Ask.com has been working with their new advertising agency Crispin Porter + Bogusky to create a campaign that champions “The Algorithm”.
Ask.com acquired algorithms from Teoma and Direct Hit in 2000 and 2001, developing what is known as ExpertRank. What they need us to know is that Ask.com searches are based on fully automated, reliable and regular analyses of the billions of web sites around the world. No longer do we ask Jeeves. We ask the algorithm.
Re-posting this after a re-read of the source article. Its interesting to note how in 2007 ask.com wanted more than an ad campaign, they wanted to manipulate the public into not knowing what ‘algorithm’ meant and simply assume it was something to do with ask.com, no one else. Its a good case study of how the term has been purposely obfuscated for marketing reasons. As the source article says:
Ask.com’s campaign isn’t going into detail about how an algorithm works. But they’re keen for members of the public to associate the word with Ask.com, like “Intel Inside”.
