CentralPark.com among Time’s coolest sites of 2006

We love it when passionate publishers succeed.

Way back in April when the blog first launched, we ran a Publisher Spotlight featuring Aric Boyles and his already outstanding web site, CentralPark.com. Well, Aric continued to enhance his site, adding quality content, new features and functionality. At Yahoo!, we were pretty pleased to see Flickr and Yahoo! Answers interactivity badges among the many additions and refinements. “I’ve found that the addition of Yahoo! content really enhances the overall user experience on my site,” Aric told us over the phone from his home New York.

Now Aric’s inventiveness and attention to detail have won the site recognition. On August 8, Time magazine announced its 50 Coolest Web Sites of 2006 and CentralPark.com was one of them. Time’s Maryanne Murray Buencher enthuses:

This comprehensive, interactive guide to one of the world’s most famous public spaces offers up-to-date information on 43 different attractions, from the Carousel to the Conservatory Garden, Strawberry Fields to the Swedish Cottage. A model of organization and design, it’s a pleasure to navigate.

We think the award is well deserved. CentralPark.com is a living case study for good publishing practices—great, original content; clever use of interactive features; attractive design and crisp layout.

Congrats, Aric.

—Willan Johnson, Vice President & General Manager, and the Team

Jeremy Shoemaker
Publisher, ShoeMoney.com
Host, Net Income on Webmaster Radio

Serendipity’s like this. One day you you’re an appliance salesman at Sears and another you’re a web-celeb making bank on the Internet and helping others do the same. Well, there’s usually a little more to it than that, but as Jeremy Shoemaker explains, it’s taking the initiative that makes the difference.
 

“Procrastination,” he says, “is a five-syllable word for fear.”

Those of you who attend conferences like Webmaster World probably know, or at least, know of, Jeremy. His boundless enthusiasm for doing successful business on the Web is infectious. In addition to his consulting firm ShoeMoney Media Group, Inc., Jeremy shares his experiences through his blog Shoemoney.com, is an editor at Threadwatch.com, a contributor to SERoundtable.com, and the host of his own radio show, Net Income, on Webmaster Radio. He’s been on both the advertising and the publishing sides of the SEM world.

I recently spoke with Jeremy from his home, the “ShoeMoneyPlex,” in Lincoln, Nebraska,  to find out how a little chance, ingenuity and know-how, combined with a lot of perseverance, translates to success.

MICHAEL MATTIS: So give me the quick low-down on ShoeMoney.com and your Webmaster Radio program, Net Income. What are your goals?

JEREMY SHOEMAKER: My goal on Shoemoney.com is to write about my experiences, with the idea that they may help others earn money online. We all have frustrations and need help from time to time, and I just started sharing some of the things I have learned with others. I do this through my radio show as well; in addition to listening to my interviews and hearing ideas, people can call in and ask me questions.

MICHAEL MATTIS: How did you get started in all this?

JEREMY SHOEMAKER: While working as an appliance salesman at Sears, a customer offered me a job at an ISP. The customer had heard I was known to have computer skills. At that time, those skills consisted mostly of playing video games. But I learned everything I could about Linux, Web server management and mail system management. Eventually I ended up doing security administration for large financial institutions. My first web site experience was with MacOsRumors.com. I hosted it and helped in finding advertisers.

MICHAEL MATTIS: How important were those job experiences for what you’re doing now?

JEREMY SHOEMAKER: Very. The MOSR experience showed me the power of the numbers. I could see the statistics and analysis. After all, that’s what Search Engine Marketing (“SEM”) is all about; the numbers and how you make them work for you. And the security administration jobs in the big banks showed me that I didn’t want to be a corporate number all my life. (Editor’s Note: We resent that last remark :-)) So I took the leap and started doing my own thing.

MICHAEL MATTIS: How do you enhance your technical skills?

JEREMY SHOEMAKER: By this time you might get the impression that I am fairly action-orientated. I find a lot of solutions just by trying to work problems out. I do have a huge library of programming language books, but I only scan them for clues. I just jump in there and start trying stuff that leads me to a solution.

MICHAEL MATTIS: How did you get started with contextual advertising?

JEREMY SHOEMAKER: My business really took off two-and-half years ago. What really got me interested me in it was that it’s basically “fire and forget.” You just fire off a simple line of code and let advertisers choose the best product to advertise on your web site based on context.

I got interested in it because it makes money. I can instantly deploy advertising on five million pages like I did it by hand. What more can I say? Contextual advertising; it’s quick; it’s easy, it makes money. Win, win, win.

MICHAEL MATTIS: If there were three things that you would tell other publishers to help them be successful, what would they be?

JEREMY SHOEMAKER: Number One: Just do it! If you have an idea, go with it. Get a site up and running. Procrastination is a five-syllable word for fear. Don’t be afraid to fail or that your site isn’t a work of art. Get it going and tweak it later. Believe me; you will learn so much stuff just by doing it.

Number Two: Don’t overplan. You can get yourself into a state of paralysis by analysis. No kidding, I get guys sending me 12-page business plans almost every day. And that’s fine, but it won’t get your site up and running. I truly believe in this business, but structure has to come after the money starts coming in.

Number Three: Prioritize Potentially Profitable Projects. Take an honest look at your ideas. Then work on the idea that has the most potential for profit. The goal here is to make money, not to be entertained. I love what I do, but the thing I love most about it is the money it makes me. I love keeping score with dollars.

—Michael Mattis, Blog Editor

David Beach
Publisher

ItsBeach.com
DieOld.org
SwedeLife.com

In his own time, David Beach uses the Web to share his enthusiasms–for new technology, music, and recently, his desire to help himself and others live better and die older.

That’s right, die older. Since February, David, one of the heavy hitters at Yahoo! Shopping in Sunnyvale, California, has blogged at DieOld.org about the daily adventure of getting into shape. His goal: to lose more than 100 pounds–and help others do the same. Since starting his program of dieting, exercise and blogging, David has shed more than 20 pounds, according to the “Die Old Tracker” featured on his site. In the process, he has also inspired countless others to take up healthier lifestyles.

“Using the medium to express myself publicly has kept me accountable to what I’m trying to do,” the Santa Cruz-based, 37-year-old father of two told me. “At the same time, it’s definitely touched a nerve with others in similar circumstances. I get lots of comments and email from supporters.”

DieOld.org is just the most recent of David’s enthusiasms. He first started blogging in 2000, although his new media blog, ItsBeach.com is only about a year old. There, David blogs about technology, the high-tech biz, and his job at Yahoo!, and keeps a daily link blog.

But music is perhaps David first and foremost enthusiasm. In a former life, David worked with Quagmire Records, a San Francisco-based label for indie and alternative music that was active in the 1990s. When the label went under, David and his musician cohorts were left with some 100 rock albums (about 1,200 songs) for which they had no way to distribute. On Swedelife.com, David offers a new mp3 song every day, for free.

The Yahoo! Publisher Network ads that appear on his sites allow David to keep publishing at minimal cost, recouping a little of the cash – and time – he spends keeping his blogs up to date. In other words, Yahoo! Publisher Network helps David promote his enthusiasms while helping “Pay the Bills.”

– Michael Mattis, Blog Editor

Making Web 2.0 more fun than a barrel of sock monkeys

Alex Welch

Darren Crystal
Co-founders
Photobucket.com

You might have heard some of this “Web. 2.0” buzz. While it’s supposed to be everywhere these days, even the technorati sometimes have a hard time coming up with a concise definition – usually they murmur something nebulous about “Web sites behaving like applications.”  According to Wikipedia, “Web 2.0 generally refers to a second generation of services available on the World Wide Web that lets people collaborate and share information online… ” Yawn!

Maybe Wikipedia should just post a link to this week’s Publisher Spotlight instead. The best way to explain Web 2.0 is by example and Photobucket is a great place to start. It’s a Web service that allows you to upload, store and publish visual digital media – such as photos and video – to any site. It’s like having your own image database, server and media publishing software without the expense or the learning curve. In fact, the image at left was uploaded, resized, stored and published using my own Photobucket account. It took about 37 seconds.

Alex Welch, 29, and Darren Crystal, 35, a pair of engineering gear heads out of the Internet backbone sector, started Photobucket back in 2003 and have spent most of the last three years fine tuning it while watching it grow exponentially. The company now boasts 35 employees and, with 15 million members and with 50 billion image requests monthly, was awarded “Fastest Growing Site” by Nielsen / Netratings in 2005.

Advertising – along with premium subscription services – is key to helping Photobucket be as successful in the boardroom as it is with its users, and Alex and Darren consider contextual advertising an important part of the company’s long-term strategy. They’ve taken advantage of our Network’s Ad Targeting ability, as well as our customer support, to implement Photobucket’s ad serving solution.

Pioneering efforts like Alex and Darren’s are transforming the Web from what for a long time seemed like a giant product brochure into a truly useful, fluid and personal new medium that promises to bring people together, help them communicate, create, collaborate and do business in new and exciting ways – and for less investment than ever before. That’s what Web 2.0 is really about, and contextual advertising is playing a major role in helping its pioneers achieve success.

I wonder what folks like Alex and Darren have in mind for Web 3.0?

Know a publisher who would make a good Spotlight? Send us your nominations. 

– Michael Mattis, Blog Editor

Philippe Daix
Publisher
HoopsVibe.com
TopSpeed.com

One of Yahoo! Publisher Network’s top revenue performers, Philippe Daix, has made a livelihood by understanding what drives sports fans. From his single account, Philippe publishes ads to two sports-related Web sites.

HoopsVibe.com, which Philippe launched with pal, Romain Rousseau, in 2001, is targeted at the basketball fanatic. Whether it’s news and rumors about pro hoops or videos of street ball action, tips on vintage-style b-ball gear or a rough-and-tumble open forum that lets fans go strong to the basket on their pet players, HoopsVibe.com’s got it. 

“I first started this publisher activity to fill my spare time,” the 33-year-old explains from his home in Miami, “then my best friend, Romain, came up with the basketball idea. He’s the basketball fan. A few years later, I decided to setup TopSpeed.com, because I am more into cars and speed.”

TopSpeed.com is to car crazies is what HoopsVibe.com is to basketball fans–a space where enthusiasts can read about racing, argue over cars, play driving games, examine auto specs, view videos of car crashes (may favorite page, I have to admit) and more, all in a media- and interaction-rich environment.

One of the things you’ll notice on both sites is the interesting mix of contextual ads. While many pages feature basketball- and automotive-specific ads, others feature ads about fitness equipment, health programs and even grooming products.

“We found out that our audience is interested in health and beauty, even though that is not the main topic of our Web sites,” Philippe explains. “Sports fans and car fans are very much into the way they look–on the playground or at the traffic light.”

Philippe uses the Ad Targeting feature to tweak the ads that appear on his pages: “The tool helped us find a compromise between ad relevance and ad revenue. We’re always testing to explore categories revolving around our content… The ultimate engine in all this is the opportunity to make a living out of it.”

Key take-aways from this successful publisher? Be passionate about what you do and, above all, know your users. 

Know a publisher in our Network that would make a good Spotlight? Maybe it’s you! Send us your nominations.  

—Michael Mattis, Blog Editor

On the frontiers of Web-based journalism and contextual advertising

Jonathan Weber
Publisher & Editor in Chief
NewWest.net

Jonathan Weber is no stranger to the Western spirit. He’s a media pioneer who doesn’t have much patience for maintaining the status quo. 

“I’ve felt for a long time that newspaper journalism in this country has gotten trapped by its own formulas and conventions,” says Weber, founder and editor-in-chief of the Rocky Mountain-focused news and info site, NewWest.net. “The big stylistic contribution of blogs has been to cut through this and write in a direct, straightforward way and invite the readers into the conversation…”

In the early days of the dot-com revolution, Weber co-founded The Industry Standard (with John Battelle), a cutting-edge print and Web publication that documented the uncanny rise of the Web as a for-real business, competing directly with pubs such as Business 2.0, Upside and Fast Company.

Unfortunately, when the boom went bust, The Industry Standard went with it. Weber, a veteran newspaper man who has written and edited for The Los Angeles Times, among many other outlets, went “back west” to Missoula, Montana, in 2002. There, he took up teaching at the University of Montana’s journalism school, settled down, got hitched, and started NewWest.net.

Read the rest of this entry »

Aric Boyles

Founder, CentralPark.com 

New York, New York

Meeting people who turn their passions into livelihoods is the best part of writing the Yahoo! Publisher Network blog. CentralPark.com founder Aric Boyles, 35, has had a love affair with New York’s Central Park for as long as he can remember. He solidified that love affair a few years back when he developed and successfully marketed the first, complete, aerial-view poster of the park. To create the poster, Aric chartered a plane to fly over Manhattan. Since then, Aric has built a print and web-based business around a very specific niche market – people who love Central Park, want to celebrate it, find out what’s happening there this weekend, and learn about its past.

“Self-service contextual advertising makes sense for our business, because it gives us the freedom to focus on what’s most important to us, the content,” Aric says. “CentralPark.com is all about the Park, and Yahoo! Publisher Network helps us with the revenue to keep it that way.”

 —Michael Mattis, Blog Editor