Digivate - More money for your blog

Internet search supremo Google will give businesses tips on how to improve their online presence at a conference next month.

Matt Brittin, the director of Google UK, will give a presentation expansively titled Keeping up with the Consumer - Ecommerce and Sales Imperatives for the Digitised World at the E Commerce Expo 2007.

He will showcase the search engine’s products, laying particular emphasis on Google Checkout, Google AdWords, Google Product Search and Google Maps.

Mr Brittin said: “Google offers businesses a variety of tools that can help them make the most of the online opportunities to drive both ecommerce and in store sales.

“From our well-established advertising platforms to our innovative Product Search and Maps products, Google’s technology helps businesses of all sizes to connect with people online.”

Justin Opie, event director at E Commerce Expo, said: “We are delighted that Google will be exhibiting and speaking at the show. Google are industry experts and will have invaluable advice to give visitors looking to improve the performance of their business’s online.”

The presentation is scheduled for Tuesday October 30th at 10am.

For information regarding online marketing click here.

Friends Provident has announced that it is to offer business tracking for all of its products.

Origo, the standards body for ecommerce in the UK financial services industry, will help to develop the automated tracking device.

It is expected to help streamline business processes, cutting time and costs by enabling advisers to monitor new business electronically.

Dave Mace, head of ecommerce at Friends Provident, said: “The key to a successful use of ecommerce is ensuring that the right data is in the right place at the right time.”

He added: “I believe the potential for the new business tracking service is huge and given time, we hope to roll it out to a number of other forward-thinking business partners in the near future.”

IFA firms Positive Solutions and Tenet Group are already using the system, with six more providers set to roll out similar tracking facilities across their product ranges in the next six to nine months.

For information on ecommerce technology click here.

Yahoo! has bought online marketing business BlueLithium for $300 million (£149.4 million).

The acquisition is the latest in a series of deals by Yahoo! as it seeks to challenge market leader Google.

Earlier this year, the search engine secured Right Media, one of the largest internet advertising exchanges, for a price tag of about £337 million.

BlueLithium, which has ten offices in the US and Europe ad a team of 135, will become a wholly-owned unit of Yahoo!

Founded in 2004, it is the second-largest advertising network in the UK, according to comScore Media Metrix.

Yahoo! chief executive Jerry Lang said: “BlueLithium’s products, technology and team will be an integral part of our drive to build the industry’s leading advertising network.”

Gurbaksh Chahal, BlueLithium’s chief executive, will remain with BlueLithium for an “interim period” of integration.

Both companies use ‘cookie technology’, small data files that create online profiles which advertisers to better tailor their online marketing strategies to the individual consumer.

For information regarding online marketing click here.