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Even Google is reminding us to Vote!

I opened up the Marketing Curve My Client Center the other day to find the following message amongst the alerts at the top of my page:

Just another reminder that Election Day is almost upon us, and that then the political chatter may wind down for a while. Maybe Twitter will return to a less fervent state.

With all the cash that the election season is pouring into television ads and paid search it makes me wonder what the effect will be on media and Internet advertising revenues in the quarter to come? With so much chatter in the industry on what is growing and shrinking it is up to each business owner to make sure they are getting the best return for their advertising dollar, no matter what size the business. Maybe instead of spending thousands on Yellow pages ads, you should be spending hundreds on online listings and a few online testimonials. As a business owner it is your responsibility to help shape the next evolution of media and advertising, every dollar spent is like a vote. Vote wisely.

I’m Going as Yahoo! This year for Halloween

What to be for Halloween each year is a big decision. I mean, it says a lot about your personal brand…and stuff. But really, this year I have decided to go as Yahoo! and here are the key qualities I will be trying to show off:

1. I will answer the door when the children knock, but if they aren’t regulars, it will take me longer to get their candy. I prefer my Gold Status trick-or-treaters.

2. I will be great for socialization, I’ll have the coolest front yard, but don’t ask me anything.

3. I will offer games, but once you show a modicum of skill I’ll make you pay to be challenged.

4. When someone offers me $20 for my pumpkin I will not sell it, but will instead hold off for a better deal from the big pumpkin dealer, who I rent land to, that they seem to never pay for.

The more I read about Yahoo, AOL, MSN, ASK, and Google competing it gets simple…

Google needs shades…

MSN needs to stick to software solutions…

ASK needs to get the grey out of their ad text…

AOL needs to go to the retirement home…

and for Yahoo! everyday is Halloween.

Google continues to Break it Down

Recent changes in the way that data can be displayed in Google AdWords allows the advertiser to really break down data on ad distribution in any level of the account. Previously, this type of breakdown really was only available at the adgroup and keyword level. By making it possible easily break down data at the campaign level Google has made it easier for advertisers to know how each campaign is doing across the different ad distributions offered by Google AdWords.

Bringing the Search/Content breakdown up to the campaign level is one thing…          …but the real new feature here is the ability to separate the Google Search Network from the Search Partners, such as ASK.com and AOL.com. This added transparency may just be Google’s way of trying to ease concerns over the deal with Yahoo! SM.

What this shows is that in the same week that the competitors tried to start catching up to Google, Google took another leap forward in delivering a better service than the competition. With the rate of innovation seemingly not slowing down at Google, and the competitors struggling to duplicate what Google did years ago it is not surprising that Google AdWords continues to dominate the pay-per-click marketplace. The more transparent they become, the more advertisers will follow. Its all about features and benefits, and Google is continuing to pull ahead of the competition in both.

Why Branding has everything to do With Google’s Success

According to reports in <a href=”http://www.internetretailer.com/article.asp?id=27941″>Internet Retailer, October 2008</a> pay-per-click advertisers experienced an increase in ad rates by 14%. During this period Google accounted for 77% of search advertising budgets and accounted for about 62% of searches.

At the heart of this growth for Google is the user experience. User’s surveyed saw Google scoring higher in consumer satisfaction, while Yahoo slipped, and Microsoft remained steady.

For search marketing this means that as competition increases on Google AdWords advertisers must have the right strategy to harness the best clicks, and create campaigns focused on driving qualified conversions.

So why has Google continued to increase revenue, the key is in how they have branded themselves and how that translates to the understanding tat they are serving multiple customers: Searchers, Advertisers, Web Site Owners, Content Providers, Consumer protection agencies, Governments. Even as they have added advertising to many of the new acquisitions, such as YouTube, Google has kept consistent with their branding: clean layout and relevant results, both organically and paid. As long as Google continues to improve tracking and targeting features faster than the competition, which is lagging behind, they will remain as the primary platform for most paid search budgets.

Recently Ask.com  has relaunched their search engine and returned to their branding, semantic search, answering questions users ask. With a purposeful effort to constantly improve becoming more noticeable over the past six months it may only be a matter of time before Ask starts eating into the search and advertising shares of it’s competitors. The question to be answered is “<a href=”http://www.ask.com/web?q=who%E2%80%99s+share+of+search+traffic+will+ask.com+eat+into&search=search&qsrc=0&o=0&l=dir”>who’s share of search traffic will ask.com eat into?</a>”

Are You still Yellow about Google Local?

It happened again yesterday…

…It appeared in my driveway, inches from the curb and the rushing water from the continued storms. I wondered how many died for it to be brought to me? How many trees were being destroyed to make something little cumbersome yellow different typical? Of course I am talking about the yellow hole that sucks the life out of small businesses, intimidating them into believing that if you aren’t yellow you should be afraid not to be, because your competition is.

Seriously, when was the last time you went into your phone book to look something up? It was to find a restaurant coupon wasn’t it? Unless you are looking to have a furnace from the 1970’s serviced there really seems to be no need to consult the book forged from fear of a competitive disadvantage.

Here is the alternative:

Instead of paying thousands of dollars for an unknown number of people to view your ad spend your efforts on having an awesome Google Local listing instead. With Google Local you can set up the listing for free. There are a lot of features that can allow you to have a great web presence without even having a web site. Then spend the money you would have spent on the yellow ad on taking out your ten best customers for a great dinner. Just ask them that in return they leave a review of your business on your local listing. The testimonial will be worth way more than the dinner, and you can also pick your customers brains for what they think you can do to improve. And sell nothing. remember the dinners purpose, get the testimonials. If you are really savy, bring a video camera and take short clips of customers raving about you, then connect the videos on YouTube and your listing.

If your business hasn’t seen a provable conversion from the yellow intimidator don’t keep throwing money at it because that is what you think is part of doing business. Instead spend the money on your customers or employees and your returns will greatly outperform the big book of one line text ads.

How much Data is Best for Split-Testing Ad Copy

When trying to decide what ad copy is most effective in moving a viewer to a click, to a conversion each step of the equation offers it’s unique input into what drives a viewer of an ad to convert.

Step 1: Impression to Click

The almighty click through rate, CTR, has been regarded by pay per click marketers across the industry as the primary focus of PPC performance. Since this metric supposedly weighs heavy in the computation of the AdWords quality score it seems many marketers have no problem driving up high click through traffic even if it does not convert.
Impression to click is really the least important factor in determining the success of the bottom line of the purpose of the campaign, to convert visitors to clients. CTR is most useful when determining the strength of headlines, but becomes less useful when testing description text and display url’s.

Step 2: Click to Conversion

Conversion rate is a metric many pay per click marketers just felt they didn’t need to pay attention to. When I first began researching and managing PPC accounts I was contracting for an agency in Boulder, CO and was told not to worry about conversions, that was the job of the Web team. The idea was that it was my job to get the people there and their job to make them convert. What happened is a lot of traffic that was generated was not even qualified, much less actually going to convert. Disconnected data led to bad results.
By taking an integrated approach to Interactive design, Creative content, and Search marketing an environment is created in which departments consult with each other about the data collected and collaborate on implementing the best solution.

First, the importance of setting a baseline for when there is enough data to do the analysis is necessary. I draw the line at a thousand search network impressions. It is important to draw this line in the sand and stick to it. By knowing I have adequate quality data to analyze I can be confident that the conclusions I draw will provide the optimizations needed to continue to improve performance.

Where were you at in 2001

First, Congrats to Google for their 10th birthday!

A lot has changes on the landscape of Google’s results page since 2001, from the logo to the results the difference is striking. Back in 2001 I hadn’t become engrossed in the Internet like I am today. Robert Gniadecki, a world leading cancer researcher, was still the dominant result for a search of my last name.

So where were you at in 2001 on Google?  This look back is a really cool toy to play with and reminisce. Take a look and see where you were at, and be amazed at how far Google has come.

Google Politics - Two Party Betas

From day one of the 2008 political primaries the use of the Internet has had a huge effect on the results and communication of the candidates message. With Barack Obama using leading the web in search, and John McCain leading in Paid Search it is no wonder that Google is using the political season as yet another way to test some new products in Google Labs.

“In Quotes” compares the candidates views on issues side by side. The idea here is to let the searcher know who said what, and how the candidates differ side by side. The applications of this feature beyond politics aren’t part of the test, but I am sure many B2B buyers would love to use this feature to compare possible competing vendors.

“GAudi” or Google Audio Indexing begins the real connection between Google and YouTube as the search giant tries it’s had at audio indexing. Anyone who has tried any of the image or video searches by any search engine knows they are typically unreliable. If Google can get it right with YouTube, perhaps users could expect an improvement in non-text based search technology.

Now if only they indexed the third-party candidates like the Libertarians and the Green Party this may actually bring some real progress to politics and voters knowledge base. But just because Google says that they are looking to improve user experience doesn’t mean they don’t have a vested interest in towing the Republicrat line. After all, with the Yahoo! ad deal on the table they just aren’t looking to really give great information, just a beta.

What Percentage of Marketing should be Search Marketing?

Currently the portion of the advertising budget being spent on search marketing has been increasing much faster than other advertising forms, and for many businesses it is difficult to gauge what percentage of their media spend should be allocated to search. From 2006 to 2007 ad spend on Search advertising increaded by almost 19% according to Neilsen’s. In December of last year ComScore reported the top five search engines had increased their share by 15%, totaling almost 100% of search queries. So the traffic is becoming limited to a few lanes, and reaching it has become even easier for advertisers.
But what percentage of media budget is usually spent on search? Sources vary greatly, but it breaks down that in the US search budget for an average company is about 11% of their marketing budget. Dies this mean that 11% needs to be your budget, no. What it is is a starting point, from which to begin the discussion of what id the best way to spend your marketing budget as a small business.

With over 99% of search moving through five search engines it is then good to start by looking to gain exposure across all five of these engines. Too many small business owners go with Google because they are the largest, and figure if they have budget left over they will expand to the others. Start with all five, the upfront costs may be a little higher, but the wider range of data and the lower price points of the #2-#5 engines makes it well worth the investment.

According to ComScore the US search share for July 2008 breaks down like this:
#1 Google @ 61.9% (up .4%)
#2 Yahoo @ 20.5% (down .4%)
#3 MSN @ 8.9% (down .3%)
#4 AOL @ 4.5% (up .2%)
#5 Ask @ 4.2% (up .1%)

By breaking down the total search budget by these same ratios a business can make the most informed choice as to where they will get the best ROI, and a positive first impression of search marketing.

AdWords can take it to the Street

One of the biggest competitive advantages that Google’s AdWords platform has over the competitors is

the ability to really fine tune geo targeting.  Lets face it, Chicago is a huge city, with a massive number of residents and neighborhoods. Many businesses thrive, only serving a small geographic area within this large city, or DMA.

With AdWords it is possible to very finely tune the geographic targeting of a campaign, allowing local advertisers to enter into the PPC market with confidence that the traffic they pay for is not in an area they do not serve.

Knowing exactly where ads are going to appear lets advertisers not only target the areas they wish to, but it also allows very specific copy to be written. By knowing exactly where the target audience is advertisers can utilize local terms in ad copy to give the local searcher the best information.

Recently Ask.com included geographic targeting in their advertising platform. Unfortunately, it mimics all the other second tier PPC platforms in that the finest tuning an advertiser can do is to a DMA. If the second tier platforms want to compete with Google they must also give advertisers what we want…          … more ability to fine tune and target.

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