Search Engine Marketing Firm iProspect Files Patent for Pay Per Click Advertising Bid Management Tool: iSEBA

Business Wire, July 27, 2004

WATERTOWN, Mass. -- iProspect Becomes The First And Only Full-Service Search Engine Marketing Firm With Proprietary "Global Optimizing" Keyword Bidding Agent to Drive Pay Per Click Management Service Results

iProspect(R), the Original(R) Search Engine Marketing Firm, today announced that it filed a patent on July 22, 2004 for its pay per click advertising bidding agent named iSEBA(TM) (iProspect Search Engine Bidding Agent). iProspect's internal software technology team began building the agent nearly two years ago and the firm has been successfully managing over 40 pay per click advertising campaigns for large PPC clients over the past year. iSEBA(TM) is the only global optimization, or "portfolio based," keyword bidding agent actively managing campaigns on both Google and Overture's pay per click programs that is operated by a full-service SEM firm.

"The filing of our patent is a milestone in the life of what has become a very robust professional services offering for iProspect," said iProspect CEO, Fredrick Marckini. "Many of our clients who were spending six- and even seven-figure budgets on pay per click advertising were telling us that the solutions available in the marketplace were not meeting their ROI goals. So we performed our own due diligence and determined that the most effective way to meet the needs of marketers who were managing thousands of keywords was to build a better mousetrap - and we feel that in the end, we've done just that."

True "Agent" Technology

iSEBA(TM) is a true bidding "agent" in every sense of the word - very similar in concept to the portfolio management tool offered by Efficient Frontier (formerly known as Everest) http://www.clickz.com/news/article.php/3370791. Similar to the Search Optimizer tool announced today by Overture, iSEBA(TM) also features fully-automated bidding functionality that raises and lowers bids, unattended, to meet business objectives including conversions, ROI, traffic, CPA, etc.

iSEBA(TM) manages keyword bidding campaigns "globally," optimizing at the campaign level and not on a keyword-by-keyword basis. The agent tests every keyword in a client's keyword set by position within the paid search results, by bid price, by time of day, and by day of week every hour 24/7. It then applies what it "learns" from the results to forecast bid prices and success metrics and then optimizes the client's pay per click campaign by the client's choice of objectives, including: ROI, conversions and traffic.

Offers Global Campaign Optimization

"Unlike simpler 'rules-based' bid management solutions that are available in the marketplace, our agent maximizes the performance of the entire campaign, much like it was a stock portfolio," explained iProspect Vice President of Client Services, John Tawadros. "Instead of blindly following thousands of individual keyword-by-keyword rules, it re-calculates the optimum allocation of your PPC budget across your entire set of keywords in every conceivable position every single hour, and adjusts bids and positions automatically, channeling more funds to those keywords that it predicts will produce the highest results toward your overall campaign objective."

Putting iSEBA(TM) to the test, iProspect's senior scientist presented it for peer review at the 3rd International Joint Conference on Autonomous Agents and Multi-Agent Systems held at Columbia University in New York City on July 19-23, where it was very favorably reviewed by many of the world's leading experts on agent technology.

Supported by Professional Services

"Unlike the global optimization bidding agent in the marketplace recently announced by Efficient Frontier, our technology is both cutting-edge and supported by a dedicated professional services team. Add the capabilities of iSEBA(TM) to the robust marketing services we provide our clients in selecting the best initial set of keywords, helping compose and adjust the creative for their paid search ads, and making sure their PPC efforts are enhanced by the findings generated by their natural search engine optimization and/or paid inclusion campaigns, and we feel we have a pay per click management offering that's truly unique in the marketplace," added Marckini.

Analyst References

Forrester Research analyst Charlene Li (cli@forrester.com), as well as Jupiter Research analysts Gary Stein (gstein@jupitermedia.com) and Nate Elliott (nelliott@jupitermedia.com) are available for comment on iSEBA(TM).

About iProspect

iProspect(R) is The Original(R) Search Engine Marketing Firm. The company helps many of the world's most successful brands maximize their online marketing ROI through natural search engine optimization, paid inclusion management, pay per click advertising management, Web analytics, website conversion enhancement(SM). iProspect has published three books on search engine marketing, including Achieving Top-10 Rankings in Internet Search Engines, and most recently, Search Engine Positioning. Distinguished as a 2003 Inc. 500 and Deloitte & Touche Fast 500 fastest growing company in America, iProspect is located in Watertown, Massachusetts and can be reached at 1-800-522-1152, or by visiting http://www.iprospect.com.