SEARCH CLINIC

The internet now accounts for a quarter of all advertising spending in the UK according to the Internet Advertising Bureau (IAB).
UK online advertising has bucked the recession with strong growth of 12.8% on a like-for-like basis in 2010 to reach a new milestone of £4,097 million, according to the bi-annual advertising spend study from the Internet Advertising Bureau (IAB) and PwC.

With total UK advertising spend in 2010 valued at £16.6 billion, this takes the internet’s market share to a record high of 25% (23% in 2009), meaning that £1 in every £4 invested by advertisers is spent online.

These findings demonstrate that, despite the recession, online advertising is in rude health.

Significantly, marketers are increasingly using online channels to drive their brand building campaigns. Consumer goods and retail advertisers increased their investment in online to become two of the top four big spenders in display, capitalising on the medium’s core strengths of reach and engagement as well as accountability.

In 2010 the biggest gain was display advertising, thanks to a nearly 200% surge in display advertising in a social media environment (on a like-for-like basis)* and 91% year-on-year (absolute growth) in video formats. Expenditure on pre-, mid- and post-roll video advertising nearly doubled to £54 million (£28 million in 2009). Overall display grew by more than a quarter (27.5%) on a like-for-like basis to a new high of £945.1 million, representing 23% of total online spend (up from 20% in 2009).

Consumer goods manufacturers became a top three display spender in the first half of 2010 with 12% share, jumping to 13% in the second half. The top spender in online display is finance with 15.2% share, indicating that as the economy recovers, finance brands are seeing their marketing budgets re-emerge. Finance market share has overtaken entertainment and media, which has dipped slightly to a 14% market share.

Paid-search continues to perform strongly with growth of 8% year-on-year on a like-for-like basis to £2,346 million, representing 57% of total online spend (61% in 2009).

Mobile advertising has experienced a staggering 116% year on year growth (on a like for like basis), up from 32% in 2009. Advertisers spent £83 million on mobile advertising in 2010, led by the entertainment and media sector, but with encouraging growth from finance, telecoms and consumer goods advertising.

The UK is still glued to social media– Social networks now account for 25% of the time spent online in the UK. This is reflected in the growth of display advertising spend as brands are able to tap into the social nature of the web.

The research is published at http://www.iabuk.net/en/1/adspendbreaks4billionmilestone280311.mxs

AOL is to cut 900 jobs- nearly 20% of its 5,000-strong workforce, as part of a move to restructure the company in the wake of its purchase of online newspaper the Huffington Post.
AOL bought the Huffington Post last month for an astonishing £196m.

The job losses are intended to offset duplication between the two companies.

Some 200 jobs are expected to go from the company’s US content and technology divisions.

AOL said another 700 jobs would be lost in back office roles based in India, although 300 of these positions would be outsourced to firms taking over such support functions for AOL.

AOL is hoping its purchase of the popular Huffington Post will boost flagging advertising revenues.

Formerly known as America Online, AOL merged with media giant Time Warner in 2000, at the height of the dotcom bubble in what was then regarded as a huge destroyer of shareholder value

That deal is widely considered to have been a disaster and the two firms split ten years later.

At its peak AOL had a workforce of more than 20,000 employees.

The Search Clinic has long been warning that pay per clicks- and Google’s AdWords in particular are not your magic online marketing channel, now new research proves my caution.

Online searching has become a nearly ubiquitous online activity and Google remains the undisputed king—receiving the largest share of search ad revenue and traffic.

But an eye-tracking study by user experience research firm User Centric adds a new perspective.

Its research indicates that most search users overlook search ads almost entirely.

The findings showed organic search results were viewed 100% of the time, and participants spent an average of 14.7 and 10.7 seconds looking at organic search results on Google and Bing, respectively.

However, only 28% of participants looked at right side ads on Google, and just 21% did the same on Bing—spending around 1 second viewing all ads combined on each search engine.

To put this in perspective, searchers who viewed the left hand site navigation spent more time doing so than they did viewing ads on both search engines.
Viewing Metrics for Search Results on Google and Bing, July-Aug 2010 (% of participants and time spent (seconds))

With users spending nearly all their time viewing organic search results, Hitwise’s latest numbers give some further insight.

Bing and Yahoo!’s success rates, meaning searches that resulted in a click, are just over 81% whereas Google sits much lower at 65.6% in December 2010 and January 2011.
Although the sheer volume of searches Google handles may bring down its success rate, the difference been Google and Bing is still large enough to draw conclusions.

First, users were shown to spend the vast majority of their time looking at organic search results on both search engines, and Bing’s success rate is 16 percentage points higher than Google’s.

Therefore, even though Google has more traffic than Bing, the Microsoft search engine generates a greater share of relevant traffic per search.

Additionally, this data indicates that SEO is more essential than ever. Users have learned to overlook search ads, and they will continue to ignore such ads as they become even more search-savvy over time.

SEO will become increasingly challenging as users start to rely on search engines for different reasons.

A recent study from Forrester Research found that internet users were 22 percentage points less likely in 2010 to rely on search engines to find websites than they were in 2004.

Although this doesn’t mean people are using search engines less to find information about product types or branded goods, it does mean that they are relying on search less to find websites specifically.
Perhaps this change is because internet users are becoming more knowledgeable and do not need to rely on search to find popular sites such as Facebook and YouTube.

Also, they may be relying on social media more to find websites. No matter the reason, this data indicates that search users’ behavior is in constant flux.

As search users continue to change their behavior, marketers will need to adjust their SEO strategy to keep up.

This research was initially published on: http://www.emarketer.com/Article.aspx?R=1008270&AspxAutoDetectCookieSupport=1

Particularly over the past month Search Clinic has noticed that some of Google’s search results are becoming dubious- to say the very least.And it’s not just us who have noticed a marked deterioration is their results.

A number of of other bloggers have also noticed this downward trend who are critical of Google’s search quality.

Could it be that Google is getting greedy as spam results may force some lazy and desperate online marketing companies to resort to their notorious pay per click AdWords?

It isn’t that tricky to spot these rogue websites. Step forward SeoQuake, McAfee and a number of other free and paid for services which provide a checking facility.

While there doesn’t seem to be a single tipping point for these posts, many people are getting frustrated at spammy search results and the large number of content farms which have started to emerge.

The result, however, is awful. Pages and pages of Google results that are just, for practical purposes, advertisements in the loose guise of articles, original or re-purposed.

While the major problems with Google’s search quality appear to be the rise of content farms and review sites, some posts also mention a number of other black hat SEO tactics like link buying and doorway domains that are still working for some sites.

With the number of posts on this topic, I don’t think it will be long before a Google representative steps in to clear the air. In the mean time, what do you think about Google’s search results? Have you seen a decline in quality in recent months?

Let us know via the blog comments below!

The European Commission has finally launched an investigation into Google after other search engines complained that the firm had abused its dominant position.
The EC will examine whether the world’s largest search engine penalised competing services in its results.

The probe follows complaints by firms including price comparison site Foundem and legal search engine ejustice.fr.

Google denies the allegations but said it would work with the Commission to “address any concerns”.

The objection is that Google manipulates its search results.

“The European Commission has decided to open an antitrust investigation into allegations that Google has abused a dominant position in online search,” the ec said in a statement.

It said the action followed “complaints by search service providers about unfavourable treatment of their services in Google’s unpaid and sponsored search results coupled with an alleged preferential placement of Google’s own services.”

The European Commission’s competition watchdog has quite a track record with technology companies- Microsoft and Intel both received massive fines.

This case, though, will be a tricky one, because to determine the outcome the Commission will have to look closely at Google’s all-important search algorithm, the rules that determine whether your company shows up high or low in Google’s search results.

Google regularly changes this algorithm, and as it changes the ranking it can make or break companies when they re rank websites.

To pin down the US search giant, the Commission will have to find a smoking gun, either in the algorithm itself, or in Google’s e-mail trail.

The Commission’s investigation does not imply any wrongdoing by Google.

Google offers two types of search result – free results produced by the firm’s algorithms that are displayed in the main body of the page and pay per click “ads”- or called sponsored links.

The investigation will try to determine whether the firm’s method of generating free results adversely affects the ranking of other firms, specifically those providing competitive search services.

These are specialist search providers, and can include sites that offer price comparison, for example.

Dr Search points out that Google has never published it’s full free results ranking algorithms in full, so it will be very interesting if they ever become accidentally leaked during the investigation.

Hard on the heels of the US’s Black Friday- today will be the busiest shopping day ever experienced on the internet, as UK consumers start buying Christmas presents in earnest.Some leading retail experts believe that today, Monday November 29, will see £22 million an hour spent online by British consumers, most of who will have just received their final monthly pay packet before Christmas.

The peak trading is predicted to be boosted by many retailers launching their Christmas sales over the weekend and consumers increasing desire to budget for Christmas by spreading out their spending throughout the weeks running up to the big day.

Kelkoo, a price comparison site, in conjunction with the Centre for Retail Research, calculated that consumers are likely to spend £537 million online today, nicknamed by some retailers as Mega or Manic Monday, up 29 per cent on the equivalent day last year.

Visa, the credit card company, said it would handle 3.8 million card transactions during the day with consumers are increasingly comfortable buying goods on the internet.

However, many others including IMRG, the online retailers trade body predicted trading will peak between midday and 1pm on December 6, as office workers use their lunch hour to click and buy.

Traditionally consumers window shop and do their research over the weekend, before using the internet access at work on the Monday to order their goods.

All experts, however, agree that this year will see a significant increase in the number of transactions taking place over the internet, thanks to better quality retail websites and a greater number of households with access to fast broadband connections. So though retail spending is likely to tick ahead by just 1 per cent or so, online spending is expected to jump by at least 25 per cent.

According to Ofcom, the proportion of households with a broadband connection has jumped from 52 per cent three years ago to 71 per cent.

Some of the purchases on Monday are likely to be large items, such as furniture or large televisions, being bought by consumers now, rather than in the post-Christmas sales in an attempt to avoid the increase in VAT from 17.5 per cent to 20 per cent in January.

Business experts have warned that employers will see a drop in productivity as workers spend time at their desk searching for gifts.

Richard Stables, the chief executive of Kelkoo, added: “Trading conditions remain challenging on the high street, and in a bid to entice consumers to shop now and drive up sales in the run up to Christmas, a number of retailers have already announced early discounts. The impending VAT increase is also expected to provide an additional catalyst for consumer spending this Christmas, with every household in the country facing a steeper VAT bill, amounting to an additional £1.16 per day.”

Organic search engine ranking- how to achieve great results pt5- 1 min 2 secsTopics covered in this video include the importance of not just being ranked on search engines, but the need to top search engine free results listings.

This is the fifth part of 11 videos on how to promote your website using the most cost effective elements of the marketing mix.

This video series was made from the lecture Simon Dye Dr Search the Principal Consultant at the Search Clinic’s made at the University of Gloucestershire on online marketing to to businesses, professionals including Members of the Chartered Institute of Marketing, Chartered Managers and the Chartered Institute of Personnel and Development and students at the 5th annual Gloucestershire Professionals conference in June 2009.

More than 300 people attended the conference with over 60 attending Dr Search’s lecture on Online Marketing Tips, Strategies and how to use the most cost effective tools for your online marketing business.

Of the 12 seminars during the day Dr Search received the top rating with 93% of the attendees saying that he was relevant to their needs and 86% of attendees rated the content as highly rated.

Please have a look at the other videos as they become live on the Search Clinic YouTube Channel

Please let me know what you think of the video. Have you found it useful? Was there anything else that you would like to learn about? Please contact Dr Search by clicking here now.

The third part of Dr Search’s lecture focused on  Website Focus= Customer Focus

The content of the third video explains why brand names aren’t enough, Keyword phrases explained, Tips to find where your customers are, why optimisation is at heart of online marketing,
What’s Good for your customers=good for search engines=good for social media=>profits
Similarities between icebergs and websites and Google’s UK database current key optimisation requirements

Dr Search the Principal Consultant at the Search Clinic’s lecture at the University of Gloucestershire on online marketing to to businesses, professionals and students at the 5th annual Gloucestershire Professionals conference in June 2009.

More than 300 people attended the conference with over 60 attending Dr Search’s lecture on Online Marketing Tips, Strategies and how to use the most cost effective tools for your online marketing business.

Of the 12 seminars during the day Dr Search received the top rating with 93% of the attendees saying that he was relevant to their needs and 86% of attendees rated the content as highly rated.

Please let me know what you think of the video. Have you found it useful? Was there anything else that you would like to learn about? Please contact Dr Search by clicking here now.

Please have a look at the other videos as they become live on the Search Clinic YouTube Channel

Search Engine Optimisation SEO tips, tools, tutorials guide and techniques Part 2 YouTube VideosContinuing the series on online marketing today Dr Search publishes his second video on search engine optimisation (SEO) tips explaining organic listings and guiding the pros and cons of organic listing- a long term great value but seldom instant results process.

Second part of Dr Search the Principal Consultant at the Search Clinic’s lecture at the University of Gloucestershire on online marketing to to businesses, professionals and students at the 5th annual Gloucestershire Professionals conference in June 2009.

More than 300 people attended the conference with over 60 attending Dr Search’s lecture on Online Marketing Tips, Strategies and plan the most cost effective tools for online marketing business.

Of the 12 seminars during the day Dr Search received the top rating with 93% of the attendees saying that he was relevant to their needs and 86% of attendees rated the content as highly rated.

Please let me know what you think of the video. Have you found it useful? Was there anything else that you would like to learn about? Please contact Dr Search by clicking here now.

Please have a look at the other videos as they become live on the Search Clinic YouTube Channel.

As more marketing and communications professionals use social media channels for UK brands, new research by McCann Erickson shows that many agencies and consultants are not providing enough guidance to help their clients with social media.Almost half of those surveyed (48%) said they still don’t feel they have adequate knowledge on how best to use social media channels effectively for marketing purposes.

Although this is down by over 16% from 64% last year the figure is still surprisingly high.

Nearly a quarter of respondents (23.4%) admitted that advances in social media are difficult to keep up with and almost the same proportion (22.4%) said they would like to understand social media more but that it is not easy to find genuine ‘experts’ in the field.

Interestingly, in just 12 months since the last survey there has been a marked increase in general social media usage for communications activities.

On average, usage for each of the main social networks (facebook, twitter and LinkedIn) is up by around 22% from last year. Twitter has shown the most increased usage (+28.2% since 2009) with 61% of those surveyed now saying that Twitter is regularly used as a way of distributing news stories.

It seems that IT departments are now more willing to let their marketing teams have access to social networks at work.

Last year’s results showed that 46% of respondents were unable to get access at work and although this figure has come down to 24.3% it still shows that nearly a quarter of UK marketers and communications practitioners are not granted workplace access to social networks, making monitoring and campaign execution impossible.

Social media monitoring for brands is now a key area for marketers who need to demonstrate effectiveness of activity, ROI and target audience usage of social networks. By far the most popular way of brand monitoring online is through Google Alerts with 45.5% using this free tool.

Radian 6 has emerged as the most widely used paid-for tool with 14.3% usage followed by PR Newswire’s monitoring tool Social Media Metrics at 10.4%. 11% of those surveyed said they relied on their retained PR agency to monitor social media brand activity and 37% said they conducted ‘ad hoc’ monitoring in house.

Asked where they think the responsibility for social media communications should reside, 50% said it came under a combination of disciplines; 23% said it was best managed by public relations professionals and 11% said it should sit with digital experts.

Additional results at a glance:
• 59.8% respondents said that social media communications is now part of their day jobs
• 29% think there are now too many social media networks
• 12.1% think social media networks are becoming too commercial
• 16.8% said they are interested in using social media more within their daily role but do not
currently use it

Dr Search reviewed the research from: McCann Erickson Social Media Index 2010