Continuing with the research theme of yesterday's post on negative keywords, I wanted to make sure you, Dear Advertisers, are aware of the useful tools you'll find at the Microsoft adCenter Labs site. If you're not familiar with adLabs, it's a three-year old research group dedicated to incubating cutting edge digital advertising technologies in areas like keywords, content, audience intelligence, ad relevance, social networking and interactive media. 

If you're new to search engine marketing (SEM), the information on the adLabs site could make learning about digital advertising seem more intimidating than it really is; I would recommend holding off on taking a deep dive on the adLabs site until you're feeling confident and comfortable in your SEM knowledge.  In the immortal words of Mr. Miyagi, "First learn stand, then learn fly" (who hasn't seen The Karate Kid?).

If, on the other hand, you consider yourself to be fairly savvy when it comes to building out and refining your SEM campaigns, then I think you'll find some interesting information and helpful tools on this site.  As some of the language can be a bit in-depth and technical, it can help you -- as my techie-gadget aficionado manager is fond of saying -- "get your geek on".

Here's a quick snippet from the adLabs site that offers a brief description of each of the tools you'll find if you click on the "Keyword Research" link from their home page:

These keyword research tools are just a sampling of those available on the adLabs site -- you can find more by visiting their comprehensive list of all tools.  And while we're on the subject of keyword research, I should also give a quick mention of the adCenter Add-In Beta for Excel, a keyword research and monetization tool that can make the process of building out your campaigns infinitely more informed, faster and easier.

If you've used any of the tools on the adLabs site, we'd be interested to hear what you think about them.  Feel free to comment on this blog or stop by our forums to share your thoughts.