Archive for the ‘Paid Search’ Category
Search Advertising is the Most Cost Effective
Marketers and advertisers, ever wonder where you should be investing your marketing or advertising dollars? Search advertising is definitely one that you should put it into your marketing mix and invest heavily as search advertising has been proven to be the most cost effective method of advertising (Piper Jaffray Study). The study shows that the cost per lead from the search engines is a fraction of the cost of email marketing, direct mail, online banners or yellow pages.
SEM and SEO: Agency Vs In-House
In almost 10 years of working in advertising and marketing there is only one aspect that has caused the most arguments in the industry and that is the trade off between In-House and Agency for SEM and SEO. Every company has their own thoughts on the subject and all of them can hold forth with a reasonable argument for their choice. However no matter how effective their reasoning is all of them boil down to four simple points: Time, Cost, Results and Control.
Most companies feel that these four key points will determine the direction that they go when it comes to how they manage SEM and SEO and it is quite obvious why. Combined they will decide how effective the campaigns are and what the bottom line return will be at the end of the day.
More often than not a business that decides to manage their SEM or SEO themselves will have a simple reason for doing so and it will use a combination of all of the above points or the ones that are most important to them. But if you look into them a little deeper it simply does not make financial or rational sense to attempt to self manage an effective SEM campaign In-House if the business has a large number of keywords active in their campaigns.
Aside from the obvious fact that all Agency fees are a tax deduction as a Marketing Expense we need to look at the hidden costs of doing SEM and SEO In-House. Firstly you need to find an expert who is willing to manage it on your behalf and these do not come cheap, if you decide to manage the campaigns without a specialist in SEM or SEO then the person assigned to manage the campaign will have no time to do anything but monitor the campaigns therefore there is a loss of productivity from 1 staff member who is in effect learning on the job. Following on from this is the fact that an active campaign needs to be constantly checked, modified and updated to ensure that there is no wastage and that you are achieving the best possible results. Lastly if you are running a campaign with any number of Keywords over a thousand you need to maintain your quality score through effective Landing Page Management and multiple Creative’s for each keyword as consumers want to be hooked to click on the link rather than just see the same generic Creative for every search term.
When you add all of the above aspects together then it seems obvious that of the four key points highlighted at the start there is only one that stands up as to why a company would manage their SEM and SEO In-House, and that is Control. There is a demonstrated loss of staff time as they try to manage campaigns while doing their core role, results suffer as the Quality Score for the campaign will not be at an optimal level and the costs (both of the campaign and the staff costs) spiral as there is not going to be an effective system of management on what keywords are working and how to alter the Creatives to enhance Click Through Rates.
A good SEM and SEO Agency will manage all of the above on your behalf and consult with the client to ensure that they maintain complete control and understanding of what is going on, once a company has found the best Agency for them then the upfront cost of setting up the campaign and the ongoing Agency fees are actually going to save them money in the long term as a result of better campaign management, higher traffic levels, greater conversion rates and a better understanding of what is working for them now and will work for them in the future.
In short if you are running campaigns with more than a couple of thousand keywords then you are costing yourself money by attempting to manage your SEM and SEO campaigns In-House.
SEM Holiday Seasonality
Search Seasonality
Talk about a fickle search market! What is happening when great keywords get a sudden spike in impressions ? We usually put it down to an event or publicity driving interest in a subject that increases the number of people researching using related terms.What about when your CTR drops likes like a stone all of a sudden. Check those Ads !What about if CPA suddenly takes a jump even though CPC remains consistent ? Have we screwed up the Ad or something. Ah perhaps it’s those new competitors again ? Ahh, the joys of Search Marketing. We constantly Worry about each little blip on the trend lines and wonder what evil force is at work ! But what about when Impressions jump, CTR drops, CPA jumps (too much), CPC is flat and nothing has changed ? Simple really. HOLIDAY season !!! Did anybody notice this in some of the consumer goods sectors Post-Christmas ? Amazing. What is it about holidays that defies standard trends and then returns to normal only after you have blown a bunch of time trying to understand what’s happening ? Are people just too lazy to click that mouse button too many times when they are holidays ? Why do they search and yet not buy ? Well nobody will probably ever know for sure but I do have some thoughts. I suspect a least two things are at work here.
ONE - I think the holiday period provides a lot of non-traditional web customers with the time to “play”. Time to scan around and find that non-critical item that they usually de-prioritise because of a perception that it will take too much time. If this hypothesis has any truth, then this is a great thing for Online Marketing. It indicates growth on the edges of our traditional market.Those that haven’t been buyers in the past are beginning to learn how to use online services and will most likely be back. If they have found what they were looking for quickly and easily, they will look for their next buy online.
TWO - I think the holiday season removes the urgency for traditional online consumers. Whilst on their holiday break they have the time to “shop around” and there is no pressure to buy on the first visit. It may even be that bricks & mortar vendors are now more competitive with their Post Christmas sales and our typical online buyer having the time to check them out. Suddenly the online convenience factor is not such an advantage.
Not sure how to prove or disprove either of these hypotheses but one thing seems certain. Holidays can change the mid-set of the average online researcher. Whether that is because there are more searchers overall or because there is unusual competition it will pay us to remember to remain competitive for the benefit of the new searchers (that are always coming online) even if we don’t feel we want to compete with holiday laziness or bricks and mortar desperation sales. Best of all, it is suggesting to me that there is significant online growth just around the corner when even AFTER the Christmas rush, there are more people searching than normal.
Free Search Engine Marketing Training Video
When a Search Agency shares it’s IP and methodologies it demonstrates a number of great corporate qualities - Transparency, leadership, confidence and a team setting the standards and agenda in search. Great to see the latest initiative by e-Channel Search in launching the first in a series of Search Engine Marketing Training Videos. Thought I’d share the news… see link below to press release. This initiative highlighted to me that there are many interesting & informative videos on search, particularly on YouTube. This one from e-Channel is different concentrating on how to design great creatives, giving it a point of difference. The fact that it is a proven method in an agency environment and assists with the very difficult task of designing a large number of ads (with less brain strain) for clients is fantastic!
http://www.e-channel.com.au/press-releases/ Check out the actual training video here: http://au.youtube.com/watch?v=i9rKwFA9sqE
Search media of choice in difficult times
I’ve read several articles over the last few months from a number of authors and publications and it seems to me that online advertising will be the media of choice to get companies through the tough times we are in! Specifically, pay per click advertising, will emerge as the preferred choice for many marketers as the move from banner and other forms of advertising dissipate.
All the research points to search marketing continuing to grow even in the downturn because, I suspect, it is a proven method of successful advertising with a great ROI, is very affordable and highly measurable.
One can only imagine that when the search fence sitters and depleting number of sceptics get over their fear of taking a search ‘ticket to ride’, consumers will have greater choice. In the meantime those with search in their marketing mix will weather the current financial storm and take market share from their competitors.
Search Engine Marketing - Prove It!
Many people ask me to prove that our people, software and search methods really work. I tell them our clients and results are our best proof. Several of our existing clients are happy to talk to companies looking to use our services & talk about results like just a few listed below. Others prefer to keep e-Channels results a secret (sshhhh)……from their competitors! Below are a number of real examples but we can’t show you company names! Some will allow us to talk about these results with you over the phone and some will give you a personal reference so contact us.
Career company XYZ - e-Channel improved CPC of $0.66 in January 08 to $0.46 in November 08. We are now at $0.37 CPC (Dec 08). The industry average is around $0.63 to $0.73. CTR is 11% the best competitor in the employment category has a CTR of 7.6%
Classified client X - CPC is now at $0.24. The client told us that an opposition agency was averaging mid .30’s
Car Loan company Y - before contracting e-Channel use one of Australia’s larger Ad agencies & their CPA was over $153. Within 9 months e-Channel’s team improved the CPA to $75.
Classified client Z - e-Channel dropped their CPC from $0.37 to $0.19 and at the same time increase their traffic by almost 95% within a few months.
Client W- e-Channel has delivered in 12 months:
- 30% decrease in CPA
- 22% increase in conversion volume
- 40% decrease in CPC
- 15% decrease in advertising cost
Book seller client XY - their KPI is a $16 CPA, we are now $12 CPA
Florist Client - KPI is $0.71 (CPC) & $4.66 (cost/conversion). We are now at $0.51 (CPC) and $2.53 (cost/conversion)
Many of our clients are happy to provide verbal testimonial. Other examples can be found on our website.
When Average Position Is Not The Average Position
Most of us within the SEM industry use the various performance statistics provided in Google AdWords to make everyday decisions to optimise and improve our campaigns. Some recent tests provided some interesting (yet very logical) insight into the Average Position statistic which is shown for keywords, ad groups and campaigns.
For those are not aware, this statistic provides an indication of the position in the paid search result list an ad is being displayed for a given keyword, the position is determined by Google using several factors including the landing page Quality Score and your Max CPC. Each keyword is assigned an Average Position and until this point everything appears very straight forward… moving up to the ad group/campaign level it would appear the average position is not in fact (as I would have expected it to be) simply the average of the average position values for each keyword within the ad group!
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Example:The total average of the values shown here should be approximately 1.7, however, when factoring the number of impressions the adjusted average is actually 1.3. |
It seems that the Average Position for each keyword, when viewed from an ad group/campaign perspective, is actually adjusted to include the number of impressions each keyword has received. Therefore the Average Position for those keywords that have had the most searches are given the most weight and the least weight is given to keywords with the least searches. The resulting formula to calculate an ad group’s Average Position, where k=keyword and n=number of keywords within an ad group/campaign:
average_position(k1…n) = sum(average_position(k1…n) * number_of_impressions(k1…n)) / number_of_impressions(k1…n)
This logic allows the importance of each keyword to be reflected the in the Average Position shown for ad group and campaign statistics allow more accurate decisions to be made.
Brand Lift of Search Marketing Part 2: Brand value of Search by Google
In my previous post, Enquiro has proven that search marketing helps lift brands. Now, hear it from Google themselves. Now this is a story to get more people & businesses (especially consumer packaged goods businesses) spending with Google:
According to a recent, rather self-serving study (July 2008), search marketing is an excellent brand-building vehicle for consumer packaged goods advertisers, according to Google. This new study was called “Brand Value of Search“.
2400 survey respondents were exposed to a generic search term like “drinks or make-up.” Then they were asked to take a brand survey which measured aided brand awareness, unaided brand awareness, purchase consideration, and purchase intent.
Awareness decreased when a brand did not feature in four major categories — beverage, cosmetic, food/snack, household cleaning/laundry — but its competitor did.
“Typically, ROI models for search don’t give any value to a search impression, but this study finds that there’s brand value in a search impression, particularly in top-of-mind awareness and purchase intent,” said Kevin Kells, Google’s CPG Industry Director.
By and large, the survey supports the notion that brand presence on a search results page, no matter where, positively impacts brand metrics.
Brand Lift of Search Marketing
Does search marketing help lift your brand? You bet it does. Here’s a report by Enquiro proving this. The research company ran an online survey and interact with a mocked up Google Search Engine Results Page (SERP) to test the effects of branding through Search Marketing.
Here are some results:
• A 16% increase in Unaided Brand Recall by having a brand presence in both the top sponsored and top organic listings of a SERP.
• Users are 5% more likely to recall your brand if you have a top sponsored listing in addition to your organic listing (for non-branded queries).
• The gap between your brand and a competitors grows if your brand is in both the top sponsored and organic positions and theirs is not.
• When a brand is in both the top sponsored and top organic listings a subject is 10% more likely to recall the brand when asked specifically whether or not they would consider it as a purchase.
Be Brave! Survive the economic downturn by adding Search to your media mix
I recently read an article in the Oct/Nov 2008 issue of inbusiness SA magazine that made me go Yes, Yes, Yes! It was written by Dr. David Corkindale and was about “Marketing basics in a downturn”.
I got excited for two reasons. Firstly because is stated what a lot of marketers (and most definitely CFOs) tend to forgot: Do not cut your advertising spend when things are tight. Just don’t do it! It will cost you more in the long run.
The key comments by Dr Corkindale that pushed my buttons were:
“Various studies have shown that firms who increase advertising spend during a recession do slightly better than firms who increase advertising at other times” and,
“Businesses that are in a dominant or strong position at the start of a downturn, and which have strategic emphasis on marketing, are well-managed with an entrepreneurial orientation and have under-utilised workers and facilities, are well situated to turn an economic slump into an opportunity to strengthen their competitive position”
Many companies turn a large business into a small business by cutting their advertising spends during lean times and consequently lose business. Very soon, without even knowing it, you have started the ball rolling of a self fulfilling prophecy whereby you start to lose clients, revenue and so on, and your situation becomes economically tight - just as you said it would; when if fact you have quite possibly caused it yourself!
And the second reason I got excited was because it didn’t just recommend maintaining the status quo in a downtown (what I call the easy “head in the sand approach” to marketing), but instead recommended getting more value from your marketing dollar by considering things such as Search Marketing and other e-marketing initiatives.
“Of course some firms may feel compelled to cut advertising and other expenses simply to survive a downturn, survival being much more important that simply doing better or worse than rivals. However, putting something else in its place to continue to do some promotion can pay dividends; using search marketing and other e-marketing can be very cost effective.”
Search Marketing is a fantastic, cost effective and measurable advertising tool for companies to use; particularly when ROI is of extreme importance in your company’s survival. The key is to be brave enough to change your media mix to take advantage of the current economic climate.
By allocating a percentage (or larger percentage) of your advertising dollar to Search, not only will you stay within your advertising budget, but you will receive quantitative data that can help you more effectively target your above the line media mix.
Then as the economy recovers (as we know it will) your company will be in a much better position to take advantage of the economic upturn than those companies who have been off the consumer’s radar through lack of advertising.