Andy Jamieson: Entrepreneur

A few months ago, an industry colleague, who will [and should] remain nameless, made the brash statement that ‘search marketing catches the rain generated by other marketing clouds’. It made me ponder,is search marketing a paradigm shift in marketing or is it simply a newer, shinier, bigger bucket to catch the rain that mainstream marketing generated? Is search marketing simply a leech, or does it provide an increased reach and frequency to a relevant audience?

Three key thoughts came to mind….

1: Search trends are not independent from real world events.

News events drive search volumes and rightly so. It makes sense for people who are seeking more information go online to use search engines to meet that desire. For example, the four fold* increase in search volumes for the term ‘APEC’ during September reveal a significant spike that was driven by real world events. In September, APEC was on and the related news coverage was higher than that freshly minted shiny fence! What happened to that fence anyway, sold on eBay maybe?

However, as marketers, if we create buzz via a traditional above the line marketing campaign, will that marketing campaign drive a similar spike in related keyword search volumes?

The short answer is yes. For example, the term “ManCans” was heavily used in a recent campaign. This usage drove a spike in search volumes for the term “ManCans” during August and this increase was driven by the various non-search marketing executions that supported the campaign. This spike reveals that when consumers were seeking to engage more, they turned directly to search to meet this desire.

2: Search must be part of the modern marketing mix.

Taking the ManCans example further, paid search marketing formed a critical capture tool for the rain that was created through non search marketing campaigns. Good integrated executions will ensure that when this rain is generated, it is caught. Therefore, failure to include search marketing, leaves a consumer who is actively seeking to engage further with little or no direct avenue through which to do so. They either end their engagement with your product or are distracted and go elsewhere.

Therefore, paid Search marketing must form a critical piece of any modern marketing mix. Failure to use search marketing as a capture tool is like knowing that there are holes in your bucket that can be plugged, and yet not being willing to do so.

Is this all that search marketing does? How can search marketing claim to provide access to new markets?

3: Search marketing does allow access to new markets.

Search marketing has created a channel that connects marketers with an active rather than passive audience and as such can provide access to new markets. This access to new markets comes through reaching consumers who have a problem they want solved. This increased access is achieved via matching search advertising against consumer needs, rather than relying on brand associations. For example, searches for; rental cars, hotel rooms or recipes are often problem centric and brand agnostic. In these cases, regardless of the work you have or haven’t done offline, there is an opportunity to position your messaging and product along side key relevant terms and attract active customers.

As marketers and business people then, it leaves us all to ponder… What will happen to businesses that fail to make search marketing a capture tool for current non-search marketing efforts? How will businesses compete against competitors that are able to access new markets via search marketing? What marketing channels will they be forced to rely all the more on to create still larger clouds, with more rain to fill the existing buckets that will be shown to be increasingly leaky!

Therefore, in response to my industry colleague I conclude that whilst Search marketing is an effective bucket for catching the rain from other marketing initiatives as it should, search marketing is also a cloud and bucket in its own right.

Andy Jamieson, Founder and Director of Switched on Media

* Data sourced from Google Trends.