Direct Response Marketing and Search Engine Marketing (SEM) Principles
Marketers have bought into the idea that SEM is something that can only be properly utilized by those who is familiar with the correct “voodoo” to make it work. But really, SEM is just another form of direct reply marketing and many of the same principles apply. winning marketing messaging resonates with the prospect audience and the same controls apply to search marketing campaigns.
Here are some direct response marketing principles that should also apply to your SEM Movement:
(1).You has to track results. Just as savvy off line marketers can tell which piece of mail and from which specific message a customer converted, you have to be able to tell which keyword, message and referrer drove your sale. Tracking is easy to do on PPC, harder on search engine optimization, but critical on both.
(2). Creative is key. Google rewards those with high click-through rates on PPC by better placement, and the way to get high CTRs is to write huge copy that resonates with your audience. alike to an offline campaign, online creative should be tested frequently.
(3). It’s all about CPA or CPL. All search engine marketing campaigns need to be analyzed by cost per acquisition (CPA) or cost per lead (CPL).
(4). Create customer loyalty. Search engines are looking more and more at how many websites link to yours… You need customer evangelists driving more sales, and links can provide that.
(5). It takes work. Successful marketers have to constantly test response rates: copy, keywords, placement, pricing, messages, landing pages
(6). you have to test. In direct reply marketing, testing rules is never-ending. Just like testing in direct mail, the cost of the campaign can be justified if the lift in the change rate is enough to offset the expense. If the lift in change offsets the cost of optimizing the pages, keep testing and roll out new ones.
(7). It’s all about the advantage. Successful marketers sell on benefits, not features, and look for the messages that play on their customers’ moving responses to their product or service. Over time, you will learn offers that work only online, but like off line marketing, it comes through the same test-and-learn discipline.
(8). The “Lead to Sale” conversion rate is important. Just as in the offline world the key to conversions from search is providing the right hook in your listing at the right phase of the buying cycle, and then converting that show into a paying customer with the right offer on your landing page.
(9). Analysis is your friend. Like any good offline campaign, you learn a great deal from analyzing you’re testing and conversions. One set of keywords can carry out significantly better than the rest; but because even changing a keyword on or after singular to plural can have obviously different results, you have to test and analyze each changeable incoherently.
Direct reply marketing skills and experience are some of the key drivers in SEM campaigns. There is some shade of SEM that you can only study by experience, but if you go into it with the mindset that these rules apply you will depiction the whole experience.
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