The Die is Cast

Demo’ing the Future of Search Advertising at PubCon Vegas 2006

Yesterday, the first day of Webmaster World’s PubCon Vegas 2006, we gave the first live demo of our new search advertising platform. The lunchtime session was attended by more than 500 of the world’s savviest search engine marketers and web pros—quite a roll of the dice.

By all accounts, we came up sevens.

Jen Slegg introduced the panel, which was led off by Dan Boberg, our senior director of sales and technology programs. John Kim, our senior director of advertiser product marketing, took it from there with a demonstration of the new platform and its features, concentrating on its advanced geo-targeting, campaigning, budgeting and forecasting capabilities.

Every time we show off the new interface, the one feature that seems to get everyone’s “wow” is the slider bar that lets you set your bid and give you visual insight into the estimated number of clicks you can get based on your bid. The PubCon crowd was no exception. The “ahs” were palpable.

John Slade, our senior director of global product management, also weighed in, talking about the implications of the new platform in the face of new, up-and-coming ad-blocking technologies. Slade told the crowd that the new platform “will create value to advertisers, publishers and consumers that is so critical to us, so that each group can continue to enjoy the growth we’ve experienced in the past.”

—Michael Mattis