Advertiser Forum at SES New York
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Written By Reprise Media | March 3, 2005 | Share This
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Yesterday I managed to survive the unexplainable stampede that I later learned was the Accoona Mini giveaway and make my way to the Search Engine Advertising Forum session, moderated by Rebecca Lieb of ClickZ. Though described in the conference guide as “What’s new in the world of paid listings and other search engine advertising programs,” […]
Yesterday I managed to survive the unexplainable stampede that I later learned was the Accoona Mini giveaway and make my way to the Search Engine Advertising Forum session, moderated by Rebecca Lieb of ClickZ. Though described in the conference guide as “What’s new in the world of paid listings and other search engine advertising programs,” at times this session lapsed into a rehash of basic stuff most of us already know.
Dana Todd of SiteLab kicked things off with a look at the state of the industry, breaking it down engine by engine in a `Cheers and Jeers’ type format that proved pretty amusing (she’s not one to hold back).
Todd’s take on:
- Yahoo’s new name - ick
- Google’s status as portal - denial is not just a river in Egypt
- AOL and their ilk coming on stronger in search - “Wow, you managed to find your ass in the dark.”
Todd brought up the Blinx name that’s been on everyone’s lips and dismissed pay-per-call as still mostly hype. I haven’t yet taken a good look, but the eye-tracking study at Enquiro.com she mentioned seems pretty cool.
Dan Boberg of Overture next addressed the name change dissed moments ago. Leveraging the awareness of the Yahoo! brand and making products and services more accessible to marketers was the motivation behind the switch, though I agree with Todd that they could have chosen something a little snappier, if not shorter.
He went on to reveal some data slides from recent comScore studies that show the buying cycle as being longer and purchasing behavior as more latent than previously believed. I won’t rehash it all here, but his overall net is that marketers should focus on the entire buying cycle and take advantage of the latest available tools in order to track and optimize their campaigns to the fullest.
Now that Yahoo’s had their say, of course the other guys have gotta get in on it. Patrick Keane of Google was up next, with some insight on the “Consumer’s Online Life.” He sees this life as falling into 5 major categories: 1. Communication and email, 2. Shopping, 3. News & information, 4. Lifestyle and leisure, 5. Academics and career. Is it just us, or do these categories sound a little like Trivial Pursuit?
He reiterated Boberg’s points about the latency of the purchase cycle (he calls it the “Consideration Economy”) and went on to talk a little about Google’s geo-targeting and advertising professionals program (zzzzz). All these products and innovations are part of Google’s aim to “Sniff out demand across micro-niches worldwide” - i.e. smoke the consumers out of their holes.
Last up was Ron Belanger of Carat Interactive, who wants you to know he’s a Sox fan (he also sounds eerily like Kevin Nealon, but that’s neither here nor there) He started with a discussion of the traditional mass communications model, one which he says is breaking down. No longer can you throw a single message at a consumer and garner 60% of market share.
He sees catching consumers earlier in the purchase funnel (somewhere between unawareness but before point of sale) as being critical. He also said we need to start thinking of in terms of “portal-centric” planning vs. “publisher-centric” planning and start taking into account the different demographics of the search networks.
A rather dispirited Q&A came next (maybe everyone was saving it up for Sullivan).
Quick highlights:
- Patrick Keane noted the increasing number of big marketers using search to measure the success of their offline efforts (Super Bowl, anyone?)
- Get off our backs - all panelists agreed that in the coming months search will be thought of as less measurable due to the new learnings about latency as it relates to the purchase cycle.
- MSN Search isn’t that bad. Dana called them the quiet runner up and one of the last high volume, flat rate click packages available, though once they move to an auction model all that will change. However, most panelists noted minimal impact from the ad blitz a few weeks ago.
Topics: Advertising: Behavioral, Advertising: Contextual, Advertising: Distribution, SEM: Ad Creative, SEM: Bid Management, SEM: Firms, SEM: Keyword Generation, SEM: Paid Search, Search: Innovations, Search: Local |
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Comments
Hi,What Yahoo name change are you referring to?Thanks,Dan
Overture announced that they were rebranding themselves as "Yahoo Search Marketing Solutions" earlier this week.
When and where was the forum held? I am trying to track down the originator of the term "consideration economy". Any thoughts?–Thank you.
Not sure where "consideration economy" originated, however, the forum was held at the Hilton Hotel in New York City this past week. More info on the conference can be found at:http://www.searchenginestrategies.com
The term "consideration economy" was used by Patrick Keane of Google at the show. Not sure if he’s the originator of the term or if its been used elsewhere.