3 ms·

What Does $14 Million Worth of PageRank Look Like?

50 points by tortilla 17y ago

fallentimes 17y ago
Reminds me of the Polaroid acquisition: http://dealbook.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/04/06/private-equity-group-buys-polaroid-for-59-million/ http://dealbook.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/04/06/private-equity-... It was mentioned that Polaroid was one of the most recognized brands in the world and $59 million was a relative bargain. Update: See corrected link and figure ($89 million) below.
- byrneseyeview 17y ago
  Unrelated, but I think Knight's Bridge actually got them -- and for a lot more: http://www.reuters.com/article/pressRelease/idUS174749+17-Apr-2009+MW20090417 http://www.reuters.com/article/pressRelease/idUS174749+17-Ap...
  - fallentimes 17y ago
    You're absolutely right. I couldn't remember the PE group and CNN and NY Times both showed Patriarch Partners for the acquirer when I googled it.
vaksel 17y ago
thats just stupid, pagerank != brand equity, not by a long shot.
- fallentimes 17y ago
  Agreed, but the rest of the article acknowledges that.
ars 17y ago
I worked for a company that had 3 completely different websites selling electronics. The backend was the same (i.e. same products and descriptions), but the prices were different. Essentially they competed with themself. They actually got some orders on the more pricey site! And the price checkers were happy thinking they checked a few sites, and found the lower one.
- fallentimes 17y ago
  Managing the SEO/PPC for those 3 sites had to be a massive headache.
  - mikeyur 17y ago
    Yes, but that's not a 1-man job. And that company is EXTREMELY smart. It may sound stupid to compete with yourself, but what about 'owning' a google search term? Good SEO on all 3 sites may result in 3 top 10 rankings for a single product, 1 on each site. If you owned position 1, 2 and 3 - what % of that search traffic do you think you would get?
- michael_dorfman 17y ago
  This is a fairly common occurrence in the real world, too. I knew a guy whose father worked for a company that manufactured windshield wiper fluid, which was packaged and branded in three varieties: budget, midline and premium. Identical product, three different price points, and all had good sales, because they were going after different market segments. Not every sale is driven by "low price"-- in fact, in some segments, low price is a turn-off.
quizbiz 17y ago
Am I right in assuming that not much is paid to so called search engine optimization among start ups? The products and services market themselves virally(?).
- fallentimes 17y ago
  It really depends. If you're in a very competitive market (cough tickets cough) SEO is essential. Also, good SEO has made some startups. Examples: About.com, Yelp.com
- vaksel 17y ago
  just stick to basics, it doesn't take too much effort to make SEO friednly urls/titles
- mikeyur 17y ago
  You should be thinking about SEO (at least partially) with any content-driven site you launch. There is also much more to SEO than just friendly titles and URLs, but that's always a good place to start. For most startups SEO is normally handed off to anyone working on PR/Marketing/Viral efforts. A good place to start for most people would be Brad Callen's SEO Mindset e-book (http://www.seomindset.com/index2.htm http://www.seomindset.com/index2.htm) - Aaron Wall's SEO Book is a bit outdated. (Both of these can be easily found on other 'content networks' - but SEO Mindset is worth the small investment ($97) if you know nothing about SEO)
buugs 17y ago
I might be wrong in my thinking but: Isn't this a kind of a weird buy I mean everyone saw that circuit city went bankrupt and out of business it was highly public through many news outlets including headline news for many weeks doesn't that destroy a brand and make the website much less trusted?

50 points by tortilla 17y ago

Reminds me of the Polaroid acquisition: http://dealbook.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/04/06/private-equity-group-buys-polaroid-for-59-million/ http://dealbook.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/04/06/private-equity-... It was mentioned that Polaroid was one of the most recognized brands in the world and $59 million was a relative bargain. Update: See corrected link and figure ($89 million) below.

byrneseyeview 17y ago
Unrelated, but I think Knight's Bridge actually got them -- and for a lot more: http://www.reuters.com/article/pressRelease/idUS174749+17-Apr-2009+MW20090417 http://www.reuters.com/article/pressRelease/idUS174749+17-Ap...
- fallentimes 17y ago
  You're absolutely right. I couldn't remember the PE group and CNN and NY Times both showed Patriarch Partners for the acquirer when I googled it.

vaksel 17y ago

thats just stupid, pagerank != brand equity, not by a long shot.

fallentimes 17y ago
Agreed, but the rest of the article acknowledges that.

ars 17y ago

I worked for a company that had 3 completely different websites selling electronics. The backend was the same (i.e. same products and descriptions), but the prices were different. Essentially they competed with themself. They actually got some orders on the more pricey site! And the price checkers were happy thinking they checked a few sites, and found the lower one.

fallentimes 17y ago
Managing the SEO/PPC for those 3 sites had to be a massive headache.
- mikeyur 17y ago
  Yes, but that's not a 1-man job. And that company is EXTREMELY smart. It may sound stupid to compete with yourself, but what about 'owning' a google search term? Good SEO on all 3 sites may result in 3 top 10 rankings for a single product, 1 on each site. If you owned position 1, 2 and 3 - what % of that search traffic do you think you would get?
michael_dorfman 17y ago
This is a fairly common occurrence in the real world, too. I knew a guy whose father worked for a company that manufactured windshield wiper fluid, which was packaged and branded in three varieties: budget, midline and premium. Identical product, three different price points, and all had good sales, because they were going after different market segments. Not every sale is driven by "low price"-- in fact, in some segments, low price is a turn-off.

quizbiz 17y ago

Am I right in assuming that not much is paid to so called search engine optimization among start ups? The products and services market themselves virally(?).

fallentimes 17y ago
It really depends. If you're in a very competitive market (cough tickets cough) SEO is essential. Also, good SEO has made some startups. Examples: About.com, Yelp.com
vaksel 17y ago
just stick to basics, it doesn't take too much effort to make SEO friednly urls/titles
mikeyur 17y ago
You should be thinking about SEO (at least partially) with any content-driven site you launch. There is also much more to SEO than just friendly titles and URLs, but that's always a good place to start. For most startups SEO is normally handed off to anyone working on PR/Marketing/Viral efforts. A good place to start for most people would be Brad Callen's SEO Mindset e-book (http://www.seomindset.com/index2.htm http://www.seomindset.com/index2.htm) - Aaron Wall's SEO Book is a bit outdated. (Both of these can be easily found on other 'content networks' - but SEO Mindset is worth the small investment ($97) if you know nothing about SEO)

buugs 17y ago

I might be wrong in my thinking but: Isn't this a kind of a weird buy I mean everyone saw that circuit city went bankrupt and out of business it was highly public through many news outlets including headline news for many weeks doesn't that destroy a brand and make the website much less trusted?