YouTube to Offer Sponsored Videos

YouTube on Wednesday said it's rolling out a new ad platform called Sponsored Videos. Videos of Ann Arbor homes for sale and neighborhood tours have become very popular and Google will no doubt attract a lot of real estate agent ad spending.

According to YouTube, which held a press conference at its headquarters, Sponsored Videos lets users promote their videos by bidding on keywords.

Here's how it works: First, YouTube users, whether individuals or corporations, decide which of the videos they've uploaded they want to promote through site search.

Google, YouTube's parent company, has created automated tools that help users place bids for the keywords in an automated online auction, as well as set spending budgets.

Wouldn't creating an Adsense-like offering on YouTube have been one of the first things Google did after purchasing YouTube for $1.65 billion two years ago? As one reporter asked YouTube executives: "Wasn't this a no-brainer?"

It's not as easy as it looks, according to Matthew Liu, a YouTube product manager. There are a lot of intricacies involved. We've been integrating with Google AdWords for some time, and now we're at a place where it can be win and win." Sponsored Videos, labeled as such when they appear following a keyword search, are priced on a cost-per-click basis.

So how much could this be worth to Google? It's hard to say, at this point, whether Sponsored Videos will be the answer to YouTube's revenue problems, but consider that the site recently surpassed Yahoo to become the No. 2 Web search provider, behind Google.

For the whole story - source: Cnet.com

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Keeping track of what you read

Here is an excellent post on a way of keeping track of what you read, storing good ideas for later retrieval. Google spreadsheets and Microsoft spreadsheets can work great for managing your business and your life!

Also mentioned in the comments is an idea of starting a blog and making a quick post to keep track of a good idea or website/information source. With Blogger you can set your preferences to private and it can be for your eyes only.

As a Realtor, taking this one step further, it would be pretty easy to start a blog for each listing client and set up an rss feed - so every time you post an update they would be notified.

At Piperpartners.com we are using Google spreadsheets and Google calendars pretty extensively to manage our Ann Arbor real estate business. The best thing about them is that you can share them with your team members and you can access them from anywhere.

The options are endless.
I am curious what you are using to track your business and keep track of things. What is working for you?