Bottree :: Internet Marketing Commentary

I love it when SearchEngine Land releases their next ‘Search Illustrated’, images that are produced by elliance.  I know … I’m such a geek.

Anyways, this image captures the essence of the costing for PPC vs Organic search results, both in terms of what to budget, but also in terms of time-frame.

It helps answer that question: when do I pay for search and when do I simply bask in organic traffic?

Google has launched ’suggestions’ as part of its search service.  If you’re up to the task, I’d be keen on knowing what you think.

Basically, it’s like how Outlook completes addresses for you.  Sometimes it’s 100% on the money, other times, you send the wrong information to the wrong ‘joe’ because ‘joe x’ was emailed something before ‘joe y’.

Of course, Google suggestions are a lot more harmless, but this person “disagrees” and offers a way to switch it off.

Now … what are the media implications to this?  Will media buyers be able to ‘buy’ suggestions?  Will small businesses be able to get visibility on an organic scale or will they be pounded by the mainstream ‘law of large numbers’?  What does this mean for the Long Tail folks?

Original story link / research credit

Official Google Site Announcement

Original Story here.

Original Google Post here.

As indicated by Danny Sullivan, the author of the first post, Google is testing the use of synonyms with search results.  Previously, ’stemming’ was an important part of the search process, where extensions were added to a basic keyword.

Example:

• jog
• jogs
• jogging

So, if you type jogging, results related to ‘running’ might appear.

With SEM, we’ve been using synonyms and related phrases for some time, but this will more of impact on folks who are concerned with SEO.  Increasing the keyword density for related terms may help you gain in your organic rank, something everyone loves!

The past four years have been a boon to Google, bane to its competitors.

AOL, MSN and Yahoo’s market share have been decimated by Google, as seen by this research by eMarketer:

and this summary:

It is truly amazing how Google seems to have caught these other major players off guard. Most of it deals with three basic simple concepts: make your products free, accessible and easy to use. The market will follow you when you do.

Original story here.

“Ad Quality” is a very nebulous concept that a lot of marketers frequently fail to account for when they build flashy, javascript landing pages for their ad campaigns.

It’s an important concept because ad quality will make or break an ad campaign. When people seek out things like “low mileage scooters” or “local recycling services” and they don’t see them with the results that the advertiser has promised, there will be one of two results:

1. They will not be displayed as the campaign progresses.
2. The advertiser will have to increase their bids on these terms in order to have them displayed, but even then, that won’t guarantee results.

Search is the creative killer. Google doesn’t like it when you send people to landing pages that have all kinds of swirling images and text and, guess what? Most people don’t either.

People also don’t think in terms of a single ‘campaign’, which removes the need for web sites to look like the latest TV ads or print brochures. They think with a ’spur-of-the-moment’ attitude, which means if you promise that you have the information they’re looking for, you’d better have it. And it doesn’t need to have anything to do with the ‘campaign’ that you’ve been planning for the last 8 months.

A lot of smaller companies are taking advantage of Google’s attempt to take the high road, mainly by creating thousands of landing pages that speak to the topic people might search on. However, some companies are taking the ‘low road’ by directing people to potentially misleading pages that have nothing to do with the services that they actually provide.

In fact, an entire cottage industry exists where ’search arbitrage’ threatens the intended positive results that people are supposed to experience when doing search. If you’ve ever clicked on a link and it’s a big page full of other links, this is most likely an arbitrage page. Google is trying to clean up this aspect of the business, but it will likely prove to be very difficult.

Regardless, with a little luck and lots of cool new algorithms and hands on effort, ad quality will improve and search results will get better. This will drive down the cost of doing search for legitimate businesses and service providers.

The volume of ad networks has exploded in recent years. The ubiquity of blogs, User Generated Content (UGC), social sites, innovative new products and a host of other lines of communications via the web has translated to significant interest in ‘corraling’ this activity in the interest of getting a larger audience.

Most mainstream media portals have done their best to keep traffic within their reach, but networks allow for users to go beyond portals and other contextual sites, leaving portals choking on their dust.

This image / research from eMarketer captures that notion quite nicely:

By using a single network, you’ll be able to score at least 80% reach for most networks. Adding 3-4 will ensure lots of overlap (which is why some planners worry about buying too many networks), but the good news is that your reach will be like, 150%. OK … it’ll be pretty solid.

Moving forward, expect even more ad networks to materialize and become one of the central pillars of an advertising campaign. The impact of this is that if portals and mainstream sites aren’t looking into pricing opportunities that are parallel to those offered by networks, they may see hard times ahead. At a point, mainstream sites offered contextual targeting, that is, the ability to market to a specific demographic or point of interest. Very soon, that will be offered by something like the ‘knitting network’ or ‘college rugby network’, where very specific niche offerings can be advertised to select groups of people.

Original story source

This article talks about ‘dead’, ‘dying’ and ‘comatose brands’ without really applying insight as to why they might be flagging or falling off the radar of consumers. Analysts and industry insiders ‘blame the economy’ and the notion that everything is ‘tighter’, but I think they’ve missed the mark.

My thoughts are that people are teaching themselves to really not care about certain products. Brand loyalty is disappearing in the wake of the promise of the digital age.

Also, I would argue that many companies need to get away from the notion that owning a wall of the soup aisle or every possible square corner of the cereal row in the grocery store is just plain foolish.

Of course, that would also mean a death spiral for a lot of things we hold dear: stores in the middle of once-productive farms with so much space you could fit 10 football fields (and cheerleading squads) in them; the act of monopolizing physical space at the cost of potential competitors; and the act of driving to middle of nowhere on the outskirts of our cities because the parking spots are free.

Well, in the digital world, this is no longer a consideration, is it? ‘Space’ is no longer a physical concept that someone can just buy out so that their product is in your face all the time. Getting premium real estate is nearly impossible because you cannot possibly own ALL of the advertising opportunities of ALL web sites out there. And when you do, more just pop up. Dilution is the cause of the death of many products, not ‘tightness’.

In The New Market, consumers are bypassing this traditional model of monopolizing ‘foot traffic’ and heading straight for the digital aisles that show them products that they really want, as opposed to those that they’re told to buy.

Search, social and other digital marketing strategies help consumers find that product, but many big ‘elephantine’ brands are unable to move as swiftly as new suppliers because of the level of internal fragmentation and competition that exists. At car companies, the managers of the new truck brand fight with managers of family-class or compact brands. One’s more profitable, but one’s more likely to be bought. Meanwhile, individuals find scooters online that can be delivered to their doorstep tomorrow.

My last thoughts: for many, this level of choice for people can seem extremely destabilizing. People are straying from the model without the permission of marketers and it’s really frustrating the ‘powers-that-be’. We’re experiencing a period of massive change, well beyond anything that the world has experienced before.

Control is no longer an asset that many large companies enjoy and they’re being forced to engage, and that is something that scares them to death.

I’ve just loaded Piwik on bottree.com and bottree.com/blog. It’s pretty darn cool.

For those of you who don’t know, Piwik is the latest version of an open source analytics package. It’s original name was PHPmyVisites. Still not familiar? OK … click here.

As I get more familiar with Piwik, I’ll be sure to share some of the insights. With the latest version, Piwik may start to pull people away from Google Analytics. A good thing? Damn straight!

This Marketing Daily article revealed some interesting insights into consumer behaviour in the wake of the housing crisis, high oil prices and so on.

Here’s a quick summary:

• Consumers are building on trends that were already gaining momentum
• Simplicity: buying less, but also buying less complicated products. The ’streamlining’ of possessions is becoming more of a priority.
• Trading instead of buying: swap sites and trading is taking precedent over transactions. Witness Craigslist and kijiji.
• Local: with high gas prices, a yen for supporting local producers, a distain for sweatshops and other trends, consumers are reaching out … by getting closer.
• Food: combine with local, where consumers seem to be spending less in fast-food restaurants and more time around the dining table.

What interests me is that the article really only hits on the tip of the iceberg. Some of the ‘trends’ identified are more like ‘movements’. More people are demanding fair-trade products. People want to support other people they know and see every day, throwing globalization into a bit of a tailspin. Less is being saved because more is being spent on organic, high-quality product instead of poorly made crap.

The important message that I get from this kind of research: people are getting smart and they’re voting with their dollars against things that fail to impress them. We’re seeing the impact of this every day in the marketplace as new, genuine and small companies filling the niche void left by large, mass-marketed products.

Clickz published this list a few days ago and I thought I’d share it with the folks that read this blog.