Integrating Search Into The Cross Media Marketing Mix

On the final day of AD:TECH, only the truly dedicated show up for the sessions. And, during this final day the focus turned towards search. In the 10 a.m. session, Integrating Search into the Cross-Channel Marketing Mix, moderator Gary Stein of Jupiter Media began the discussion by suggesting we think of a marketing ecosystem, rather than a mix. Stein feels the word Mix overly simplifies the myriad interactions between each media.

Stein went on to set the stage with some statistics about the evolving search marketplace. Notable were:

• Search marketing is becoming more complex, and marketers are taking a more comprehensive approach. The percentage of search advertisers targeting more than 1,000 phrases grew from just 4 percent in 2003, to 22 percent in 2004.
• This growth in complexity is a driving force for analytics solutions and management tools.
• There is a disconnect between marketers goals and the measurement of results. While nearly all marketers seeking direct sales acquisition measure results of their efforts, few with brand awareness goals do the same.
• Large marketers, defined as those with greater than $1 Million annual budgets, are gaining as a proportion of total search advertisers.

Mike Bruno, Director of Online Marketing for D&B Sales and Marketing Solutions, described a qualification process they use for search-derived registrants on ZapData.com. It went something like this:

1. They first identify whether new registrants on the site are already D&B customers. If so they route the contact to the existing D&B point of contact.
2. If the lead is identified as a high potential client, the contact is routed directly to D&B telephone sales.
3. Contacts of unknown potential are routed to phone pre-qualifiers for follow up.
4. Low potential clients are routed into a sophisticated email trigger system to help filter out those of significant value.

One way they identify the potential quality of the lead is by the search terms they use when finding ZapData. Broad based phrases which indicate a client need, but not a particular solution, fall into their Interest category, Progressively more specific phrases are categorized as Consideration, Performance, Action, and Loyalty. The leads even more qualified than the Loyalty category were described as the “Glenn Garry Leads”. Bruno did not specify whether coffee in the office was for anyone but closers.

Scott Skurnick, Manager of Search and Affiliate Marketing at Circuit City, described the counter play between ROI and Brand Presence objectives in online marketing. At Circuit City he separates the tracking of search campaigns with branding objectives from those with a direct sales/ROI focus. Targeted keywords are separated into buckets, with the more general phrases generally attributed to branding campaigns. The spectrum of bidding strategies ran the gauntlet from branding focus to ROI focus:

• Premium position in broad category phrases.
• High click volume words and phrases.
• High sales volume phrases.
• An efficient spend of budget.
• Cost per sale emphasis.

Chris McGarry of Covad discussed the challenges they have marketing a service that is only available to a small subset of Americans in major metropolitan areas. Thirty percent of his potential prospects cannot use the service in their area, and another thirty percent are already customers without knowing it through their partnerships with Earthlink, and AT&T.

The session finished with a brief introduction from Gord Hotchkiss of Enquiro to research he performs on search engine user behavior. Hotchkiss found that people like to start broad with their search queries, and then narrow them down. Results at this broad level can modify the direction of the more specific searches. So, if you are not present at the broad level you may pay a cost in terms of lost customer acquisition opportunities.

More research from Enquiro can be found here.