Google is making available Product Listing Ads (PLAs) for local businesses - and potentially revealing its ecommerce intentions. When users search for products on Google they will now encounter localized, product - centered advertisements on the search results from nearby merchants. Should they click, users will arrive at "local storefronts" (powered by Google) where they can browse store inventory. The company is also innovating on a number of other levels of course - from the release of Hummingbird to the introduction of hashtag search to the gradual retooling of its analytics offering. Stay in the virtual loop on these and all the most important Google developments with Website Magazine's 'Net Features news stream at wsm.co/NetFeatures.
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App Annie is taking on a new vertical, launching two new tools for authors and publishers of eBooks. The tools include analytics and store statistics dashboards, which can be used to gauge the success of specific eBooks as well as to study larger market trends. The Analytics dashboard, for example, enables users to keep track of sales, bookstore rankings, downloads, customer reviews and ratings. Conversely, the Store Stat dashboard provides market insights, such as rankings, ratings and information on featured sections.
Web-based services for consumersare entering their monetization phase as both Pinterest and Instagram formally introduced advertising opportunities in the past month. Pinterest announced its ads would be coming to the network in September, but just a month later, the ads are now being tested and can be seen in the digital wild. According to Pinterest, ads will be "tasteful, transparent and relevant" and won't come in display banner or pop-up form. Instead, ads will be shown as "promoted pins" and found in the network's search results and category feeds. Promoted pins will work just like regular pins, according to Pinterest, but they will have special "promoted" labels with links. Not to be forgotten, Facebook-owned Instagram also made its ad platform official. Users of the image-based social network will begin to see the occasional image and video advertisement from several popular brands that are currently using the network. Stay up to date on all the digital advertising news important to your enterprise at wsm.co/DigitalAdChannel.
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In the most unexpected-expected news, Twitter finally filed for its IPO. And, what better way to announce the news and kick off the roadshow than with a tweet? The social network indicated it will be offering up nearly 500 million shares of stock in its initial release mid- November, but many are wondering if the company will suffer the same fate as Facebook after its IPO. According to Twitter, the social network currently has 218 million monthly active users, which have created more than 300 billion tweets since launching the service. As far as revenue is concerned, the filing reveals that Twitter has never been profitable and even lost $69.3 million in the first half of 2013. So will it be boom or bust for Twitter's IPO? Join other Website Magazine readers, the largest group of Internet professionals, and cast your vote at wsm.co/2013twitterIPO.