Pocket More Profit with Better Paid Search - DMNews

4/20/2009

Vice President of eMarketing Michael Behrens contributed to a Technique feature about getting the most value from paid search advertising in DMNews' Search Engine Marketing sector.

What is the “one thing” you need to improve your search engine marketing (SEM) performance in 2009? It's something many abandoned when radical wins began to diminish and excitement faded quickly: a recommitment to testing.

While 2008 did not yield most search marketers' three-digit increases in conver­sion rates or 50% savings in media cost through day parts or bid management; it was a year of incremental wins that cer­tainly added significant value. Here are a few notable examples from our agency:

In a landing page test for a financial services company, adding video to the search landing pages increased conversion rates 18%. Because consumers perceived the landscape as cluttered and seemingly commoditized, video provided clarity to the market about our client's differentia­tion. Although the conversion rate didn't double, the 18% increase provided a needed competitive advantage.

Also, A/B testing for creative in a soft­ware provider's content campaign proved successful. For many advertisers, a Google campaign is primarily a search campaign with a few dollars allocated to the contextual network. For many of our clients, contextual advertising is a significant portion of their media allocation due to the strong returns and increasing amount of available sales volume ripe for picking when using the net­works. We tested two banners with similar positioning strategies but unique position­ing methods for a free software download. The winning call-to-action produced a 14% increase in conversions.

We also measured creative impact on average order value (AOV). An often-overlooked element of creatives used in Google, Yahoo and MSN is the impact a creative has on the AOV of a client. Should the title tag use “free shipping” to get the popular “free” word in the prominent part of the ad creative? How about using thresholds in the D1, i.e. “Free Shipping Over $50”? In a test for an e-commerce client the AOV increased by $12.09, or 21% by adding “Sale Ends Soon” to the ad copy.

Testing isn't new but it gives us serious ROI. Are you still committed to testing? Have you become complacent? Hopefully, the examples that gave us incremental wins will inspire you to dust off the stats soft­ware, login into your multivariate testing platforms and get down to work.

THE TAKEAWAY
Don't get complacent — recommit to test­ing of paid search campaigns

From the April 20, 2009 issue of DMNews