Microsoft have confirmed that Windows 8 will have an App store, but details are yet to be supplied.

It’s safe to assume that Microsoft are attracted to some aspects of Apple’s model, but until further details are released, it’s impossible to say how far they are prepared to go.

But imagine the following.

Imagine a store where you can buy and install software for your Windows PC with one click. Without multi-level installations with rebooting, without having to decide how and where to install an application, without having to make decisions before the software has even been installed.

A store that will be linked to your email address, allowing you to instantly redownload and install your software when your PC is replaced.

There’s no way of knowing whether Microsoft have the means or desire to setup such a system, but they’re likely to be at least considering it.

If the above scenario were to become reality, how long would it take your company to get your software in the store? And how long would it take your users to realise the advantages of the new model?

How long would it take your sales model to change?

Change is never linear though, especially when other parties have the potential for great loss or gain.

Consider Apple’s App Store. Finding a product by name is simple, if a little awkward. Finding an application by feature, however, is poorly-implemented and surprisingly clumsy.

I suspect it won’t take Google long to adapt to the opportunity, and I’m expecting to see their side nav offering Apps under Everything within the next few months.

Great change may lie ahead for the software industry.

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We already know what makes a person attractive: symmetry and (apparently) a resemblance to our parents. The latter is disturbing beyond words.

But what makes a website attractive?

Probably not symmetry, and certainly nothing to do with our parents.

Colour? Use of space? Eye-catching graphics? Clarity? A picture of a grinning model wearing a headset?

Probably a combination of most of the above.

The real question, however, is whether it matters.

Bafflingly, a large number of companies prioritise the appearance of their website over how well it functions.

Question: When did wowing your visitors become more important than engaging with them?

From a marketing perspective, the answer to what makes a website attractive is how well it performs.

Listen to your data.

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Google have always maintained a strict separation between their paid ads and organic listings, yet I believe that this has now changed. At least in terms of strategy.

In the early days of AdWords, Google’s model wasn’t that different from that of GoTo. Essentially you paid for ad position: the higher the bid, the higher the placement.

But Google soon realised that this model was flawed, as it effectively diluted the quality of their search results with poorly-targeted ads. Some of their advertisers had different agendas, poor skills and/or larger budgets, but none were as committed to the quality of the results as Google.

And so along came Quality Score – the AdWords equivalent of PageRank: over-hyped, misunderstood and often mistakenly interpreted as either the holy grail or irrelevant.

Stage 3 in the evolution of AdWords saw Google placing a far greater importance on the landing page.

This was a critical turning point, as before this you could directly ramp-up the number of AdWords visitors by spending more, irrespective of the quality of your website.

The same principle still applies, but if Google deem landing pages to be low quality, advertisers soon realise that to have any impact on their position and clicks, they’re going to have to spend a great deal more. Increasing volume becomes exponentially more costly.

So let’s take a step back.

Effective SEO requires on-site optimisation, external optimisation and a hint of black magic.

Effective AdWords management now requires the need to optimise the website, a healthy budget and a pinch of voodoo.

Both require website optimisation. And dabbling in the occult helps.

Ads and organic listings are not only starting to look like each, the optimisation process is moving ever-closer too.

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Most businesses choose to take advantage of the persuasive powers of numbers at some point, but a recent post on Google’s Inside AdWords left me less than impressed:

“Advertisers often wonder whether search ads cannibalize their organic traffic. If search ads were paused, would clicks on organic results increase and make up for the loss in paid traffic? Google statisticians recently ran over 400 studies on paused accounts to answer this question… 

On average, the incremental ad clicks (IAC) percentage across verticals is 89%. This means that a full 89% of the traffic generated by search ads is not replaced by organic clicks when ads are paused. This number was consistently high across verticals.”

My favourite quote comes at the end of the Search Ads Pause video:

“When search advertising is turned off, some advertisers assume that organic clicks might make up for many of the lost paid clicks. For most advertisers, the study shows dramatically different results.”

To describe the study as flawed is an understatement.

A single page on a website might rank well for two or three keywords in the organic results, but could target hundreds of pages in AdWords.

And most keywords will have a number of competing AdWords bids, so disabling your ads will most likely lead to your competition receiving those clicks instead.

If, hypothetically, a company’s keyword bids all had no competition, and they also ranked highly for the same keywords in the organic listings, then switching off their ads might make sense.

The whole thing is quite frankly bizarre.

The results achieved by Google AdWords speak for themselves. Why would Google resort to such cheap and flawed propaganda?

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As you read this, your AdWords stats from last week or the week before may have changed since you last looked at them.

No, this isn’t some form of AdWords trickery. It has to do with a little known fact that recorded conversions are applied to the date of the ad click, and not the date of the conversion.

So if you were to look at your stats from last week today, and then check on the same date range tomorrow, you might see a different number of conversions.

Data older than 30 days should be stable, as conversions can only be tracked within 30 days of the ad click. So if, for example, someone were to click on one of your ads then purchase 31 days later, the conversion would not be recorded, as this would be beyond the 30 day tracking period.

The bottom line is that yesterday’s conversions may be better tomorrow than today.

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I used to be strongly opposed to using Google Analytics and AdWords together, but I used to be skinny and muscular too. Things change.

My single issue with using Analytics was that it wasn’t free. You paid for the use of Google’s software by supplying them with your data.

If you’re aware of this, and decide that the price you’re paying is worthwhile, then everyone’s happy.

But as is often the case with Google, most users of Analytics aren’t aware of what they’re paying – or even that they’re paying at all.

That said, let’s not overlook the main point. That Google Analytics today is useful and powerful enough to be worth paying for.

So back to the question: can you use AdWords without Analytics?

It’s critical that you use something to analyse what your visitors are doing, as the information that Google give you within your AdWords account isn’t enough.

Imagine you have a daily budget of $500, and are consistantly producing a 15% CTR to use all of your budget each day. Good.

Now imagine that 98% of the people clicking your ads leave your website within three seconds of clicking your ad. Not so good.

You need something to show you what’s happening on the other side of your AdWords data. And unfortunately there aren’t that many options out there.

ClickTracks was our tool of choice for many years, but their support and product development…. let’s say could be improved.

Before our company made the transition from ClickTracks to Analytics, we looked at all the options. Incredibly I wasn’t able to find a single viable contender.

Perhaps not surprising when you consider trying to compete with an ostensibly free server-based enterprise-quality application.

Ultimately you’re stuck with Google Analytics whether you like it or not. But we can at least take some consolation in that it’s a very fine piece of software; even if it’s not free.

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