Follow the evidence to more effective online advertising.

One of the best things about marketing online is that you can collect fine-grained evidence to help you decide where/how to spend money in the future. That's especially true when you're advertising on Google search results pages, because every end-user click and every advertising penny paid is traceable. In this followup to my previous post about online advertising (Expert says pay-per-click advertising can be evidence-based (well, 90% evidence-based, anyway).), I'll recap more evidence and sage advice from search marketing experts.

Getting the word out: I'm tempted to assume this type of evidence is so well-established that surely *everybody* in online marketing knows it by now ...but as with any attempt at evidence-based management, there are always myths and habits (some old, some new) to overcome, not to mention more people to educate. I know some companies who want to use new media, and therefore are doing some search engine marketing (SEM), but whose people have no clue how to collect evidence to optimize their spending.

David Szetela has been writing about how to use science to guide SEM. His latest column provides evidence based on his experience using Google AdSense for pay-per-click (PPC) advertising. He goes through the basics of setting up an SEM campaign and explains that "Hybrid search and content campaigns should almost never be combined -- and the poor performance that results is one of the most significant factors in the failure of PPC advertising campaigns." While Szetela doesn't offer hard evidence, I would expect that if pushed, he could produce specific examples to back up this advice, and identify when these two types of campaigns might be successfully combined.

In other news about evidence-based pay-per-click (PPC) advertising, recent research by AdGooRoo provides interesting findings about relationships between the length of a keyword search phrase, an advertiser's position on the search results page, and the profitability of their marketing campaign. Among other things, it tells us to resist the temptation to spend big so you'll appear at the top of the list. The evidence shows that paying to be first on the list isn't profitable if you want to optimize the ROI for a campaign. As explained by Eric Enge in his By the Numbers column, When Being First Isn't Worth It , on Search Engine Watch: "The report shows that, generally speaking, for short keywords (one to two words) it's not profitable to bid your way into the high positions. The most profitable positions are the fifth and sixth positions for these types of keywords. These [more expensive] types of keywords lose money in the first and second positions. This trend will likely continue as more big brand advertisers enter the market and consider placement in those positions as an investment in 'branding'. However, the story is quite different for three-word keywords, where the most profitable position is the second and third position (but these still lose money in the first position). The results are so different because the big brand advertisers likely aren't interested in the lower volumes of clicks available on the longer tail keywords."

Comments

[San Diego pay per click services]

One of the best things about marketing online is that you can collect fine-grained evidence to help you decide where/how to spend money in the future. I agree with it. thank you for posting this.

-faith-