Display advertising boosts results from search: study

For those who can afford it, a combination of display advertising together with search marketing will make a lot of sense. There is a direct correlation between the two, according to a new study which has been reported by eMarketer.

That such a correlation existed was always taken for granted by marketers, but it is good to see numbers demonstrating it. An excerpt from the eMarketer article:

David Hallerman, senior analyst at eMarketer, agreed that display can boost search. “There is a connection between display and search ads,” he said. “Marketers know this intuitively. Often it’s not the search ad alone that gets consumers to act, but the context of all the marketing that preceded it.”

eMarketer predicts that search and display ads will retain the highest share of online ad spending formats through 2013, and will be the only formats to maintain double-digit share through that period.

SEO: Durable marketing

With marketing and advertising spend tightening by the day, the value of a good organic search marketing strategy is even greater.

Companies that invested in SEO activities in the past will continue to benefit from the visibility, traffic and leads/sales they get, without having to shell out instant cash for the instant gratification that other forms of marketing, including paid search, provide.

Granted, continuing to do well in organic search results is not without consistent SEO effort--- but then, given a choice between spending time or spending money in times of cash crunch, "time" is invariably the choice.

SEO is an investment; it is akin to medical insurance for marketing. A regular investment of "small premiums" in terms of both time and money will stay one in good stead during the hard times.

Of course, SEO results in the form of traffic and click-throughs will undoubtedly be affected by the economic environment; for example, a real estate company is likely to get fewer sales leads because fewer people have the 'intent' and urgency to buy houses. However, you can be sure to at least capture the attention of those who are still interested and looking for what you offer. The business will not suffer because you could not be found by the target audience.

Even when the money tap runs dry, the leads pipeline doesn't have necessarily have to.Which is why SEO is durable marketing.

Google Adwords 'site targeting' now offers CPC bidding

The Adwords program has made an important change to its "site targeting" option. One, it will now be called placement targeting to reflect the additional targeting options now available [including specific sections/ sub-sections of a website, targeting by demographics and ad formats].

The second, and more important, change is the option for cost per click (CPC) bidding. Previously, Adwords offered CPM bidding for the site targeting feature. The flexibility to use both CPC & CPM when using placement targeting is good for advertisers and could see more advertisers using this feature now.

Our experience with the few 'site targeted' Adwords campaigns we managed was that it seemed to be significantly more expensive than the regular keyword targeting campaigns; hopefully, the latest addition will change that. It will surely be worth testing out.

Here's the official announcement on placement targeting from the Google Adwords blog.