Microsoft will showcase a good selection of Digital Advertising Breakthroughs at their Third Annual Demo Fest this week, their two-day gathering on Microsoft’s Rednond campus.

Microsoft will showcase nearly 60 technologies at various stages of develpment. Their latest digital advertising beta tools are available at http://adlab.msn.com.

“The technologies showcased at Demo Fest will help create unprecedented opportunity for developers and search engine marketers like the Keyword Services Platform,” said Tarek Najm, distinguished engineer and general manager of Microsoft adCenter at Microsoft. “KSP is a service that provides a framework for researchers to plug in advanced algorithms in the form of building blocks to be consumed by developers for building sophisticated advertiser applications.”

Developed by the rapidly growing team of more than 120 Microsoft adCenter Labs researchers and engineers, technologies displayed Wednesday are all designed to help provide the best advertising experiences for users, advertisers and developers. They include the following:

• Keyword Services Platform. The platform provides a set of Web service APIs related to keyword technologies, including keyword recommendation, forecasting, categorization and monetization, enabling developers to build more intelligent applications for online advertising and beyond.

• Commercial intent detection. Advanced keyword analysis helps differentiate consumers who are looking to make an online purchase from those who are searching for information about products or performing other tasks.

• Large display feedback. Vision-based technology creates interactive public displays that can measure the size of the audience, as well as track audience gestures and estimate demographics.

• Social video sharing. This next-generation video sharing solution features a synchronized “commenting” technology. The introduction of novel in-video, synchronized comments enables a new level of interaction between users, opening up the video as a medium for collaboration.

• Content classification: By accurately analyzing and matching the Web pages included in search results, Microsoft adCenter Labs technology helps increase the probability that the ads displayed during Web searches are relevant to consumers.

A complete list and explanations of the technologies showcased at this year’s Demo Fest can be found in the Microsoft adCenter Labs Advanced Tools fact sheet at http://www.microsoft.com/presspass/newsroom/msn/factsheet/adCenterBreakthroughsFS.mspx

The message to competitive search engine companies is clear, innovate or perish!

Has anyone else noticed that Google Adwords slows down to a crawl around lunch time? I am sitting here at about 12:20pm trying to create an ad, and it appears that the entire system is hanging up. I had the same issue yesterday.

Maybe Search Engine Markerters work harder during their lunch breaks?

Adam

Hitwise reported today that the share of US Internet searches for “gift cards” surged 109% for the week ending December 16th, 2006 vs the previous week as online shoppers looked for last minute gift ideas. Some of the fastest growing Gift card searches include “american express gift cards” up 184%, “itunes gift card” up 69%, and “visa gift cards” up 19%.

“For the second year now, we’ve seen a pattern of increased searches on gift cards as Christmas day approaches,” said Bill Tancer general manager of global research at Hitwise. “This year branded credit and charge gift cards dominated top searches as gift givers opted for the most flexibility for their gift recipients.”

Now that shipping deadlines have mostly passed, online shoppers will probably start looking at digital / email-able gift certificates that can be purchased right up until the last minute.

Happy Holidays!

Chris Carpenter, the write of the ever popular Google Cash eBook, has been working on an update to answer some of his customer’s latest questions about the changes going on at Google.

Chris was just about to release his 3rd edition of his book as well as an update entitled “the Landing Page Special Report” when his office caught fire. See the pictures below:

Could this have been a coincidence? Could it have been one of those funky Sony batteries that have been being recalled left and right? Or could be some interesting tidbits in his new book that Google doesn’t want you to know about?

Maybe Google is Evil after all. Maybe Matt Cutts has created an undercover hit team? I better stop writing before I get targeted for demolition…

So what can you expect in the 3rd Edition of Google Cash?

• A Google Slap workaround explained with video - (This is totally original and as far as he can tell, he’s the only one doing this!)
• “Landing Page Special Report” - a 55 page special report on building high performance landing pages.
• “Adwords Rumors Crushed” - a 43 page special report on systematically improving your Google. Adwords Campaign results.Mp3 audios of both special reports.
• The Google Cash 10 Day Action Guide - A 10 Day Action Guide with daily action steps, checklists, and helpful insights.
• Detailed instructions on how to obtain and use a domain effectively.

If his incites are anything like his original eBook, I will be grabbing a copy as soon is it comes to press!

Enjoy!

Adam