Archive for the ‘SEO’ Category

Google’s Search Market Share Fallen Behind in Asia? Not Exactly

July 30th, 2010

Don’t call it a comeback, but Google might actually be gaining a lot of ground in the Asian market very soon. Yes, the make up of search engine usage in the Far East (the focus of Reform’s International Search Review series so far) – where only a few months ago Google left China, Yahoo! dominated in Japan and few people in Korea even used Google at any point – has changed drastically.

Yahoo! Japan has about a 57% share of the market there, while Google’s share is just over 35%; Microsoft has a share of about 3%. Yahoo! and Bing are merging results elsewhere, but Yahoo! Japan, being to some extent independently owned (unlike in other markets, the Yahoo! Japan branch is actually majority owned by Softbank) has opted to go with Google instead of Bing for its results on both the SEO and PPC side. Microsoft quickly protested, citing that Google will suddenly have close to a 95% share of the 3rd largest search market after the US & China, thus monopolising it in a similar way to Microsoft’s dominance in the PC market over the years.

As for China, Google is back to work in the market that they shocked many people by threatening to leave earlier this year. Only a couple months ago, Baidu was pulling away with a clear lead in one of the fastest growing markets (and potentially largest) in the world.

But earlier this month, Google managed to work out a deal where operations in China could resume through 2012, and the google.cn domain no longer redirected to Hong Kong. But the relationship has been short lived, as while http://www.google.cn/ is back, trying a query as of July 30th takes you to Hong Kong once more. So, the comeback is still a work in progress there. In fact, you can take a quick look at day to day status via http://www.google.com/prc/report.html#hl=en

Google has also cut ties with two of the twenty five “authorized advertising agents” in China, which account for most of the paid search spend within China.

Moving over to Korea, where Google’s market share is even lower (under 5%), they’ve worked on a new strategy – going away from search and moving towards mobile and even TV. Working on partnerships with local companies, Google has shown progress in the mobile market there (which rivals such as Naver were late to enter) and are working with companies such as LG and Samsung on integrating search with other forms of media, such as TV, where Samsung is potentially working on launching a Google TV that would run on Google’s Android Operating System.

Still, contrary to what some people felt a few months ago, Google hasn’t given up on Asia yet, and the search market in countries like China, Japan and Korea is still ready for new competition. Find out more about these markets and more via our market research pieces:

Search Marketing in China

Search Marketing in Korea

Search Marketing in Russia

Search Marketing in India – Coming Soon.

Blog post by Niall Madden, SEO Director of Reform

The integration of search with other marketing channels

July 16th, 2010

Integrating search with other marketing channels has been a hot topic for many years now.

We’ve seen paid & natural reporting interfaces developed by technology providers, studies that correlate uplifts in performance in PPC with TV activity, and path to conversion analysis which shows that ATL activity also generates interest in generic search terms, not just brand. These are all significant steps forward and very useful for making investment decisions, but are based on budget justification, rather than guiding us in creating a more coherent and user-focused strategy.

So what can we do to align our marketing strategies, so that we are presenting the consumer with a consistent message that provides them with exactly what they’re looking for? The answer is to think about it from the consumer’s perspective.

In search, the results page acts as a point of confluence: it is the meeting point for the efforts of many marketing channels. A searcher could have been influenced to search by PR, a television or radio ad, a mail drop, an email, word of mouth, or any other form of marketing. It is therefore crucial for a search marketer to understand some key things about this results page:

  1. What results pages are searchers viewing (i.e. what search terms are they using)?
  2. What type of content are they looking for?
  3. What options are they currently presented with?
  4. What is the best way to get this content ranking?

This isn’t a reactive process, though. By the time a piece or PR has generated a spike in search volume the opportunity will be lost. The key to success in integration is therefore proactive communication; ensuring that the search team are aware of the ATL strategy and are anticipating search volume and optimising for it with the right kind of content before the event.

It’s not just about being there, it’s about being there with the content that the user will be most responsive to to make sure that you have what the user is searching for. This requires bringing together multiple stakeholders and possibly drawing on multiple budget lines.

With marketers from different channels often being very different in terms of personality and skill sets,  it’s not always an easy win. But in terms of efficiency and capitalising on the full investment that you are making in your marketing budget it is absolutely crucial. Search is also particularly cruel in that not only is there an opportunity cost of not pro-actively aligning your strategies , you will be feeding traffic to competitors who are ranking on those pages already!

Blog post by Graham Everitt, Search Consultant at Reform

The SEO community starts to test social media search optimisation strategies

July 2nd, 2010

When we think of search we think of external search i.e. search engines like Google that act as windows onto the web. From these windows we can find and access news, videos, social media forums, maps – as well as a wealth of branded content and information about businesses, products & services.

But of course people search elsewhere on the web. After email communication search is the primary web behaviour. And there is another kind of search engine: internal or enterprise search. In the US in March of 2010 Facebook’s internal search engine, for example, saw its usage soar by 48% to total 2.7% of all US searches carried out on the Web in that month. OK, so compared to Google’s 64% share of the US search market that might not seem to impressive. Still, that’s a whole lotta searching going on – and mostly for people’s names.

As brands and businesses start to saturate social media properties like Facebook, SEOs are already trying to fathom what the ranking factors are, so that they can lend their services to help brands become more visible in social media search. This article by Marty Weintraub entitled “Facebook SEO Ranking Factors, 2010 Study Results” suggests that criteria such as the Facebook Suggest Box, inserting generic keywords into name fields, population of the Interests field, encouraging as many Fans and “Likes”, might become the focus of SEO test strategies.

However, as Weintraub points out it’s early days in terms of cracking the social media search algorithms. But that won’t stop the more innovative and curious SEOs from having a go!

Blog post by Amanda Davie, Managing Director of Reform

Google’s “Search Funnels” reporting represent a massive step on in data visibility

June 3rd, 2010

Google recently rolled out a beta of a conversion funnel reporting system that allows AdWords users using Google Conversion Tracking pixels to track conversions to see beyond the last click. This allows us to improve our understanding of what the consumer journey within search looks like. We can see the average time lag between the last click and conversion, the number of clicks on our ads before someone converts, the ads and keywords that they are interacting with first, and the different keywords and ads they’re interacting with all the way to the last click.

This is pretty exciting. Previously, we could only get this level of understanding by implementing a costly consultancy project with floodlight tags, using DoubleClicks Click Path Analysis product or similar, or by engaging a search technology that includes path to conversion analysis as part of their pricing. OK, so Google’s Search Funnels tool only works for Google and not with Bing and Yahoo, and it doesn’t yet seem to be reporting on content network activity, but considering it’s free it’s a pretty big step on.

The implications for search advertisers, especially the smaller businesses who have previously run CPA focused activity within strict profitability targets, are signficiant. Being able to see which keywords don’t cost in on a CPA metric, but fuel cost efficient conversions on other keywords has huge implications for the volume of conversions you are able to drive, and will completely alter the way that we analyse success. We will now be able to analyse what each search term is contributing to the campaign as a whole, wheras before we could only see part of the story.

Looking at the data in some of our client accounts, we’re already seeing some interesting things. Some of the “keyword click paths” (this shows all of the keywords that a searcher has interacted with before converting) contain repeat searches for the same search term, up to 5 or 6 times before conversion. This clearly highlights the importance of an always on strategy, as if you’re not there for the last search your consumer will most likely end up somewhere else! Another example of something strange is that we’re frequently seeing some paths to conversion that start with a brand search, then converts on a generic search. This could be where above the line advertising is driving searches, and then people are then shopping around for a better offer and returning to the site on a generic term once they’ve done so. This highlights the importance of not only making sure you have full brand visibility when investing in other channels, but ensuring you have the required visiblity on generic terms.

We’re very excited about the potential to dramatically improve investment models using this data, and will be keeping our ears to the ground on what other practitioners are doing with the data. Not only are we excited about the potential it has for improving search performance, but it signals a step forward in the sharing of the rich data that search engines hold with marketeers. Data is the driver of insight and as such innovation – so the more steps search engines take in sharing this data with us, the more and more we’ll be able to do for clients.

Blog post by Graham Everitt, Search Consultant at Reform

Thinking outside the search box.

May 28th, 2010

I’m not going to bang on about how great search is, or about how you should make sure that your site maximises the use of SEO with PPC as part of an integrated strategy involving all types of media. Chances are you hear that all the time anyway if you work with us. However, I will look at some of the things that, for me, make natural search a unique experience – not just in marketing terms but in the way that people approach it, the way their minds work.

Clients are becoming increasingly involved with and interested in SEO, which I think is great. I have no idea why some companies still try and make SEO such a top secret operation. By now everyone on the ‘practitioner’ side ought to know that the best projects are the ones where we can help the client understand how natural search truly works, pushing aside the mystique. Once the client understands and believes in it, they are more likely to make changes. Just as the search algorithms constantly evolve, so does the need to clarify with more depth. We want clients to ask about our recommendations, or suggest recommendations of their own, as we’ll be glad to discuss and explain what we feel works best.

Of course, there is never just one right answer. There are so many factors that influence natural search that it is imperative that we continue to think outside of the box. For example, for one of our clients the biggest influence on their SEO traffic is daily news stories. It is not a news site, but if a subject is not on the news then no one searches for their related terms. Another example is a site which sees increased traffic whenever specific episodes of certain shows are shown on TV. The trick is spotting these trends and attempting to capitalise upon them. We’re not necessarily saying look out for every wave of traffic, but when you see one wave coming in, think about how you might catch the next. A referral from a search engine may not result in a sale right away, but other influences can help you convert it into a sale further down the road.

The worst thing you can do in SEO is think “if I do ‘A’, then ‘B’ will happen immediately”, and it is crucial that agencies and clients communicate to avoid this kind of assumption. When clients understand more about the process, hopefully conversations around SEO will go far beyond the ‘As’ and ‘Bs’, to questions such as the right way to link several sites together, or how to sculpt ‘link juice’, ‘page rank’ or ‘link strength’ within a site. Or on the PPC side, whether to use keywords with ‘free’ in them if you are targeting something that users have to pay for.

If you’re keeping score by the way, the short answers are: you can build some strength by connecting your different sites, but it needs to be done in a way that seems natural; for link strength if you don’t want a link to be followed, it’s not going to improve the other links on your page, in fact it can hurt the site overall as retaining link strength is unnatural; and last but not least, for the PPC question, yes, some of the best ‘paid’ conversions came from ‘free’ keywords.

As for the long answers, well that’s another conversation or blog post. Still, here at Reform we like being asked questions, because in the world of search there is always at least one answer…

Blog post by Niall Madden, SEO Director of Reform

iPhones, iPads and the advent of ‘shortcut search’

April 26th, 2010

The advent of Apple’s iPhone – and indeed smart phones in general – is changing how we consume media and content. Nowadays, web-based information can be accessed more readily (and more cheaply) without us necessarily having to be chained to our desks.

The behaviour of searching for web-based information on the smaller screen is, however, different to how we search on our personal computers. This is exemplified by the fact that mobile search volumes (the amount of times that people search the web on their mobile phones) have been, by and large, disappointing, to the extent that to date neither Yahoo! nor Google have been able to realise significant ad revenue through mobile search advertising.

When we’re on the move we tend to be more time poor, and the restrictions of screen size and bandwidth mean that we are more likely to limit our searches to content such as maps, or for local listings such as restaurants, and less likely to carry out in-depth search-based research for purchases such as office equipment or cars.

Another new behaviour to understand is the consumption of apps. Apps on smart phones are fast becoming short cuts to finding information and the apps development market is being flooded by brands who want to make their mark. Often this new app consumption behaviour is replacing the behaviour of web search. For example, on my PC if I want to find out if there is a National Trust property in a certain area I will open up my browser and I will search on Google for “national trust properties in [area]”; but on my iPhone I won’t search by my browser (Safari), I will open up my National Trust app, and I search within it by area. This behaviour of downloading and deploying apps to snack on information can be described as ‘shortcut search’ behaviour.

Google’s CEO Eric Schmidt has made it clear that the technology giant will be prioritising their product and technology strategy for “first screen” technology moving forwards, in order to capitalise on the larger and faster growing web markets such as India, Africa and South America (where mobile phone adoption takes precedence over personal computers). It is therefore important for digital planners to keep one-eye on the future opportunities for brands on these new platforms. And if app search and app consumption grows to be as prolific as PC-based web search over the last ten years, Google, Microsoft and the other search providers will want to capitalise in terms of advertising revenue.

For those of you who have seen or even touched one of the new iPads, it is enough to melt the heart of the most sceptical of gadget geeks. I think the experience is more akin to the iPhone experience (and eighteen months in, I am still a woman in love!) than to the Mac. It has the speed and the rich visuals of the Mac but it is a giant touch screen that glides at the swipe of your finger, and with big, friendly app buttons on it.

So the big question is: if we start booting up our iPads on the train, bus or in the car (preferably not when driving!) because the very mobile screen size and bandwidth affords us more time online, will our search behaviour be similar to our PC or Mac search behaviour i.e. via the web browser, or will be it be more comparable to mobile phone search behaviour i.e. via apps? Will one platform’s search behaviour cannibalise the other? And what will this mean for brands who rely so heavily on search traffic volume to satisfy direct response, sales and business targets? We shall wait and see!

Blog post by Amanda Davie, Managing Director of Reform

Search Engine Marketing in Russia – International Search Review Issue 2

February 16th, 2010

Thanks to everyone for their feedback on the first issue of Reform’s International Search Review. Issue number two is now available, as we move north into Russia.  Like China, Russia is a large market where Google is not the search engine of choice, playing second fiddle to Yandex.ru.  As a result, SEO and general search marketing strategies from international companies looking to expand into Russia often find obstacles here.

For instance, it can be difficult for foreign companies to do PPC advertising on Yandex. Their PPC service is known as Yandex:Direct – which has a user interface for accounts that is entirely in Russian. Unless you have a fluent Russian PPC person on your team (and even then), potential advertisers are advised to let Yandex manage the PPC accounts on your behalf. This is known as the “Yandex.Direct Carefree account” – which their site says will provide you with a dedicated, English speaking account manager who will help you create and run your campaign (assistance with keywords selection, composing the ad text and advertising strategy consulting).

The initial take up of broadband was behind the pace of many other markets, but in the recent years Russia has started to really experience a steadier increase, becoming one of the top countries in regards to take up and usage of Mobile internet usage and Social Networking.   Russia is currently the eighth largest country in terms of internet user population, and is set to overtake the UK into seventh place.

Download a copy of the full “Russia Search Review” issue here

Take a look through the PDF and hopefully we can answer any questions about the search market share in Russia, along with the habits of the local internet user population there.

We look at the Yandex natural search algorithm, along with recent changes in Gogo.ru and Mail.ru, which had made an agreement with Google to use their natural search results, but instead opting to build their own algorithm first and using Google’s as a back up. Gogo.ru and Mail.ru do however use Google’s PPC results, which has helped extend its reach (and earnings) there. Considering Google had a 5% market share in Russia only 4 years ago, it has come a long way. But like in China, there are many factors which will try hard to make sure it never crosses the 50% line.

The overall search market share in Russia currently (along with other key stats from the PDF include):

- Yandex – 54.5% (62% when including Mail.ru) / Google 34.5% / Rambler – 1.9% / Bing – 0.4% (Source: Comscore, August 2009)

- 42,000,000 Internet users as of Jan 2010 and only a 33% estimated internet penetration.

- The average user in Russia spent 6.6 hours per month on social networks (highest in the world out of 38 countries that were reported), compared to a worldwide average of 3.7, 4.6 in the UK and 4.2 in the US. (World Metrix / Comscore: July 2009). The top choice of social network was Vkontakte.ru, followed by odnoklassniki.ru and mail.ru – while Facebook was a distant seventh.

- Twitter integration into search results was done on Yandex first in 2009 (before Google or Bing), yet Twitter usage in Russia is still relatively low, holding less than 0.5% of the overall global Twitter market share.

To get more details on this and everything else, download a copy of the full issue here – and let us know any comments / feedback.   Contact us, and we’ll get the next issue out to you before anyone else gets it!

You can also leave a comment below too.

Blog post by Niall Madden, SEO Director of Reform

Search as a Commodity?

February 4th, 2010

The recent trend in agencies outsourcing search to cheaper suppliers, whether they be in the UK or abroad, signals the possible commoditisation of search skills in the near future.

Both SEO and PPC practitioners are available in plentiful numbers at low rates; there are companies in India willing to work on hourly rates as low as £5. That’s 80p lower than the minimum wage for an adult in the UK, so you can see why it would be tempting for clients and agencies alike.

In practice, outsourcing opportunities will deliver a very cheap solution for the simpler aspects of PPC or SEO delivery. My experience of being involved in relationships (from a third party perspective) where both PPC and SEO have been outsourced has always seen something lost in the translation though, with poor quality results being achieved through either poor campaign builds and management in paid search, or the use SEO techniques that are slightly outdated and that fail to address the real issues needed for success in natural search.

So what’s the reason for this? Where is the value being lost? Let’s face it, some of the actual delivery work in search doesn’t require a huge amount of brainpower – adjusting keyword bids when a CPA is too high or re-working meta-tags to have an emphasis on different words is a simple task. So why does it go wrong so often?

The problem comes from the fact that search strategy is inextricably entwined with its delivery. For example, with paid search, when you’ve spent several hours analysing results, understanding how various factors affect the different metrics, and deciding where to focus your efforts, the matter of performing the optimisation is a relatively simple task. Natural search will sometimes similarly require someone to immerse themself in the market, observing what’s working well for the competition, translate this into a strategy for their site, and then spend time delivering what then seems to be relatively simple output in terms of actual SEO work.

So what does this mean for clients or agencies looking to outsource work? I’d suggest that although there are cheap options out there, the skillset of this type of business or individual is never going to be able to drive real success in search for your business by using them alone. Perhaps we need to look at a more traditional model where a planner would devote their time to building a strategy and a separate buyer would then specialise in buying the media – so for search you may be able to draw value from outsourcing options by using them simply as an implementer of the more time consuming tasks, but you will still need a channel expert to decide your strategy, spend time interpreting the data and recommending what changes need to be implemented to your site or PPC account. For all but the largest of advertisers, the benefit is going to be minimal.

Of course, this may change over the next few years as businesses in lesser developed markets become more savvy and develop their skill sets further. When that does happen we may see search agencies turning into more specialist comms planning style businesses and we’ll see companies who specialise in cost effective implementation springing up to complement them. Larger agencies may choose to break staff down into planning & implementation departments to respond to the market.

So while the current standard of delivery from cheap outsourcing options isn’t yet high enough to actually benefit from the cost saving, the threat to the current search agency model from these suppliers is real – and we can expect to see it driving change in the way search is bought over the next few years.

Search Engines in 2009 & Predictions For 2010

December 22nd, 2009

It’s that time of the year again. End of year roundups and predictions for 2010. It’s been a busy year in search, well in fact its been a busy decade (but we won’t go there)! If 2009 was the year of Bing, Wolfram Alpha, Google Caffeine and expansion of AdWords usage, along with everyone’s attempts at Real-Time search integration, then what does 2010 have in store for the search industry?

From a user perspective, search engines were looking east. Taking from insights in the far eastern search markets, Bing and Google focused more on becoming a one stop destination hub. From the second you type your query into Google, suggestions are sent your way. In 2009 they upgraded the suggestions to include direct links and elements such as the latest weather reports, or even parcel tracking information, all before you even click “submit”.

Personalisation was a key objective for search engines too, as user data continues to get used to determine future results and trends. However, it met a lot of critique, from many who cited that personalisation may take away from independence (with less and less “new” perspectives given to users). Just like the improvements in audio/video searches and real time search though, 2010 looks to be a big year for the development of these technologies.

As far as traditional SEO and PPC goes, Google impacted these strategies too. Lines began to blur between the two, as Google integrated local results (map results) and expandable PPC ads (integrating PPC and Google Base results together) to include sitelinks and product prices / listings. From an SEO perspective, Google spent the latter part of 2009 emphasising the need for speed – advising that a sites load time may become a big factor for optimisation in 2010.

And Google didn’t stop there, continuing their foray into a vast range of things – some of which it has been working on for a few years, such as voice recognition search, along with working on more efficient translation tools and various apps for the Android operating system. And then there were the many mash-ups of their existing offerings, such as City Tours and Social Search.

It wasn’t all bright lights for Google though, as they continued to seem out of place when it came to other forms of media, including a much criticised attempt to push the Google Chrome browser on TV and print media ads. They also took what many people felt were a step back with a more traditional pricing on “paid placement” local listings, and YouTube ads, opting away from their cost per click rates – and instead going towards the old CPM rates in some cases.

At the same time though, marketers looked closer at the impact of TV on search. Going beyond slogans that say “search for (name of brand) on Google” – marketers looked at having the celebrity presence on their search listings too. Hilary Swank, Scarlett Johansson, Oprah Winfrey and Jessica Alba were celebrities used to endorse PPC ad copy in 2009.

The merger between Bing and Yahoo looms ever present for 2010, while Yahoo Search Submit Pro calls it a day. Yahoo site explorer is rumoured to be next in line, which was the source of many an online SEO tool that analysed links. When this will happen is unclear, but it does remind many of a search marketer of the times when the Yahoo / Overture keyword tool was silently put to sleep.

And of course, it wouldn’t be an end of year / new year posting without some predictions, so here goes. Among our predictions for search in 2010, are:

1. SEO will become the darling of marketing, as recession strapped companies look to get the most of their budgets

2. SEO’s will need to know how to communicate with designers and developers (and vice versa), as factors such as load time, script usage and site coding become key SEO factors

3. Data (advertiser and customer) debates will heat up over the year, as companies like Facebook, Google, Bing, etc tread the line between insight and privacy

4. Local and retail advertisers will see Google Maps and Google Base traffic volumes soar

5. Launched in 2009 – Scoopler.com will become one to watch in the “real-time search” race

6. Search becomes the marketing channel for geniuses (or genii), as from keyword research to semantic psychology – things are about to get really interesting!

7. International SEO and PPC strategies will evolve fast in 2010, as search engines such as Baidu spent late 2009 moving towards a more westernised search methodology in both paid and natural search listings

8. Real time search still needs a fair bit of work and will look vastly different this time next year

9. Mobile search will finally catch up to all the hype its received in the last few years

Drop us a line and let us know what you think is in store for search in 2010.

Blog post by Niall Madden, SEO Director of Reform

Why I don’t want my search ‘personalized’

December 8th, 2009

So, now Google thinks it knows me. Even when I’m not logged in to one of their products. Well, Google, I’m not happy about this and I don’t want you deciding what I see and when.

Obviously Google has a massive influence on what we see on the internet these days and as the number one search engine in the UK, that’s unlikely to change, but I have to object to them taking all the fun out of search as they seem to be doing with this personalized search yoke.

If I’m searching on Google (or any other search engine for that matter) I will have some idea of what I’m looking for and I might be in one of three key search modes; navigational- getting to a site whose domain I’ve forgotten, transactional- researching with intent to make a purchase, or information search- just looking to find out something to enhance my own knowledge. I might be looking for a recipe,  I might be looking up the answer to a trivia question to settle an argument.

What I expect from Google in return is a set of relevant search results based on content from the whole of the world wide web. I don’t care what I searched for recently or what Google thinks I’ll like best. I want to decide. I am a moody searcher and my mood swings shall decide whether I’m looking for something old or something new.

When any user searches, they normally have some idea of what they want to find. There is obviously a big difference between someone looking for an apple phone and an apple pie recipe and Google can easily distinguish between simple behaviours each time we are searching to show appropriate result sets. But, sometimes I am looking for something out of the ordinary. How is Google supposed to know that? Sometimes I’m looking for something on behalf of someone else, or I just feel like branching out. Sometimes, heaven forbid, I’m interested to see what’s new out there.

I’ll be clearing my cookies and deleting my history so Google can’t try and understand me. If you want Google to be your friend and predict your inner thoughts and desires go spend some time on your igoogle page, but I say Bah Humbug to giving my soul to Google.

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