LeapFish - what to do?

So I have been contacted by a sales rep from LeapFish, a new
aggregate search engine. Of course, he's selling something. At least one of my Google Guy clients has been contacted too, and was asking for advice, so I've decided to post my thoughts here.

Their basic sales pitch is that you buy a permanent advertising slot on their results page - for a certain phrase (such as "Seattle counselors" - which is different to them from "Seattle counselor" by the way). You pay a 5% fee (5% of the original sales price) each year. You then "own" this advertising slot for....well, forever.

It's an interesting idea. It's like buying a Google Adwords slot....except LeapFish is no Google. They are a new and unknown search engine, and are basically re-vamping a concept that was tried by DogPile and Mamma.com. People get quite used to their habits, and so I don't foresee LeapFish changing people's searching habits.

In short - I wouldn't do it.

Best, Peter
Your Google Guy
Get Clicks, Get Clients

From the book "Click"

For those tech-heads out there, the new book Click - What Millions of People Are Doing Online and Why It Matters is an interesting read.

The author, Bill Tancer, has been writing about how people use the Internet, and especially search engines, for years.

Overall, a complex and fascinating read, I think there is one nugget I can definitely give out as advice - if you do anything regarding diets, stopping smoking, or other habit changes, you should absolutely binge on pay-per-click advertising from December 30th-January 4th. The bulk of New Year's resolution searching is made at that time. By the time the 5th has rolled around, search volume on New Year's resolution items drops down to pre-holiday levels.

This should stand out especially for hypnotherapists and coaches.

Best, Peter
Your Google Guy

Welcome to the Google for Therapists Blog!

Hi folks,

Many therapists around the US know me as "Your Google Guy", because of my site YourGoogleGuy.com. I'm a busy guy, having helped well over 100 therapists, counselors, psychologists, psychiatrists and coaches around the country with their web marketing.

I'm launching this blog to help you understand a bit more about this whole web marketing business. It gets more and more complex each day (really, and I was a computer guy before I was a therapist).

To launch this, I wanted to link to a video from the man at Google named Matt Cutts. He's Google's chief "Spam fighter". You might think of Spam as that annoying bunch of unwanted email you get. It is, but it also now means tricks people try to do to get their website listed higher on search engines.



I know there are do-it-yourselfers out there. If you're not one of them, give me a call - 206-799-6566.

Best, Peter Hannah
Your Google Guy
Get Clicks, Get Clients