I’m piggybacking on a great article Joe wrote a few months ago. I thought I’d bring another example to light. I was watching the nightly news on April 5th and heard that the Transportation Department announced that within 5 years all cars must have electronic stability control in them. I’m all about car safety – so I was immediately out on Google, trying to find out if my car has ESC in it already (it does, whew).

The night that the story broke, the only person bidding on the term “electronic stability control” was MSN! (Click on the image below for a clear screenshot.)

Hey, automakers! Car review magazines! Car review websites! This is a MAJOR opportunity! It would take you 5 minutes to develop a little ad that says something like, “Find out if you car has ESC,” or “Which cars have Electronic Stability Control?” or “Government requires ESC within 5 years. Which cars have it?” Those were my initial thoughts on ads I could write in one minute.

Funny how one week later the paid search results look exactly the same. I’m willing to cut companies some slack – when a news item breaks, it does take some time to digest, decide if it fits with your company, develop a landing page, whatever. But a week later – give me a break.