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Yahoo & Google Testing Pay-Per-Call Ads

Posted by Zonk on Fri Dec 02, 2005 07:37 PM
from the do-i-get-money dept.
Google Yahoo! Communications The Almighty Buck
khundeck writes "'Internet giants Google Inc. and Yahoo Inc. are testing a new form of online advertising that encourages people to pick up the phone rather than click on a link, lending credibility to the 'pay-per-call' ad model.'" From the article: "Google is testing a variant in which users click on a phone icon and type their number into a box. Google then dials the user, who hears ringing until the merchant answers. Google says the service is free for callers even on long-distance calls, and it promises not to divulge the caller's number to anyone."
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  • I'm on Dial up you insensitive clod! (Score:3, Interesting)

    by DoninIN (115418) <middendorf@mad.scientist.com> on Friday December 02 2005, @07:43PM (#14170767) Homepage
    Wait, this isn't a poll? I actually like this idea, when I'm at work looking for something in a hurry I use google to find a vendor that can solve a problem immediately, and that means getting someone on the phone who can A: Help me B: Tell me right away that they can't help me so I can resume my search C: Give me some idea if there's someone out there who can help me

  • Hmm... (Score:5, Insightful)

    by Bun (34387) on Friday December 02 2005, @07:44PM (#14170773)
    Google says the service is free for callers even on long-distance calls, and it promises not to divulge the caller's number to anyone.

    That seems pretty empty to me. They will still have the information. If they promised to not keep a record of the caller's number, I'd feel better about it.

    • Re:Hmm... (Score:2, Interesting)

      by Alef (605149)
      Google are getting more and more types of information every day it seems. For now, they don't really have any incentive to do bad things with it, since it would destroy their not-evil-image, but if Google one day turns to the dark side it will make one hor

    • They DO delete your number... (Score:5, Informative)

      by KingSkippus (799657) * on Friday December 02 2005, @08:22PM (#14171030) Homepage Journal

      From Google's FAQ [google.com] about the service:

      When you're connected with the advertiser, your number is blocked so the advertiser can't see it. In addition, we'll delete the number from our servers after a short period of time.

      I guess you could always argue that a "short period of time" isn't good enough, or simply choose not to believe Google, but that statement is a heck of a lot better than you'd get from anyone else, I think.

      Google has a good reputation; call me gullible, but given their history, I'm willing to believe that they're doing this to make revenue from the advertisers, not from selling your personal information.

      [ Parent ]

  • Who says I have to use my own number? (Score:5, Insightful)

    by canadiangoose (606308) <djgraham@@@gmail...com> on Friday December 02 2005, @07:44PM (#14170780)
    Sounds like a great way to prank-call someone at all hours of the day. Heck, you could even prank-call people from your desk at work all without picking up the phone.
    • That's a great idea!! Oh wait, I remember now, I'm not five years old.
      Cruel idea reserved for crazy women and competitors.
    • Sounds like a great way to prank-call someone at all hours of the day. Heck, you could even prank-call people from your desk at work all without picking up the phone.

      But... Google says do no evil! Stop.. doing.. evil ..

      I guess if Google tracked the IPs as

    • Re:Who says I have to use my own number? (Score:4, Funny)

      by Anonymous Coward on Friday December 02 2005, @09:16PM (#14171317)
      When I worked at dynamicsoft [dynamicsoft.com] (now Cisco) we wrote an app that would conference two totally random individuals at a time. With one click of the button, two phones would ring and each person would insist that the other had called them. It was very fun to watch.

      Its even better when you anonymously schedule it to call people at 6am.
      [ Parent ]

  • We did something like this once with Bayonne (Score:3, Interesting)

    by dyfet (154716) on Friday December 02 2005, @07:48PM (#14170804) Homepage
    We created something like this many years ago with Bayonne, for a specific merchant that, um, had a certain high volume web business with customers who would, er, be rather concerned about their privacy, and did not trust entering credit cards over the internet to procure their, ahm, "personal use" products. They were once in the top 10 internet search terms, too...

  • in... (Score:5, Funny)

    by kirkb (158552) on Friday December 02 2005, @07:51PM (#14170820) Homepage
    In Soviet Russia, ads click you? (sorry)

    • Re:in... (Score:2)

      by Harker (96598)
      Shouldn't that be:

      In Soviet Russia, the adds call You!

      Wait, that happens here in the US too...

      H.

      • Re:in... (Score:2)

        by starm_ (573321)
        No it should be: In Soviet Russia they don't call you and let you eat your F$%?& dinner in peace...err You

  • Private Callee (Score:3, Interesting)

    by Doc Ruby (173196) on Friday December 02 2005, @07:54PM (#14170845) Homepage Journal
    Google might actually honor that promise not to share the callee info. But what about their cutrate knockoff competitors? The US needs privacy laws like the EU. You'd think that the Constitutional "right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated" [findlaw.com] would protect our "papers and effects" against searches violating representations of privacy, but it obviously isn't. A new privacy amendment would be great, but Americans have been so numbed lately by threats to amend the Constitution to discrimimate against gays and protect flags that it won't even be seriously considered. We could try a federal law, and when that's not enough, maybe get the amendment to protect this fundamental right. Easy abuse of personal info in convenience features like this Google feature will set the stage.
      • The Constitution specifies how the government is to protect our rights. Those rights exist independently of the Constitution or any law. The laws, and the government, are created by the people to protect our rights.

  • Balmer, its Google calling. (Score:3, Funny)

    by Anonymous Coward on Friday December 02 2005, @08:00PM (#14170883)
    Quick! Has anyone got Steve's phone number?

  • Abuse waiting to happen? (Score:2, Interesting)

    by Sp00nMan (199816)
    The first thing I thought of on reading this was "How long would it be till someone figured out a hack for free long distance?" I mean, if you can get the "ad" to dial up your friend in singapore, then you are good to go. It seems that in the past any se

  • Advocates of pay-per-call, including some merchants who have tried it, say customers who call are ready to buy and aren't just browsing the Internet; thus, search engines can charge more -- $2 to $10 or even more per call, compared with less than $1 per cl

  • AT&T tried this in the early 90's (Score:4, Informative)

    by klubar (591384) <ken@lubar.net> on Friday December 02 2005, @08:17PM (#14170996) Homepage
    When the net was still young to e-commerce and AT&T was still a force, they tried a service very similar to this. It was sold as an extension to AT&T's 800 service. You would click on a link, enter your phone number and get a call back connecting to the mechant.

    I don't think it was ever very successful--no one quite understood how it worked, AT&T didn't understand how to sell it (what is the flash in the pan web thing?), and there weren't search engines yet.

    Someone should integrate it seamlessly into Vonage or Skype to bypass the phone piece completely.

    The market will be stronger when PCs are sold with handsets that look more like phones, rather than headsets.

  • Why would I want someone to call me? (Score:3, Insightful)

    by Billly Gates (198444) on Friday December 02 2005, @08:29PM (#14171079) Homepage Journal
    Whats the incentive?

    Do they pay me to listen to an ad? Or is this a way to add my number for a product I am interested on some website?

    With sites like buy.com and ebay.com I can just browse what I want and pick my price. Its a little different from someone calling me and I have no idea who the hell they are.

    Also I do pay even for local calls on my wireless plan if I go above a certain number of minutes during certain hours of the day.

  • Dupe (Score:3, Informative)

    by zaguar (881743) on Friday December 02 2005, @08:29PM (#14171080)
    http://slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=05/11/23/233620 3&tid=217&tid=99/ [slashdot.org]

    I'm getting kind of sick of all of this. A simple /. search (which, BTW, is the worst search engine on any high traffic site I have ever seen) for Pay Ads Google brings this story up. How about a little bit of journalistic integrity?

  • Astounding (Score:2, Redundant)

    by Chemisor (97276)
    To me, the truly astounding thing is that there actually are people in the world who click on these ads. It is absolutely mind-boggling that anyone would voluntarily call a telemarketer!
  • google never fails to impress me with how much they are willing to diversify their services. while you could say some of this is kind of weird, at least google is willing to come up with original new ideas on how to advertise to people.

    i sometimes catch m
    • Maybe its time to give the readers mod points to mod the stories. Enough -1 Dupe mods and it drops off the front page.
      1. -1 Dupe
      2. -1 Roland Pipsqueak shill
      3. -1 Ad masquerading as news
      4. -1 Editor troll/flamebait
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