Highlights brought to you by Search Lately at SMG this week include: All Eyes On SES London 2012 Are you Pinterested? Google Introduces Enhanced Ad Sitelinks Google Personalised Search – Yes or No? The Future of Online Marketing Microsoft Advertising adCenter Efficiency Updates Browse last week’s Search Lately for more details and initial reaction from industry experts on recent hot topics.
All Eyes On SES London 2012 – 15th Feb 2012 Next week sees UK’s leading search and social marketers come together at SES London 2012. Most notable sessions on the agenda include talks about the increasing impact mobile, tablet and display should play in digital marketing as we step into 2012. Among the challenges facing online marketers this year include the need to integrate online with offline, but also the necessity to develop campaigns that cross platforms and make full use of the unique opportunities both mobile and tablet present. The picture gets even more clustered if you add into the mix the revolutionary developments within display that DSP and ad-exchanges have given us, the increasing influence of Social Media through Facebook, Twitter and even the emergence of Pinterest. Whether you are new to search or have a wealth of experience and knowledge, SES London represents an opportunity to get up to speed with the ever demanding world of search. Talks will be conducted by many of the most knowledgeable people in search including the Head of Strategy at Yahoo! UK, as well as Heads of Search and SEOs from companies such as Bronco, STEAK & Carat. - Kevin Ting Read more: www.stateofsearch.com/andrew-girdwood-search-has-evolvedsignificantly-in-the-last-year sesconference.com/london/index.php
Are you Pinterested? – 15th Feb 2012 There has been a lot of hype around Pinterest over the last few months. Essentially, Pinterest is a digital mood board on which you can publicly pin and display images that you have found interesting. In my experience, it is common for a man to scoff and dismiss Pinterest as a social media outlet for women who merely want to share pictures of ponies, flowers and hair clips, but this article points out that UK users are predominantly men and that the audience is growing fast! According to compete.com, Pinterest amassed 13 million users in 10 months, most of who have come from the US with a surge in UK popularity in recent months. Mashable have put together an informative infographic regarding Pinterest users. With Pinterest’s popularity growing and displayed in a pretty infographic, the first question that comes to mind is, can it be optimised to help a website rank? Brands are making use of Pinterest. For example, Barneys New York, the high end department store from the US, have an account in which they pin and promote their own products. It is also possible to search for images that have been pinned by other users that are available from Barneys. As Pinterest is quite new it is not easy to measure how it will affect a Google search. This said, however, Pinterest is set to expand (especially as the site now prompts you to sign in through Facebook or Twitter) and essentially provides a platform to increase visibility for any website. A Pinterest profile can be optimised at various stages when creating a profile, boards and pinning images in the following ways:
Keywords in the profile description Optimised titles and descriptions on a Pinterest board Images posted with a website link Keywords in your image description (users will see this, so keep this in mind and keep them simple)
If you are chomping at the bit to join the online phenomenon then be aware that you must receive an invite from an existing member or request to be put on a ‘waiting list’. This style of sign up is an interesting way to create the illusion that Pinterest is exclusive, but evidently this is just a gimmick and anyone will be granted access to create an account within a matter of time. - Hannah Struve Read more: mashable.com/2012/02/14/pinterest-america-england-infographic/ www.stateofsearch.com/what-is-pinterest-and-why-should-marketers-care
Google Introduces Enhanced Ad Sitelinks – 15th Feb 2012 Enhanced ad sitelinks work by incorporating text from ads in your account that are related to your sitelinks. To be eligible, your ad with sitelinks must show above Google search results and your account must contain active ads closely related to the sitelinks in your campaign. Here is an example: Say you've created sitelinks for your pizza restaurant campaign, and your ad displays sitelinks as shown here:
Now, let's say your account also includes the following text ads:
With this enhancement, your ad could now look like this:
The new layout of sitelinks will enable your ads to take a much bigger space in the search engine results page. It will certainly push your competitors down and probably increase the CTR as a result. You may start to consider creating some ads that closely relate to your sitelinks to take advantage of this new feature. - Blair Liu Read more: adwords.blogspot.com/2012/02/introducing-enhanced-ad-sitelinks.html
Wikipedia Always In Top Google Results – 14th Feb 2012 For some time now there has been the unanswered question of why Google loves Wikipedia so much. The latest studies have shown that Wikipedia appears on page 1 within Google search results for a staggering 99% of searches! The study was compiled using 1 word nouns as search terms. Of the 1,000 search terms used, only 8 didn’t appear on page 1, whilst 56% of these did. Everyone has come across and used Wikipedia for something, because it always appears! Whilst Wikipedia is a strong, dominating site and this will help it to rank highly, is it slightly misleading to base this research on one word nouns? After all, Wikipedia is an encyclopaedia and how often would someone’s searches involve just a one word noun? Whilst it is understandable that people are getting concerned that Wikipedia, (which isn’t always an accurate source of information) is taking up 1 of 10 natural search results, this study may not reflect the real life scenario of what people actually search for. - Jimisha Lakhani Read more: searchenginewatch.com/article/2152194/Wikipedia-Appears-on-Page-1-of-Google-for-99of-Searches-Study searchengineland.com/why-the-wikipediagoogle-search-results-study-is-flawed-111628
Google Personalised Search – Yes or No? – 11th Feb 2012 Google have been tampering with personalised search since 2005, although 45% of respondents in a recent survey do not like the idea of this form of search. A further 39% of respondents like the idea of personalised search but have concerns about privacy issues that it brings up. Many participants feel that Google search results should be kept the same for every Google user and this insistence on personalization is forcing everyone into a “filter bubble”. It is questioned that personalised search is actually narrowing our results based on what Google feels we would like to see rather than expanding our options based on what is really interesting and useful. Whether or not the general public will shift away from Google as a result or slowly become to accept this new era in search is yet to be seen. - Kevin Ting Read more: searchenginewatch.com/article/2145297/Google-Users-Dislike-Personalized-Search-ResultsSurvey
The Future of Online Marketing – 10th Feb 2012 Comscore have just released its annual report on trends in social media, search, online video, digital advertising, mobile and e-commerce. This whitepaper titled “2012 US Digital Future in Focus” gives valuable insights into the direction of digital online marketing in the coming year. Looking back at trends from 2011, Comscore
reveals key findings and predicts where they feel the industry is heading. Read more: blog.comscore.com/2012/02/putting_the_digital_future_in.html www.comscore.com/Press_Events/Presentations_Whitepapers/2012/2012_US_Digital_Future_i n_Focus
Microsoft Advertising adCenter Efficiency Updates – 10th Feb 2012 Microsoft Advertising adCenter will be making some updates to increase campaign management efficiency soon. Some of the changes will be seen as early as midFebruary. Some of the efficiency updates include:
Duplicate keywords in the same ad group will be deleted
Exclusive Gender/Age Demographic Targeting will be removed due to limited data availability
Ad Groups that contain more than 10,000 keywords will be divided to meet a 10,000 keyword limit. Ad groups will be duplicated as many times as possible to preserve all excess keywords. Historically, adCenter allowed ads to be shared between multiple ad groups. Ads will no longer be linked to multiple ad groups, so you can edit or pause ads without unintentionally affecting other ad groups. - Blair Liu More details: community.microsoftadvertising.com/blogs/advertiser/archive/2012/02/10/efficiencyupdates-coming-soon-to-microsoft-advertising-adcenter.aspx