn off of podcasting and it has been integrated into the mainstream. Do you agree or disagree and why?
Greg: Nothing interesting has happened in podcasting since Apple came out with support for podcasting in iTunes. People associate podcasting with iPods. This has not been good for podcasting, as, in many people’s minds, podcasting is inextricably tied to Apple. This is beginning to change, with the growth of online video, where podcasting becomes just one of many ways users can get at content. I think what we’re progressing towards is a much more integrated world; iTunes will become like another YouTube, but focused on your Apple device. For everything else, or for a better experience with more complete search and better recommendations, there will be Odeo and other video hosting/aggregation services. It will depend on your medium and the availability of the content you are interested in.

As for podcasting itself, we’re still straddling the fence between marketing content and actual content. I think we’re going to see growth in the area of branded content, especially video, which is much more measurable in terms of the statistics that are required for monetization.

Steve: To close our interview I would like to get a “Top 5” from you. Many small businesses are still exploring starting a podcast for their business. What should be the top 5 things they should consider when thinking about launching a podcast?
Greg: It really depends on your business goals, and if you’re targeting a broad audience or a targeted audience. Either way, it’s about marketing, and that means you have to be creative, to do something to set yourself apart from all the others that are out there. You also need to have the right technology in place to track your content and understand, as much as possible, what your audience is needs and wants. You should let your content be free, and let people discover it wherever they are. If you want to funnel them back to your site, build that into the content; if your goal is monetization, build that in as well. Interact with your audience as much as possible. Don’t just broadcast to them, use the web to communicate and respond and build a more meaningful connection. And once again, be creative. It’s really the most important thing. If you’re going to be successful on the web, you have to be doing something others aren’t. And the best way to get creative is to start doing stuff, and figure out what works. It may take a few tries, but you’ll get there.
1. Be creative
2. Find and use the right tools
3. Let the content be free
4. Be responsive; communicate, don’t just broadcast
5. Just do it. You learn more doing than by planning.

Next up was Tara Hunt who is with Ma.gnolia and they announced that they are going completely open source which should take their product to the next level. They are going to be the wordpress of social bookmarking allowing people to download and start their own social bookmarking platform. It was a good presentation about why being open gives you more power with the community you are trying to work with.

After a little coffee break we were entertained by Ben Huh of icanhazceezburger.com which talked about the evolution of memes and the humor that can be funnier with the use of social media and the power of community. If you haven’t ever checked out that site or the original LOLCats.com with captions under funny pictures you are missing out on a core part of the funny side of the Internet. I love good presentations and his slides used the eras of grow for the site in one word formats like the site, for example “icantgetanysleep” or “programmatica” eras. He used lots of pictures and few words which made his talk funny and impactful. These are good lessons for any business person that has to present a topic that is left of center and needs to be recieved by everyone.

Last before lunch was Danny Sullivan on how using search can meet real life. He touched upon a couple of important points:

“It’s easy to underestimate the importance of search in our everyday lives. Only a few years after search engines arrived, they had replaced friends, books and libraries as the top resource people used to answer questions. Today, the frequencies of daily search use continues to rise — as does what you can find in search engines.

If you look at how the real world – rather than just the “web world” – is increasingly becoming searchable, and at the impact this has. Is Google StreetView cool until it’s your house that’s showing up? Should people be able to pull material even if it’s “public” in other ways? Do we need to better understand how revealing search can be about ourselves, in particular when so many are now Twittering and Flickring their private lives?

And what happens as search continues to jump off our web browser and into our televisions, iPhones and GPS units. These bring us a world of new search opportunities, such as location-specific restaurant search — but they also open new concerns about the search records and profiles left behind. After exploring some of the issues, plenty of time for audience discussion.”

Great session and now it’s time for a great lunch, networking and video interviews of some of the attendees.

Next is going to be coverage of the afternoon sessions. Stay Tuned.