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Don’t Gamble with Your PPC Campaigns! Save It For The Casinos.

By Account Deleted

In the lyrics of one of my favorite songs by Kenny Roger’s “the Gambler” which states that “you gotta know when to hold em…., Know when to fold em… No when to walk away…… Know when to run….  And it is those lyrics which reminded me of how easy it is to gamble with your PPC Campaigns, when "rash" decisions can really screw-up your bottom-line. (BTW - What the hell happened to Kenny Roger's Face? It looks like he gambled and lost with his plastic surgeon - See photo below) In this post, I will discuss why it’s important to “know when hold certain keywords and also “when to fold ‘em” or pause them. Just because a keyword may be under-performing, does not mean it’s a bad keyword. It just may bring attention to other areas of the PPC optimization experience (Landing Page, website usability or even the Text Ad). Let’s discuss

Not all keywords are the same for everyone. In my experience, I have seen other PPC Marketers and even myself at times, be guilty of not giving keyword a 2nd chance at life it deserves and it's very much like gambling with real money where the only difference is that your not bidding with Chips, your gambling with your business.

In my humble opinion, the best approach to managing keywords in the PPC Campaigns is to create  a small group of 10-20 “tightly” relevant Head Terms and Long Tail Phrases about that specific product or service. Depending on your analytics package, it is sometimes a good idea to identify a few head terms and leave them in either Broad or Phrase Match and let the user find the long-tail work for you. Once you have that setup, I would then monitor them closely a few times a day for a week at a time just to see the behavior.

A Few Behaviors would be:

• Click Thru Rate (CTR%)
• Avg Position Fluctuation
• Competitive saturation
• Eventually CPL/CPA.

Once you have a good idea of the winners and “non winners” – (Notice I did not say “LOSERS” because the under-performers may just have the wrong “intent” factor which is perfectly ok), segment them and start working on the ones that need a little more attention. The beauty of Paid Search is the ability for the search marketer to try all types of "last resorts" and test new things. Moreover, finding the ultimate “gold-mine” keywords are not always instant. It could take months to truly get a handle on how to continue the ROAS Success. So in comparing PPC to Gambling at the Casino, you are in effect,

1. Looking at your cards
2. Looking at the others players
3. Looking at the dealer’s cards
4. Deciding to FOLD'em or HOLD'em

The benefit of PPC is that you do not have to fold right away, you can try different tactics to truly determine if it’s a lost cause and/or stop the bleeding before the credit card company knocks on your door.

So what are some examples of Rehabilitation Tactics?
Certainly, there are many tools to utilize when you are forced to give these keywords a second and third chance at life in your campaigns.

1. Step #1: Look at all of the RAW search queries (through analytics) and see if there is a gap in the long tail searches. An example maybe adding a FEW MORE negative keywords to filter out unqualified visitors to keep the cost down and improve CTR to get your ROAS at the level it needs to be.
2. Step #2: Look at the keywords position. Perhaps the “quality score” effect is just not there, so you may want to drop a few cents of the maximum CPC.
3. Step #3: Look at your Landing Page and Website and looking for problems in your Conversion process. This could also be an issue with price, lack of information, shipping costs (if applicable) as well as anything else which may be affecting your ROAS.
4. Step #4: If on the Content or Site Placement Networks, run a referring sites report and add those sites that are driving up add spend and not converting to the Site Exclusion section within Google Adwords.

In Conclusion:
The bottom-line of this post is to highlight on the fact that PPC does not have to be a game of High Stakes BlackJack. The PPC Marketer has many options on the table and just needs to be conscious of the surroundings of the user experience to make a better decision. Many great PPC experts in the industry  have also been evangelizing on these similar tactics, techniques and strategies mentioned in this post. However, this SemGeek’s thought process is using all of these best practices and simply relating them to other types of behavior, whether you are gambling at the Casinos, or Fishing (That’s another analogy to write about) it’s all relative.

PPC marketing is dynamic in that sometimes you can “win by Knockout" in the first 30 seconds, but if you get knocked down more that 3 times in the same round, as a PPC Marketer you can still continue to analyze your opponent (client) and fight your way back to a successful campaign.

Don't Be Afraid of the Dark: Black Hat PPC Tactics in SES NY

By Brian Cosgrove

The "Black Hat" PPC session contained quite a bit of overlap in content. There was a certain risk/reward scenario that followed and for the most part, the panelists agree that it's a good idea to push the boundaries far enough to get push-back, but not so far that you banned. At SMG, we suggest that you use your own best judgment on whether to use these tactics, but also that you keep your eyes open to see whether they are being used against you.

The panelists for this session include:

Moderator

• Richard Zwicky: Founder & CEO, Enquisite

Speakers

• Jamie Smith: CEO, Engine Ready
• Kevin Lee: Co-Founder & Executive Chairman, Didit
• David Szetela: CEO, Clix Marketing
• Bill Leake: President and CEO, Apogee Search

Among the topics was shelf space. This means getting multiple listings on the same page by the same company. They mentioned that this can occur by working with channel providers, or creating resource portals with a few competitors. In cases where there is a decidedly different user experience; many folks may get away with the multiple listings. Nonetheless, the foot print that would tie the accounts together must be minimized. Also, there may be several situations where a user will click on multiple of your listings on the same results page driving the cost per acquisition (CPA) up. In this respect, it's better to separate the listings (1 and 4 instead of 2 and 3). Note that CPA could go over the top if users regularly click multiple listings; but the vast majority or users click on or under two for any SERP. One panelist mentioned that it may have a negative impact on your brand if low-quality flanker sites or low quality affiliates are taking up the listings. As long as your trying to avoid complaints, you're on a far better path to keep those multiple shelf-space ads alive.

Another topic covered is hiding from competition. To do this, geo-targeting can be applied to exclude your competitor's town. Further, an IP address may be blocked from you campaign and this can be obtained by sending an email to the competitor and viewing its properties to get the IP address of where it went. If the competitor uses an agency, it must be excluded as well. If the geographic region of the competitor is too important of a market, geography-based exclusion should be reconsidered. Beware that affiliates will often use this tactic against you.  This concept is important with black hat PPC because it may reduce the number of complaints you'll receive from competition about black/gray-hat tactics and it hides the successful ads from their view as well. As a best practice the top three to five competitors should be considered. In the same notion as hiding from your competition, one panelist suggested hiding from Google as well (i.e., only violate rules when Mountain View, CA is sleeping.)

Trademarks were covered in length. On the topic, they mentioned that it takes a long time to get trademark usage approved with some companies. Dynamic keyword insertion in one tool that can help to facilitate getting trademarks in the ad copy when they are used in the search. Also mentioned was using hyphens or spaces creatively. For example, if the word "company" was a trademark, someone might use "comp-any" or "c o m p a n y" in their ad. In other cases, there are still companies who haven't or can't enforce a trademark and therefore could be easily targeted. One suggestion was to align ppc spend with the competitor's market spend to capitalize on large marketing campaign pushes that will increase the volume of related queries. Monitoring and syncing with their campaigns will let you harvest the clicks from the entire "ecosystem" of words that they stimulate. Note that re-targeting may also let you connect your ads with competitors' trademarks in an indirect manner.  Finally, use of broad match on mispellings(sic) of names, pieces of names, or pieces of domain spellings can further capitalize on searches intended for competitors. 

On the PR side of things, they suggested using Adwords for promoting negative press about competitors. For example, you could promote your own marketwatch.com article by making a better quality score and higher bid or you could publicize someone else's "statement of truth."

Some tactics were simply around testing boundaries. For example, one was about using special characters and symbols such as bullet points, arrows, etc... in your ads. While trademark and copyright symbols in an ad are a best practice, (and apparently improve click-through rates), they are not only characters that can work. Some such as the # sign will probably not work but by using the Adwords editor, you can test which others will. Similarly, use of superlatives, capitalized words, or CSS-layer styled pop-ups on landing pages are things that can be quickly corrected if you're caught but probably won't result in a ban.

Other areas for gray hat include some light "cloaking" where landing content is different based on geography, time of day, cookie acceptance, ISP, HTTP referrer, or landing page personalization characteristics. In the same way that the self space approach may let you get the right copy for the user, personalization can let you further resolve persona differences and keep your various ads connected with the content on the landing page. One example showed a landing page that simply reproduced the copy of the ad to indicate to visitors that they are on the right page.

Some general best practices were discussed that weren't "black hat" at all:

1. Take time to strategically plan and organize campaigns.
2. Examine the visitor behavior to try to figure out what better post-click experiences will improve the conversion rates of that particular ad or keyword.
3. Use a valid data sample before making a decision (thousands of impressions and hundreds of clicks).
4. Read organic listings and look for inspiration: those are probably proven performers.
5. The concept of match type has evolved and exact isn't often as useful. A broad match with lots of negatives may work better for the same terms.
6. When possible, try to figure out how that term fits into the conversion cycle before assessing its value.

In a bit more detail, they covered trying to measure assists. One panelist spoke of a study of 16,500 sales which showed that 70% included assists.  When a phone number is listed on a site, assists can be measured using unique numbers for keywords or groups. 800 numbers tend to be better than 877, 866 or 888 for the purpose of getting calls. Local area codes tend to be better for local businesses. Note: Free toll free numbers might be available in Google audio ads before they finally turn the entire program off.  Tenchu, Click Equations, Maestro, and Enquisite are some tools that let you measure assists. Some companies may be able to sort their analytics by IP addresses or cookies as well. A self developed cookie tracking system may keep tabs on prior keyword searches.

I wasn't sure what to expect from a "black hat" PPC session and I was surprised to find that among the list of questionable tactics were bits of wisdom and some warnings that anyone competing in the paid search space can use.

Pay-for-Performance: Winning Strategies for Advertisers and Agencies at SES NYC

By Brian Cosgrove

At the end of the first day at SES NYC came this interesting panel. Many ideas were shared about the importance of restructuring payment for search services and a few of the solutions offer considerations that should be made when considering these models. The panel featured the following speakers:

Moderator

• Matt Van Wagner: President, Find Me Faster

Speakers

• Richard Zwicky: Founder & CEO, Enquisite
• Ron Belanger: SES Advisory Board, Vice President of Agency Development, Yahoo!
• Tom Cuthbert: President & Founder, Click Forensics
• Brian Klais: Executive Vice President, Netconcepts
• Jonathan Scott: COO, Direct Traffic Media

Zwicky began the panel by illustrating the imbalance in compensation for paid and organic search. In his statistics, approximately 88 percent of spend goes to 12 percent of the search engine traffic (paid search) and 12 percent of spend goes to 88 percent of the traffic (organic). These numbers back up his notion that organic search is not getting the compensation it deserves. According to Zwicky, top SEO specialists can deliver top ROI so they deserve to be compensated for value delivered; and everyone should be focused on real value to the end client.

Next up is Belenger. Like Zwicky,this Yahoo! employee stresses minimizing the industry buzz-speak and getting down to business value. Unlike Zwicky, Belenger calls pay for performance problematic. It's true that for Belenger, search marketers need to minimize the sorcery by taking details of the tactics out of the price negotiations and instead get into value delivered. When it comes to pay for performance, however, there are a number of reasons that it may not be a good fit.

For example, the agency may not be able to influence all factors such as:

• Conversion flow
• Pricing competitiveness
• Shipping and promotional offers
• Brand "trust"
• Customer service

As an alternative, percent of media spend presents its own issues:

• It provides incentives agencies to spend more for paid search than they should.
• In some cases, it disincentives economies of scale.
• The first 90 days of of the engagement are bleeding red for agencies.
• Search marketing is reduced to buying more keywords.

For Belenger, an FTE (Full-Time Equivalent) model with fair rates makes the most sense. The following were points on this subject:

• Data is the new black: pay for it and agree on its value. Use it to derive strategy and insights.
• Add incentives for cost savings: use technology deployment, outsourcing, and only provide in-house support where applicable.
• Reach and stretch goals: create an upside for heroic work and a win/win business climate.

Next up, Cuthbert provided some interesting statistics. Online advertising is up 11% while print is down 19%. To explain this, he references phenomena such as CPA models, targeting, measurability, an roi focused culture, the collapse of traditional media, and enhanced tools.

Following Cuthbert is Klais. Klais works with software that is used to execute pay for performance search campaigns. Like Zwicky, he reiterates that there is an inverse relationship between spend and volume with paid and organic search. When thinking of pay per performance, there are a number of factors to consider such as the following:

• Market opportunity
• Click-through rate
• Acquisition costs
• Keyword coverage
• Non-brand reach
• Page placement
• Page yield
• Incremental traffic/revenue
• ROAS

In general, the margin can increase based on value delivered which better aligns agency/marketer interests and should ensure positive ROI/ROAS. He did, however, express some performance model drawbacks for agencies:

• Investment of resources ahead of revenue
• Lack of control over execution and conversion
• Difficulty in managing channel attribution
• The possibility of succeeding out of a job
• The program may contain baggage

For the customer, there are also drawbacks:

• Costs can scale indefinitely
• Bigger payouts tempt agencies to try risky tactics

When constructing a pay for performance arrangement, consider a revenue sharing model where you define fair commission structure. In this respect, consider rates for the percent of brand or nonbrand; or for incremental increases only. Consider affiliate levels for brand merchants and figure out how to handle channel attribution. Ultimately, try to make sure that SEO and paid search are given their fair split in credit.

Another model is cost per click. After defining a fair click cost, similar considerations should be made about branded vs. non-branded, comparing SEO cost to ppc acquisition cost, and multichannel attribution.

Scott came next and echoed the idea of performance related pay. He believes the industry should embrace performance contracts because the SEO gold rush is over, and clients are demanding accountability and governance in plans.

Scott proposes a base + performance model. That is, the performance element is the carrot, the motivator. He suggests setting up incentive targets based on true KPIs where you can approximately value them and trust them. Even still there are a number of considerations that should be accounted for when developing one of these plans.

The first consideration is seasonality. On a month to month basis, consider using Adwords trends to predict the possible changes in volume that occur. On a similar note, also consider other external factors such as the state of the market by doing a year over year comparison and utilize some basic forecasting. After that, relax and caveat a bit.

In some real life examples, Scott explained how there were bands where the % of bonus became larger and these bands were routinely adjusted to account for seasonality and market factors. It's about taking the time to reach an agreement that makes life easier and avoiding an overly complicated model. In this respect, the client should feel in control, there should be a warm-up period explained, and there should be get out clauses for both parties. It's about negotiating a sense of shared risk among both parties.

That wrapped up the session.  In summary, there are many factors out of the control of search marketers which make it difficult to come to a performance based agreement but, none-the-less, organic search marketers should be paid on the value that they deliver.

Google Grants: Much More Than Free Clicks for NonProfits - Part III

By Account Deleted

In Part III in a Three Part Series by SemGeek on the socially responsible gift from Google called Google Grants, I focus on the importance of utilizing web analytics and some "outside the box" thinking when it comes to analysis. Too many advertisers have focused on the wrong things such as CTR% and Clicks when it comes to the Free Google Funny Money. What's important is NOT THE FREE CLICKS, but what you are learning from the Free Clicks. Let's discuss.

Another integral part of the search marketing process is the implementation of  web analytics and analysis. However, evangelizing the importance of that to Nonprofits, both large and small, is rather an uphill battle. For many search marketers who provide PPC and SEO in the “for-profit” world, they can make a much greater case for using analytics to track KPIs (key performance indicators) because most companies cannot survive unless there is a ceiling ROAS%, ROI% or CPA to measure against the investment.

As part of the standard PPC analysis, the search marketer would need to identify either at the campaign, adgroup or keyword level, and the basic conversion or non-conversion flow of the “after the click” scenario. For example,

Keyword → Ad/Creative → Landing Page  → Conversion (of any trackable sort).

Now, even though is may seem like a no-brainer strategy for future optimization, I often go beyond this method and dig deeper into other types of analysis, including Ad Messaging Testing, Indirectly related campaign testing as well as anything else that the Nonprofit could benefit from all of their “offline” and event based initiatives. 

With the generous $10k per month from Google, a search marketer could position the strategy around a Multi-channel Research, Search Behavior and Website Usability that not only generates traffic, but also provides valuable insight into future endeavors such as new website creation, newly created programs and all sorts of advocacy and messaging in other media. In essence, this methodology, here are a few areas where what is practiced in the “for profit” world can be applied to the “not for profit” world.

Each Google Grantee would be presented with a comprehensive 6-12 month paid search plan, consisting of a campaign-to-adgroup matrix, as well as reserved remnant space for any future “time sensitive” advocacy and messaging that is important to the Nonprofit. . Remember, the search marketer needs to be vigilant about the importance of seasonality of a Nonprofit, as it’s similar to any “for profit” business.

For example, a paid search plan would contain campaigns and adgroups based on Brand; Programs; Initiatives; Fundraising Events; Sponsors; Current news events, etc…  As you can see, this is very similar structure to that of mainstream PPC Account. Along with the different audiences that are being targeted, performing a level of Ad testing is another valuable area that should be considers. Wouldn’t a Nonprofit find it important to know that the CTA (call to action ) of the word Donate outperforms the word Contribute that can then be applied to all other offline initiates, which result in more donations?

To conclude, I see Google Grants from a much different perspective than just free clicks to a website. The socially responsible gift from Google has not been given the greatness it deserves and even though many top search marketers may be providing amazing results for the client, the Nonprofit has more to gain for the well-being of the organization because remember they are not paying to LEARN. For SemGeek, such as myself , the  true gift from Google is the freedom to do whatever the Nonprofit wants to do with the free advertising. It’s not about the Free Clicks, it’s what you do with the Free clicks, which makes a difference to the Nonprofit.

• Part I of Google Grants: Much more that Free Clicks for Nonprofits
• Part II of Google Grants: Much more that Free Clicks for Nonprofits

Greg Meyers is Partner and Co Founder of CampaignGrid, LLC and World Benefactor. He is also author of the search marketing blog Semgeek.com.

Google Grants: Much More Than Free Clicks for NonProfits - Part II

By Account Deleted

In Part II in a Three Part Series on the socially responsible gift from Google called Google Grants, I focus on the "cross-pollination" of appling the best practices of Quality Score. Let's discuss.

Following the best practice of Quality Score, which in essence, is better position for a lower CPC is key to any successful PPC campaign. This is especially true when it’s a Google Grants Account where advertisers are limited to the one-dollar CPC. As many of us in the industry know, the creation of very specific and tightly grouped keywords, Ad copy that is keyword-rich and a corresponding landing page which continues the keyword relevance, as well as visible SEO attributes, intelligent linking structures and most recently efficient page loading times all contribute to Quality Score.

The problem with this however, is that many of the cash-strained Nonprofits do not have the resources of a paid search marketing professional, nor do they know this best practice, which explains why many of the Google Grants that have been awarded in the past, have under-performed and been left untouched and forgotten. On the other side of the spectrum, those Nonprofits who have taken full advantage of this program, Google has been known to reward their efforts with an increase in the monthly Ad spend anywhere from $20k, to as much as $40k per month in appreciation for the success that they have achieved.

When evaluating a Google Grant, I often notice a trend in the missed opportunities that are preventing the Nonprofit to get the most out of the Grant. Many of problems go back to basic industry best practices and some lack a little of the “thinking outside the box” mentality. For example, many of the keywords that have been used are all very generic head search terms, and for most Nonprofits, the service offering and topics that they support are often the "Head Term" keywords that will most likely have a "high price tag", so the obvious solution to that problem goes into identifying the traditionally cheaper and more specific "long tail" keywords which are in essence less competitive and allow for higher position and more effective.

To continue the discussion on the importance of Quality Score, the writing of the Text Ad plays an important role in the “before the click” experience for the searcher. With that said, as a Google Grantee does have some technical issues to overcome with the Editorial police at Google. As with any Nonprofit organization which advertises their cause, it’s imperative for them to include the “call to action” of Please Donate. However, as many us know, the Google editorial process is rather strict and some nonprofits may have noticed some of their Text Ads keep getting denied due to the error message of "Solicitation Funds". This is due to the fact that your Ad most likely is saying something like "Help us by Donating Today!" Even though the message sounds genuine, Google sees this as a sensitive issue and can sometimes be misleading to the searcher.

If the solicitation of funds is promoted in ad text or occupies a significant portion of your site, the ad's landing page should clearly display tax-exempt status such as 501(c)(3) status in the United States, and should state whether the donations are tax-deductible in full or in part. Other countries need to have an equivalent status (must be a registered charity or not-for-profit organization).

So, the solution to help alleviate this issue is making sure the Landing Page states they  are a 501c3 status in the US and that they are tax deductible. If not, then Google sees this as false advertising and will turn the ad off, regardless if you are a registered Grantee.

In Part III of Google Grants: Much more than Free Clicks for Nonprofits, I will dive into the importance using web analytics and "outside the box" ways to analyze and monetize success that goes beyond online.

So please check back next Monday for Part III of this article.

To read Part I of Google Grants: Much more that Free Clicks for Nonprofits.

Greg Meyers is Partner and Co Founder of CampaignGrid, LLC and World Benefactor. He is also author of the search marketing blog Semgeek.com.

Google Grants: Much More Than Free Clicks for NonProfits - Part I

By Account Deleted

I have put together a Three Part Series on the socially responsible gift from Google called Google Grants. The goal of this series of posts is to highlight on the key differences and similarities of Google Grants as compared to the mainstream Google Adwords program we have come to know and love. I also provide detailed insights and some "outside the box" thinking that goes beyond the idea that Google is just giving Nonprofit free clicks to their websites. I hope you enjoy

PART I:
In 2003, Google launched Google Grants, a truly remarkable and unique type of advertising offering that was designed specifically for 501(c)(3) Nonprofit organizations. In a nutshell, Google is giving away $10, 000 per month in free PPC advertising. The overall goal of this program is to utilize and transform the Google Adwords system into a powerful tool to spread advocacy, awareness, volunteer-ism and provide the ability to increase donations, both online and offline, to make the world a better place.

Since it’s launch, Google has put very specific requirements in both applying for the grant as well as managing the grant. Throughout this article I will be focusing on the key differences and similarities between Google Grants and the traditional Adwords program that we are, in general, familiar with as well as discuss additional strategies that will help every participating Nonprofit get the most out of this program.

The key differences between the mainstream Google Adwords program and Google Grants program are mostly about the limitations of what can be done from a tactical perspective. For example, for many of us who are used to a multi-level strategy that includes testing with different networks, image display ads, and bidding tests, that this is NOT an Option with GG. In fact, two of the biggest restrictions facing the Grantee is placement on (1) Google.com only and (2) Maximum $1.00 CPC (cost per click).  Advertisers are forbidden to spread that free “Google Funny Money” to the other participating networks such as their search partners, Content and Site Placement Networks.

This lack of advertising freedom, as compared to the mainstream Google, does make it a little more difficult for the search marketer to allocate what campaigns and Adgroups should be given priority. Regardless of whether Google is Free or not, the end goal is to drive as much qualified traffic to the website and track the performance using analytics to decide what is working and what is not working. I would also like to note that with Nonprofits, integrating high-powered analytics filled with nifty bells and whistles is not suitable for them because of the cost and the extensive knowledge needed for them to simply understand what they are looking at.

Grantees are also stifled by inability to increase their bid for a quick jump in position, which is done almost religiously everyday in the mainstream. This is especially difficult for them, because many of the Nonprofits Topics, Issues and Causes require a specific industry related keyword(s) that are highly competitive, possess a higher worth and hence becomes an uphill battle to try and achieve a better position.

On the other hand, I have seen “actual” real life evidence where traditional account and click history along with a little help from the “magical algorithm fairies” within the Google Grant program have revealed magical positions within the search results. With that said, there is one major similarity which MUST be applied to counteract this cost vs. position issue, and that tactic is the infamous and ever changing Google Quality Score for which all search marketers have been victim of this love vs. hate relationship.

In Part II of Google Grants: Much more than Free Clicks for Nonprofits, I will dive into the tactical area of the Quality Score, Google Editorial issues as well as some additional strategic opportunities.

So please check back next Monday for Part II of this article.

Greg Meyers is Partner and Co Founder of CampaignGrid, LLC and World Benefactor. He is also author of the search marketing blog Semgeek.com.

Interview with Google Website Optimizer's Tom Leung

By Julie Joyce

Google's Website Optimizer, currently in beta, is a free site content testing tool offered inside of Google AdWords. Designed to improve conversion rates on paid ads and thus keep advertisers happy (and, not coincidentally, keep them spending money), Website Optimizer allows advertisers to test out various combinations of original and varied headlines, images, etc. in order to determine which combination has the highest conversion rate.

Tom Leung, Business Product Manager of Google Website Optimizer, was kind enough to answer my questions about Website Optimizer. As someone who’s been doing PPC for a few years, I was actually quite excited to speak to him and learn more about a product that even a picky client who swears by numbers would like. (I’ll let you know how it works out once I convince my picky client to use it.)

What’s so fascinating about this product is that it has the potential to provide clients with NUMBERS to back up what the best chance for the highest conversion rate is.  As you’ll see below, the product has the potential to increase conversions by 30%, which is quite significant. If you’ve ever dealt with a client who didn’t trust your recommendations because you didn’t really have actual numbers to back it up, Website Optimizer could seriously make your day.

And, just for all the mathletes out there, check out their section on Fractional versus Full Factorial Analysis for a jolly good read.

Julie Joyce: “What are the basic principles behind Google Website Optimizer?”

Tom Leung: "It's a tool that lets you test different combinations of content and web designs. You tell Website Optimizer, for a given page, what things you're curious about testing to increase its effectiveness: this headline could be better, one of these three images should work, this button should be located here ... Website Optimizer lets you test all of those ideas by distributing the traffic that hits that page, showing each visitor one of the various permutations, and providing reports that help you make more informed decisions and maximize conversion rates and visitor satisfaction."

Julie Joyce: “Where did the idea for this product come from?”

Tom Leung: "It came from the overall goal of what we do with Google AdWords and Google Analytics: increasing transparency and marketing effectiveness. With AdWords and Analytics, we've done a good job of helping website owners get targeted traffic to their sites. Website Optimizer closes that loop; it's the third leg of the stool. Website Optimizer will show what you can do to make pages perform better. The only way to figure out the ideal page is to try a bunch of combinations simultaneously and see, with great precision, what caused conversions."

Julie Joyce: “What does Google stand to gain from the improvement of PPC conversion rates?”

Tom Leung: "Google benefits from doing big things: making a big impact on the Web and the world, helping people design better pages so that users have a better experience. Websites can do a better job of converting and getting people more engaged and involved. It's also very scientific. Website owners will get a higher ROI, which can help people decide if they want to invest more with AdWords. Everyone wins."

Julie Joyce: “What feedback have you received so far on the tool? Has the initial response been what you anticipated?”

Tom Leung: "Great feedback. As a result of doing testing, a lot of users tell us their companies will not make any permanent changes to their site unless they've done at least one test. People aren't just designing pages by guessing and gut feel. A 20% or 30% increase in conversions is not uncommon! We encourage people to test all the time; it's a free tool. And marketers feel like they've gotten some power back. They used to be beholden to the designers and the IT team. Everybody feels like it's not about opinion and politics anymore, which makes it great buy-in across the company."

Julie Joyce: “What is the maximum number of combinations that can run for one page?”

Tom Leung: "From an engineering point of view, we limit the number to 10,000 for a single experiment, but it depends on your traffic. The rule of thumb is that for every 100 conversions, you can test 1 alternate version of your page. If you have 300 conversions per week, test 2 or 3. That's suggested for statistical relevance. We also recommend that people start small."

Julie Joyce: “Currently the tool doesn't allow testing of database-driven content. Are there plans for doing so in the future?”

Tom Leung: "Website Optimizer will work fine for a dynamic page, as long as the tags get inserted on the page by your CMS or webserver. We hold webinars about once a month where we explain how it works. As your site gets more sophisticated, the tool is still flexible enough but it requires a bit more investment. We also have Website Optimizer Authorized Consultants who offer additional support and marketing strategy."

Julie Joyce: “How long is a typical experimentation period?”

Tom Leung: "Even if you have a ton of traffic and you're testing 2 versions, let it run at least a week, but generally 2 weeks because of seasonal effects that need to be normalized."

Julie Joyce: “Any potential abuse that could happen from the tool? Can black hats use it for anything nefarious?” [Editor’s note: I was hoping to get some black hat tips but Tom was too clever…]

Tom Leung: "Testing is good if you're improving user experience, but if you're using any testing tool to deceive search engines or users, that is subject to the same penalties. Using Website Optimizer does not buy you any protection for wrongdoing, but if people are worried about being mistaken for cloaking, they can read on our Help Center about how testing for the good of users and making pages more effective are good things."

So there you have it...Google's Website Optimizer is quite a fascinating tool so if you're doing PPC, give it a go.

SES New York: Landing Page Testing & Tuning

By Brian Cosgrove

Moderator: Sage Lewis, (www.sagerock.com)
Speakers:

• Tim Ash, (www.sitetuners.com)

Description:
This session had only one speaker which is atypical of an SES conference. Fortunately, this speaker came with a great ppt full of examples to illustrate each point and plenty of enthusiasm to keep the entire room engaged.

Who should design your website?

Marketers? IT? No! Visitors should design your website! You get thousands of people who can test out your experiments. Guinea Pigs who are willing to give you answers about your site.

Case Studies:

Tim presented a number of test scenarios from various sites. For example, he shows that RealAge.com received a 40% lift in conversion rate once the proper form was identified.

The headline, the length of questions, the look of the button,… these were all factors for the site’s registration page. The point is that a number of subtle changes meant $3 million to bottom line. Thinking streamlined, shorter, and simpler is a good way to get a page to convert. A big green round-edged button doesn’t seem to hurt either. In many cases a radical simplification is the best option.

The Matrix:

Tim’s Matrix is a calculation to decide whether people’s needs are being met.

The Matrix = Roles x Tasks x AIDA

AIDA stands for Awareness, Interest, Desire, Action.

In essence this means:

Getting the Right People

through the Right Activity

in the Right Order.

Example Roles:

Southwest airlines had a number of actions that a new or returning visitor might want to perform. They made to sure to organize their homepage to reflects these roles.

Common Awareness Problems:

Banner Ads can be distracting and could lead users away from the primary point of the site.

Entry pop-ups are annoying and invasive.

A cluttered home page such as Adorama with 146 links is confusing and overwhelming.

A site with good awareness will focus on categories. That is, if you have a lot of crap, let people focus on the subset of crap that they care about.

Keys to Creating Awareness:

1. Stop screaming at your visitors – Flashing banners or lots of competing visual elements will drive a negative response.
2. Eliminate choices – Less choices puts more prominence on each one.
3. Uncluttered what remains – A clean interface simplifies choice.

Rules of Web Awareness:

1. If you cannot find something easily, it doesn’t exist.
2. If you emphasize too many items, all of them lose importance.
3. Any delay increases frustration.

Typical Desire Activities: Research and Compare.

Example: A user may go to a shoe store and research the options by a number of criteria such as – Text, Category, Brand, Size, Color “On Sale” “New”

A site that is unhelpful for the research component of desire is Zappos. Its search feature lends itself to zero-results options make you reenter your search criteria again (or enter a form to get updates on new sizes…).

Rules of Web Desire:

1. Make me feel appreciated
2. Make me feel safe
3. Understand that I am in control

Action Stage Consideration:

Brand Strength – Some users buy on brand. This is more the result of long-term efforts.

Previous Resource Investment (“satisfycing”) - Maybe your option is the next best thing that comes along.

The total solution- Users may be looking for the all-in-one value: availability, customer service hours, return policy, price, free shipping, etc…

Risk reducers & credibility:

These concepts are different. Risk reducers eliminate things that would scare a user away. Credibility increases the likelihood that this site is the best place to convert.

Unhelpful Risk Reducers:

Trust and credibility symbols below the fold or placed as an after thought.

Helpful Risk Reducers:

Petsmart put their Hackersafe symbol in the upper left where a logo would normally appear. 

Credibility and Validation: 

A lead form on the left side of the page is complemented by a list of high-profile customers on the right.

Rules of Web Action:

1. Get out of my way.
2. Make it easy.
3. Don’t surprise me.

Bad Web Action:

Overstock.com’s screen is reconfigured when clicking radio buttons indicating whether you’re new or returning. A better design would focus on the new customer first and make any registration occur after the checkout process.

Transaction Interruption such as a popup during checkout will drive down conversion. Don’t ask the customer “Would you like fries with that?” through a popup when they have their wallet open. Don’t interrupt checkout process.

Interaction

Most tuning methods don’t take into account the interaction between the elements. For example the term: “Ferraris are Fast” would go well with an image of a fast moving car. It would not go well with the image of a car wrapped around a tree. A picture of a car wrapped around a tree would go well with the headline “Volvos are Safe” if it accompanies a story of a person walking away from a horrific accident.

That is: It’s not the picture, it’s not headline, it’s the context in which they appear.

The best setting for a variable depends on its context and it’s best to maximize positive interactions. Not only do interactions exist, they can be very strong. Ignoring them will lead to suboptimal results. A/B split and Multivariate/Tagushi testing assume that there are no interactions.

A-B Split Test:

Test one variable at a time (with 2 or more vales), send equal traffic to all versions.

- Very simple to implement

- Requires atleast 10 conversions/day to get worthwhile results.

Multivariate

Test several variables at the same time, ignoring interaction.

The scope requires identifying the size of the test in terms of total unique recipes. For example: 12 variables making a total of 38 different values leads to 552960 different versions of the page. This type of testing needs more than 50 conversions a day to get valuable results.

Tuning Pitfall #1: Ignoring Your Baseline

- Always devote some bandwidth to your current version (the baseline)

Tuning Pitfall # 2 Not Collecting Enough Data

When considering numbers, remember that some degree of variance is inherent in chance. For example, 1/3 of the time, 90 is the same as 100. An inadequate sample size leads to very wide and overlapping error bars. When sample size is ramped up, bars get narrow and become uncrossed. Sample size matters.

SES London 2008: Balancing Organic & Paid Listings

By SEOidiot

Moderator: Kevin Ryan VP Search Engine Watch
Speakers: Dixon Jones, MD Receptional Limited
Jay Bean: Founder CEO, Orange Soda Inc
Nathan Levi: Head of Search Campaign Marketing Avenue A | Razorfish
Richard Clark: Pureplay Marketing Manager, Dixons.co.uk

Paid and organic has been a debate for a long time and the panel discussed the ways to balance the two strategies for the best results.

Dixon Jones
Lots of peoples clients argue that organic is something that should replace the early spend for PPC. Dixon showed an example of someone who contacted him via the form on his site after clicking on Receptionals Adwords ad attempting to sell him SEO!

You should pay for ppc even when you have placement within the organic serps. Dixon showed a good example of how the organic and paid results are blurred now, the example illustrated how a search can return the one box results that gives news and stock info etc.

Many of the sites linked to within the one box carry advertising as a business model. So traditional organic listings do get pushed down the page, thats why you need a dual approach.

We then looked at an example of how changes in screen resolution / size can almost allow one company with indented results in the serps to dominate the above the fold results.

Dominance in any one serp cannot be achieved without a balanced approach to using both methods.

Affiliates can also provide a way of finding your site pushed from the visible to below the fold for a given vertical.

PPC is part of the mix, SEO is the sum of the mix. You need both tools to be able to ensure you have the ability to respond the changes in circumstances that come with any search engine.

Two listings on a page converts better than just one method and more listings help you dominate more of the space on the page from your competition.

Jay Bean
Smaller local advertisers have some real opportunities today as a growing percentage of searches feature a localization element.

Benefits for the balanced approach: -

• You can turn up and down the ppc spend dependent on business or seasonal factors.
• You don't have any guarantees that the organic wont change and without the paid listing you can find yourself exposed to changes in search engine preference.
• You get greater credibility from appearing both in the paid and organic results and this can benefit conversions significantly.

Where to start ?
Check the current ppc spend and analyze your keywords to give you an indication of terms that you might want to optimize for in natural search or by adding a local market segment.
Set a budget to allow you to allocate your spend between the paid and SEO efforts and in the early days whilst waiting for the seo efforts to kick in paid can take more of the resources.

The case study Jay showed highlighted the benefit of targeting specific terms for SEO and a far broader set for paid.

For the smaller or local companies it may be difficult to compete with the large corporations but there remains good opportunities to compete on the local level.

Nathan Levi
Why should I buy my branded keywords when i rank for the terms in the organic listings often at a high cost per click?
Nathan showed us some case studies to illustrate the effect of the dual strategy over the single.
Its important that you try to get the analytics in one place to allow you to make informed decisions.
You need to be able to drive enough traffic to be able to get robust statistics so keyword choice is key.
They did a test to see what effect turning the paid listings off one day and on the next would have.
When the paid listings were on it pulled traffic away from natural but the click through rate was greatly improved and the overall effect was that both listings benefited from each other.
Conversion rates were static across the test, whilst increasing the incremental cost of having paid listings the overall benefit from the increased conversions made it well worth it.

In conclusion there is a multiplier effect of holding both natural and paid.

Richard Clark
60% of searches now have 3 or more words and 90% have 2 or more.
Dixons.co.uk started by spending all their online budgets on paid listings targeting generic terms but have grown to use a more balanced approach.

Dependent on budgets you need to target the stage on the buying process that you can afford and that makes sense for you, for example if Dixon's target the term 'TV' they  are targeting people in the research phase of the buying cycle but you can also target people in the buying phase by targeting much more focused terms like 'Toshiba 32 inch  lcd TV'.

When trademark isn't protected you should always bid on the brand.
Over 20% uplift in revenue when bid on branded terms when you are also top of the organic.

Being top of ppc and organic increases brand awareness and recall.

Q & A Session:
Will buying paid listings affect your organic listings?
Nathan Levi - Throughout there many thousands of listings where they have organic and paid results they don't see any effect that would indicate the engines (MSN specifically in this case) do not alter any organic results based on paid ads for the same.

Effective PPC Strategies For Political Campaigns

By Account Deleted

In a previous post on SemGeek.com entitled "Study: Search Marketing In Prime Spot To Play Major Role in Political Spending" I discussed the great opportunities that awaits for the Search Industry to get a bigger piece of the campaign spending pie. The only thing in our way is convincing the Politicians and Campaign Managers to see the value in all that the Search Industry has to offer. Especially the "high level" online strategies that can be created, implemented, tested and reported on in Paid Search. If we can convince them of that, then we will strike that "all important" commonality of getting a greater ROVP (Return On Voter Participation). However, it is that same messaging power of the web that also scares them to put more money into it. But over time, Analytics and actionable data will change their minds.

To help reinforce this skepticism, acccording to this study done by Borrell Associates which states “The jury is still out regarding the Internet’s effectiveness for reaching and targeting the undecided,” the report read. “There is a fear that their message may end up going to an unintended recipient. Consultants would need to be convinced of the accuracy of this type of direct advertising reaching and persuading the intended targets before they would find sufficient value to devote much money toward it.”

Who's Helping To Get This Message Out:
I have been fortunate enough to be a part of a new company called CampaignGrid which is headquartered in Philadelphia, PA where the goal is to not only educate and persuade the massive opportunities in SEO, PPC, Social Media, Analytics and Testing, but also drive measurable results that help the candidates, non-profits and charitable organizations who need help. In a nutshell, it's all about Raising Money, Advertising and Organizing Online to drive the best possible results. Results consist of online donations, capturing information from volunteers and cross channel support.

Here are just a few of the things we are doing at CampaignGrid:

• Behavioral Targeting with Interactive Video and Transactional Banners
• Using PPC to persuade voters of all parties on the candidates messaging.
• Counteracting negative campaigning tactics (which is essentially reputation management)
• Testing different messaging tactics across different Geo and Demographic  audiences.
• Creating streamlined data flow processes to maximize the effectives of all online advertising
• Implementing robust analytics tracking to provide political campaign managers with everything from the amount of donations and volunteer submissions on any given day to how effective specific PPC campaigns are doing against others.

In conclusion: There is a big perception problem with political parties that the Internet is a very dangerous playground and it's easier to spend millions on traditional media such as TV, Radio and Print. However, we can bridge that gap by simply educating the political arena that Search Marketing is not only much more cost effective, but it is comprised of "cutting edge" strategies, best practices and highly detailed analytics which allows for a greater understanding of how the campaign's money is being spent.

As an old Mentor used to tell me you need to tell clients "Fish where the Fish are!" It doesn't get any easier than that in Search.