There’s a lot of talk about social media – often way too much. I understand…it’s the latest and greatest in web marketing, but let’s not get too carried away with it. In fact, for businesses interested in executing some really great Internet marketing programs, the more traditional approaches are still very strong and remain relevant – often having better exposure and more conversions. One of these traditional programs is search marketing and it might surprise you that even with all the latest advancements in Internet technologies, this specific industry is still growing.
It’s alive and kicking
In a recent report released by the Search Engine Marketing Professional Organization (SEMPO) on the State of Search Engine Marketing, the overall industry is growing at near double digit rates even while other marketing & advertising budgets are being slashed. In fact, SEMPO concludes that here in North America, search engine marketing will grow by at least 14% in 2010 alone from $14.6 to $16.6 billion. Over the past six years, search marketing has always been on a steady rise through the good times and the recession and out of those 1,500 client-side marketers and agencies surveyed, the one critical issue that still remains fully unanswered is finding a way to measure a campaign’s Return on Investment.
Over the past few years, some search engines have come and gone. I remember in the 90s, the main player was Yahoo and slowly moved to Google. Now in 2010, Google maintains a stranglehold over the market while Yahoo has slowly faded to a distant third place with Microsoft’s Bing search engine becoming the nearest and most serious competitor to Google’s success. So who do search marketers prefer when they put together a strategy for their clients & companies? 97% indicated that they still prefer Google. Why? It’s probably because the search engine giant still gets most of the search queries and traffic on the Internet compared to everyone else. 71% of those surveyed said that they would advertise on Google’s extensive search network – which is defined as a “large group of websites and other products, such as email programs and blogs, who have partnered with Google to display AdWords ads.” Yahoo’s search engine is favored by 50% and Bing comes in at 44% – shockingly a 10% decrease from those who said they’d use Microsoft Live Search when it was still around last year.
Let’s look at the 2010 trends
Two things: inflation and personalization. By inflation, we’re talking about the rising cost of keywords. They’re getting more expensive for people to purchase: 56% of advertisers are saying that they’ve experienced an increase in the keywords over the past year. With personalization, 31% report that this concept has a huge significant impact on search marketing efforts – and why not? With the age of social media and so much information being thrust at consumers, should it be a surprise that there’s just too much noise? So much, in fact, that we can’t make heads or tails of the data we’re consuming and this is probably causing massive amounts of confusion and disappointment for businesses trying to reach out to us. As personalization is with email marketing and social media, so to can you use it for search engine marketing. Making things more relevant and contextual to the user who is seeking information is incredibly useful. Whether it’s more geo-targeted to that person’s region, related to their past queries or even their browsing history, having personalized results to their needs can be beneficial for both the company and the end user.
What’s behind door number three?
The SEMPO State of Search Marketing report also includes a list of the proverbial “winners and losers” within the industry. A huge majority of companies that were polled engage in search engine optimization and this number has remained relatively stable over the past three years, but surprisingly the number of people executing paid search campaigns has risen over the past two, from 70% to 81%. More and more companies are bringing their SEO strategy in-house and away from agencies…is this because they are realizing that they don’t need to spend their precious budgets on hiring an agency to do the stuff they can do? In fact, it’s not just SEO, it’s also paid search as well. Companies are starting to bring in specialists to help them do what they used to pay agencies for. So while businesses are still getting their monies worth, agencies are suffering and need to find a way to become more innovative to find a reason for brands to bring them back on board to help them get found.
Connecting the dots
How are you viewing the search engine marketing industry? Do you see it dying out anytime soon? I certainly don’t because no matter where you are and what device you’re using, there will always be a need for a directory of information and the most primitive form of monetization for any business is advertising…and this will be the basis on which search marketing professionals will continue to make their money. Although, as more companies are starting to realize that they could possibly bring this knowledge in-house instead of hiring an agency, there’s a need to be on your toes to make sure that you’re not being complacent. And this includes being up-to-date on the latest technologies and services out there to help make your campaigns better. According to the SEMPO State of Search Marketing report, more companies (53%) are not using third-party bid management tools to help oversee paid search marketing – they’re resorting to using search engine tools and Excel…so there looks to be room for other companies to get in there to help fill a gap.
To help connect the dots and always be prepared with your search engine marketing strategy, a good place to start would be to attend any search marketing panel, course or even a conference like Search Engine Strategies held throughout the year across the country. The next one will actually be held in San Francisco in August and this time, they’re putting it all under the umbrella of integrating all marketing programs. Called Connected Marketing Week, it’s designed to help search marketing professionals better integrate their programs and strategy with the overall communication mix – learn how consumers and audiences are really connecting and find a way to influence them.
Another place to get started in finding the latest information on search engine marketing is through your hosting provider. While they may not all be specialists in search marketing, what they are skilled at is being kept abreast at the latest changes and tactics being deployed as it relates to affecting how your domain can be found. And don’t forget SEMPO as they have a great resource to help you get started.
So now that you know the latest in search engine marketing trends, where do you see your business going in terms of search? Are you putting more money into making sure your brand is found?
Image credit: SEMPO via Search Engine Land
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