RTONZ Online Marketing Program Capabilities & Benchmarking Ready, Aim, Fire Online Marketing Campaign Planning & Management Mark Sceats & Chris Adams RTONZ Online Marketing Program Facilitated by: Miles Media Program Facilitated by:
Session Summary 1. The role of search marketing 2. Have a plan & budget 3. Integrate with offline campaigns 4. Selecting an agency 5. Research & preparation 6. Managing & refining campaigns 7. Tracking & reporting
Travel Information Sources Used
Time Researching before Purchase
The Importance of Search Display Search
Search Marketing SEO Search Marketing Paid Search
Develop a Plan Your website is likely to be your flagship visitor information office Define clear objectives (SMART) Work backwards (from what want to achieve)
Clear Campaign Plans
Clear Campaign Plans:
Media Use & Ad Spend Mismatch Missed Opportunity Gap between ad investments and media consumption
Why Are Businesses Spending More Because it works! on Search?
Budgeting How much should you spend on search? 30% - 60%, depending on objectives (branding or direct response) Not enough is spent on SEO
Integrate Search With Offline Media 37% of online search users are driven to search as a result of a TV ad 30% 20% Media channels work together: 67% of online search users are driven to search for information by an offline channel 17% Source: iprospect, Offline Channel Influence on Online Search Behavior, 2007.
Impact of TVC on Search
Selecting an Agency Options Traditional agency Digital agency Specialist search agency Questions to ask
Selecting an Agency What they need from you Remuneration models Beware the cowboys
Research & Preparation Understand Your Business, Marketing Goals, the Competitive Landscape Determine Best Strategies: SEO, Paid Search, Display Advertising Implement Campaign, Optimize, Monitor, Test, Report & Analyze
The Value of Organic Search Organic results get about 70% of all clicks
Importance of Top Rankings 45.00% % of Clicks in Natural Search Results 40.00% 35.00% 30.00% 25.00% Key Points: Page 1 results get 89% of clicks #1 gets 4 X more than #2 20.00% 15.00% 10.00% 5.00% 0.00% 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11+
Cornerstone principals of SEO Site structure/architecture Ensuring site can be readily accessed & crawled by search engine spiders. Content Ensuring appropriate content is present in the right amounts & in the right places for search engines to index & readily interpret. Links Enhancing a website s reputation by securing inbound links from thematically relevant and authoritative sites
Pick the Right Keywords Keyword phrases Focus only 1 or 2 primary KW per page Selection Criteria: Relevance Audience Relevancy Page Relevancy Demand Competition
Invest in Good, Relevant Content 1. Useful Content Other relevant sites will want to link to this content if because they think it worthwhile 2. Informative and Original If your intended audience likes it, then the probability is that search engines will too. 3. Frequently Updated If pages are updated periodically with new content, then search engines and site visitors will keep coming back for more.
Link Building 60 +% of SEO success depends on it A long hard slog Great content makes it easier Caution! Google hates link manipulation
Link Power
SEO Payback Following SEO work website rankings improved This resulted in organic search traffic volumes growing. In June traffic from organic search was more than two and a half times greater than in Jan.
Paid Search Planning & Setup Define KPI metrics and budgets Keyword Research Campaign set-up Ad Copy Writing Landing page development Tracking URLs Bid Strategy Development
Precise Geographic Targeting Campaigns can be hyper local Polygon or radius based targeting
Keyword Inflation As competition increases having smart bid management strategies is essential to maximise ROI & not waste money This is the value a specialist search marketing agency with expertise in paid search brings
Content Network Remarketing Unique ads on Content Network show only to previous visitors to your site based on their past interactions on your website On Display Network sites, visitors are targeted with a specific message relevant to their past behavior on network or past visit to the destination site.
Managing & Refining Campaigns Not set & forget! Continual process of review & optimisation PPC Test different bid strategies Split test ad creatives based on clickthrough rate and conversion performance Split test / multi-variate test landing pages SEO Tweaking on-page SEO Optimising new pages Link building, link building, link building
Data Driven Campaigns Continually test and refine campaign elements based on analytics 50% 40% 30% 20% 10% Lowest Landing Page Bounce Rate 37% 32% 31% 26% 24% 21% Week 4 Week 6 Week 7 Week 8 Week 9 Week 11 $4.50 $4.00 $3.50 $3.00 Average Cost Per Conversion $4.20 $4.17 $4.01 $3.95 $3.48 $3.31 Week 4 Week 6 Week 7 Week 8 Week 9 Week 11
Conversion Optimisation Why is Amazon so successful? Because they invest as much time and money improving conversion rates as they do building traffic. Small improvements in conversion rates can produce huge impacts on your bottom line.
Landing Page Optimization Targeted landing pages are developed & tested. Test A 41% Bounce Rate 71% Conversion Rate Test B 38% Bounce Rate 89% Conversion Rate Test C 27% Bounce Rate 121% Conversion Rate Test D 24% Bounce Rate 114% Conversion Rate This A-B-C-D testing above led to a 85% lift in campaign performance.
Campaign Tracking & Reporting Benchmark Test, Measure, Learn, Improve Challenges: Analytics mis-configuration Different tools, different measures Last click attribution Need to add tagging code Offline conversion attribution Measure the important stuff
Clear, Actionable Reporting
Campaign Measures Traffic Engagement Goals, Conversions or Signals of Intent to Travel
Traffic & Engagement Traffic 1. Clicks or Referrals 2. Visits 3. Page Views Engagement Core: 1. Time on Site above XX minutes per visit. 2. Page views per Visit above XX pages per visit. 3. Bounce Rate bounce rate of campaign landing page(s). 4. Bounce Rate bounce rate of site s home page overall. 5. Bounce Rate overall bounce rate of all traffic to site. 6. Facebook Likes Additional: 1. App download 2. Other Social Media referrals or interactions 3. Optional (via Quantcast) People by market & demographic profile. 4. Other custom traffic or engagement measures appropriate to RTO and/or Campaign
Goals (S.I.Ts) The Goals or Signals of Intent to Travel are a set of important success events that indicate strong interest in the destination and specific trip planning activity.. Core: 1. Deals views view of any deal detail page on the site, 2. Listing detail page view of any detail page for accommodation or activity 3. Visitor Guide(s) order complete the order page, 4. Email(s) sign up form: completion of email sign up form 5. Event Listing page view of event detail page Optional: 1. Booking information review pricing & availability or related detail page 2. Booking confirmation page 3. Contact Detail Information 4. Dining Listing page view of detailed page for dining 5. i Site request form completion of any of the I Site enquiry forms 6. Others that could be added based on feedback or specific campaigns 7. Other custom goals or conversions
Campaign Tracking Codes 1. Create a tracking code for each platform or campaign. 2. Use a url shortener to create a social media link Web Address of Campaign Landing Page: www.mywebsite.com/campaign1 Web Address with Tracking Code: http://www.mywebsite.com/campaign1?utm_source=twitterevent01 URL Shortener: http://bit/ly/ciuci3
Takeaways 1. Ignore search at your peril 2. Essential to develop a plan 3. Budget adequately 4. Chose an agency with care 5. Organic search traffic is not free 6. Content is King. Links are Queen 7. Conversion optimisation is essential 8. Measure the important stuff. Learn. Improve
Resources & Links Workshop Materials & Resources @ www.rtonz.org.nz Google Guide to Hiring an SEO Firm: www.google.com/support/webmasters/bin/answer.py?hl=en&answer=35291 Google SEO Starter Guide: www.google.com/webmasters/docs/searchengine-optimization-starter-guide.pdf SureFire Search: www.surefiresearch.com SEM 360: http://knol.google.com/k/chris-adams/seo-360/37x2jyc3aqmqg/4# Program Facilitated by:
Recognised as one of NZ s leading SEM agencies Won the Marketing Association Award: Best Use of Search Engine Marketing for TVNZ. Operating for over 9 years & specialises in SEO, paid search, web analytics & related services. A Google AdWords Qualified Company We deliver results Get more from your search spend Conversion focus Relentless pursuit of ROI
Contact Details Mark Sceats SureFire Search Ltd www.surefiresearch.com marks@surefiresearch.com 09 356 4623