If you don’t see the value in Search and believe you don’t need it, then you really don’t need your website either.

Again and again, we hear marketers speak rather harsh words about Search as a branding vehicle (anything not centered on Direct Response). The theme of those arguments is that Search doesn’t provide value for the business or the brand.

Let’s challenge that belief.

To simplify this response: it provides value to your consumer. Value to your consumer equates to positive perceptions of your brand. The more positive perceptions your brand has versus its competition, the more likely you are to move mass product for your business.

That may be a fluffy answer for some of you, but let’s take a step back and dissect the marketers’ discontent with Search. As mentioned in previous articles, Search is a bridge medium that takes your consumer from their “home” to your brand’s home, the foundation of your modern brand, The Always There Brand. Search elevates the investment you made in your website by beginning the brand experience on the search engine results page (SERP) and driving incremental traffic to your website. Not only that, but Search captures consumers at a very unique, valuable mindset. They are literally searching for you. They are explicitly requesting help from your brand. The mindset of your consumer at the moment she is exposed to your brand’s message makes all the difference. TV, Print, and portions of Display advertising are much more passive in nature. Search, Email, Text, and other “permission-based” channels naturally connect with your consumer at a deeper level. Search usually isn’t positioned as “permission-based”, but let’s argue that if a consumer is going to Google to search for something, she is giving you permission to talk to her. She’s not watching How I Met Your Mother when your spot appears or flipping through Seventeen magazine when your makeup insertion interrupts her experience. She’s looking for you (or someone like you)! Search often outperforms other channels in marketing mix analysis due to this difference in mindset.

The next time you hear a marketer challenge the value of Search, ask them how they measure the value of their website. Ask them what they want the consumer journey to achieve within their owned digital media. Then kindly explain to them that Search probably drives more than 50% of that value. You don’t manufacturer product and place it on shelves without telling consumers, so don’t build your website without Search Marketing.

Noise. Specifically, the kind that results from a zillion different advertisers living within a channel.

How are you going to stand out and be heard when you’re launching a campaign in Search?

Easy, differentiate your brand and separate from the competition by re-thinking your keyword strategy!

Let’s be honest, many search marketers simply type in a few obvious keyword variations into the Google Keyword Tool, sort by volume, copy and paste, and maybe create a few more variations from there.

That is just silly.

Think about what you are trying to do! What is your marketing philosophy?

1)      Reach a high volume of qualified consumers.

2)      Reach the right consumers.

3)      Reach them often, err, more often than the competition.

4)      Reach them at the right time.

5)      Reach them with the right message.

And, of course, do all of this at the lowest cost possible while avoiding resemblance to other advertisers!

Visualize your strategy. How are you going to accomplish all of this? Think positioning.

For example, the query “acne” is being owned by advertisements, but the query “forehead acne” seems forgotten by advertisers… but not by consumers.

What better way to differentiate yourself from the competition by being the ONLY advertiser across a wide range of keywords. Do this for enough keywords and WOW. It takes longer to build the keyword bulk of course, but as a good steward of Search Marketing, you should take great pride in doing this better than others.

So, next time you’re hit with the moment, “Um, could you be quiet, please?! I’m trying to differentiate my brand…”, just remember this post, determine what you are even trying to do, craft your own marketing philosophy, and let your brand stand out!

What do AM New York employees and search marketers have in common?

The business of handing out free newspapers is a high stakes, high pressure game that depends on location, weather, cleverness, looks, dress code, the economy, and knowing your target audience.

Okay, so maybe it’s not that dramatic.   But after spending months commuting to work, it’s hard to ignore the persistent cry of each AM New York employee.  Location, cadence, rhythm, attitude, message and tone can be the difference between being stuck with a large stack of papers, or walking home empty handed.  The same can be said in search marketing, where leveraging the right search management tools can be the difference between a great ROAS or money wasted. So, what makes a great pitch?  What makes for a good search campaign?  What gets us to convert?  Let’s examine the strategy of both these practices in tandem.

Below are three recordings of AM New York employees delivering their pitch.

1)  “The Stunner” – Unique and persistent, her pitch is less about the message and more about delivering consistency with great tone and attitude.  She obviously has found her ‘evergreen copy’ and rarely deviates.  You can find her on 32^nd and 7^th, right at the door step of MSG.

2) “Information-giver” – She is more concerned with delivering a pitch about what her product offers – coupons at Macy’s – and updates on localized current events.  Her message is long and drawn out, but not as effective.   You can find her by the subway entrance on 35^th and Broadway.

3)”The Mixed Bag” – She’ll let you know about the contents inside, but also repeat her core pitch every so often.  Her pitch occurs too infrequently, and seems drawn out, but her technique is better than only giving information.  You can find her at 34^th and 7^th, at the north entrance of the LIRR.

I’m not an expert in newspaper delivery, nor have I done any research, but I’m willing to wager “The Stunner” is walking home empty handed more often than her counterparts. With a limited amount of time to capture her audience, she has chosen to emphasize cadence and attitude over message to design a pitch perfectly catered to the medium.  This philosophy should sound familiar to search marketers.

Message & Cadence:  What are you saying in your search ads and how are you saying it?  How is the rhythm of your copy?  Does it read well? This can be the difference maker.

Tone & Attitude:  What is your brand’s voice?  Does it come across in your search ad?  Can you create a brand voice through search?

Location & Timing:  In search, geo-targeting and timing can be the difference between converting and not. Geo-targeting,  seasonality, time of day, and day of the week each inform how we spend our budget and manage our campaigns.

Examine all the parts that it takes to manage a good search campaign, study your competitors, and be data driven and be bold!

For fun, here is my own rendition of an AM New York pitch.  Feel free to post your own!

We credit an improv class at from Upright Citizens Brigade for a new perspective on search marketing. It’s inspiring enough to share.

Yes… and

The first lesson in improv is to always “Yes…and” everything. Your improve partner tells you your name is Ichabod? “Yes, and… I’m the sixth in a long line of Ichabods.” She sets the story in ancient Rome? “Yes, and… everyone’s hygiene here could use a little work.” The premise behind the rule is that a story can’t go on unless open minds allow it to go on. If someone comes up with a brand new idea, and all you say is, “No,” there’s nowhere to go from there. If the response to a new idea is, “Yes…and tell me more,” the story evolves.

Search is a constantly evolving field, so if you’re not open to new ideas, you’ll fall behind. Search marketers learn through constant testing how a single additional word in ad copy can lead to a significant improvement in results. Keeping an open mind about new searching habits is rewarding because we can always test to see if a different approach works better than the original. The key is not to disregard something as a failure right off the bat, because you never know how the story is going to develop.

Add new elements

In improv, everyone starts off with zero information and builds from what other people say. Saying “Yes…” establishes that what was said in the past is part of a story. The function of “and” is to make sure each statement adds new information to the scene.

Your search accounts are a treasure trove of data. You might as well just draw a giant X on your computer screen because that’s the place to start digging for the first fact in a story. If impressions rose after you launched a set of keywords, “Yes… and” why? What else happened? The story could go anywhere from that point. The way to make something happen next is to add new information by extrapolating from your data set or running more tests to establish more facts.

Truth in Comedy and Search

As Del Close and Charna Halpern stressed in their book Truth in Comedy, nothing is more impactful than the truth. For improv, the truth is where we find humor. When was the last time you were on the floor with tears streaming down your face while clutching your stomach in a fit of laughter? Was it because you were watching a comedian on TV? Or was it that the situation you were in was extraordinarily hilarious? Because comedy comes from everyday life, the funniest improv always mimics ordinary circumstances.

In search, the truth is where we enhance results. Search is the only medium where people are trying to tell us what they want. SEM experts are closer to a true connection with consumers than everyone else in marketing. The way to be true to customers is to provide a satisfying experience. No gimmicks. No tricks. Just relevance and service. As improv stories earn the gift of laughter, search connections are rewarded with happy customers and exceptional results.

In search, the Excel vlookup function is used on a daily basis to synthesize massive amounts of data. Like men with women, we usually take vlookup’s merits for granted. We’re entirely dependent on its speed and accuracy, but when things go awry we feel hopeless.

Around here, ‘vlookup’ is a verb. We eat, sleep and vlookup.

If you have a list of keywords, each with numerical identifiers, and you need to attribute them to the correct redirect URL, enter the vlookup function like this:

=vlookup(C8, Report!$E$7:$K$327, 7, 0)

which translates to:

=vlookup(cell containing your keyword’s identification number, a range on another spreadsheet containing your redirect URLs and the keyword to which they match, the number of rows to the right of the keyword, and 0)

Problems can occur during the matching process. For example, if your data sets are in different formats, Excel won’t be able to match one to another, and will leave “#N/A” behind. In the search world, this is likened to a pile of $%($*&%&#. Even if you change the column format to text or general or numbers, nothing changes!

What may help in this particular situation is this pretty little formula:

=IFERROR((VLOOKUP((J8*1), [Report_1271326324069.xls]Report!$E$7:$K$327, 7, 0)),0)

This iferror formula converts all #N/A’s to 0’s, and multiplies the reference cells containing the numerical identifiers (J8) by 1, forcing it to be a number.