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How Yahoo! SM can beat AdWords

That’s right, I believe that if Yahoo did a two simple things, and two not-so-simple things they could totally take Google down, and put everyone below them out of the business of search. I wrote the post on the Movéo Integrated Blog, (My name for the blog, BTW) and will see how the responses go over there. Please leave a good comment, so I can get the Boss to approve it.It went through a few edits, if I get enough(25) substantive comments I’ll put the original up here. It is quite the rant.

Using Tag lines as AdWords Headlines

Traditional thinking of how to construct an AdWords typically falls into two schools of thought. The first school, championed by Perry Marshall and other Guru’s, is to use dynamic keyword insertion to ensure your headline matches the search query of the user. The second school, promoted by many experts such as David Bullock, is to instead to very finely group keywords so you can write a headline that will always be very specific to what the user searched for. I have always agreed with David.

However, I never shy away from split-testing something new. There are several new styles of headlines I have split-tested that have proven effective.

 

1. Tag Lines as Headlines.  Ex. For NES Rentals I used “Get it in Gear”
2. Brand Centric.  Ex. For Alloyd Products I used “Alloyd Brands”
3. Event Based.  Ex. For Thermosafe I used “See Us at PackExpo”

 

By giving each of these different approaches a chance my client’s ads stood out from the competition, who were set in one of the two typical schools of thought. In PPC ad copywriting one cannot be afraid to try something new. Metrics are so easy to track and analyze that finding the best conversion sources is often just one creative test away. Headlines do not all need to be the same style.

Ranking Importance of PPC Campaigns

Whenever setting up a new pay per click account part of the discussion is what delivers the best ROI for the client, and what are their goals for the campaigns. One of the common ways to separate the importance is with a simple A-B-C ranking.

This ranking is used when determining how much of the monthly budget should be allocated to what campaign. This may seem so simple that the ranking system isn’t necessary but as campaign budgets fluctuate with search traffic and conversion optimization it becomes necessary to have a overall structure to the budgeting importance of each campaign.

So does this mean the C level campaigns are unimportant, and will never be given the attention they need to convert? Of course not, often these campaigns target areas that have a lower profit margin, and higher demand. This allows bids to be set much lower and cost per conversion to be driven down as the demand driven campaign is optimized for ads to be shown only to the most qualified potential conversion.

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>”

You Down wit OPB? - Other People’s Brands

One of the first steps I take in writing a campaign structure outline and summary is to begin doing some shallow keyword research using the top organic search terms, suggestions from the client, and keywords extracted from potential destination URL’s.

For any term that is associated with a product or service there is usually a handful of keywords in the initial list that include the brand name of a product they distribute or of a competitor’s product. Knowing when and how to use these terms is not a yes/no question. For each industry customer expectations and goals while researching a product or service online differ. By understanding the motivation of the prospect we are able to determine whether or not branded keywords, other than those of your own company, should be included in the campaign and at what level of organization.

One example of how competitors’ branded keywords can be used is at the keyword level. Branded keywords in this usage are placed in the ad group organization in the ad group where the keyword would be placed if it did not have the branded term attached. This format is particularly useful when the product offered is not brand specific or when the branded term does not appear on the destination page.

By understanding where using brand names other than your company’s is appropriate you can be sure to offer an appropriate alternative to the online prospect by having your ad appear with a competitor’s search results.

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.

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.

Dynamic Keyword Insertion is Soooooo 2003

Whenever I hear someone who is new to writing AdWords ad copy they inevitably mention great “tricks” they learned from whatever “guru’s” course they took, I know Perry Marshall is responsible for many people using this technique in the worst possible ways. The first one to always come up is dynamic keyword insertion.

Here is what dynamic keyword insertion is physically: {keyword:alternate text}

So you search for “local laundry service”

And see the ad:

Buy local laundry service
Best deals on local laundry service
Limited quantities. Buy Today.
www.store.com/local_laundry_service

I went little overboard, but it illustrates the point. You have seen ads like these, where they use the insertion only once, and you have laughed because it was so irrelevant to what you had searched for. I had heard they were so effective from so many sources that I agreed to do it for one client who had been suggesting it for months, to my resistance. Upon testing we discovered a higher CTR, corresponding to an increased bounce rate, lower conversion rate, and higher cost per conversion.

I have not used dynamic keyword insertion since. I find that it is much easier to properly structure an AdWords account so that each ad group is so finely focused that filling in the 25 character headline at least 2/3 of those characters will be the keyword that every phrase in the ad group has in common. Dynamic keyword really is an effective trick, a trick by the platforms on advertisers who just run for the click, no matter who is doing the clicking. It’s not 2003 anymore, It’s time to think past the click, consider the conversation you are having with prospects, and use your best semantic judgment to design a quality account and not just use a bunch of cheezy tricks.

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