Google is reducing ads on web pages to an all-time low, which has many people scratching their heads.

“Virtually any other company facing slow economic times would be interested in increasing the places in which it could sell ads,” wrote Saul Hansell, in the New York Times article Google deliberately sells fewer ads – and may have gone too far. “It certainly wouldn’t take steps to reduce them.”

Meanwhile, Jonathan Rosenberg, Google’s Senior Vice-President for Product Management, said that Google has no plans to increase its coverage because of its efforts to improve what it calls “ad quality.”

By reducing the inventory, it would seem logical the per click price will go up with more advertisers competing for less space. As a result, the rise in click price will offset the click reduction.

And more relevant ads equal better search results, which should eventually translate to increased market share (or a greater stranglehold on the market) and revenue growth.

Plus, perhaps Google’s being proactive and discouraging Internet users from utilizing ad-blockers.

At the end of the day, the ones who will feel the greatest impact will be the small business owners who could be squeezed out of AdWords auctions. Small businesses in many industries may not be able to market through this means for much longer.

Increasigly impatient online consumers are opting for fixed-price purchases over auctions, reports Catherine Holahan in the BusinessWeek article “Auctions on eBay: A Dying Breed.”

Sales at Amazon.com, the leader in online fixed-price goods sales, rose 37 per cent in the first quarter of 2008. At eBay, where auctions make up 58 per cent of the site’s sales, revenue rose just 14 per cent.

Hence, fixed-priced items appears key to eBay’s future growth. EBay’s “Buy It Now” business, where consumers can purchase auction items at a set price, makes up 42 per cent of all goods sold on eBay and is growing at an annual 22 per cent pace. That’s the fastest among eBay’s shopping businesses.

It shows just how impatient Web users are. The novelty of the Web is gone. Consumers just want to get to a site, complete a task and move on in as little time as possible.

It seems the term “browsing the Web” is quickly becoming obsolete.

Good web writers know more words do not create additional impact.

When it comes to web writing, you should remove any words or messages that have no value for your target audience.

Review your web writing and cut it down to what’s truly essential. Self-aggrandizing messages, for instance, aren’t useful. They add dead words with little or no value. They get in the way, making it harder for visitors to find what they’re looking for – benefits.

Here’s an example from a resume consultant’s website: “We are committed to customer service and believe we provide the highest standards of customer service in the CV writing industry.”

Does it make a strong point that makes a mark with the prospect? Probably not. Any CV consultant can state that, and many likely do. It’s vague, ineffective and should be removed from the site. No one would miss it, except possibly the employees who wrote and approved it.

Good web writers know less is more.

Adobe announced July 1 it is working with the search industry to improve search results of dynamic web content and rich Internet applications. Up until now, search engines were not able to effectively view, decipher and index Flash-based sites.

Adobe has created a special Flash player, currently distributed to Yahoo and Google, which allows the search engines to crawl through Flash content and gather any text or hyperlinks within the rich content.

This is great news for businesses with Flash-based sites, which hindered their online presence.

Google has already begun indexing Flash sites, and Yahoo plans to release the technology in a future update. Adobe also plans to roll out the technology to other search engines.