An article in last Sunday’s New York Times made me aware of a new web surfing habit I have developed without even thinking about it.

The basis for the Times article was how web users, particularly young peope, were using YouTube as much for education as for entertainment.

It seems that YouTube is evolving into a search engine, one that is much more appealing to young users than the static search returns that Google provides.

I got over my infatuation with expoloding Coke bottles full of Mentos and kittens playing the piano pretty quickly, and chalked YouTube off to yet another brilliant invention of a time wasting machine.

I now find myself going back to YouTube almost every day to learn how to do something valuable.  In the last week, I have used it to finish a water heater installation under my house, sharpen kitchen knives using a new tool my wife got for Christmas, and to get some help with a particularly challenging part of a piano lesson.  Time saved, not time wasted!

Perhaps the most important piece of information in this article was buried near the bottom of the page (in parentheses no less). Google owns YouTube!

While Microsoft continues their never ending courtship with Yahoo in an attempt to develop an advertising revenue stream based on a model that Google perfected years ago,  Google is now ready to take their $1.65 million dollar purchase of YouTube to the bank.

In fact, as of November, the number of monthly searches on YouTube now exceeds Yahoo searches.  Either way (text or video), when someone clicks on an ad served up with their search results, it’s money in Google’s pocket.

We are beginning work on some simple videos that we hope will help our customers make better use of the products they buy from us.

Get ready for the GoodBuyGuys to make their Hollywood debut!

GoodBuyGuys.com is your online source for Shurtape gaffers tape, Duracell Procell batteries, MagLite flashlights, Nashua duct tape, Bay State wire ties, Enterainment 1 extension cords , OnStage Stand mic stands and quality speaker cables. Count on us when you need specialty tape items and sound advice.

My last several blog posts have centered on issues related to search engine optimization, and the more I read about this important area of web development, the more I come to realize that not nearly enough time is spent on the simple things-optimzation strategies that almost any web site owner can use to their advantage.

On my way to work, I usually listen to Morning Edition on National Public Radio.  It has been a long time since NPR has been advertising-free, even if they choose to not call what you hear “advertising”.  Almost all their programs are underwritten by corporate sponsors, and this underwriting is just another name for advertising.

I was struck this morning by how differently two of these underwriters try to take advantage of their broadcasting budgets to drive traffic to their web sites, using the broadcast version of “word of mouth” marketing to leverage their brands.

One, a national home builder,  K. Hovnanian Homes, uses their complete (unpronounceable, unmemorable and unspellable) name in their underwriting, directing a listener to the web for more information, but in a way that makes it almost impossible for the listener to remember, spell or even “Google” the underwriter’s name.  The chance that this underwriting will actually bring NPR listeners to their web site is unlikely at best.

The second is for a public relations firm,  Rella-Cowan, an equally difficult company name to remember, spell, or “Google”.

Realizing the difficulty of using word of mouth for site traffic building, Rella-Cowan instead uses the cleaver and easy to remember web URL iffytimes.com prominently in their NPR underwriting. Iffytimes.com drives web traffic to their site designed to help businesses with marketing problems in difficult economic times.  “Iffytimes.com” is clever, easy to remember and intriguing to the reader.  Its easy to remember this URL on your walk from the parking lot to the office and it allows Rella-Cowan to build a web presence by planting an idea where they really want it, in your memory.

We are blessed to have a number of web sites that are both easy to remember and which are a subliminal “call to action“, something that any marketing pro will tell you is critical to successful marketing and advertising.  Buytape.com, buybattery.com, buyextensioncord.com, buymicstand.com and all the other members of the goodbuyguys.com family all lend themselves to building web traffic by word of mouth.

Remember, just because you have a web site that is considered your primary company web address, nothing prevents you from having additional web sites that are more relevant to building the kind of word of mouth traffic that can put your web site to work.

GoodBuyGuys.com is your online source for Shurtape gaffers tape, Duracell Procell batteries, MagLite flashlights, Nashua duct tape, Bay State wire ties, Enterainment 1 extension cords , OnStage Stand mic stands and quality speaker cables. Check back here for ideas on web development.