Since sitelinks have been launched in early 2009, they have revolutionalised the way many PPC campaigns are run. The sitelinks allowed campaigns to more specifically target or push certain messages in term providing marketeers with even more touchpoints with potential customers. Since then sitelinks have been expanded and pushed out to multiple devices and have to be considered one of the success stories of recent times in terms of Google product enhancements.

Its intereresting therefore that Google have announced embedded sitelinks which have been rolled out globally bar China, Japan and Korea. With Embedded Sitelinks, there are no additional lines appended to your text ad. Instead, text in your ad that exactly matches one or more of the sitelinks in your campaign will automatically be linked to that sitelink’s destination URL. This means that potential customers should be able to pick the part of your ad that applies directly to their current interests and visit the most specific page for that topic.

To use embedded sitelinks, the campaign must be enabled for Ad Sitelinks. Further to this the ad must appear in the paid search ads which appear above the organic search results, and part of your ad text must exactly match one or more of your Ad Sitelinks. Additionally, embedded sitelinks will only show for ads that don’t meet one or more of the requirements for one- or two-line Ad Sitelinks.

Its getting towards that time of the year again when many of us starting thinking about next years calendar – and what/which conferences we may attend during the course of the year. We in the UK are fairly spoilt for choice. We in the UK are reasonably spoilt for choice with global brands such as SMX/SES, Affiliates conference A4U, the International Search Summit and some out of London fayre in terms of Think Visibility and Sascon.

If you think of any we may have missed out – let me know and we will add them in (and I’m sure people will as is the nature of these polls)

There used to be a time when as marketeers, us SEO’s sat as a very siloed bunch – but times have changed and continue to change at breakneck speed. SEO techniques are increasingly more sophisticated, and with it the way SEO practioners measure and evaluate campaign success, something we covered during a recent post on whether rankings as a metric for success were dead.

One area which is developing very quickly are analytics. Traditionally many SEOs have used traditional tools such as Google Analytics to evalaute their campaign impact much of the time in isolation to other activity which may be going on within an advertisers marketing ix, however as the influence of SEO has grown the traditional big boys within the paid search campaign management marketplace have started to take notice.

In particular, two tools have started to make interesting manouvres into the organic marketplace, namely Atlas and Doubleclick. Before I go further its possibly worth highlighting why I say interesting. Lets create a scenario:

• Client x is running three channels namely PPC, SEO and Display, of which that client is monitoring/managing their campaigns via Doubleclick – SEO is monitored for traffic purposes through Google Analytics – a scenario I would suggest many SEO’s are used to.  For simplicity sake we are only going to use PPC and SEO here though.
• At the end of the month PPCagency A reports on their traffic, leads/sales and lead/sales revenue to the client, using last click attribution from their monitoring systems. At the same time SEOAgency B does the same  – however using Google Analytics as their source for data.
• Client x gets the report and concludes that PPC leads + SEO leads = overall leads and does not take into account any potential cannabilisation from the above mentioned sources.

The problem with the above scenario in a traditional sense is that we are going to have a fairly significant volume of doublecounted leads in the scenario highlighted above for the following reasons

• The PPC tracking system in all likelihood has not been configured to monitor organic traffic and as such will set the cookie for last click to PPC.  Say the user then goes away from the site – and then returns via an organic result – the analytics would pick this up – however the paid search monitoring system will not
• The user then goes on to convert and gets counted as a lead via GA for organic search and as a lead for paid search via the tracking system there. Same lead but attributed to two differenct channels….

Traditionally this has been a very difficult situation to overcome – however increasingly these Paid Search management systems are starting to migrate into the organic search landscape. With Doubleclick for example, one is now able to track organic search like never before, allowing the opportunity to pivot, query and integorate data like never before.

Lets take the scenario outlined above, and incorporate these tools into the framework with a central tracking system in place such as Doubleclick:

• User enters the site via PPC.  User then goes away from the site and returns via organic search. Depending how my system is configured this would now correctly be attributed as an : organic visitor (if last click), paid search visitor (if first click) or blend of paid/organic (if blended option) has been chosen.
• The same principle as highlighted above would then be attributed to conversion as well.

Last Click and Multi-touch attribution models both have their own pros and cons. Many argue that the last click is the most beneficial as around 75% of conversions can be attributed to a single click, however there is an increasing appreciation of the role of other channels apart from search within the conversion matrix. Further to this, assigning attribution back to Local or even offline activity is increasingly important in a blended marketing world.

Such a framework provides a far more ‘realistic’ overview of a clients search landscape and a much truer representation of the true commercial impact of their marketing activity. Doubleclick is one of the tools on the market would appear to have the upper hand at the current moment in time, however other tools Atlas shouldn’t be discounted and what these systems now allow organic search practioners to monitor and report on is the true search engine landscape – often taking into account full channel attribution modelling or ‘search path analysis’.

I should add these aren’t the only two systems on the market – however what I would highlight is that I can’t help thinking having run these blended campaigns on a number of accounts that it provides a much more more intelligent framework to work in where paid search and organic search are configured to work completely in synergy with each other. At the end of the day talk a language that is consistent to both effectively allowing you to compare apples with apples – which I can’t help thinking means less work and more time to spend doing what really makes the difference to your clients  – increasing visibility.

There has been a lot of drivel written over the last couple of weeks – magnified by the Google Instant launch at the beginning of September. Interestingly many of these have centered on the ‘SEO is dead’ angle, the first being Steve Rubel from Edelman and more recently one from Techmap profisicing the same thing. Many of these articles seem to have an underlying tone of SEO being replaced with social media or derivatives thereof or merely removed from a consumers behaviour due to technical changes.

Its disappointing to see articles such as that written by the Techmap rabble suggesting the death of SEO and apparently suggesting budget should be migrated towards social. Whilst there is no doubting the role social media and engagement can play in the online marcomms mix, this needs the support of other channels both on and offline – particularly when one looks to monetize such campaigns in terms of its effect on ROI.

Through many of the agencies I have worked with, integrated SEO has been key. That is not just in terms of the integration of SEO with paid search but how SEO works and integrates with other marketing channels including press, display and affiliates. Note here the mention of integration rather than replacement. These channels are not working in isolation but rather together to produce the best results for the client. Further to this there have been a number of ‘studies’ in terms of the effect of Display/Social media etc on SEO both in terms of ‘share of voice’ (visibility) and in terms of direct return on investment. A recent .Fox Networks/Comscore study found the following:

1. Video and display advertising both successfully increased brand engagement in each of the four campaigns analysed. The average uplift across the campaigns saw site visitation increase by more than a factor of seven over a four week period following exposure to an ad, with consumers three times more likely to conduct search queries using brand or relevant generic terms in the same time period.
2. When evaluating video and display side by side, consumers exposed to video advertising were 28 percent more likely to visit the brand site and nearly twice as likely to conduct a trademark search.
3. Confirming expectations and previous industry understanding, video was able to generate a more immediate impact in the first five exposures than display ads in terms of increases in site visitation and search queries; however, behavioural response for those exposed to display climbed steadily as the number of ad impressions increased..

This highlights quite effectively the natural effect of display advertising directly on the search landscape, and further to this there have been a number of research studies related directly to the impact of social on SEO (further to this the direct impact of social related links and subsequent linkage activity highlight the power that channels such as organic search. Such activity could similarly be done on the effect of TV etc on social media (take for example the Evian TV ads, or Meerkat ads here in the UK whose adverts have gone supersonic on Youtube.

Convergence in media
It is thus more important than ever to think of a converged media, rather than channels in isolation. Increasingly clients are looking for more bang for the buck – particularly given the current economic climate – and as such every pound spent will be scrutinised. Isolating other channels thus is likely to not result in the increased spend you are looking for (well perhaps short term), but rather a lack of understanding of the digital mix.

I have long since advocated that SEO supports multiple channels and really should be central to your marketing communications

• TV – Online distribution of video. Development of Youtube branding/presence etc.
• PR & Press – Online PR and Blogger Relations
• Radio  – Podcasting/Vodcasting + Social Seeding

All these offline channels can work a lot harder when working in collaboration with a digital specialist, simply using these offline is only telling half the story – particularly given that more and more people increasingly are online whilst watching TV or consuming other media.

A Holistic Search Approach
Increasingly agencies in particularly are looking at search as an integrated piece, rather than SEO and PPC operating in isolation. This increasingly can offer

• Greater efficiencies in spend where spend
• Greater share of voice
• Increased awareness of the search landscape as response can be measured side by side rather than in isolation
• Greater awareness of the search path – that is how people interact with your site.

One of the tools aiding such innovation in the sector is the number of tools now able to provide a more blended overview. Take for example Doubleclick, once the domain of Paid Search, which now is able to track natural seach. Such tools allow a more blended overview to be presented, and a more accurate one as one tool is able to offer the insight on both a last click and contributory model – something which is essential to any succesful campaign planning framework.

So what for the future

Rather than the doom mongers which suggest the end of search engine optimisation, one can’t help but feel positive for the future of SEO. Yes our landscape is evolving but surely that has to be a good thing to a certain extent. We as SEO’s now have far more scope of influence than we have ever had, and given the increasing budgets which appear to be migrated towards SEO one has to suggest clients are increasingly aware of how this can be used successful.

Google Instant won’t be the last big change we will have to deal with, there will be more coming – but lets face it without organic search provides the search engines wuith a level of balance, something which is often difficult to achieve purely via paid search inventory, where bigger clients can afford to drive bigger campaigns, with more widespread visibility.  Sure Google is looking to increasingly monetize its real estate – however we have to tailor this with its strive for relevance – and that is where SEO is key to Googles future plans

As part of the ongoing guest bloggers series on Holistic Search, Rob Weatherhead – Operations Director at Latitude Express explores how transparency within the search marketing sector is key to ongoing success

The market for agencies offering search engine marketing over the few years has become increasingly cluttered. Many moons ago when I started on the search marketing career ladder there was very little competition and the number of serious search marketing agencies could be counted on one hand. Since then the market has changed significantly with web developers, hosting companies, media agencies and a growing lists of specialists all competing for the UK’s search marketing budgets. It sometimes seems like each time you speak to a prospect you are faced with a new competitor, somebody you have never come across before, and the list continues to grow.

With this increased competition comes the inevitable focus on price and the margins available for search marketing agencies have been significantly squeezed as competition has increased. Clients have started negotiating harder, and the dreaded procurement team are now a regular participant in the pitch process. On top of this, increased competition puts a natural pressure on agencies to lower or discount their fees in order to secure business.

In this situation I have seen a lot of agencies reducing their fees, sometimes to ridiculous levels, just to win some new business. This approach however does nothing but devalue the services being provided, not just for the agency in question, but the whole market. It also puts the eventual winner of business (assuming they went lowest) at risk once they have to actually deliver for such a low fee. I hate to think how many search contracts are out in the market which are loss making for the incumbent when the maths are done.

I’m pretty sure this trend cannot continue (at least I hope not!) and that competition, and market pricing, will level out. And whilst improved efficiencies, processes, and technology may mean agencies are able to offer services for less, this will not simply be done blindly in an attempt to win new business. But this will only come if the agencies learn that winning loss making business isn’t a long term strategy, and clients are educated and open to the value of the service provided.

Key to this transition is transparency and understanding. If agencies provide transparent pricing models which are built on logic and facts, allowing clients to understand exactly what they are getting for their money, then everybody will be better off. Clients understand more about what they have paid for, and just as importantly, what they haven’t. Whilst agencies can ensure that they are charging a fee for their services that they are comfortable with by providing a “menu” of services and associated costs, thus allowing the client to get more, but at an agreed rate.

And through this level of transparency and understanding you will also foster a greater relationship. Once everybody can see, and is comfortable with, what they are getting from a relationship then on the whole, they will be happier. Non transparent pricing with unclear deliverables are a thing of the past and have been the downfall of many a client relationship, the future is transparent, and the sooner agencies wise up to this fact the better it will be for everyone.

Rob Ousbey, from Distilled found this interesting test from Google where search results are updated on the fly. This is an interesting development as it could have a number of impacts on search behaviour. Interestingly, Rob Managed to pull together a video of it in action.

The following was observed as part of this latest test:

• Users results are updated as they type
• Users do not need to click on search to update their results
• Paid Search results update as well as organic
• Blended search results update as well as the other results

Perhaps the biggest impact on these latest tests could be on the following

1. Paid Search CTR. Just imagine, if this works as it looks as though it does. Every time I am typing my phrase in the results update. Every time the paid search result updates, this updates the PPC result. This could mean that my advert could get a significantly higher volume of impressions than it did previously which in turn could have an impact on the performance and accountability of the paid search ads. Let me put this into context. One of the factors which impacts Paid Search Quality Score, is click through rate. By increasing the potential impressions on non-relevant searches – particularly on phrase or broad heavy searches – the likelihood is the quality score may be impacted and thus advertisers may pay more for their ads as their quality score is lower than it would have been on previous incarnations or under the results page current guise.
2. Search behaviour. Much of the recent research tends to suggest users have been favouring longer tail searches particularly since Google introduced Google Suggest. With the results now impacting on the fly, users may again start to favour much shorter tail terms for entry into the site, as they potentially find the results they want much earlier. Commercially again this may impact the paid search inventory more as much of these results are often more expensive in terms of CPC and thus likely to cost more to potential advertisers as a result.

From a usability perspective, I actually quite like the thought of it, however from an advertiser perspective, I can’t help thinking this could have some quite significant impacts, not least in terms of commercial accountability of the paid search results particularly on accounts where due diligence may not have been placed on the ongoing optimisation of the accounts, or where keyword matching may not have been particularly tight – I would suggest exact/phrase match phrases would be impacted far less.

This is still fairly limited in terms of its rollout however I will certainly be keeping a very close eye on this one

Its one of the worst kept secrets in search, but Google has announced today a number of changes to the way it deals with agencies, unsuprising giving the way the market has evolved significantly over the last couple of years.

Further to this. Google have taken feedback from a number of agencies in terms of both qualifications and working practises and announced a number of improvements to the framework including

• More indepth knowledge required for qualification
• Release of a new ‘Adwords Certified Partner qualification’
• Qualified Partners directory
• Preferred Adwords API Pricing

In particular the qualifications are something which many organisations will be scrambling to achieve over the coming months, particularly given the commercial benefits of a Google backed partners directory.  The more challenging and rigorous process of qualification may also help to raise the profile of the accreditation as a trusted mark of whether a potential partner is any kop or not.

The new certification program will provide agencies and their employees with more up-to-date, comprehensive, strategy-focused training and certification on the latest tools and best practices for managing AdWords accounts, including:

• New training materials to help agencies better understand recent changes in search marketing and AdWords functionality, available via webinar series, learning center, or on-site training at Google
• More challenging certification exams to test practical application of knowledge and best practices (rather than simple recall of knowledge)
• Advanced-level exams to highlight competency in search, display, reporting and analysis

Further to this, agencies which achieve the qualification can opt-in to the partners directory which will allow prospective clients to view potential agency partners who have achieved partner status.

Finally partners will also be able to benefit from reduced API pricing, something which is likely to benefit potentially the larger agencies but something which all the same will benefit both small and large agencies alike.

To find out more, please visit the officialGoogle announcement

After months of planning, we are pleased to announce the launch of SASCon (Search, Analytics and Social Conference) 2010. The event is being held at the Bridgewater Hall in Manchester – and will bring together some of the best digital marketing speakers in the UK including Jon Myers, Richard Gregory and Dixon Jones, but also bringing in some of Europes finest such as Fantomaster and Joost de Valk. More speakers are to be confirmed too.

The event is being organised by a number of industry prominent national and regional search marketeers including Ben McKay (MediaEdge), Richard Gregory (Latitude), Simon Wharton (PushOn), Nicky Wake (Dont Panic), Peter Cobley (iSpy Search) and Peter Young (MediaVest).

SAScon Event Details

Date: April 28th 2010

Venue: The Bridgewater Hall, Manchester, UK

Early Bird Tickets: £225 + VAT (Available until the 1st March 2010)
Early Bird SEMPO / Manchester Digital Member Tickets: £195 + VAT

SAScon is going to be one of the UK’s finest search and social events for those agency and client side looking to excel in their field.

For further information or to book tickets please go to the SASCon website which can be found at www.sascon.co.uk.

If you would like to sponsor the event, please go to our sponsors page or contact Nicky Wake @ Don’t Panic on 01706 828855

To follow SASCon on Twitter go to twitter.com/sasconference

There are a number of potentially sensitive products that Google are currently working on or are close to release phase at present including Google Real Estate currently being trialled in both the US and Australia and the secured loans merchant search options that were beta’d a while back.

That early testing now seems to have paved the way for Adwords Comparison ads, which lets users compare multiple, relevant offers more easily. From their launch post on the Official Adwords blog, they describe the new feature as follows:

AdWords uses a host of targeting and relevancy signals to determine the best ads for each query. However, sometimes a user’s query doesn’t provide enough information for us to confidently predict what they want. Take, for example, users who search for “mortgage.” Do they want a new home loan or a refinance? Do they want a fixed rate or an adjustable rate loan? Comparison Ads improves the ad experience on Google.com by letting users specify exactly what they are looking for and helping them quickly compare relevant offers side by side.

For example for searchers typing in the term mortgage into Google could be presented with a result as follows:

These ads offer more than traditional Adwords ads do, and include a couple of example data plus the option to further refine the loan criteria. Once users have refined their search, they are presented with the results page much like the previous merchant search rollout, which allows them to further refine their search (within the advertisers who are utilising these services)

Once users find an offer that matches their specific needs, they can either call directly or request a quote. If a user requests a quote, Google automatically anonymizes the user’s phone number and sends you a unique code that the advertiser can use to contact the user. Advertisers only pay if a user calls the phone number on theoffer or fills out a form to request a quote.

So what does this mean for users, Google and advertisers.

Well for users this can only be a good thing. More choice easily accessible from the Google search page can only mean users are presented with a greater choice from the SERP’s pages however if it was anything like the previous merchant search testing, the number of advertisers who utilised this was fairly small. This would obviously need to scale up if this was to be of use, however one can imagine some advertisers being very cautious and very wary of the Google behemoth.

That leads us nicely on to advertisers. This is where I can’t help feeling there is likely to be some discontent. The Adwords Comparison ads take up the first position on the sponsored ads options on the Google search page, and as such take up a piece of core real estate, which for terms like mortgages does trigger a high volume (albeit impulse clickers included) of clicks. Align this with the ‘standoutness’ of the ad block itself and you have an onpage feature that carry a significant amount of traction. The net result being

• Advertisers don’t occupy position one
• Advertisers have to work harder to make their ads stand out
• Positioning within secondary results becomes more important

My colleague at Mediavest Jon Myers talks about the search engines as the new landing pages, and this is such a perfect example of that, something designed to create a sticky landing page. The net result, three fold in my opinion

• Mining the long tail becomes every more important
• Creative optimisation and landing page optimisation becomes more important to paid search advertisers
• Natural (and blended) search (SEO) become even more crucial, particularly those core results above the fold on the page

It will be interesting to see whether this test ever makes full rollout, however given its refinements from earlier testing it would appear it is only a matter of time before this sees the full light of day

There have been a number of tweets going round Twitter over the last hour or so relating to combining a PPC and SEO strategy and figures for employing such a tactic. Google and Yahoo for obvious reasons will highlight the benefits of such a tactic, however there are a number of such studies in existance, and the evidence is quite compelling.

99% of C-level executives use the web at work.

52% of executives consider the Internet the most important source of information on business.

C-level execs are online somewhere between 115 minutes and 137 minutes per day.
Source: Harris Interactive & GartnerG2 Study, March 2005

Yahoo have one such example where the following evidence regarding holistic search marketing was producted
Source: Yahoo

Google have a similar bit of research published however whilst the original Yahoo research targeted impact on clickthrough, the Google study was more involved in terms of brand perception and brand association.

Further research by Enquiro and Google continues to reinforce the benefits of a combined PPC/SEO strategy and the effect it has in terms of consumers willingness to purchase following engagement.

The full Enquiro/Google research whitepaper can be found via the Enquiro website (Highly recommended reading).

There are obvious niches where such tactics may not work, and it is often a case of testing (refining and testing again) however I would always advise caution when deciding to blanket turn off PPC once organic traction has been obtained. As the research above suggests, it may not always result in the best ROI.

SMX London is approaching … FAST. Despite the fact it only November since the last SMX London, one of the biggest conferences in the UK Search Marketing agenda is taking place between the 18th and 19th of May 2009.

Speakers include:
Jon Myers – Head of Search – MediaVest
Fellow State of Search founder Bas Van Den Beld – Searchscape: Latest Stats About The Search Engines
Andrew Girdwood – BigMouthMedia – Understanding Searcher Needs & Intent (Suprised to see two Bigmouths on the panel – personally would have preferred to say a ‘difference’ in opinions)
Mel Carson – Microsoft – Brand & Reputation Management Strategies
Dixon Jones – Receptional – Paid Search & Tricky Issues
Ciaran Norris – Altogether Digital – What’s New With Social Media Marketing
Lisa Ditlefsen – Verve Digital – SEO Checkup
Dave Naylor – Bronco – Give it up!

One panel not to miss is certainly the ‘Blow your mind link building’ containing SEM twitterati such as Rand Fishkin, Patrick Altoft and Lyndon Antcliff early on day 2.

A full breakdown of the agenda can be found here.

As one of SMX London’s official blog partners, we are proud to announce that we are able to offer Holistic Search readers 15% off. To take advantage of the offer simply go to http://searchmarketingexpo.com/london/2009/register use the following code:

PEYOUK09

Firstly, I should highlight much of the rationale for this post comes from an earlier post from Bigmouthmedia’s Andrew Girdwood who highlighted the use of search in the current MVA (Thats Monsters vs Aliens) trailers currently doing the rounds on the television here in the UK.

In the final frame of the ad, the viewer is prompted to search for ‘MVA’. Now I am a big fan of prompting viewers to integrate with search for four main reasons

1. Many browsers ‘multi-task’ . That is they watch television whilst browsing the internet.
2. Search phrases are often easier to remember than domains
3. Potential for greater interaction with potential browsers – PPC, Organic and Blended search results
4. Ability to track the influence of the advert.

However the implementation of such campaigns is done very badly, and sadly Monsters vs Aliens is no different. There have already been a number of posts regarding its implementation on Google primarily, mostly regarding the PPC, however it is the lack of organic placement that is a secondary concern. With a rough 75% (organic)/25% (paid) breakdown it hugely suprises me that organic is often a forgotten channel in these campaigns leaving these types of campaigns open to cannabalisation from competitors (albeit limited in the MVA example) and limited impact.

And talking of limited impact, I would add that I would suggest that is exactly what the MVA implementation will be having. Whilst there is no doubt it will inspire users to search…

… What about those searches on Yahoo

Monsters vs Aliens advertising on Yahoo - erm Where??????

and MSN

Monsters vs Aliens on MSN

Now admittedly Google is the majority shareholder as far as search volumes in the UK is concerned however that doesn’t mean Yahoo and MSN should be ignored, particularly if the premise of the campaign is to encourage people to search for the campaign. After all by ignoring the other two engines, surely you are getting a slightly inaccurate reflection of the impact the ad has had on search engine traffic?

It should also be noted the impact it appears to have had as far as searches are concerned.

Impact on search trends

Just imagine the impact it could have had if:

• They had complimented the paid search ad with an organic ad
• They had thought better through the PPC creative
• They had run the ad on multiple engines.
• Considered the impact of blended search. Video search optimisation should have been a given….

Many of these campaigns are still in their infancy, with many organisations still in early rollouts, however one would suggest they may want to think about what they want to get out of the campaign – and develop a campaign best suited to maximising those targets.

At present too many of these campaigns, appear half thought out and half implemented and as such I would suggest are only getting half the returns they could be getting. Moving forward greater integration (and greater thought) is required – if these integrated campaigns are to be a fully effective marketing strategy.

Dave Naylor did a post yesterday regarding the expansion of the favicon testing in the UK, something which has been getting increased coverage over the last couple of weeks. This doesn’t appear to be widespread testing, certainly on all the accounts I tried it on, there was little or no usage of the new ‘branding features’

Source: Dave Naylor

Testing of the ads was first reported on Search Engine Land highlighting testing in Poland and Germany, however recent observations have been reported in the US and the UK suggesting a much broader test.

Given the recent ‘Vince update’, one can’t be suprised with the increased focus on brand within the search results, particularly given the recent ‘improvements’ to the search pages – in particular the increased snippet lengths rolled out last week. I would suggest the increased snippet lengths, the reduced organic search results and the incorporation of blended search must be dragging eyefall (and subsequent CTR) away from paid sources, thus the incorporation of such a visual component can only have a positive impact on CTR for paid search ads.

Other articles on the Google Adwords favicon testing

Dave Naylor – Online Bingo ads in Google

Search Engine Land – Google expands Adwords fav icon test

Kerstin Baker-Ash – Google uses new partner icons in paid search results

This is a response to our previous article on SearchWiki results being shown on Google Adwords results last week. The nice people at Google have sent me a quick FAQ on the SearchWiki Trial. The key points being

• Small Experiment at present
• Troggered only on a small number of SearchWiki users
• Users that remove a result will no longer trigger that specific ad for that user
• Ads do not affect quality score, CPCs or ranking, but may in the future
• Advertisers will not be able to see reports on ad removal at present
• Advertisers are charged for clicks as usual

Below is the response:

What is this experiment?

This is a small experiment to show the SearchWiki “X” next to AdWords ads on Google.com search results pages.

Is there a formal name for this feature?

No.

How big is the experiment?

The experiment triggers for a small number of SearchWiki users. SearchWiki is launched to most (but not all) signed-in US English users.

What happens to ads that users remove?

Ads that users remove will no longer trigger for that user on that query.

Are we using this data to impact advertisers’ Quality Scores or CPCs?

Not at this time. The experiment does not affect Quality Scores, CPCs, ranking, or anything else.

Will we use the data for Quality Score or other purposes in the future?

It it too soon to say how we will use the data in the future.

Are advertisers charged for clicks during this experiment?

Yes, advertisers are charged for clicks as usual.

If an ad is removed, does it still count as an impression?

Yes, any time an ad is shown to a user, an impression is counted.

Can advertisers opt out of this experiment?

No.

Can advertisers see reports on ad removal?

Not in this experiment.

Will we be launching this feature to all users? Will we be expanding it to the content network?

It is too soon to say what the next steps are. We are currently gathering and analyzing the data from this small experiment.

Doing a search on ‘search marketing’ this morning highlighted something new this morning on the image search feature within Google

Paid Search ads on image search

The number of results returned appears limited to three at present, all presented across the top of the results pane, above the image results themselves, and whether this is further extended to follow the traditional search pages is still to be seen.

Whilst the integration of new functionality within the Google pages is not suprising – given all the recent differences noticed, such as the longer description snippets, the timing is suprising given the announcement of a number of tools/services being ceased yesterday.

First impressions are I quite like it, and I can certainly some mileage on it on more visually reliant searches, such as products (ie Golf clubs etc). Time will tell whether this stays or goes the way of Google Notebook

* Hat tip to my colleague at Mediavest, Tom Cull on this one

According to a post on the ‘PPC Hero blog‘ it appears that Yahoo are planning to shut down their Content Match network ads in the UK. The Content Match network efffectively was a contextual ad network which displayed Yahoo’s ads based on the contextual relevancy of the page content to the keywords  the relevant advertisers purchased.

Despite gaining some limited traction in the US, Content Match never really caught fire here in the UK – or anywhere else to be completely honest – however the decision by Yahoo (should the rumour be true) is all the more suprising given the level of revenue generated by Google’s Adsense/Content Network. That however could come down to the quality of many of the publishers (and from my previous experience down to Yahoos ability to police it).

In the email sent to PPC Hero, Content Match is pencilled in to close on the 31st March. Currently however, the YSM UK makes no mention of it on the Content Match product description page, however PPC Hero are quite widely respected in the industry.

The correspondance reads as follows:

As a valued client we are writing to give you advance notice of the closure of our Content Match product in Europe.

The decision to close Content Match underlines our commitment to focus on our Sponsored Search and Display business and to simplify our solutions to deliver a high ROI for our advertisers.

Content Match will close on 31 March 2009, after which the product will no longer be supported. All Advertisers should therefore opt out of the Content Match marketplace by this date. Your account manager will be happy to assist you.

Opt-out instructions: 1. Login to your account. 2. Click on the ‘Administration’ tab. 3. Click on the ‘Edit’ button next to ‘Tactic Settings’ 4. Set ‘Content Match Status’ to OFF. 5. Click on the ‘Save Changes’ button.

We aim to work with you to propose alternative products.

Much like 2008, 2009 is forecast to be another difficult year for businesses. In the UK, we have seen the demise of many established bricks and mortar retailers, household names such as MFI and Woolworths. It is no surprise therefore that advertisers are demanding that their advertising and marketing activities are as effective as possible, and this can only mean that agencies will have to ensure their campaigns are water tight.

It is also a time when advertisers will be looking at trimming wastage from their marketing budgets. We have already seen a number of traditional channels seeing significant falls in spend, areas such as radio in particular. Online is not immune from this, and there is evidence of significant reductions of paid search campaigns and display, affiliate and SEO budgets.

However despite these reductions we are still seeing increasing numbers of advertisers shifting budget allocation from traditional channels to online marketing. These are new and interesting waters for everyone. The last time, many people experienced a recession was in the last century, and many organisations such as Google, Yahoo et all were either in their infancy, or not even thought of. For this reason it is difficult for marketeers to draw directly on any previous experience, however that is not to say, previous experiences should not be discounted.

In particular, during previous recessions – there were examples of many organisations that decided the ‘bunker’ approach. That is – they decided to wait it out, until the recession ends cutting back on assets and investment – including marketing. This often results in an inability to react when market conditions improve – and thus a loss to faster, more nimble competitors. Recessions often see periods of real innovation, and we only have to look at the boom of e-commerce & as a result of search following the dot-com bubble bursting to see how a potential negative can become a positive very, very quickly.

With many downturns, two things often go hand in hand. Accountability on the one , and innovation on the other.  For this reason, I would suggest the winners from this recession are going to be those that innovate during this period – offering clients extra value for their money, and those that invest and provide quality service to their clients.

Accountability is not a difficult thing to cover. In times such as this clients want their money to work even harder. Channels which do not perform will either see reductions in budget, or alternatively the chop altogether. Display for example is seeing falls in budget as marketeers struggle to determine effectiveness.It is therefore imperative, the tools in place to measure effectively – thereby allowing you as the marketeer to make educated decisions based on fact rather than guesswork.  Simple Clickthroughs and traffic are not enough. Conversions and ROI are going to play (and are already playing) a more and more important part – and branding exercises are likely to become more and more scarce.

Spending through a recession may seem like a daft idea, however Dave Morgan of AOL makes an interesting point

“The financial pressure will be severe,” …”When you take out big chunks of money, it’s not just the spend that disappears but also the competition.”

This is likely to mean that two potential scenarios could develop. Areas where ROI cannot be easily determined are likely to see slowdowns in spend (if not reductions) – with channels which deliver on spend seeing increased spend – albeit this comparitively. Expert analysis would suggest channels such as Search (SEO and PPC) are likely to see stability in spend, with other areas such as social media still remaining high on many peoples agendas. Whilst social media has been a bit of a hit and miss channel for many marketeers, there are becoming an ever increasing number of success stories such as Comcast – who have seen successful campaigns on social media platforms such as Twitter, and I would expect the number of success stories to continue to increase in 2009.

Reductions in spend however are reflected in industry figures – E-Marketer have forecast an increase of 8.9% in 2009, from $23.6 billion to $25.7 billion – down from an initial forecast of 14% back in August 2008.  As an agency, we are going to have to work harder to make campaigns work – advertisers are going to be scrutinising all aspects of campaigns, and as a result, I would suggest we are going to see greater movement between agencies over the coming months. It is therefore essential that you get your house in order now – before it is too late.

This is the first post in the Digital Marketing and the Recession series.

71% of people are unaware of how Internet search engine results are compiled – thats the figure that has come from a study from Fasthosts called “Online Search Matters.”. Interesting for many search marketeers particularly those actively employing SEO or PPC campaigns.

Search Page Overview

The study went on to say that the majority of UK browsers either have no idea or an inaccurate view of how online search results are generated perhaps indicative of the level of understanding regarding SEO within the general public. Of the 97 percent of respondants who said that they frequently use search engines, only 29 percent are aware that search results are generated based on the search terms and optimisation techniques used by the individual website owners.

Further to this 24 percent of respondents believe that the search results cannot be affected, while 22 percent suspect that results are ordered entirely according to how much has been paid by the websites listed. The report also stated that:

• 19% say they have no idea at all how results are compiled
• 5% believe that search listings are arranged completely at random.

Staggering…..

Further to this, browsers continued to favour organic search rankings over that of its sponsored partners – with 38% of respondants saying they typically ignore sponsored listings. I personally would caveat such a statement by suggesting this figure is likely to change significantly the more brand or product focussed the search term is – and you would typically see clickthroughs on PPC increase significantly in these circumstances.

However the survery highlighted that 33% of respondents believe the sponsored listings to be ‘less worthy’ and ‘less useful’ than main search results, whilst to other 66% report that they always pay attention first to main results. In terms of demographic breakdown, there was also a significant slant with:

• 40% of women vs 34 % of men will ignore sponsored links whenever they appear as standard
• East England seemed to be the most sceptical towards sponsored listings with 45% of Norwich residents and 43% of Nottingham residents not clicking on them – compared against just 12% from Northern Ireland.

Whilst it should be highlighted this was quite  a small study, with only 1636 people surveyed – it does give us an indication as to the level of awareness out there in relation to search – and in particular the importance of an integrated search marketing approach comprising both SEO and Paid Search.

According to a recent Specific Media study using Comscore data, Display Advertising and Search Marketing are directly correlated. In particular brand and segment related searches jumped by over 100% in a number of areas where consumers were exposed to both display ads and search ads.

The impact of display ads on search – emarketer.com

The report went on to say that search clickers exposed to brand advertising were 22% more likely to produce a sale than those that did not view a display ad. It should be noted that such increases in performance are not merely limited to areas where just display and search are used. The recent Enquiro/Google study suggested that where priority visibility on both paid and organic search were occupied – brand association and purchase intent increased by circa 16%.

Further to this Microsoft’s Young-Bean Song said in a recent article on Clickz that the study results highlighted that search alone was not a standalone solution to customer acquisition

“The issue we have with navigational search is that it completely obliterates the value we’re creating from other digital marketing we’re doing,” Mr. Song told ClickZ. “The idea that search is this magical fountain of customer acquisition—in many cases it’s not.”

There is no doubting that search is reliant on other forms of advertising, one only has to look at other bits of research published over the last couple of years, such as the iProspect Search influencers study, which highlighted that two-thirds (67%) of search engine users are driven to search by an offline channel (37% of them because of TV advertising), and 39% of those offline-influenced search users ultimately make a purchase from the company that prompted their initial search – to see how much more effective search is as part of a multichannel marketing mix.

As budgets become tighter, marketing spends will have to work far harder – however online does have a significant advantage in terms of accountability, key in an environment where ever bit counts. That doesn’t mean however that other channels should be ignored…

One of the things 2008 (particularly by paid search advertising specialists) will be remembered for is the change in trademark rules here in the UK. However the first cracks have started to appear with the news that Interflora UK has started legal proceedings against both Marks & Spencers and Flowers Direct for bidding on Interflora (and various brand related misspellings).

Whilst both M&S and Flowers Direct are not breaking any Google Adwords Policies by bidding on Interflora brand terms, as Google changed the old Adwords Policies back in May this year, which allowed organisations to bid on competitor trademark terms – however they are not allowed to mention trademarks within the ad creative. However, Interflora UK is arguing that the actions of M&S are a breach of trademark law.

Michael Barringer, marketing director of Interflora UK, told OUT-LAW.com:

“The Interflora brand is extremely valuable and we will not tolerate competitors taking advantage of it and infringing our right.

“Throughout its history, Interflora has been forced to use legal means to prevent infringement of its valuable trade marks. This action represents only the beginning of a broader strategy to defend the Interflora mark against infringers.”

A spokeswoman for Marks & Spencers was quoted as saying that they were “extremely surprised by Interflora’s course of action”, adding that it was industry-wide practice and not unlawful.

Whether this will open the floodgates for further legislation remains to be seen, however this bound to have both advertisers and search agencies on the alert.

Brand Reputation is becoming a big word in marketing circles. Warfare is taken place on the search engine results pages for many brands, and is becoming an important part of the Search Marketing professionals armoury. However what should you have in your brand reputation toolkit.

1) Know where you stand

It is very difficult to understand how and where to react to an issue if you do not know what is being said about you, and there is really no reason why you shouldn’t be able to setup even the simplest of monitoring tools without spending hundreds or thousands of pounds on brand reputation software.

Simply implementing a Google Alert on your brand will give you some sort of idea of who, what and where your brand is being talked about. I would add however there are some fantastic brand reputation monitoring tools out there that do pick up a wide variety of content, across a range of different channels, and if you are considering some of these tools some of the better ones are:

• Magpie Brandwatch
• Radian 6
• Market Sentinel
• Sentiment Metrics
• Asomo
• and even Trackur from Andy Beal.

2) Dominate your brand search.

Thomas Cook - Dominating brand

There are various ways of doing this, however it is imperative you make it as difficult for a potential brand detractor to influence any searcher, by reducing visibility below the fold. The example above shows an organisation that does this very well by utilising a mixture of subdomains and domains to dominate the top 10 of searches for ‘Thomas Cook’.

3) Use your paid search tactically

Often a lot of brand reputation issues will arise in public forums such as blogs and forums. A large proportion of these sites will carry various forms of online advertising such as Google Adsense advertising, or other forms of online advertising as a way of monetising their sites.

Use of sponsored search for brand reputation

Where particular issues may arise on a suitable site, it is possible to tailor adverts to particular sites – such as Google Adwords – site placement. These ads may carry creative developed particularly for a particular issue advising browsers of where they may be able to find more applicable factual data.

4) Use your offline channels online

Modern day search pages allow search marketeers to influence a far greater proportion of the search engine results page than ever before including

• Video
• PR
• Product Feeds
• Local Listings
• and Images

Blended search allows greater brand infiltration than ever before

Using the example above, for the iPhone, advertisers are able to use a variety of channels to attract potential custom, including

• the traditional organic listings – where Apple (as you would expect dominate)
• the Paid Listings – allowing advertisers such as Carphone Warehouse and Vodaphone to advertise on these terms

but also

• PR – Taken from Google trusted news sources
• Products – taken from advertisers who have submitted Google Base Feeds.

All these channels allow a far wider variety of usage outside of pure search results, for example the video used above is obviously pulled from Youtube – and has already received nearly 6 million views since it went live.

They also tend to dominate key areas of the page, for example

• Google Products – often visible between positions 1-4 (above the fold of the screen)
• Local – Generally the first result – and highly prominent in terms of eye catchment
• PR – Often within positions 1-5
• Video – Depends but normally anywhere between 1-10

They are in many cases ‘eyeline breakers’, often breaking the natural browse of a results page, and meaning users spend more time on search pages – something Enquiro looked into recently.

5) Use Your affiliates

This is obviously going to be more pertinant to some advertisers more than others, however it is worth noting how much real estate can be taken up by affiliates. Whilst this may be a more expensive way of taking up search page real estate, it can result in some significant coverage, all of which is likely (as long as you treat them right) to result in good brand (and sales focussed) coverage.

The role of affiliates on brand searches

And more:

• Use social media (Will cover this in a later post)
• Is Wikipedia relevant – WHilst you aren’t likely to get any link juice – this does take up valuable real estate
• Create a Squidoo lens

One thing is for sure – don’t just ignore the problem. There are a number of high profile examples out there in, that highlight what happens if things are simply left to fester. Certainly people like Dell have developed a brand reputation response learned from the ‘Dell Hell’ days.

Just been looking at events in November, and noticed a huge logjam of events round the first week of the month.

For us UK search marketing profs, there is Danny Sullivan’s SMX London, running from the 4th to 5th of November 2008 at the New Connaught Rooms in Covent Garden, London (with the (in)famous LondonSEO party wedged inbetween. One for both search marketing bods and potentially clients alike, its always good for a bit of Search Marketing celebrity spotting if nothing else (MediaVest’s very own Jon Myers will be there and is always worth listening to, but there is also the likes of Bigmouthmedia’s Andrew Girdwood, Key Relevance’s Christine Churchill, Alltogether Digital’s Ciaran Norris, Broncos Dave Naylor and (SEM’s serial Mr Fixit- sorry Dixon), Receptionals Dixon Jones – full SMX London agenda here.

For those further up north – there is also the option of the Internet Marketing Show at Manchester’s GMEX on the 4th and 5th of November. Whilst this is a bit more broad in terms of subject coverage it promises to be a superb function with the likes of Steak, MediaVest and MediaEdge all in attendance.

However it is a shame that there is also a big US function on in the same week which I can’t help has affected the potential turnout of some of the US ‘welebrities’. The Ad-Tech New York show takes place from November the 3rd to November the 6th 2008 and includes the likes of Kevin Ryan on the speaker list.

Whichever conference you are attending or thinking of attending – Enjoy.

Whether indeed we are technically in a recession is a different question, however one thing is for sure. Times are tough, and marketing budgets are being squeezed for everything they can in order to maximise ROI. Every penny/cent has to be accountable. It will therefore come as no suprise to many that SEO came out as the most ‘popular’ channel for marketeers in a poll by Lee Odden’s Toprankblog

That itself is a massive boost for SEO, with the incorporation of the channel as a mainstream marketing activity continues. This year in particular has been a particularly good for SEO, with many advertisers shifting budgets into search engine optimisation. Part of this can be put down to marketeers and budget decision makers comfort with SEO, and the ‘disassociation’ from its black art days. I would also suggest the further integration of paid search into many marketing budgets, is another of the reasons behind this pickup in SEO – as many studies by organisations such as Google and Yahoo have highlighted the benefits of utilising a double facing/doubleplay tactic on key terms. Lee also highlights the considerable exploitation of Social Media and the integration of Search Engine Optimisation into many of these technologies.

There were however a couple of interesting stats.

• Affiliate Marketing came into just 11% of respondants. Now this could be dependant on the background of many of the respondants however given the current economic climate, I was suprised to see Affiliate Marketing so low down in this poll
• Video Marketing – Interesting I said not suprising. Certainly I have to say I am not suprised this is down at the bottom. Video Marketing does not have the same direct response ability of other channels such as SEO, Paid Search and Affiliate Marketing. Certainly in times where marketing spends are more flexible I am sure this will significantly increase, however in the meantime, the use of high end video advertising is likely to stay subdued for the forseable future.

Whilst this was just a smallish study, it certainly raises some interesting questions

Its a conversation that has come up often in the past, but as many previous ‘search only specialists’ move to a more cross channel approach are the days of ‘the search specialist really over’.

According to a recent report by search engine marketing specialists, Vertical Leap, only 12% of companies in the UK offering SEO services focus exclusively on search. The report went on to say

“Vertical Leap’s researchers analysed the top 300 pages reported by Google for the search phrase ‘search engine optimisation’.

Duplicates, and any non-commercial sites were then removed and each of the remaining 217 sites were analysed for defining information including their geographical location, the services offered specifically by each ‘specialist’ and those of their parent company.

From the sample of 217 businesses, 83% (181) were UK based. Of these 19% specialised in search engine services. The rest offered web design, email marketing, display advertising and hosting among their many other on-line services. “

However it was Matt Hopkins, Vertical Leap’s Managing Director who raised an interesting question

“For me, the impact of this study is that many different companies are listing SEO as only one of their many services. But are they really capable of delivering the service? Managing and implementing an on-going, effective SEO campaign requires specialist skills and experience. It also requires the internal systems and processes to consistently deliver success for clients…I just don’t believe you can get this from someone who is providing multiple services to multiple clients.”

Its certainly an interesting suggestion from Matt and to a certain degree I can see where Matt is coming from. However working for an agency where we offer a range of online marketing disciples (such as display, affiliate, Paid Search and SEO), I also see how well all channels can work if treated as a cohesive unit.

Much of this has to come down to the level of skill of the personel involved. Certainly at Mediavest we are lucky to have Jon Myers on board, someone well respected in the search community, and are lucky to have a comprehensive ‘learning’ programme in place. Each channel has a number of specialists undertaking the service, and is certainly one of the market leading product offerings across the multiple channels out there.

There is also a process of ‘expansion’ within the search sector. Take search marketing specialists Bigmouthmedia. Not happy with their European/global expansion, they have expanded their product offering to include paid search (old news), Affiliate Marketing and more recently Display. Surely no one could doubt such search credentials despite SEO not being their primary focus any more.

However, Matt is certainly right in one thing

Managing and implementing an on-going, effective SEO campaign requires specialist skills and experience

No-one can definitely argue with that

[ This post from Peter Young's blog contains only his personal opinions. ]

According to an E-Consultancy report, spend on search marketing in the UK is set to slow considerably over the coming year. The report (the annual ‘Search Engine Marketing Buyer’s Guide 2008) predicted that search spend will rise by 24% in 2008, down from 58% year on year growth in 2007 and 65 percent growth in 2006, which in laymens terms would equate to £2.75 billion ($4.9 billion) this year, up from a £2.2 billion ($3.9 billion) spend in 2007. The report predictions are based on the total amount spent on search engine marketing in the U.K., including media spend and money spent on agency services such as paid search management.

Chris Lake from E-Consultancy suggested that this slowdown was not merely down to the economic slow-down but also to a matured UK search market. The report stated:
“Although there is significant room for further growth in spending, the sector is now becoming more established and, as such, cannot keep on such a steep curve indefinitely,” whilst going on to say
“While there remains strong growth in the market, the upward trajectory of search has begun to flatten as the industry has become more mature, as has happened in the United States”.

According to the report the majority of the spend was earmarked for paid search (approximately £2.4 Billion or 88%), with organic search engine optimisation accounting for around a mere £330 million (circa 12%). It should however be noted that year on year SEO spend is expected to increase by 32% this year. That is hardly suprising in my opinion given the saturation of many of the paid search verticals, where cost per click can make entry to the market prohibitive to a certain extent. Whilst there are certain verticals within the organic framework that are certainly as saturated I personally feel there is significantly more growth within the sector, particularly given the greater integration of blended search within the search engine results themselves.