For any business, its website is a business asset with value that accrues over time and should be treated as such. Here are five timeless “worst practices” to avoid:

1) Link buying – Attempting to make your site more authoritative by paying for links (see J.C. Penney). 

A major element of most search engines’ ranking algorithm (especially Google’s) is “link popularity.”  Simply put, link popularity is a measure of the authority, trustworthiness and number of links pointing to a domain. Authoritative and trustworthy websites (Forbes, The New York Times, PBS, etc.) are able to pass along a significant amount of their authority and trust if they link to a company’s website. Not surprisingly, these links tend to be very difficult to get. However, there are also cases where sheer “tonnage” of links suffice to boost rankings and organic search traffic.

Unfortunately, it’s very common for sites to try to cheat the system. Instead of creating a remarkable website, stellar services and content, unethical Web marketers try to buy their way to the top by purchasing links. There is no shortage of site owners who would link to a site for a fee. Buying links should be avoided at all costs. It is a violation of any search engine’s Terms of Service, and it can get a site banned from the index.

J.C. Penney famously got caught in 2011 for buying large amounts of links. The company was banned from Google’s index for 90 days. While losing a full fiscal quarter’s worth of profit from organic search traffic is certainly nothing to take lightly, that’s not the worst-case scenario. Plenty of sites without the brand clout of J.C. Penney have been banned for much longer periods of time for the same infraction.

If “building links” is a service that an agency or vendor offers to you, have them explain to you exactly how they’re building links, and how their methods are within the engines’ Terms of Service.

2) Cloaking – Serving different content to a search engine versus a human visitor. 

The term “cloaking” certainly sounds dark and mysterious, but the concept is relatively simple. It means that a Web server will deliver different content based on whether the request is coming from a search engine or a Web browser.

Some “black hat” Web marketers use cloaking for very nefarious purposes, serving pages that are radically different to engines and humans. Usually the cloaked version served to the search engines is very text heavy (which engines understand well) and often targets off-topic, popular phrases just for the traffic it might pull in. The version served to humans is typically a conversion-centric page with very little content, trying to lure some fraction of visitors to pull out their credit cards and spend some money.

Not all cloaking is done with malicious intent. A few years ago, I worked with a very large comparison-shopping site, helping the international versions of its sites generate more traffic. One of the interesting things I noticed immediately was that it was cloaking its own home pages! Instead of the version that humans saw with products, photos and marketing copy, the cloaked version was a simple list of links to most of the categories for which the sites had products.

When I brought this issue to light, it turned out that the engineer responsible had knowingly done this. He thought it would be more helpful to search engines to present a simple list of links to enable them to discover the content on the site. He didn’t even know that cloaking was against the rules and could get the sites banned!

This kind of oversight, while not done maliciously, could have gotten the site into a penalty situation. Any agency you hire should be checking for cloaking on all of your Web properties as part of a standard technical SEO audit.

3) Keyword stuffing – Cramming page content full of a keyword to make the page appear more relevant for that keyword.

Keyword stuffing is a very old-fashioned tactic that stopped working well a long time ago—around 2005. The rationale was based on the notion that the more times a particular keyword appeared on the page, the more “relevant” an engine would consider that page to be for that keyword. Text on the page would be “stuffed” with the keyword, and it would read terribly.

Search engines have long since moved past basing relevance calculations on simple keyword repetition. While good keyword research is still central to publishing content that performs well in engines, your writers should be writing for the visitors that they have to inform and persuade, not a search engine spider.

4) Hidden text – Using tricks to make different content visible to humans than engines (see BMW Germany).

Hidden text and keyword stuffing often travel hand in hand. Because keyword-stuffed text reads so awfully to visitors, the idea is to hide it from them while still having it as machine-readable text on the page for engines.

Hidden text comes in many forms, from old-fashioned white text on white background, to positioning text off the visible portion of the page using CSS, to having text that’s visible only when JavaScript is disabled.

BMW Germany was guilty of the aforementioned variety of hidden text in 2006 when it was caught serving pages with pretty pictures and very little text to visitors, but behind the pretty pictures was keyword-stuffed garbage for search engines.

Some methods of detecting hidden text are easy for search engines (e.g., white-on-white text), whereas others are more difficult (e.g., hiding content with JavaScript). However, you can rest assured that the first time a company catches its competitor with hidden text on the page, that company will likely be filing a spam report with the search engines.

Content should be central to your website. It’s how you communicate value to prospective customers. There are plenty of legitimate ways to balance content with aesthetics and conversion, and hidden content isn’t worth the risk.

5) Being a seed for spam – If visitors are allowed to create profiles or leave comments on your site, and they create links to “bad neighborhoods” on the Web, your site can suffer as a result.

Social media and community involvement continue to develop as important aspects of a fully realized Web marketing campaign. But while interaction with your customers and peers is undeniably good, it can also hurt your website if implemented and managed incorrectly.

Especially on blogs, a central part of fostering an interactive and healthy ecosystem is to involve your readers. Commenting and discussion should be encouraged, both as a way to strengthen bonds with existing customers, acquire new ones and even address news that may be particularly challenging for your organization.

The flip side of this coin is that the more active and successful your community is, the more it can attract bad actors just looking to exploit your site’s popularity and authority by creating profiles and comments that exist only to drive links back to the bad actors’ sites.

Ensure that your blog comments are being actively filtered (by software, using “nofollow” on outbound links, and by employee curation) to remove manipulative, promotional posts and the users involved.

Search engines are particularly sensitive to sites that feature links to “bad neighborhoods.” These sites are seen as the seeds for Web spam and can be penalized as a result. Engines don’t want bad sites in their indexes. Keep your community clean, and you’ll reap rewards. If you allow your site to be a seed for spam, you can suffer for it.

With the Web becoming an increasingly important marketing channel for most companies, it’s more critical than ever that you ensure your Web marketing tactics are focused on the long-term health and success of your website. The risks associated with outlawed SEO tactics are not worth the reward.

Ethan Hays is Search Director at gyro
Follow him @ethanhays

Originally published at Ignite Something on the Forbes CMO Network

Whether their focus is online or offline, any savvy public relations person understands the benefits from being presented on page one. This makes it pretty ironic that PR pros continuously make the same mistake: Failing to use press releases, blogs, and other tools at their disposal to improve organic search visibility.

After all, they hold the unique position of pushing out messages to create pull for their clients. The copy must start being strategically used to hit key messaging AND to drive search authority and traffic to your client’s Web site.
So, for all of you PR folks that are currently writing your final drafts and are ready to hit send, stop and consider the four points below. Each will help you increase your SEO visibility:

1: Employ the one link per 50 words rule. Excessive linking is frowned upon by search engines and may be considered a manipulative linking spam. The general rule-of-thumb is to include one unique link per 50 words, so that linking is viewed as “natural” which carries increased keyword rankings. This is true for all online communications.

2: Be unique with your anchor text. Do not hyperlink your company name 10 times in a three-paragraph press release or in a blog post. Not only does it tend to bother the reader, it is going to have the opposite effect with the search engines than you intended. (Namely, they may penalize the page).

Instead, be unique with anchor text. This means hyperlinking different terms to create diversity for your keyword portfolio. Select the right mix of terms that describe your service offerings and capabilities, which will have the effect of generating better visibility for the terms that your prospects and customers are searching for. (In short, make sure you pick the words that people are most likely to key in when they are looking for your company or client.)

3: Don’t just point to your client’s homepage. Now that you are using a variety of terms, make sure they aren’t all pointing to same place. Consider linking to pages that are deeper than just the home page to increase relevancy.

4. Remember: Not all external sites are created equal. A word about where your content lives – a few authoritative links are far more valuable than a large number of spam links. In other words, a link on the Forbes CMO Network has stronger domain authority than 100 tiny blog posts. Ultimately, you want your articles linked from the sites with the highest authority.

The moral of the story: Link unique, diversified keywords to deeper pages (beyond the home page) from external sources with the highest authority.

Do this and you up your chances of making page one of Google.

Don Ball is a marketing strategist at gyro, the global ideas shop.

Follow him @DonaldJBall

Originally published at Ignite Something on the Forbes CMO Network

According to Forrester, $77 billion per year will be spent on digital marketing by that time, roughly the equivalent to the ad spend in television today. A few key observations from the research include:

• - Interactive marketing has established legitimacy within the marketing mix. Watch for digital programs to become a more strategic outlet for integrated communications.
• - Search will lose share among digital marketing tactics, but will still grow into a $33 billion/year channel.
• - Display, mobile and social all will enjoy healthy gains. Social will lag the growth of the other channels, but only because social programs tend to be less costly.

Clearly, the digital marketing industry is booming. Beyond the obvious growth trend, Forrester’s projection that an age of multi-channel digital communications is before us is most intriguing.

One could point to several factors that lead to these projections:

1. 1. Online consumers are smarter and empowered with more research tools today than ever before. Even the simplest of online transactions is becoming more considered and scrutinized.
2. 2. The evolution of the web itself has facilitated an environment of research and self-discovery. Consumers are relying on social networks, online reviews, video demonstrations, mobile applications, and other technologies to inform a purchase decision.
3. 3. Smarter data analytics allow for a truer valuation of each online touch point.

It’s that last point that holds so much promise for web marketers. With digital marketing becoming more diversified, it’s fair to say that the days of launching a single-tactic campaign and watching the conversions roll in are gone. A multi-touch presence is required to engage and convert today’s sophisticated online consumer.

The challenge then is how best to optimize across channels. This high-spend, multi-touch digital environment will give rise to the digital orchestrator.

Google Understands the Trend

Perhaps it was coincidence that Forrester’s research was introduced the same week that Google, with which gyro has a business relationship, announced the public availability of its new Multi-Channel Funnels feature within Google Analytics. Multi-channel funnels are intended to empower users of Google Analytics to understand the full range of influences that lead to online conversion.

According to Google:

“When a customer buys or converts on your site, most conversion tracking tools credit the most recent link or ad clicked. In reality though, customers research, compare and make purchase decisions via multiple touch points across multiple channels. So marketers that measure return solely on the last channel that a customer touches before conversion are getting an incomplete picture, and potentially missing out on important opportunities to reach their customers.”

This form of conversion analysis is referred to as multi-channel attribution, and is certainly not a new concept. Early pioneers in multi-channel analytics include ClearSaleing, Atlas Solutions, DoubleClick, and Omniture. But these tools have been geared towards the advanced web analyst, and come with premium pricing. Now, Google has introduced similar insights to all its users … for free.

Given the latest Forrester data, it seems as if Google has timed this market perfectly. But this data is complex and can’t be entrusted to a novice web analyst. Google’s data alone won’t be enough to maximize digital investment.

The Digital Orchestrator

Just as a conductor leads his orchestra with poise and precision, the digital orchestrator must react and respond to the ever-changing dynamics of the connected world. Think of this role as Digital Planner 2.0.

What will separate the legitimate digital orchestrator from pretenders is a fluency in data. Equal parts of left and right brained activity will be necessary for brands to simultaneously delight, engage, convert and retain customers. Rapid iteration in communications and constant re-optimization will fill the daily to-do list. Data is the engine that facilitates all of this.

Google’s entry into multi-channel attribution is a huge step for the digital marketing community. Many organizations are only now being exposed to the complexities of the environment in which they market. Most of those aren’t prepared to respond to what they’re seeing.

The rise of the data-fluent digital orchestrator brings the promise of a communications competitive advantage for those that install this now requisite role.

By
Ryan DeShazer
Vice President, Global Practice Leader – Search

Cross-posted at Ignite Something on the Forbes CMO Network

Follow Ryan on Twitter @RyanDeShazer.

Source: Base One 2011 Annual Survey of Changing B2B Buyer Behaviour

Recent research by Base One, 2011 Annual Survey of B2B Buyer Behavior, as well as others, continues to show that although social media adoption and usage are expected to grow, no absolute conclusions can be made as to social media’s effectiveness in B-to-B marketing efforts.

The real insight in the report is the growth in importance/usefulness of what researchers referred to as “traditional online” in the buying process. The traditional online efforts of search and corporate (supplier) websites are predicted to grow two to three times in comparison with “new online/social media.” And that growth is seen at each stage of the buying process.

The nearer the buyer is to signing on the dotted line, the more influential the information sources become, according to the report.

The conclusion? Social media warrants experimentation. And I suspect to understand social media’s true value, companies are going to have to discover their own “killer application” just like they’ve done with other new technologies.

Source: Base One 2011 Annual Survey of Changing B2B Buyer Behaviour

However, with limited time and money, business marketers need to cover the basics, and that is traditional online. Don’t let social media detract from the focus of optimizing your corporate website and search, both organic (SEO) and paid (PPC). Social media might pay off in the future, but search is a sure bet today.

by Scott Gillum
President gyro Washington, D.C. and Head of gyro’s Channel Marketing Practice

Follow Scott on Twitter @SGillum

Cross-posted at Ignite Something on the Forbes CMO Network

This is a significant new norm. Not only have these annotations become commonplace, but also there is evidence that when social share data is present, those entries may appear more prominently across the results page. Now, creating content that is easily shared across social sites is a crucial tactic for the digital marketer.

But why would the search engines expend energy in integrating social data into their core results? Conventional wisdom would say that, as a result of the popularity and adoption of social media, there’s an incredible amount of consumer preference data available within the social graph. As users grow more comfortable sharing personal information and preferences online, incorporating that intelligence within search engine results seems to be a logical evolution. In the long run, it will help search engines maintain relevance as the Web becomes decidedly more complex and personal.

Does that tell the entire story though? What if the whole truth points to a far more ominous outlook for traditional search?

Along comes Google+

I posed these same questions in an article I wrote for MediaPost’s Search Insider a few months back. At that time, I went as far as to suggest that social search may represent a sign of desperation by the search engines; an extreme measure taken to remain relevant. With social media networks functioning as a primary source for information sourcing and dissemination for many, the search engines needed to tap into that larger social conscious. Social search seemed to be the response.

Google wasn’t content with social search alone though and in June launched its own social network, Google+. Seemingly overnight, it was no longer a bystander to the legitimate social scene (let’s forget about the Buzz debacle). Since then it’s become the fastest growing social network ever and has generally been met with critical acclaim save for a few gripes here and there.

But what are most intriguing about Google’s entry into the social space are the possibilities. Google will no longer need to rely on third-party share data alone. It also won’t be on the sidelines as other destinations facilitate fluid peer-to-peer communications. By joining the social arms race, Google has an opportunity to surround its users with a relevancy regardless of the specific touchpoint. Search is more social, and social is more … searchy.

It’s that last point that could help Google to achieve sustained success in social, and play defense against the current threat social poses to its dominance in search. If Google were to introduce core tenets of its search algorithm (authority and trust) to Google+, it may be able to deliver a more relevant experience to users. That experience may be something that Facebook and others find difficult to replicate.

The biggest challenge facing Google+ then is user adoption.

What does this mean for search and social marketers?

For the search and social marketer, a “wait and see” mentality is still largely required. Despite the seismic shifts occurring in the space, there remains little to do until the dust settles.

That said, there are some fairly pragmatic, necessary near-term actions. Silos need to be brought down. Search and social marketing teams need to collaborate, even join forces permanently. The new reality for these marketers is that everything is now interrelated under a common umbrella of “inbound marketing.”

Yes, social has become the new search. With Google’s recent entry, search may become the new social too.

by Ryan DeShazer
Vice President, Global Practice Leader – Search

Follow Ryan on Twitter @RyanDeShazer

Cross-posted at Ignite Something on the Forbes CMO Network

by Ryan DeShazer

And I was reminded again yesterday of how quickly things can change. It may not come as any big shock that new advertising vehicles or technologies are frequently introduced, but people come and go just as quickly. My friend Alex Cohen wrote an exceptional piece at Search Engine Watch, 10 Key Things I Learned From Working at a Search Startup. Not only was it a great reflective piece on the search industry over the past four years, it operated as Alex’s final sign-off from ClickEquations, a PPC management technology firm that my agency has had a longstanding relationship with.

This was my first indication that Alex had opted to move on in his career, and it struck me as apropos given the topic I was writing about this week. The search industry moves fast. Everything can change in a blink of an eye.

Alex’s retrospective piece got me thinking of the search industry of tomorrow. What will it look like? Who will be leading the charge? Given this pace of change and innovation, what will the next generation of search marketers need to succeed? As I sat with my thoughts on a long flight to San Francisco, I was interrupted by a young man sitting next to me who had noticed that I was reading about Google on my iPad. He asked me if I worked in the online industry and what I did specifically.

We began a dialogue about my work and the industry in general. It turns out he’s involved in the industry too; paying his way through college as an AdSense affiliate promoting a handful of content aggregation sites (yes, I warned him about Panda). We reviewed his sites and I gave him some tips on improving his SEO efforts. He then asked me how people get into the search industry professionally. After all, SEO/SEM isn’t offered at most major universities.

I pointed him first to fellow Search Insider Janet Driscoll Miller’s column: Six Tips for Getting a Job In Search Engine Marketing. Then we discussed where I believe the industry is headed, because staying on top of trends and innovations will be crucial for tomorrow’s practitioners. We discussed a few specific themes that I’ve been observing and following.

But I used that more tactical conversation to make two key points about the changing landscape of the search industry:

1) Search will continue its evolution away from a singular focus on conversion; and

2) Above all else, search marketers of tomorrow must have passion.

And it’s this last piece of advice that I think will really shape the industry of tomorrow. With the current demand for talent far exceeding the available supply, companies are taking what they can get. Tomorrow’s environment will be far more competitive.

Breaking into this industry will still require great skill, but those who also bring great passion to the space will become the most successful.

by Ryan DeShazer
Vice President, Global Practice Leader – Search

But for global organizations, shying away from the complexities of paid search is not an option. You have to pursue the inbound opportunities that only search can deliver, and you have to be exceptional in your execution. Plus, enterprise paid search is materially different from run-of-the-mill search programs. You’re in the big leagues now  — and trust me, you need a game plan.

What does best-in-class enterprise search look like?

Enterprise search is global, it’s multilingual, and it’s high-volume, with incredible risk and reward dynamics at play. Enterprise search is not something you can manage with a single analyst and a few spreadsheets. The stakes are too large to not get this right.

Global organizations need a best-in-class SEM team or agency partner to derive value from this complex space: a team with the ability to draw out strategic audience insights that can then be put to use at the point of execution. This group must include a mix of both senior-level strategists and more tacticallyfocused planners and analysts, each with discrete areas of responsibility to ensure that all programs are performing as optimally as possible.

In-market team members are a must, too. Region-specific keyword research and local insights are the only way to maximize the investments being made across disparate markets. But though team members are geographically dispersed, another critical requirement is having a centralized global strategy. It allows the organization to see a holistic view of program performance, and provides for cross-region optimizations when opportunities emerge.

Technology is the final piece of the puzzle. A modern, enterprise management platform is needed that can easily handle simultaneous uploads of millions of keywords, and offer support for multiple languages and currencies. A key offering too among leading solutions is a built-in, multi-user workflow. This feature alone will save the team managing the programs innumerable hours, as duplicative efforts are minimized while many people work on the programs simultaneously.

Killer KPIs are a must

A huge miss I often see is organizations that don’t place enough emphasis on the clear articulation of program key performance indicators (KPIs). My agency defines KPIs as the “primary indicator(s) used to monitor how well a business is achieving its most important quantifiable objectives.” Applied to paid search, KPIs represent a critical tool in assessing the health and well-being of the programs at large. Clearly understanding what the organization wishes to accomplish with its investment in search, and being in a position to determine whether or not those objectives are being met, is paramount to enterprise SEM.

KPIs are most impactful when agreed to by a multi- stakeholder team across the organization. Getting buy-in on key objectives and measurements before any monies are spent will serve the SEM team well before the programs go through subsequent optimization revisions. Conducting a series of internal stakeholder interviews is a perfect way to curate the development of KPIs that have organizational approval built-in.

And if you still need help, I know some “Secrets to Creating Killer KPIs.”

Enterprise advertisers are always a step ahead

The enterprise search space is a battlefield and one where savvy advertisers recognize the need to always stay abreast of emerging technologies and best-practices. This means that enterprise SEMs are constantly experimenting with new beta advertising opportunities at the engines. It also means that more advanced constructs in paid search have to be present: systematic multivariate experimentation at both the ad and landing page levels, comprehensive retargeting, and multichannel attribution analytics.

Looking forward, it seems as if the next major frontier for enterprise search advertisers will be the infusion of social graph intelligence into SEM programs. Imagine the possibilities for engagement and conversion if both search query data and social preferences are known.

Get your game plan together now if you want to go big, or else your opportunity to go enterprise may pass.

By
Ryan DeShazer
Vice President, Global Practice Leader – Search
gyro

As search matured and more advertisers and organizations entered the fray, an environment of hyper-competitiveness for desirable clicks emerged. That competition spawned hundreds (perhaps thousands) of star-tup companies that sought to develop analytics technologies aimed at bringing greater visibility to search marketing performance and the mechanics behind managing programs properly.

Yet, despite the profound impact these technologies have had on the industry, many SEMs still rely on basic technologies like Microsoft Excel to help manage sophisticated programs. This is primarily the result of a fragmented marketplace for the search analytics buyer, one where needs often go unmet.

Driven in part by frustration, I decided to list four of my top (missing) features that would make for great additions within a definitive search analytics toolset. A couple of these features do exist within modern platforms, but don’t get the universal appreciation they deserve. Other features are ones I would happily pay for access to, if they existed.

All you aspiring software entrepreneurs, take note:

Query Mining
Search query mining is one of the most under-appreciated elements to best practice paid search program management. Query mining is the process of identifying raw queries which were mapped to keywords within the search auction, and then extracting long tail derivatives and negative keywords to be explicitly introduced across the programs to enhance overall performance. This is an essential tactic for advertisers who rely on broad match keyword portfolios or are launching new programs.

Think of query mining as a way to help eliminate the unqualified noise, while enhancing the keyword portfolio with more precise phrase and exact match keyword targets. 

Search Attribution
The entire attribution category is hot right now, and for good reason. With billions being poured into digital advertising, it’s becoming crucial to understand the entire range of influences and touches that ultimately result in a transaction. Legacy attribution models like last-click no longer cut it, yet we’ve been forced into accepting many such methods for attributing conversion by the analytics tools.
Rather than solve for the more complex multichannel attribution, search attribution is focused on the range of keyword queries that eventually motivated our audiences to take action. This is important for two reasons:
1)    Properly crediting early touch keywords for playing an influential role during the fact-finding phase
2)    Understanding consumer behavior as search queries are refined, even absent a click-through against the original query.

Keep in mind too that Google will serve carry-over ads from the original query to subsequent ones under the guise of “session-based broad match.” Smarter search analytics would enable the advertiser to better understand where and why prospective customers refined their queries.

Audience Demographics
There are times when we know we need to pursue very broad keywords, despite having limited insight into whether those terms reach our intended audiences. A very timely example from one of our clients is for the keyword “cloud computing.” We know that term belongs in our portfolio, we just don’t know whether the clicks we are receiving against it are from those we were hoping to communicate with in the first place.
Understanding search-referred audience demographics mitigates that problem, and would allow for more meaningful messaging to be authored which would speak in a relevant way to discrete audiences. That discrete messaging may mean we have to set aside click-through rate and Quality Score as potential program KPIs, but it should yield higher engagement and conversion rates in the trade off.

Organic Search Rank at the Time of the Click
The solution to the ongoing debate around the utility of traditional keyword rank reports would be “rank at the time of the click.” This metric would address the many factors known to influence natural search positioning across the results pages: personalized search, regional biases, new +1 results. SEOs could leverage that intelligence to make smarter re-optimization decisions, based on resultant on-site behavior patterns.
For example, if my site consistently lands within the top three positions yet engagement and conversion are both low, then perhaps I should pursue different keyword targets. Conversely, for keywords that drive high engagement and conversion, it may be possible to improve my position across the SERPs and receive higher volumes of traffic.

And this wish-list item isn’t far-fetched either: Google is already passing this information in its referral string when the search engine user is logged into a Google account.

Though search analytics technologies have certainly advanced over the years, many more innovations are needed in order for SEMs to forever set aside the spreadsheet. These four are my biggies. I’d love to hear yours.

By
Ryan DeShazer
gyro

A big reason why many program KPIs are so underwhelming is that a lot of practitioners lack the skills required to construct a comprehensive, strategic search program, and so opt instead to avoid that conversation altogether. It doesn’t help too that search is often thought of as a silver bullet tactic, where a handful of ads and keywords paired together will yield strong click-through and conversion. The result is that many SEMs continue to embrace a “set it and forget it” mindset that worked once upon a time, when the landscape was easier to navigate and competition for clicks was a fraction of what it is today.

But today’s elite SEMs recognize the importance of well-rationalized KPIs, and work hard to define precisely what they hope to accomplish before any unnecessary time or money is spent. So let’s crack the code on Killer KPIs, beginning by defining the requisite vocabulary:

KPIs – primary indicators of the overall health and well-being of the search program. These data points are very clearly stated and allow for action on the part of the marketer when either opportunity or under-performance is identified. Think of the best KPIs being no different than what’s displayed across a car’s dashboard: data that informs the driver when it’s time to get more gas or slow down, even that a door is slightly ajar.

Baseline – the initial starting value of a KPI. Baselines are often discussed when launching entirely new search programs, where benchmark and/or trend data does not yet exist.

Benchmark – the mean average of a KPI as seen over a period of time. For example, if the average cost per lead (CPL) in 2010 for an online business was $25, then $25 is then referred to as the benchmark against which future time periods will be compared.

Trends – a progression of KPI data over long periods of time. It’s important to note that individual movements up or down do not necessarily reflect trends absent a sustained observation over some period of time.

Just bringing clarity to these terms is crucial to understanding the role of KPIs overall.

The first step is to recognize what the organization is hoping to accomplish through its investment in search. All too often we hear clients telling us that they “want more traffic” or “want more sales” as a result of their investment. But let’s be honest, those are bogus goals. To be actionable, we need something more concrete to work with.

Ideal objectives would look more like, “We’d like to enhance our marketplace awareness through increasing our search-referred visit count” or “We’d like to boost profitability by lowering our cost-per-lead by $10 this year compared to last.” These objectives are ones we can support with actionable KPIs like “Share of Search Clicks” or “Search-Referred CPL Trend.”

We’ve found too that those types of clear objectives often aren’t known or the program that’s being discussed is a first of its kind. In those situations, leveraging the first 60 to 90 days of in-market activity to establish an initial baseline for any KPI is highly recommended. That new baseline then becomes the data point against which the program is judged from that moment on. This approach is typically preferred, even if industry-wide benchmark data is known.

There’s nothing as pure as our own data.

A final consideration to keep in mind is that search plays a very broad role across the entire buy cycle process. In fact, it’s very rare to find a communications problem that can’t in some way be solved by a relevant presence across the search engines. So the keys to defining mission-critical search KPIs are:

1)  assess the challenges facing the organization;
2)  determine the most appropriate role search can play to assist with those challenges;
3)  anticipate the resultant data that will then be available; and
4)  focus on and optimize against those metrics mash-ups that best highlight program successes.

By
S. Ryan DeShazer
Vice President, Global Practice Leader-Search
gyro

Those tasked to manage the SEO requirements of the corporate website are, after all, judged by their ability to secure prominent rankings for keyword phrases deemed to be important. And it seems fairly logical. What better way to measure the quality of SEO work than to view where the website ranks for target keyword terms on the likes of Google and Bing?

But there’s an incredible flaw in that approach: it doesn’t take into consideration whether the SEO work actually has a positive impact on the organization.

That’s a frustrating conclusion to draw, because there’s incredible opportunity (and money) awaiting the B2B organization that does SEO right. Consider this: in May of last year, Hitwise reported that 92 percent of all search-driven clicks in that month came from the organic set of results. Plus, JP Morgan and the Search Engine Marketing Professionals Organization (SEMPO) reported that approximately $39 billion per year is spent on PPC advertising, compared to just $1.4 billion per year spent on SEO.

It’s safe to say that search is out of balance because SEO isn’t being held accountable.

To see the search balance of power restored, organizations must demand more accountability from SEO. This past week, I shared my thoughts on the four steps to SEO accountability to a standing-room-only crowd at the UK’s largest digital marketing conference, Internet World, in London. Here are the highlights of the discussion.

1. Place SEO in Proper Hands
SEO has never been well understood by most B2B decision makers. Often, SEO is made the domain of the webmaster, web agency, or IT department. Even in 2010, new client prospects say, “We optimized the website for search when we built it. We’d prefer now to focus on PPC.”

The truth is that SEO is deserving of a far more strategic role within an integrated marketing communications plan. Placing it in the hands of the web development or IT staff is not proper SEO.

SEO needs to be iterative and evolutionary. It should learn from itself and its PPC sister to become more targeted and relevant to the intended audience.

Over time, SEO should perform better. In short, it should operate just as other forms of digital marketing operate. After all, SEO is digital marketing.

2. Set Realistic Expectations
I can recall a pivotal conversation in my career. I was in an unsatisfying job and was having a drink one afternoon with a friend who was pitching me on a new business he was starting and wanted my help with.

I was eager to entertain any new job opportunity so I met with him and listened as he explained everything. He wanted to start an agency where companies would hire him to make their websites “pop up” when certain searches were performed on Google, Yahoo, and MSN.

To this day I remember my disappointment — and my naivety.

“I don’t think businesses are really going to need that,” I told my friend.

At that time, I believed that when you built a website, Google magically knew you were there and knew to give you your fair shot at relevancy for industry keyword searches.

In many B2B organizations, that mentality still exists. When a new website or piece of content is created, some expect that content to immediately shoot straight to the top of the results. Not so. SEO isn’t a quick hit tactic; it’s a long-term investment.

For SEO to become accountable, it can’t be saddled with unrealistic expectations. Give it some time to develop its legs.

3. Pick (Keyword) Fights You Can Win!
SEO isn’t about getting your website to rank in the first position for the industry keyword phrase. SEO is about achieving maximum visibility for the set of keyword phrases that drive tangible B2B results to the organization.

Attempting to rank for the definitive industry keyword term is often a fruitless exercise; it’s either a difficult or impossible task, or once-achieved it only brings tire-kickers to the website. To be accountable, SEO must produce results and the organization has to expect the channel to perform.

4. Optimize For Conversion Performance
A logical extension to selecting keyword fights you can win, optimizing around conversion performance is a B2B SEO’s primary indicator that you’re winning some fights! The unfortunate thing for B2B SEO in particular is that the buying environment is far less transactional than is often the case with B2C.

Typically, we don’t see purchase decisions made on a whim or after a single exposure to a search result. Still, a mechanism is needed to help quantify the positive impact SEO has on the organization, determining SEO’s role in effectuating or influencing an eventual purchase. This is where micro-conversions become essential.

It’s fairly intuitive that while asking for the sale at first touch may not be the best move, some form of engagement or conversion can be expected of our SEO-referred visitors. Micro conversions are more passive ways for website visitors to interact with a website and brand, and indicate an interest to buy ahead of an ultimate transaction.

The key here is to really understand your target audiences, their needs, and motivations. Set up your website and offers to nurture site visitors through the courtship process. Once sales eventually start to come through the pipeline, a simple set of regression analysis tests will confirm (or discount) the correlation that your micro conversions had on producing an eventual sale.

Summary
Admittedly, these thoughts are distilled for brevity, and only touch on some fairly advanced constructs. But if your B2B organization can embrace these four steps and put them to use across your SEO initiatives, you’ll undoubtedly be light years more advanced than you were when the only SEO report you cared about was the rank report.

Ryan DeShazer
Vice President, Global Practice Leader – Search

*Originally posted on Search Engine Watch: http://searchenginewatch.com/3640233