David Berkowitz in the Press

I've been quoted in The New York Times, Associated Press, New York Post, ABC News, CNN, and dozens of other outlets. Advertising Age named me one of the "25 Media People You Should Follow on Twitter." Below is a roundup of some of my citations in the press and blogosphere.

If you'd like to reach me, email marketersstudio @ gmail . com and note it's a press request in the subject so I can try to respond well in advance of your deadline. You can also reach out to 360i’s head of media relations Amanda Bird, abird @ 360i . com.

June 2009

  • Adweek
    • Microsoft Bing Issues Ad Manifesto
      • David Berkowitz, director of emerging media and client strategy at 360i, last week told Mediaweek during Bing's launch announcement that he was impressed with what he's seen of the product so far: "I'm still waiting for the full picture, but this is easily Microsoft's best search experience to date."

        Still, Berkowitz is cautious to declare any firm competing against Google a winner too soon. "I'm wondering how much the average consumer is going to be able to tell this is something different," Berkowitz said. "The ads need to communicate that. If you look at the growth of Google, people only keep relying on it more. If it really stunk, Google wouldn't be in the position they're in."
  • MediaPost
    • BuzzLogic Unveils 'Conversational' Dashboard for Advertisers
      • "It's a very intuitive dashboard for reviewing campaigns, from the results to the sites involved," said David Berkowitz, director of emerging media and client strategy at digital agency 360i. "Also, while it's designed for advertisers, the social graph of blogs in the campaign can be used to pinpoint influencers for digital word of mouth programs or other earned media efforts."
  • DM News
    • Inside a Social Search Engine
      • For David Berkowitz, director of emerging media & client strategy for 360i, social search engines fill a void currently left wide open by Twitter, Facebook and even Google. And while valuable, it is Berkowitz's expectation that these platforms play catch up. “Twitter could make its own engine more useful, or acquire one engine so that the others are basically killed off. That's what happened when Twitter acquired Summize to improve its own search experience,” he said.
  • MinOnline
    • Bing: More Than a Blip?
      • "They made a very honest attempt to create something useful to consumers,” says David Berkowitz, director of emerging media and client strategy, 360i, a marketing agency. “What is actually the most surprising thing about Bing is that it is a Microsoft product. Focusing on the consumer experience is not a strong suit for them,” he says.

        Nevertheless, he says that the all-important search marketers Microsoft is hoping to attract from Google may not be impressed yet. “They are wait-and-see types,” he says. Microsoft has been seeing its search share fall in recent years even as Google moves past a 70% control of the market in most estimates. Marketers have complained in the past that Microsoft search just doesn’t drive enough traffic.
  • MediaPost
    • Google Incubating Performance-Based Search Ad Model

      • That can become both an obstacle and a benefit, according to David Berkowitz, director of emerging media at 360i. The new model could have a higher commission rate, which will probably make advertisers question whether the CPA model can provide a high return on investment (ROI).

        There are lots of benefits, Berkowitz says. "For retailers betting on a CPA model, this is a no brainer for testing," he says. His argument is that Google doesn't need to prove the quality of its search inventory, only how well the model will perform compared with other CPA offerings from companies like Microsoft's Bing.

  • Ad Age
    • To Build Display, Yahoo Joins Self-Serve Fray

      • It also gives Yahoo a performance-ad product besides search. "Performance inventory is such a dominant force of online advertising right now," said David Berkowitz, director-emerging media at 360i. "The recession is only enabling that further with the need for accountability."


May 2009

      • David Berkowitz, a director at the digital marketing agency 360i, said it might make sense for MySpace to double down on the under-34 audience. “A lot of sites do very well when they have that concentrated focus,” he said.
  • Ad Age
    • 25 Media People You Should Follow on Twitter
      • In the spirit of Twitter's Follow Fridays, when users suggest other interesting people to follow, Ad Age's MediaWorks offers a batch of media and marketing people you should follow on Twitter -- along with recent, decent tweets to give you an idea what they're up to.
      • David Berkowitz, emerging-media director at 360i
        Follow: @dberkowitz
        Tweet: "My Google Wave Limerick will ensure Google never lets me try it (apologies to Irish or poet followers) http://bit.ly/urdRd"
  • MediaPost
    • Microsoft 'Kumo' Hot On Paid, Multimedia, Semantic Search
      •  "If it's as good as it looks in the demo, this will be the most impressive search experience Microsoft has offered," says David Berkowitz, Director of Emerging Media & Client Strategy at 360i. "The focus is on the right areas such as organic results, layout and advertising."

        Berkowitz, one of the chosen few outside of analysts and Microsoft employees to get a briefing, took extreme precautions to select every word in describing his experience. He couldn't speak to the difference in the way that Microsoft will serve up relevant ads in paid search campaigns, but did reveal that it has been a focus for the team with the launch of the new engine. "Historically, one problem for Microsoft has been serving up relevant ads," he says. "They haven't been as relevant as they could be. But I've see firsthand they are trying to fix that."

  • BNET Media
    •     Lesson from "American Idol" Upset: Don't Put Too Much Stock in Google, Twitter
      • All of which is to say, it’s a bit too easy to get enamored with Internet data, and social media, partly because we didn’t have such a visible, rich data mine before. As David Berkowitz, head of emerging media at 360i told me: “With any of this, there’s a degree of reading too much into this.” While I’m sure the people at NBC are watching the attempt to save “Earl” unfold on Twitter, they should keep that salt shaker handy — they may need several grains of the white stuff.  As much as Google got the “American Idol” pick wrong, there is even less known about how to project what goes on on Twitter out to the broader marketplace; it could be a bunch of “Earl” fans talking amongst themselves.  Sometimes, Berkowitz, says, “All the buzz in the world is only going to do so much.”
  • NY Post
    • Bing is the Thing

      • "Even if they really believed this was the Google killer, I think they know enough not to say so," said David Berkowitz, director of emerging media and client strategy for 360i, a digital marketing agency. "That's always the kiss of death for any new search engine."

  • MediaPost
    • Microsoft Faces Bing Challenge

      • Video and image search has been the most impressive improvements. The ability to hover over an image or link to see the content on the connected page will prove valuable. "Microsoft is doing a lot to show improvements in multimedia," says David Berkowitz, director of emerging media and client strategy at 360i. "This is where you will see the most notable changes and clear-cut difference." …

        As for the advertising campaign promised to roll out with the new search engine, Berkowitz says, Microsoft will need to do a lot to get consumers excited. The company has seen a couple of hits and misses lately. The Jerry Seinfeld campaign had a lot of people scratching their heads. The price-conscious PC vs. Mac ads demonstrate more finesse.

  • Mediaweek
    • Microsoft Search Leads to Bing
      • David Berkowitz, director of emerging media and client strategy at 360i, is impressed with what he’s seen so far with Bing. “I’m still waiting for the full picture, but this is easily Microsoft’s best search experience to date,” he said. “This is a very serious upgrade.”

        Still, Berkowitz injected some caution: “This is what most people have been waiting for from Microsoft for years. But now Google is only more entrenched. For Bing, the presentation is the most obvious change. I’m very curious to see how much more relevant its results are. Relevance is something that you notice only when its not there.”

        Microsoft’s marketing plan for Bing -- estimated at $100 million -- may be just as crucial as the product itself, since most Web users don’t seem as dissatisfied with Google’s ability to deliver relevant results as Microsoft might think.

        “I’m wondering how much the average consumer is going to be able to tell this is something different,” Berkowitz said. “The ads need to communicate that. If you look at the growth of Google, people only keep relying on it more. If it really stunk, Google wouldn’t be in the position they’re in.”
  • DM News
    • New Microsoft Engine Bing Vies for SEM Share
      • David Berkowitz, director of emerging media and client strategy for search agency 360i, agreed, saying the new engine's design may keep consumers using it.

        “Traditionally, the search experience has been getting consumers to the end result very quickly — that means hitting the ‘back' button a lot and clicking around a lot,” he said.
  • iMedia Connection
    • Social Media: Whose Job Is It Anyway? - Featured in this panel of social media pros assembled by Adam Broitman:
      • I decided to create a form and sent it to the following thought leaders, who represent different types of agencies:

        David Berkowitz, director of emerging media & client strategy at 360i.
        Shiv Singh, vice president, social media & global strategic initiatives at Razorfish.
        Rick Liebling, global director, account management at Taylor.
        Michael Lazerow, founder, chairman, and CEO at Buddy Media.
        Christine Perkett, founder and CEO at PerkettPR
        Shel Holtz, principal at Holtz Communication + Technology.

April 2009

  • NY Post
    • Web Social Studies: Marketers Go to Where People Meet - quoted

      • "Whenever you're telling consumers to go someplace beyond your own site, you do lose some of that control," said David Berkowitz, director of emerging media and client strategy at 360i, a digital marketing firm. "The same applies if you tell them to go to a Facebook page or check you out on Twitter. It's very easy for the consumer to stumble into the wrong direction."

        So why would Skittles make such a radical move? Berkowitz said it makes more sense when you look at the Skittles corporate site, which draws fewer than 20,000 visitors a month, according to various traffic estimates. In comparison, Skittle's Facebook page has more than 600,000 fans.

  • Entrepreneur.com (here on MSNBC.com)
    • Mobile Social Networking Unleashed – quoted
      • Many retailers still don't get it, says David Berkowitz, director of emerging media and client strategy for online ad firm360i. Their marketing departments, he says, see advertising as online or not. But the advertising here is a hybrid. It starts online and directs consumers not to websites but to brick-and-mortar locales.
      • "The biggest challenges," Berkowitz says, "are organizational--getting the people who are in charge of driving sales to their stores to adapt to mobile media. The whole value of location-based advertising is to have these real-world, offline interactions. It's a wasted effort to get people to their websites."
      • Even as the number of people who use their mobile devices to access news and information has doubled in the last year, the mobile social networking ad scene will experience "more gradual than explosive growth," Berkowitz says.
  • Ad Age
    • Why This Digital Exec Thinks Twitter Should Buy Google – contribution to Digital Next blog (small excerpt below)
      • Let's put the "will it or won't it" debate on hold. If Google does acquire Twitter, what does this mean for all parties involved? We see it as the best possible scenario. Here's why:

        Search first, talk later: While only a certain percentage of marketers and consumers will use Twitter to communicate, every marketer and business small and large can take advantage of Twitter Search.

        Part of your recommended digital diet: Monitoring live conversations through Twitter Search (or, perhaps, another service that replaces it down the road) has the potential to be one of those staples for businesses, along the lines of updating their directory listings (YellowPages.com, Google Local, etc) and making sure they have a decent domain name.

  • DM News
    • Rumored Google, Twitter Merge Could be Good for Marketers - quoted
      • David Berkowitz, director of emerging media and client strategy for 360i, said Twitter could offer Google better real-time search and other capabilities like increased brand and trend monitoring. On the flip side Google can offer Twitter two things it needs: “Twitter needs more reliable servers and it needs some sort of a business model,” he said, “Google has some flexibility to find a consumer-friendly way to monetize Twitter in a way that consumers and marketers can really get behind.”

        He went on to say that a Google-owned Twitter partnership would entrench the idea of just how important a role Twitter Search can play for brands. “Google search optimization is at least a consideration for marketers,” Berkowitz said, “If an acquisition happens and Twitter's growth rate continues, marketers will realize its importance as a tool and make it a larger part of their overall Web presence.”

    • Teams, Fans Really around Twitter - quoted

      • The real innovations in using Twitter to market sports teams and leagues while driving results are yet to come, said David Berkowitz, director of emerging media and client strategy at New York-based 360i.

        “If you're able to bring people closer to the game, ideally they're going to want to experi­ence it live,” Berkowitz said. “Plus, all of a fan's followers are being exposed to [the interaction with a team]. The real goal is to reach the influencers and get to their audiences.”

  • MediaPost

    • Google/Twitter Marriage Would be Joyous Occasion for Marketers – quoted

      • While it's a great communications tool for the average person, the power for marketers lies in its real-time search capabilities, said David Berkowitz, director of emerging media and client strategy at digital agency 360i.

        "Twitter Search has the potential to become a crucial tool for marketers in both understanding what's being said about their brands online, as well as for timely communication with their customers," Berkowitz said. "A Google acquisition would likely only accelerate its importance to marketers because Google can give Twitter what it most desperately needs right now, which is the servers to power it, and a revenue model."

  • bnetTV

    • Interview at ThinkMobile conference – video Q&A with Peggy Salz

      • From the press release:

      • David Berkowitz, Director of Media and Client Strategy for 360i, suggests that mobile search is evolving into its own content category as people are becoming social broadcasters. The result is that consumer preferences are influencing brand choices in real-time.

  • ClickZ
    • Marketers Mull Value of Twitter Search Ads - quoted

      • While MySpace is used primarily for finding and interacting with friends, David Berkowitz, director of emerging media at digital marketing agency 360i, suggested: "A lot of Twitter's value is really as a search engine." He said advertisers could facilitate the user experience when people are looking for up-to-date information on a specific issue or news event. For instance, media brands might link to their stories through Twitter search ads in the same way they do in Google search results or their own tweets.

        "MySpace already had a lot of venues for advertisers, and right now this is really about figuring out the first way for advertisers to actually take part in [Twitter]," added Berkowitz. "There will be a lot of opportunities for advertisers to keep adapting to ways [Twitter usage evolves.]"

        Berkowitz also sees potential for local search ads within Twitter, suggesting users seeking timely data on the crowd status at nearby restaurants or bars could benefit from advertisements from local establishments. In addition, he anticipates Twitter offering advertising in mobile platforms. "One of the very convenient aspects of Twitter is that there are 140 characters, and with text messages there's room for 160, so you have some built-in ad room right there."

        "If Twitter does do a deal with a major search engine, then there are going to be a few instant advantages," added Berkowitz, noting a partner like Google, Microsoft, or Yahoo could make Twitter ads "fairly easy to buy."...

      • The greatest benefit of Twitter to marketers may already exist. Search advertising or other forms of ads in Twitter may never be of as much value to marketers as the platform's current use as a buzz research tool. "I hope nothing supersedes that value; it's only going to get more important," Berkowitz said.

  • Conversation Agent
    • The Agency Side of Business: David Berkowitz, 360i - featured interview by Valeria Maltoni

      • David and I met in person when we both blogged BRITE at Columbia a couple of years ago. No matter how long you may know someone online, the best way to get to know them is face to face.

        Since we've also spent a few days crossing paths at SxSWi recently, I wanted to invite him to participate to our conversation on the agency side of business.

  • BtoB Magazine
    • High-Tech Video Evolution - quoted
      • This time last year, b-to-b advertisers were using video, but what they were doing could be compared to Dorothy's Kansas in “The Wizard of Oz”: boring and gray. Today, video advertising has evolved, said David Berkowitz, 360i's director of emerging media and client strategy, because it's had to change to continue to attract prospects and customers.

        “As [high definition] becomes the default online, and end-user expectation goes up ... b-to-b marketers are more willing to invest in the user experience,” he said.
      • Marketers can provide links to video assets via e-mail and place video on landing pages for search campaigns. Going forward, search and video integration will get a boost as searchable video becomes the norm, said 360i's Berkowitz. “We've already seen Google and Yahoo experiment with it,” he said. “Marketers can start by optimizing titles and links.”

March 2009

  • MediaPost
    •  Facebook Users Give Redesign Thumbs Down - quoted 
      • "With the new homepage design, Facebook is experimenting with different placements of advertising, although it's too early on in the design changes to see how or if the design impacts overall interaction, exposures, and traffic for brands," said David Berkowtiz, director of emerging media and client strategy at agency 360i. He added that changes to the design and features on brands' own pages "show that Facebook is trying to provide more flexibility and opportunities for brands to interact with their customers on Facebook." 
  • Ad Age Digital Next Blog
    • How to Brace for the Facebook Page Redesign - bylined contribution
      • Facebook is planning to redesign its advertiser "Pages," according to reports. And while the social network has yet to announce the changes publicly, many of the leaked changes will affect top page holders such as Barack Obama, Coca-Cola, Mr. Bean and any marketer with a Facebook page. Here are three of the biggest changes coming, along with tips for what marketers can do once the redesign is enacted.
  • DM News
    • Facebook Beats Google in Steering Niche Traffic - quoted expert
      • David Berkowitz, director of emerging media and client strategy for 360i, said it's important to remember that the mindset of a Google searcher is much different than someone who clicks on a link on their Facebook wall.
      • “If people are actively searching for con tent, they're much more invested in the information,” he said. “If a person clicks on a link from Facebook, they may not remem ber where they saw the information.”
      • Berkowitz suggests marketing differently to those users who are driven to a site from social networks.
      • “For example, for those who appear to be first time visitors, you could have a ‘best-of-your-site' to accompany the content that was linked to,” he explained, adding that in this way, brands can draw in new visitors who previously didn't know the company. “Then, for those who spontaneously find your site, you can make a much deeper connection.”
  • BNET Media
    • Facebook Redesign Leads to Filter Fatigue – quoted in Cathy Taylor’s column

      • By contrast, one of my Facebook friends, David Berkowitz of interactive ad agency360i, admitted on the service today that he is “hiding friends on Facebook who monopolize the news feed.” When I got in touch with him later, he told me, “There are a handful of people who seem to show up all the time, and then I’ll check their Facebook profiles and find they are updating every 5-10 minutes. There are a few people, including my wife and Jon Stewart, who I’d welcome hearing from that often, but most others just aren’t that interesting.”

  • Whrrl Blog

    • 10 Social Media People You Should Meet – one of the 10 people

      • I’ve been reading David’s work for many years. For instance, in “How does Facebook know I am Jewish?” http://www.marketersstudio.com/2008/07/how-does-facebo.html David discusses how a Facebook ad targeted him based on his religion. He then investigates how this happened and what targeting techniques were used. When we met, we discussed how “ad targeting” is a serious responsibility for advertising channels, advertisers and agencies. I told David he is the right person to explain why ad targeting is critical to the future of independent content. The industry needs David Berkowitz and if you’ll meet him, you’ll understand why.

  • Forrester Research

    • A Bad Economy is the Right Time to Catalyze Marketing Change – quoted in Forrester’s blog by Shar VanBoskirk

      • I tested the idea and some of my research to date with a few bloggers well known for their own thinking on marketing innovation: David Berkowitz and BL Ochman.

        Overall, they agreed with the notion and made a few very interesting points that I am going to try to flesh out into the speech.

        First, leveraging interactive tools can actually make marketing innovation *less* risky. Berkowitz mentioned – and I agree – that doing things like monitoring Twitter for what is being said about your brand or campaigns is actually an extremely *safe* thing to do. Although Twitter sounds all newfangled for a traditional brand, it provides a way to listen to how your audience is talking about your brand. Heeding this input can help marketers actually be better/more secure in crafting customer-centric marketing programs.

February 2009

  • DM News
    • Twitter Talk May Come at a Cost - several quotes on Twitter best practices

      • David Berkowitz, director of emerg­ing media and client strategy at 360i, has worked on several Twitter initiatives with companies such as H&R Block and the National Geographic Channel.

        Berkowitz stressed the importance of these two-way conversations, but said that there needs to be a concrete strategy in place before brands dive into the Twitter pool.

        “If a brand starts building a following and gets noticed in the community and gradually starts giving offers to those in the Twitter community, then the effect can be very viral,” he said.

        “You can't just expect to post coupons on Twitter and expect everyone to click and suddenly get this huge sales drive,” Berkowitz continued. “Twitter can really put brands on the front lines with their custom­ers, maybe in a way that's more personal than they've ever used before.”...

        Because of the personal nature of Twitter feeds, consumers may feel like they're talk­ing to a person instead of a building, which, Berkowitz said, can build loyalty.

  • DM News
    • Search and Social Media: A Power Pair - featured contribution
      • "The largely untapped field of online mea­surement and reporting is bringing disparate sources together. Two sources of information about consumers that can complement each other well are search behavior and social media activity..."
  • MediaPost
    • Microsoft's Streamlined Search Makes Targeting Critical - quoted expert
      • ...David Berkowitz-- director of emerging media and client strategy at 360i, New York--said it has been a topic for discussions that has been floating through the industry for years.

        "Streamlining search means there will be fewer ad impressions for every search session, so there are fewer opportunities to reach consumers during the search process, but it also means the ads must be more meaningful each time they engage with consumers," Berkowitz said.


  • MediaPost
    • Ad Experts Talk-Up Google's Obama Appointment

      • David Berkowitz, director of emerging media and client strategy at 360i, said Obama's administration has shown an understanding of technology's potential. "Stanton's appointment is one way that Obama shows us he will connect with people and that his administration's take on tech is much bigger than one form of technology," he said. "It's great to have one more person in the administration that gets how online advertising and major online publishers work."

        Berkowitz said the industry might not see immediate change, but the "big message" sent with the appointment relays that Obama gets that "online marketing is a two-way channel."

January 2009

  • MediaPost
    • Search Insider: Hyperlinking Reality - a column by Gord Hotchkiss
    • Online Spin: How Not to be Creepy - Joe Marchese answers my concerns about respecting consumers
      • I was on a panel at OMMA Social titled "Personal CPM" that discussed the true value of an individual to a marketer.... I for one am in total agreement that marketers must consider the value of people as a source of media in the age of Facebook, MySpace and Twitter, but as David Berkowitz pointed out, it begins to sound a little "creepy" when we talk about monetizing people and targeting based on personal information. So how can marketers be effective -- without being creepy -- in a world where people control media distribution ?
  • Libertad Digital
    • 2009, un ano importante para internet - coverage in Spanish of trends for 2009
      • El año de consolidación del monopolio de las búsquedas: En 2008, ningún buscador ha sabido o ha podido hacer competencia a Google. La fusión de Microsoft y Yahoo! ha quedado en nada y se ha perdido un tiempo muy valioso para hacer competencia al gigante de Mountain View. Por eso, el 2009 no presenta a la vista ningún competidor para Google, que seguirá innovando y sorprendiéndonos con nuevas propuestas, pero en solitario. Como simpáticamente dice David Berkowitz en Advertising Age, a empresas como Yahoo! sólo le queda sobrevivir ya que algunos le seguimos teniendo cariño y sabemos que su tiempo ha pasado.

December 2008

  • CNN
    • Transcript of CNN Newsroom - December 4, 2008, 3pm EST - Rick Sanchez discusses my Twitter feedback on the air:
      • Now, I know what we do here is a little different than most newscasts, let's face it, using Twitter and MySpace and Facebook. While we are trying to do a newscast at the same time, it is more of a conversation. And if when you first watch, you are left kind of scratching your head, you are not alone.

        Just ask David Berkowitz, social media and marketing strategist. He gives lectures all over the country on this topic. And he was watching me on a plane recently and he was at the same time impressed and annoyed by all the business that was going on. So, on his blog -- and we are checking the blogs -- Marketers Studio -- that is his blog -- he writes -- quote -- "I still fear how it plays out on CNN. As a social media strategist, I am tickled by it. As a student of media, it intrigues me. As a marketing consultant, I am learning from it. But, as a consumer who is on a flight to Salt Lake City halfheartedly tuning into CNN as I get a few things done, I want it all to go away."

        (LAUGHTER)

        SANCHEZ: Mr. Berkowitz, we thank you for watching, first of all. I enjoyed your blog and I hope you will enjoy mine, CNN.com/ricksanchez, where you can see some shows and some interviews that you have obviously missed, sir, just so you can be maybe a little more tickled as you write.

  • CNN
    • Sanchez: Love Him, Hate Him, Twitter Him! - Rick Sanchez responds to my blog, in this write-up here which he also shared on the air:

      • I know what we do here is a little different: using Twitter, MySpace, and Facebook during a newscast. It’s more of a conversation, and if, when you first watch, you’re left scratching your head, you’re not alone.

        Just ask David Berkowitz, a social media and marketing strategist.

        He gives lectures all over the country on this topic, and he was watching me on a plane recently. He was at the same time impressed and annoyed by all the busy-ness going on... (there's more on his blog)

  • Ad Age
    • Facebook, Google, and MySpace Represent the Future of Web Registrations - post on DigitalNext blog; excerpt:
      • We have the browser wars, the search engine wars and the social network wars -- so where will the next digital battle take place? It's among services that offer third-party logins for publishers, which sounds as unsexy as it gets, except the stakes are so high that everyone with a Web presence needs to take notice.
  • DM News
    • Integrating Search Across Channels - featured expert; excerpt:
      • As widgets are posted across the Web, each link from the widget gen­erally connects with the site of the marketer sharing it. Therefore, wide distribution of search-optimized widgets or other digital assets can increase the quality and quantity of inbound links to a marketer's site, which also improves the site's rankings across the engines. This applies to more than just widgets, of course. Increasingly, photos, videos, news stories and other forms of content are being shared on high traffic sites and blogs across the Web.
  • MediaPost
    • Rough Patch In Economy Means Return To Basics - coverage of my Search Insider Summit panel
      • Consumers are beginning to look for local information on mobile devices, but David Berkowitz--director of emerging media and client strategy at 360i, who led the discussion--asked panelists what's next for local search tied to mobile applications that marketers can tap into.
  • ClickZ
    • The Ad Downturn: Why Isn't Digital Immune? - a quote from a Twitter post

      • At the risk of posing a too-obvious question, is it safe to say that desperate demand for talent is a thing of the past?

        Not quite.

        "While it's tough knowing people out of work right now, I'm getting lots of updates from people with new gigs in interactive -- very uplifting," David Berkowitz, emerging media director at 360i, wrote in a Twitter update Friday.

  • Ad Age
    • Burger King's Whopper of a Virginal Search Slip-Up - post on DigitalNext blog; excerpt:

      • The Whopper Virgins experience begins with a TV commercial with a brief teaser that directs you to WhopperVirgins.com. The spot was compelling enough that I noticed the spot while watching the time-shifted "My Own Worst Enemy" through my DVR; it's running heavily during weekend football games. Go to the site and you're treated to a video of Burger King running a Whopper vs. Big Mac taste test with people in Romania, Thailand and Greenland who have never eaten a hamburger before. It's poignant and amusing, if you can tolerate the implicit ethnocentrism.

        What if you don't remember the exact Web address and Google it? You still better remember the domain name. While WhopperVirgins.com ranks first in Google for "whopper virgins," it's invisible when you omit the plural.

    • Commentary sprung up globally: Как одна ошибка может загубить вирусную кампанию Burger King - excerpt (translated by Google, updated by me):

      • The campaign could be quite successful, the movie is good and with dry humor. But David Berkovits (David Berkowitz), director of the emerging media company 360i, indicates a significant «blunder». The domain WhopperVirgin.com, which certainly attracts a considerable proportion of consumers who barely saw the URL on the screen. As a result, according to Berkovits, who writes for AdAge, Burger King risks causing dissatisfaction of consumers who want to watch a video, but instead will land on an empty domain. And this is just an unforgivable mistake for such a big brand. And it dramatically reduces the effectiveness of the campaign.


November 2008

  • MediaPost
    • Facebook Adding 'Fan' Pages to Public Search Listings - several quotes

      • "The way links on Facebook are structured right now, they don't have the type of permanence that search engines are looking for," said David Berkowitz, director of emerging media and client strategy at search engine marketing firm 360i.

        He continued: "Facebook does evolve pretty quickly, but so far they've been a little behind the curve when it comes to SEO."

        He also said it's not clear how Facebook will select which fan Pages are displayed in public search entries. Berkowitz noted, for instance, that the 10 Facebook friends shown on his profile through a Google search are not always the same. So Pages could likewise vary from one search to another.

      • Nevertheless, Berkowitz added that inclusion in search listings could encourage more marketers to create Pages, which Facebook offers for free. "If this does start fueling search engine rankings, then, given how pervasive SEO is, that will help marketers go about creating these pages and developing them," he said.

      • When Facebook first opened up profiles to public search listings last year, a small proportion of users changed their privacy settings to block dissemination of their data, according to Inside Facebook's Smith. But 360i's Berkowitz suggested that members who "fan" a brand on Facebook have a limited expectation of privacy.

        "When someone becomes a fan of a Page, it's a pretty explicit action you're taking, and it's pretty clear it's going to show up elsewhere on Facebook--so most users are going to welcome it, or at the very least not care," he said.

  • MediaPost
    • Google Search Links (or Lack Thereof) Spur Suit

      • While suing is a drastic step, many small business owners complain that they feel thwarted when their companies don't appear in the search result listings as high as they would like, said David Berkowitz, director of emerging media and client strategy at search engine marketing firm 360i.

        "It definitely can be frustrating," he said, adding that sometimes companies temporarily fall out of the organic search listings for seemingly random reasons. "With search results, it's normal for unexpected things to happen."

        For instance, he said, an algorithm tweak can cause a company to be dropped from the listings. "It's a fairly normal occurrence. It doesn't happen to most sites, but it definitely happens

October 2008


  • DM News
    • Ad Club Panel Offers Perspectives on Search - coverage of my Advertising Club panel
      • However, Berkowitz noted, because Google is performance based, if an ad doesn't garner enough clicks, the advertiser could be penalized. The ad's cost per click could increase, or the ad could even be removed.
        • Oh, and for the record, the last quote attributed to Epstein is mine. Just had to get that out there.

  • MediaPost's Just an Online Minute
    • 360i Turns 10, Doesn't Use Party Hats or Clowns
      • Last night was 360i’s tenth anniversary party... David Berkowitz, director of emerging media at 360i, is a familiar face to me for a number of reasons: I found him on Flickr when I was trying to gather a pool of people who took photos at OMMA events, we started following each other on Twitter, he’s spoken at OMMA events that I haven’t been to, and then finally we met in person at the Buddy Media party a while back.

September 2008

  • Interview with Blog Talk Radio from Blog World Expo
  • Ad Age
    • Chase Now Lead Ad Spender in Shrinking Sector - featured quote
      • "It's a dangerous time to be too aggressive; you don't want to be a vulture," said David Berkowitz, director-emerging media and client strategy at 360i. "But there is definitely missed opportunity in terms of being a resource through search. Clearly you can't use search the same way you've always used it. If you Google 'WaMu' now, probably free checking isn't your No. 1 concern."

August 2008

  • IT Knowledge Exchange: Overheard in the Tech Blogosphere
    • Tag, You're IT -- Meet David Berkowitz! - a featured interview
      • Excerpt: Q: David, when did you first discover your love for technology?
        A: One of my earliest memories of really embracing technology was when I wrote my first book report in first grade on Stuart Little. My family had our first PC (my brother already had an Apple IIe), and I learned how to use the thesaurus on Wordperfect. I never turned back. Typing had a great impact on me too, allowing me to get thoughts on paper much faster than I could write them, so even in the early 80s I seemed to be itching to be a blogger.

July 2008

  • AdWeek's Ad Freak blog
  • Ad Age's DigitalNext Blog
    • Cuil Needs a Chill Pill - my blog post on Ad Age covering the launch of Cuil.com
      • Excerpt: In this superhero-obsessed summer, it's about time everyone found an underdog to root for. In a feat as inexplicable as Tony Stark fashioning scrap metal into an Iron Man suit in an AfghEdit Page | Post | Inside the Marketers Studio - David Berkowitz's Marketing Blog | Your Weblogs | TypePadan prison, Cuil.com gained almost iPhone-like levels of publicity for its launch yesterday. Yet Cuil (pronounced "cool" -- get ready for a new swath of Web 2.0 words that don't sound anything like how they're spelled) is due for a run-in with Mr. Freeze as its media mojo gets put on ice.
  • GoMo News
    • Coverage of SMX Expo - Mobile Advertising Tactics & Opportunities panel; I served as a panelist

      • The Mobile Search Advertising Panel started off with David Berkowitz, Director of Emerging Media & Client Strategy at 360i. He talked about the big benefit of reach with mobile subscribers as the number of users at over 3B eclipses PC users, which are only at 1B. There is a shift when it comes to customer reach away from on-deck (carrier portals) to off-deck (Yahoo Go!, Yelp iPhone app, etc) where standard paid search can take place. Two examples of ad networks with paid search that are off-deck, he mentioned are Medio and Jumptap... He also mentioned that with voice search with advertising, there is 100% penetration!

June 2008

  • New York Post
  • DM News
    • Google Trends Updated
      • Google Trends has always been useful, and these updates make it more useful than before, said David Berkowitz, director of emerging media for search marketing firm 360i, in response to the news. That said, it's still not perfect, in his opinion: “The one thing Google won't give away here is the exact numbers,” he said. ...

        Before, Google provided graphs that gave users a sense of what some of the trends were — including trends across geographic regions, Berkowitz said. Now, however, people can actually quantify the comparisons, he said. “Taking this all together you can get a better picture of the marketplace.”

  • DM News
  • MediaPost
    • Will Social Media Force Spending Up or Down - coverage of OMMA Social
      • Most experts on Monday agreed that effective social marketing goes way beyond banner ads on MySpace. "You can make social media a flat-out media buy by running a big banner ad campaign on MySpace, but that part of it really isn't that special," said David Berkowitz, director of emerging media and client strategy at digital agency 360i.
  • SEM Brasil
    • Sonhando com um Super Modelo - column syndicated to Brazil's leading search engine marketing site
      • David Berkowitz, diretor de planejamento estratégico no 360i, escreve sobre uma questão crucial: afinal, sua empresa está gastando mais ou menos do que deveria em Search Engine Marketing?

May 2008

  • DM News
    • Microsoft Starts Rebate Debate - several quotes on Microsoft Cashback:
      • David Berkowitz, director of emerging media & client strategy for SEM firm 360i, said the move was, “a new twist on comparison shopping.” ... “It is unlikely that a lot of consumers are going to go to the cashback site on their own,” Berkowitz said.

        Most likely, most of the traffic will be coming from consumers searching for good deals during a declining economy on product categories on MSN.com or Live.com, he continued.

April 2008

  • CK's Blog
    • Review of my Media Sponsorship Policy
    • Excerpt:
      • Why am I pleased? Because of:
        • How David is looking to add value to his blog (clever!) while bringing value to his readers.
        • How his new sponsorship is rooted in an authentic passion of his--seriously, that dude gets around a lot, and speaks at and attends conferences left, right and center.
        • How upfront and respectful his policy is of his blog's audience.

March 2008

  • MarketingSherpa
  • Financial Express (India)
    • When It Gets Official - featured expert, along with Steve Rubel, on corporate blogging
      • One of my quotes: "There should be someone who monitors the blog daily, monitors other mentions of it in the blogosphere, and has full permission to respond to people on the fly, including commenting on others' blogs and really playing a role in the community. That kind of approach will create a groundswell of respect for that company."

February 2008

  • The Performance Interviews
    • Featured interview - a Q&A on performance for ValueClick's series featuring industry experts
  • Mobile Marketer
    • "How Will Microsoft's Bid for Yahoo Affect Mobile?" - featured quote:
      • “The mobile channel is so much bigger than the online giants, but this is one area where Microsoft and Yahoo have strengths that could play-off each other,” said David Berkowitz, director of emerging media and client strategy at interactive agency 360i, New York.

January 2008

November 2007

  • Ad Age Search Marketing Fact Pack
  • iMedia Connection
    • Ten Tips by Ten Bloggers - I'm one of the ten in this great roundup by Joe Kutchera
      • Through his blog, the Marketer's Studio, David Berkowitz has established credibility for his consulting client strategy work at 360i (where he is director of emerging media) and obtained numerous speaking engagements at the Consumer Electronics Show, the Magazine Publishers of America and MediaPost's Search Insider Summits and OMMA events. In addition, it has also opened up a means of conversation with other bloggers.

        Berkowitz says, "Recently, I offered another perspective on a post Forrester Research's Jeremiah Owyang blogged about Twitter (on his personal Web Strategist blog), and the exchange led to MarketingProfs inviting us to debate the issue on a new podcast the company was launching.

        "Ultimately, these conversations and connections, and at times enduring friendships, that I've established through blogging have provided the most value, and then everything from speaking engagements to deeper client relationships have been added perks on top of that."

        What are the benefits of spending time reading and commenting on other blogs?

      • Bloggers whose blogs you comment on notice you
      • Commenters on those blogs notice you
      • It brings you into those other blogs' communities; you'll often notice the same commenters over and over each day
      • Usually, you can link to your blog from the comment, which is great both for traffic and potentially for search engine optimization
      • You gain new ideas to write about; you might take a comment you left for someone and use that to build another blog post of your own that fleshes it out

October 2007

  • Web Strategy by Jeremiah
  • Fortune Small Business
    • Scott Jones's Big Bet: Can Human-Powered Search Beat Google?: quoted analyst
      • "I think if you're trying to change the search experience as a whole, it's a much bigger challenge," says David Berkowitz, director of emerging media and client strategy with 360i (360i.com), a New York City search-marketing agency, "and that's where ChaCha falls in."

August 2007

  • Certification Magazine
    • The Latest in Web Site Search Technology

      • “Thanks to the proliferation of social media, consumers are creating more and more content and updating it frequently, so the sheer mass and scale become issues,” said David Berkowitz, director of emerging media and client strategy at 360i, a search engine marketing firm.

        “A growing volume of content is in some multimedia form — images, movies, podcasts — and those are harder to index than text,” he said. “Search queries are becoming more demanding, prompting the need for better search tools that understand the semantics both of queries and content.”

        At the same time, all expect results to be highly relevant and rapidly delivered.

        “There’s a constant cat-and-mouse game with search technology,” he said. “As the technology improves, consumers find new ways to use it, and they set their standards higher.”

      • “By some standards, it’s amazing what search technology accomplishes today,” Berkowitz said. “By other standards, it seems infantile compared to the potential for what it can deliver. It has become good enough that we can more easily envision how amazing it will get, and that’s a great sign for the industry, even if it causes some frustration over the short-term.”

  • Advertising Age
    • The Early Days of Video Search
      • "We're still in the early stage in terms of marketing opportunities for video search," agrees David Berkowitz, director of emerging media and client strategy at 360i, which boasts video-heavy companies such as NBC Universal, Scripps Networks and MTV Networks as search clients. "It's in natural search where more opportunity lies." He says one of the problems with video search that doesn't plague text search is there isn't a universal standard for how videos get indexed into search engines.

        Mr. Berkowitz points to an example of how his firm has optimized video so that it shows up higher in search results. When the "Saturday Night Live" hit "Lazy Sunday," a hip-hop-music-video parody starring Andy Samberg, went viral on YouTube in December 2005, NBC was nowhere to be found in the first page of results for a Google search on "SNL videos." After major video-search-optimization efforts, the SNL video page showed up first. Mr. Berkowitz also credits optimization efforts for ensuring NBC video sites show up in the top half of results for other phrases, such as "Friday Night Lights," ahead of other popular sites such as IMDB, TV.com and Wikipedia.

June 2007

  • DM News
    • 360i's Berkowitz and Hofstetter Promoted - official story on my promotion to Director of Emerging Media & Client Strategy

      • David Berkowitz will continue to run 360i's Emerging Media Lab, helping clients understand online marketing and emerging-media trends. He is chairman of the Search Insider summits and a well-known figure in the search industry.

        Prior to 360i, he served as director of marketing for Viewpoint's rich-media advertising group Unicast and search engine marketing firm iCrossing.

May 2007

  • Multichannel Merchant
    • Google's New Search: Universal, and Far From Remote

      • David Berkowitz, director of strategic planning for search and performance firm 360i, says the rollout of this integrated search was foreseeable for a long time. "Marketers should have been going in this direction anyway, because there've been a lot of signs that this is part of the evolution of natural search," he says. "Conveniently, Google has spelled out a lot of the rules here."

        Two of the most important lessons for marketers and Web optimizers, he says, are optimizing for the vertical and specialized search services on any of the major search engines, and digitizing and optimizing any asset that could conceivably be found in search. Whether it's making sure that every image on your Website is tagged and findable by the search bots, getting a list of all your patents onto the Web, or making a page that contains all your TV commercials, get that content optimized and out there, Berkowitz says. "It might not be something that you'd actively promote, but having the content online and optimized is one more hook for the search engines, and one more way to expand your presence in search results."

  • Search Engine Watch
    • What Does Universal Search Mean for SEM?

      • Many times, the changes in results Google returns will be subtle, but other searches will offer surprises that will serve to highlight the strength of Google's vertical search properties, according to David Berkowitz, director of emerging media at 360i.

        "For instance, for a search on [iPod], categories appear up top that include the Web default along with patents, products, and news. Do that many searchers really care about patents? Probably not," Berkowitz said. "More likely, Google uses opportunities like that to showcase just how robust its vertical search offerings are, which means that just as universal search replaces vertical search in some regards, it highlights the value of vertical search in other circumstances."

        Most all industry watchers agree that this will have an impact on search marketers, since searchers will now be presented with more than just Web page results.

        "The moral for search marketers is they need to take a holistic view of search," Berkowitz said. "For those who get it, this gives them an unprecedented chance to dominate entire search engine results pages and gain sizeable competitive advantages. Marketers need to consider every digital asset of theirs as an opportunity to gain more visibility in Google, whether it’s an image, video, press release, store listing, blog post, or anything else."

April 2007

  • Amy Cham's Blog
    • Web 2.0 Expo: David Berkowitz on SEO and SEM trends
      • This was a great talk that introduced a lot of ideas and pointed out how things are changing.  Search is more than having good keywords and site structure.  The "inter" in internet is becoming a powerful force, and behaving in ways that we didn't see just a few years ago.  It's an evolving, rich area of challenge and opportunity that warrants a little extra homework creative experimentation on the part of marketers and business owners.

March 2007

  • Ad Age
    • How Functional Widgets are Shaking up the Web
      • "There's a lot of promise, but we're still in the early stages of marketers using them," said David Berkowitz, director of emerging media at search-focused agency 360i. His research recently found just 8% of the top network- and cable-TV programmers use emerging media such as widgets in their media-marketing efforts. Already widget aggregators such as Widgetbox and Clearspring have seen jumps in number of users and picked up substantial private-investment dollars.

        Of course, all the activity and popularity is not to say widgets are a done phenomenon. Still, Mr. Berkowitz said, "these days things move so quickly from early adopter to 'me too,' so there is a limited window where you can get in there and make an impact."
  • DM News
    • Deeper Targeting and More Competition on the Search Horizon

      • Things in the search arena are looking good with moderate growth in inventory, traffic and ad spend. The industry has grown 20 percent to 30 percent from the first quarter of 2006, said David Berkowitz, director of emerging media at 360i, New York.

      • Mr. Berkowitz said the industry is becoming more transparent, and there is increased competition among the major engines.

        "On the paid search front, Yahoo's new ad platform Project Panama is requiring marketers to completely review their campaigns and adjust to the new system," Mr. Berkowitz said. "Early indications show that marketers are paying a lower cost-per-click and getting a higher ROI from their ad spend there.

        "Meanwhile, Google is offering much more transparency into its Quality Score so marketers have a better indication of how their ads rank," he said.

  • Mediaweek
    • 360i Report: TV Nets Digital Efforts Lack Consolidation
      • Such a vacuum can result in fans of these network’s show getting lost when shifting from various channels, whether they visit network’s Web sites, video sharing sites, social networks, or wherever TV fans congregate online. “Marketers typically run social media campaigns as separate entities, and often social networks, blogs, mobile marketing, and other channels are run by different people or groups,” said David Berkowitz, 360i’s Director of Emerging Media. “What’s clear from these results that marketers must learn to connect the channels so that the sum is greater than each of its parts. When all the channels are connected, it will be easier for consumers to navigate through the entire campaign and remain engaged with the brand.”
  • MediaPost
    • TV Brands Could Do More to Exploit Digital Efforts

      • The inability of networks to maximize investments online--according to 360i's director of emerging media David Berkowitz--has more to do with integration than with adoption.

        "Marketers typically run social media campaigns as separate entities, and often social networks, blogs, mobile marketing, and other channels are run by different people or groups," said Berkowitz. "What's clear from these results is that marketers must learn to connect the channels so that the sum is greater than each of its parts."

        Network marketers, for example, are more than likely today to create a MySpace page devoted exclusively to one television series. It is less likely, said Berkowitz, that these marketers will establish a connection between the MySpace page--and its visitors--and the show's other digital platforms.

        Added Berkowitz: "When all the channels are connected, it will be easier for consumers to navigate through the entire campaign and remain engaged with the brand."

  • MediaPost
  •     Microsoft Deal Gives It Shot at Thriving Health Search Vertical

      •  Health is one of the most valuable verticals when it comes to search, said David Berkowitz, director of emerging media for 360i. "It's one of those things that is so valuable to consumers and such a huge market, spending-wise--just look at the trillion plus dollar healthcare market," he said. "If you get it right, then you have something really valuable to advertisers that are dying to find new ways to reach consumers."

      The acquisition is the second for Microsoft's Health Solutions Group, which bought Azyxxi, a healthcare software product, in 2006. Medstory, a search engine, has "a lot of the tools to compete," and has particularly good search refining tools, returning results on treatments, drugs, and prominent researchers, for terms entered, Berkowitz said.

February 2007

  • MediaPost
    • Google Adds CPC Pricing to Site Targeting

      • The move is expected to make site targeting more useful to advertisers who have aim for both branding and direct response with their campaigns, said David Berkowitz, director of strategic planning for 360i. "Even brand marketers often have direct marketing and traffic goals, and they'll want to use CPC pricing for those campaigns," he said.

  • Direct Magazine
    • Google Gets Personal - Should You Care? - Ruminating on personalized search

      • Dave Berkowitz, director of strategic planning for search marketing firm 360i, is of pretty much the same opinion. For one thing, even those users with a registered Google account may still conduct many of their searches on the basic www.google.com start page, which requires no registration. He thinks the users most likely to be searching while logged in are those with a Gmail account. And while that Google service has a lot of momentum, he points out, the “tens of millions” of Gmail users Google claims are still running well behind the users of Yahoo! Mail or MSN’s Hotmail.

        For another thing, optimizing for the possible variations in personalized search is close to mathematically impossible. “I had a friend at UC Berkeley calculate the possible permutations for a search that could have 25 links—a totally arbitrary number-- show up in the ten slots on a Google results page,” Berkowitz says. “The total worked out to about 11.9 trillion possibilities.”

        “If you go on doing [optimization] right, you’re going to capture most of the interested audience,” Berkowitz says. “If you’re not as visible to an occasional personal searcher here or there, you just have to hope it averages out in your favor.”

        That jibes with what Matt Cutts, senior Google engineer, who was the keynote conversation at the London session of Search Engine Strategies two weeks ago. Where optimizing for a trophy keyword in general search produces a few big winners and lots of losers, he said, “Now you can target specific niches, and everyone can rank in some niche.” The important step, he said, will be figuring out those niches and targeting them properly.

        Berkowitz agrees. Search marketers who have been aggressively pursuing the long tail of search with ten thousand keywords in their lists may be ahead of the curve should the search audience begin to fragment, he says. “In fact, it may work to search marketers’ advantage,” he says. “If they start getting less traffic from a key term [as a result of personalized search], that term may turn out to cost through the roof.” So personalization, combined with a long-tail approach and some careful monitoring, could actually help sharpen marketers’ targeting skills.

January 2007

  • ClickZ
    • Google Posts Q4 Profit

      • "Their own destination remains the huge driver of the revenues. Everything else that came up, especially when it comes to mobile and Google Checkout, and those emerging models, are not yet a source of direct revenue," said David Berkowitz, director of emerging media for 360i, a search marketing agency. "Google's still a search engine. Their numbers speak to that a lot more than their executives do."

  • MediaPost
    • MSN Tests Analytics Tool

      • David Berkowitz, director of strategic planning for 360i, said the planned offering seems needed. "There's a lot of room for thought leadership, and a lot of room to basically reach out and provide transparency for advertisers and agencies," he said. "When the traffic comes in and as they provide better ways to target their users, then they can provide more value than just the raw numbers."

Note: I'll be selectively adding earlier archives here, but this is a very rough work in progress. Additionally, many links are no longer available online.

November 2006

  • DM News
    • Local Search Spreads Its Wings

      • A local search function can be cost effective. For example, an insurance company that operates only in 10 states would not want to serve its ads nationwide because that would waste most of its ad budget right from the start, said David Berkowitz, director of strategic planning at 360i, New York.

        Some marketers may need even narrower geographies, like a hairstylist who attracts customers within 20 miles of her salon.

        A national brand might want to reach out to different geographies in different ways.

        "In March, a department store might still be selling winter coats in Montana while selling swimsuits in Florida," Mr. Berkowitz said. "An airline might target East Coast searchers with flights to Europe and West Coast searchers with flights to Asia.

        "A fast-food chain might stress the speed of delivery to rushed urban-area searchers while stressing the low price and great value to those in the Midwest," he said. "All of this is with the goal of making ads more relevant, and the major search engines include ways to accomplish this."

        In June, eMarketer projected that U.S. local online advertising would be $1.3 billion this year and skyrocket to $2.8 billion by 2008. And a recent comScore Networks report found that 109 million people performed a local search in July, up 43 percent from July 2005.

        The potential of this market encourages innovation.

        "We're seeing quite a bit of innovation, especially from the search engines," Mr. Berkowitz said. "Mapping technology keeps getting more sophisticated. Google is constantly rolling out new features for Google Earth, where users can search the globe displayed with 3D satellite imagery.

        "Microsoft is using its 3D aerial maps as a big component of Live Local," he said. "Yahoo also has a new map program in beta that makes it easier to plot directions for multiple points on a given route and also makes it easy to browse local businesses on a map."


  • Media Magazine
    • Ready, Aim, Segment: Adventures in Search Targeting

      • As keyword prices soar in some popular categories, targeting introduces necessary efficiencies. At 360i, day-parting reduces budgets and helps outflank competitors. “Targeting is a big focus for us,” says David Berkowitz, the firm’s director of strategic planning. “If rival advertisers blow their budgets by 3 p.m., then you can ramp up in the evening and get prime positioning, saving significant money and increasing click-through rates.”...

      • Still, as marketers drill down into location, demographics, and day-parting tactics, the targeting miracle everyone wants remains in the wings. “The future is behavioral,” says 360i’s Berkowitz. “If you only want to target someone who’s made a certain type of purchase, it could have a big impact on messaging.”

  • Advertising Age
    •     Search Marketing Fact Pack
      • (A two-page spread interview with David Berkowitz on 12 search engine optimization strategies for 2007)

October 2006

  • ABC News
    • Google Bombing Politicians
      • "Google could theoretically impact an election," said David Berkowitz, at the search engine marketing firm 360i. "Presumably, Google could have a role in who controls Congress."

      • The idea isn't new, according to 360i's Berkowitz. He said that during the 2004 election, a similar approach was used to link searches for simple phrases or words like "waffle" to Democratic Sen. John Kerry, and "miserable failure" to President Bush.

        "But those results don't have a lot of competition," said Berkowitz, who believes the specifics of today's Google bomb campaign make it much more difficult. "I'm very skeptical in terms of how all this will work. Maybe for a handful of politicians it will, but for the majority, I think it will be a long shot."

  • DM News
    • DMers on Danny Sullivan/Incisive Media Agreement

      • "His presence at the show breeds familiarity. He adds a lot in terms of knowing the people, the companies, the stories, the trends, the success stories, and the inside dirt," said David Berkowitz, director of strategic planning at 360i .

        “It’s reassuring to hear the show will continue to benefit from his expertise,” Mr. Berkowitz said. “As search marketing budgets grow, and as top executives at the world’s leading companies grasp the importance of search, it’s all the more important that these flagship SES events provide the best possible educational and networking experience.”

  • iMedia
    • The Industry Weighs In (Google Acquiring YouTube)

      • David Berkowitz, Director of Strategic Planning, 360i
        Google's acquisition of YouTube will change some of the rules of engagement for agencies involved with media buying.

        The old rules (the ones in place today) were that marketers would turn to search marketing agencies, or whatever agency they've been using that offered search marketing services, to buy media through Google, and this would be predominantly text-based and direct response. Video-related ads would run through the client's interactive agency or rich media provider, and branding would be a primary goal.

        Google has been blurring those lines for some time with image and video-in-banner ads, but as Google rolls out more formats specific to video, and to the viral user-generated content that has made YouTube its billion-dollar baby, those lines may disappear entirely.

        Search marketing agencies will now be tasked with buying text and video ads and gaining more stewardship for achieving both direct response and branding goals, while agencies that have traditionally handled rich media and video will now work more closely with Google, giving them more leverage with the largest online advertising company.

  • Media Magazine
    • Built for Speed

      • And consumers now expect as much. "It's an instantaneous marketing process," says David Berkowitz, director of strategic planning, 360i. Marketers need to reel in in-market consumers who are predisposed to buying, and then fulfill their requests immediately. Search engines level the playing field, allowing small companies like regional airlines and boutique financial consultants to compete with bigger rivals. "It's a great equalizer," Berkowitz says.

September 2006

  • MediaPost
    • Google Introduces Mobile AdWords

      • David Berkowitz, director of strategic planning for search engine marketing firm 360i, said Google's entry could make the world of mobile advertising more accessible to smaller advertisers. "Right now, there's only so much mobile search buying going on, but Google's done a great job integrating this into their overall AdWords system," he said. "There's a lot of mobile advertising companies, it's a really chaotic, confusing space, so for a lot of marketers, this could be a relief for them."

August 2006

  • MediaPost
    • 360i: Search Marketers Overstate Organic Listings
      • "Marketers tend to look at the last click before conversions," says David Berkowitz, the director of strategic planning for 360i. "There is a real process going on, and what this means if you're only crediting the last click rather than just the assist--you may well not be giving proper credit to the clicks that are taking part in the consumer's buying process."
  • ClickZ
    • Study: Search Marketers Undervalue Assists
      • These multi-click conversions accounted for two-thirds of the total clicks measured in this study, according to David Berkowitz, director of strategic planning at 360i.

        "Many marketers are looking at the last click before a conversion and crediting it entirely. Most 'assists' are being ignored," Berkowitz told ClickZ. "Knowing the value of 'assists' gives marketers more power to budget their search campaigns, and make more efficient decisions."...
      • "Paid listings are more likely to be uncredited by marketers looking only at the last click," Berkowitz said.

        The most common move was from non-branded to branded searches that led to clicks on natural results. Clicks on a natural result for a non-branded search led to clicks on a natural result of a branded search 32.5 percent of the time.

        Next most common progression led from a click on a paid result of a non-branded search to a click on a natural result of a branded search, which took place 22.4 percent of the time. That path should be considered most valuable, Berkowitz said. "It indicates that the searcher was not sold on who they wanted to do business with."

June 2006

  • MediaPost
    • Google Upgrades AdWords with Daypart Scheduling

      • David Berkowitz, director of strategic planning for search engine marketing firm 360i, said that dayparting will likely prove useful for search marketers. "Dayparting can help marketers better align their campaigns with their overall marketing strategy," he said. "For instance, if a marketer's running a major TV campaign in prime time, and they want to make sure they don't burn through their search budget first thing in the morning."

  • MediaPost
    • Google Tests Cost Per Action Ads

      • If Google cost-per-action ads become more widely available, the search giant could attract a large group of new advertisers to whom the model appeals. "It will attract advertisers that might have been using CPA networks," said David Berkowitz, director of strategic planning for search engine marketing firm 360i. "Given the success of CPA networks, I'd say a lot of advertisers are going to be asking questions about this."

        The move, Berkowitz said, is a play at the non-brand advertisers on the Web--a contrast to programs such as image ads and site selection, which were targeted largely at big brand budgets. "This is clearly not a branding play right here," he said. "It's a little refreshing to see--even if Google is expanding its options a little, it's still sticking with its direct marketing roots."

  • ClickZ
    • Google Tests Cost Per Action

      • "Advertisers concerned with click fraud will be some of the quickest to sign up, but it's not going to be the main driver of the program," predicted David Berkowitz, director of strategic planning at 360i. "Google's biggest traction will come from advertisers that are already using CPA with other networks, and have a relationship with Google. Google has a trusted name with advertisers, publishers and consumers. I can't see any reason an advertiser wouldn't at least experiment with this."

  • Ad Age
    • Microsoft Adds Search to Windows Live Email
      • "All the talk about default settings giving one company an advantage over another is completely overrated," said David Berkowitz, director-strategic planning at search marketing firm 360i. "When Google became Google, it was no one's default setting."

May 2006

  • DM News
    • Yahoo Overhauls Paid Search Program

      • "This is the most significant development on the platform side since MSN debuted with adCenter and demographic targeting built into it," said David Berkowitz, director of strategic planning, search marketing firm 360i, New York.

  • MediaPost
    • Report: Last Clicks Get All the Credit

      • According to David Berkowitz--the author of the study and director of strategic planning at 360i--marketers should look more holistically at campaigns, and not necessarily assume that the final search term is the one that gets the sales. "One thing that marketers can and should be doing is manage the brand and non-brand terms together--holistically, they're often seen as two separate entities," he said. "There's a reason to categorize them separately when running the campaign, but when running the analytics, and seeing what terms can explain the conversions--that's when you need to bring them all together."

  • DM News
    • Yahoo New Front Page Gets Personalized

      • "What's different with the new homepage is that it stresses personalization and content. Yahoo sets the main top-center focal point on its leading stories and their related video clips," David Berkowitz, director of strategic planning for search marketing firm 360i told DMNews.

        While search is very prominent, so is content. Yahoo added more feature stories, entertainment and sports items, as well as more video and text news.

        "The new site reinforces Yahoo's role as a portal first and search engine second, so the design competes more with AOL and MSN than Google and Ask," Mr. Berkowitz said.

  • MediaPost
    • AdSense Upgrade Could Speed Growth of Online Video Ads

      • David Berkowitz, director of strategic planning for search engine marketing firm 360i, said that the do-it-yourself, auction-based format could allow advertisers who have been blocked from buying video advertising to do so. "There's such a low barrier to entry, and so anyone can participate," he said. "For a local advertiser who might want to repurpose a local TV campaign, this could very well present their first foray into online video advertising."

        Berkowitz said that 360i had been receiving inquiries from its clients as early as Tuesday morning--hours after the announcement was made, about getting video into the content network. "It's one of those things that we'll definitely look at in terms of how it fits into the rest of their campaigns," he said. "It's definitely something that our clients will be asking about, and already first thing this morning, we've been educating them about it."

March 2006

  • ClickZ
    • Click Fraud Settlement Viewed as Win-Win by Some

      • Some search marketers, such as David Berkowitz, director of strategic planning at 360i, say click fraud has been over-hyped and is little more than a distraction for most sophisticated marketers. Much of the problem is in advertiser's perception of the issue, and the way the search engines have handled it, he said.

        "Search engines need to better educate marketers and provide greater transparency into their methods. If they say that a certain percentage of clicks are fraudulent or if they offer a refund to marketers on some clicks, the engines will best serve marketers and agencies by being more open about how they come to such conclusions," Berkowitz said.

  • Multichannel Merchant
    • Taking Surer Aim on Contextual Ads

      • “This is great, especially for those who’ve done advertising in other media or even in other online channels,” says David Berkowitz, director of strategic planning for search marketing agency 360i. “Now advertisers can target specific demographics with contextual ads and ideally make those ads even more relevant to viewers.”

        Adding the demographic filters to the media buys on Google AdSense therefore makes that channel a lot more like buying ad inventory in other online media such as banner ads, Berkowitz says, so in that sense it’s an evolutionary step rather than a great leap. “What was really new for AdSense was adding Google’s bidding model to that medium,” he says. “Adding demographic targeting on top of that just makes it make even more sense. It’s something that I’m sure advertisers were hoping for.”

        In the different avenues that Google and MSN have taken to add demographics to their ad offerings, you might be able to read two companies trying to play to their very different strengths, Berkowitz adds. MSN has a very large registered base of users for its various products, from e-mail and instant messaging to social networking and its other Passport services, and it has built most of its profiling capabilities on that large data mound, with some additional input from third parties.

  • MediaPost
    • Study: Most Search Conversions Happen Offline

      • David Berkowitz, search marketing firm 360i's director of strategic planning, took another view. He contended that many marketers were indeed aware of the ROI gleaned from offline conversions, but said the major challenge was figuring out how to measure the offline conversions stemming from search. "There's still more room in terms of improving the measurement of offline channels for interactive campaigns," he said. "That remains a significant challenge for marketers."

February 2006

  • BtoB Magazine
    • 360i Names Director of Strategic Planning
      • New York—360i, a search marketing and interactive agency, has named David Berkowitz director of strategic planning. Berkowitz was previously director of marketing for Viewpoint Corp.’s rich media advertising group. In his new role, he will work with senior management to develop strategy for emerging media including video search, mobile search, RSS, podcasting and pay-per-call.
    • Also in ClickZ Execs & Accounts

January 2006

  • MediaPost
    • Intel, AOL Partner for Web-to-TV
      • The result was an online display unlike much else on the Web. "It is in fact brand spanking new ... combining takeover ads to multi-unit ad executions," said David Berkowitz, an executive with the rich media company Unicast.
  • MediaPost
    • Google Wins Copyright Case
      • "Until now, the cache has just been a nifty little bonus in using Google when a page won't load," said search industry observer David Berkowitz, director of marketing for Viewpoint Corporation. "Down the road, cache presumably could play a much bigger role than it does now."
  • Media Magazine
    • Agency of the Year: AKQA - guest judge

      • "RunLondon is [one of the] better examples of branded content that I've seen recently," says David Berkowitz, director of marketing for Viewpoint Corp. The site used Google Maps to route the best course to NikeTown for runners to pick up their race pack. AKQA concluded the campaign by adding a layer that would truly link the runner with the race, not to mention the Nike brand: Runners were supplied with 3G mobile phones, enabling them to see themselves cross the finish line in the palm of their hands.

        "The site does a great job at targeting both beginning and experienced runners," Berkowitz adds. "The tag line is strong upfront -- 'I Will Run a Year' -- making the site extremely personal to runners, while the entire time you know that you're on a Nike-branded site."

November 2005

  • DM News
    • Rich Media Gets Richer: Merchandising via Online Advertising - bylined article
      • Rich media offers many opportunities to engage consumers, with television-quality video and countless options for consumer control and interaction. Yet, even as the online experience for consumers becomes more immersive, consumers want control. In light of the continued push and pull between consumers and advertisers, advertising and content are increasingly intertwined.

May 2004

  • Associated Press
    • Online Groceries Keep Expanding Quietly

      • "People who go in and feel fruit have no idea what they're doing, but it's still so important for them," said eMarketer analyst David Berkowitz. "Online shopping changes that dramatically."

December 2003

  • CNN/Money
    • Wigs, Bandanas, and Sex for the Holidays?

      • "This year has been very strong for the e-commerce industry," said David Berkowitz, spokesman for e-commerce research firm eMarketer. "Every indicator in this space, from online sales, broadband growth and domain registration is up. It's not surprising that individuals, small businesses and even the bigger brick-and-mortar retailers who didn't have an online presence before now have a Web site."...

      • "The Internet is gradually becoming more of a standard way to shop," said Berkowitz. "It's convenient to use, especially as people are more confident now of using their credit cards online. Web vendors are giving customers what they want like free shipping or the option to order online and pick up the goods at the store."

        But despite all the sugary predictions, analysts point out that at the end of the day, the Internet accounts for less than 2 percent of the overall retail sales pie, which last year totaled over $3 trillion.

        "So even if we have a very strong season for Internet sales, it doesn't necessarily signal a strong holiday season," Berkowitz said.

October 2003

  • Orlando Sentinel
    • Quotes on e-commerce
      • "Price is an important factor for consumers online but is not the be
        all, end all," said David Berkowitz, a spokesman for eMarketer, an
        Internet and e-business research firm. "It's a matter of convenience --
        people shop online or through catalogs because they don't have time to
        shop elsewhere.

        "The passage of this legislation certainly would be a little setback to
        the industry," he continued, "But online retailers are only getting
        better and more sophisticated. Brick-and-mortar retailers are going to
        feel the heat regardless."

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Who's David?

  • David Berkowitz is Director of Emerging Media & Client Strategy for 360i. A frequent speaker and media pundit, he has been published hundreds of times in MediaPost, Ad Age, eMarketer, and elsewhere. Get to know him in the links below the blog's header.

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