I’m happy to report that SilverDisc won the bidding for Nick Park’s Austin A35 van on eBay on Saturday, with all proceeds being donated to the Wallace and Gromit’s Children’s Foundation. According to Nick Park, Oscar-winning creator of Wallace and Gromit:

I’ve always been a fan of Austins and this particular vehicle inspired me to come up with the Anti-Pesto van that was central to the plot and rehabilitation of the vegetable eating ‘pests’ in Curse of the Were-Rabbit. The van needed to be big enough to transport Wallace’s invention the Bunvac 2000 while at the same time slick enough to go on high speed chases after the formidable Were-Rabbit, and the Austin was a perfect match.

We’re very happy to be supporting the Wallace and Gromit’s Children’s Foundation with our purchase of this inspirational piece of movie memorabilia. We have some big plans for the van, which we’ll let you know about over the coming days and weeks on this blog.

Poor old Ming Campbell. Literally, “old” Ming Campbell has resigned/been ousted from the leadership of the Liberal Democrats, the UK’s third political party, because he is too old at 66. Supposedly, in this News 24 society, you need to be young, dynamic and good looking in order to attract votes and one of his likely successors is said to be telegenic enough to fit the bill.

Telegenic. What a horrible word, a real cut and shut job (photogenic and television, but the result should mean “produced at a distance”, not “looks good on television”). But it got me thinking … the phrase “search engine friendly” has always seemed so clumsy. So what about “robogenic” as a one-word equivalent, meaning “search engine friendly”, or “looks good to a robot”.

robogenic

search engine friendly; looks good to a robot

I like it. Unfortunately, robogenic should literally mean “Produced by a robot”, in the same way as photogenic literally means “Produced by light”. Ah, so what? I still like it.

OK, sorry for the slightly misleading headline (although if you read on you’ll find it’s not that misleading). No apologies, though, for giving my opinion on what is now old news, which is that Google has dropped Best Practice Funding for agencies from 2009 onwards. Don’t ever expect this blog to be first with the news … there are others in the industry who are devoted to that. What you can expect here is considered, truthful opinion and, hopefully, an insight that you won’t find anywhere else.

There’s plenty of comment around about the fact that BPF was not a subsidy, was not a commission and was not, in fact, related to any individual advertiser but rather to the net billings of the whole agency. Personally, I think it’s great the playing field is levelled, but I’m still not looking forward to having to renegotiate rates with clients. Any agency that doesn’t have to renegotiate was either not receiving BPF or was charging too much in the first place, and SilverDisc does not fit either of those two categories, I’m happy to say.

What’s missing is comment on what BPF actually is, and what its withdrawal therefore signifies.

Probably the best document that describes what Best Practice Funding is, if you’re prepared to read between the lines, is the 2007 - Best Practice Funding Terms And Conditions. This lists several conditions that an agency must meet in order to fully qualify for BPF. Those conditions include:

1. the fact that the agency, rather than the agency’s customer, must communicate with Google
2. the fact that the agency is responsible for Google being paid its invoices on time

I can’t help feeling that Google is massively undervaluing the role of agencies in providing these services. Their support role, in both account management and invoicing, will grow enormously in 2009. I hope that Google uses the time between now and then to grow its infrastructure accordingly.

Another requirement on agencies to qualify for BPF is that they employ at least two GAP-qualified staff. This is where my slightly misleading headline actually has a ring of truth. The GAP exam has been the best tool for building and maintaining an understanding of Adwords. I’ve passed it myself and, before Christmas, I’m due to renew my qualification. All my PPC management staff and PPC programming staff (we write PPC API apps to manage our clients’ spends) have passed the GAP exam too and, again, are due to renew before Christmas.

I always thought that the Google’s encouragement of agency staff being GAP-qualified was of great benefit to Google, the agencies, and the industry as a whole. In dropping BPF, I think Google are sending a poor message - in, literally, stopping funding best practices, they are stopping supporting best practices.

Rarely does Google give such a public ringing endorsement for a third party as this, on the official Google Analytics blog:

Your next coffee table e-book

Can I look forward to a link drop to SilverDisc here or here?