Archive for July, 2009

For Best ROI, SEO Is Still Your Clear Winner

Wednesday, July 22nd, 2009

It is not news that marketing budgets have been severely cut this year and that even paid search marketing allocations are in a slump. What is news, however, is the realization by companies that the so-called “free” search engine marketing program, i.e. search engine optimization, is returning large dividends for companies that are engaging in it. Because of the recession, companies have been forced to look at alternatives to their online marketing programs and, naturally, SEO becomes a lot more interesting now as it can be a low risk, high reward proposition in most cases.

Still, it amazes us that most people have balked at the costs or have not yet signed up for optimization services – even a decade after most people figured out that people, by and large, prefer organic listings over paid ones. The last statistic I read was that the organic listings get clicked over 80% of the time, whereas the paid ones only get 20%. This may be even higher now, as people have started to “get” that “paid listings” are from advertisers… and most people distrust or are skeptical of advertising.

To get your site optimized, you will need to begin with your website. What, we call – ‘on-page’ optimization. Included in these services is keyword research, selection, and assignment, meta tag development, content optimization, image optimization, URL optimization, site submissions, code optimization and several other key factors that will ensure that the search engines can find your site and properly index all of the pages of your site. For most Industries these days, however, on-page optimization is not enough to obtain and sustain rankings. The field has become too competitive and now even the smallest competitor is starting to figure the on-page part out.

Off-page optimization is now the quintessential component to a successful SEO program. In particular, the main question to ask is how “popular” is your site outside of your site?  Included in off-page services are link building activities, social media marketing, online PR, directory inclusion, and many other factors critical to your success. There is also an “x factor” with optimization that may include the age of your domain and the length of commitment to your domain. If it all sounds greek to you, you can engage a company like ours to help you get through it all.

Eventually, I believe that all sites soon will be on-page optimized. Meaning, most people will eventually have all of the right keywords and codes in place to be found by the engines. What that means is that there is a huge opportunity in off-page optimization and the sooner you start engaging in those activities, the sooner you can create a gap between you and your nearest competitor.

SEO still represents the best Internet Marketing program because of the large ROI potential it represents. Even with all of the hype surrounding social media marketing, there is still no better way to get new customers than to meet them when they are ‘actively” seacrhing for your service in a search engine. Google is your new Yellow Pages and if you are not visibile in Google, you are missing the point of online marketing.

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Google’s Conversion Optimizer: Proceed With Caution

Thursday, July 16th, 2009

Every once in a while, a new featureis announced by the Google team that helps improve the experience and the results you get through the Google AdWords Pay Per Click Advertising Console. Recently, in fact, Google started implementing a new user interface that allows their advertisers to more easily, more readily, and more efficiently manage their campaigns. This, in fact, has been a very positive change (although the new interface takes a lot of getting used to after so many years working with the old platform). 

Google Conversion Optimizer, on the other hand, has not been something that seems to be working for a lot of advertisers.  A recent google search for ‘google conversion optimizer review’ brings up a number of web posts, blogs and case studies that do not exactly paint the optional service in a very positive light. Below are quick links to a few of those reviews. 

http://www.webmasterworld.com/google_adwords/3858558.htm

http://www.google.com/support/forum/p/AdWords/thread?tid=1b46b2064debcd8c&hl=en

http://www.marketingmorgan.com/ppc/google-adwords-campaign-optimizer-review/

Google Conversion Optimizer has been in beta testing since 2007. Now, released to all advertisers that qualify, it represents a chance to bid on a “cost per action” versus a “cost per click”. In theory, this is all great but what happens in reality? My own results over the past few weeks for a client did not perform well at all. In fact, our cost per conversion went from less than $20 per conversion to over $35 per conversion. Obviously, not a good thing for me or my client.  I have now turned the service off.

How does Conversion Optimizer work? The Conversion Optimizer is an AdWords feature that uses your AdWords Conversion Tracking data to get you more conversions at a lower cost. It optimizes your placement in each ad auction to avoid unprofitable clicks and gets you as many profitable clicks as possible. To begin using the Conversion Optimizer, you must have AdWords Conversion tracking enabled, and your campaign must have received at least 30 conversions in the last 30 days. Also, the campaign must have been receiving conversions at a similar rate for at least a few days.

The “Conversion Optimizer” option is a tempting one… and Google does its best to make sure you know that your ad group is “eligible” for this option. Instead of taking the bait, however, you are better served perhaps working with the proven Google Website Optimizer, which in essence allows you to take better control of your landing page experiences. This truly is a better way of managing your conversions anyhow. True marketing and testing of headlines, offers, photos, etc. should always give you a better lift than trying to do it from the acquisition side. In other words, the “post-click” environment (landing page) is always more important than the “pre-click” environment (traffic) in my humble opinion.

Still, optimizing both pre-click and post-click environments are important tasks to the overall scheme of things and that is precisely what makes Conversion Optimizer something that should make sense to all advertisers that qualify…but just a word of warning to all… proceed with caution ! There are better ways to optimize your traffic, including key word analysis, analytic review, and writing better, more targeted ads. If you don’t heed my advice…well, you’ve been warned.

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The Return of the Banner Ad?

Friday, July 3rd, 2009

Okay, I know what you are thinking. And I can almost hear your laughter and snickering because, let’s face it, banner ads have been on life-support for a long time now. How bad has it been for banner ads? A recent report in OMMA suggests that banner ad click-through rates are “as low as .1%” these days. That’s point zero zero one for those of you counting at home. So, that being the case, how can I possibly suggest that banner ads will at some point be making a comeback? Because, at some point, online advertising will be given credit for what it does in leading someone up to a conversion. In other words, many in the online advertising world believe that someone’s “last click” activity has been given too much credit for a conversion whereas little is given to the branding and impressions that are seen well before someone makes a purchase decision As OMMA puts it, “someone doesn’t just wake up one day and decide to search for something”.

There are advances coming, many being headed by major companies such as Microsoft, that will help to measure “view-through” activity that will ultimately give online advertising the credit it deserves for leading someone to a conversion point. Some studies show that exposure to online ads have led to a 27% increase in online sales and 17% in offline sales versus control groups not exposed to the same ads. Still, as a pure ROI vehicle, banners are far inferior to search engine marketing. However, when put in proper context ultimately I believe that banners will be given their credit for what they do – increase awareness – much like their counterparts do in traditional advertising such as magazine, radio, TV, and outdoor. When that day happens, I am confident that the return of the banner ad will occur.

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