Who's Blogging What? - Hulu vs YouTube, InLinks, Yahoo Glue (ecommerce edition) Nov 20, 2008

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Nov 20, 2008 - Spotting things you'll want to see today.

Mainstream media brings user generated revenue

Hulu's advertising revenue might soon top YouTube

Hulu might never top YouTube in terms of viewers but, according to an article in the Financial Times, it might soon generate greater revenues. There are plenty of lively opinions regarding this possible victory of mainstream over user generated content. The New York Time's Bits Blog bluntly asserted that YouTube is a 'mess'. Mashable listed weaknesses in YouTube's sales efforts but wondered if it wasn't a deliberate holding pattern waiting for a clearance in copyright laws and attitudes. Publishing 2.0 drew up 10 observations on the future of mainstream media based on Hulu's ability to monetize while YouTube struggles as a Google subsidiary.

The mainstream vs user generated content business models are quite different. All Things Digital explained the differences and pointed out that YouTube's cost base isn't as inviting as most people assume. Henry Blodgett cautioned that seeing might not be believing for Hulu, with a low profit margin business that might be better than YouTube's but still a bit hazy on the long term.

Product placements for link building
	InLinks is a new service that will automatically generate links based on keyword selection, for a fee of course. The product operates in the gray area between paid advertising and content. Digital Inspiration felt that publishers and advertisers should proceed with caution given the likely reaction from search engines and TechCrunch quickly received an email from Google's Matt Cutts calling the practice 'very high risk behavior'. Shoemoney, a blog for affiliate marketers, defended the program under certain conditions that approximate editorial control. Download Squad took a longer, pessimistic view and wondered about the effect on consumers of blending organic links with their paid cousins.

Tools: New and/or improved

Announcing the Search-based Keyword Tool (Google Adwords)
33 Free Tools to Make Your Website Better (futurenow)
20 Great Online Image Editors (Mashable)
On-Demand Sitemaps for Custom Search (Google Webmaster Central)
Unique Search - Targeting Semantic Root Phrases and Keywords (seo design)
Elements of a Good LinkedIn Recommendation (Chris Brogan)
Landing Page Best Practices to Increase Conversion (Be Relevant)
Secrets of Web Analytics – a podcast with Avinash Kaushik (Buzz Marketing)
Looking for Mr. Goodtweet: How to Pick Up Followers on Twitter (Guy Kawasaki)
Using LinkedIn to Boost Your Company’s Search Result Reputation (Fathom SEO)
7 Signs Your PPC Campaigns Needs Optimization (futurenow)
A deeper look at Advanced Segmentation: filtering on the fly (Google Analytics Blog)
The 2008 Social Network Analysis Report - Geographic - Demographic and Traffic Data Revealed (ignite)
15 Tools for Your Twitter Toolbox (Louis Gray)
Announcing the Search-based Keyword Tool (Google Adwords)
YouTube Unveils Two New Ad Options (ClickZ)
2008 Retail Email Subscription Benchmark Study: Executive Summary (Retail Email Blog)
4 Components of a Successful Internet Marketing Strategy (HubSpot)

Radar Screen: Yahoo Glue applied to America

After a successful test in India, Yahoo has now launched a new search aggregation named Yahoo Glue worldwide. Classified as 'universal search', the new service coordinates results from multiple sources including text, images and video.

Gluing Together the Best Content on the Web (Yahoo Search Blog)
Yahoo Brings Glue To U.S.: A Plethora of Aggregated Topical Third Party Content (TechCrunch)
Yahoo! Glue Launches in America (Mashable)
Yahoo! Glue Finally Comes to the US and It's Awesome (ReadWriteWeb)
Yahoo Brings Visual Search Display, Glue to the US (Search Engine Journal)
Yahoo Brings 'Glue Pages' To The US (Search Engine Land)