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PR & SEO Blog from Silicon Alley

Thursday, February 14, 2008

There's a great article by Tameka Kee in MediaPost today about SEO providing great ROI and outperforming other marketing initiatives. It looks like the rest of the industry is finally catching on!

However, what worries me is the idea that some marketers believe pay-per-click (PPC) is an investment. Now don't get me wrong; PPC is a fine business. Connors helped launch the entire industry with its PR work on Overture, after all. Yet let's be clear in that PPC is advertising. And once you stop paying, its benefits disappear. It may be a good buy with consistently high ROI that continues to bring in search traffic and provide leads, but it is not an investment.

PPC is kind of like renting an apartment. You can sign a lease and move in quickly. Sometimes you can even get a month-to-month agreement. If you have any problems, you can talk to the super and (hopefully) he'll fix your place. But you are not gaining any equity. Should your landlord decide to sell the building or raise rent dramatically, you'll be stuck without a place to live. In the long term, isn't it better to buy or build your own house?

SEO, on the other hand, provides compounding returns. You can build your house (or site) and then make improvements or additions. Yes, some patience and hard work is involved but don't worry, as you can still hire contractors like us to help. It will all be worthwhile when your property value (or PageRank) goes up. Then, should you choose, you can sell at a profit.

There is nothing wrong with renting some keywords with PPC as long as you make sure you are saving enough to invest in your own SEO house.

Labels: advertising, PageRank, PPC, ROI, seo

posted by Adam Edwards  0 comments

Wednesday, February 13, 2008

Here’s an interesting study on Natural Born Clickers by Starcom, Tacoda & Hitwise (via SEOmoz blog).

Natural Born Clickers -- or NBCs -- click on online advertising the most, and what the data shows about them is surprising.

Heavy clickers:

1. Account for 50% of all display ad clicks, but only 6% of the total online population.
2. Skew towards Internet users between the ages of 25-44.
3. Skew towards households with an income under $40,000.
4. Spend 4 times more online than “normal” clickers – but their spending does not proportionately reflect this increased usage.
5. Are more likely to visit auctions, gambling, and career service sites.

Will this study have a negative impact on the paid display ad industry? Will more targeted methods of attracting customers like organic SEO get a boost? Only time will tell – but it’s certainly food for thought.

Labels: advertising, Adwords, seo

posted by Valerie D'Orazio  0 comments

Wednesday, November 21, 2007

The holiday season is upon us, yet it seems that in recent years, Christmas is center stage before turkeys are even bought or stuffed for Thanksgiving.

If we lived in most any other part of the country, this would be most evident in the malls, where sometimes even before Halloween, Christmas trees, wreaths, elves and Santas mingle with crazed shoppers. But we live in New York City, where instead of malls, we find ourselves in a stampede on 34^th Street with Salvation Army volunteers incessantly ringing their bells for people to throw pennies into their red buckets.

And it’s not just a result of getting older and time seeming to pass faster, it’s practically a scientific fact. Heather Dougherty from Hitwise points out in a Reuters piece about Cyber Monday that, "The holiday season is starting earlier and earlier every year, which is what consumers joke about, but it's honestly happening.”

So what happened to Thanksgiving? It’s a holiday after all, so why does it fall out of line with the “holiday season?” Once our jack-o-lanterns are extinguished, and sometimes before they are even lit, the holiday “spirit” in the form of growing anxiety about what to buy loved ones sneaks up on us. Couple that with story upon ad upon story about shopping this holiday season, and we are thoroughly inundated with one message: BUY BUY BUY!

Thanksgiving thus becomes irrelevant. As I was looking through the top dailies today, I was unable to find much on the actual holiday. Rather, articles on Black Friday and Cyber Monday were abundant.

But don’t get me wrong. I am not knocking consumerism or even the media’s approach to greeting the holiday season. Chances are that I too would be less inclined to read a story about how the pilgrims celebrated the first Thanksgiving than I would about where to find the best sales on Friday.

Happy Thanksgiving… But more importantly, Happy Shopping!

Labels: advertising, Marketing, media

posted by Gina Bolotinsky  0 comments

Thursday, November 15, 2007

Labels: advertising, Adwords, new media, Web 2.0

posted by Gina Bolotinsky  0 comments

Friday, October 19, 2007

So here's an interesting notion: Google has built its empire on its Google ads yet Google itself, probably the most famous brand of our time, does not and has not ever invested significantly into its own advertising.

So in the olden days, before we "googled" everything, how did we find out about Google? Why did we use it instead of Yahoo or Alta Vista (remember them?!)? From what I can recall, it mostly started by word of mouth. I heard about Google from the mother of the children I used to baby sit. She told me that a silly little thing called "google.com" is the best search engine! "Google?" I asked. "Really? What a stupid name."

But the name stuck in my mind and when I came home that night, I gave Google a go. To my surprise, Google was fantastic. I told all my friends about it and we, along with the rest of the world, have been googling ever since.

I imagine that this was the experience most had and what lead to Google's sprint to the top of the search engine food chain. The AP's Michael Liedtke pointed out in an article on this topic that rather than throwing money into frivolous advertising, Google put its dollars directly to its actual business, which involved perfecting the art of search.

"This advertising aversion has freed up money for engineers, computing hardware and other resources that fuel Google's search engine while leaving plenty of profit to keep shareholders happy and lift the company's stock ever higher."

Google serves as an example for many aspects of business. Its unique approach to marketing, however, is worthy of exploration for any professional in this industry. The key lesson from this particular advertising model, or lack there of, is that quality will always overcome being bombarded with a company's message.

Back when I was baby sitting, literal word of mouth had much more longevity. Before I heard about Google, I would have to actually ask my friends' opinions of things in order to gain perspective on them. Now, all you have to do is go online and you can get the opinions of millions.

The bottom line is a company's main concern, in its beginning stages especially, needs to be the quality of its product or service. Once that is perfected, they can think about giving us a call.

Labels: advertising, Adwords, Google, Internet, Marketing, Public Relations, search

posted by Gina Bolotinsky  1 comments

Tuesday, October 09, 2007

One notion that has consistently irked me over the years is the concept of a "media buyer". Rupert Murdoch is a media buyer. He made an offer the Bancrofts couldn't refuse. Now he can essentially do whatever he wants with the Wall Street Journal as long as it remains profitable for shareholders.

Advertisers, however, use the term "media buyer" to designate someone that negotiates with the media for the use of their time and/or space to deliver a message. Doesn't the word "buy" denote ownership? Ads are about media renting. And, to be honest, advertisers merely rent the medium as a communication vehicle. They are not really renting the reputation of the media outlet. When a company places an ad in the Wall Street Journal, they are not paying to have Walt Mossberg write a favorable review. Ads in nearly every medium are denoted as such, or else you lose the credibility that brings people back. In other words, ads are not the reason people consume media (except perhaps for fashion magazines when some ads can become art in and of themselves).

How effective will advertising be in the future as a one-way communication vehicle? Behavioral targeting or geotargeting helps make advertising relevant, but it's still rarely the message that consumers really want. People consume media because they are looking for specific answers or entertainment. Isn't it better to be in the conversation or in the path of research instead of trying to force feed a message that people actively try to avoid?

So when iMedia asks if we pay too much for media, the answer depends on who you are. If you're Rupert Murdoch, then no. If you're Joe Advertiser, then probably yes.

Labels: advertising, media

posted by Adam Edwards  0 comments

Monday, September 03, 2007

There was a lot of news made last month out of nothing. The fact that nothing happened 12 months after Google made an ominous deal with the AP was, in fact, quite newsworthy. Many speculated that the agreement was just a payment to allow Google News to avoid royalties and continuing to run as intended (...the kind of agreement that YouTube would love). Turns out that the timetable for unveiling something was 13 months instead.

That something was the minor footnote that Google is now hosting AP news on its own servers... as well as articles from the AFP, CP, and PA. An example here shows the story being reported on by the Canadian Press, but delivered by Google.com. This partnership as it stands now is not particularly innovative. Yahoo has been delivering articles from these newswires on its website for years. Newspapers, TV stations, and many other media sites do the same thing.

For publishers, however, that is just the problem. They may not readily admit it, but newspapers need newswires. For over a century, they have allowed regional media to cost-effectively deliver national and international news. Yahoo News adopted this model long ago. That was never too surprising given its history as a content-centric destination (and the most visited site on the Internet).

Google, on the other hand, rose to prominence as a middle man. Tell them what you're looking for... and be on your way. Later, they started showing ads alongside search results like GoTo / Overture had pioneered. That seemed like a fair deal to get a free, quality search engine. Then they started showing ads on other people's websites with AdSense and providing bloggers with free tools to let people publish their own websites. That was another good idea, even if it led to quite a bit of spam. Meanwhile, Yahoo's Publisher Network hasn't gained the same amount of traction, and their web content has always been focused on keeping people on Yahoo's servers (Geocities, 360, etc.) so the two models have peacefully coexisted.

Now Google is dipping its feet further into content hosting with Google News 2.0 and other initiatives like Google Base or Book Search. Google becoming a publisher instead of just a content locator or aggregator is one of the most dramatic underlying changes taking place on the Internet today. Media outlets better be taking notes. The advertising networks running on those sites better be paying attention. If Google becomes a destination instead of a middle man, then you both lose.

It sounds like good business for Google, but they're still not hedging their bets. They're still happy to send people elsewhere as long as AdSense or DoubleClick ads are shown.

The question is: does the partnership makes sense for the newswires?

Certainly the future of news is online, and the AP/AFP/CP/PA would all be blind to ignore the 800 pound gorilla. However, there are thousands of media outlets paying for newswire subscriptions worldwide. They provide countless articles everyday to fill up print issues and websites around which publishers sell advertising. If Google begins to pervasively deliver news from their server while showing only their advertising, that cuts out a lot of revenue for many different companies.

Of course, your local newspaper is still going to subscribe to newswires even though they made a deal with Google. I just wonder how much longer they are going to be able to afford the fees when their ad revenue declines thanks to Google News, iGoogle, and Google OneBox results.

Labels: advertising, Google, media, newswires, Yahoo

posted by Adam Edwards  0 comments

Friday, July 13, 2007

This week, Neilson/NetRatings announced that website hits will no longer count towards the popularity of a website. Instead, the amount of time spent on a site, termed “Total Minutes” and “Total Sessions”, will be analyzed to determine rank. Why the switch? Many sites now use technologies like online video and programming languages like Ajax, which require a visitor to spend more time on a site in order for their visit to count.

Neilson is of course not the first to recognize time as a factor. Hitwise and comScore have long been measuring it along with page views and others. comScore spokesperson, Andrew Lipsman, explained,

We have a host of metrics, and you can theoretically rank on any one of them. It’s just important to examine the space that you’re looking at and maybe determine what the most appropriate metric to use would be.

That makes sense, and I am not the only one who seems to agree. Online advertising experts quoted in Louis Hau’s Forbes article voiced their concern about Neilson’s bold move citing that while more than just page views are relevant for Web 2.0, it is not to say that the measurement is all together irrelevant.

Hau goes on to address the growth of the online advertising space (up 28% from last year), but reminds us that it is still just 6% of the entire industry. Not surprisingly, our eyes on the Internet are more easily monitored than for any other medium and it might take years to sort through all the available data and figure out what metrics are truly valid.

In the midst of all this talk about advertising, PR is inadvertently part of the dialogue. We also need to know the popularity of a site, just as we need to know the circulation of a print publication.

A distinct science for this is still clearly in the making. In the meantime, we are advancing in our knowledge of reaching an audience online. In our world, we would argue that page views, for example, still hold a lot of merit as reading a blog or a 500 word article can take no time at all.

Labels: advertising, Internet, Marketing, pr, Public Relations, Web 2.0

posted by Gina Bolotinsky  0 comments

Friday, June 29, 2007

But not as bad as some, apparently. In NYC, people were lining up as early as Monday morning for the Friday debut of the iPhone in stores. I understand the anticipation, the excitement, and the sheer want of having a new gadget, but it makes me wonder: How can someone sit outside on a New York City street for 5 whole days? Never mind that this week, there were thunderstorms coupled with hot and unbearably humid weather.

I hope the iPhone meets these people’s expectations.

The propensity of it not meeting expectations, of course, is unlikely. Read any review on the phone, and you will find yourself in the mind of a child in a candy story. CNET reviewers, New York Times’ David Pogue, and Wall Street Journal’s Walt Mossberg all hail the phone to be the greatest thing since sliced bread – or maybe the iPod – while glossing over some of the limitations AT&T, its sole service provider, creates.

The utter mania the iPhone has generated reminds me of a time before anything “i”. It all began with iMacs, which came onto the scene when computers were purely functional and void of any artistic characteristics. Its cuteness led us to look at our desktops as decoration or “computer couture”, as my fiancé, the IT guy, calls it. Then came the iPod, which completely revolutionized the way we experience music and so reason would suggest that the iPhone possesses huge potential.

The success of Apple’s technologies is of course two fold. It was not only due to great design, but also to fantastic marketing. The build-up for the products is managed just right, the news touches upon all the desired messages and the advertising is right on point. I couldn’t have imagined the iPod experience better than it is portrayed in its ads and the Mac vs. PC commercials created the personalities we will forever attribute to the brands.

But while Apple is the frontrunner, articles on the wireless industry reveal a grim reality. Take Marty Graham’s article in Wired. In it, Marty talks to seemingly clueless wireless service providers about their thoughts on the needs and wants of their customers. Brian Finnerty, Director of Device Development for Sprint Nextel, said:

"What do customers want? We have no idea. As an industry, we're like robots -- we go toward the light and we pile up on it."

What a sad state of affairs. Thank iGod for Apple.

Labels: advertising, Apple, buzz, Marketing, Public Relations

posted by Gina Bolotinsky  2 comments

Thursday, June 07, 2007

Labels: advertising, Google, video, Widgets, Youtube

posted by Mike Levin  0 comments

Thursday, May 10, 2007

I find it ironic that the Interactive Advertising Bureau (IAB) of all organizations is trying to challenge comScore and Nielsen//NetRatings on metrics when they themselves don't even distinguish paid search from the rest of online marketing. Can we even tell if industry forecasts for online marketing include search engine optimization? Not very often.

Yet, to us, SEO clearly falls under the realm of public relations. Our work influences the free editorial listings, the same way as we pitch news to newspaper and magazine editors. Honestly we'd be happy if the IAB ignored SEO altogether, but I don't forsee PRWeek or the PRSA picking up the slack. Unfortunately unless more people demand clarification, Google will shape the discussion in its own light by claiming their A/B ad testing tool is optimization… despite 10 years of history that has shown optimization to be clearly about influencing the natural unpaid results.

Paid search was pioneered by GoTo.com (a former Connors client, now Yahoo Search Marketing) and it made search engines immensely profitable. Ad agencies and their clients seem to know no bounds in their budgets. However, just as viewers watch TV for their favorite shows and not commercials, people go to search engines for the credible, organic results and not the advertising. There's little doubt that the long term benefits belong to SEO. After all, the web-savvy children who are growing up as Google loyalists often don't even notice the ads. Perhaps the greatest irony of all would be if future generations all used Google and not a single one clicked a text ad. You can bet that is one reason they acquired DoubleClick.

Labels: advertising, Google, pr, seo, Yahoo

posted by Adam Edwards  2 comments

Tuesday, March 13, 2007

An article by Dave Pasternack today in DM News comments on the growth of search engine marketing. Yet for all of the cheery forecasts, one of his best points is that advertisers still downplay the importance of search. He mentions a journalist that recently said "paid placement search marketing is the dirty secret of online advertising".

Search engine optimization (SEO) gets talked about even less in PR circles, despite the fact it's the same value proposition -- influencing editorial content instead of paying for advertising. Nevermind that it's more cost-effective than advertising and builds a long term corporate asset. Unlike paid search advertising whose influence disappears the minute you stop paying, natural search results stick after SEO contracts end.

More PR firms and advertising agencies need to realize that search is another medium, just like print or broadcast. Oh, but search happens to be the first place people go to do their research... whether you are a reporter, an analyst, a potential consumer, or investor. No wonder ad agencies worry about Google selling advertising and don't want to separate SEM from online marketing budgets. Too bad they don't have much of a choice as Google moves into other media.

Google didn't have to move onto Madison Avenue to make an impact in New York. When will the world wake up and realize the future of advertising is in Silicon Alley instead?

Labels: advertising, pr, seo

posted by Adam Edwards  0 comments