22May2009
Posted by Laure Muller under: Google AdWords; Pay-Per-Click.
Very interesting article by Aaron Wall. It is surprising to see that there are not so many 500 Fortune companies among the top 20.
Google gained popularity with advertisers in part through the accessibility and affordability of their AdWords ad program, which made it possible for almost anyone to advertise online. When the ad platform was young and inefficient (due to limited competition) you did not need to be skilled to profit. You only needed a credit card and a decent website.
But over the years Google has made their system much more complex, and increased competition + better competitive intelligence tools + all the layers of ignorance tax baked into AdWords (default match type as broad, expanded broad match, automatic matching, search syndication & content network on by default, tons of click fraud on the content network, etc.) have made profitably running an AdWords campaign much more challenging.
Google has hundreds of thousands of advertisers, but over 80% of their United States ad revenue comes from the top 1.35% of advertisers, according to a recent study of keyword data by SEM Rush.
The above number might be skewed toward larger advertisers due to the limited size of the SEM Rush keyword database, but the additions of expanded broad match, automatic matching, and quality scores means that the top advertisers are more likely to show up on longtail keyword search queries as well. And the limited database which over-represents some larger advertisers also misses inactive accounts and micro-advertisers which would likely mean that 80% of Google’s ad revenues are coming from closer to only 1% of their advertisers (rather than the 1.35% in this data sample).
Why do brands sort out the cesspool, as Eric Schmidt fondly states?
- brands provide most of the ad dollars
- creating a brand typically requires buying a lot of awareness via advertising
- branded keywords can be expensive
- ad waste, fraud, and sloppy account management by brands can be justified as a brand spend, and is under less scrutiny than ad spend of direct marketers
To read more about it…
24June2008
Posted by Laure Muller under: SEM.
Today Inside AdWords has announced the launch of Google Ad Planner. Basically Google Ad Planner will allow advertisers to target more effectively their audience. Google Ad Planner will connect advertisers and publishers with a better relevancy! Finally! We have been waiting for that for a long time! Basically when using Gogole Ad Planner you will enter demographics and sites that are relevant to your audience or sites that your audience is already visiting and this Google tool will give you a list of recommended sites to target. This is a great tool! You can try it if you want, just apply here.
While Google Trends for Websites, announced last week, is designed for all users, Google Ad Planner is designed with media planners in mind. Using Google Ad Planner, you can quickly create media plans and export to a .csv file, which can be opened in most spreadsheet applications. Or, you can export to DoubleClick’s MediaVisor, which helps you manage all your other media planning, buying and campaign management activities.
(Click the image for a full-size version)
12June2008
Posted by Laure Muller under: SEO.
In this great article from Vanessa Fox, you will learn how to optimize your images for SEO. Vanessa covers a great overview of it:
1. Don’t put text in images
2. Use the ALT attribute
3. Make image filenames descriptive
4. Use image captions
5. Provide textual clues around the image
6. Be cautious about using images for navigational links
7. Be cautious about using images for headings and logos
8. Block Non-Content Images
9. Opt-in to Google’s Image Labeler
10. Images can be search engine and user friendly
A picture is worth a thousand words. Unfortunately, when it comes to major search engines (which are still primarily text-based), a picture is worth a lot of blank space. Does this mean you shouldn’t use images on your site if you want to rank in search? Not at all. Just keep some simple things in mind when adding those images to your pages. As a bonus, these tips help not only with search engine robots, but with Jane as well! You want your site to be accessible in screen readers, to those who have images turned off in their browsers, and to those who have slow connections or are on mobile browsers and may have trouble loading images.
By providing search engine robots with textual information about the images on your site, your site can benefit not only from better placement in web search results, but in image search results also. Image Search can provide substantial search traffic, so don’t overlook this as an acquisition channel.
Read more…
15May2008
Posted by Laure Muller under: SEO.
Google Sets is a SEO tool that will give you a list of related keywords, a “set of keywords”. You know the importance of creating a great content for your website. Use this tool to create a list of related keywords and write around them. For instance, let’s say you are selling “coffee machines”, Google sets will give you the following list of related keywords. Try to insert some of these keywords in your content.
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12May2008
Posted by Laure Muller under: Google AdWords; Pay-Per-Click.
Load time evaluations is now available on the Keyword Analysis page. It is time to optimize your landing pages! Google Inside AdWords recommends a few things to speed up your load time, such as reducing your images size, less interstitials, less redirects… Starting in June, load time will directly affect your Quality Score so improve your landing page load time now! Check out this last post from Inside AdWords:
In early March, we announced that we’d soon incorporate an additional factor into Quality Score, namely landing page load time – where load time is defined as the amount of time it takes for a user to see the landing page after clicking an ad. Now, we’d like to post with an update.
Starting today, load time evaluations will be displayed on the Keyword Analysis page, for your review. We suggest taking some time to evaluate and understand this information because, starting mid-June, landing page load time will be incorporated into your Quality Score.
Once you’ve had the chance to review and evaluate this information, you may wish to make changes to improve your landing page load time. People who click your ads may well thank you for it, by becoming your satisfied customer.
To learn more about load time and landing page quality, please see this article in the AdWords Help Center.
6May2008
Posted by Laure Muller under: Google AdWords; Pay-Per-Click; SEM; SEO.
Well, even if it seems obvious that being number one in Google is important, you will learn in this great article from Aaron Wall the importance of selecting the right keywords, the right URL, analyzing your competitors keywords, and a few great search tools to use. Aaron covers 9 sections:
- An Example of Applying This Data to a Live Business Scenario
- Google Rankings Can Make or Break a Business
- Appreciating Google’s Market Domination
- Establish a Baseline Keyword Value
- Typical Click Distribution Profiles
- Factors Modifying Click Distribution
- Tapping the Keyword Tail
- Improving Monetization via Scale
- Improve Your SEO Strategy Today
An Example of This Research in Action
Patrick, a moderator on our community forums, runs a Bingo Card Creator website which recently ranked #5 in Google for bingo cards.
- A #5 ranking sent him 6,000 unique visitors per month.
- A #1 spot, using the leaked AOL search data (referenced later in this document), is worth 8.5 times what #5 is. 6,000 * 8.5 = ~50,000 uniques per month
- His site currently makes $40 for every 1,000 pageviews.
- His estimated income from ranking #1 for [bingo cards]: $2,000 a month.
You could do this type of calculation for any keyword you rank for that has significant search volume. You can use some of the other data points listed below to create similar calculations - even if you do not rank yet…
Read full article here.
5May2008
Posted by Laure Muller under: Search News.
You have probably heard about it, Yahoo! refused Microsoft’s offer of $47.5 billion. Some will argue that Jerry Yang - Yahoo! CEO - should have accepted it and a few shareholders might become very angry… Some like Danny Sullivan from Search Engine Land thinks that Steve Ballmer - Microsoft CEO - should have brought more bucks on the table.
If Microsoft’s walkaway from the Yahoo deal is indeed a ploy to save $5 billion, Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer may have proven himself pennywise and pound foolish. He was prepared to spend billions to finally make Microsoft a serious rival to Google. For a bit more, he may have destroyed Microsoft’s chance to get there.
Despite what I’m about to write, I like Microsoft. I’ve got many friends who work there (and at Google & Yahoo), and as a company, I actually want Microsoft (along with Yahoo) to provide a strong counter-balance to Google.
Five Years, Nothing For Microsoft To Show
Microsoft’s basic problem is this. After five years of going after Google in search, Microsoft has failed to make a dent in the big G. Millions — billions, I suppose — have been spent on the project. Huge technological effort has gone into the challenge. What’s to show for it? Google’s at all-time highs in the US and Microsoft has lost share.
Three out of four major ratings services now report Microsoft to have a single digit share of the US audience. Microsoft hasn’t even been able to challenge Yahoo (still in low double-digits), much less Google. In desperation, Microsoft signaled its defeat by proposing to buy Yahoo and get into the number two spot by proxy.
Read full story here.
Well it might have been a good way to challenge a little bit more the big Google and I am kind of disappointed not to see it happen.
2May2008
Posted by Laure Muller under: Pay-Per-Click; SEM; SEO.
Finally! I did it . I started my own blog. After reading tons of blogs on a daily basis, I decided to create my blog. I would like to share with you the best articles I find on the web regarding SEM, PPC, and SEO. I am a Search Marketing Expert and have been in Marketing for years and years! It has been 2 years now that i became a PPC expert, specially in AdWords. English is not my first language so if you find completely nonsense things on my blog, please contact me! I thought creating a blog would be a good way for me to “bookmark” my favorite articles and organize them by categories! And I hope it will help you get more info on AdWords, social networking and other stuff like that…What can I say… I am a web addict and I’m just glad it became my everyday job! Hope I will “contaminate” you a little bit 
I am very excited to start this! I hope you will enjoy it as much as I do!
