Gasta online sales 50% rise

Gasta online sales of advertising rose in the last quarter despite the doom and gloom initiated by the credit crunch, according to the BBC overall online sales rose by 50% . This is good news for the technology sector and the online advertising community, Gasta will continue to offer the most cost effective internet campiagns to SME's.

UK online sales rose by more than 50% in the three months to Christmas, according to an industry survey.

Internet sales between 1 October and 31 December hit £15.2bn, up from £9.61bn a year earlier, with electronics and clothing doing well, Capgemini said.

Firms with both a High Street and online presence, such as John Lewis, did best, the survey said.

For every pound spent on goods in 2007, 15 pence was spent online, pushing annual electronic sales to £30.2bn.

In 2006, for every pound spent on retail goods, the internet spend had been 10 pence.

Discounting

"There can be no doubt [that] online is growing its share at the expense of bricks and mortar retailers and we believe this trend will continue," said Anthoula Madden, vice president at Capgemini's consumer products and retail division.

Online shopping peaked during the first week in December, with sales rising 9% year-on-year.

However, in previous years the busiest period had been earlier, signalling that consumers were delaying spending, to take advantage of discounting before Christmas.

Retailers have painted a mixed picture of results covering the crucial Christmas period, but several firms have highlighted the strength of their online sales.

In its latest trading update, music shop HMV said its bookstore chain Waterstones saw internet sales double in the five weeks to 5 January.

Argos, which is owned by Home Retail Group, said internet orders increased by a third in the 18 weeks to 5 January, representing nearly a quarter of all sales at its Argos stores.

The firm said its online reservation system for collection in store proved particularly popular.

Tesco said its online businesses had a "very successful" Christmas, in the six weeks to 5 January, with strong demand for MP3 players, digital cameras and laptops sending total sales 24% higher.

Even Marks & Spencer, though seeing its worst Christmas sales for more than two years, saw internet sales surge 78% in the last three months of 2007, year-on-year.

Gasta & Mobile web support tools.

If you have seen our previous posts about the potential of a Gasta Phone then read on and see its not so pie in the sky!

Gasta& Mobile web support tools.

Yahoo chief Jerry Yang has revealed the firms future ambitions for an open and mobile web.

Central to the company's aims is allowing third party software developers to create small applications which can run in Yahoo portals.

The first Yahoo platform to allow these widgets, as they are known, will be Go 3.0, developed for mobile phones.

The search firm showed off applications that allow people to check MySpace, eBay and MTV on the go.

"Bringing a rich web experience to mobile devices is not an easy task," said Mr Yang.

"There are literally billions of mobile users, thousands of different devices and hundreds of different carriers.

"The challenge is to create a simple starting point for all of them."

Mobile browser

Yahoo Go is a suite of downloadable tools that allow people to carry out every day internet tasks on a mobile phone.

Software allows people to search the net, send emails, upload photos, download maps and receive news updates.

In previous versions, users have been limited to browsing and using Yahoo content.

The latest edition will do away with that and allow third party developers to create widgets that will suck content from other areas of the net.

"We're opening up all of Yahoo Go to the world, meaning every publisher and developer small or large will be able to develop mobile," said Marco Boerries of the firm.

"Consumers will be able to find those, discover those and subscribe to those very easily."

The model is very similar to that used by other sites such as Facebook which also allows software developers to create widgets for the social networking site.

Go 3.0 will initially be available to download on to 30 devices, although it can be run on other phones through a mobile browser.

The firm said it was working with mobile phone manufacturers such as Motorola and LG to preload the suite of tools.

Smart search

Mr Yang also showed off a prototype smart inbox for Yahoo mail.

Yahoo mail is a web based email and messaging program that has more than 250 million users worldwide.

"This is not a launch - it is more of a concept demonstration," he said.

The prototype allowed users to import contacts from social networking sites such as MySpace.

The inbox would automatically prioritise messages from people that the inbox owner regularly communicated with across all of the networks.

Other tools allowed a user to drag a message on to a map tool to see quickly the location of places linked in the body of the message.

Mr Yang showed off an example of a message that contained a link to a restaurant.

Dragging the message on to the map brought up its location, reviews, photographs and also whether the restaurant was compatible with a person's stored dietary preferences.

Coming soon

Other tools imported labels, known as tags, from the popular photo-sharing site Flickr and displayed them on a map.

The size of the font indicated the number of times a particular landmark had been photographed and tagged, and therefore its popularity.

Other tools would cross reference a person's preferences with the food on offer at the restaurant and if not compatible would suggest other eateries in the area.

"It's taking advantage of the social networks, it's taking advantage of connections, it's taking advantage of large blocks of structured data, it's taking advantage of a lot of tags that have been submitted by our users to offer a fairly seamless experience," said Mr Yang.

"These are the things I think we can be doing more of."

Yahoo co-founder David Filo added: "The good news is that we're not that far away from market. In the coming months you'll be hearing a lot more about Yahoo open platforms."

The technologies were showed off at the Consumer Electronics Show (CES) in Las Vegas.

Gasta what is Digg?

The new Gasta web.20 services are designed to compliment services like Digg to enable users to share content and recommend 'stuff' to each other, the only diference between gasta's new services and Digg is that Gasta offers everything on the one page right before your eyes.

This is what Digg is all about.

Digg is a place for people to discover and share content from anywhere on the web. From the biggest online destinations to the most obscure blog, Digg surfaces the best stuff as voted on by our users. You won’t find editors at Digg — we’re here to provide a place where people can collectively determine the value of content and we’re changing the way people consume information online.

How do we do this? Everything on Digg — from news to videos to images to Podcasts — is submitted by our community (that would be you). Once something is submitted, other people see it and Digg what they like best. If your submission rocks and receives enough Diggs, it is promoted to the front page for the millions of our visitors to see.

And it doesn’t stop there. Because Digg is all about sharing and discovery, there’s a conversation that happens around the content. We’re here to promote that conversation and provide tools for our community to discuss the topics that they’re passionate about. By looking at information through the lens of the collective community on Digg, you’ll always find something interesting and unique. We’re committed to giving every piece of content on the web an equal shot at being the next big thing.

Gasta Wins Belfast Top 50 Business Awards

Gasta and E4's big brother

This time big brother is disappointing, many gasta users and blogers have voiced concerns about the lack of humour and the silly celebrities who guest on the show as big brother stand-ins.

However, as recently quoted in New Media Alert, E4 is positioning itself as a multi-platform channel with the unveiling of new mobile and internet sites. It also plans to be the first of 4Radio's crop of digital radio stations. The digital platforms have been in development for nine months and launched to coincide with the new series of Skins and Big Brother Celebrity Hijack. The sites have been positioned to tie in closely with social networks as E4 aims to capture its target audience of under-35-year-olds.

Gasta wows Derry City

Gasta.com has requested beta testers on its new mutimedia search network to iron out any gliches before the official launch in Febuary 2008, the feedback from Magee University and private users has been a massive endorsement of the new service, Comments have ranged from "This is how to show videos" and " This thing is Opium for video lovers". Gasta.com commercial director Francis Higgins says he is "over the moon" at the response, "we have had a good response on a beta pre launch before but nothing like this". It seems gasta is on to another winning service.

Gasta :Belfast based search network

Gasta Search Network is taking Belfast by storm, In Belfast city with five university campus,
gasta.com and the gasta video network is proving very popular with students and pupils all over Northern Ireland and beyond. Gasta video and bookmarking systems are simple and fun to use, you can store your videos, images, and news items with the simple click of a mouse. check out the development on http://www.mysearchmachine.com/
and let us know what you think!

Gasta what is InstantAds™?

InstantAds™ allow you to create an ad campaign that appears in our side panel across all the Gasta Domains. Your adverts have no limit to the number of impressions during your campaign.

Create your advert, add your keywords, and publish. Gasta InstantAds™ is based on the age old adage of K.I.S.S

Gasta News : VideoEgg

VideoEgg, the video advertising network, today announced a further three media partnerships.

The deals include music social network Imeem, video sharing site Metacafe and entertainment site Buzznet, which will now be added to VideoEgg's network of over 200 sites, which includes Bebo and Hi5.

VideoEgg is capable of running Flash video ads in any online environment.

"These sites are the new MTVs," said CEO Matt Sanchez. "Brands need to find innovative ways

.... to get video in front of young consumers who aren't sitting in front of the TV.

Gasta continues to see growth and convergence in the search and search marketing sectors

This is a really interesting Snippet from the NMA Daily Alert

Credit Article :Comment - Cooper on search

Gasta continues to see growth and convergence in the search and search marketing sectors as the article below concludes.

The fight to be the number one UK search specialist is frantic, with all players - not just Latitude and The Search Works - claiming top spot. Meaning making the headlines is increasingly important.

Over the Christmas period the sector was left thinking about Latitude's ambiguous deal - one that is as similarly blurry as the BigMouthMedia/Global Media deal a year before - but the start of the year saw TradeDoubler's announcement once again make IMW front of mind.

So, the frantic race continues, and it won't stop with Latitude and IMW. A year of consolidation in 2007 saw deals involving companies such as Spannerworks, Green Cathedral and 24/7 Real Media, all of which now have extra cash to fuel their race.

Interestingly, that only leaves a handful of search-specific agencies still playing the courting game - or not, as they insist.

Of those, arguably Greenlight is the most high-profile. Despite the fact that CEO Warren Cowan is adamant the agency's not for sale, key wins and good work for clients including HMV, Handbag and Monarch Airlines as well as expanding UK and US offices surely makes them an attractive prospect.

And why shouldn't they sell/merge/whatever? Search is still the fastest growing digital sector, with the trade press very much obsessed with Google, Yahoo!, Microsoft - yes, IMW, at £56m, went for less than anticipated - but there are still plenty of investors out there with very deep pockets.

What is the Gasta SEM Zone

This zone is dedicated to bringing all our marketing tools under one roof. From here you can add InstantAds, SearchMatch, SearchMatch+ and Banner Campaigns.

What is better you can edit you ad during its life cycle. At no extra cost. Once you advert is approved the first time you then take control and can modify your ad when you like.

We want you to feel in control of your ad campaigns.

Gasta in the Sunday Times

Gasta.com received the best response ever to its Sunday Times ad campaign, The response was phenomenal, Print advertising is not dead yet!

Gasta: How do I open an account on SearchMatch

You can open an account on SearchMatch™
or text based InstantAds™
Simply sign up using the link at the top of the page. You will be asked to create an account; this can be done very quickly by filling in the online form page. Once you have created your password and user name you can once again select keyword and check for availability or you can purchase the keywords you have already selected. It's that simple! Secure payment processing is handled through Worldpay. For bulk purchases contact of our account managers directly.

What is Gasta SearchMatch™

Gasta Keyword SearchMatch™ offers you the opportunity to exclusively purchase a keyword or keyword phrase for up to 1 year. Be seen by millions ofweb users per month. Best of all you can control and modify your advert during the lifetime of its campaign in the Gasta SEM Zone.

Every time someone searches using your keyword your site will come up in the number 1 prime position.

You can even add an image to your listing.

SearchMatch™ makes it easy for you to achieve number 1 rank and you don't even have to wait as your site will be listed automatically. SearchMatch allows you to purchase a keyword or phrase with the Gasta Search Network. When a user searches for your term you will be listed as the first result.

We help you reach you target audience using our geo-targeting system.

You can revise your ad text and links and any time.

Gasta Mural Artists Feature in Liverpool

Two Of the Belfast Artists who participated in the Recreation of Picasso's Guernica sponsored by Gasta.com have been complimented by Irish Premier Bertie Ahern, The artists have been drafted in by the Liverpool European City of Culture Mural group and will complete murals of the Beatles and of other figures and events in Liverpools glorious history read the official blog to learn more. http://theliverpoolmuralproject.blogspot.com/


"Both Danny Devenny and Mark Ervine are highly respected artists in their field and I as Taoiseach wish this project which will see non-political murals showcasing "Both Danny Devenny and Mark Ervine are highly respected artists in their field and I as TaoiseachLiverpool's cultural and historical past for Liverpool's 2008 European Capital of Culture year every success. I also believe that this project is a wonderful opportunity to show how the peace process can bring together people from all the communities in Northern Ireland. I would like to commend you on your initiative and wish your project every success".
The Prime Minister (Taoiseach) of The Republic of Ireland, Bertie Ahern

Gasta attends NI digital Content Strategy

Gasta.com were today invited to join the launch of Northern Ireland's Digital Content Strategy, and it would not be giving the game away to say that it is a splendid tailored solution, not much discussion about search, and no show from Nigel Dodds (OBE, MP, MLA) but Gasta attendees did meet up with some old college buddies and had a bit of 'craic'

Anyway, the strategy document sub headed 'Building the Foundations' is really good, it starts from the basis that companies are working in 'splendid isolation' and "proposes a focused agenda and a framework for Collaboration" Market share and the role of Government are handled well, with the emphasis on the role of lead organisations in a European perspective to 'Internationalise the potential' ( Is this were gasta comes in? after all gasta.com is an international search engine, but you know what they say about prophets!) However, lets get back on track the aim is " A vibrant and successful digital content industry that is entrepreneurial, innovative, and globally focused, encouraging collaboration and attracting inward investment" by 2011, woa! hang on that's 3 years! when some of us 'old hands' were contemplating a starting a search engine to rival Yahoo back in 1996 we did not wait 3 years, Gasta was launched in its primitive form in 1997 the same year as google.(cry now) Gasta has never received any government assistance but has made use of the excellent PWC Intellectual property and business planning course and has heard all this before in the D.R.E.A.M project in 2001 (Can't even remember what that acronym is for now, goes something like Digital Reality Entertainment And Management). Basically the strategy document is sound , a lot of hard work and research has went into it with loads of stats and the favoured euroterm 'benchmarking' and comparison, hopefully with the proper support and management of Invest NI and the other lead groups some sort of dynamic infrastructure will emerge, disappointed at the no show from Universities and UTV, maybe they will be at the belfastmedia.com launch on Friday 1st Febuary at the Whitefort Inn.
you heard it here first. uh how many times did we mention Gasta?

Gasta Keywords

Gasta targeted keywords are the most simple and cost effective way of advertising on the web, there are great opportunities to be had by Internet marketers and advertising agencies, purchasing and reselling Gasta keywords. For individuals and SMEs the gasta search network provides an ideal solution to managing your advertising campaigns nomatter how big or small your budget. If you carry out a search on one of the major search engines try putting the keyword Gasta in front of your keyword and see what happens to the search volume, up to 37% higher return per search term value. This is of course not the case in all keywords but in most generic cases the result is a sharp rise, the question then arises of how can we make it even better! how can we get the results to focus more on your pages on your products, to index what you want? the answer is simple SearchMatch.

Gasta Advertising: Keyword 'respect'

It used to be that happiness was what advertising was all about, while marketing is all about presence, subliminal presence or in your face promotion, put your sign where the masses of people are: or better still where the masses will be, that could be downtown, on tv, or on the web anywhere were people go to do business. Now in the modern world with so much in your face advertising and the pressure to buy so great a new form of advertising dynamic is emerging, advertising now has to mean respect . Respect for the consumer and respect for the brand, sure there is some smooth talking to be done, some marketing with Jazz', but RESPECT is now the main thing, if people don't get respect they don't buy it, simple as that.!

Gasta Africa

Why launch in Africa? simple Africa is one of the fastest growing developmental areas of the future, with one of the youngest populations on earth. Gasta has launched very successfully in China, Japan, India, and Europe working with local content creators and web agencies, so why not Africa? The economic growth in Africa is strong reporting a 130% growth rate in 2007, English language is strong, and emerging market investment is pouring in creating opportunities in all areas of commerce and trade. Gasta has a presence in Africa and has aligned itself with great dynamic partners in the fields of technology and education.