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Cashing Out: Year End 2008 in Online Marketing News

Welcome to the year end wrap-up of Cashing Out. To ring in the New Year this Special Edition of Cashing Out will include the normal summation of the previous week and the Top 5 News Events we feel impacted your business in 2008.

First the previous week’s recap:

Verizon Hands Squatters a $33.2 Million Fee
In a settlement over 663 “unlawfully” registered domains that were “identical” or “similar” to Verizon trademarks, domain squatter OnlineNIC was hit with an awarded fee of $50,000 per name. According to the World Intellectual Property Organization complaints about cybersquatting have surged to new record amounts in recent years.

Large Increase in Greentech Investments Reported
According to Ernest and Young, venture capital firms have poured $4.6 billion globally into green industry investments representing a growth of 82 percent year over year. No surprise that in the United States companies focusing on solar energy and bio-fuels led in investment totals.

Pinnacle Award Finalists Announced
With Affiliate Summit coming up, co-founders Shawn Collins and Missy Ward announced the nominees for the annual Pinnacle Awards for the affiliate industry. Congratulations to all the finalists. ReveNews is honored to have several members of its family as nominees for Best Blogger.

That’s all for the recap of the last week of 2008. Now on to the Top 5 News Events we feel especially impacted your business in 2008.

1) The Downturn
With both US and global economies reeling it is almost impossible today to have a business conversation that doesn’t include talk of downturn. Impact was felt as tech companies downsized in response with over 100,000 employees laid off in the last half of 2008. Start-ups were hit especially hard as VCs suddenly demanded that companies move toward sustainable business models.

Although there was plenty of doom and gloom to go around it is important to note that overall online sales continued to grow. Online sales overall increased 15% compared to last year. Amazon and Buy.com reported record sales over the holiday season. This speaks to the fact that if companies don’t panic and focus on growing their core business they can still see growth online in ’09.

2) Amazon Tax
With many states facing budgetary short falls, concern over other states following the poor example set by New York when it moved forward with what has come to be known as the “Amazon Tax” law makes this number 2 on our list. In a time when states should be focused on stimulating the economy very little about this Amazon Tax makes any sense.

3) Microsoft and Yahoo Dance but Don’t Commit
At an offering price of $31 a share last February, Microsoft’s acquisition of Yahoo seemed like a sure thing. It would have drastically changed the advertising landscape which is why it made our list as number 3. After much dancing and posturing the deal ultimately went away, as did Yang.

4) Collapse of Newspaper Giants
Perhaps hurt the most in the tumultuous end to 2008 was the newspaper industry as it sought new ways to engage customers and make up for ever declining ad revenue. Industry stalwarts the New York Times, which had to borrow against its own headquarters, and the Chicago Tribune, which filed for bankruptcy protection, led the bad news. As the newspaper industry fights to survive it will look to the online space as a natural evolution of the business. So too will many former journalists who will migrate into the blogosphere, which is why this is made our list as number 4.

5) Skimming From the Top
When times are tough it is easy to scam people. In the affiliate channel both major networks have had scandal this year; Commission Junction who settled its class-action lawsuit and LinkShare whose ownership of OneCause crosses many ethical boundaries. Spammers, id thieves, domain squatters, patent trolls and yes - affiliates all got in on the ever increasing action this year. Next year those sorts of problems will continue to grow as companies choose money over ethics in their search for a larger piece of a shrinking pie.

In Closing

And as we say goodbye to the old year and hello to the new one we would like to express to our readers our gratitude for being part of the ReveNews audience. We hope to continue to serve as an information source for you in 2009. May you have a wonderful and prosperous New Year.

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