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Internet advertising revenues in the U.S. have increased 23 percent over the same period in 2010, according to new information released by PricewaterhouseCoopers and the Interactive Advertising Bureau. Officially, Revenue hit $7.3 billion in this past quarter. The survey includes data concerning online advertising revenues from websites, commercial online services, free e-mail providers, and all other companies selling online advertising.

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For the past few weeks, the search engine community has been abuzz with rumors of streaming results, expanded search listings and other consumer-facing alterations to Google’s famously simple interface. This morning, the search engine giant did take a step in the direction of dynamic results with an innovation they’ve dubbed Google Instant.

The implementation is still being rolled out, but, depending on your browser and your location, you may have noticed the change already today. Google Instant provides a full set of results that is updated as you type – instead of waiting for you to hit Enter or click the Search button, you’ll see results change in real time. It’s similar to the auto-complete feature that already exists; in this case, though, the full set of results actually updates dynamically, rather than just the search query.

Marissa Mayer, Google’s VP of Search Products and User Experience, provides a full explanation on the company’s official blog. The end goal, according to those at the Mountain View campus, is that Google Instant brings the benefit of speed, while preserving the integrity of Google’s search applications.

How will Google Instant affect your online reputation (ORM) or SEO program? On its face, it won’t. This innovation is not tied to a new round of changes to the search engine algorithm, so we will not necessarily alter our techniques. Google Instant will not disrupt your existing results. It does showcase the heightened need for companies and people to continually monitor and manage their online presence in the search world, and it is a great example of the kind of technological change that we adapt to on a regular basis.

We’ll continue to do that, and will keep developing the kinds of cutting edge ORM solutions that allow you to fully benefit from the changing landscape of search engines and social media – for example, our recently released Yahoo Search Assist program, which is a great way to measure and shape search behavior and direct traffic to your targeted sites.

It’s no secret that the social mediasphere is “the place to be” in 2010; many of its buzzwords have been burning up the Internet for a few years now. But, as we’ve pointed out before, the online literati have only recently begun to really develop the kind of framework and metrics that you might expect to surround such a powerful means of personal and corporate expression. The rapid rise of social media resembled a land rush, with few participants taking a step back to build a lasting foundation. That’s changing.

We’ve detailed some of the interesting ways to quantify social media. That’s a fascinating process – field of study, even – that’s still in its infancy. But before that, before we worry about tracking and placing a value on fans and friends, there’s a fundamental question we ask our clients and companies: who are you?

In other words, what’s your style? And that’s exactly the question at the heart of an excellent post over at Mashable, which breaks social media styles down into five distinct families and comes to a conclusion that is both common-sensical but overlooked all too often:

The lesson: Ensure that your engagement style matches your company’s brand, goals, and general attitude. We took a look at the top five engagement styles that currently dominate the social web. Which are you?

This should be the first question any company asks itself before launching a social media campaign. Without this singular guiding principle – essentially a mission statement – efforts can be wasted. And it’s important to define yourself before diving in. Without an identity that makes sense for your brand, the social media community will back away; today’s savvy consumers will be turned off by incongruity.

It seems George Clooney isn’t the only one.

The Pew Research Center recently released the results of a study examining Internet users’ habits when it comes to checking up on their own online reputation through search engines. The trends are unmistakable. 57% of all users have conducted a search on their own name, and that number shoots up to 65% of users under the age of 30. The highest single group of self-searchers are college graduates, at 70%.

MediaPost Publications has a good summary of the data, including some thoughts on what this trend means for the online marketing and advertising industry:

At one time people called the act of Googling yourself on a search engine a vanity search or ego-surfing. Now it’s a matter of self-preservation. The practice has long been a part of managing brand reputation, but individuals have learned the value of keeping track of information being collected and posted online about them, too. A study released this week could give advertisers insight into targeting paid search and display ads through behavior and social graphs.

Will the possibility of advertising on terms as targeted as an individual’s name raise some concerns among privacy advocates? The increasing amount of attention being paid to search trends like this one definitely raises the stakes on our online reputations.

Just in case you needed another reason to get proactive about your online reputation… there is now federal case law on the books that further drives the point home.

Last week, US District Judge Robert Cleland ruled in favor of careeragentsnetwork.biz, a “gripe site” set up by a solitary dissatisfied customer. The Career Agents Network (CAN) filed suit based on both trademark claims and the accusation of “cybersquatting,” neither of which were enough for Cleland to strip First Amendment rights from the aggrieved party:

In his decision, Judge Robert Cleland said that CAN’s case “must fail” because the company did not provide evidence that White had intended to profit from the domains. He did acknowledge, however, that White made some attempt to damage CAN’s business by climbing the search rankings, but that it was only to warn other potential customers—an action that is protected under the First Amendment. Because White’s websites didn’t represent themselves as the real company websites for CAN and they provided accurate contact information, they were clearly gripe sites and did not infringe on CAN’s marks.

Given the specifics of this ruling – and seen through the lens of RepEquity’s years of experience in this space – it becomes clear that almost every “gripe site” out there falls into this newly defined protected class. Very few sites that are thrown up by an angry customer intend to make money on their own; even the fact that the owner of this particular site used aggressive SEO tactics to promote his negative message wasn’t enough to convince the judge that there were commercial motives in play.

The lesson here is clear. A single peeved individual has the right – and certainly the opportunity, given the ease of web design – to establish a damaging presence online by piggybacking off of an established brand or trademark.

The strategy to combat this is two-fold: first, grab any and all domain names that might relate to your company or your name. And on a larger scale, a fully developed online reputation program will build a defensive perimeter that makes it much more difficult for a “gripe site” to gain visibility and prominence in the search results.

Without taking these precautionary steps, you might find yourself battling for significant traffic with one loud Internet soapbox.