Reform - Blog

Let’s start things off with a simple statement, I like to travel. Lots of people do, many of whom are quite the seasoned traveller, more so than myself (as much as I’d like to catch up). Somewhat fewer people like search. This is mainly because less people care about search (yes, it’s true), but there are actually plenty of similarities.

Search, speech, dialogue and interaction, are all integrated to some extent in ways that parallel the cultures across society and around our world. These are things that help us progress forward, they help nurture ideas. Google tries to market their product with this concept in mind, but let’s be honest – they’re in it for the money!

And rightfully so (from a business standpoint of course), as a recent look at Google’s sales figures shows that while U.S. market growth has tapered off in 2009, and in the U.K., actually slowed somewhat – the rest of the world is still giving Google it’s “glory days” where quarterly growth in 2009 stayed positive (although this has slowed down a bit too when compared to 2008). There’s more info on that at http://www.searchcowboys.com/research/936 – but let’s get to the real issue at hand and get on with the travels.

How well do you know the PPC and SEO markets in countries outside the U.K. and U.S.? Apologies for offending the few who might, but judging by a look at the overall scene, most people do not. Let’s go a step further and say “Search Marketing in Non-English speaking countries.” Search marketers and agencies from Australia, Canada, Ireland, New Zealand and South Africa, please be seated – although there seems to be a lot of untapped resource there too.

Everyone knows the basics…. Right? Host your site in the target market, use their local domain, their language. That’s a start. Build link strength to their site via other sites in that country and sites about that country, perhaps even sites in their language. Research their market, find out what converts via PPC. Analyse their user journeys when the site goes live – refine your strategy further. You’ll soon find out though, that they often travel different than we do.

For instance in Asia, you’ll find that your “Google led strategy” has no effect in markets like China, Japan and Korea, where engines like Naver and Baidu lead the way. Portal sites and social networking have a much bigger influence on where the user goes for information. So SEO is a completely different channel there. Or on the PPC side, how about Latin America, where past studies show that three quarters of users don’t even know that there’s a difference between paid and natural search. Of course, with PPC relatively untapped (read: very cheap), you can really get a lot of information gathered and testing done in these markets. Even financial terms that might go for over a pound in the U.K. can have their translated counterpart go for under 20p in countries that have a good internet user base, such as Argentina, Mexico and Chile. Contrary to studies in the U.S. and Europe, we often see that a term that ranks well in PPC and SEO getting a majority of visitors via the PPC route!

The good news for those looking to expand search campaigns into Latin America though, is unlike Asia – Google dominates here. In fact, check out the search engine market share for various countries around the world at – http://googlesystem.blogspot.com/2009/03/googles-market-share-in-your-country.html

In Asia, one of the biggest mistakes international businesses make when trying to target countries like Japan (3rd biggest web market in the world according to – http://searchengineland.com/getting-to-know-international-ppc-markets-14955) is the actual website set up. Unlike in the western world, a majority of internet users in Japan visit websites via their mobile phone. So now, you have to look beyond the keywords and bidding, but the set up of your web pages also.

Back home though, we realise that many companies want to target foreign users – but may not have the expertise to re-launch their site in every language. We can help build your English language strategy also. Users in countries around the world will often query in English, whether they are ex-pats, business people, or merely educated in English – which is often taught as a second language in many countries. Many sites overlook the opportunity to tap into some of these countries via PPC, where they can generate qualified traffic and at the cost per click that is a fraction of what they pay normally. Of course, your site has to be somewhat relevant. If you’re selling products that only ship in the U.K. it’s probably not worth it. But for some sites, expanding your search marketing strategy across the world just might be the next step you are looking for. After all, wasn’t that the whole purpose of the web?

Moral of the story…. Travel more. Or ask Reform to advise you on an international search marketing strategy.