Search results matching tag 'SEM'

Effects of social media on search

1919324 — Wed, 04 Nov 2009 23:10:00 GMT

The relationship between search and social media is the subject I get asked the most about by advertisers and agencies at the moment. It’s a hugely complex area because both search and social media mean so many different things and work together in so many different ways.

To make matters worse, the last 18 months have seen radical developments in both. However, the two have an undeniably positive effect on each other and I believe that the secret to the most effective, integrated online campaigns lies at the heart of this relationship.

The IAB will be looking into this in far more detail in the future, but right now I wanted to share my own experience below and to gather some of yours. If you feel I’ve missed something, please email me or leave a comment below so that I can adapt it.

What is search and social media?

For the purpose of this article I have made three key assumptions:

Search = a website where the primary function is to search content including video, image, blog articles etc (e.g. Bing, Google, Yahoo!)
Social media = a website or tool that allows for user interaction and content creation, whether that's a blog, forum, picture upload site, social network etc (e.g. blogs, forums, review sites, Facebook, Flickr, MySpace, Twitter, YouTube)
Social search = the search function on a social media website, e.g. Twitter search, Facebook search, Digg search.
(NB: Digg, Technorati etc can be classified as search engines, but because their content is primarily user generated or user rated, for the purpose of this article, they are classified as social media)

Table showing the effects of social media on search

This probably makes things seem a lot more complicated and perhaps a little too general, but I wanted to document everything in one place.

Explanation of the effects

Direct improvement on own website search rank (via links)
Major social bookmarking sites and networks include ‘nofollow’ script which currently reduces the effect a link has to different degrees across each search engine. However, search engines still follow and record these links and of course there are many other benefits of receiving links from the sites, e.g. gaining traffic and raising visibility of an article to help bloggers pick it up. That said, blog articles tend not to have 'nofollow', so receiving a link within an actual blog article is currently the most effective direct use of social media for improving your own website's rank. The reason a blog, forum or review section on your own site can help is because of a technique known as 'pagerank sculpting' that allows you to raise the importance of your own pages - but this is an advanced and perhaps changing technique so I won't elaborate here! :)
Significantly improves reach in search
While you can optimise your search campaign to target lots of relevant key terms, it’s not always possible to cover the thousands of key terms that attract smaller - but once combined equally important - amounts of traffic. This is known as the ‘long tail’ and where the power of Forums and Reviews created by users come into their own. Users can create thousands of new articles, allowing you to reach the thousands of search terms that may only attract one or two people each but that you'd otherwise have missed.
Improves brand visibility in search
Pages of content that you run in social networks like Facebook, MySpace and YouTube are all part of your own web presence, they also tend to rank highly in search engines. Use this to your advantage to help control the top 10 search results for your key terms.
Includes visuals or special placement to help visibility in search
Search engines now show more than just links and text results, they also show images, videos, stars for review scores and even author details. Some social media can help you make the most of these, e.g. it’s easier to include a video in Google’s results if it’s on a well optimised YouTube page, and once integrated, Twitter results may be separated out in a special part of the page in the same way that News and Blog articles are.
Improves control of brand reputation in search
Linked to 2., by extending your web presence in search and social media using social media tools, it also means you have more control over your own reputation. This doesn’t mean you can control what people say about you online, it means you can attract comments to your own properties rather than on some random ‘hate’ forum, then you can learn from it and do something about it!
Drives significant traffic to your site without search
It’s not all about search of course, social media can drive traffic to your website directly via links.
Extends brand presence into ‘social search’
By conducting the specified social media activities highlighted with green in the table above, you can ensure your brand will appear in various social network searches, e.g. Twitter, Facebook etc.
Indirectly increase searches for brand or brand phrases
You don’t always need a link, sometimes an interesting article or advert can spark a consumer to search for your brand, product or service in a search engine.This however is harder to track and measure in social media.

Conclusions… for now

This article is a whistle-stop tour of search and social media, trying to squeeze a very big subject into very few words. I’ve left a lot out here but I hope this has helped you think about the relationship between these two important marketing channels.

For me, the major breakthrough for advertisers will be the continued realisation that your web presence no longer means just your website. In fact, it’s interesting that actually, only links from other people’s blog articles will offer a significant direct improvement to your own website’s search ranking when talking about social media, while everything else is indirect word of mouth and branding.

However – and it’s a big ‘HOWEVER’ - by using social media in its many different forms, you can significantly increase the overall search ranking and visibility of your brand’s web presence in search engines in ways that no other media can.

Follow the IAB on Twitter

Google Wave – set to revolutionise online communication?

2618871 — Mon, 27 Jul 2009 09:55:00 GMT

When Google Wave was released at Google's I/O Developer’s Conference at the end of May it sparked considerable excitement. Now the novelty factor has worn off it's time to start considering the potential of this revolutionary communication tool.

The application itself is impressive, but the use of its API in allowing the possibility to create bots/extensions is what could really pave the way for a new ’wave‘ of web applications, and even the advent of Web 3.0.

Google Wave is a real-time collaboration tool, where you can experience changes to a conversation, character by character, by multiple users and with added functionality through extensions. It falls into the ‘collaboration tool’ category due to the many uses it offers - from straight communications such as email and instant messaging - to installing the wave on sites like wiki's, forums and blogs, creating content and encouraging interaction. So rather than having a set of emails, threads or instant messages; there will be just one ‘wave’.

A good way of describing how you would interact with these waves would be to imagine you’re sharing a word document with some of your friends simultaneously, where you can edit an itinerary, decision or line-by-line conversation with them - in real time. Doesn't sound too revolutionary does it? Google has put their own spin on it though, by introducing intelligent formatting, real-time translation, and integrating external tools like Google Maps, images, and soon, developer’s own creations. It wasn't so much of a product launch, but rather an API launch so they could educate the developers that will be producing these extensions for when Google Wave is officially released later this year.

With these extensions, users will be able to simultaneously run a 'wave' on a blog/forum/site and see changes made both in the application and the external locations simultaneously. If the take up of Google Wave is as substantial as expected, the way that content is delivered to web pages will be completely changed and with potentially dramatic repercussions elsewhere.

For search marketing, with Google Wave providing updates within a conversation on external sites in real-time, the content will no longer be reflective of the last time it was indexed, thus rendering search results and even text ads irrelevant. If a destination page's content changes, the ad will be less relevant and subsequently affect detrimentally the quality score and CPC price. Advertisers that would be susceptible to this would need to commit to increased levels of budget to ensure they maintain their positions if their quality score does fluctuate.

This would obviously affect certain websites more than others though and for search engines to produce relevant results, they will need to continually update and index sites. To take search to the next level, you would need the results to be switching positions in real time, as sites become more relevant than others.

For website owners, Google Wave could cause a change in the way users view their content - for example, being able to view articles, comment, take part in polls and interact, all through a Google Wave bot without even visiting the site. Google wants Wave to not only be the hub of all their products and communication, but also the hub for experiencing and contributing to content from the rest of the Internet. This could have a grave effect on display advertising, a crucial source of income to the running of many websites - and would prompt a sweeping shift of business models towards subscription models where users pay for content.

Google Wave will prompt a notable change in the way search engines index sites and produce results, simply because they will have no choice. Obviously, currently channels such as forums and wiki’s are changed often, but as Google Wave becomes widespread, search engines will have to think about how to adapt to these constant changes.

With Bing taking a couple of bites out of Google's market share and Twitter indexing updates, search technology over the next year could produce something of a cold war. Google has already started making changes to its search functionality including "search options" and Google Squared, and this will escalate between Yahoo, Google and Microsoft as the full launch of Google Wave approaches later this year. Bing's "decision engine" has woken Google up from a distinctly average innovative few years on its search front.

All of this has ramifications for companies using natural search, since to optimize their “crawlability” on Wave, sites will need updating once a day or even more.

Of course the scale of these changes is dependant upon take up, though anyone who has watched the Google I/O developer’s conference video would be surprised if Google Wave doesn’t become the next focus of online communication and collaboration and have a huge impact upon digital marketing.

Author – James Glick, Media Account Manager, CheezeDMG

Follow Cheeze on Twitter.com/cheezedmg

Badabing - it's on the up. #badabing

2306192 — Fri, 19 Jun 2009 09:14:00 GMT

So, it seems that BING is making an impression in the US – comScore reporting as much as a 3% increase in the two weeks since its launch.
It will be interesting to see if this growth is sustained, or rather whether the £100million investment rolls on and on to fuel the hype of the new ‘Decision Engine’. CEO Steve Balmer suggested that MS are prepared to offer up 5-10% of its operating incoming in search over the next 5 years (possibly a staggering £11billion!) and today at Microsoft’s European search summit MS has boldly vowed that they will be the best UK search engine – quite a statement eh!

I took 5 minutes to have a scout around BING; here are some of its nicest features that I’ve noticed.

• Search

Realted search, clear and logical – not too sales driven
Introduction of categories in the linear results - Apparently to combat the huge drop off of click through rates post position 5 that Google experiences, Bing seemingly offers a more enriched list.
Importantly – result quality seems good.

• Image search

Select by size, layout, colour, style and people – and from my test they all seem to work, makes Google’s colour selector look a bit naff!
Viewing options on how many images are on a page, nice smooth switch over of formats

• Related searches

They seem logical and unobtrusive
You can turn them off if they annoy you!

• Video

Roll over snippet functionality – gives you a small preview of the video in question (although this could reduce CTR on query based searches)
Again the plethora of search filters are welcoming and useful i.e best match or most recent

• Shopping

Bit of a fail – shoots you out to Ciao! Which just isn’t as nice? Still it’s a reputable partner, although the introduction of flashing banners, adsense and tags like ‘earn money for reviews’ removes some of BING’s simple allure.

• News

Limited, but hey it’s only in beta – expect more to come in this area

• Maps

Nice link through to Multi-map – still not Google maps is it!

Follow Microsoft’s search summit on twitter hash tag #badabing.

Bin Travellin’ Bin Comparin'

980070 — Mon, 13 Apr 2009 17:13:00 GMT

Tonight, I fly back to Blighty having spent over 3 weeks in North America.

5 days in New York for Search Engine Strategies, a weekend in Boston with friends, 3 days in Toronto doing some press and 10 days in Seattle having a ton of meetings and planning sessions for our next fiscal year which starts in July.

That’s a lot of time away from home but a fascinating trip from the point of view seeing if there’s any difference between approaches to the economic difficulties we’re all experiencing.

And really, there isn’t much of a difference!

Over here you hear on the radio that millions of people have lost their jobs. The head of tax returns in the US was saying this morning that they have a whole load of measures in place to help people who are going to have difficulty paying the government what they owe.

Things seem much more expensive too, even when you include the drop in exchange rate from $2 to $1.40 to the pound. I don’t spend as much time in Gap and American eagle when I’m in town now!

All the talk at the conferences and internal meetings I had was about how to survive the downturn. The advice was good. Very solid. But a constant theme was that online advertising would pull many brands though the next couple of years. The optimism is palpable which is great news.

One of the best presentations I saw at SES in New York was by Jack Flanagan, Executive Vice President at comScore

His last slide had the following tips for online marketers to survive the choppy economic waters:

- Know your customer and their mindset
- Know the market
- Don’t under estimate the power of paid search
- Powerful combo with display advertising
- Be consistent
- Be patient

All but 3 and 4 are common sense no? Why does it need to be re-iterated time and time again?

We’re going through a massive re-calibration at the moment both in our personal and professional lives and it ain’t just the UK – we’re all in it together!

PS: Any one want any gummy bears bringing back?

Will Google tweet people off?

2306192 — Mon, 06 Apr 2009 13:50:00 GMT

So we hear last week of Google’s rumoured approach to buy Twitter. People in the office of none Search Engine Marketing breed have asked how they can justify such high expenditure for what is ostensibly a non-commercial social media product.

Well this could be a very close snap shot of the future:

Like it? .....No? we don’t like change do we?!

It’s very real that this could be a snapshot of twitter in 12 months time – a purged profile of Google ads, whether you like it or not!

You would assume that the ads will be contextually linked to keywords that don your recent tweets – take YouTube as an example and how you see, in most cases, contextually relevant ads before, after and accompanying the videos that you view.

This will of course give Search professionals even greater reach (should this happen) and with the advancement in Google’s adserving technology I’d imagine that there’s a lot of search marketers, and brands for that matter, waiting with curiousity as to what this may bring - a reliable short cut for brand success in twitter?

If this does happen (albeit speculation at this satge) then, like a london banker, I may not carry my Google mug in certain corners of the office...

To Rank or Not To Rank? That is the question...

2306192 — Fri, 30 Jan 2009 16:07:00 GMT

Are ranking reports dead? Are they slipping into measurement obscurity? Do they still have a place in the ‘monthly report’?

I recently had a conversation with a client regarding target setting, I paraphrase but it went along these lines ‘these rankings are great, we should be setting targets for where we want to be in 6 months time’ me ‘mmm well if I’m honest then I’d prefer not to. Rankings are more indicative of actual website performance and the work that we’re doing right now. Yes, ranking improvements will improve website footfall, but we should be optimising against traffic uplift, sales and the monthly revenue that search creates against our overall targets’ client ‘yes, but we still want to be top (1st in Google) for these terms’

Since my first footsteps into search marketing the ‘Rank’ factor has always been synonymous with performance monitoring. This is logical, for it’s the easiest to monitor, the easiest to grasp the concept of and the easiest to view. I can’t even try to count the times that a client has asked those mortal words ‘where are we ranking for...’

Yet, for some funny reason, and against my better judgments, I just can’t resist checking my rankings reports every week (i would do it every day if i could) yes i know that rankings fluctuate daily, yes i know that rankings are a mere conduit for traffic, but despite all this, i just cannot help it! It’s an ego thing isn’t it? That first place ranking is the icing the icing on the cake, the final piece of the puzzle, the last battle won, the medal ceremony – take your 1st place on the podium.

I can only assume that for clients that it’s the same thing too, a form of bragging rights by getting that top spot off your nearest competitor.

Don’t read this wrong, I will always measure the true success of any campaigns by 100% advocating the use of statistical metrics. Every search campaign should, as a MINIMUM, be tracking and constantly improving (where appropriate) sales, registrations, traffic, downloads and ultimately ROI.

Take this hypothetical example to put it in to context:

If i was promoting a clothes website that specialised in clothes for tall people then you would imagine that my ultimate goal would be to rank number one for ‘large clothes’ or ‘tall clothes’

But, what if we found that achieving rankings on that one term would absorb 100% of the search team’s resource, and that it had no guarantee of conversions and ultimately could take months, if not years for you to finally get on to the 1st page of results?

Remember I’m selling clothes for tall people, therefore ‘tall clothes’ or ‘large clothes’ may offer large amounts of traffic yet little offer of reward.

The smart thing to do in this case would be to analyse your web traffic, see what keywords drove both traffic and conversions. Then you can benchmark rankings, form a gap analysis on rankings and look to optimise against these keywords. For example these could be ‘tall trousers for men’ ‘tall ladies clothes’ (a small PPC test on these keyword may also help set targets) if there’s room for improved rankings then you would assume that there’s also room for improved traffic and more sales.

By analysing actual data an securing your key battle ground you’re going to benefit on a far greater scale than chasing ‘dream’ rankings that are frankly going to be a drain on your reserves. Yes, rankings on the ego keywords will, over time, develop, and that will be a great bonus.

However, the first thing that any campaign should do is look to secure the ‘bankers’ the keywords that will drive traffic and ultimately assist you in hitting your targets. Would you rather have 1 amazing ranking and low sales or 10 ok rankings that, by means of traffic and conversions, are setting you up for a nice little bonus?

Statistical benchmarks, growth projections and realistic targets will help ensure that your campaign stays on the right track. But still, we’re all ego maniacs at heart, we all want to be number one and there is no greater thrill for a search analyst that the sight of achieving that adored 1st place ranking – just make sure it’s on the right keywords first.

Google Drive - Why we should be happy to see a cloud for a change.

2306192 — Tue, 27 Jan 2009 16:31:00 GMT

Not even a week ago I posted that I expected much more innovation from Google into 2009...it's not even the end of January and already there has been something to wet our appetite!

Coming to a internet connect near you is the Google Drive (Gdrive)- and this could be the most anticipated release of a Google's product thus far.

Crystal balls aside - The Gdrive has been talked about for a number of years; however 2009 seems to be the year that the cloud gathers pace. When it arrives, Gdrive is like to cause a major paradigm shift in how we use computers. GDrive is basically a cloud-based storage unit that allows you to access your local and online folders via a web interface from any network enabled computer.

It is expected that it will come with further integration of its already growing list of operating systems such as GMail, Docs,Picasca, etc... So the potential for this project truly is huge.

The news has not come without it doubters. Worries regarding what Google can do with you data will always be echoed. Activity last year may ostensibly suggest that Google can be subpoenaed in the US courts to hand over data when needed, and this may limit its use on a true commercial scale.

However I'm sure that the doubters will not turn this particular cloud grey and as a search marketer i'll be interested to see how Google 'monetizes' this venture (they always do!) - perhaps a similar tailored ad-serving system to Gmail where relevant PPC ads are served to contextual keyword cues from the document that you store?

All very interesting...

Mobile Search - Ready for take off?

2306192 — Fri, 23 Jan 2009 09:40:00 GMT

Predictions abound at this time of year, and once again we hear it will be the year of the mobile web – and therefore mobile search - but this time I believe it. Figures released by Nielsen late last year suggest that mobile web use is growing eight times as fast as the conventional PC internet.

Finally, it seems, we have handsets that can deliver a user a true web experience. The success of the iPhone, Android and Storm has definitely fanned the flames of the internet’s mobile success and with Samsung recently stating that it will support the Android phone in 2009 it seems the mobile web experience is literally up and running.

Why’s this important for search? Well the software that these phones run make Google more accessible than ever. The Android is obviously playing for the home team, Google’s iPhone apps are some of the best available and friends tell me that Google’s app for the Storm is also good. So that leaves us with an interesting scenario - seamlessly using the world’s biggest search engine on the world’s fastest growing internet medium...interesting indeed.

However the real test of the mobile web, search in particular, will be the proof that it can drive sales at point of interest. It seems that sceptical opinionators suggest that mobile internet is still in its infancy as a ROI driver, and that makes it still risqué on the planning sheet. Unfortunately that could prevent the investment from advertisers that perhaps it warrants. I look forward to monitoring the impact of mobile on my search campaigns in 2009 and I’m sure others will too.

Interview - Matt McGowan from Search Engine Strategies - Get a 20% Discount!

980070 — Thu, 22 Jan 2009 08:23:00 GMT

For readers of Media Week who might not be aware of what Search Engine Strategies is, could you give us the 30 second “elevator pitch”?

SES London is the only established Search Marketing Conference in the UK. Specifically it is a forum for marketers and their executive management teams to get together with expert practitioners and discuss digital marketing opportunities for their business specifically as they relate to Search Engine Marketing and Optimisation (SEM/SEO). SES London is a fantastic opportunity to see if your marketing plan stacks up to the competition’s.

You're relatively new to the top job overseeing all the global events, how’s it been going?

So far so good… the Search and larger Digital communities have welcomed me with open arms, and for that I am extremely grateful.

Let’s not forget about ClickZ.com and SearchEngineWatch.com by the way (the sites get over a million digital marketing and agency professionals visiting each month!).

How do UK search marketers stack up against folks from the rest of the world? Do you see any regional differences in approach?

Search Marketers transcend boarders… there are a few differences but for the most part skill levels are not dictated by region. One difference I have seen however is that multilingual SEO and multi-language PPC management is of greater importance to UK SEMs likely due to their closer proximity to Europe and its bouquet of cultures/languages (this however is on a case by case basis and is more company specific than regional).

What can delegates expect from this year’s show?

50 Sessions designed so that you leave with pages upon pages of actionable notes (Paid Search and SEO fundamentals through to advanced techniques, Landing Page Tuning, Social Media Marketing, Successful Site Architecture, Brand Management and much more), 80+ Expert Speakers & 2 Keynotes - Matt Mason, who will speak about how the youth culture online is blurring the long-established boundaries between right and wrong online and how business can take advantage of this phenomenon and then a roundtable Keynote discussion on where the SEO Industry is headed, which will feature moderator and show host, Mike Grehan alongside the all star panel Kevin Ryan, Rand Fishkin, Brett Tabke, Chris Sherman, and Jill Whalen.

We have also added an extra day of classroom style SEM training for those who can not make the 3 day commitment or those who want to fully immerse themselves in all things Search.

This is really a fantastic opportunity to get out of the office for a few days meet some new people and really catch up on all the developments the industry has experience this past year.

Any incentives to attend in these lean economic times?

For you… of course. Because your subscribers are smart enough to read your column they get a 20% discount to the show if they use 20MWK during the registration process.

Search 2009 – 2.0, 3.0, 4.0??

2306192 — Wed, 21 Jan 2009 16:09:00 GMT

Google took a slight dent in their pride in 2008, tales of misuse of data, sliding share prices and a failed partnership with its adversary Yahoo had its infamous PR machine spinning faster than a hamster’s wheel.

However it hasn’t deterred their innovative engineers and this past year we welcomed the first post-beta release of Google Chrome, Google street view and numerous other experience enhancing products, this for both professional and non-professional use.

And in 2009 I expect more of the same innovation. Early signs show further work on enhancing the personalised experience - the search wiki (web 3.0?) being the most advanced step forward.. It looks like it’s going to be another big year for the advancement of local search, improved geo-location relevancy and the inevitable crack down on malpractice (link buyers beware) .

Google’s bid to deliver the best, most relevant data to each and every user is no secret and improvements in Image search and the introduction of video XML site maps in webmaster tools suggests further developments in universal search that will display results for all formats. I’ve read mutterings of a potential tabbed results page where a user will be able to flick from tab to tab, viewing various results from images, to news, to video and perhaps even blogs. While this may just be paper talk it does offer a huge advancement in user friendliness and something that I for one would like to see.

But while innovation is important – so is getting the basics right and still so many brands fail on this score. We all see so many websites that cost an arm and a leg that are ultimately going to fail to deliver any search traffic. Great content, intelligent web development and some care and attention are a great place to start. Yes, there are many ‘do’s and don’ts’ in the SEO world but simple web practice should underline everything– get an agency to do the hard work.

Knowing your market and keeping on top your PPC campaigns will be more important than ever with trends likely to swing massively throughout the year in line with economic instability - the downturn of property and motor markets and the suprise lifting of embargos on gambling and alcohol terms in Google is testament to this.

The recent popularity of voucher sites, in line with the emergence of the credit crunch, already suggests that the web is turning into ‘Del Boy’s’ dream.In search, the value of proposition over placement will be magnified significantly; touting your wares in a crowded market should not be underestimated with thrifty customers expecting a ‘deal’.

The beauty of search is that it really is so objective, the landscape changes so much that it can be tough to keep up at times. This month’s buzz words could be passé by February, however I’m hoping (slightly expecting) another great year in search, albeit a tough one, with Google top of the class once more.