Do you know what a widget is? How about a wiki? If you’re trying to
market your product in today’s Internet-savvy society, you’d better
hope your advertising agency knows what they are.
Those in
the industry say that Internet search marketing — helping a client’s
Web site get more hits via Web search engines — and using social
networking sites as marketing tools have become increasingly popular in
recent years.
“With search marketing, everything is very
trackable, and you can see the results,” said Emily Chua, an account
executive with Congruent Media in Baltimore. “With the economy the way
it is right now, it’s where it is smart to put my money right now.”
In an informational session sponsored last week by the Advertising
Association of Baltimore, Chua told a small group of advertisers that
widgets (anything that can be embedded within a Web page) and wikis
(often used to create community Web sites) are just two of the devices
marketers can tap to direct traffic to their client’s Web site and drum
up more business.
“Having outside sources link to your site definitely builds credibility,” she added.
She and Dan Dawes, a partner at Congruent Media, said maintaining a Web
site and keeping the key words in it relevant so it will appear in more
search results while also budgeting for pay-per-click advertising are
the main keys to boosting a client’s Web traffic through Internet
searches.
Dawes said he typically allocates three-quarters
of his client’s Web search budget for pay-per-clicks, which appear as
sponsored ads in search results and tend to yield faster results. Chua
noted key word optimization has more staying power but can take longer
to produce a noticeable effect.
“It’s important to take the
time to sit down with your client at the beginning of the campaign and
check their expectations,” Dawes said. “These techniques do not have
the immediate gratification like a full page ad in a magazine does.”
But they are becoming more mainstream. According to data from
eMarketer, which track trends in e-business and online marketing, money
spent on pay-per-click advertising is expected to reach $15.5 billion
this year, up 32 percent from 2007.
“That’s certainly been
a major growth area in the last 12 or 18 months in our company,” said
Garry Raim, a managing partner at gkv Communications who oversees its
interactive department. While marketers should always optimize Web
sites for natural — or key word — searches, he said the paid search
market has been exploding and continues to increase.
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