Online Advertising and User Intent: Part 1: Intro

Planning your online advertising campaigns can be a daunting task. Once you have decided how much your budget is you are faced with the myriad of online advertising program choices including those offered by:

  • Search Engines like Google and Bing
  • Social networking sites like Facebook, Twitter, Buzz, MySpace
  • Professional networking sites like LinkedIn
  • Professional organizations
  • Online magazines
  • Online industry blogs, newsletters, journals
  • News sites
  • Shopping sites
  • 3rd Party websites (related businesses, information sites, etc)
  • Web Directories

The best way to decide where you want to focus your efforts is after you have done your homework. You need to understand not only the advertising platform, pricing, and the structure of the ad program, but even more importantly the advertising venue and the intent of those who frequent it.

“Intent” refers to the reason a person went to that site in the first place. For example, it is pretty easy to understand the intent of people who visit Google. They are obviously searching for something. And we can know what that is by the terms they type into the search box. But the intent of a person who spends time on Facebook is very different. He usually wants to share aspects of his life and work with his Facebook friends, or conversely, to learn what they are sharing.

By making intelligent assumptions based on your informed understanding of the intent of the audience groups you are targeting with a particular ad program, you can develop a highly focused message that not only speaks to their interests but successfully draws their attention away from their task and onto the message you want them to interact with and respond to.

In the following series of posts, I will introduce you to the concept of intent and how it applies specifically to:

  • Social Media Advertising
  • Search Engine Advertising
  • 3rd Party Websites Advertising

You will learn how to profile intent for each venue in order to craft the right message that gets the results you are looking for.  In the meantime, if you have a specific questions / concerns regarding your current / upcoming advertising venue selection and user intent impact on campaign performance, post a comment or contact me directly.

Read posts in this Series:

Online Advertising and User Intent: Part 1: Intro

Online Advertising and User Intent: Part 2: Social Media Advertising

Online Advertising and User Intent: Part 3: Search Engine Advertising

Online Advertising and User Intent: Part 4: 3rd-Party Website Advertising

Local Marketing Benefits of Google Instant on Places

Recently Google announced the addition of Google Instant on Google Places. Google Instant is identified as a ‘search-as-you-type’ feature that delivers results automatically as you type, with no need to hit ‘Enter’ or click the ‘search’ button. As soon as you see what you need predicted in gray text you can stop typing and your search results will be listed below. The purpose of this search feature is to produce relevant search results in faster time. By understanding how the tool works and its goals, business owners can develop a local search engine optimization strategy that takes advantage of the types of search results offered to users.

To access the Places View local search tool, users simply click “Places” in the left-hand panel of Google. Once there, their searches will have place and map results that update as described above (i.e. search-as-you-type).  All results are clustered around the location specified, such as New York City. A red pin identifies the location of each business on a map, and is accompanied by relevant information and links from across the web. And results now include 30 or 40 relevant links per page as opposed to the former 10. With all this information conveniently grouped, it is much easier for users to make comparisons as they search.

With this new local search feature, website owners will benefit greatly from a comprehensive local search engine optimization strategy that connects their on-site content with content they present on social media sites, review site, news sites, and other third-party websites. A few things to consider:

  1. Keywords & Phrases: Strategically use your carefully researched and selected keywords and phrases for each type of highly focused content you represent so that more local search results are available. This also helps to develop your online ‘authority score.’
  2. Online Reviews: Provide your customers with links to the various review sites where you are listed and encourage them to share their experiences working with your company.
  3. Press Releases: Compose and post over the wire press releases optimized for the local search terms in your campaign.

The key to benefiting from the local marketing opportunities offered is to look at Google Instant on Places to understanding how it works and what it is trying to achieve. Then do all the things you need to do to help Google fulfill its objective to offer its users a larger selection of qualified, relevant local search results in a faster amount of time. When developing your local optimization strategy, to get the best results take into consideration all of your content, both on-site and off-site, so that you align your efforts across all your indexable local content collateral.

 

Power of Google’s +1 for Business

Google just announced the release of its latest social media tool aimed at bringing users ever more relevant search results that take into consideration “relationships as well as words on webpages.” The new tool is called ‘+1’ because it is essentially a graphical ‘+1’ that allows users to click on it to express their view that they liked the web page in the search results listing it corresponds to.

Let’s say you click a +1 because you like a particular site you found when searching for ‘commercial draperies.” Now all the people you are connected to through Google (your chat buddies and gmail contacts) will see that a person in their social network made a +1 recommendation. It will appear next to the link in the search results for ‘commercial draperies’ corresponding to the web page you liked. It will look like this: “Joe +1’d this” and will be visible to all the people in your network to see. If you change your mind and want to remove the +1 recommendation, you can do so at any time through your Google Profile page.

This new social media tool is a clear demonstration of the direction Google and the internet is going. Users are no longer passive recipients but active participants, not only in their own search experience, but in the search experience of their trusted social network of friends, family, and business associates. Google regards it as a great asset to users who may be faced with a plethora or choices and are looking for a little advice from a trusted resource, i.e. a person within their social network with whom they already have an established relationship.

Adding a whole new dimension to the power of “word-of-mouth,” Google +1 offers business owners huge potential to reach limitless target audiences through the interconnectedness of social networking. If you are a business user who is taking advantage of Google Apps for Business you already have a significant network of contacts and chat users. +1 recommendations made by any member of your business network could effectively reach those not only within their network but within each of the individual networks of those with whom they are connected.  The reach potential is virtually limitless!

But that’s not all. As you monitor the +1 recommendations of those within your business network you begin to understand more about their interests and which webpages they like. You also begin to understand their intent behind the search: eat pizza, buy window coverings for the office, book a conference facility in Houston, and so forth.

In light of the recent admission that social networking criteria impacts a website’s relevance through its ‘authority score,’ it is safe to assume that Google will most likely start to factor +1 recommendations into the authority score as well.

I welcome comments and insights from readers about Google’s latest social networking tool +1 and how it may impact business websites.

Look for my upcoming posts on the concept of ‘intent’ and how it can be applied to successful online advertising.


Benefitting from LinkedIn Company Pages

For those of you who may not be familiar with Company Pages on the professional networking site LinkedIn, they are a great tool to share information about your brand and the individuals who represent it. If you’re researching companies, these pages also provide you with a way to familiarize yourself with others with whom you may want to work or even those that represent your competition.

The process for setting up your Company Page is pretty straightforward and you can begin here.

The best strategy when creating your Company Profile is to remain consistent with the keywords and phrases you have used in your print collateral and online marketing efforts. If you are using terms you uncovered via comprehensive keyword research (please don’t take keyword research lightly), that  accurately represent phrasing used by your target audience when searching for what you offer, then you should stick with them.

Consistency is always important for best results.

The Products & Services tab offers some powerful features that not only allow you to list your Products and Services but also to associate links, relevant information, and even promotional offers. For example, you can associate links to videos on your YouTube.com channel. You can also specify your product/service related web page address. If your employees are listed in LinkedIn, you can add the relevant one(s) to the Contact section. You can also create a Promotional offer to entice new users. And remember to continue using your keywords as you fill out the Profile title, description, image text, and disclaimer.

Additional marketing tools are available to upgraded account holders only. The first is a simple admin tool that enables you to upload up to three static banners (JPEG, GIF or PNG), 640×220 pixels in size, that link to the url (web page address) you specify. This powerful internet advertising feature can be used to sell, promote, and inform, or even to generate donations, registrants, attendees, or fulfill any number of targeted objectives.

For best conversion results, make sure your landing page (where the respondent will arrive after clicking the banner link) is focused exclusively on the message communicated in the banner.

Another great feature is the Recommendations tool. You’ve seen this in the personal LinkedIn accounts. Soliciting comments and recommendations from customers and colleagues is of tremendous value. People are influenced by what others say. And in this case, the user has the opportunity to learn something about the person making the statement so the recommendation or comment carries more weight.

This next tool takes a little strategic planning because it has to do with how you want to target your various Audience groups. Developing unique content for each of your targeted audience groups will always produce the best results because it is not diluted in any way that detracts from what is engaging to them. Before you create an audience segment, identify and plan how you want to approach each one. Then select the criteria and edit your company profile to ensure the strongest response.

If you are interested in paid advertising on LinkedIn you can do that here as well. The Campaign tool is pretty straightforward and allows you to advertise any web page you like, which may or may not be your Company Profile.

Lastly, I want to mention the Analytics tool. It is to your advantage to spend some time to learn and understand your performance in terms of page views, visitors, and clicks on content by industry and followers so you can make informed ‘next step’ decisions. The tool also offers you a benchmark comparison with companies similar to yours.

Once again, you can click here to set up your Company Page on LinkedIn. Click on the Upgrade My Account link at the bottom of the page for additional marketing tools and features.

Google Places: Personalization for Local Search

Over the past few months Google announced the addition of several new local and mobile search tools for Google Places that make it easier for users to find local businesses by personalizing their search results. Offering great opportunities for businesses, these features provide tools to customize their Google Places listings to attract their targeted local customers.

The most recent addition is ‘Open Now,’ which allows users to click the link to reveal only the establishments in their vicinity that are open at the hour they are searching. For businesses typically desired outside of the usual 8am to 6pm business hours, such as pizzerias, gas stations, and pharmacies, for example, this feature is particularly helpful. What the new Open Now feature really represents is the move toward making local search personal.

In addition to Open Now, Google Places also allows users to filter local search results by star ratings, a type of online review that indicates how others feel about a particular business, and by distance, indicating how far they are willing to travel to visit the type of business they are searching for. A mobile app already available on Android phones, Hotpot is the latest iPhone app from Google that allows iPhone users to rate a place using their phone to help them remember their experience for future reference.

The point to understand is the general direction local search is moving. The experience for users has to be personal. People want to be able to manage their online experience by specifying items that help to narrow and manage search results.

 

Get started ASAP in 3 simple steps:

  1. The first thing all business owners need to do is claim their Google Places account.
  2. Next you need understand what is important to your target audience groups as they search.
  3. And lastly, apply what you know about your customers as you use the Google Places tools to provide the right information to attract them.

 

Don’t underestimate how powerful Local Search has become to-date, or how important it will be to your businesses in the future.