Wednesday, January 25, 2006

My First SEO toys and PPC tools

Now that Analytics is on, I still have not had a chance to really go through it. The documentation front seem a bit thin compared with AdWords. This could means that Analytics is the new wild west or I am just looking at the wrong places. Surely, Google won't make software that is hard to use...

I suppose I have been procrastinating on Analytics. But, I have a good excuse. We just brought the SEO pages live. I purchase/licensed the SEO content for a list of 30 keywords that I want to get good ranking on. It turns out that one keyword I cannot use after getting a better understanding of the system. The key reason is legal, it gets too complicated to do SEO on a competitor's name. So, if you have come up with a good way to do SEO on a legally registered (competitor) name, please let me know!

The structure of the SEO pages are fairly plain. So, I spent some time with the web people to spruce it up so that at least the touch and feel is similar to the overall corporate site. Of course, this process can be taken too far. So, when my VP of engineer told me that it is time to push them out to make the licensed content earn their keeps, I readily agree.

The funny thing about SEO pages is that it could impact the performance of the AdWords program. Based on historic data, when people search on the company name, naturally, we rank highly in both the natural and paid search results. And, there are very few click on the paid search results.

You may think that this is a good thing, why pay when you get the click through natural search. the trouble is that the paid search is optimized to create conversion events. In other words, when you click on the paid search, the route is designed that you either abandon the path or leave your contact info. This is how we generate the bulk of leads.

Now that SEO pages holds the promise of getting really good natural search ranking for the keywords that have been generating the bulk of conversion traffic, this could be a problem when people no longer leave their contact info with us.

Theoretically, I would love to do an empirical A/B test to see if the concern is valid. But realistically, the stake is too high that I have no intention to taking the hit. So, I have been working on these pages to create as many conversion traps as possible.

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So, here are a few good tools to have

1. To figure out exactly what a viewer would see when doing a google search

http://merjis.com/local_google_search

Why bother: say that you want to see what a viewer in Germany searching for "tiny boots" using a German interface would see. This tool automatically generate the appropriate tags. A very helpful tool if you do regional/local advertising from afar.

2. US location keywords generator

http://5minutesite.com/local_keywords.php

Why bother: you would be surprised the power of regional/targeted ads - at least that I have been told many times over. I have never personally tried it but I am looking for an angle to do it with a regional partner - that is a separate story though. Anyway, the interface is reasonably intuitive. It does not capture ALL permeation in terms of location keywords, but it wold give you a good start. And, that is all that we can ask for in life, a good start.

3. Google match option wrapper

http://www.mikes-marketing-tools.com/cgi-bin/adwrapper.cgi

Why bother: well, if you have not heard my rant, let me just say that it is a worthy effort to include all three match options for every keywords - broad, phrase, and exact. The problem with the level of dedication is that it is painful to do manually. I constructed a macro using Word for the job, but that was still painful. Then, this site comes along and all you need to do is to plug in the broad match keywords and, voila, out comes all three permutations of the match options.

The truth is that I still manually add the match options on a day to day basis when it is just one or two keywords to add since it is a bit of hassle to open up another browser. But, for a mass job, this is definitely the ticket.

4. Statistically predictor on performance

http://splittester.com/index.php

Why bother: well, I think the original premise of the tool is to help you predict how your ad will perform relative to a benchmark ad with minimum data. Think of it as a way to predict the result of the A/B test. I actually have no idea what kind of statistical model they use in the backend. But, I think it is an interesting idea and until I am willing to sit down and figure out my own statistical prediction model, this is a good standby tool.

On a related front, I think the model can be expanded into additional usage than just comparing ad's. For example, why can't I use the same model to compare the number of click through vs conversion rate? I think these would be much more interesting.

5. Where do you rank on Google

http://www.nichebot.com

Why bother: Technically, this site offers mostly keywords related services. Which, to be honest, I have not really looked into. The last option on Google ranking, however, is a great tool. This is especially important if, like me, you are embarking on an SEO project and need to have a third party benchmark to see how things are coming along. My favorite part is that you just dump in all the keywords that you want to have ranked and just let it run in the background. It is not the fasting service. But, for the data provided, I do not mind the wait.


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