Search Advisory

Google+ (“Google plus”), a new social network, launched about two weeks ago.  Although there was much cynicism surrounding the launch (given Google’s late entry into social media and their failed efforts with Google Wave and Google Buzz), early reviews are quite positive and millions have joined Google+ already, despite the fact that it’s still “invitation only.”  We wrote last time about Google’s “+1” button and how it affects search engine marketing – the odd naming of “+1” makes more sense now that we know it’s part of Google+.

So what does Google+ mean for search marketers and how can we leverage it to drive more website traffic, leads and revenue?

On the Search Engine Optimization side…

Social media activity around a piece of content is always positive – it generates posts, links, shares, tweets, likes, +1s, etc.  So having this kind of activity happening directly on a Google property will presumably help popular content rank high organically on Google.  This is the opposite of Facebook, whose content is mostly in a “walled garden” – behind a password and unavailable to search engines. Read more…

Some of our favorite Vert & Search Discovery folks

The food is always awesome at Park Tavern!

This is the third and final post on our notes from the AiMA/SEMPO Social Impact on Search event. First up is a very interesting account from the VP of E-Business for Newell Rubbermaid, followed by a summary of the Q+A at the end of the event.

Bert DuMars, Newell Rubbermaid

It’s not common for brands to allow reviews on their websites.  One example from Newell Rubbermaid’s experience was working for two years on a product launch which allowed customer reviews to be posted to their site.  There were seven immediate responses; five of them were negative.  While this was an uncomfortable start, he said it really helped them make immediate product improvements.  Another learning was that by providing users a forum for writing their own product descriptions, it helps prospective buyers to get beyond what product managers want you to know to what actual users are saying about how they use the product.
Read more…

AiMA & SEMPO Atlanta event

Mixing & Mingling

Here’s part 2 of our notes from the AiMA/SEMPO Social Impact on Search event. To view part 1, click here.

Check out what the representatives from Google and Bing had to say about social search:

Walton Norris, Google

The evolution of the internet looks like this:

Phase 1:  Links rule the ranking algorithm
Phase 2:  Applications rule – such as ecommerce, virtual tours, gaming
Phase 3:  Now, social rules – connecting people and facilitating interactions
Read more…

The Social Impact on Search

PPI Team Members Enjoy the Event

Last Wednesday, the Prominent Placement team made its way to Park Tavern for the AiMA/SEMPO event The Social Impact on Search. We learned how Google and Bing are transforming into “social search engines” and Newell Rubbermaid shared how making their site social helped their business. We have a lot of great info to share!

Panel :

• Dave Williams, BLiNQ Media  – Moderator and Event Sponsor
• Walton Norris, Google
• Mike Ching, Program Manager of Bing Social
• Bert DuMars from Newell Rubbermaid

Read more…

Google’s “+1” (“plus one”) button was launched in Google’s results on March 30.  It allows searchers to recommend a site that appears in either the paid or organic listings.  (Here’s Google’s explanation, and here’s what we wrote the day after launch.)  On June 1, Google made the +1 button available to be added to any web page, similar to Facebook’s “Like” button.

What Does +1 Mean to Marketers?

First, let’s look at the impact of the +1 button in the search engine results.  From a purely visual standpoint, it’s desirable to have searchers click the button because the blue +1 button and the notation that someone in your social circle clicked on it help take up more room on the page and draw the searcher’s eye to your listing.

In addition, the fact that others have recommended a listing gives it more credibility and makes it more likely that you’ll click.

On the SEO (search engine optimization) side, Google has said that when a searcher clicks the +1 button, it prompts Google to recrawl the page, which ensures that the freshest copy of the page is in their index.  More importantly, as we predicted in March, Google has stated that +1s may affect rankings: “This is just one of many signals Google may use to determine a page’s relevance and ranking, and we’re constantly tweaking and improving our algorithm to improve overall search quality” (source).

On the PPC (pay-per-click) side, Google reports that while +1s will not affect Quality Score directly, they may indirectly because more searchers may click on your ad (due to the “taking up more room,” “drawing the searcher’s eye” and “credibility” factors cited above).  A higher click-through rate will positively impact your Quality Score, potentially leading to more clicks and a lower cost per click (source). Read more…

Stacy Williams, founder and president of Prominent Placement Inc, led a webinar for Online Marketing Connect’s Search Engine Marketing Focus Week in early May. This is the third post in a six-part series based on her webinar about the use of search engine marketing to pull B2B buyers through the sales funnel. To view the slides from Stacy’s presentation, click here.

Now that we’ve covered SEO, let’s go back to the top of the funnel and focus on PPC (pay-per-click, i.e., the ads you see to the right of and sometimes above your organic search results). While both SEO and PPC fall under the umbrella of “search engine marketing,” some of the specific strategies involved in the two can be very different, or even directly opposed to each other. Read on to learn more about using PPC to pull B2B buyers through the sales funnel.

PPC – Keyword Strategy

It is crucial to remember that the organic and paid results that come up for any given search query are completely separate from each other. This is especially important when it comes to keyword strategy. In SEO, the goal is to target one or two specific keywords per page that users are likely to search for, but aren’t so broad that they bring up mostly editorial results. With PPC however, you don’t have to worry about getting outranked by Wikipedia, and there is no limit on the amount of keywords you can target, allowing you to cast as wide a net as you find cost-effective. Read more…

Stacy Williams, founder and president of Prominent Placement Inc, led a webinar for Online Marketing Connect’s Search Engine Marketing Focus Week in early May. This is the second post in a six-part series based on her webinar about the use of search engine marketing to pull B2B buyers through the sales funnel. To view the slides from Stacy’s presentation, click here.

After you’ve put together your brilliant SEO keyword and content strategy, your site looks good and reads well and rests comfortably at the top of the SERPs (jargon for search engine results pages). Your link-building campaign has netted you plenty of quality inbound links, elevating your site further up the SERPs. So now you’re visible to searchers and are getting a lot of potential buyers in the top of your sales funnel. Let’s shift focus to nurturing those organic leads as they move closer to making the decision to purchase. Read more…

Stacy Williams was recently asked to speak to a group of business owners about search engine marketing.  This is the third post of a five-part series based on her presentation about the most important things you need to know about search marketing today.  We cover tips about PPC and Social Media today.

8.    Pull PPC levers wisely

There are numerous performance-affecting levers in a pay-per-click campaign that can be pulled. Focusing on improving those that have the greatest effect can really improve your campaign. Want a hint? High quality and relevant landing pages, compelling ad copy, and keyword quality scores are three variables that can always be improved upon.

9.    Focus more on PPC ad copy and less on bids

Bid management can just get you more eyes and won’t do much if your campaign lacks compelling ad copy. Focus on the disease, not the symptom. Improving ad copy can raise click-through-rates and conversion rates, and can also reduce the cost-per-click. This often makes struggling with bids less of an issue.
Read more…

AiMA and SEMPO Atlanta separately hold fantastic events – they’ve teamed up to present an event together on how social media impacts search marketing.  Don’t miss it!  (Full disclosure: I’m on the board of SEMPO Atlanta.)  Here’s the official info:

Social Media and Search Marketing are colliding into what is termed “Social Search”.  Come learn about the Social Impact on Search and how you can influence consumers to engage with your brand through techniques on Google +1, Bing and Twitter and see how a large corporation in Atlanta executes Social Search to build their business.  Dave Williams of BLiNQ Media will moderate the top notch panel and field audience questions. Read more…

The Interwebs have been abuzz since yesterday about a public relations scandal that pits Facebook against Google.  Apparently, Facebook hired PR giant Burson-Marsteller to anonymously represent them in an effort to have privacy advocates shed light on Google’s questionable privacy practices.  Plenty of articles have already been published about this situation – here’s the Wall Street Journal’s take.

Apparently, Facebook doesn’t like how Google’s “Social Circle” results can pull data from Facebook.  Rather than confront the problem directly, Facebook turned this into a privacy issue – one that presumably the public would care about more than one behemoth using another behemoth’s data.  But Facebook couldn’t poke at Google’s privacy lapses directly since Facebook’s own privacy policies are arguably worse.  Hence the subterfuge, which blew up in Facebook’s, well, FACE, when one of the bloggers that Burson-Marsteller approached smelled a rat and published the email exchange online.

Facebook claims that it was just trying to focus attention on publicly-available information, and Burson-Marsteller is now saying that withholding its client’s name was not their standard operating procedure and that they should have declined the assignment.

What was that saying about glass houses, again?