1. Sharing a room at the Swissôtel with enjoyable Tricia Meyer from Sunshine Rewards.
2. Having dinner at Soldier Field. I almost had enough Rum Punches to dance to the 80′s cover band, Sixteen Candles.
3. Meeting GAN merchants with private programs that wouldn’t even consider working with me before.
4. Visiting with the pleasurable Dan Greene before I learned that he was such a big-wig at Google (and Navy fighter pilot). 
5. Listening to Avinash Kaushik compare web analytics to orgasms.
6. Hearing “The Father of the Internet” Vint Cerf speak about the past, present and future of technology.
7. Wishing I would have gotten Mitch Joel to autograph my copy of his book Six Pixels of Separation.
8. Hanging with old friends (even if they skipped some of the event to take a private jet golfing) and making new friends.
9. Seeing the filming of the Transformers 3 Movie in downtown Chicago.
10. Eating dinner with the ShareASale gang (gotta love Brian, Sarah, Jessica and Grandpa David) before catching my flight back to the middle of nowhere.

Looking back, there are only a few things I would have changed about the trip:

1. I would have accepted Connie’s invitation to Rock-Fest beforehand and drove to Chicago with the Schaaf brothers.
2. I would have checked my bag on the way home instead of carrying it on – TSA confiscated my goodie bag from Footsmart.
3. I would have looted more Kit Kats into my handbag from Google’s snack shelf.

But watch out Google, there’s a new search engine in town, Bing.com. And my guess is that Microsoft is hoping “bing” will be the next new verb among our lingo. How long do you predict before Bing.com is the default homepage on PC’s powered with Microsoft’s Internet Explorer? BTW, I just upgraded my IE to 8.0, and I’m not sure I’m liking it.

Back to Bing… I read Todd Crawford’s tweet…

@toddcrawford have you tried this yet? http://bing-vs-google.com/

So, of course I had to try it.  Searched my name, my business, my top keywords, yadda yadda. The results were still way better on the Google side, but Bing is still an infant, so I’ll give it some time to mature. Another similiar site is BingandGoogle.com.

The jury’s still out among the big dogs discussing whether or not Bing can dethrone Google…

CNN - Bing vs. Google: Consumers Can’t Tell a Difference (7/11/09)
Mashable – Google vs. Bing: The Blind Taste Test (6/07/09)
NY Times – Bing, the Imitator, Often Goes Google One Better (7/08/09)
PCWorld – Google, Microsoft Invade Enemy Territory: Who Wins? (7/10/09)
TechCrunch – Search Smackdown: Bing Vs. Google (6/02/09)

What you say? “Bing” it on!

I almost forgot to do a Free Shirt Friday post today!  Here it is past 5 pm on a Friday, but do any affiliate marketers really work bank hours?  So instead of actually having to get up out of my chair to go to my tote of free tshirts, I looked down to see what shirt I was wearing… an oldie, but a goodie!  I got this shirt from Google.com over a decade ago, and it has been a staple in my collection.  And I didn’t even have to get up to take this pic (note affiliate marketing makes you lazy). Yes, I know my webcam sucks at taking pics and I need a new one, but this way you can’t see all the paint splatters from my new house.

Anyhoo, I love Google.com!  I google (google is official a verb now) absolutely everything, from recipes to potential dates and everything inbetween.  I’ve been using Adwords to bring visitors to my sites and Adsense to make money on my sites for quite a few years now. And then they brought us Gmail and Google Checkout, and I have to use to them all! 

Google just unveiled Knol (short for knowledge) where you can submit articles on specific topics.  Some speculate it will over-rule Wikipedia and Mahalo (Mahalo recently declined 18 of the 19 links I submitted and Jason Calacanis wonders why I use Google over Mahalo).  I’ve already submitted two articles to Knol hoping they will rank well in Google’s natural search results.  Plus you can include your Adsense ID to get credit for the ads that surround your articles (my account is still under review, says the process can take up to 2 weeks).

I think it’s pizza time, cya!

Want to send me a t-shirt to wear on this site for free publicity to promote your website? 
Send to: Kim Rowley, Key Internet Marketing, Inc., PO Box 12, Pierce NE 68767-0012