Know-How Exchange : SEO/SEM

JC,

Common thinking today with respect to PPC search engine marketing is that more specific is better. Many people are using phrases versus key words in search. If you look at your business from this standpoint, versus buying the common words - which get expensive - pick specific phrases to buy. This definitely will result in lower cost words and reduce your PPC search engine marketing expenditures. With this, it also will reduce your traffic - be aware of this! However, it's not traffic you're after, it's conversions. Because you are getting more specific, your conversion percentage should go up and your return on investment in search engine marketing should improve. You can get specific phrases by looking at the adword tools, or even better, ASK your customers and marketplace what they search for.

Another common opinion out there is that SEO and organic placement is MUCH more valuable than PPC search engine marketing. Because of the over- and misuse of active ads where the sponsored ads use part of the search in their text (Like, if I'm searching for a chiropractor, the ads say, "Find a chiropractor at eBay" or "Find a Chiropractor at Target"), people are becoming distrustful of the sponsored ads and tend to pick from the organic ranking. Because of this, the return of invest in SEO is outpacing ROI in PPC. I haven't seen specific research to this point, but I have to believe email marketing ROI is higher than PPC as well, because I have seen reference that of all marketing activities, it's the highest ROI. I would recommend you "max out" your investment email marketing (using a marginal return approach) and then max out investment in SEO, and then if you have money left over, put it PPC. It will take some analysis to get the level right, but this would be the priority.

I hope this helps.

Wayde

Those expensive keywords wouldn't seem so expensive if your conversion rates were higher. Why not spend some time, effort and money on post-click marketing?

Have you optimized your landing pages and made sure that each landing page is matched to its source? Or are you just sending everyone to a common homepage and hoping they'll figure out what to do next?

And what about the offer? Have you tried 5 or 6 different offers and tested them against each other to find out what works best with each of your key market segments?

And have you looked at different ways of segmenting your audience so that the landing experience for each segment is optimal?

Very often the greatest leverage is not in picking the right keywords or coming up with the right search advertising strategy, but in finding ways to boost conversion AFTER the click. If you can increase conversion by 2-6x, then the cost of first-page placement for AdWords won't look nearly so outrageous.

It depends on how they became so expensive. If you bid, then your competitor outbids, then you bid again, then, on occasion, you can drop your bid which may also result in your competitor bidding lower and you start the ratcheting up process again. It's game playing but it may still keep you in the play.

The question I have is what value do unprofitable keyword phrases have? If they contribute to brand awareness that may be worthwhile but difficult to measure.

You also need to truly understand your CPA. If you do, you'll answer your own question. It sounds like you don't have ROI/CPA-based rules in effect. Establish a threshold where you no longer are profitable and keep your bid below it.

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