This time a more technical blog-post:
As the guys who deal with the Google-AdWords-API probably have noticed, a new version (V11) of the AdWords-Webservice was released on Oct 11, 2007, so V10 and V11 are co-existing at the moment. Especially the redesigned reporting-system with the new DefinedReportJob-feature provides more flexibility in retrieving exactly the stats you need.

After the API-team was able to solve some critical bugs in the beginning, the service now is stable enough to be integrated in existing system-architectures.

We already did that (and it works fine for us), because our customers deserve the most up-to-date products and services offered by Refined Labs.

Nevertheless there are lots of guys that are not happy with the new release, because their well-working-software is affected by the way, the retrieval of IDs for campaigns/adGroups/criterionKeywords/… is handled now by the various types of reports.

The API-team responded promptly to all the complaints and assured that there would be an internal talk about how these problems might be solved.

The important background-information is: It’s planned to shut down the currently running V10 in Feb, 2008.

I am very curious to see, if the API-team is able to cope with the current complaints till then and/or if the shutdown of V10 will be postponed and/or the users have to accept the effort to modify their existing software in bigger dimensions, and/or …

Tino

Btw: If you think about applying for a JAVA-job at Refined Labs, don’t forget to mention your perfect Nexuiz-skills. At the moment, the Java-backend has no chance against the Ajax-GUI-Guys

Yesterday we had the chance to attend and exhibit at CDTM Grow 07 in Garching, thanks to Holtzbrinck eLAB. We were really amazed by how many students were actually looking for jobs as well as the differences of their experience and knowledge.

As this was really our first time we were exhibiting somewhere our booth looked rather basic, but playing Wii Sports (Thanks to guut.de) was definetly the favourite thing for all students at CDTM according to our impression. I think bringing some of the sweets (Knoppers, Hanuta, Lollies, …) was also quite appreciated.

The contacts we made, as well as the feedback we got, I hope that we can fill our job openings soon.

As some of you might have heard from various rumors we were recently exploring various ways of growing faster to offer better solutions to our clients. This search has come to an end as of tuesday.

Refined Labs and Holtzbrinck eLAB, part of Georg von Holtzbrinck publishing group, agreed to a strategic joint venture for future developments. Holtzbrinck eLAB acquired a minority share in Refined Labs.

So much about the official part from our side. We are genuinely happy that we could find this agreement with an excellent partner that has a proven track record as well as great connections and expertise in this industry. We are extremely looking forward to work with them on creating tomorrows visions of the online marketing industry today. We went through lots of offers, possibilities and options in the last weeks and months and are confident that this was a good move for all parties involved.

One of our main goals was always to develop great services with happy employees in a fun environment. Looking into the office today I think that we achieved this goal so far and I am looking forward to welcome more great minds in our team soon. If you’re interested in joining, please have a look at our job openings.