Google seeks out China's billions

[Rubber Duck]

Google has obtained licence to operate in Mainland China. Soon to be followed by Sina.com.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/business/4536473.stm

Google has also apparently obtained a stake in Baidu.com, which is China's largest search engine and already has a substantial PPC advertising programme along the lines of Adwords.

Best Regards
Dave Wrixon

 

[Rubber Duck]

Google has obtained licence to operate in Mainland China. Soon to be followed by Sina.com.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/business/4536473.stm

Google has also apparently obtained a stake in Baidu.com, which is China's largest search engine and already has a substantial PPC advertising programme along the lines of Adwords.

Best Regards
Dave Wrixon

Further to previous, I have been doing some research into the PPC Markets both in China and Russia. What I have found is that although there is yet no obvious outlet for PPC traffic from domain owners, the main search engines Baidu.com and Yandex.com are well organised. Their equivalents of Google Adwords are not only up and running but very heavily populated, unlike Google which has recently opened its services to these markets.

The interesting thing is that whilst most of the keywords relating to our domains generate large numbers of advert impression, there English translations or even pin yin produce generally very sparce results, except for international ubiquitous terms for predominantly English Language sites.

This would seem that the search keyword market is going to be very much in the local character sets. As search engine position is clearly going to be similarly dictated, it is not difficult to denounce those who think that ASCII character domains are going to dominate these markets. The key to a good domain is to correspond with an important search term, preferably in the relevant language.

Regards
Dave Wrixon

 

[Anthony Ng]

The interesting thing is that whilst most of the keywords relating to our domains generate large numbers of advert impression, there English translations or even pin yin produce generally very sparce results, except for international ubiquitous terms for predominantly English Language sites.

This would seem that the search keyword market is going to be very much in the local character sets. As search engine position is clearly going to be similarly dictated, it is not difficult to denounce those who think that ASCII character domains are going to dominate these markets.

Very interesting, indeed. Yes, many domain investors totally overlook the cultural difference and simply think that those keywords that work in English would work anywhere else like China, and they have suffered financially, e.g. with the 2ld .cn gold rush. However, we might want to avoid automatically come to some hasty conclusion regarding IDN (sorry, I have some difficulty understanding your double negative "not difficult to denounce"), esp. when it's still in its earliest infant stage. My two cents is that it may be more practical to focus on SEO, optimizing Western domain names for e.g. the Chinese market using local characters.

 

[Rubber Duck]

Very interesting, indeed. Yes, many domain investors totally overlook the cultural difference and simply think that those keywords that work in English would work anywhere else like China, and they have suffered financially, e.g. with the 2ld .cn gold rush. However, we might want to avoid automatically come to some hasty conclusion regarding IDN (sorry, I have some difficulty understanding your double negative "not difficult to denounce"), esp. when it's still in its earliest infant stage. My two cents is that it may be more practical to focus on SEO, optimizing Western domain names for e.g. the Chinese market using local characters.

Well SEO is a possibility. I sold seo.cn to a guy in Taiwan.

My personal experience of SEO in the UK was that I was promised a lot but got very little for a hefty fee. I actually got my money back and optimised my site myself my own way. I get to the top of Google on whole selection of keywords. I found that a combination of the site design around predetermined keywords, links and a URL containing the keywords was the best way forward.

Seo is can be very competitive and there are only so many tricks that can be pulled. The right domain will always give you an edge. In big volume high value consumables any edge is important. Surprisingly for some, the value of a good domain name extends beyond natural type in volumes.

Best Regards
Dave Wrixon

 

[Anthony Ng]

I sold seo.cn to a guy in Taiwan.

... which happens to be hosted by yours truly, me! :-D

 

[Rubber Duck]

... which happens to be hosted by yours truly, me! :-D

Hi, I hadn't made the connection. Hope things are going well!

Seo and every hypenated derivative of SearchEngineOptimization is sold out in just about every extension. This shows that SEO operators regard this as highly significant for the promotion of their own sites. SEO is undoubtedly a powerful tool, but it seems it will never obviate the need for a strong domain name.

Regarding the Chinese Market, there is currently one obvious problem with the Baidu search engine, in as much as single Glyph Keywords do not provide an paid advertising impressions. Any ideas why that might be? Is it because Baidu's system will not accept them, or is it because nobody would pay for the high levels of traffic they would attract, especially as in many instances the relevance might be poor?

In any event, I am deeply encouraged by the results at Baidu and Yandex, as a tie up with a free parking PPC operator is a small and apparently inevitable development. There may currently be no such outlet for IDN domains, but the signifance of traffic is clearly not lost on these markets.

Best Regards
Dave Wrixon

... which happens to be hosted by yours truly, me! :-D

Actually, a big thank-you deserved there!

I have just registered the Simplified Chinese Version of:

"SearchEngine".net
xn--20tu5ikpao29e.net

"SearchEngineOptimization".com
xn--4oq20hg9mc5eqzav18h.com

"SeachEngineOptimization".net
xn--4oq20hg9mc5eqzav18h.net

These produce good results on Baidu, in fact for the first term Baidu have actually subscribed to their own programme.

Just goes to show there are still plenty of good domains available.

Best Regards
Dave Wrixon

 

[Rubber Duck]

Very interesting, indeed. Yes, many domain investors totally overlook the cultural difference and simply think that those keywords that work in English would work anywhere else like China, and they have suffered financially, e.g. with the 2ld .cn gold rush. However, we might want to avoid automatically come to some hasty conclusion regarding IDN (sorry, I have some difficulty understanding your double negative "not difficult to denounce"), esp. when it's still in its earliest infant stage. My two cents is that it may be more practical to focus on SEO, optimizing Western domain names for e.g. the Chinese market using local characters.

Seem to have crack the Valid Keyword issue. Using 3721.com the number of adverts thrown up seem to provide the best value indicator that I have been able to find. I also use Baidu and Overture, but this is by far the best.

Baidu have a top 50 Keyword searches. That gave me quite a few very interesting prospects in terms of Overture etc. My online dictionaries, however, give very little insight into what they actually mean!

Best Regards
Dave Wrixon

 

[mole]

Interesting read.

 

[Anthony Ng]

Baidu have a top 50 Keyword searches. That gave me quite a few very interesting prospects in terms of Overture etc. My online dictionaries, however, give very little insight into what they actually mean!

That's probably because most of them are not generic terms but news-related buzz words like peoples' names or movie titles.

 

[Rubber Duck]

That's probably because most of them are not generic terms but news-related buzz words like peoples' names or movie titles.

Yes, I guess there is an element of that.

Most of them spend 2 years or more in the top 50, which probably hasn't been going for much longer than that, so whatever they are many have a half decent shelf life.

Regards
Dave Wrixon

 

[Anthony Ng]

Most of them spend 2 years or more in the top 50, which probably hasn't been going for much longer than that, so whatever they are many have a half decent shelf life.

Wonder if we are on the same page, but 7 of the top 10 Baidu searches in 2004 are non-generic, incl. a song title (and its singer/songwriter), a Zhang Yimou movie and an Olympic gold medal winner.

If you are referring to current top 50 keyword searches, then those with 700 days of history or longer (only 10 altogether, as of today) ARE mostly of generic nature. And they shouldn't be difficult to understand, but then you need to know not only mp3, flash and bt but also qq.

 

[domainhunter]

Wonder if we are on the same page, but 7 of the top 10 Baidu searches in 2004 are non-generic, incl. a song title (and its singer/songwriter), a Zhang Yimou movie and an Olympic gold medal winner.

If you are referring to current top 50 keyword searches, then those with 700 days of history or longer (only 10 altogether, as of today) ARE mostly of generic nature. And they shouldn't be difficult to understand, but then you need to know not only mp3, flash and bt but also qq.

It's so interesting that you have studied search engine in chinsese characters.


I am from China and the page http://top.baidu.com/top_keyword.html lists the top 50 keywords. Most of them are life and entertainment related keywords.


As for SEO, baidu has blocked many websites abusing SEO techs which annoyed many personal website owner!

 

[Rubber Duck]

It's so interesting that you have studied search engine in chinsese characters.


I am from China and the page http://top.baidu.com/top_keyword.html lists the top 50 keywords. Most of them are life and entertainment related keywords.


As for SEO, Baidu has blocked many websites abusing SEO techs which annoyed many personal website owner!

Just goes to show the value of a good domain with a relevant keyword in local characters, as it cannot be copied by others. This is the ultimate SEO technique and it cannot be held against you!

Regards
Dave Wrixon

 

[Theo]

There is one entity bigger than Google: The Chinese government

 

[furca]

I saw this on CNN, this isn't possibly moral.

 

[Anthony Ng]

One of the reasons behind all these crackdowns is that the recent anti- (Japanese) Imperialist demonstrations are partly organized in the non-traditional manner via e-mail, websites (particularly forums), and text messages. And the conventional ways of monitoring old-time dissidents have proven not to be working: because we now have a whole new generation of liberal minds who are to a considerable extent unrelated to their (pre-)Tiananmen predecessors and have their own way of communicating with peers.

 

[Rubber Duck]

One of the reasons behind all these crackdowns is that the recent anti- (Japanese) Imperialist demonstrations are partly organized in the non-traditional manner via e-mail, websites (particularly forums), and text messages. And the conventional ways of monitoring old-time dissidents have proven not to be working: because we now have a whole new generation of liberal minds who are to a considerable extent unrelated to their (pre-)Tiananmen predecessors and have their own way of communicating with peers.

Yes, whilst is rather unfortunate, it does show that the Chinese Government have recognised the importance of the Internet and are struggling to come to terms with its implications.

Whilst, freedom of expression is a wonderful thing in a fully developed democracy, if such a thing actually exists; it is clearly potential destabilising in a system where huge reform is not only necessary but inevitable.

Is this as bad as it sounds, or simply a sensible way of managing change? Beijing has made huge progress in many areas in a comparatively peaceful way, despite having massive problem of resources and demographics. Comparisons with Russia are frankly very favourable. Only time will tell whether individual Chinese will experience the freedom of self determination enjoyed elsewhere and the consequent further economic benefits that this would bring.

Best Regards
Dave Wrixon

 

[Mr.Domains]

I saw this on CNN, this isn't possibly moral.

Erm... this is china, they don't have to abide by US morals!

 

[furca]

Not laws, morality :S

 

[MarkMan]

so ,.. so far i don't see a way to make money on Chinese traffic right now.

People should know that Google AdSense would Disable your account if you have Chinese traffic. especially if you have a lot of it. even thought they say they except Chinese traffic they are not willing to pay for it.

does http://www.baidu.com/ have an affiliate program or AdSense like program??

i believe people are people , if they are from China , USA, Canada they are still people and they still need to buy stuff and companies still need to advertise to them .. so their must be a way to make money from the fact people find something useful in your site.


anyone has figured out of way to make any money on Chinese traffic yet??