Chief Executive Briefing #28:Ask A CEO - Internet Advertising & Search Engine Optimization

Ask A CEO- Internet Advertising & Search Engine Optimization
(Several members expressed an interest in the results of this inquiry so we decided to share with the entire membership )

We have had some experience and some success here at EXAIR with both paid advertising and search optimization. Please let me know if I can help.

Bryan Peters

To view Bryan's contact information, click on the following link: Bryan Peters - CEBI Profile
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The key is what you are willing to spend for highly qualified clicks...For example, we do work for Kettering Cancer Hospital in NYC and there are a number of inquiries concerning different forms of the disease. This will sound gross, but a large NYC law firm that specializes in medical malpractice cases was willing to pay $85 for certain types of inquiries...since a special inquiry means that person has some association with a person with a certain type of cancer. A rather gross use of the data, but an example of quality clicks that are "dead-on" the thing or service you're selling.

Grant Parsons

To view Grant's contact information, click on the following link: Grant Parsons - CEBI Profile
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My brother Jim Kukral does this for a living. He would be more than happy to discuss and help you out. His email address is Jim@jimkukral.com and is website is www.jimkukral.com

Ken Kukral

To view Ken's contact information, click on the following link: Ken Kukral - CEBI Profile
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I have a number of different websites: www.abcbronze.com, www.resilver.com and www.proshine.biz. The first one is the one I promote most heavily. The other two are very "rough" sites that I will be updating shortly to make them more professional looking and easier to navigate.

With abcbronze I have used a number of different ideas to generate web traffic:
A. Google adwords. Very effective...but also pricey...as these are the most-used search terms on the net. 70% of all net searches are on Google. It takes time, but if you create a good list of search words and study the bidding, you can get a lot of traffic directed to your site.
B. Yahoo. Same concept as Google, just on a smaller scale.
C. Natural placement - Make sure you have your best list of keywords embedded in each of your web pages as "metatags". This will help the search "spiders" find your site and place it high on the search list. And best of all...this is free!

I've done a very limited amount of email marketing...the jury is still out. And I'm investigating banner advertising on sites where my customers shop. Very expensive and very high minimum investments. Not sure if I will proceed.

If you have any additional questions, please give me a call.

Bob Kaynes

To view Bob's contact information, click on the following link: Bob Kaynes - CEBI Profile
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My company, Marketing Services, specializes in the development of websites that achieve and maintain high rankings, based on the merit of the site, for phrases clients target. We can also assist with paid internet ads, but recommend that the site first be optimized for rankings based on merit. There is no better cost than free, and unless there are more than 900,000 matches for a targeted keyword phrase, this has always proved a successful strategy for both results and cost conservation.

We have a substantial “paper trail” track record serving manufacturers and service providers; we produce and maintain ecommerce sites as well.

Barbara Reaman

To view Barbara's contact information, click on the following link: Barbara Reaman - CEBI Profile
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Response from John Staten's Marketing Manager May, 2005 (prior similar question)

The two search engines that we use are Google and Overture. Google is by far the most popular and highest used search engine - it also is the most expensive. Overture (now owned by Yahoo) combines just about every search engine but Google into one service. So it includes AOL, MSN, CNN, AltaVista . . . (about 12 different ones in total).

To explain the difference in cost, our budget for just Google is about $200/month and the budget for Overture is $250/month. You only pay when someone actually clicks through to your site. Both search engines allow you to establish a monthly budget which will either cut-off referrals after the budget is reached or it will send you an e-mail about 3 days before your account runs dry, so you can add more money.

They both also allow you to establish a ranking placement budget by keyword and it kind of works like a silent auction: there are some words we establish a cap of say $5.00 for each click-through, but we only pay one cent more than the next highest bidder - so if they bid $2.30 for that word, we would pay $2.31. There may be other keywords that we just can't afford to compete with, so we settle for a 2nd or 3rd (and sometimes lower) placement. Our placement average for all the keywords we use is 2.4, so you'll always see our name at or close to the top of the list with the exception of a few that may drop down to 10th. The minimum charge per click-through is 10 cents.

Both sites provide some good reporting functions, so you can see how your search words are doing. Maybe a search term is getting 1500 impressions/month and they actually clicked through to your site 15 times for a 1% click-through rate. They also provide some pointers for increasing your click-through rate - having good titles and descriptions are critical: you need to quickly let the viewer know you are an expert in the particular word/term they searched on, because there will be pages of other companies for them to scan as well.

Another suggestion - if your site is deep in content, you can map each keyword to a particular page on your site, so they are immediately taken to what they were searching for. The viewer appreciates this and the potential for them contacting you for business is much higher.

Much like anything else in business, it is a tool you have to spend some time getting used to and the return is proportional to the effort put into it.

I hope this helps -

Sincerely,
Thomas R. Hawley
Marketing Manager
O'NEIL & ASSOCIATES, INC.
495 Byers Rd.
Miamisburg, Ohio 45342-3662

Submitted by CEBI Member John Staten (May 2005)

To view John's contact information, click on the following link: John Staten - CEBI Profile
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Two types of searches:
1) Natural
2) Pay-Per-Click

The second type, Pay-Per-Click is where Google Ad words comes into play. It allows you to bid on keywords found in your industry and then based upon your bidding ranks the position of your website. The bidding starts at $0.05 and can go up to $5.00 or more a word depending on how popular that word is. The higher you bid the higher your rank.

Your web address will show up on the top where it says Sponsored Sites in blue and on the right hand side where it says Sponsored Links

All you have to do is call Google Ad Words and then they will assign an account manager who will set up you ad campaign and teach you how to use it until you are able to do this on your own.

It will only cost as much as you are willing to spend, however, they do ask that you put $1,000 in your account to start and in the beginning ask that you have a cap at $200/day. After that, you are on your own and can spend what you'd like. There are no contracts and you can quit whenever you'd like.

Submitted by Chuck Biehn (May 2005)

To view Chuck's contact information, click on the following link: Chuck Biehn - CEBI Profile
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From CEBI HQ files -- recent development at Google:

Google has announced local business ads, a new feature in AdWords that allows advertisers to promote location-based products and services. Local business ads appear with an enhanced map component on Google Local and in a text-only format on Google.com and other sites in the Google network. Currently, this service is available to any advertiser who targets locations in the U.S., Canada and the U.K.

According to the Kelsey Group, 70% of U.S. households now use the Internet as an information source when shopping locally for products and services (March 2005). With local business ads, businesses can promote location-based products and services to users at the precise moment when they seek local information.

Up to three local business ads will display on Google Local below the normal search results. Each ad will be associated with a marker on the map that users can expand to reveal more information such as phone number and a customizable logo or image. Both small businesses and large chains can easily target multiple locations within a single Ad Group using the same keyword list – yet another way of targeting more customers more effectively. As with regular text ads, local business ads can be continually updated or enhanced based on user response or local promotions to give advertisers maximum campaign efficiency and flexibility.