SEO and Paid Search Campaigns: Share the Data!

Here is more on the stance that companies should hire 1 vendor that can handle all 3 aspects of search (paid placement, paid inclusion and natural). There is also a little shot against the traditional agency who typically handles the paid placement and treats it like a media buy.


SEO and Paid Search Campaigns: Share the Data!:

"Companies often hire multiple vendors to manage SEM campaigns. One firm, often a traditional agency, manages the paid search advertising spend; another executes an SEO or site-side optimization campaign; and in some cases, a third firm manages paid inclusion feeds into Yahoo!'s OSMX program. There's nothing wrong with this strategy, except these companies often don't -- or won't -- share information."

Using Paid Search Engine Advertising for Better SEO Campaigns

Yet another article that indirectly supports the position that your search provider should not just do natural SEO but also have the ability to do paid placement and paid inclusion programs as well. There are so many key findings from one aspect of search that will another.

Using Paid Search Engine Advertising for Better SEO Campaigns:

"SEOs know most search engines display up to 70 characters from a page's HTML title tag in search results. Smart SEOs write title tags that contain targeted keyword phrases people type into search queries that are also a call to action (CTA), such as clicking on a link to the Web page. Accomplishing both goals in only 70 characters isn't always a simple task.
One site we're currently redesigning uses the words 'find' and 'search' throughout the site. These are great keywords not only in terms of optimization but also because they're CTAs.
We came up with two samples of title-tag content:

Find payroll accounting software from XYZ Company (48 characters)

Search for payroll accounting software from XYZ Company (55 characters)"

Yes, Virginia, There Is SEM Brand Lift, Part 1

I have been meaning to post this article for weeks and now that I am finally getting around to it, I have additional thoughts on Search as a branding tool.

The article talks about the branding lift a marketer can receive with paid placement search marketing. That is great news but there is a down side. Beware... Search is addicting! I have some clients who started doing business with my company with the objective of increasing traffic to the site and giving their brand increased awareness. When we reviewed the early results of the program, the client became obsessed with search's ability to do more than brand. This awareness and visibility campaign is now turning into e-commerce, which is fine but not the original intent.

Whatever makes the customer happy is fine with me...

Yes, Virginia, There Is SEM Brand Lift, Part 1:

"This week, the Interactive Advertising Bureau (IAB) Search Engine Effectiveness Committee published a study on the brand lift of textual paid search results. The results will knock your Christmas stockings off. Search can cause brand lift to soar!"

MediaPost Advertising & Media Directory

This is becoming one of my favorite topics. I have accumulated tons of agency contacts over the last few years but am still reluctant to call on them simply because many of them just don't get it. Dana Todd is exactly right in her statement below. But why don't they get it? This is the part that baffles me. A recent IAB study told us that 40% of the interactive budget is going to paid placement search marketing. The agencies are famous for chasing the money so why are they not better at this.

My theory on why agencies don't get it is because this is dirty work. Any good SEM firm will tell you that they work their butts off and are accountable for results. Hard core accountable for results. Most agencies measure success not by actual results but rather by awareness or visibility or some other fluffy metric.

I do have a couple of agency clients and although this is self serving, they have made the decision that I am their SEM guy. They do their thing and I do mine. The end result is a successful campaign and a happy client.

MediaPost Advertising & Media Directory:

"Dana Todd, co-founder of SEM firm SiteLab, said that this out-of-place feeling gives agencies something of an inferiority complex when it comes to SEM and SEO. They want to feel like they hold dominion over the entire campaign, and that outside firms are mere facilitators of that process. But Todd argued the reality is that the agency gets in the way of a campaign by unconsciously trying to over-exert its authority. 'You can't control what you don't understand,' she said. "