search marketing blog: ambergreen

Last Friday night saw some of the ambergreen team dressed to the nines in our best evening gowns (and that was just the guys!) for an evening at the Sheraton Grand to see ambergreen scoop the top prize for ‘online excellence’ at this year’s Marketing Society’s Marketing Excellence Awards Scotland.

In case you are wondering the award was made for our work with MyTravel (which is now part of the Thomas Cook group) to transform one of the largest names in travel from an underperforming online brand into an e-Superbrand but there’s a whole press release that goes into a little more detail on that!

The Marketing Society annually launches a search for the stars of marketing excellence in Scotland. The Marketing Society developed these prestigious awards to promote best practice and to recognise the marketing stars that provide direction and inspiration for all.

Anyway back to the evenings events and the show was compered by Dougie Vipond the drummer from Deacon Blue who often presents BBC’s sport coverage. His line in humour was cutting to say the least (if you were there you’ll get that in joke) and he did a fine job in keeping the evening flowing. A lot slicker than his team St Mirren’s passing this season!

There was some particularly strong work short listed from many agencies (work from The Leith agency is always excellent) and Marketer of the Year Glen Gribbon gave a fantastic acceptance speech to round the night off before most of the marketing community descended on the bar to talk business I’m sure!

I digress. Well done to everybody who made the shortlist, and to the winners; How good did it feel to get your hands on that star eh? Here’s to next year. Maybe we’ll pick up another award…

The recent decision by Google to allow brand owners bidding for keywords that are trademarked by rivals has not been welcomed by certain sections of the industry. UK’s largest supermarket chain – Tesco is the first major advertiser to have shown its discontent in this sudden change brought about by Google.

The latest rule by Google that comes into affect from May the 5^th is expected to bring a lot of change and conflict amongst UK’s biggest and highest spending advertisers. Consumers who search for specific brands such as “Tesco” will for the very first time be given sponsored listings for its competitor brands.

Tesco taking a moral stance has made it openly apparent that they will not bid for on any search terms that are related to its competitors. Tesco currently is spending more than £2 million every year on its online advertisements campaign and hopes that other UK brand owners will take a note of its decision which is to prevent unnecessary rise in the money being spent on paid search ads.

High profile brands such a Diageo, Mercedes-Benz and O2 have already started anticipating the major change that this rule will bring about in the market and have begun revising their approach towards Google paid search.

Bidders will now have to pay more as this change is most likely to result in the prices of branded paid search listings to rise. In the past advertisers had the chance to purchase trademarked search terms at a lower price which enabled them make considerable gains from their sponsored search advertising activity.

We are delighted to announce we will be exhibiting at this year’s Internet World Exhibition, Earls Court, London from 29th April – 1st June 2008.

If it’s happening in the digital business world then it’s happening at Internet World. With over 200 inspirational hours of free seminars and hard-hitting keynotes, it’s the one and only place you’ll hear the ultimate digital business insight and understanding.

We are exhibiting at stand number E366, so please drop by and see us there or contact David Goldie on info@ambergreen.co.uk to arrange an appointment in advance.

Our Technical Director, Grant Whiteside and Thomas Cook’s Russell Gould will be presenting “How to build an e-superbrand” Case Study in the Digital Marketing Theatre on Wednesday 30th April at 12pm.

How to Get There By Air

Heathrow Airport

The easiest way to travel to Internet World from Heathrow is to take the Piccadilly line direct to Earls Court.
Alternatively you can also use the Heathrow Express to Paddington and then transfer to the District Line to Earls Court.Contact information for Heathrow are as follows:

General enquiries - 0870 0000 123

www.baa.com/heathrow

Gatwick Airport

The easiest way to travel to Internet World from Gatwick Airport is to board the Gatwick Express service to Victoria where you should transfer to a direct train to
Earls Court

You can also use frequent train services that run through Clapham Junction where you can then board a direct train to Earls Court

Contact information for Gatwick are as follows:

General enquires - 0870 000 2468

www.baa.com/gatwick

Stansted Airport

The quickest way to Internet World after arriving at Stansted Airport is to board the Stansted Express and travel to Liverpool Street, where you can take the Central Line to Holborn and change onto the Piccadilly Line which will take you to Earls Court.

Alternatively you can change onto the Circle Line at Liverpool Street and travel to Edgware Road, where you should then change onto District Line to Earls Court.

Contact information for Stansted are as follows:

General enquires - 0870 0000 303

www.baa.com/stansted

City Airport

The quickest way to Internet world from City Airport is to board the Docklands Light Railway from City Airport to Canning Town. There you should transfer onto the Jubilee Line Westbound and travel to Westminster. Here you should then change onto the District Line Westbound to Earls Court

Contact information for City Airport are as follows

General enquires - 020 7646 0088

www.londoncityairport.com

The last post on this blog discusses the trademark changes for Google. When asked Google’s reason for these changes we can only guess at the reasons, but I wonder if the reported revenue percentage drop has anything to do with it. Google UK’s revenue accounted for 15% of the search engine’s total net income according to its first-quarter results, up 1% on last year’s fourth-quarter results but down 1% on the same period last year.

Google also revealed a total rise in net profits of 31% to $1.31bn (£655m) and revenues for the UK alone totalled $803m (£402m). With their dominance in the marketplace these profits come as no surprise, we can only hope for the merger of MSN and Yahoo to shake things up a bit and make for a more interesting search landscape!

As you may have read in the papers, blogs and other media, Google have recently announced that as of May 5th they will no longer bar people bidding on trademarked keywords in the UK and Ireland, a 180 degree turn from their previous policy. This announcement has sent ripples through the online marketing world, with advertisers and agencies alike spreading panic as though the entire internet were about to shut down. However, the impact is likely to be fairly minimal, for the following reasons.

Firstly, this is not a one-off experiment. Google has never enforced such a trademark policy in the US and there is absolutely no problem with it there. Paid Search, and AdWords in particular, continues to be an extremely cost-effective and targeted form of marketing despite the presence of competitor ads on branded searches.

Secondly, there is no reason to assume, as many self-proclaimed experts have done so in the media, that CPCs on previously protected keywords will suddenly sky-rocket as a result of increased competition. This is because Google are continuing to prohibit the use of trademarked terms in ad copy unless the trademark holder gives permission. The upshot is that a search for “Company X” will also display ads for “Company Y” and “Company Z” BUT the user is specifically looking for Company X and only one ad will contain that keyword. This ad will continue to attract clickthrough rates much higher than those of the competing ads and will consequently have a much higher quality score. This quality score will counteract the effect of competing bids on CPC so average CPC will rise only slightly while leading rankings are maintained. On the other hand, competitors will be forced to pay high CPCs for any clicks they attract because of their relatively low quality scores.

A final point of note is that the policy also opens up the possibility to bid on your own competitors’ trademarked terms if such an approach is attractive to you. Such a campaign should not be looked upon as a way to ’steal’ traffic from other sources; as noted above such traffic will come at a high cost. However it is an excellent opportunity to raise brand awareness, advertise new product lines relating to those of a competitor and advertise any USPs which may give you an edge over competition. The aim for such a campaign would primarily be impressions rather than traffic.

In the end this all boils down to a storm in a teacup. Yes, there is the fact that brand campaigns will now need slightly more care and attention in the light of new competition; and yes, branded terms may start to cost more than a couple of pence each. However, this can only be a make or break point for the weakest and most marginal campaigns. The purpose of the policy change is simply to open up some more revenue for Google but it’s evident they have enough sense not to endanger their entire advertising network for the sake of a few dollars more.

Google has completed its purchase of DoubleClick having been given the green light by the European Union. The deal cost the search company £1.5 billion and will unite it with a leading ad–provider. “Google and DoubleClick were not exerting major competitive constraints on each other’s activities and could, therefore, not be considered as competitors at the moment,” the Commission said. The deal attracted criticism for competitors such as Microsoft and Yahoo! and from consumer groups concerned that together the companies could gather vast amounts of user data. US authorities had already approved the deal, as had legislators in Australia which saw no cause for concern on anti-competitive grounds. The Centre for Digital Democracy, in a letter to the US Federal Trade Commission had told policy makers the deal would create ” insurmountable barriers to entry in the interactive ad market”.

The European Commission is expected to allow Google to buy Double-Click, sources close to the deal told Reuters. The deal would combine Google’s search capability with the online advertising company that provides the ads. Tim Armstrong, president of advertising and commerce, is keen for it to go through. “This transaction will strengthen our advertising network by expanding our access to publisher inventory and enabling us to serve the needs of a broader set of advertisers and ad agencies,” he said. The Australian Competition and Consumer Commission (ACCC) decided not to intervene in the merger as the two companies were not close rivals. Its chairman, Mr Graeme Samuel said: “In this context, the ACCC considered that the merger was unlikely to result in a substantial lessening of competition in an Australian market.” Some privacy concerns have been raised as Google keeps users’ search data and DoubleClick connects advertisers and publishers.

TV and newspaper advertising are less effective than email at getting consumers to go online, Brand Republic has reported. Research by Response One found that customer emails are 52 per cent more likely than average to make consumers turn to the web - TV/newspaper ads lagged behind at 34 per cent. Amanda Ling, data intelligence director said the research showed there were other ways to drive web visits. Significantly, Response One found advertising on social networks was 26 per cent less likely than average to encourage web buying activities. However, these results were notably different depending on which age group the respondents belonged to – those aged 18-24 thought it was 22 per cent better than average at getting users to seriously consider a purchase. Newspaper publishers are now looking to mobile online adverts to support their businesses. News International has created Leadership in Mobile and hopes to offer the market new advertising data.

Phorm, the digital technology company that signed deals with three of the UK’s internet service providers (ISPs), has defended its plans. The company is set to collect data from web users who are signed to contracts with BT, Virgin Media and TalkTalk. Senior vice president, Marc Burgess told the Guardian: “Our privacy claims have been audited by Ernst & Young they have been through our system and seen that it does what we say it does.” Phorm uses anonymised ISP data streams and targets users by deciding ‘channels’ or groups of users with similar interests. “We have spoken to the Information Commissioner’s Office. All of the privacy groups in the US, UK and Europe have been impressed by our approach,” he explained. The firm’s Open Internet Exchange (OIX) will track surfers’ activities, record the URL and header data of visited sites but not the users’ IP address. Targeted advertisements provide users with messages that are more relevant based on their browsing and search habits - eMarketer has predicted that online ad spending will surpass £3 billion in 2008.

Google has agreed that clicks on its search adverts have fallen, Online Media Daily has reported. Alan Eustace, senior vice president of engineering & research told delegates at a conference in California it was down to their recent algorithmic changes. He explained the changes had occurred on the ad-serving end and were due to the reduction of clickable space. Mr Eustace said the company opted to “reduce the number of advertisers and decrease accidental clicks”. This he hoped would deliver “better information to users and make them click more in the long run.” Research by comScore revealed that the number of paid clicks per Google search query were down by eight per cent since December. The analyst has agreed with the search company’s explanation, saying Google’s own initiatives were responsible for the decline. One approach to help fight ‘click fraud’ would see users provide marketers with personal data so they are identified each time.

Ambergreen can help you track your customer’s buying behaviour and monitors the metrics for potential click fraud so you know you’re in safe hands.