SEM Industry

September 23, 2008

Blogger evolution

Two and a half years ago Susan and I thought that we needed a blogger to help get the word out about our beliefs and support for our still emerging industry. We were in need of a new writer. The industry and business was growing, opportunities to comment constructively and with a bit of humor were plentiful and Susan was complaining that she needed to sleep at least once a week. Still hasn't happened.

When Lisa was interviewed, she was a sweet, shy, quiet girl. Or so we thought. It was obvious that she was a great writer, and from a great school newspaper so we knew she could speak her mind. And so we gave her the new Bruce Clay Blog. Sometimes things come together just the right way and you get magic. You hope it will be exciting and a leader in the industry. We wanted it to take on a life of it' own, and through Lisa it did just that. We found that, quite by accident, we'd found exactly the right person for the right task. It turns out Lisa wasn't just a writer; she was a blogger and an engaging one at that. Her fresh, witty, snarky style (we have other adjectives) gave a new twist to the same old news and it was our privilege to help her grow her voice and find her footing. She's made the blog a must read in an industry full of incredibly smart people and she developed the style for the incredibly complete BC liveblogging style that makes our coverage the best out there. Losing Lisa is a setback for us all.

If we could have kept Lisa forever, we would. Chains, rope and duct tape simply were inappropriate, and the handcuffs offered by cupcakes only go so far when you miss your home. Life intervened and Lisa will be moving back to New York. We'll miss Lisa's voice around here. Her passion and drive were as valuable to the success of our company as her way with words. She has always stood up for what she believed in, fought for those who needed a voice, given a spotlight to emerging talent and shared knowledge freely to everyone. She fit well here and projected the spirit of the company with every post.

I do not think any of our industry blogs has lost such a significant voice, and I'm sure this is not the last. Don't worry; the blog will still be here, albeit in a different fashion, while we try to replace The Lisa. Like a TV newscast that has lost its anchor, we will undergo "Blogger Evolution" and continue to bring our views to the industry. We don't want someone to just imitate Lisa--she's irreplaceable in that sense -- we want to bring in an equally strong voice to move the blog forward from here. And we know that Lisa's voice isn't one that's going to be quiet for long either. You can't keep a good writer down.

She's been part of our team for a long time and she will continue to be part of our family. We wish her all the best and thank her for everything she's given us. Now where's that duct tape?

Posted by Bruce Clay on 09/23/08 at 1:55 PM | Comments (9)
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September 22, 2008

Handing Over The Keys To The Blog

I'm just going to get to it.

After lots of soul searching, heartfelt conversations with friends, and intense debate between Swat, Jack and myself, I'm making the very difficult personal decision to leave Bruce Clay, Inc. and move back to the East Coast just in time to see it obliterated with snow and become a totally unbearable place to live. Or, said simpler, this will be my last week working at and blogging for Bruce Clay, Inc.

Truthfully, I can't begin to express how much I'm going to miss everyone here (except Susan*). The entire Bruce Clay, Inc. organization has been great to me over the past two and a half years and I couldn't have hoped to have been adopted by a better group of people. People who have helped me to grow, stood by me through personal roller coasters, and given me a voice in an industry that I love. And even though I'll be moving on, I will miss them all dearly and will continue to value the wisdom and strong SEO background they have imparted on me.

The fact that I'm leaving is also why last week's post thanking our readers was so important to me. Jim Hedger had no way of knowing the circumstances when he suggested it, but I am glad that I had the opportunity to say "thanks" before the news of my departure was made public. It greatly reduced the amount of snot that wound up on my sleeve.

I'm leaving, but obviously the blog will live on. In my absence, you'll see a tag team of Bruce Clay faces (some old, some new) taking over the blogging reins while they transition and eventually adopt someone new to carry on the nonsense I've helped start here. I have full faith that in a few weeks they'll be able to scrub the Lisa off this thing and make it an even better place for search marketers to hang out.

If you have any desire to be our new blogger/social media person, please send Susan your resume and let her know. I hear she's very excited about the idea of getting someone new to abuse, torture and send for coffee.

And with that, it's time to get back to business. We won't be allowing any emo here on the blog, so don't even try it.

*Okay, that's not even a little bit true. I may just miss Susan most of all.

Posted by Lisa Barone on 09/22/08 at 10:43 AM | Comments (57)
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September 16, 2008

Social Networks More Popular Than Dating, Porn

If that headline doesn't say horrible things about the state of social interaction in the world today, I don't know what does.

Seriously though, an interesting story from Reuters today that says social networks have passed porn in popularity among users. We're all too busy twittering, sphinning and Facebooking that there's no time to head out in search of um, some "adult entertainment". Or maybe users are just confused and think twittering and sphinning are all sexually related activities? (Actually, pretend I didn't just say that. I'd rather not go there.) Adding to that is Jupiter Research's projection that social networking will overtake online dating revenue in 2009.

According to Bill Tancer, the number of users searching for porn has dropped from 20 percent of searches to 10 percent over the past decade. The searches that are leading the pack today are for social networking sites.

There could be lots of reasons for this. Perhaps social networking sites get more searches because they're done at work where searching for porn isn't encouraged. Or maybe searches for porn are just happening on social networking sites (Hi, MySpace!). Logical reasons aside, I'm going to use this as a testament to the fact that social networking is a huge resource for businesses looking to connect with or get to know their audience better. If your customers are spending an increasing amount of time looking for you, you should too.

Personally, I don't really care how many people will admit to searching for porn online. We all know that if you asked the entire Internet if they've ever performed an adult search, you'll see that no one does. Nor have they ever. They didn't even know porn existed on the Internet! How odd. What is interesting to me are all the trends that Bill has been able to spot by looking at social media and how users are interacting with it. Trends that if you were a company paying attention to social media, you'd be able to spot for your audience, as well.

In the article, Bill notes that incredibly odd piece of trivia that elbows, belly buttons and ceiling fans are just as scary to people as rejection and social intimacy. He notes how searchers' moods change with certain times of the year, saying that there are definite patterns for Internet searches that repeat specifically and predictably. If you're a search marketer selling cream for scaly elbows, dusters for ceiling fans or swimsuits, that's incredibly important information. Even more important than porn.

I mean, who knew that people were afraid of elbows? I didn't, but if that's true, than maybe you have to be careful the way you market to these freaks folks. Or maybe knowing this is awesome because now you can use fear tactics to send hordes of elbow-fearing people to the stores to pick up your product! Or maybe it's time you start marketing that elbow Halloween costume to really get sales going this year. I'm just saying, once you're, er, armed with this information, it puts you in a better position to address your customers specifically.

As much as search marketers are fascinated with social networks, the general Internet is just as fascinated. They're creating profiles that reflect what they're interested in, what they're afraid of, what they want, what they don't want, what books they're reading, etc. They're giving you an insight into who they are and what they value. And if you're not looking at that, you're a damn fool. Your consumers are generating a story for you to take in and learn from. Tune in.

In case you missed it, yesterday's edition of the SEO Newsletter had a Feature article from yours truly about the 7 Deadly Sins of Social Media, talking about all the ways companies fudge up their social media efforts. You may want to give it a look.

Posted by Lisa Barone on 09/16/08 at 10:35 AM | Comments (1)
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August 26, 2008

Displaying Your SEO Ethics

It's been interesting to see the recent chatter about SEO ethics over the last couple of days. Twitter was all aflutter during the weekend and then Harith brought the conversation to Sphinn asking, "should a SEO company declare its 'SEO Code of Ethics'. It's a topic worth discussing.

I'll start off by saying that while I don't think it's necessary for an SEO company to declare on its Web site what rules they adhere to, I do think it can be an important differentiator for those visiting your site. You have to see the value in letting potential clients know from the very first interaction what they can expect from your company. What better way to start building trust with a client than to lay it all on the table from the very beginning and let them know what the type of search engine optimization and tactics you'll use to improve their Web site?

That has always been the thinking behind our SEO Code of Ethics and Code of Conduct. It's never been about policing the search community or trying to impose rules. It's our way of letting clients and other SEOs know from the start what we believe in. It's also our small way of helping to spread ethical search engine optimization, since we allow likeminded SEOs to take the crest and put it on their own Web site.

Our Code of Ethics and Code of Conduct also helps to set our reputation as an ethical SEO company who puts clients first.

If you were at SES San Jose last week you probably met a search engine jackass or two. Someone who clearly was out to promote themselves. Someone who made claims we all know they can't back up. Someone who acted like a royal jerk in the middle of sessions and whose main agenda seemed to be causing a scene. That's not the kind of behavior we engage in and we want clients to know that from the beginning. We may not be able to promise you a number one Google ranking for every keyword on the planet, but we can promise you ethical SEO and a professional demeanor.

Search-Mojo had a post last week that really resonated with me called Reputation Is Not Absolute - You Must Learn It. In that post, author Catherine Pots writes:

"Is it really worth it to damage what could be a great reputation for playing the game fairly or are you OK with having that crowd of doubters who think (and maybe know) that you cheated to get where you are? I'm not. So I keep it white hat. Mind your reputation, it WILL follow you and if respect is a word that means something in your life, you need to be cautious."

Amen!

Love it. The entire bit of it. That's why we do the type of search engine optimization that we do. Our reputation means a lot to us. We're not going to jeopardize the kind of work we do because a client wants quick rankings. If you want an SEO vendor that's going to dabble in black hat, there are plenty out there that will. We're going to protect our reputations and the reputations of our clients by playing inbounds and doing things the right way.

And that's what our Code of Ethic really means to us. Catherine really hit the nail on the head when she said it's about not risking your reputation. We adhere to the Code of Ethics and Code of Conduct we set out because we think it helps show people what we're about - white hat search engine optimization that puts the client first. That's the reputation and the promise we've created for ourselves and it's something we stick to.

So while I don't think it's necessary for every SEO to put a Code of Ethics on our Web site, I'd encourage you to have a page that shows your clients who you are as a company. For us, that's how our Code of Ethics and Code of Conduct is. If you've never taken the time to read it over, you may be interested in it. And if you agree with what you find there, feel free to sport that crest on your own site. You'd be in good company.

Posted by Lisa Barone on 08/26/08 at 11:03 AM | Comments (7)
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August 19, 2008

Keynote Roundtable: Technical and Information Giants

How awesome is this going to be? Check it out: Kevin Ryan and Mike Grehan are moderating the most fantastic panel on the planet. Matt Cutts (Google), Danny Sullivan (Search Engine Land), Tim Westergreen (Pandora), Robert Scoble (FastCompany.TV), Kirsten Mangers (WebVisible) and Rich LeFurgy (Archer Advisors). It's still dark in here but the glow off the superstars on stage is more than enough to blog by. Lisa and I have super good seats because we got here 45 minutes early to stake out the front row. We're committed. Or should be committed. Debate that in the comments.

Kevin gets us started with some house keeping and more award winners. Yay! Check out the winners on the site. Matt Cutts gets the Editor's Choice award for having cute cats. Or possibly contributions to search marketing.

It is PACKED in here but no less cold. Am going to become a bloggersicle.

Right to left: Mike, Tim, Robert, Kirsten, Matt (Kevin says he's worshipped as a god in some countries), Danny (also a god in some countries), Rich and Kevin. We start with a video. I like those. They're easier to blog. Essentially it's this [Clips from lots and lots of popular media with characters talking about Google, MySpace, YouTube, etc. It's funny, if very, very geeky. Perfect for this audience basically.]

Robert's on his phone through the whole thing.

We start the actual session with a couple quotes from Vint Cerf.

Looking back at the next ten years, now and what's next.

Robert: We're seeing Twitter going down, and it's that these sites get so big, so fast. I was the first to talk about ICQ back in the day. iLike got to 6 million users in the first 6 days. How do you keep up with that demand? You're not going to be able to do that unless you're Google.

Kevin: How did we get here? We started out as just a bunch of geeks. What did this look like when it first started.

Robert: I started out at a camera store and it was all word of mouth. But it was all very inefficient. Now it's become (over time) hyper efficient. He was twittering through the video about being on stage with Matt. [I knew it!]

Matt: I haven't really talked much about the early days of Google on my blog. I stopped working on my Ph.D. to join Google. They didn't even have a lobby. It's wild to look back and say wow, how did this happen how tid this occur. I came to the conclusion that Google should be an advocate for our users. Offline there's Consumer Reports but online it didn't work as well. So that was our role, we tried to make it reputable.

Kevin: Is there a Google killer?

Danny: I think Google's going to be fairly dominant for years to come. Whenever I hear that there's a Google killer is turns me off. They underestimate how hard it is and even if they did have the relevancy and the information they probably wouldn't have. If there's going to be a Google killer, it's going to be Microsoft. At best what you're going to see is incremental stages. YouTube is a classic success story of succeeding where Google could not. Google came along with a great product at the right time and they stuck with it. They succeeded in part because it was user first.

Kevin: So when you go to the VCs, you say 'I'm going to be purchased by Google?"

Mike: Why does there have to be a Google killer? Competition is good. It's brand switching at this point. The average guy sits at the search engine and just does his search. He doesn't care about privacy. He just cares about results.

Robert: I got shown a stealth project and the first thing they said was 'we're not a google killer and we're not Cuil either." More than half of the sites I visit use Google analytics. Microsoft is going to need the same kind of foothold. They're not going to compete on the brand. Even if they get the relevance. How many people search for Yahoo on Google. They don't understand the address bar, they only understand the search box.

Kevin: To the lay person, they just want it to work. It took hours to set up my Slingbox. I just wanted to plug it in. The less thinking the better off we're all going to be. [Reads several quotes from a 2003 article] Do you think it's possible to acquire Yahoo.

Matt: We have a culture of trying to build things ourself. We've had to scale things up. The ability to scale is really tough. People assume that Google is simplicity itself but we do a lot of experiment. We've got more people working on search than ever before. I think Yahoo partners better than we do but I think it's a strength if you can do things in house.

Kevin: Is the first man on the platform the winner?

Tim: Pandora's thought about acquiring Google but we're not there yet. We started Pandora because as a musician, your challenge is reaching an audience. We wanted to do that in a democratic horizontal way. The thing with search is that it's building one big huge popularity contest. I think the next generation is an engine that addresses the sites that never had a chance to be in the Top 10, the Top 100.

Mike: Even if Google brings up 30 million pages a day, 90 million go live and you're never going to see that. In terms of the way that Google led the way by emphasizing linking. The voice of the end user is important. They can't link to you so there's got to be more than than.

Kevin: To most of the world, local is mission critical. How is that process evolving? Are small businesses engaging?

Kirsten: No. I asked Matt what the killer local app is and it's Urban Spoon. (Hee, she says she's both the token female and the redheaded stepchild.) [Robert explains what Urban Spoon is] The problem with online is that you only get what's cool not what's convenient. It needs to do a better job of bringing buyer and seller together. The content needs to get online. They don't understand it on a local level how to do that yet. No one just comes to a site. You have to go out and buy eyeballs. We have a long way to go before we can make Urban Spoon relevant, before we get every restaurant on Yelp. We need a hell of a lot of servers and more content and better efficiency. We need to be able to make it simple enough for the local people to understand.

Robert: I think we're going to see a lot of back filling, lots of education.

Kirsten: It would take your average carpet cleaner 31 hours to do what we can do in minutes. They need education.

Kevin: You're not the token female. I invited a lot of women. I prefer women. [Ariana, the other female, was busy]

Rich: I think some of the open local formats for content, like Google KML and Yahoo FireEagle, it's not so much about where the businesses are, it's about where users are. It's about GPS and fixed IP. I think that level of relevance is going to be layered over it and I think it's important. How do you do relevance at scale, that's the point.

Matt: What's made your life easier? Broadband, wireless... I went to Waffle house in Tennessee. They didn't have tablet PCs but they, every single one of them, had cellphone. He was down in LA last week and could look up traffic and restaurants [but not apparently the directions to the BC office, eh Matt?]

Rich: One company to focus on is Nokia. They sell a million phones a day. They have a lot of smart phone capabilities.

Matt: Nokia open sourced Symbian and that was good. Now there's all sorts of open platforms. If you make a great app where someone can run it and install it, you'll see a lot more innovation.

Robert: The right question is who is going to get earlier into the buying behavior. Can I get earlier in the buying behavior and lock up the user before they get to already deciding what to get and where to get it?

Kirsten: Imagine the relevance if Facebook picked up local search. If they took cues from updates.

Tim: From pandora's perspective, local is the motherlode. Our growth rate doubled when we launched the iPhone app. When you look at radio, they have double the revenue of the retail business. We on the Web, we're looking at putting out business on every person the street. [Robert takes over the interviewer role and asks Tim to explain royalties. Kevin thanks him a bit dryly. Tim explains.]

Robert: Search is where you get the transaction. There's lots of things that come before search.

Danny: No, there's search through all parts of the process. You don't know anything about wine, you go to Google and ask it about Google. Then you go back and refine and ask it something else. There's not any time when search isn't part of it. [I heart Danny.]

Kevin: Are consumers doing it backwards? Should people be marketing the way Danny describes? Is there going to be a social rejection of the process?

Matt: We don't want to lock in the users data. All the of the users data can be pulled out. What if you could link it all in and have Google suggest things for you to do. What if, like Robert says, you could get in earlier and find out 'here's this thing you might want to do'

Kevin: Most important things to avoid? Top Trends? Biggest challenges? Today's decisions, tomorrow's consequences?

Tim: The next wave is accommodating big money now. Launching a new car isn't about buying a keyword. How and when will those companies find a way to really make the most of online.

Robert: I agree with that. People are looking for ways to put money online but they're not there yet in understanding how to do that. They're still trying to understand how to spend money online. It's not what they know. Mobile and social are the trends I'm watching right now. Evernote is getting better. The search engines are getting better at finding photos and recognizing the fingerprint of a photo. [Brief discussion of Robert's phones.]

Kirsten: Agrees with both, and expands it from big marketers to all marketers. No plan survives its collision with reality. The future is about becoming Costco. High quality at low cost. It's all about mobile and hyperlocal and "find" instead of search.

Matt: Cloud based storage. If I dropped my laptop, I still wouldn't lose my data because it's stored elsewhere. It's cheaper than ever to do a startup. It costs virtually no money. You can code on weekends and so many opportunities. We haven't even scratched the surface of what's possible.

Danny: Search marketers. As you're watching stuff rolling out and people getting exicted on things that you don't know are going to convert. Don't forget what made you unique as a search marketer. You know how people are looking for information. They seek it in different ways and you understand what those venues are and what it takes to get there. That's what I get concerned about when people get all excited about social or video ads but that's not search. Don't get distracted by the shiny new things. Don't get distracted from your expertise.

Rich: I think the big thing is that agencies realize they have a problem. 4-5 years ago, they were waiting for it to go away but now they know they have a problem. Media exhanges--Google and Doubleclick creating a place for display advertising. I think that's going to squeeze ad networks. You'll see media futures. That's going to take some time to get going. Exchanges are really granular and really scalable.

Q&A

How do I afford anything after I have to pay so much to get all these shiny things?

Kevin: [doesn't quite call Verizon Wireless Nazis.]

Danny: Arguably, the bulk of the people still aren't going to be using smart phones. In the Sex and the City movie, Carrie needs a phone and Sam gives her the iPhone. She doesn't know how to use it. This is not the year of mobile. Next year isn't the year of mobile. It's gradual growth. It's not simple enough yet and not cheap enough yet.

As businesses start to use Twitter and Web Analytics, how do you make those a competitive advantage?

Kevin: I can't believe we just used Twitter and analytics in the same sentence. [Lisa and I said the same thing!]

Robert: You need to create extraordinary experiences. Get people to talk.

Kevin: Use it, don't abuse it.

Kirsten: Keep it simple.

Mike: What's the point of twitter?

Robert: There is no point to Twitter!

[general chatter]

Matt: You find that guy who wants to learn about that stuff anyway and you let them come up with something viral. People move to the things that are interesting to them.

Posted by Susan Esparza on 08/19/08 at 2:49 PM | Comments (2)
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August 18, 2008

Keynote: How Much Search is Enough?

Can I tell you how much I appreciate not having to do a keynote first thing in the morning? So much. Instead of an 8 am call for blogging, we're sitting down for our opening keynote after lunch, which means I'm actually awake for once.

I'm going to need to be alert to keep up with Robert Murray (iProspect), Aaron Goldman (Resolution Media), Steven Kaufman (Digitas) and Bob Tripathi (Discover Financial Services). Kevin Ryan (SES) and Anne Kennedy (Beyond Ink) moderate this roundtable.

Why is it so dark in here?

Kevin first announces some winners for the SES Awards. Congrats to the winners!

The panelists introduce themselves. From left to right: Aaron Goldman, Steven Kaufman, Robert Murray and Bob Tripathi. I say this not for you, but for me. Inevitably I will screw up who is who.

Kevin: what's the best plan? How are you integrating digital strategies? I hear that people say they are doing it but the clients say that they aren't. What's the marketing metrics and mix?

Bob: What I really see is that TV is still dominant but search and online is in there at 12 percent. It's grown 100 percent. [Goes through an example of an intregated ad campaign] Ad creative supporting TV, Brand building ads, Landing pages supporting a TV ad, a microsite supporting the TV spot.

Kevin: Is that pretty consistent with how the campaigns come together?

Robert: I think this is a good example. We just did a study and less than half of marketers are integrating search with other campaigns so this is bleeding edge stuff.

Kevin: How do you stay on budget?

Steven I think it varies by braind by lclient byu the digital nature of the campaign. Google is getting aggressive about pushing youtube, about getting people to upload their TV creatives. The brands are getting savvy that their content is going to live in a lot more places than just on TV.

Ultimately search is where people go to find things.

Aaron: I think one of the things that we need to recognize is that paid search is different than natural search. The budget for natural search isn't usually marketing money. It's IT money, Web site development money. We're starting to see that budget come from creative side now.

Kevin: What sort of things?

Aaron: One of our clients is Gatorade. They built a microsite to support their current ad initiative. We were in there even before the wire frame stage to get them to be more search friendly. We tried, unsuccessfully, to coach them out of Flash. Two years ago, no one was thinking search that early in the design process. On the Internet, your shelf life is indefinite.

Kevin: What do you attribute the changes to? Is it just awareness of search?

Robert: I would say the efficiency of search is really the factor. People are noticing how it returns value.

Bob: It used to be a hard sell because why would they take the money out of TV? But now they're seeing it's a much better channel.

Aaron: I think a lot of it is education. Shows like this that are teaching CEOs and CMOs that it's worth it.

Kevin: Where is the money coming from? Where does holistic start?

Anne: Where it starts is by using measurement. Search is the one medium that's truly accountable and trackable. What I'm wondering is when you're looking around companies and agencies, is it being used and can it be used better?

Robert: He has a client who is very advanced. What they will do is see how they can do the direct capture stuff first and then work on demand generation stuff. They actually budget for the media cost in the long term. Costs are going up and you have forecast for it.

Steven: Same sort of thing, there's the demand side of the business and the branding/generation side of the business and there's opportunities in both. Google needs to work on selling on a CPM basis for the branding side.

Aaron: We're starting to use search to justify traditional media budgets. We're matching up query volume to TV broadcast. When something goes national we can see the search spike and that way we're able to show the value in TV advertising. That accountability wasn't there before.

Kevin: I want to go back to the search needing to do better of selling branding. Yahoo has searchlight awards. They launched campaigns specifically to spend money and hoped people wouldn't click on the ads.

Steven: If you search for Special K on Yahoo, there's a special branded ad. That's what I mean by Google needs to do a better job. It needs to be more than 70 characters to say what you want.

Aaron: Even text only there's studies from GYM that show that visitors do end up with a brand lift just from viewing text. We need to do a better job of capitalizing on that and the engines need to advertise that to the agencies more.

Robert: People assume that the brands that show up high in the results are the brands that are top in their field.

Steven: It's a problem because what we want is the branding not the clicks.

[Kevin takes a second to ask about how lunch was and the silence is telling... and now onto more discussion]

Robert: The most advanced marketers are the ones who invest the incremental dollar provided they can prove ROI metrics. The thing that may drive proportional spend depends on where your market is in its life spend. If you're in a growing category, you're going to see a different lift than one that you've been doing a while.

Anne: there was a study that came out in June that baby boomers aren't really interested in doing business online as a whole, if they see a web site mentioned in regular press some extraordinary number like 90 percent will visit the site and seventy five percent will convert.

Robert: We did a very similar study, two thirds went to do the search and 37 percent actually purchased from that brand.

Steven: You can't make people search more by spending more on search but you can make them search more by spending more on other media.

Aaron: Digital marketing doesn't work like traditional marketing, it's not run it at the beginning of the year and take focus groups at the end. People are getting more flexible, making changes after a couple months, seeing what works and moving dollars around.

Robert: One thing I'd add is that clients should have separate testing budgets as well so you're not interrupting the core campaign.

Steven: You're not necessarily going to take money out of TV to search. Brand building through TV really still works.

Kevin: What about resources on the agency side? It seems like they're still morbidly obese with staff on staff on staff and then you go to the online side and it's seven guys versus what 200 people do on the traditional side. There was an agency that laid off 200 traditional people and hired 20 online guys. Are we seeing agencies becoming leaner?

Steven: We're seeing them becoming leaner because they have to. They're becoming more accountable for spend and clients are asking for more for less.

Aaron: We're seeing the larger guys diffuse their online teams into the rest of the teams. There's not an online team anymore.

Kevin: Are they /really/ coming together? Or are they just saying they are?

Aaron: They're really doing it. We're making progress.

Kevin: They think they're better than us. Traditional people really do. [Kevin rants a little. Hee.]

Steven: I think they're getting better. The TV guides can now say look TV good, search shows TV good. So they're embracing it a little more.

Robert: 8 years ago it was an education process but nowadays people are really starting to get into SEO and understand how important it is and understanding the longer term yield.

Kevin: Is that the blended search integration? Is it less ads? What's fueling that interest?

Robert: I would say the driver is the increasing cost of all other media. 6 out of ten people are going to click the organic, that's a big driver. And yes, blended is changing click through rates.

Bob: I think people are realizing the organic side goes much further.

Takeaways?

Steven: Tip one: Recognize the outcome that you're hoping to achieve and measure everything that you're doing.

Robert: Recognize the difference between demand capture and demand generation, know your customer's lifetime value and build in a test budget.

Bob: Educate your organizations. Maximize your spend, and figure out how you can take it further on the web

Aaron: Be open and be fluid with your budget allocation. Don't just stick it one place and leave it there. From the consumer standpoint it's all fluid so you have to mirror that with your budgets too.

Kevin: For a lot of people search is the only advertising they do. They don't have money for TV, they don't have money for the rest of this.

Q&A

My companies don't have any marketing budget, they just brought me on and they don't understand ANY of the marketing side. What's my best way to educate them?

Steven: Find a new client. [Hee!] It doesn't have to be that complex. Google makes it simple. Start small, keep it simple, show them results from other clients. Don't overcomplicate it.

Kevin: Eat the cake one piece at time.

Robert: You don't have to start big, just start. SEMPO has a lot of great resources. But you have to start somewhere. Start small and build.

Kevin: What are the some of things that you can do to start small and get small victories?

Robert: You have to start with Google I would say. PPC is good to start with. SEO is not going to yield short term results, put it on the back burner for now.

Who is going to control the display ads budget?

Steven: ON the content side it's probably mistakenly viewed as PPC and held to the same standard. It can't do that. The traditional agencies aren't going to understand that and the digital agencies are going to have the advantage.

Robert: Google and Yahoos are going to provide tools for that and that's going to put the people in this room into the drivers seat on those campaigns.

If the Yahoo/Google deal goes through, what effect will it have?

Panelists: [silence reigns]

Kevin: They're screwed, thanks for coming everybody!

Aaron: I think there are two schools of thought: They're going to be more open and more transparent. And they're going to have more scale. All the individual segments are going to be more

Kevin: Okay, just answer yes or no. Hypothetically: Do you still have a search agency when all your traffic is coming from 90 percent of one engine?

Steven: No.

Kevin: Thanks everybody!

Posted by Susan Esparza on 08/18/08 at 2:33 PM | Comments (0)
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August 12, 2008

Congress To Regulate Online Ads; Tomorrow SEO?

I don't know about you but I'm getting totally sucked in to Congress' recent interest in Web privacy. In case you haven't been following, on August 1, the House Committee on Energy and Commerce sent letters ordering 33 cable and Internet companies, including some of your favorite search engines, to explain their privacy standards and what information they're collecting from users for monitoring purposes.

And now that the results are coming in, we're all gathered around in fear waiting for someone to come and pick poor Congress off the floor. I think its head just exploded. IT seems online advertising isn't made up of as many unicorns, bunnies and rainbows as Congress initially thought.

Seriously, Congress seems just a bit too surprised with the information being reported, deciding that it's time for some rules and regulations to be applied to Web advertising. Edward J. Markey went as far as to say he would like to introduce an online-privacy Bill of Rights some time next year that would require companies to include an opt-in tracking policy that explained what information they were collecting and how it would be used.

Amen and hallelujah!

So what is Congress all worked up about?

Well, they didn't seem to like that companies like broadband providers Cable One and Knowlogy admitted to using deep-packet inspection in trials without first informing users. They also didn't seem to be aware that the reasoning behind Google's DoubleClick acquisition was so that they could track users with the hopes of serving better ads. Methinks Congress should start reading Search Engine Land, with a dash of our Friday Recaps.

In Google's letter to Congress, they admitted that had been doing some testing with DoubleClick recently, knowing that Congress likely read Google's recent blog post touting that they can see the number of people who have seen an ad campaign and how many users visited their sites after seeing an ad. However, they tried to clean off their halo by being adamant that they do NOT use deep-packet inspection like some of those other bad companies do.

Well, of course you don't Google. You don't have to because you already know more about Web users than anyone else in the world. You're the biggest search engine on the Web, getting information from Google Analytics, AdSense, and a host of other services. You don't get an (edible) cookie when you have that entire data treasure chest to work from.

I'm glad to see Congress getting more involved with online advertising practices, maybe it'll wake companies up that at least some body of law is watching. If you're going to use behavioral targeting, make sure you're upfront about it and that you make it easy for users to opt-out if they don't want it. When companies don't do that and make it difficult for consumers to know what information is being tracked, it sours everything. Interestingly, according to the Washington Post article, some small businesses claim that if Congress institutes a law making opt-in a requirement for targeting it will hurt their ability to learn about their customers. Please, people! Find another way than being deceitful. That argument sounds nothing more than a child angry that his father is taking away toys he shouldn't have been playing with in the first place.

As interesting as it is to watch Congress get up in Google's face, I think the reason I'm so enthralled in this whole fight is because I'm looking bigger. It's an excellent example of what happens when an industry doesn't set standards for itself and goes unregulated for too long. In case you didn't get the memo, search engine optimization is also a form of online advertising. We're looking at our future here. You can fight that SEO doesn't need standards and that you don't want someone telling you how to optimize a Web site, but it's coming. SEO is advertising and advertising needs to be regulated, just like Google and the others are finding out now. If we're not proactive about outlining what we do, it's not going to be long before Congress comes knocking and does the same thing to us that they're doing to Google. Enjoy your wild west of spamming now.

Posted by Lisa Barone on 08/12/08 at 2:37 PM | Comments (5)
See more entries in Pay Per Click, SEM Industry, SEO, Search Engine Optimization

August 7, 2008

The Adolescence of SEO

Editor's Note: Kate Morris is our next guestblogger. She's going to share some war stories and give us some food for thought about SEO's growing pains.--Susan

Back in the day, selling SEO/M services was relatively easy. The internet was "new," business owners were completely oblivious to the craft of search engine optimization, and were willing to pay people to "get them on the web." Those were the days when SEOs spent the majority of time on education (as much as we hated it), the rest on keyword density and link building. Life was good.

Today we are at the point when we not only get clients that have never done search engine marketing, but also the clients that:

• are not happy with the service they are getting with another reputable agency
• got duped by one of the many the SEO scams out there
• have decided that they want to bring the service in-house

There are many reasons why they want to change tactics, some good and some bad. The good reasons maybe that the in-house has reached their threshold and need help in specific areas. The current agency may be too focused on core tactics and the client wants something more. This can sometimes be a bad thing though, especially when the client thinks they are getting high level services when they are only getting the bare minimum. This is starting to happen more and more recently.

On the flip side, the client may have been talked into doing some pretty shady things, made some bad decisions, and aren't even aware they are being penalized for the actions of others. All they know is their online traffic and sales have dropped. We have all seen the horror stories, but here are a few of the most recent ones I've seen.

• Paid links through brokers
  

  This is a grey area for most people in SEM, but we all know if found selling, you can get penalized. If found buying, the links don't work as they were supposed to work. What happens is some agencies have not made their clients aware of this. That $10K spent on links? Worthless. It's not a fact over the entire internet, but it is becoming a reality more and more every day.

• Traffic Power and other nominal monthly fee products
  

  This was one of the most common ones, but thankfully business owners are getting a little smarter about these promises. Score one for the SEM industry. But it does still happen, clients pay $500 to be #1, and get nothing. Reeducation about expectations and actual prices of services can be difficult in these situations.

• JavaScript <body> redirect
  

  One client had previously had terrible cloaking technologies implemented on their site, a JavaScript onMouseOver event that triggered a redirect within the <body> tag. Apparently, this was done by the agency in a wholesale manner to hundreds of clients. Ouch

• .asp doorway pages
  

  An agency once had created .asp doorway pages that referenced pages on the client's website. So instead of having the real pages on the clients' actually site, they were just being pulled in from the SEO's server. And when the client didn't renew their services, the SEO Company killed all of the pages that were being pulled in by the clients' site.

• Stolen Content
  

  In one instance, a new client had an in-house employee doing all of their SEO/web design before they changed services. It turns out that the in-house guy had stolen all of the content for their informational pages from a competitor's site that was going well in the rankings. And to top it off, the guy actually left all of the links within the content that was pointing to the site they he had stolen the content from.

• Hidden Links
  

  One of my first stories, a client's last in-house had placed hidden links in their ecommerce system, built in house and licensed to other companies. So these links to an internal site (one of about thirty) were on other's sites. I found it because a client called and complained, rightfully. I removed all instances of the hidden links and educated the company on Google guidelines. They hired the guy back when I left...

What's my point? Just to tell you horror stories? We love to hear them, it builds camaraderie ... okay, I have a point, swear.

My point is that we have to change how we present our services. SEO is not dead as many have suggested. It's just that sales pitches are no longer just about building presence online and conversions, but rather perfecting the system. Clients today are looking for the next step; they want the idea that is going to set them apart online since some industries are in tough battles for top spots in the SERPs.

When you are approaching a new client that has been with former agencies or services, plainly ask that perspective company what is wrong with their website and how they would fix it. This will give you some insight to where they are in the process and where you need to start. Then you can launch into how you can help. While you do not have to go into detail (but some free advice will sometimes close the deal real fast), the fact that you are willing to tell them what is wrong will let them know that you know what you should know about SEO.

Tip for Agencies: If you have a sales team, teach them the basics (training is key!) but also teach them how to identify the clients wanting that next step and what to pitch to them. All small business owners want SEO to be a process and it can be, but those same small business owners are getting smart. We've done our job for some of them, and they now want us to go the extra mile.

It's time for us as internet marketers to step outside the box and get back to our creative core. Internet marketing is not a process, it's an adventure.

Kate Morris is the In-House SEM for RateGenius. You can find her on her blog and on Twitter. She wants to thank Casey Yandle and Scott Polk for their examples.

Posted by Guest Author on 08/ 7/08 at 10:49 AM | Comments (8)
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August 5, 2008

That's Just Not Cuil

Editor's Note: (Super)mom Jordan McCollum just had a new baby girl and still managed to get us an entry for our Guest Blogging week. All I managed to do this morning was get coffee. Thanks, Jordan!--Susan

For all the press it generated, it's not too surprising that Cuil didn't live up to expectations. While Cuil boasted it was bigger, more relevant and more private than Google, most people quickly panned the limited index, the three-column search results layout and the technical glitches. But amid the mistakes of the launch, there were a few things they did right, too.

Working against Cuil:

Hype—When the Wall Street Journal trumpets your launch, it's probably going to be difficult to keep up with not only the expectations you're setting, but also the traffic you get. Remember, nothing kills an inferior product faster than superior PR.

Selling points—You're certainly not going to impress people in the industry touting your index size and relevance (especially not if you don't live up to the claims). While both of these metrics sound good to the average user, they're usually not enough to make them consider a permanent switch of their default search engine (again, especially not if you don't live up to the claims).

Brand recognition—This is a big one. If nobody can spell or pronounce your name, it will be exceedingly difficult for them to get to your site. My husband works for a company with an unusually-spelled name like Cuil—it's pronounced like a "real" word, but it's not spelled like its homophone. I can only imagine how much type-in traffic (not to mention email) is lost because people can't spell the name. Yes, all the good domains are taken, but . . . come on. That word is "quill."

Brand recognition again—This is such a big one that it deserves mentioning again. Remember that study last year, the one that said that people don't really "see" relevance? What made them say results were relevant was the brand on the top of the page—the exact same results were magically more relevant with a Google or Yahoo logo.

Actual traffic—Despite the fact that traffic overloaded Cuil's servers, during its first day of life, the search engine only barely cracked the top 10 search engines as measured by Hitwise. Tuesday, it slipped to #12. Worse yet, more than a third of its first-day traffic was from other search engines (and more than a quarter came from news and media sites). Breaking the top 20 during your first week is good, of course, but you might expect coverage by the WSJ would generate more than 0.6% of search engine traffic.

Working for Cuil:

Attention—If you can get the WSJ to cover the launch, your PR department (or is that just PR person?) should get a pizza party. Or at least a pizza.

Focus on Google's weak point—privacy—While a lot of search engines do have excellent privacy features, privacy was probably the strongest of the three features that Cuil touted the most. It was possibly the best selling point they were going to have. With fervor over Google's perceived invasions of privacy renewed every few weeks, for the most part the only thing that has kept many of the privacy-emphasizing search engines back is lack of publicity—something Cuil had in spades.

The moral of the story: never, ever describe yourself (or allow yourself to be described, if you can help it) as a "Google killer." We've been disappointed too many times by that hype. It's a kiss of death.

Instead (and this lesson isn't just for search engine startups), focus on things that are truly unique and worthwhile to your users—and deliver.

Jordan McCollum is the assistant editor of Marketing Pilgrim, an Internet marketing news site. She has worked in search engine optimization, content creation, web analytics, and, of course, blogging.

Posted by Guest Author on 08/ 5/08 at 11:57 AM | Comments (1)
See more entries in Branding, SEM Industry, Search Engines

July 7, 2008

Bruce Clay Housekeeping

[dramatic exhale]

Hi, kids. It's the first day back after the delicious, most relaxing three day break ever which means one thing - OMGZ there's a lot of work to do! With so many nuggets and developments and news bits floating around my head, I thought sharing them with you would help me des-tress and get it all out there.

So, without further ado, here's all the Bruce Clay stuff going on that you need to know about.

We're Hiring!

If you're a content writer, programmer, SEO analyst, analytics fan or any mix of the four, and you want to work for a company that believes, practices and preaches ethical SEO, send us your resume. [Please! --Susan]

All fluff and pitch aside, things are happening and coming together at an amazing pace right now. Maybe it's the recession and companies need to hire an SEO vendor they can trust to get them visibility without encroaching on bad areas, but we have some great things happening right now. Interesting projects are coming in, wall-sized white boards are filling up (next we get to write on the walls!) and we're literally bursting at the seams. As much as new people often scare me, we're hiring. In all areas. Right now.

If you're in Southern California and interested in joining the team, I'd encourage you to check out the Bruce Clay, Inc. employment page and see if you're a fit.

Where In The World Is Lisa?

I'm asked a lot what conferences we're going to next, whether we'll be liveblogging and if Bruce will be presenting. To help put some of those questions to rest (and save my inbox some), here's a short list of where we'll be in the coming months.

• BlogHer (July 18-19): Later this month I get to head up to San Francisco and experience my first BlogHer. I'm quite excited. Not only will I get to connect with other women who blog and share war stories and hugs and bond, but it will be my first face-to-face with Heather Armstrong, the woman who is secretly living the life that I want. You have no idea what represents for me. I hope I'm brave enough to introduce myself to her. The safe bet is that I sit in the front row, stare and then look away when her eyes are about to meet mine.

  Also, no liveblogging. I'll be attending the show like a normal person and reporting on what I learned once I return.

• SES San Jose (August 18-21): Next month is the big SES show and Bruce Clay will definitely be there. I also hear a rumor you'll be getting all three Bruce Clay Writers, so how lucky are you? We'll be liveblogging, Bruce will be speaking, and there will be lots of other team members to talk to and field your questions. We'll also be doing some SES speaker interviews before the big show, so look for that.


• BlogWorldExpo (September 20-21): Two blogging conferences in three months? It's like Christmas! After having way too much fun last year, Bruce is sending me back to BlogWorld to relive it. Again, no liveblogging. I get to be a normal person for a few days. Or at least, try to convince people that I'm a normal person. It's probably good the show only lasts a few days.

  I'm also hoping to have a blog interview with BlogWorld CEO & Founder Rick Calvert, so I'm pretty excited about that as well.

The SEO Newsletter Is Going Monthly

Starting on July 15th, our biweekly SEO Newsletter is going back to its roots and once again becoming a monthly publication. It hurts us a bit to do it, but with all the traveling, conferences and internal projects, we need the lighter schedule to ensure we maintain the quality of the newsletter we put out. I mentioned we were hiring, right?

There are actually two more really big announcements to make, but I'll save them for their own post when the time is right. Yeah, that's right; I'm going to make you wait a little more. ;)

Posted by Lisa Barone on 07/ 7/08 at 3:10 PM | Comments (0)
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June 19, 2008

Fight For Your Right To Desphinn

I've come across a few threads on the subject of desphinning and now I'm just plain curious: Do you desphinn your colleagues when you visit Sphinn? If so, what criteria you use? Do you simply have to disagree, find the content offensive, or maybe you only desphinn when something is blatantly spam? Would you desphinn more often if it was anonymous and you didn't have to provide a reason?

Yeah, you would, don't lie!

As most are aware, the desphinn feature was added to the site back in February. At the time, Michelle explained how it should be used as follows:

"You see a topic on the What's New page and you either disagree with it or otherwise think that it doesn't deserve to go Hot - make it to the home page. You click the "Desphinn" button, submit your comment (which is required and will be public) explaining why you disagree with the post. Then a negative sphinn is applied against the story. For stories on the home page, that have already gone hot, the procedure is the same. "

Cool, but here's the thing, hardly anyone actually uses it. Why?

I'm not the most active Sphinn user, but I do visit the site every day. I subscribe to RSS feeds for both the Hot Topics and the New Topics. I may not vote on every story that comes my way, but I do click through to the site and spend a decent amount of time reading the articles, leaving comments when inclined, and seeing what the conversation is about. In that time I've desphinn'd a total of three articles - two were pure fluff that I didn't think deserved to hit the front page and one was an article that I found offensive and of little value. That's it. Three articles.

And those really are my two tests. I will only desphinn content for the following reasons:

• The content has no real value to the community and doesn't deserve to be listed.
• It's offensive to either me or to my community.

I won't desphinn if it's spam (there's a Spam button for that), if I disagree with it, if it's written by a competitor, etc. I have two reasons and that's it.

Even saying that, I know there are times when I've wanted to desphinn something but haven't and there are reasons for that. Kevin Muldoon was on the same page wondering why don't Sphinn users desphinn. I think the reason for that is pretty clear: no one wants to make enemies or be seen as a jerk. No one wants to offend anyone else. There have definitely been times when I wanted to desphinn something but then didn't when I saw who posted it. Let's not lie; some of us take these things more to heart than others. I don't want to kill anyone's morning.

At the same time, I also don't think walking around on eggshells, leaving comments you don't mean, or turning a blind eye to bad information is good for this industry. If something doesn't deserve to be promoted to the front page, for God's sake, desphinn it. That's why the feature is there. You're not insulting anyone, you're protecting the quality of a social community that hundreds (thousands?) turn to every day for Internet marketing information.

Another thread on Sphinn asks if desphinning something is rude. It's only rude if you want it to be. There's no reason why you can't desphinn something without coming off like a jerk. Simply hit the desphinn link and then state your case like an adult. People should be able to handle that. If not, it's because we hand out too many trophies these days and issue too many unwarranted pats on the back. Realize that sometimes people just have differing opinions. It doesn't mean everyone hates you. Realize that you don't have to Sphinn a post about who Matt Cutts follows on Twitter simply because Matt is mentioned in the title and he's SEO royalty. Matt, I love you, and I'm glad to have you as a follower, but who cares? :)

Part of me really wishes the option to desphinn was anonymous, similar to how you can vote up and down people's comments. I completely understand that Danny is trying to promote transparent and ethical behavior, but what he's really done (with the best intentions) is to create an environment where people are afraid to speak up. People often say that anonymity is what fuels bad behavior on the Web, but it's just as dangerous when people are afraid to act because they don't want to be seen as the bad guy. Rendering people into silence is, in my opinion, even worse than giving an idiot a microphone.

If there's something on Sphinn that shouldn't be there, desphinn it. If you disagree with something to the point where leaving a comment doesn't seem like enough, desphinn it. Some of our more sensitive industry faces may get a case of hurt feelings (I proudly admit to sometimes playing on Team Oversensitive SEO Babies), but as long as you're acting professionally, they'll get over it.

Go find something that doesn't belong on Sphinn and desphinn it. It may just make your entire day.

Posted by Lisa Barone on 06/19/08 at 4:08 PM | Comments (4)
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June 4, 2008

Search Marketing & Surviving a Recession

It's a brand new morning and a new day of sessions. We're starting off on such a cheerful note: Search Marketing and Surviving A Recession. Jeffrey K. Rohrs is moderating this discussion-based session. Our speakers are Andrew Beckman, President, Location3 Media; Dave Davies, CEO, Beanstalk Search Engine Positioning; Russ Mann, CEO, Covario; and Jon Miller, Vice President, Marketing, Marketo.

As an introduction each speaker gives their take on the state of the recession. Andrew says that the recession has been mild thus far, but is trending in the wrong direction. He says that search marketing is a pretty safe industry; however, success comes at a higher cost. Dave is based out of Canada and so says that his view of the impact of the recession is different. He says the biggest effect is due to the value of the dollar. Russ says that rather than half empty or half full, the glass is overflowing. He says that marketing spend is significantly shifting online. Jon is optimistic about the economy, but as a realist, recognizes that some people are struggling.

Are we in a recession?

Dave thinks yes, as evidenced by the decreasing value of the dollar. Russ says that we've been skirting a recession as well as stagflation, more recently. He says that some sectors are doing well while others are doing better. Jon says that the catch is how you define a recession. If defined as 2 consecutive quarters of GDP downturn, we haven't seen that - things have been flat. He says that it's the worst possible non-recession.

Andrew says that the recession is industry specific. Consumers have mismanaged their budgets and are now feeling the squeeze. He says they're seeing a pullback, and so his company is analyzing where the few buys are coming from in order to hone in on where purchases are being made.

What worries you?

Russ says that CFOs are tightening up, scrutinizing purchases and media spend. As an analytics software company, he says that marketing is the least provable and least automated part of the business and so it's often the part that loses budget. However analytics is a good measurement for marketers to be able to argue for keeping their budget.

Jon says that companies with deep pockets realize that times of downturn are actually opportunities to double the spending, whereas small companies cut their spending. He thinks that branding will be cut back. Andrew says that companies need to find the new opportunities and is facing a challenge of convincing clients that marketing should not be cut out. Dave says that organic search is provable. His concern is that the success of his clients is declining, due to no fault of their own.

In this environment, where do you put your first marketing dollar?

Andrew says that optimizing for the correct terms and analyzing with the right metrics are the fundamental mainstays. Dave says that he fully agrees. People need to take a good look at their site, watch what users are doing, and provide what they're looking for. Russ says that the first thing is customer research and strategy. He says that no technology or system is the silver bullet unless you get really strategic with the client first. Jon says that when budgets are tight and clicks are fewer, testing and conversion optimization should be the primary focus and customer relationships should be built.

Jeffrey polls the audience: Do you think it's more important to focus on acquisition or retention? A few more people raise their hand for retention than for acquisition.

Do you expect prevailing macroeconomic conditions to lead to increased consolidation?

He says that first you'll see big companies gobble up tech companies. You'll also see lots of fragmentation on the small end and new companies popping up in the search industry. Dave says that we'll see some consolidation in the industry, but not because of recession. That's just where we're at in the evolution of the industry. The money is there and consistent, so companies are now ready to acquire. Jon says that he's seen an increase spending in offer development, specifically offers targeted at people in the later stages in buying.

What SEM-related strategies or tactics help minimize marketer stress?

Russ says that lifetime value modeling is something he tells clients to do. He says that search can be used effectively for retention and lifetime value and expansion. Again, he says it goes back to understanding your client's business and who they are targeting. Jon is constantly surprised by how small business owners don't understand the benefit of SEO. To minimize your stress, he says you have to find a way to tie what you're doing as a marketer to the impact on growth and activity.

Andrew recommends that when your acquisition strategies are in place, look at the conversion percentage. Multivariate landing page tools are critical and will help you increase your lead or sales value. Nothing will help you increase you leads better than what the numbers actually show. Also, he believes that there is a way for affiliate search is a strategy to consider when moving forward in the recession.

Dave ways that providing analytics information and being able to explain it to a client is good for marketers. He said that before you could build it and they will buy. The recession has forced marketers to take a look at what they're doing, and looking hard at analytics and conversions has helped develop the industry.

How do you deal with prospective clients hesitant to jump into SEM, in part due to the fact that you can't guarantee rankings?

Dave says he does guarantee rankings. Andrew says it depends on the term. However, he would help them see that focusing on the content of the site will be of great benefit. Russ says that test and invest is a proven strategy, seen in previous case studies, that he proposes to new potential clients. Rather than guaranteeing first-page-results, he says that it's a process of working toward success.

Some areas have been more heavily affected by the recession. How does this affect SEM and how can marketers leverage the right areas?

Andrew says geotargeting is the answer. Find the stronger local economies. Russ says to look to Asia, where the economy is booming. More clients are asking about how to market and promote their products and services abroad. They're helping clients be included on Baidu.

What areas of the budget are clients moving their budget from in order to redirect it to search?

Dave says that one of the first actions will have to be analyzing yourself and what are you doing. Find the things that are lease effective, trim those and test. Jon says the biggest area where money is wasted is push marketing, advertising that just shouts at the market. Andrew says that search has the opportunity to be both a direct marketing and branding vehicle at the same time. The foundation of search marketing needs to be placed now because fine tuning is a long term program. Russ says that the most money is wasted on short term activity rather than long term value.

Posted by Virginia Nussey on 06/ 4/08 at 10:16 AM | Comments (0)
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