SEARCH ENGINE STRATEGY INTRODUCTION

Tuesday, 25th May 2010

Before we start

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What is this session about?

Search: A definition

10 mins

Search: Five things to remember 20 mins Search: Closing thought Discussion 10 mins 5 mins

Why I love search?

Data

Insights

SEARCH: A DEFINITION

What does a search engine do?

From a users perspective:

Ask a question Receive an answer

From a search engine perspective:

Get asked a question Find all the answers Give you the best onesRANKED Measure the human interaction with its logic

If you (or your client) are not the answer, someone else is

What is search?

Search

Paid (PPC*)
*PPC = pay per click

+ OR

Natural/ Organic

SEM
Search Engine Marketing

SEO
Search Engine Optimisation

Visited Google & searched for digital cameras

Paid placements outlined in green: top & right

Natural placements outlined in green: centre

Visited Google in December 2009 & look at the changes

May 2010

March 2010

WHAT IS SEM?
SEARCH ENGINE MARKETING (PAID)

What are the different types of SEM?

Paid Per Click - PPC
(Paid for performance - P4P)
Benefits High level of control & security Low level of click fraud Highly accountable Great ROI Disadvantages Poor venue for some industries Not suitable for branding campaigns Increasingly competitive with inflating CPCs Benefits Few Disadvantages Lack of control Expensive Most exposed to click-fraud

Contextual placements

PPC

Contextual

WHAT IS SEO?
SEARCH ENGINE OPTIMISATION (NATURAL)

Search Engine Optimisation

On page optimisation
Site technology & accessibility Site content

Off page optimisation

Link popularity Link reputation

Best Practice SEO: Design

Several on page elements are taken into account by Spiders (not limited to):
Page Titles Meta Description & Keywords Page Copy (Body Content) Image Alt Text Internal Link Anchor Text File names Search Friendly Navigation Site Map Heading Tags

A clearly distinguishable site architecture & navigation structure can help with inclusion & improving rankings.

What is happening in search?

In December 2009, there were >131 billion searches conducted by people age 15 or older from home & work
46% increase from December 2008.

USA is the largest search market with 22.7 billion searches (17%).
China with 13.3 billion searches Japan with 9.2 billion U.K. with 6.2 billion.

Russia grew 92% to 3.3 billion.

Source: comScore, 22 January 2010: http://www.comscore.com/Press_Events/ Press_Releases/2010/1/Global_Search_Market_Grows_46_Percent_in_2009

All segments search on generic terms

It doesnt matter what the age, gender of socioeconomic profile of consumers, they all search on generic terms & keywords (eg camera, mobile, insurance)

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SEARCH: FIVE THINGS TO REMEMBER

#1: SEARCH IS MORE THAN WORDS

QUICK POLL:
How many people think about more than a website (destination) for a campaign?
Online advertising Emails Search

QUICK POLL:
Thinking about search, how many people only think about the key words? Do you ever think about: - articles? - images? - video? - maps (retailers)? - blogs?

Content is king!

You need to be thinking about all of these things & how they can be included for your clients.
The more you think like a consumer, the more the client will trust you & the more they will invest with you. All of these areas are extra opportunities for you to add value.

What does that mean for you?

When you get a brief, think about all the extra elements that will be created as part of the job:
Images Videos Articles

Think about how you could use them & include them as part of a campaign
Does the client have a flickr account, an image gallery on their site, videos, YouTube channel?

#2 SEARCH MUST BE CONSTANT

How most businesses approach search?

Campaign activity

Most clients view search as being very on/off, but consumers dont just search because our clients have a campaign in market. It is a key driver, but not when they are out of market

How businesses should approach it?

Base line activity (consistency & presence in market 365 days)

Campaign activity

Search must be on 365 days a year. With insurance, consumers search on average for two weeks a year, but not all consumers are searching at the same time. This means insurance companies need to be there 365 days a year.

How do most clients approach search?

Conscious

Unconscious

What does that mean for Baileys?

Recipe After dinner Desert Relaxing Celebrity chefs

TV shows TV programming

Conscious

Unconscious

DVD release In-home experience Interior design

What can you do for your clients?

Help them create a keyword bible

What is a keyword bible?

Baseline activity Brand terms (Canon, IXUS, PIXMA, EOS, sub-brands) Generic terms (Camera, digital still camera, DSLR, video, etc)

Campaign 2 IXUS Tell your story

Campaign

Campaign 4

A keyword bible should be developed for all clients. It should cover a range of their specific brand & sub-brand terms, as well as generic terms. The campaign activity will come in & out dependent on the offers & T&Cs attached.

Campaign 3 MDS

Campaign 5

Campaign 1 Photo5

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#3: THINK ABOUT THE DETAIL WHEN YOU BUILD

Keyword in title Keyword in directory

Content tab

Keyword in H1

Keyword body spread

Hyperlinked text

Keyword meta tags

What can you do for your clients?

Work with your digital team to let them know what is important
Keywords & terms to be associated with the campaign What does the client want to be known for?

Work with your creative team to prepare copy for the site
Headings, description text, keywords

Start asking for this & working together

#4: SEARCH IS INVOLVED, BUT QUICK TO SET UP

What do you need to set up a search campaign?

1. Refine customer goals 8. Organic site review & recommendations 2. Select methods (P4P, SEO)

7. Landing page strategy

3. Keyword Research

6. Creative rotation & optimisation 5. Rules based bid-management

4. Tracking set-up

What does a campaign look like?

Advertiser
(campaign)

Campaigns
(brand, campaign)

Ad Groups
(copy)

Keywords
(brand, campaign)

Creative
(test 1, test 2)

Competitors Travel News General KWs Destinations Travel Airport Codes Airport Names Reward names Travel News Provider Rewards programs General terms Car Rental Cos Transport Bus / Train Cos General terms Hostels
Accommodation

syd lhr gtw jfk etc

Cheap flight Discount flights Train to Car hire Travel guide

Hotels General terms Airline names

Airlines Classes, tickets

What is involved in developing a SEM campaign?

keywords bid price ad copy landing page product specic
general
education
navigation
relevance

sourcing
categorising

tactics

position
CPA
ROI
volume
testing

headline
keyword insertion
brand integration
offer
call to action

matching
testing
purging

conversion tracking combine, test & learn optimal rule implementation

#5: GOOGLE IS MORE THAN JUST A SEARCH ENGINE

Google teleporting is also called search in search & this is dictated by the site map & the structure of the site.

Google bomb = practices intended to influence the ranking of particular pages in results returned by the Google search engine.

Google flights allows users to search for flights within a specific time frame & check the travel sites for prices everything is updated automatically.

Google US digital camera search results

Google US digital camera search results > Canon brand results

Google US digital camera search results > Canon brand results > Shopping

Google US digital camera search results > Canon brand results > Shopping > Over $1,000

Google US digital camera search results > Canon brand results > Shopping > Over $1,000 > Add to Shopping List

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What you need to remember?

1. Search is more than words
Content, images, video, words

2. Search must be constant

Search isnt just a campaign, it must be on 100%

3. Think about the detail when you build

Every detail helps push results

4. Constantly, review, refine & learn

Search can be optimised real-time, campaigns can be tested & learnings taken out immediately

5. Google is more than a search engine

Constantly explore & learn about what else Google are doing

CLOSING REQUEST

Homework when you are back at work?

Pick one of your clients:
Think about 5 keywords that might be important to them. Go to Google, Bing & Yahoo! & do a search on all five words. Note where your client appears & any observations about competitors or the clients search engine activity (paid vs natural) (brand vs keyword)

Click on the ads & look at the pages each keyword takes you to, is it relevant for what you have typed in?

THOUGHTS QUESTIONS DISCUSSION

THANK YOU!
http://www.slideshare.net/domhind http://dominiquehind.wordpress.com

SUPPORTING INFORMATION
Additional information that might help

Register your trademark

Check, then submit your site

What to focus on for a client?

Search needs to focus on all aspects of a client: their products, offerings & brand.

SEO

SEM

Products Accessories Offers Retailers

Googles Golden Triangle

Prior to Google introducing Universal search, eye tracking studies suggested that the users eyes always went up to the top left. Meaning that it was extremely important to try to get the top position.
Note: Google Eyetracking study prior to recent updates & the introduction of Google Universal

Googles Universal Eye Tracker

After Google Universal was introduced, the eye tracking studies suggested that the users eyes went to the images first & then the copy next to those images & above then below.
Note: Google Eyetracking study showing that most people focus on the image before looking at text.

Do you buy your brand name?

Benefits:
Integrated Marketing messages - Tag lines - Price or offer changes Control over top placement Search Volume grows with brand awareness

Disadvantages:
Cost when you have built that term eg Nike. Engine doing a good job then you should be the most relevant right? Key times to buy: Competitor terms

Strong ofine brand campaigns. New product launch or offering. While SEO is poor

Tracking Paid Search What to look for from the Media Company?

From Search Tool:

Actual term clicked Click count audit (click fraud filter) Site side conversion event (count, dollar value, id) Search portal (ninemsn or Yahoo?)

What does this tell you?

The conversion rate of the term, creative & landing page The ROI on the term, group of terms, Search Engine or campaign Audit trail to check search engine costs

What can you do?

Optimise bids, creative & buy type Compare Search Engines

Tracking Paid Search What is the end result of this tracking?

Useful & meaningful reports Campaign strategies can be informed by the data & optimisation strategies implemented Bid management can be automated for so that the ROI of individual terms can be maximised

Tracking Search What to look for with organic listings?

No data from Search Engines (in most cases) All tracking is site side (log files) or SEO tags Manual log file tracking ok for very low traffic sites 80%+ of the time a tracking tool will capture:
Search portal Search term that led to the visit.

On page optimisation - Site accessibility

Make the site accessible to search engine crawlers
HTML is better than Flash
Multiple files rather than one large file

The absolute minimum:

Robots.txt file Correct HTML coding Meta tags with relevant information use text visible information should be in text (html) not embedded in graphics such as .jpg or flash Site navigation that the crawler can follow i.e. site map

For dynamic (database driven or Flash sites):

Ensure the URL structure is crawlable by the engine Have a browse function as well as a search function Consider static pages for key content (terms)

On page optimisation - Site content

Start with researching which terms that you want to get found for. Build genuinely useful content relevant to someone searching for that topic. Make that content accessible & readable. Meta tags
i.e. keyword = car insurance are important but the search engines check for visible text that is relevant, not just the html source code.

Consider offering additional content other than that which is strictly required to sell your product i.e. mortgage calculator, hotel information & facilities, whitepapers on industry etc. The more useful your content & the more that consumers appreciate it, then the more that the search engines will want your site to rank well for relevant terms.

Off page optimisation

In order to provide more relevant results, the search engines look further than the content of a particular page/ site. Google led the trend, they measured link popularity
If lots of other sites have links to a site then the site must have some value to consumers

The more recent extension of this is link reputation

If sites link with a tag that includes terms, then the page is more likely to be relevant for those terms:
For example, click here if you want information on car insurance

Beware artificially boosting link popularity is now being monitored by the engines & will be penalised.
Use a genuine strategy of contacting relevant sites and request appropriate reciprocal links.

What you need to remember?

1. Constant
Search isnt just a campaign, it must be on 100%

2. Nurture
Search must be nurtured, whether it is paid or organic

3. Integration
Search must be integrated into campaigns. Only 2% of people remember URLs shown in TVCs or other activity.

4. Optimisation
Search can be optimised real-time, campaigns can be tested & learnings taken out immediately

5. Measurement
What does success look like? What were the take outs from the campaign (ATL elements)?