Key findings:
..in most search marketing strategies; the emphasis is put on encouraging the purchase, while most people using search engines are more interested in anonymously gathering info - We believe this to be a fundamental disconnect.
to entice people to purchase online, the web vendor has to offer at least one significant advantage whether it’s price, selection or convenience. if all things are equal or even close to equal people will tend to avoid entering into a purchase process online
...women tended to scan all organic results and read titles and descriptions more carefully than men. An organic listing in the number 8 position on Google might not have been seen by almost half the men in the group, but would have been seen by the majority of the women. This is just one example of how one search marketing strategy won’t fit all prospective customers.
..people have already mentally divided the results page from their favorite engine into sections. These sections tend to be:
1) sponsored listings (in some cases, both at the top and along the side of the page)
2) above the fold organic results (free listings that appear without the user having to scroll down)
3) below the fold organic results (free listings that require scrolling down)
4) other features (such as Google’s news and shopping feed results, just above the organic results).
Not all these sections are treated equally by the user. Some, particularly the sponsored listings, are often skipped over by many users (over half the group) to go directly to the organic listings. Depending on the type of searcher and what they find in the organic results, they may or may not come back to sponsored listings after looking at the organic ones.
..eyes started to drop off as we moved to below the fold organic results and the sponsored results, with only 16.6% of users saying they check out sponsored listings, regardless of what they find in the organic results. 50% of users said they’d check out sponsored listings if they didn’t find anything relevant in organic results.
A typical search is a circular and complex process, with multiple interactions with sites and search engine results pages. The average online research interaction can involve 5 to 6 different queries and interactions with 15 to 20 different sites. Often, the actual contents of a search results page can cause the searcher to take the search in a totally different direction, launching a new query that is at best somewhat divergent from the original purpose of the search. Dead ends are common and the browser back button is used extensively to navigate through the search process. For this reason, the search engine results page is actually used as a navigation aid in negotiating the online research interaction, as people continually refer back to it and launch another online exploration from this starting point.
The long bits of findings.....
Building the Search Query: The Funnel Approach
Over 70% of participants indicated they like to start with a generic, inclusive keyphrase and narrow it down from there. Reasons for this included:
Not wanting to exclude potential quality sites by being too exclusive in the original search
By being broader, the searcher may find other options to help take the search in new directions by looking at the results
Being able to judge relevancy of the original findings and selectively increase relevancy by adding qualifying keyphrases
It’s easier and quicker to type in a broad, short phrase at the beginning
In this type of search pattern, looking at search volumes and typical conversion metrics can be misleading to many marketers.
For many searchers, the search becomes increasingly specific as they go through the searching process. As this happens, the chance of the searcher finding results that could lead to a conversion becomes greater and greater as the search progresses. However, the direction the search takes can be determined by the results found in the early, generic searches. For instance, in one case where a participant was looking for information on cruises, the searcher didn’t start out looking for either a Panama Canal Cruise or a Princess Cruise, but results found early in the search process led her to refine her search query in these directions. If awareness of these options hadn’t been introduced early in the search process, she would have never refined her search in these directions, leading to a likely conversion for Princess for a Panama Canal Cruise.
the Anonymity Threshold
Take...the cruise example used in the buying funnel, it wasn’t until the searcher had found the right destination, type of cruise and cruise line that they were ready to engage in the purchase process. For this reason, they were resistant to purchase process oriented incentives (i.e. discounts) until the very last.
The internet has become very popular as a research tool during the information gathering process because it appears to offer the ability to remain anonymous. Through search engines, you can gather a lot of information quickly and you don’t have to enter into a situation where you surrender your anonymity until you choose to. We believe this is the reason there is a significant drop off between people willing to use the Internet to research a purchase decision and people willing to use it to purchase online. This drop off has been identified by a number of ecommerce studies. The purchase requires people to cross the anonymity threshold and they’re not prepared to do that. They know once they surrender contact information, they will likely be contacted by the vendor and be engaged in a purchase transaction. The consumer wants to do this according to their timing, not the vendors.
An interesting example of a violation of the anonymity threshold was presented by the use of online real time, real person sales chat tools such as HumanClick and Groopz. At first glance, these tools seemed a great answer to the impersonal nature of the Internet. You could watch visitors navigate through your site and if they wished, they could click on a button and initiate a real time chat with a sales person. As long as vendors stayed on this side of the fence, and let the visitor initiate the session, there was no problem. The challenge came when the vendor “pushed” a chat window to visitors, offering assistance. Almost without exception, the visitors left immediately. We, along with a few other vendors we talked to, found that the minute we crossed over the threshold and made visitors aware that they were being watched, they quickly left our site.
People won’t cross the threshold until they have no option. If given the choice between getting information and remaining anonymous and getting the information through registering, people will always choose the former. This creates a bit of a dilemma for the marketer, because generally the key metric is measuring against acquired or converted visitors. Almost every definition of an acquisition or conversion requires the visitor to cross the anonymity threshold. Because of the reluctance of the visitor to cross this threshold, the site owner may be building significant brand equity or trust with the visitor but is not giving credit to it because of the anonymity threshold.
In order to entice people to purchase online, the web vendor has to offer at least one significant advantage, whether it’s price, selection or convenience. If all things are equal or even close to equal, people will tend to avoid entering into a purchase process online.
In looking at most search marketing strategies; the emphasis is put on encouraging the purchase, while most people using search engines are more interested in anonymously gathering information. I believe there’s a potential disconnect here that more search marketers have to give some serious thought to.
Conversion
when participants wanted to search for vacation opportunities. Often they
went directly to a travel portal and, in many cases, never did use a search engine.
In big ticket purchases, there is likely extensive research done, often involving multiple online
research sessions and repeated use of search engines. The search process and the queries
used are usually much more involved and diverse than in smaller ticket purchases.
For example, offering a product brochure, a vacation planning guide, or competitive comparison
charts were all conversion methods likely to attract a researcher. We cover more about observed
conversion behavior in Post Click Behaviors and the Anonymity Threshold.
In cases of small ticket purchases, there would generally only be one online research session and
the path to conversion is much shorter and more direct. There is also a greater likelihood of
online conversion.
Gender...marked variation in search patterns has to be understood by marketers in formulating their
marketing plans. When looking for reasons why women as a group appear to search differently
than men, we believe the reason is analogous to distinct shopping patterns in both genders. For
the sake of clarity, think about shoppers entering a mall. Some go directly to a store, buy an item
and leave. When applying this behaviour to a search engine, these would be similar to the Scan
and Clickers or the 2 Step Scanners. Others shop several stores, compare prices and deliberate
over the buying decision. These individuals enjoy the shopping experience. Again, drawing
parallels to the search profiles, this group would be similar to the Deliberate Researchers or the
1,2,3 Searchers. I think most agree that the first group is generally predominantly male, while the
second group is predominantly female.
1 out of 2 people believe that all search results are tainted to some extent by commercialism.
We also found that Google users tended to have the best understanding of which were paid and
what were organic results.
The Above the Fold Organic Results were the “prime real estate” on the search engine results
page. All 24 participants checked these 2 or 3 top organic rankings. One participant (a Scan and
Clicker) indicated that he usually went straight to sponsored links for a commercial search, but
still looked at the top organic results. If there was a highly relevant and trusted site in these top 3,
it would likely draw clicks from almost 100% of the participants and, if the site met their needs,
they might never return to the search engine results page.
19 of the participants (79%) either didn’t look at the sponsored links at all, or only looked at them
after they had gone through the organic results. We found that Google users were the ones most
likely to skip over the sponsored results.
To me this indicates that any PPC etc search campaign budget is better spent at sites other than google except on premium sponsored listings in the 2 top of page positions...while organic seo remains top priority...and here is why...
found that Google has created an inherent contradiction between their mission and their business model that results in a interesting dynamic with their users.
Google, in their drive to continually enhance the search experience, have always maintained a
sharp distinction between paid and organic search results. To their credit, this is one of the
contributing factors to their success and large market share. Sponsored ads are very easy to
identify on Google. For this reason, users who prefer to ignore sponsored ads tend to be drawn to
Google, because of this ease of identification. Generally, we found users of Google more likely to
be resistant to looking at sponsored ads than on other engines. There was a general perception
that Google’s organic results were the least commercially tainted ones of all the major engines.
While the percentage of users looking at sponsored listings seems to be less on Google,
advertisers can’t ignore the fact that this clear delineation of search results attracts more users,
so in fact by using Google you capture a smaller percentage of a much larger market.
..Google results page,where the similarly formatted AdWords were also ignored by searchers. In effect, Google was
training its users how to ignore its own advertising. This, together with the point below, could explain the greater likelihood on the part of users to scan the premium sponsored listings in the 2 top of page positions.
research search
• Product information: features, comparisons, reviews, prices, Reports
• The exact query in the Title and Description
• Trusted sources of information, i.e. Consume
• Trusted brand names and vendors
• Trusted URL’s
Purchase search
• Offer product information: features, comparisons, reviews, prices
• The exact query in the Title and Description
• Trusted brand names and vendors
• Promises of added value: discounts, free shipping, etc
• Ability to buy online
• Trusted URL’s
relevancy is a key factor in catching the searchers eye …seeing their exact search query in the title (preferably) or in bold type in the listing text caused the listing to “jump out” at the searcher.
attitude towards price information changed as the searcher got closer to the buying decision. Earlier in the research phase, price was important to ensure that the product was “within budget”. As the actual purchase drew closer, searchers then were searching to find the best price...
...certain listings drew a disproportionate number of clicks if they appeared within search results pages. For instance, if a Consumer Reports page or a product review from a well known industry publication or site for the prime key phrases in
e search engine results page, industry publication or site appeared during the research phase in the top 3 or 4 organic listings, they were almost guaranteed a 50% plus click through rate. The same was true to a lesser extent
for listings from very familiar vendors. These names caught the searchers attention and built instant trust, giving a much greater likelihood of click through.
For marketers, it’s important to see if these category killersand, if so, to devise strategies to work around them. By clearly
understanding what the searcher is looking for, it is often possible to minimize the effects of a click through Category Killer.
posted by Jen @ 6:11 AM
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