FourSquare Integrated into Bing SERP (US) – 18th July 2012 Last week we mentioned how Bing has been growing their market share in the US, now this week they have been making further developments to fight back against Google. They have announced the addition of FourSquare data to the 3rd column on the redesigned Bing SERP. This will allow users to not only to see Facebook related results but now also FourSquare related information to help them find what they want. This 3rd column that combines social recommendations across key social networking platforms, including Facebook and Foursquare, has the potential to be a real game changer in the search market. While we are yet to see this new design for Bing on this side of the pond, it is evident what benefits may be brought to the search page going forwards. The ability to not only see what others in your social network think about products or services related to your search, but to see when or how often they have interacted with a certain brand are huge. Adding this socially interactive layer to the search pages will give users not only a better understanding of the brand before they make a decision to click, but also help advertisers to achieve a higher quality of click traffic. Users that do click through to search ads as a result may end up having a higher propensity to convert as they will be more likely to click on content with brands highly recommended by their peers. What this could mean for advertisers is that they may have to work a little bit harder in terms of promoting their brand and achieving a higher social impact. Brands may be encouraged to think about the brand perception and values a little deeper as social recommendations and interactivity will mean a lot more to users in search. No longer will brands have a level playing ground, but this extra social search column will mean that those brands that have made more efforts socially may be given an extra boost by the power of Facebook and Foursquare. As Bing have seemingly made the first real step into becoming a true social search engine and merging the lines between search and social like never before, Google continue to focus on their own social network “giant” Google+, in an attempt to push social into search. The question is whether or not they will be able to combat the integration Bing now possess by partnering with 2 of the largest social networks in the world through Facebook and Foursquare. While Bing search market share is considerably higher in the US than the UK, will this be a big enough factor to change the swing of the Google momentum built up over the last decade? – Kevin Ting
More Details: http://thenextweb.com/microsoft/2012/07/18/bing-integrates-foursquaredata-into-its-search-results-to-boost-personal-recommendations Let us know you thoughts about this article by tweeting #SL51 @SearchLately.
Google to Introduce Analytics Data into Adwords – 14th July 2012 While advertisers have long been able to see Adwords data inside Google Analytics, Google are now trying to bring more Analytics data into Adwords. What this means for advertisers is that users will be able to see statistics for metrics such as bounce rate, pages per visit and average visit duration. These changes will help advertisers gather more insight into the performance of onsite activity without having to log into Analytics. While this will not provide any extra data for those that have access and are proficient in the art of Google Analytics, it will make it easier and swifter to respond to any changes. This will be particularly useful for brand focused advertisers and provide more insight in one place. – Kevin Ting More details: http://searchengineland.com/google-testing-adding-analytics-data-toadwords-127601 Let us know you thoughts about this article by tweeting #SL51 @SearchLately.
US Paid Search Growth Slows While Mobile & Tablet Spike in Q2 2012 – 13th July 2012 A few different sources have recently revealed that whilst paid search spend is growing steadily, the rate of growth is actually slowing down in the US. Paid search spend increased 15.5 percent YoY in Q2 2012, though the growth rate actually slowed, at nearly half that of last quarter, according to IgnitionOne. Rimm-Kaufman Group (RKG) found a similar trend among their clients who saw a 29 percent YoY increase, down from the 32 percent Q1 2012 spike in paid search spending. At the same time, Mobile and tablet paid search spend have increased astronomically. In the U.S. mobile search spend increased by an incredible 333 percent YoY, representing an increase from 12 to 14 percent of total
search budgets, reported IgnitionOne. Engagement on mobile ads also spiked 325 percent, while impressions were up 130 percent. RKG found that the entire mobile segment nearly doubled in paid search click share YoY while tablet share nearly tripled. Tablets, with a 9 percent lower CPC compared to desktop, accounted for 57 percent of all mobile clicks. “Increased adoption and higher ad engagement on smart phones and tablets is resulting in a greater share of paid search clicks coming from mobile devices,” Marin Software reported. Their data showed that the share of clicks from mobile in the U.S. rose from 14 to 18 percent QoQ. Share of paid search spend on iPad and other tablets, meanwhile, rose 40 percent. – Blair Liu More details: http://searchenginewatch.com/article/2191346/Paid-Search-Growth-SlowsMobile-Spikes-in-Q2-2012 http://www.rimmkaufman.com/content/quarterly/q22012.pdf Let us know you thoughts about this article by tweeting #SL51 @SearchLately.