Need some to tips in creating a profitable SEM program?

1. SEM Program Management:
Six Essential Components of a High Performing SEM Program
Having your company’s
website appear on the
first page of a Google
or Yahoo! Search. That
is what every marketer
wants for their company,
because they know expo-
sure on the first page will
lead to more clicks, more
calls, and more sales.
Unfortunately, few companies can
obtain placement on the coveted
first page. Why? Because for many
categories there are thousands of
companies competing for the same
placement.
And while a carefully thought
out and executed search engine
optimization program will certainly
increase your ranking in natural
search results, for most companies
the only way to get first page
placement is to use a paid search
engine marketing (SEM) program.
One that promotes their website by
increasing their visibility in search
results through paid placement.
Berry Network White Paper SEM Progam: Six Essential Components of a High Performing SEM Program

2. Executives Lack
Confidence in Most
SEM Programs
The need to be found on search
engines is resulting in marketers
75%
The number of US Senior-Level SEM
spending an ever increasing
Executives that feel their SEM program
amount of dollars on SEM
programs.
will underperform or just meet their
expectations.
38%
A recent study released by
Forrester Research, titled the “Five-
Year Interactive Marketing Forecast
Report” projected a 105% increase The number of those executives that feel
in U.S. SEM spending over the next their SEM will greatly underperform their
five years. Spending in 2009 should
expectations.
close out at about $15.4 billion,
while they project 2014 to top the
charts at $31.6 billion.
SEM is the largest part of lack of confidence in the ROI in
The Six Essential
interactive marketing budgets as SEM from our own executives.
Components of a
well. In 2009, SEM will comprise High Performing
60% of budgets. Through 2014, Given these numbers, today’s SEM Program
SEM is still poised to remain marketers need to take a critical It is hard to believe, but SEM has
the leading form of interactive look at SEM programs and re-tool been around for nearly ten years.
marketing . their company’s SEM strategies to Goto.com (which later became
boost executive confidence. But Overture and then Yahoo! Search
That’s the good news. The bad that is easier said than done. Marketing) began in 1998. Google
news is that in another report launched its flagship AdWords
released by [x+1], called “Search Before an evaluation takes program in 2000. Despite the years
Engine Marketing in 2009,” 75% of place, a marketer needs to have of history, some marketers still
U.S. Senior-Level SEM executives a solid understanding of what struggle with understanding the
feel that their SEM programs will differentiates a good SEM program essential components of an effective
underperform or just meet their from a bad one. They need to SEM program.
expectations. understand the six essential
components of an effective SEM When SEM first emerged, it was
These executives outweigh the program as explained in this report. largely seen as a function that few
25% of executives that felt SEM in people understood, and relegated
2009 will exceed their expectations. to a select few people that knew the
Certainly, this indicates a complete SEM lingo. And while today some
Berry Network White Paper SEM Progam: Six Essential Components of a High Performing SEM Program

3. marketers can identify the basic week is an effective technique that is 6. Measurement/
components of a high performing often underutilized in SEM programs. Optimization - To maximize
SEM program, they have a tendency It is an effective technique for driving your program’s results, you will need
to oversimplify them. conversions and reducing wasteful to measure its performance and
spending. optimize your program; adjusting
Greater understanding of SEM is keywords, geography, budgets, and
needed by marketing executives 4. Landing Pages - A landing other components as your business
if they want to truly manage their page is a page that appears when changes.
company’s SEM program. An a potential customer clicks an ad.
effective SEM program must include Landing pages need to be carefully These components are complex
the following six components: thought out in order to convert a enough that a white paper could
click into a sale. be written on each one of them;
1. Choosing Proper however, for the sake of brevity, we
Keywords - This refers to 5. Bid Level/Budget - will take a look at the fundamentals
selecting a set of terms or phrases Budgets are limited, so determining a of each component that every
that, when searched, will deliver maximum bid level for each keyword marketer should know.
your ad to those who are searching. and developing daily and monthly
Pick the right ones and you are well budgets is vital to ensure funds are
on your way to bringing targeted, properly allocated throughout the
qualified visitors to your site. Pick the year.
wrong words and you will sabotage
your SEM campaign.
2. Geo-targeting - If your Keywords
business is in any way location- Measurement/
Optimization
specific, you’ll want to take
advantage of geographical targeting.
Choosing where your ads will appear
can be done in a variety of ways: At The Six Essential Geography
a city/metro level, based on a radius Components
(in miles) from your location/service of a
area, or the geography can be fully Bid Level/ High Performing
customized to include only the cities Budget SEM Program
or ZIP-codes you want to reach.
3. Dayparting - Is a person
conducting a search at 3:00 AM on Dayparting
Landing
a Tuesday morning a good prospect Pages
for your business? Targeting your
advertising by time of day or day of
Berry Network White Paper SEM Progam: Six Essential Components of a High Performing SEM Program

4. Keywords
Keywords
Measurement/
Optimization
Geography
Bid Level/
Budget
Dayparting
Landing
Pages
Choosing Proper Keywords
Choosing the proper keywords for your SEM program consumers actually use-not technical jargon or internal
sounds easy, but for those that actually do this it can be company buzz words.
a daunting task. Since keyword selection is the first step
in a SEM program, if not done correctly, it can lead to an Consider demographics, keep in mind the target audi-
inefficient, wasteful program. Below are some guidelines ence and use the words related to that particular group.
for proper keyword selection: Be sure to include all the common misspellings, abbre-
viations, acronyms, and synonyms.
1. Start With The Obvious -
Those words that are most relative to your business. In 2. Use Website Analytics -
most cases you will create a list of keyword phrases, as Basic web analytic tools like Google Analytics can quickly
most searches take place using multiple keywords. For and easily identify the keywords that consumers are using
example, “car repair” has two keywords while “car and to get to your site. Not only that, but they can help identify
truck repair” has three keywords. the keywords that are actually converting into clicks.
Statowl.com, a site that contains comprehensive 3. Evaluate Search Volume -
aggregate internet usage statistics, shows that as of You have generated a long list of keywords—the question
September, 009, the majority of searches conducted now becomes how do you prioritize these and determine
contain three or more keywords. Once your initial list how many searches are actually being conducted using
is complete, scrub it to make sure these are terms that these keywords?
Search Engine Key Word Count
5 words 2 words
17.50% 9.09% 6 words 6.77%
1 word 4.87%
4 words
24.47%
7+ words 3.75%
3 words
30.55%
Berry Network White Paper SEM Progam: Six Essential Components of a High Performing SEM Program

5. Keywords
Measurement/
Optimization
Geography
Geography
Bid Level/
Budget
Dayparting
Landing
Pages
Geo-targeting
Sample Keyword Phrases with Why pay for clicks that don’t convert? An SEM campaign
Local Modifiers that does not use geographic targeted online marketing
will end up wasting advertising money on visitors that
Florist 27312
are not potential clients simply because they live in
Florist Fearrington Village
another area or even in another country. So, unless
Florist Fearrington Village, NC your business is a virtual business that can sell products
anywhere in the world, your SEM campaign will need to
Florist Fearrington Village, North Carolina
take advantage of geographical targeting.
Geo-targeting is the method of determining the
Google’s Keyword Selector Tool and Wordtracker (and geolocation (the physical location) of a website visitor
others) can show you search volume by keyword. These and delivering content to that visitor based on his or her
tools can also tell you how many competing sites are using location. Choosing where your ads will appear can be
those keywords. Caution is needed when using these tools done in a variety of ways - at a city/metro level, based
though; high volume keywords are going to cost you more on a radius (in miles) from your location/service area, or
than low volume keywords. And just because a keyword the geography can be fully customized to include only
or phrase has a high search volume, whether it leads to the cities or ZIP-codes that you want to reach.
conversions is another matter (more on that later).
Recognizing that consumers desire to receive local,
4. Add The Local Modifiers - relevant search results, the geo-targeting tools in search
If your business is in anyway location specific, you’ll need engines are becoming more robust. Google even lets
to add local modifiers to your keywords based on your marketer’s geo-target down to the street level.
targeted trade areas. Why? Because consumers are
increasingly adding local modifiers such as a city name,
town name, or Zip-code to their searches to generate more
specific search results.
Considering that there are 0 states, nearly 0,000
governments, and 9,6 ZIP-codes, adding local
modifiers will increase your keyword list significantly.
Although the search volume of keyword phrases with local
modifiers is low, these “long tail” keywords often have high
conversion rates.
Berry Network White Paper SEM Progam: Six Essential Components of a High Performing SEM Program

6. Keywords
Measurement/
Optimization
Geography
Bid Level/
Budget
Dayparting
Dayparting
Landing
Pages
Dayparting
Sometimes referred to as “ad scheduling,” dayparting An additional benefit of dayparting is the ability
is the practice of dividing the day into several parts and to determine “slow times” and develop targeted
determining when your ad will be served as part of the advertising for these times. For example, a plumbing
search results. Dayparting allows advertisers to optimize company that finds itself with open appointments on
their SEM program by “dialing up” their campaign when Friday mornings could run a campaign offering % off
they know it will generate clicks and conversions and service calls during 8:00-:00 a.m. on Friday’s.
“dialing down” their campaign when it won’t.
Sample Keyword Traffic Data
Targeting your advertising by time of day, day of week,
Retail
or just those months that you have identified are most +60%
successful in converting prospects into customers, is a
Relative Conversion Rate +30%
technique often underutilized in SEM programs, and
is an effective technique for driving conversions and Avg
reducing wasteful spending. For example, a company
-30%
that offers exterior household painting will most likely
want to dial up in the summer months and place a -60%
1am 4am 7am 10am 1pm 4pm 7pm 10pm
heavier emphasis on the spring when home owners are Hour
refreshing their homes. Finance
+60%
Conversely, the advertiser may want to dial down their
Relative Conversion Rate
+30%
programs in the winter months. In another example, a
Avg
company that targets teens may want to dial down their
program during school hours and dial up their program -30%
during the late afternoon and early evenings when teens
are most active. -60%
1am 4am 7am 10am 1pm 4pm 7pm 10pm
Hour
All the major search engine sites offer tools that provide
the traffic data you need to analyze an SEM program.
When developing a dayparting strategy you will need to
ask questions like:
• When are the ads delivering the most activity?
• When are the ads delivering the most conversions?
• Are these patterns repeating day-after-day,
week-after-week, month-after-month?
Berry Network White Paper SEM Progam: Six Essential Components of a High Performing SEM Program 6

7. Keywords
Measurement/
Optimization
Geography
Bid Level/
Budget
Landing
Landing
Dayparting
Pages
Pages
Landing Pages
Getting a customer to click on your Two types of landing
Sending prospects to
ad is one thing, converting that click pages: reference and
your website home into a sale is a whole other matter. transaction.
page will distract the A reference landing page presents
consumer. As they One of the more common reasons information that is relevant to the
wander through your for poor conversions from SEM visitor. These can display text, images,
website they become programs are landing pages that a list of relevant links, or other
sidetracked and the don’t fulfill the promise of the search elements. Reference landing pages are
opportunity to connect keyword or search ad. Sending often used to educate and to generate
with them is lost. prospects to your website home further interest on behalf of the
page will distract the consumer. As consumer. Reference landing pages
they wander through your website will have a clear call to action, and
they become sidetracked and the usually includes some form that allows
opportunity to connect with them is the visitor to ask for more information
lost. That’s why landing pages are so or sign up for a newsletter. The goals
important. of reference landing pages are often
to capture the lead. This information is
A landing page is a stand alone used in marketing efforts to promote a
page that appears when a potential future sale.
customer clicks on an advertisement
or a search-engine result link. The A transaction landing page seeks to
page will usually display content convert the visitor into a customer by
that is a logical extension of the promoting a single prominent offer.
advertisement or link, and that Rather than capturing the lead, a
is optimized to feature specific transaction landing page is designed
keywords or phrases for indexing by to make an immediate sale.
search engines.
A visitor taking the desired action
In SEM programs, the landing on a landing page is referred to
page should be customized to as a conversion. The efficiency or
measure the effectiveness of quality of the landing page can be
different advertisements. By measured by its conversion rate
adding a parameter to the linking - the percentage of visitors who
URL, marketers can measure complete the desired action. Since
advertisement effectiveness based the economics of many online
on relative click-through rates. marketing programs are determined
by the conversion rate, marketers
routinely test alternatives and make
improvements to their landing pages.
Berry Network White Paper SEM Progam: Six Essential Components of a High Performing SEM Program

8. Keywords
Measurement/
Optimization
Geography
Bid Level/
Budget
Landing
Landing
Dayparting
Pages
Pages
The goal of a landing page idea to test different calls to action to your landing page. This includes
is to get the prospect to see what works best. navigation bars, visual clutter, and
take your desired links to other sections. Stay focused
action. So what makes a • Put your most critical landing and make sure everything on the
good landing page? Here page elements in the upper part of page is relevant to the headline and
are some basic tenets of the page: Usability research shows offer.
good land page design. that over half of site visitors will NOT
scroll “below the fold.” So forget the • Test, test, test. Changing
• The landing page headline should warm-up copy and get right to the landing pages is relatively inexpen-
reflect the ad copy that drove point. sive, so why not experiment a little
the click. This will keep your visitor to see what works best? Try different
focused and engaged. • Stay focused on your goals. It is headlines, calls to action, and copy to
easy to get carried away with writing see what combinations leads to the
• Provide a clear, strong call to extensive copy and filling the pages highest conversion rate.
action. You need to tell your visitor with fancy graphics or animation.
what they need to do. It is a good Remove all irrelevant material from
Sample Reference Landing Page
Berry Network White Paper SEM Progam: Six Essential Components of a High Performing SEM Program 8

9. Keywords
Measurement/
Optimization
Geography
Bid Level/
Bid Level/
Budget
Budget
Dayparting
Landing
Pages
Bid Levels/Budgets
So you’ve got an annual SEM budget. It doesn’t matter if the budget is $0,000
or $,000,000, the big question is how will you manage this budget in terms
of developing keyword bid levels and monthly SEM budgets? SEM uses a When it comes to
bidding model in which advertisers that are willing to pay the most “per click” managing your
generally appear first (relevancy also plays a role), with others following in order
SEM budgets,
of spending.
no other factor is
SEM budgeting requires careful planning in order for your program to deliver more important
full impression delivery throughout the day, week, month, or year. Imagine if you than determining
were a manufacturer of air conditioners and your SEM budget for the summer the maximum
ran out of money only two weeks into July. Faulty bid level strategies can result bid level for your
in costly mistakes that drain your budget and prematurely halt your campaign. keywords
You may not realize it, but if you have properly targeted your keywords,
developed a geo-targeting strategy, and a dayparting strategy, much of your
budgeting work is already done. Using SEM bid management software, you or
your agency can set the rules for your SEM program. These rules will impact just
how much money you spend on a daily basis. For example, you bid on ,00
keywords in markets, with ads running between the hours of :00 am to :00
pm Monday through Saturday. Makes sense right?
The problem is, most companies don’t have the money needed to support the
“perfect” SEM program. Hard decisions will need to be made between what you
want and what you can afford. While most of these decisions will revolve around
keyword and dayparting selections, here are some strategies to get the most out
of your SEM budget:
Develop a Bid Formula
How much are you willing to pay for a keyword? When it comes to managing
your SEM budgets, no other factor is more important than determining the
maximum bid level for your keywords. Developing your own bid formula will
take the guess work out off keyword bidding. Here is one example. If you sell
a product for $0, at a profit margin of 0%, and your conversion rate is a
conservative % (for every hundred clicks, you get one sale), you will have $00
of profit per sale to use as ad spend over 00 visitors. In other words, you can
afford to spend a maximum of $ per click.
Developing a bid formula will help instill discipline in your bidding strategies and
can help you defend your keyword selections. Remember that the maximum
Berry Network White Paper SEM Progam: Six Essential Components of a High Performing SEM Program 9

10. Keywords
Measurement/
Optimization
Geography
Bid Level/
Bid Level/
Budget
Budget
Dayparting
Landing
Pages
cost-per-click will fluctuate over time and you will need to make adjustments
When is comes according to your actual conversion rates as well as the cost-per click’s of your
to keyword competitors.
bidding,
You Don’t Have To Be #1
remember to For popular search terms, the top positions come with a hefty price tag. What
listen to the good is paying for the first position if you exhaust your daily budget by 0:00 am
numbers and each day. You may find that there’s a significant difference between the costs of
not your heart. positions , and , but there may be little impact on how frequently your ad is
clicked. In popular searches users may click on several ads, so appearing in a less
expensive position can still give you good results.
You will also want to look for bid gaps. For instance, if the top bids for a search
term are $.0, $.9 and $0., the difference between the nd and rd bids is
called a bid gap. In such cases, it makes more sense for the advertiser to bid for
the rd position, paying $0.6 as opposed to the top positions which would cost
$.0 or $..
Remain Unbiased To All Keywords
Keyword bidding can sometimes seem illogical meaning the least likely keyword
will perform well. And while it is tempting to develop an attachment to certain
keywords, when it comes to keyword bidding, remember to listen to the
numbers and not your heart.
Berry Network White Paper SEM Progam: Six Essential Components of a High Performing SEM Program 0

11. Measurement/ Keywords
Optimization
Geography
Bid Level/
Budget
Dayparting
Landing
Pages
Measurement/Optimization
Unlike traditional media, the results of search engine marketing are extremely
easy to measure. Trackable metrics include clicks, calls, conversions, and ROI.
It goes without saying that a high performing SEM program is one that is
monitored and adjusted on an ongoing basis. Every facet of the program;
keyword selection, geography, dayparting, landing pages, and budgets, must
be reviewed on a regular basis by a knowledgeable, experienced SEM program
manager.
Summary
Search engine marketing is no longer a function relegated to the IT “geeks” -
it is part of mainstream marketing. As SEM budgets continue to expand, market-
ers at all levels of the organization need to understand the complexities of SEM
program management if they are to meet executive expectations.
For the Marketing Manager
Whether your SEM program is managed internally or externally, spend some
time with your SEM team. Use the framework presented in this white paper to
ask questions relative to how your SEM program is being managed to deliver the
highest number of conversions at the lowest possible costs.
For the C-Level Executive
Search engine marketing budgets continue to rise yet executives continue to
lack confidence in these programs. This does not have to be the case. Use the
framework presented in this white paper when reviewing the performance of an
SEM program, and challenge your staff to build and manage an SEM program
that meets your organization’s objectives.
Berry Network White Paper SEM Progam: Six Essential Components of a High Performing SEM Program

12. About Berry Network
Berry Network, Inc. is an advertising and marketing agency, and a wholly-
owned subsidiary of ATT. Headquartered in Dayton, Ohio, Berry Network
supports over 00 regional and national clients with marketing programs
designed to drive leads at the local level. Berry Network’s award winning
portfolio continues to expand, and currently includes solutions such as; print
Yellow Pages advertising, Internet Yellow Pages advertising, search engine
marketing, mobile marketing, direct mail, and social media.
Contact
To learn more about how Berry Network drives local leads, visit our website at
www.berrynetwork.com or call one of our offices listed below. You can also follow
us on Twitter, and LinkedIn.
Berry Network Berry Network
Headquarters West Coast
00 Kettering Blvd 0 Pacifica, Suite 0
Dayton, OH 9 Irvine, CA 968
Tel: 800-66-6 Tel: 800--0
marketing@berrynetwork.com marketing@berrynetwork.com
© Berry Network, Inc. All rights reserved. #3669-1a 9/09
Berry Network White Paper SEM Progam: Six Essential Components of a High Performing SEM Program