Lijit

I was back on the United “bus” this week…or so that flight  seems to be these days with frequency of trips to the Bay Area for client and partner meetings. This latest trip included a visit to the Nikko Hotel in San Francisco for the OMMA Social Conference, a gathering of on-line social media and marketing professionals. I was asked to be on a panel discussing my ‘favorite’ topic: “real time search”. I’ve been known to say a thing or two in the past about the topic and I loved having the opportunity to discuss it openly with a great group of panelists. Here’s a video of the whole panel if you’re interested.

My point on the panel was this:

There is no such thing as real time search.

Ooooh. “Controversial.” (Yeah, right). Truthfully, I wanted to make it clear that I felt the industry was getting all caught up in a scrum over a term and nothing was really being understood about the “situation”. And the situation is what needs to be understood fundamentally so we can effectively act on it.

I think about it all in this way…

In the days before “user generated content”, life was good. It was simple. The web was a collection of sites with content growing quickly, but consistently and all in a fairly familiar structure (think HTML, image files and text primarily). Moreover, the path to ‘discover’ these sites was perfectly tuned to progressive search algorithms of the time like Google’s Page Rank. Content ‘consumption’ amounted to ‘surfing’ the web on your terms and leveraging search results to isolate items of interest to view and ‘book mark’.

Fast forward to the mid ‘00’s and the era of blogging took off simultaneously with other user-generated forms of content such as videos, photos, etc…all utilizing growing trends to quickly share and syndicate for others to consume. The USB cable and ‘embed’ code changed it all. Faster uploads. Faster syndication. But alas, we were happy to watch idiots do stupid human tricks on YouTube. Content ‘consumption’ at this period revolved around the ‘RSS feed’ and aggregators helped us evolve past the ‘bookmark’ as it simply couldn’t effectively scale. Literally, bookmark features on browsers required search portals to find ‘that old bookmark’!

Now fast forward to today. Everyone is an author. Those that never hit the blogging bandwagon are now provided the weaponry to transcend from one side of the monitor’s glass to the other…from reader to author. The age of ‘micro blogging’ has come in strong and provided an ability to broadcast your ‘status’ to your trusted group of friends that you just sneezed, OMG! WTF! and every hashtag-driven commentary we can manufacture in 140 characters. Content consumption now is just….well it’s just too much as it comes too fast.

So back to my point of ‘there is no such thing as real time search’:

Content is content. I don’t care what form it is (text, video, photo, et al) or by whom it is created. Content is merely DATA. It is how this data is sourced, consumed and synthesized (and at what frequency) by the reader that it can have the hope of becoming relevant INFORMATION to the reader. And therein lies the major problem. The most problematic of all of this is the escalation in data being generated….the majority now of which is 140 characters of garbage.

I personally believe what is meant by marketers who invented the term ‘real time search’ is simply “the ability to search for and aggregate content spilling out of user-generated tools” (primarily twitter). In my view, you are either searching with intent to source content….or being notified in real time of ‘events’ through other forms of content(e.g. tweets, etc). The gross volume of data now requires that people REALLY do a rethink about their social graph…e.g. not being so impulsed to hit the ‘Friend’ button every time and prune those that aren’t true analog friends.

That level of restraint aside (we must assume people will be people and measure their importance by how ‘long’ their follower list is…), tools to synthesize data into information must evolve…and evolve quickly. Search systems need to embrace aspects such as scanning a trusted social graph first (like Lijit and now Google Social Search Beta as a feature of Google Search) before opening up the query to the web (and non trusted sources). Real time notification systems should take a page out of the chapter of financial institutions who have been required to synthesize minute bits of data (trades) on sub-second intervals. A re-think of this being in the browser or as a traditional thick client tool on your non-mobile devices also needs careful examination to ensure the best productivity in consuming the data without friction to your work flow.

OK, rant done. Time to tweet this article.

In case you hadn’t heard, January is a very special month. Not just because we all head back to the gym with resolutions in mind or because it’s considered the door to the year, but also because it’s the month that we celebrate oatmeal. What? You didn’t know? Let us explore the wide world of oatmeal together, as seen through the lenses of some of our publishers…

Food Loves Writing shares the recipe for the best cookies she eats, which also happen to be oatmeal chocolate-chip. If the picture doesn’t do it for you, take into consideration that she bakes a lot of cookies…and these are the best she eats. That says a lot about oatmeal. And these cookies.

Perhaps you’re in the mood for a cookie and for oatmeal, but you want something that might be a *bit* healthier than the cookie pictured above. EcoSalon has a yummy recipe for Oatmeal Harvest cookies, which substitute dried fruit for chocolate chips. So maybe you feel a little less guilty eating ten of them?

Then, there’s the Brown Eyed Baker, who eats oatmeal in the mornings, but enjoys it in a different form. She has a delicious-looking recipe for Maple-Oatmeal Scones. Although not as healthy as a bowl of oatmeal, they seem to be much shinier. And quite possibly tastier.

If you’re in Chicago, one of our publishers highly recommends going to the Protein Bar, a healthy cafe where you can get a bowl of oatmeal that tastes like a pancake. But much better for you. In my opinion, this is one Foodie Wannabe that dishes out good recommendations.

Joining in on the oatmeal party is another of our publishers, Whisk, who proudly shares an old family recipe with an awesome name…the Rickety Uncles. Seriously. But judging from the picture, these are probably much tastier than anyone’s real rickety uncles. I’m guessing.

If you’re looking to go a completely different direction in celebrating this fine food, one of our local Colorado publishers, Crunchy Domestic Goddess, has a very interesting idea: oatmeal burgers. She says that they’re a great alternative to veggie burgers and since I’ve met her in real life, I’m thinking she’s not totally crazy when she claims such things. Plus, she makes them look good.

Perhaps healthy isn’t what you’re looking for with your oatmeal. If so, might I suggest some oatmeal stout ice cream? It’s featured on one of our most favorite sites, Drink of the Week, and it looks dangerous. And while you’re over there, be careful searching for new drinks…you never know what kind of trouble you’re going to find.

And speaking of drinks, in case you were curious, this is the official drink of the month. (Unfortunately, we don’t have any beer bloggers using Lijit, but it’s a vertical that I plan to go after. Soon.)

Many thanks to our Lijit publishers, who continually teach us about new recipes and make our mouths water with their pictures. No matter what means you choose to observe National Oatmeal Month, be sure to enjoy it. And in the famous words of Wilford Brimley…

Today, I’m guest-posting over at one of our publisher’s sites, Elementary Spirits, discussing this very topic.

If you’re unsure about how to interpret some of our stats, I’m breaking it down for you over there. Check it out and if you have questions, be sure to leave a comment on Barb’s blog!

It’s no surprise that we dig what PostRank is doing with their analytics around blog engagement. They let blog publishers know how readers are interacting with blog content, from commenting to bookmarking to writing a blog post in response. This is valuable information for getting to know what your audience likes and can help you to create better content.

These kind of stats are right up our alley. In fact, we use a piece of their data to show our publishers what posts readers are especially enjoying. You can see for yourself by clicking on the ‘Readers’ tab within your Lijit stats…

So, when we heard that PostRank was coming out with a 2009 Best of Blog list, culled from the data they collect, we were excited. PostRank did all the hard work of analyzing over two billion engagement activities on twenty different social services to rank blogs in fourteen vertical categories, everything from art to religion to technology. And to keep the rankings fair, the PostRank team decided to award bloggers in three areas of accomplishment: Most Engagement, Most Influential and Biggest Movers & Shakers.

Imagine our pleasant surprise when we saw the number of Lijit publishers who were in the top spots. Nicely done folks!

If you want to see your blog on the list next year and are interested in checking out PostRank, they’ve generously offered Lijit users a special deal: one month free to see what their analytics are all about. Use the coupon code lijit109 when signing up and have fun discovering (even) more about your readers!

Although his title above is self-appointed, there are many signs that point to it being true. For instance the header on John’s blog states that the stunts he performs on a closed course should not be attempted by the home viewer. I think this has something to do with MySQL, but I could be wrong. In addition, he also claims to be the first person on earth to connect a Tcl/Tk application running on a Mac to a PostgreSQL database running on an mklinux server.

Yep. He really is that awesome.

But just in case, you need further proof, check out what John has to say when asked some hard-hitting questions.

What is your Lijit contribution?

I’m on the team that is developing the coolest business intelligence system on the planet. Right now I’m building the processes that will load the data. When it is done, Lijit will rule the universe. No really, it will.

What is your least favorite sound and why?

Gasoline engines. They just don’t have the calming rumble of a diesel. Crying is a close second.

What turns you on emotionally, spiritually or creatively and why?

Hiking in Colorado, especially near streams does it for me. Instrumental music really helps me in the creative category.

What profession, other than your own, would you like to attempt and why?

I’d like to be a professional fishing and hunting guide. Then I would know where all the secret spots are and have a great excuse to go more often.

Something you’re guilty of…

Nothing - I was acquitted, thank you. I will admit that I have no problem stealing candy from my kids’ Halloween stash, or desks of co-workers.

Now that we know that none of the candy in the office is safe, John suddenly seems much more dangerous. Or perhaps that’s just how all top-notch database architects talk?

Either way, welcome aboard John. We’re glad to have you joining us in the mission of total domination. Your help is greatly appreciated.

Our first release of 2010 is an exciting one. And we’re not just saying that because we worked extra hard on it. However, there’s nothing like a new look and new features to really kick off a new year. Check it out.

Web:

Our homepage is getting a little bit of a facelift. We want to be sure that when people come to our site, they know what we do. Crazy, I know. With this release, we’ll be doing a more effective job of explaining our value to both blog publishers and advertisers. In fact, with a simple click, you can find out why using Lijit can help both you and your blog readers.

This release also brings an enhancement to how you can build out your network within Lijit. When creating your network, you can now add the blogs of your Twitter friends and make those searchable. To see this feature in action, simply log into your Lijit account and click on ‘Network’ at the top. You’ll see a shiny, new Twitter tab. For now, this feature is an all-or-nothing add, which means that you can either add all the sites of your friends on Twitter or none.

Ads:

There is a new zone size available to the publishers using our Ad Services. This new zone size is an IAB standard 728×90 leaderboard. If you’re interested in running this size ad on your blog, simply log into your Lijit account and click on the ‘Ad Wijit’ tab to change existing zones.

Search Results:

In case thumbnail images weren’t enough bling in your search results, we’re now doing more with video thumbnails. We previously supported YouTube and Vimeo thumbnails on your Content tab, but as of today, Viddler has been added into the mix as well. And as before, you can play those videos from within your search results.

This means that if you do a search for ‘cage’ on our CEO’s blog, you’ll now see a Viddler video listed in the search results.

AND? Even cooler is that we are slowly rolling out the ability to see video thumbnails from your blog posts. If you embed videos from Youtube, Viddler, or Vimeo in your blog posts, we’ll show thumbnails for those videos in your blog search results.

Told you this was an awesome release. If you have any questions or feedback about the new stuff, feel free to leave a comment. We love hearing from our users!