Inside Search Engine Strategies, San Jose
Day One
Danny Sullivan’s Search Engine Strategies rolled into San Jose this week, bringing an unprecedented four days of search engine marketing advice (SEM) and news to more than 1700 attendees. If you still had reservations about the legitimacy of search engine marketing, one look at the impressive roster of exhibitors, sponsors and attendees would quickly dispel any doubts.
More than 48 companies, including Google and Yahoo, decided to exhibit at the event (the highest number of exhibitors ever for SES) and speakers included representatives from all of the main search engines as well as the top SEM companies.
At the immensely busy registration desk, a buzz was developing with attendees enthused about recent developments in the search engine industry. With Overture, Google and Lycos, just a few of the search engines expected to make some big announcements during the proceedings, the conference was expected to provide a lot more than just ‘how-to’ information.
Day One of the conference had been designated as a ‘pre-conference’ day with the sessions taking on two distinct tracts. Danny had decided to move all the beginners SEM sessions to this day and additionally take the opportunity to provide an annual update on the economics of the search engine industry.
As part of this exclusive insight to the world’s largest SEO conference, I decided to take a seat in many of the search engine economic sessions. A notable exception being my own presentation on ‘Search Term Research’ (which I provided as part of the beginners itinerary).
One of the most interesting sessions of the day was unquestionably the Search Monetization Strategies. While none of the panelists could agree on what ‘monetization’ meant, they all had some interesting information to share.
Sheryl Sandberg, VP of Global Online Sales & Operations for Google was the first to speak on the topic. Discussing the growth of Google, she shared with us that Google is not only the largest search engine property, but is also the fastest growing. Focusing on the ‘how do make money’ side of Google’s operations, she offered that with more than one hundred thousand advertisers, eight-eight different interfaces and products in 11 languages, Google had taken great steps to secure its position.
Sandberg also shared with the audience the great success they had seen with their Google Search Appliance product, allowing any business to purchase an easy and effective search tool for their own website. With companies on board that include Boeing, Cisco and Xerox she confirmed that this is a growing market for Google. She also took the time to showcase the recently launched AdSense service, which allows the average website to display Google’s AdWords campaigns and receive commission on the click-thrus. The success of AdSense is in part due to the fact that Google is able to spider the website of the proposed partner and use an algorithm to determine which ads would be most relevant to the page being displayed. This format was far more accurate than simply asking the website owner which terms they thought were relevant to the page.
Finishing, Sandberg offered answers to audience questions which confirmed the following:
1. Google has no plans to introduce a ‘paid inclusion’ or trusted feed service at anytime in the future.
2. While Google’s AdWords campaign does track the click-thru rates of an ad, they do not track how long a visitor remains on the advertiser’s website.
3. Commenting on eBay’s request to remove any ads that infringe on their copyright, Sandberg confirmed that these requests could be made by any company concerned about trademark or copyright infringement.
While Google is still the darling of the search engine industry, Yahoo has caused quite a stir with their recent acquisitions. Tim Cadogan, VP of Search for Yahoo explained some of the initiatives Yahoo had taken to improve their search offerings. One of the most interesting Yahoo developments has to be their new Product search. While still in beta-testing, this service strikes an uncanny resemblance to Google’s new Froogle service. Perhaps its no surprise that the new service from Yahoo will also include sponsored listings from Overture.
Cadogan also describe some other steps Yahoo has taken to improve user access to search. These included:
1. Showing Yahoo Yellow Pages listings in search results for products or services that also include a zip code. E.g. Pizza delivery 95110
2. Search for Weather or Maps for a location will bring up relevant information not just search results.
3. Including a search box in Yahoo Mail accounts so that a user receiving an email on a product or service can search without leaving their mailbox,
With the addition of Tony Mamone of LookSmart and Jim Diaz from Ask Jeeves, a lot of information was shared. Look for more details in a future round-up of the session.
Another session of interest was the Advertiser Roundtable. This was an opportunity for respected experts in the search engine marketing industry to discuss future developments of the search engine technology, in particular PPC and Paid Inclusion.
Most of the panelists agreed that there needed to be a lot of improvements made to PPC or paid inclusion if the search engines wish to see marketers continue to use these mediums. Dana Todd of SiteLab International made a valid point when she complained that with all PPC solutions an advertiser must pay the same click-thru rate whether their ad was shown on one of the top search engine partners or on some lowly unknown search engine. She suggested that a model would need to be developed which would provide for different costs per click depending on the quality of traffic.
Kevin Lee of Did-It.com offered that there are two types of company that place high bids for search terms. Those that are very smart and those that are incredibly dumb. The smart bidders are the ones that track traffic and understand the value of their visitors, while the dumb ones simply keep increasing their bids without knowing if the high bid brings a ROI.
Asked whether PPC and paid inclusion would overtake Organic SEM, Frederick Markini of iProspect suggested that there would always be a need for a balance in online marketing. With PPC there is always a risk that a company will run out of money or no longer be able to keep up with escalating bids, he argued that organic SEM did not suffer from these factors.
The Industry Analyst Roundtable session brought together some of the industry’s best know analysts. Danny Sullivan and Chris Sherman of Search Engine Watch were joined by Brett Tabke of WebmasterWorld.com and Greg Notess of Search Engine Showdown.
This open forum took on a simple format with audience members interacting with the panelists. Some topics discussed, of which I will bring further details of after the conference, included:
1. Anecdotal evidence that simple paid inclusions did offer some assistance with obtaining better search engine ranking despite claims to the contrary by the search engines themselves.
2. The limitations of PPC; advertisers are limited to only being displayed for search requests that they have identified and bid on. Many search terms have no PPC bids on them.
3. The constant evolution of search engines. Google replaced AltaVista, will Nutch replace Google?
4. Should XML Trusted feeds be labeled as such, clearly identifying their placement in search results?
Day Two of the conference will revert to the normal format expected from SES and with three distinct tracts being offered, there should be lots of varied information to report back. In the meantime, please excuse me while I prepare for tonight’s ‘Google Dance’ a soiree taken place at the Googleplex where I hope to track down a Google employee and find out exactly what is happening with their PageRank these days.
Day Two
Day Two of Search Engine Strategies, San Jose promised to step up the pace with the offering of three separate itineraries for search engine marketers to choose from. While many attendees were recovering from the Google Dance the night before (which should probably be re-named ‘Googlepalooza’ as the open air event offered a soundstage with DJs, marquee tents, Segway rides and massage chairs all designed to sweep attendees up in further Google hysteria), they soon got down to business when Danny Sullivan took to the podium to give an unprecedented keynote address on the state of the Search Engine Industry.
While Danny started off his address with a comical look at the recent acquisition upon acquisition, he soon got down to the nitty-gritty of the future of search. With over 5 billion searches conducted in the month of June, he confirmed there is no doubt that the search engines are here to stay. Danny decided to look into his ‘crystal ball’ and made some predictions of what is to come. Some important observations included:
• Yahoo will launch its new search engine sometime in 2004 with a combination of Inktomi, AltaVista and AllTheWeb technologies.
• MSN should also be ready to launch their own crawler in 2004, with the possibility of purchasing any of Ask Jeeves, FindWhat, LookSmart or even Google, to help speed up the implementation.
• AOL is likely to continue its partnership with Google as this remains a non-competitive relationship for them.
Moving on to audience reach of the search engines, Danny explained how Google’s current reach of 76% of all searches would be diminished in 2004. He predicted that Google’s total audience would reduce to around 51% with Yahoo at 25%, MSN at 15% and the other engines making up the remainder.
Discussing the future popularity of the search engines he suggested that Google might become a victim of its own popularity with both reporters and users experiencing ‘burn-out’. With tongue-in-cheek he predicted that Ask Jeeves would make valiant attempts to become the ‘Avis of search engines’ by positioning itself as the #2 preferred search engine. He also believed that LookSmart would position itself as the most popular supplement to primary search results, continuing its current trend of being a provider to other search engines.
Turning to paid placement and paid inclusion, Danny expected to see growth and development in this side of the industry as search engines look to increase their Advertising revenue from their search results. Citing results from an IAB survey, Danny didn’t believe that search engine users would object to paid advertising as 64% of them are already aware that it exists and 52% of those do not care, so long as the paid advertising is relevant to their search. Drawing from his previous journalism experience, he estimated that in the coming years search engines would increase the amount of paid advertising shown on a search results page from an average of 25% to around 70%.
Danny wrapped up his keynote address by answering a question on everyone’s mind; ‘Will SEO still be important?’ He strongly believed that search engine optimization (SEO) would still be a dominant part of the industry as there will need to be a balance between paid ads and organic listings.
While the Search Engines & Trademarks session concentrated on information that would be of interest to those involved with the legal aspects of a company’s campaign, there were some interesting comments that stood out.
The recent incident where eBay asked Google to remove any sponsored ads that included their trademarked name, drew claims of hypocrisy from the panelists. They pointed out that while eBay did not want companies to bid on the word ‘eBay’, one could go to Google and search for trademarked names such as ‘Barbie’ and instantly see paid ads for the product on sale at eBay.com. The panelists also touched on cases that are currently working their way thru the legal system. They suggested that, while it is fair for a company to use trademarked names in comparative examples, the waters become very murky when simply bidding on a competitor’s brand name. The best advice from all of the panelists was to seek legal advice before bidding on the trademarks of any company.
A new topic to SES was ‘Cleaning up the Mess’; a look at how to clean-up spam that had been left by another SEO company. Many of the panelists discussed techniques for identifying spam including viewing Google’s cache of the site and the source code. In addition, Matthew Bailey of The Karcher Group offered an assortment of techniques for spotting spam and rectifying it. Some of these tips included:
• With Google’s PageRank fluctuating wildly over the past couple of months, he urged SEOs to not automatically assume that a low or zero PageRank meant a penalty on the website.
• However, if you do determine that a site has been banned by Google, fixing the problem and then sending an apology email to Google outlining the problems fixed and promising not to do them again, was the best approach to getting a ban lifted.
• Bailey also suggested viewing the website with a text viewer such as the one located at http://lynx.browser.org to determine how a spider might be viewing the site.
Shari Thurow of GrantasticDesigns.com also suggested some things to keep an eye out for when reviewing a website. She pointed out that a site might not be banned, but may be using techniques that were preventing it from getting listed. These included:
• A recently redesigned site that had switched from static content to dynamic.
• A newly implemented Robots.txt file might also have an adverse effect on a site’s ranking if not correctly formatted.
• The new use of cookies or session IDs might also be to blame for a websites sudden drop in ranking.
All of the panelists suggested that businesses should review the contract of any SEO firm being considered to ensure that they would not be taking any risks. A clearly outlined ‘anti-spam’ policy was considered to be among the top things to look for when choosing an SEO. With the use of doorway pages being viewed one of the worst things an SEO could implement in an ‘organic’ optimization campaign. However, as Danny Sullivan pointed out, using doorway pages for PPC was totally fine and acceptable. Although, he confirmed that using them for ‘crawler’ listings would be bad for anyone’s website.
It seems that a new search engine statistic or survey is released every week. The Search Engine Ratings session promised to shed some light on exactly where all of this data is coming from. Up first was James Lamberti of comScore Networks to provide details on how his company collects information and what they know about search engine use. Lamberti explained that comScore uses data collected from more than 1.5 million online consumers who agree to have their Internet activity monitored passively. Unlike some consumer rating companies, comScore is able to track various types of Internet activity including searches, click-rates and conversions.
They are unique in that they are able to track online activity in addition to asking the normal consumer survey questions. The benefits of this were apparent when Lamberti offered two stunning statistics.
1. 15% of Google visitors do not actually go there to search. He gave an example that many people have Google set as their homepage when they launch their browser. This registers a visitor for Google even though no actual search was carried out.
2. 20% of consumers surveyed attributed their searches to the wrong search engine. For example, they may have said they went to AOL, but the data tracked by comScore showed they actually used MSN.
The remainder of the panel was made up of experts from Nielsen/NetRatings, Hitwise and Statmarket. While none of them could agree on percentage share of search engine users, between them they offered some very interesting statistics:
• While Google may be dominant in the US, in Japan, Yahoo receives 74.19% of all searches.
• There were 5.5 billion searches carried out worldwide in June 2003, up 28% compared to the previous year.
• In 2002, more than 25% of all online product purchases originated from a search engine.
• While 96.9% of US searches are carried out on US search engines, only 56.6% of UK searches were done on a UK search engine. In fact, the US Google is more often used in the UK than Google.co.uk.
The end of the ratings session also marked the end of the second day of Search Engine Strategies, San Jose. Day Three brings Google co-founder Sergey Brin to the Keynote address podium and advanced topics of search engine marketing and search engine technology are also introduced.
Day Three: A Chat With Sergey Brin
Day 3 of Search Engine Strategies, San Jose included a wide range of sessions covering broad topics such as ‘Meet the Crawlers’ and the more targeted ‘Google API’. However, there was not an empty seat available when Danny Sullivan sat down with Google co-founder, Sergey Brin, on the eve of his 30th birthday, to chat about the past and future of the world’s most famous search engine.
Sitting in two elegant arm-chairs with a large plasma screen providing a back-drop of a roaring log fire, the setting suggested that we were ease-dropping on too old friends who were reminiscing about the past.
Google’s growth
It has been five years since Google entered the search engine arena and in that time the then unknown challenger to AltaVista has grown from 15 million pages indexed to a colossal 3+ billion, serving 76% of US searches. Danny Sullivan recalled how Brin had attended one of the earlier conferences and had asked the audience who had heard of Google. Back then, few hands went up. Laughter circulated today’s audience when Danny gave Sergey the opportunity to ask the same question; ‘Who here has heard of Google?’
Danny then proceeded to real off the developments that Google had made this year alone; AdSense, Toolbars, buying Blogger, launching Google News Alerts etc. Asked if Sergey was proud of these accomplishments, he replied modestly, that despite the list sounding impressive, he believed they were ‘not doing enough’ in his mind. Sergey wanted his company to expand even further and provide searchers with even more technological developments and enhancements that would expand the use and enjoyment of Google.
Expanding content on the web
Danny wanted to know from Sergey which of the past year’s accomplishments he was particularly pleased with. After giving the question some thought, Sergey offered that the recent launch of their ‘AdSense’ service was his proudest moment. The affiliate type service allowed small businesses an opportunity to display Google’s AdWords sponsors on their own website, providing a means for many companies to increase income from their website by sharing in the revenue these sponsorships generated. Sergey expressed his desire for AdSense to ‘spur the next generation of content on the web’.
An IPO for Google?
Turning to the question on everyone’s lips, Danny asked Sergey if an IPO was on the horizon and when might Google make a public offering. Giving his answer, you could tell that Sergey was a man that had envisioned building a better search engine to assist the world, with the last thing on his mind being answering to Wall Street. ‘We debate [going public] periodically at board meetings’ said Brin and it ‘would be nice to have currency to do acquisitions, [however] there are significant management distractions with being public’. While his statements seemed to signal that Google does not intend to become a public company, Brin did admit that there is a ‘good chance eventually’ that they would issue an IPO but that it is ‘not the most pressing thing.’
Google acquiring MSN?
If issuing an IPO was not in the future of Google, was an acquisition strategy likely to be developed? Danny couldn’t resist putting a twist on a recurring question, ‘Any chance Google would buy Microsoft?’ Sergey joined the audience in raucous laughter as everyone dismissed this as being a possibility, although with Google’s reputation and dominance, you would be forgiven for thinking that this impossible scenario could just happen. On a more serious note, Danny did ask Sergey whether Google would entertain any advances made by a rival company such as MSN. ‘We have always said ‘no’ thus far’ explained Brin, but he went to on elaborate that they ‘can’t discount any approach’. This statement created more questions than it answered, suggesting that rumors of an approach by MSN and Yahoo had an element of truth.
Preventing misuse
Turning to the technology developments that Google had planned for the future, Danny asked Sergey to elaborate on the work that goes into the constant development of the famed Google PageRank. Sergey explained that it was still very much an important part of Google’s ranking system and that more than half a dozen new ranking technologies are tested each month with roughly half of these being integrated into Google’s PageRank algorithm. He went to on discuss the issues Google faces with spam and indicated that Google is aware of the ‘corrupt’ uses of some companies in an attempt to manipulate the PageRank but he made it quite clear that they have technologies to deal with any misuse.
Paid inclusion not likely at Google
A request that is often made to Google is that they introduce a paid inclusion option so that those interested in obtaining faster inclusion into the index, have a means to do so, at a premium. While many representatives of Google have expressed in the passed that this is unlikely to happen, Sergey made a point of clarifying his dislike of introducing paid inclusion. ‘I don’t really believe in it’ said Brin, adding that he wanted to ‘keep any kind of payment from objective search results’. ‘Objective search’ the very thing that has made Google popular, hence his reluctance to tinker with its formula for success. In the second part of the question, Danny asked whether Google had given any thought to offering some form of ‘paid support’ to allow webmasters a faster and easier way of communicating a problem with Google engineers. This was also a ‘no go’ as far as Sergey was concerned as he believed that by offering this type of premium support it would sap resources and ‘slow down [Google’s] pace of development.’
As the ‘virtual fire-place’ started to die down, Danny asked Sergey what was the worst thing about being at the helm of the worlds most popular and most analyzed search engine. After taken a few seconds to consider the question, Sergey offered a simple answer, ‘coping with the growth’. While many of us might think that we would love to be involved with a company growing as rapidly as Google, being in control of behemoth such as Google can be a daunting task for someone who has yet to celebrate his 30th birthday.
Day Four
While many attendees had decided to forego day four of Search Engine Strategies, San Jose in order to catch a flight, those that did stay, were offered some very diverse and interesting sessions to choose from.
The most important topic of the day for any search engine marketer had to be Converting Visitors into Buyers. While some marketers concentrate on simply obtaining top rankings in Google, Yahoo and other search engines, those more experienced SEM’s know the importance of actually converting that valuable traffic. An impressive panel of speakers provided the audience with ideas and solutions to increase a website’s conversion ratio.
While iProspect is known for its expensive service, their pricing does allow for extensive work in the area of visitor conversion. Conversion Product Manager, Larry Kerstein, shared with the attendees different factors that help ensure a website encourages conversions. While the natural thought process might lead a website owner to write text that screams ‘buy it now’, Kerstein suggested that in some instances your visitor may not yet know that they need your product or service. He suggested that the copy on a website should inform and educate a visitor so that they can ultimately decide what meets their needs. Once they know what it is you offer and why it is better than your competitor’s product, you can then encourage them to order. Talking to the buyer in the language of the buyer and using benefit statements rather than product specifications, were all conducive to increasing client conversion, according to Kerstein.
Michael Sack, Chief Product Officer for Inceptor offered similar advice but suggested that you ‘do not have to take apart your website to increase conversions’. Citing an example taken from Dell’s website he backed-up his theory by demonstrating that the computer manufacturer had increased conversion rates by 6% simply by enhancing the category structure of certain areas of their website. Sack provided research from Shop.org that suggested that the average conversion rate for the retail sector was just 1.8%.
Sack also gave attendees examples of questions a visitor may ask themselves when at your website:
• Why should I buy from you?
• Should I trust you?
• What is special about your company?
The most important part of Sack’s message was that website owners should simply ‘expose their content on the Internet’. By this he was suggesting that too few websites offer enough information about a product or service and with many people using the search engines to research a purchase, marketers needed to provide this valuable information. Finally, Sack told attendees to constantly ‘test, analyze and adjust’, giving a great example of how different types of pages tested on MSN yielded conversion rates from 1.75% to more than 3%.
Repeat speaker Heather Lloyd Martin took the conversion process to a different level when she challenged that the conversion begins with enticing a search user to actually click on your listing. She implored marketers to ensure that Title tags and Descriptions were compelling to humans and not just search engine friendly. She explained that a site ranked lower on a search results page, could have higher click-thrus than the number one listed site, if it’s listing were more enticing and targeted.
Of course, in order to accurately track all of these conversions, a website owner would need to ensure accurate reporting and tracking of visitors. The Measuring Tool Vendors session brought together different web analytics companies together in one room to tout the benefits of each of their respective products.
Representatives of all the major analytics tools were in attendance, each offering the benefits of their product and how it worked. The companies included:
• Urchin.com ‘ software based analytics starting at $895 with additional modules priced at $695. A 15 day trial is available at their website.
• ConversionRuler.com ‘ for the minimalist looking for a cheap alternative. Focused on reporting PPC data the service is priced ‘per click thru’ analyzed with a free trial available.
• WebTrends.com ‘ the most well known web analytics service and most popular. Comprehensive stats can even show you which stage of a website’s checkout process causes the most abortive sales.
• ClickTracks.com ‘ the newest, but arguably the most original web analytics package around. ClickTracks displays website visitor behavior directly on the pages of your website. Different demos can be downloaded from the website.
John Marshall of ClickTracks was particularly entertaining when he decided to skip thru his entire presentation in about 30 seconds so that he could discuss a book that he felt would provide great insight for marketers looking to collect and present data. Marshall suggested that each attendee purchase Edward Tufte’s ‘The Visual Display of Quantitative Information’ as it would assist them in analyzing website data. While the unique abandonment of his own product to discuss a book may have seemed crazy, I suspect that Marshall knew that the findings of the book would lead marketers to conclude that ClickTracks unique display of website analytics was the perfect solution to their needs.
As the last day of the conference wound down, a wave of satisfaction appeared to be felt by all of those involved. The attendees, staff, exhibitors, speakers (and those of us who had agreed to write daily articles when they should have been relaxing) all agreed that the event had been the most successful and well received search engine conference yet. The industry is growing at a rapid rate. Not only is there change in the landscape for the search engines, but search engine marketers are also changing and adapting. With the successful launch of SEMPO (Search Engine Marketing Professional Organization), marketers even have a ‘trade union’ in an industry that is expected to grow by billions of dollars each year.
If you were not able to attend the conference in San Jose, I hope this series has given you an insight into the developments taking place and maybe even encouraged you to attend the next conference in Chicago in December. If you were able to make it, I’m sure you will agree that the event was an outstanding success.
Author Bio:
Andy Beal is Vice President of Search Marketing for WebSourced, Inc and KeywordRanking.com, global leaders in professional search engine marketing. Highly respected as a source of search engine marketing advice, Andy has had articles published around the world and is a repeat speaker at Danny Sullivan’s Search Engine Strategies conferences. Clients include Real.com, Alaska Air, Peopleclick, Monica Lewinsky and NBC. You can reach Andy at andy@keywordranking.com and view his daily SEO blog at www.searchenginelowdown.com.
