Web Search & Marketing Newsletter – April 2013

Web Search & Marketing Newsletter – April 2013

Welcome to the April issue of our monthly newsletter, which covers news, tips and advice on effective website marketing techniques and trends.

In the first article this month we take a look at ‘cookies’ – what they are, how they work and the escalation in privacy concerns and regulations over them, which are becoming an increasing concern for online marketers.

In the final article this month, we follow up on last month’s focus on Google’s introduction of Enhanced AdWords campaigns for the Search Network, with more details about those for Display Network campaigns, which have just been introduced.

You can read more below, or you can also browse through previous editions of the newsletter, either by month or by subject. You can also follow us on Twitter for the latest developments during the month, or follow our Facebook page or Google+ page for updates.

On to this month’s edition…

HTTP Cookies and Privacy Concerns

The issue of ‘cookies’ is becoming increasingly important for websites, online marketers and privacy advocates. Cookies have traditionally been used by websites to track visitor activity and repeat interactions, as well as what those visitors do on a website through tools such as Google Analytics. The use of these tracking cookies has become increasingly sophisticated, but online users are also more concerned about their role, leading to privacy concerns and recent changes to legislation in Europe.

A cookie (aka HTTP cookie, web cookie, or browser cookie) is usually a small piece of data sent from a website and stored in a user’s computer or device, or in the web browser while a user is browsing a website. When the user browses the same website in the future, the data stored in the cookie can be retrieved by the website to notify it of the user’s previous activity so that repeat behaviour can be tracked (such as by Google Analytics), or advertisers can use cookies to display relevant adverts to web users based on their tracked behaviour.

Although cookies were originally designed as basic tracking mechanisms, they have now progressed beyond this and have become a crucial component for marketers to target advertising and to implement direct marketing techniques to relevant prospects. This tracking activity has raised privacy concerns to an extent that prompted European authorities to take action in 2011. The European Union’s Privacy and Electronic Communications Directive began to dictate that “explicit consent” must be gathered from web users who are being tracked via cookies. As a result, all websites in the UK, for example, that use tracking cookies, need to make this clear and give visitors the option to block these when they use the website.

This area is increasingly becoming a issue between privacy advocates and web users on the one hand, who don’t want their online activity to be tracked, and online businesses on the other, who want to target and improve their marketing activity. This includes user tracking which many websites now do through tools such as Google Analytics, and targeted advertising which companies can use, from behavioural marketing to remarketing activity – which should increase relevancy and reduce advertising costs.

In the past month, Mozilla announced their intention to include a default setting that disables third-party cookies by default in upcoming releases of their Firefox browser. This prompted the US Interactive Advertising Bureau to state that it will fight the move, which it describes as being “a nuclear first strike against the ad industry”, as without the third party data companies will simply not be able to track users across sessions. Firefox may be hoping that this move will attract more web users to start using their browser and if that proves to be the case, then the other main browsers such as Google’s Chrome and Microsoft’s Internet Explorer, are more likely to follow suit.

This could be a backward step for online businesses, who will lose valuable information and the option to improve the targeting of their advertising. For web users, it can also mean less relevant advertising and a reduced user experience. If you’d like to know more about cookies and how they can affect your online business or privacy, contact us now.

Google’s Enhanced AdWords Campaigns for the Display Network

Following Google’s recent introduction of the new Enhanced Campaign settings for AdWords search campaigns (which we featured last month), the company has just announced the availability of these settings for the Display Network as well. The Display Network covers those 3rd party websites that carry Google AdWords ads, either in text, image or video format, and allows advertisers to extend the reach of their advertising beyond the main search area. So, what are the implications of this further development?

Some commentators were surprised that the initial launch of the Enhanced Campaign settings didn’t apply to the Display Network as well as Search, although there are significant differences between the two. The reason behind the enhanced campaigns for the Display network is to simplify the process of reaching the right person with the right advert, in the right location, at the right time, on the right device. This will now be possible from within a single campaign, whereas previously it was recommended to separate campaign by the type of device they were targeting (i.e. mobiles/tablets/desktops).

The fact that Google has different Enhanced Campaign settings for Display and Search means that this, at first glance, is good news for Display advertisers. Google kept some features for Display advertisers that they took away from Search advertisers: namely, device targeting. In fact, Enhanced Campaigns for display ads have even more device targeting options than ‘legacy’ campaigns and allow for display ads to target specific mobile devices.

This prospect may not be as rosy as it first seems however, as it’s harder to converge devices around Display, because of the differences in capabilities. Rich media and flash ads are pretty prevalent (and successful) on Display, but will struggle to get any traction on mobile platforms. So for the time-being at least, advertisers aren’t being forced to combine the devices on Display campaigns. It’s safe to bet though that this will happen once Google works out the technical implications around image ad formats.

So the long-term advantages are that when you upgrade a Display campaign you get bid adjustments, just like the multipliers on search. Instead of adjusting per device you get to adjust per target. At ad group (or campaign) level you can now specify the multiplier for a target. These multipliers will work together so that users who match multiple targets get even higher bids.

The disadvantage is that a user matching multiple targets isn’t necessarily more likely to convert than a user who matches one, if that one target is well defined. So if a person matches many targets your bid might reach unprofitable levels. This approach is also likely to encourage broader targeting at the basic level, so it’ll be important to use low bids on broad targets in conjunction with high multipliers to appropriately target the high value users.

So the initial benefits in the settings for the Enhanced Display Campaigns are not as straightforward as they may first appear, but on the whole, the industry opinion is that the extra control that they provide is going to be positive.

For more information about Google’s Enhanced AdWords campaigns for the Display Network, please contact us for details.

Web Search & Marketing Newsletter – March 2013

Welcome to the latest issue of our monthly newsletter, which covers news, tips and advice on effective website marketing techniques and trends.

In a special edition this month, we just focus on Google’s recent introduction of a significant change to the AdWords advertising system, in the form of Enhanced Campaigns. We take a look at the details of these changes, the advantages and disadvantages and the best course of action to take.

You can read more below, or you can also browse through previous editions of the newsletter, either by month or by subject. You can also follow us on Twitter for the latest developments during the month, or follow our Facebook page or Google+ page for updates.

On to this month’s edition…

Google Introduces Enhanced AdWords Campaigns

During February, Google announced major changes to AdWords which will have a significant impact on the way the search advertising campaigns can be managed. The new changes – called Enhanced Campaigns – allow marketers to manage their search advertising across different devices with some increased flexibility for bid levels and other features. There are some clear advantages and disadvantages with these changes and we review these in this issue, along with our recommended course of action for anyone managing AdWords campaigns.

The new Enhanced Campaigns are available now, but there will be a transition period up until June this year, when all existing ‘Legacy’ campaigns will be converted to ‘Enhanced’. It’s therefore important for any AdWords campaigns to be converted over the next few months in a managed way to ensure the best process with limited impact on current advertising performance.

The following is a brief summary of the changes being introduced with Enhanced Campaigns:

• the use of separate mobile targeted campaigns will end, with mobile-specific bid adjustments now available at campaign level
• the ability to target specific mobile devices and carriers will be removed
• the ability to specifically target tablets will be removed and these devices will now be bundled with desktop campaigns
• advertisers will now be able to control ad extensions at the adgroup level
• ad scheduling will now be possible for sitelinks and mobile bids
• there will also be more targeting and bid options by geographic area.

These are therefore quite substantial changes that provide some better management tools, but also go against the advice that Google has been providing for the past few years. The Enhanced Campaigns are designed to simplify the management of AdWords across different devices, but for many existing campaigns that have been structured for device targeting, this will require some significant transitions to the new format.

Advantages & Disadvantages of Enhanced Campaigns

Advantages

As we’re now living in an ‘always online’, multi-device world, Google has recognised that this warrants a different approach by marketers to reach potential customers. So these new campaign enhancements will provide the ability to deliver different creative depending on whether people are mobile with their smartphone or at home with their tablet, without the inefficiency of having to manage multiple parallel campaigns to deal with these different situations.

Many of the new Enhanced features are powerful additions to AdWords campaign functionality, such as bid level adjustments, sitelinks management and new reporting features that will help advertisers develop effective paid search campaigns in a changing online marketplace. One strong feature will be the “upgraded extensions” that will make it possible to create these either at the campaign or at the adgroup level, with more control over when they appear – by device and by time of day – and more reporting insights to help improve the performance of these advert extensions.

Another advantage of the new campaigns will be the ability to bid differently on a variety of geographies within the same campaign. For example, a coffee shop might want to bid higher for potential mobile customers within a mile of their location, a little lower for those within five miles, and even lower for those further away. In the longer term, there will also be the ability to provide offers based on user location and also call tracking functionality within AdWords.

Disadvantages

However, there are some disadvantages with these new changes. There is a widely held view that these upgrades will reduce the level of control that advertisers have over their campaigns. The changes will favour those advertisers running smaller and more basic marketing campaigns and reduce the level of control that many experienced AdWords managers are currently benefiting from.

Another complaint about the new changes is that it will no longer be possible to separate the bidding for tablets and desktop computers. This will stop some of the bargains that marketers were getting on tablet traffic. The types of click through rates can be similar on desktops and tablets but the conversion rates can vary significantly, so not being able to separate them could be detrimental, with a combined conversion rate.

The other main concern is the way that mobile bidding will change, and whether the bid adjustments will lead to higher mobile costs. At the moment, mobile clicks can run at 50% of desktop clicks for the same term, which has impacted Google’s profits as mobile search grows. Cynics will say that the new bid structure will help to push these levels up now and Google will see the benefits – this will be closely monitored over the coming months to see what impact there will be on mobile costs.

Recommended Implementation

There are arguments for and against upgrading campaigns to the enhanced format now. One of the reasons to postpone the changes for a time is if you have a large number of campaigns targeting different devices, then it would be necessary to prepare an upgrade plan and gradually merge these campaigns together. On the other hand, if the number of campaigns is fairly small and they are not too complex, then there is no reason to postpone the upgrade and to start taking advantage of the new changes.

The best solution would be to either create a new enhanced campaign and test the new features on a small scale, or to convert an existing campaign that currently targets all devices and to become familiar with the management and reporting tools before rolling out the changes to more of your managed campaigns. You can then start to develop new best practices for structuring accounts and campaigns, as well as testing different creatives.

This is the process we will be taking with our managed accounts, so that we test and learn the best practice with the new Enhanced Campaigns, before rolling out changes across all accounts prior to June. For large accounts, the AdWords Editor tool can now be used to manage the transition (make sure you have the latest version of this tool), and we will be keeping a close watch on the KPIs for campaigns before and after the transition to see where the main improvements or reductions in performance might occur. We will also be monitoring the extensive market commentary on these changes to see what experiences others are having with these changes as well.

If you currently manage your own AdWords campaigns and would like to receive Google’s detailed documentation for converting existing campaigns, please get in touch and we can email this to you. If we are managing your account, we will contact you once the transition process begins and keep you informed of the impact of these changes.

If you require any further information on the Enhanced Campaigns and how the Web Marketing Workshop UK can help your online marketing activity, please contact us now.

Web Search & Marketing Newsletter – February 2013

Welcome to the latest issue of our monthly newsletter, which covers news, tips and advice on effective website marketing techniques and trends.

In the first article this month we look at Google’s Search Suggestions feature and how this can be used by search marketers to improve their SEO or PPC / AdWords campaigns. We also review the important distinction between Display and Destination URLs used in the adverts of a Google AdWords campaign and how these can be used most effectively.

Finally for this month, we take a look at Facebook’s recent introduction of its new “Graph Search” tool and what implications this will have for users, as well as concerns over privacy issues.

You can read more below, or you can also browse through previous editions of the newsletter, either by month or by subject. You can also follow us on Twitter for the latest developments during the month, or follow our Facebook page for updates.

On to this month’s edition…

Making use of Google’s Search Suggestions

Since 2008, Google has provided searchers with the ‘Search Suggest’ option, which aims to predict the search terms that users are typing into the search query box. In 2010, this was combined with Google’s Instant Search service, which continuously changes the results list as the users types in their query. The suggested search term function is therefore a valuable tool for users, but also for search marketers.

The drop-down list of search suggestions that appear as users enter a search query on Google will sometimes display up to 10 options, although in most cases, there are 4 suggestions shown, which are continually refined as the query is typed. The aim of Google is to help the user complete their search query faster, by anticipating the search term they might use. These suggestions come from historical data on how people have searched, as well as the content of web pages indexed by Google.

The search popularity is the primary factor in what Google shows as a suggestion, yet the suggestions may also be influenced by a user’s previous search history, or by relevancy factors that are calculated by Google’s complex algorithms. There is also a “freshness layer”, so that if there are terms that suddenly spike in popularity, these can appear as suggestions, even if they haven’t gained long-term popularity.

What’s important from a search marketing point of view is how these suggestions may influence the results shown on the page, and how this information can be used for a business advantage. Although there are no figures on usage of these suggestions, many people say that they will look at the suggestions being shown and are likely to choose the relevant query to save typing in the full query. As a result, this tool can help to influence the way that people are searching and could increase the times that websites will appear in the rankings for selected search queries.

This is important for search engine optimisation (SEO) and for PPC advertising (Google AdWords). From an SEO perspective, marketers should see what queries are being suggested for the main search terms they are targeting through their optimisation, and then ensure that the relevant suggestions are also being targeted in their site content.

This is also true for Google AdWords, so that by targeting the relevant suggestions for the market – either as a phrase or exact match term – marketers can see how often those terms are being used as a search query, and whether they perform well in their campaign. Targeting these suggestions can also help bid pricing on specific queries, and in addition to this, any suggestions that are shown, but are not relevant, provide good information on negative terms that should be added to the campaign.

If you would like more information about Google’s search suggestions and how these can be used for your search marketing activity, contact us now.

Defining Display and Destination URLs in Google AdWords

A common question that often arises amongst AdWords advertisers is “what is the difference between Display and Destination URLs in the adverts?” This is a valid question and it’s important to understand how these work and how they should be used to maximise the performance of a paid search campaign.

The difference between the two types of URL shown in the Google AdWords ads are as follows:

• the Display URL is the URL (coloured green) that appears below your ad text when your ad is shown in the search results. This URL is purely a visual identifier on the advert and doesn’t function as the link for the website.
• the Destination URL on the other hand, is the specific location within your site where you’d like to take a user that has clicked on your ad (the landing page). This may be a long URL and the Destination URL isn’t visible in the ad, so you can use it to direct people to a specific page within your site without cluttering your ad.

Google has guidelines and restrictions on how the Display and Destination URLs are used. The most important consideration is that the Display URL must show the same domain name as the website that the advert links to. The www. part of the domain doesn’t need to be included here, although Google will show this in the advert if space allows.

It’s important to use the Display URL as part of the marketing content of the advert, to indicate to searchers what they will find on the website and, where possible, to re-emphasise key terms in the advert text, which will appear bold and can help to increase clickthroughs from an advert (such as yourdomain.com.au/Search_Term).

Remember, the text used in the Display URL is not the actual URL link to the website and has no influence on the Destination URL used in the advert. This destination is set up as a link from the ad but hidden from the searcher until they click on the ad and see the website and the landing page URL in their browser. Therefore, in the above example, the Destination URL would be something like: http://www.yourdomain.com.au/category/product/item15.html.

For more information about the use of Display and Destination URLs, including best practice and Google policies, read this. Alternatively, please contact us now for more information.

Facebook Introduces “Graph Search”

In January, Facebook announced their new “Graph Search” tool, which is gradually being rolled out to users of the social networking service. As with many product developments by Facebook, there have been concerns raised about privacy, as the tool now allows greater in-depth searching of the user database.

The launch of the Graph Search function provides a new type of social search that can’t be completed through Google or any other existing search tool. It therefore fills a gap in search because, if used regularly, Facebook has a massive amount of social data on users which can now be mined and used for different purposes – giving Facebook an advantage over Google’s range of search options.

The search function will now enable users to search for ‘people, places or things’ with results shown based on your network of friends and the things they have posted, liked or commented on. For example, if you typed “movies my friends like” into Google, it would have no idea what you wanted, whereas Facebook would potentially provide this information, as the new feature allows members to search for this and find results, as long as your friends have posted this type of information in the first place. (If search results are not widely available from your friends network, then Bing will provide results and this search engine is becoming more integrated with Facebook.)

While this data – called the “social graph” by Facebook – has always been on the site, it’s not previously been easily accessible. Only advertisers could use this type of data previously, through the targeting options provided, such as showing an ad to only “18-24-year-old males who like video games and live in Australia” for example. This has now changed with the wider access to this “social graph” for all users.

The new Graph Search has been getting a lot of media attention, but not all is good. Facebook often faces privacy concerns when they launch new features and this one is no exception. There was an immediate impact on the company’s already battered share price as concerns were raised over how this tool could be used, but Facebook hopes that it will place them in a stronger position for increased usage and, of course, better revenue opportunities.

The privacy concerns revolve around the changing usage and access terms for information posted on Facebook, and from the potential for personal information to be collected by criminals to build profiles of individuals that could then be used to target victims for identity theft. However, users of Facebook also need to be aware of what information they post online and who has access to this through their individual security settings.

For more information about the new Graph Search feature, and the implications for Facebook users (and advertisers), please contact us for details.

Web Search & Marketing Newsletter – January 2013

Welcome to the first issue of our monthly newsletter for 2013, where you can read about some of the latest news, tips and advice on the best website marketing techniques and trends.

In a change from our usual January issue, we focus on a website marketing health check in this newsletter. That’s because the first month of the year is always a good time to pause and review, to consider your current strategy and to set future plans for the new year. The online market is becoming ever more competitive, with new entrants, updated websites, different marketing opportunities and, in most cases, a more crowded space to compete for business.

This means that your website needs to be performing as efficiently and effectively as possible. It means that you should be reviewing your website, your marketing and your online tools to get the most from your website spend. You need to ensure that you’re getting in front of your target market as effectively as possible, and then converting your website visits to enquiries or sales as efficiently as you can.

You can read more below, or you can also browse through previous editions of the newsletter, either by month or by subject. You can also follow us on Twitter for the latest developments during the month, or follow our Facebook page for updates.

On to this month’s edition…

Website Marketing Health Check for 2013

We’ve outlined below some of the key things you should have in place or be thinking about to tackle in 2013 as a prominent website in your sector. You may be targeting a small local area, or a national or even international marketplace. Either way, you can ensure that you’re one step ahead with our health check report, which will highlight any areas of potential improvement – some of which can be quick to fix, others may take more time and cost.

We’re also offering our standard health check reports – either for your overall website marketing positioning, or specifically for your Google AdWords account – at half the usual price for January only. So now’s the time to start and see what needs to be done to get 2013 to the best possible start.

What does the marketing health check cover?

There are some core areas that we would recommend need to be in place for any website competing online and our health check review will address these, including the following:

Website Indexing – how well is your site being indexed by Google and Bing, and how often? Is your site using the Webmaster Consoles provided by these search engines? Are your robots.txt and sitemap.xml files being used correctly? Do you have duplicate content pages and, if so, is canonicalisation being used?

Search Engine Optimisation – if your pages are being indexed, how well can your website be found? How effective is your search engine optimisation structure, including the use of search terms, body content and design issues? Are you targeting your local market effectively? How strong is your brand name reputation in the search results?

Links – one of the key requirements for a good ranking performance on Google is the number and quality of inbound links to your site. How does your domain perform and what else could be done, both with internal and external links?

Pay-per-click advertising – are you using PPC advertising, such as Google AdWords, and how well does this perform? We can give your account a brief review, or we offer a more in-depth health check for PPC advertisers if required (see below).

Website design & functionality – once you drive visits to your website, how well does it perform? Our health check will identify any key issues like navigation, design or content issues, how ‘trustworthy’ is it, and more. We will also review your site on smartphones to see how you are catering for the growing mobile search market.

Analytics – does your site use an analytics package, and specifically Google Analytics? If so, what does it show and how can you use this powerful business information tool for your advantage?

Social media – finally, what role does social media play in your market and are you doing enough to capture potential customers from this market?

Google AdWords Health Check for 2013

If you’re currently using Google AdWords as part of your online marketing strategy, make sure your account is set up as effectively as possible for 2013 with our health check report. It’s becoming more important than ever to get the most from your search advertising spend, and so this report will highlight any key issues with your campaigns.

Our 10-point review will identify any potential areas for improving your AdWords campaigns, either through better targeting or reducing wasted spend. We’ll look at your account structure, the use of search terms (including negatives), how your adverts could be improved, and which ad extensions could help your clickthrough rates – all with the aim of improving your quality scores and get more visits and conversions for your spend.