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Seek and Ye Shall Find - 6 Search Term Tips
Did you know?...
Second only to email, Web searching is
the most popular activity of US Internet
users.
US Department of Commerce
74% of Internet users conduct Internet
searches more than three times per week and
55% of US Internet users clicked on search
results in 2001.
AC Neilsen
In a February 2001 survey by the NPD Group,
when asked where their online purchases
originated, 55% of the 2,288 US respondents
indicated "search listings."
If your company is like my company, you are
looking for ways to drive more traffic to your
website, but have to work within a finite
budget and be able to quantify the results.
After re-evaluating our own company's approach
to search term listings, we at Roving ended up
working with, and ultimately partnering with,
Overture Services. We learned a lot in the
process. So, I asked Overture SVP, Lisa
Morita, to contribute an article including her
top tips for maximizing search term listings.
Advertising Cost Effectively On the Web and
Measuring ROI
By Lisa Morita Senior Vice President and
General Manager, Online Advertiser Groups,
Overture Services
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Internet advertising has changed.
A few years ago CPM buys were hot, but
today many advertisers will only consider
Web advertising if they can track results.
CPM buys are based on a cost per thousand
impressions. For example, if you had a CPM
of $10, you would pay $10 for your
advertisement to appear 1,000 times.
Banner ads and tiles still abound, but
Cost-Per-Click (CPC) search listings are
gaining in popularity. CPC buys are based
on a cost-per-click. Regardless of how
many times your impression may appear, you
would only pay when someone actually
clicks and goes to your site.
Cost-Per-Click (CPC) search listings are
growing for two reasons:
- The CPC model gives advertisers the
ability to reach prospects when they're
actively searching the Internet for
goods and services;
- Advertisers can easily measure their
return on investment(ROI).
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Cost-Per-Click is a Simple Concept
Companies like CPC Internet search term
advertising because it's simple:
- You determine common words (search
terms) that are used to describe your
product or service (such as "widget").
- You decide in advance how much you
are willing to pay for someone to visit
your Web site.
- When someone searches the Internet
for the term "widget," Web sites with
that word can appear at or near the top
of the Web page under "search listings".
- When someone clicks on your search
listing, you pay the previously agreed
upon price.
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Measurable, Flexible and Cost Effective
Advertising
In January 2001 NPD Group conducted a
study on consumer purchase behavior and
tested the impact of search listings,
banner ads and tiles across a variety of
branded and unbranded sites to determine
which was most cost effective. In every
situation, search listings came out on
top.
The research showed that sites listed in
search listings were considered more
favorable than those in banner ads and
tiles, and that consumers were five times
more likely to purchase products after
seeing search listings versus banners.
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Top 6 Tips on How to Maximize Search
Term Listings
To get the most benefits from CPC, look
for these key factors when evaluating your
media buy:
- Volume: Even though you only
pay when someone clicks on your listing,
pick a company that places search
listings on high traffic portals so that
more people see your ad.
- Quality: See if the company
follows editorial and relevancy
guidelines that protect you from paying
for irrelevant leads.
- Changes: See if you can
change your bids on a real-time basis.
Also, see how easy it is to change bids
multiple times throughout the day.
- Billing: See if you can set
up automatic debiting from a charge
card, and can pre-set spending limits on
a daily, weekly or monthly basis.
- Reporting: Find out how often
can you get reports (daily, weekly,
etc.) and how they are sent (via e-mail,
or downloaded from the company's Web
site).
- Customer Service: See if
customer service is provided via
toll-free phone or e-mail.
When you're ready to go, start with a
test: Set a small budget, list search
terms on a few sites, and measure your
results. Calculate the conversion rate and
ROI from each site, and increase spending
only where returns are meeting your goals.
Overture's search listings let
advertisers like you target customers at
the moment they are searching for your
products and services. You bid on search
terms and list your business in search
results on the Web's premier sites like
Yahoo!, Lycos and MSN.
Click here to learn more.
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Email
Marketing Video Tutorials Show you how to plan, create, and send
successful newsletters.
Read Email Marketing Tips
and Lessons written by Michelle Keegan, Constant
Contact's Email Marketing Diva.
Learn E-Marketing Lingo from the
glossary of Email
Marketing terms.
| by Michelle Keegan, Constant Contact's Email
Marketing Diva(TM) |
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