News broke late tonight (Saturday) that Steve Ballmer (CEO) from Microsoft sent a letter to Jerry Yang (CEO) of Yahoo saying the deal is off.

OMG - the deal is off. What about the hostile takeover Ballmer guaranteed if Yang would NOT agree to the proposed Microsoft Acquisition?

Let me remind Jerry - Yahoo (YHOO) was trading at about $19 when Steve came in and offered $31 per share.

I can’t tell you how upset I was that I didn’t buy a few thousand shares of YHOO before the very aggressive MSFT offer was made public. No worries Jerry and Steve - I got in on GOOG at the IPO price…sold it and then bought in again and again and sold all the way from $125 to $600 (BTW - sold what I had left around $600 and never looked back).

OK. YHOO at $19. Ballmer makes bid with a price tag of $31. YHOO trumpets to nearly $30.

Think about this for a second.

YHOO responded as if the rise in share price (NOTE: YHOO climbed over 50% in value the next trading day) had something to do with the actual quality of the YHOO business. Guess what - it didn’t!

Now what.

Ballmer has officially pulled the deal from the table.

Yahoooooooooooooooooooo - I’m glad I dind’t buy the stock because Monday morning is not going to be pretty.

My heart goes out to my friends at Yahoo, including employees and shareholders.

What’s next?

Will Yahoo as a company rebound?

Absolutely not. At least not alone.

Can Yahoo realistically compete with Google in the search space? No.

Can Microsoft realistically compete with Google in the search space? No.

Can the combined MSFT / YHOO compete with Google? Hmmmmmmmmmmmmm. Not likely.

So what happens next?

My guess is that Google waits for Yahoo’s stock price to go into the teens and they make their own bid for YHOO….

Then, MSFT comes back in and makes another offer.

GOOG and MSFT battle it out and MSFT ends up the winner at $38 per share.

Note that if you are following the details of the story in the popular media YHOO would have done the deal already if MSFT would have ponied up $37.

If my theory is correct Yang will be celebrated as a hero to YHOO shareholders.

If my theory is incorrect Yang is absolutely screwed.

UPDATE: Michael Arrington over at TechCrunch is predicting a “Black Monday” for YHOO tomorrow referring to the likelihood (see above) that YHOO is going to tank when the markets open tomorrow. Another interesting part of his post was that he suggests YHOO may be moving as quickly as possible to make an announcement about a pay-per-click syndication deal (i.e. YHOO syndicate GOOG) with GOOG.

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Joel Comm is the mastermind behind the internet’s first ever reality show - The Next Internet Millionaire.

For those of you who don’t know Joel, he is a very smart entrepreneur and marketer - he’s always planning for the next big thing….the next big idea.

While you might think that the Next Internet Millionaire was Joel’s biggest project of 2007 he’d probably tell you it wasn’t.

Why?

Because he believes his biggest idea (no offense to the show, which was a tremendous hit!!!) is the launch of “the Secret Classroom,” which includes over 24 hours of educational footage from the “teachers’ behind the Next Internet Millionaire show.

The Next Internet Millionaire teachers included Mark Joyner, Armand Morin, Jeff Walker, Marlon Sanders, Brad Fallon, Michael Koenigs, Kristopher Jones (that’s me), Dave Taylor, Perry Marshall, Mike Filsaime, Rich Schefren, and Ray Edwards.

Here’s what Joel told me about “the Scret Classroom”:

“During the course of taping NIM each teacher spent about two hours each day TEACHING, and there was no pitching. Pure content.

Our contestants heads were exploding with information, as you might imagine.

In each episode, the audience only sees a few minutes of the teaching, and they are asking for more.

So we’re going to give it to them.

“The Secret Classroom” is a 12 DVD set with accompanying workbook, providing ALL the teaching that the contestants got.

And there is more.. .of course!

We are also including the entire show, all 13 episodes, of The Next Internet Millionaire, on DVD. Many people have watching online, but even more want to be able to watch in glorious DVD resolution on their television set. This will finally give them the opportunity to do so.

The DVD set will also include a behind-the-scenes documentary and outtakes from the show. It’s going to be an incredible set that we’re very proud of. ”

Well, that’s Joel’s take on “the Secret Classroom.”

Here’s mine.

The Secret Classroom will be a great learning tool for you regardless of your expertise level. The teachers included on the show were chosen selectively to provide a broad expertise across multiple forms of business and online marketing. Whether you want to refine your skills on making a kick-ass sales pitch, want to turn your affiliate business into a 100+ person fast growing full-service company like I did, or you want to promote your product or service via viral marketing and video blogging, The Secret Classroom is likely to help.

While I’m not sure I believe him (hahaha) Joel is claiming that he will only sell a limited number of copies of the Secret Classroom. Regardless, the launch doesn’t occur until December 5th, 2007….so I’m giving you an exclusive head’s up so that you can place your name on the list if you want to learn more.

To learn more about The Secret Classroom - CLICK HERE!

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The waiting is finally over - Episode 7 of the hit internet reality show The Next Internet Millionaire is finally LIVE - I serve as the special guest, which includes me giving the contestants some insight on how to build a successful company, while having a ton of fun in the process.

(UPDATE: SCROLL BELOW FOR CONTESTANT PICS)

The show starts out with Laura Martin facing elimination in the judgment room. After that the contestants went on a hike in the Colorado Rockies and came back to the Next Internet Millionaire complex where I was.

Joel Comm, the host of the show, only told the contestants that a close industry friend of his would be present and that the remainder of day would be spent doing something different and fun.

The theme of the day was how to skillfully build a successful business, while making sure that you (and your employees) have a lot of fun in the process!

I was honored that Joel chose me to address this topic and was equally humbled that he shared with the contestants the fact that Pepperjam is one of the coolest places to work in the entire online marketing industry. With that intro Joel and I had the contestants participate in a series of challenges called “Pepperjam Games.” The idea was to expose the contestants to some of the fun things that members of the Pepperjam Team get to experience on a daily basis working at Pepperjam. Challenges included things like Ping Pong and Nintendo Wii. I also host a Trivia Show toward the end of the Episode where the contestants square off against one another and answer questions about Pepperjam.

The show was an absolute blast and I can’t thank Joel enough. In addition, it was an honor meeting each of the remaining contestants and getting to spend some time with them throughout the day and later in the evening over dinner and drinks. Also - I have to mention that I was extremely impressed with Joel’s entire production team led by Eric Holmlund. The complex where the show was taped was state-of-the-art and on the level of a Hollywood production - the entire team was professional and the level of energy and creativity would make anyone proud to be associated with such an amazing experience.

I consider this show a tribute to the hard work and dedication of the entire Pepperjam Team. The reason why Pepperjam is one of the most talked about companies in online marketing is because we have the most amazing group of people who are super talented and show up to work every day with a level of enthusiasm and commitment that is inspiring.

Here’s the show - Enjoy!

Thor Schrock

Nico Pisani

Jaime Luchuck

Charles Trippy

Alisande Chan

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GOOGLE LAUNCHES FREE BID MANAGEMENT TECHNOLOGY (BETA)

As a leading SEM agency, Pepperjam has the luxury of being one of the first to test Google’s new technologies. We were absolutely stunned (although not entirely surprised) to find out that Google is slowly testing FREE Bid Management Technology within select Google Adwords accounts.

According to the information we have been given so far by Google, here is what the technology will do:

The technology is called Conversion Optimizer - Google claims that its main goal is to help advertisers save time and minimize conversion costs.

According to Google, the Conversion Optimizer lets you specify a maximum cost-per-acquisition (CPA) bid for each ad group. Then, this feature continually adjusts your CPC bids to keep your conversion costs under your maximum CPA bid, showing your ads only when you’re likely to get conversions. By using the Conversion Optimizer, you can save time while minimizing your conversion costs.

I don’t know about you but this sounds a lot like technology that already exists, but for a STEAP, recurring fee. Companies like Atlas One Point (a Microsoft / Aquantive company), Omniture (NASDAQ - OMTR), DoubleClick DART (Pepperjam’s exclusive partner), and Efficient Frontier, among others, offer this kind of technology, usually to agencies and the largest of advertisers. The access fee, per advertiser, can be thousands of dollars per month.

What does this potentially mean for bid management providers like the ones mentioned above? I think is spells serious trouble, especially if Google’s goal (which we assume it is) is to provide the technology for FREE TO ALL GOOGLE ADWORDS ADVERTISERS.

Once Google begins to open up the technology to more and more Adwords advertisers will there even be a need to pay for bid management technology from Atlas and others?

I’ll let you be the judge on that.

What are your thoughts?

In my opinion, this is could completely equalize the playing field for small and large advertisers as it relates to bid management technology access. Smaller advertisers will be able to run their businesses more efficiently and compete on a larger scale based on ROI, instead of advertising budget.

Get more information on the Google Adwords Conversion Optimizer HERE.

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