If you’re thinking a blog is too much work for your marketing efforts, check this out…. More than 8 of 10 business journalists (84%) say they have used or would use blogs as primary or secondary sources for articles.

This from the 2007 Arketi Web Watch Survey: Inside B-to-B Media Usage of Web 2.0

• One-quarter (25%) said blogs make their job easier
• 18% said instant messaging makes their job easier.
• 97% said they enjoy using new technologies
• 30% said they use some type of instant messenger for professional communication.
• 60% of journalists said they spend more than 20 hours a week on the internet.

Hat tip to Lee Oden for the Twitter.

Since my blog has a mix of SEM and non SEM posts, and I still want to post the Sphinn plug in button on them, I did a quick mod that only shows the “Sphinn It” button in the case where you’ve put the tag “Sphinn” in your Wordpress 2.3+ tags list. Feedback welcome. Bold text is new code.

function io_sphinn_it_filter($content)
{
global $wpdb;

$sphinnfound=false;

$targettag = “Sphinn”;
$posttags = get_the_tags();
if ($posttags) {
foreach($posttags as $tag) {
if ($sphinnfound=stristr($tag->name,$targettag)){
break;
}
}
}

if ($sphinnfound){

// generate $sphinn_it_html based on …
echo ‘<script type=”text/javascript”>submit_url = \”.get_permalink().’\';</script>’;
echo ‘<div align=”right”>’;
echo ‘<script type=”text/javascript” src=”http://sphinn.com/evb/button.php”></script>’;
echo ‘</div>’;
// new content will be added after each post
$content = $content . $io_sphinn_it_html ;
return $content;
}
return($content);
}

If you have an improvement, feel free to shoot ‘em over.

Remember, you have to put “Sphinn” in your post Tags before the button will display.

On my pay per click campaign summary I see this:

I’m not sure but this seems like the first time they’ve made specific traffic increase predictions. Here, they point out

Daily budget of $100.00 met on 13 of the last 15 days. Increasing your budget to the recommended amount would allow your ads to show 118% more often and get approximately 784 more clicks per month.

Yeah, more traffic. But is it the right kind of traffic? Only a watchful eye can tell that. Sadly, many amateur PPC marketers will just go with the recommendation without thinking.

The Logo From Google India - I’d never seen this before.

I’d only seen this one after finding it on pulse2.0

Yet another expansion on Google Transit.

Yesterday, they moved Japan to the top, so we knew something was up.

This complements Vancouver’s existing NextBus Info and Trip Planner services.

“….TransLink, the Greater Vancouver Transportation Authority, is a small organization involved with transportation planning, administration of service contracts with subsidiary companies and contractors, the management of capital projects, financial management and planning, public affairs and supporting business functions. …”

They are having a celebration, and here’s the invitation.

image: wikimedia public domain

The Sacramento Regional Transit District (RT) operates 97 bus routes and 36.87 miles of light rail covering a 418 square-mile service area. Buses and light rail run 365 days a year using 76 light rail vehicles, 254 buses powered by compressed natural gas (CNG) and 17 shuttle vans. Riders can now use Google Transit to plan their mass transit routes.

While the SRTD already had a route planning system, Google Transit offers directions on Google Maps, making for a very simple way to get around.

....Annual ridership has steadily increased on both the bus and light rail systems from 14 million passengers in 1987 to more than 30 million passengers in FY 2005. Weekday light rail ridership averages about 43,600, which accounts for approximately 40% of the total system ridership. Bus weekday ridership has reached an average of 67,000 passengers per day…..

See also the Friends of the Light Rail and Transit site.