A Visit from Google AdWords

On Monday, five staffers from the Google AdWords Ann Arbor office paid us a visit here at MagazineLine. It's always exciting to get visitors - being in the Midwest, we don't get a lot of them (grin), and once again, Google is way ahead of the pack by offering to make the (quick) trip. For the better part of the day, members of our marketing and IT staff talked about search and internet marketing with the biggest hitter in the space.

I was really impressed with the amount of training and preparation the Googlers brought with them. We talked mostly about holiday marketing plans, and they had some great ideas on expanding our reach, as well as new testing ideas we haven't tried before. We also talked about some of the Google products, including Checkout and Analytics.

The conversation also uncovered some gaps in our current Google strategy. For instance, we discovered that although we're regularly submitting a feed to Google Base for Product Search, we're basically nowhere to be found. The Googlers didn't even know we were listed there. The discussion brought the issue back onto our radar, and with the help of Google, we've found some fairly easy ways to improve our feed and get better visibility.

All in all, it was a productive day on both sides of the table. As I've said here before, it always helps to have a face to put with the voice at the other end of the phone; and we were able to accomplish so much more in person than we ever could by phone and email.

We're very lucky to have the Google office so close by. It's definitely bolstering an already-strong relationship.