Thanks for the $100 Gift Certificate, Google ... But The Gap Is More My Style

(MoneyWatch)  As someone who has a blog on Blogger, independent of this one, that runs some spectacularly unsuccessful AdSense ads, it was nice getting a letter from my friends at Google yesterday afternoon offering me a $100 gift certificate. Well, sort of. While AdSense is the Google program for publishers that lets any publisher or blogger run search ads against his or her content, this gift certificate was for AdWords, it's advertising program.

In other words, Google, which has taken its share of (not so hard) knocks here in the Great Recession, is trying to pull in more revenue by even getting bloggers like me to try out AdWords, so that it can, "help [me] connect with prospective customers who are searching for [my] business." Awwww, how thoughtful!

The targeting -- via direct mail no less! -- is a little odd. I'd hardly qualify my site as a business, but nonetheless, perhaps this will jump-start some potential small-time advertisers into giving AdWords a try, or getting back in the game if they left it earlier in the economic crisis.

As for Google, it is seeing its version of hard times, though CEO Eric Schmidt recently said that things were getting better. In the third quarter, Google's revenue -- the vast majority of which comes from advertising -- increased by 7 percent compared to the third quarter of 2008. If that sounds good, all things are relative. While certainly a performance most would be envious of, in the third quarter of 2008, revenue increased by 31 percent.

All of which is to say, it's time to start sending out the $100 AdWords gift certificates. Me, I'd be happier if it was redeemable at The Gap.

Previous coverage of Google at BNET Media:

• More Evidence that News Corp. Would Be Nuts to Shun Google
• The Debate Between Google and its Opponents: Heart vs. Logic
• Google's Fast Flip and the Return of Serendipitous Surfing