General Adspend up 10 Percent in 2004

9 Mar 2005

BtoB Online reports that TNS Media Intelligence released figures showing that marketers spent $141.1 billion in the U.S. in 2004, up 9.8 percent over the previous year. The internet grew the fastest, as is customary, it's growth rate reaching 21.4 percent. Outdoor advertising came a very close second, growing 20.1 percent, followed by syndication (up 15.8 percent) and cable (up 13.8 percent). Procter & Gamble and General Motors again topped the list of spending marketers, approaching $3 billion each. Time Warner came in a distant third, although its media properties typically book a great deal of barter between themselves, making that company's true expenditures harder to calculate.

If adspend is up, I would be interested in seeing what the channel breakdown was in terms of source; ppc, banner, etc.

San Diego Search Marketer in Dallas, TX

Thankfully, I am in Dallad right now, waiting out for my flight back to San Diego. It's nice to be headed home after enduring the weather of New York City without a winter coat. If you saw someone wearing just a button down in the blistering winds of Manhattan, that was me. I should be updating my blog with some notes and articles about the conference. I will not be straight posting any information because of the coverage by SERoundtable. Here is a little excerpt from a document I am putting together:

All of the sessions seemed to have this theme of track everything and measure. Define your goals from the beginning, plan for the long term and test. If it's as simple as these three things then creating an online marketing strategy for your business should be just that, simple.
Yet there are a lot of nuances in each vertical within each business. Are you B2B, B2C or do you really know what your unique selling point is? One of the important things to remember when deciding on how to handle your overall searchmarketing budget is not to see each component as that, separate. Not only can you find data in your PPC campaigns to help refocus your organic seo efforts, but shifting dollars to support the method that is converting for you is the key. And doing it at the right time, whether seasonal or promotional. It's not a matter of spend a % of this on that and a % of that on this, but a cohesive set of tools to strengthen your search marketing strategy.

Lee Odden, from Top Rank, had these thoughts following the conference: Online Marketing Blog: SES NYC post mortem

So I've been missing out on posting on the daily nuances of the SES in NYC. I swear the wireless connection at the Hilton is horrible. I am paying $9.95 a day for a connection that haven't had until now...I will be super-posting my notes from the sessions I attended chock full of little comments of my own. There has really been this buzz of unintentional viral marketing going on in each session. Think about it, you develop a tool that is used by a marketer in the Search industry,if it's useful and they are using it; you can guarantee they are mentioning it in their Powerpoints or during the Q&A part of the sessions. There are so many levels of marketing and advertising going on, it's overwhelming. If you are a business owner contemplating jumping on the Search wagon, you should be here. The networking opportunities are endless as well as the insurmountable stack of business cards you will have acquired by the end of the day on thursday. I've been exchanging cards with so many business owners, analytics firms, other SEMs', independent link developers; needless to say my stack is growing. That stack could potentially include a strategic partner, client or just a lot of great contacts. There still is some power in print advertising or if you're really cool plastic advertising collateral. Tonight is the MSN party and if it is anything like the Yahoo party or better yet, Avenue A/Razorfish was very well done. I'm off to network and get a bite to eat and later tonight I will post session notes/feedback.

Search Engine Strategies in New York 2005

I landed in NYC today from San Diego, CA and I have to say, it is freezing here...35 degrees? Had some good times at the Hilton lounge talking about industry drama, global SEO and oh yeah, finally had a good slice from Ray's Pizza. Left at the Hilton, next left, on your left. Hmm? 3 lefts I guess.
I will be posting everynight with some interesting info from the sessions I attend.

Small Business Approach to Integrated Search Engine Marketing

So it seems someone likes my writing and level of intuition. This is my first article written for Search Engine Guide and I will be featuring articles every quarter on this site. Everything from integration of PR and Natural Search to PPC: Why are we spending so much on unqualified leads to SEM: What is it?

Oh yeah thanks to all of my writing professors and English teachers back at good old Haddon Township High School in Westmont, NJ. I guess those grammar test and vocabulary quizzes finally paid off.

SMA-UK Has Been Born

So when are you coming to the USA

The Search Marketing Association ­ UK is to be officially formed!

We gave ourselves 6 months to achieve the necessary level of interest required to properly form a registered Trade Association and, thanks to the applicants, have reached our target within 4 months!

At a meeting of the Steering Committee held on 15th February it was decided that we should formally proceed with the formation of SMA-UK as an official body.

Now we are officially forming, all Steering Committee members are standing down and elections to the SMA-UK Committee have to take place from the membership. So, I’m delighted to say this is my last message to you as Acting President of the association!

If you haven’t joined yet but keep meaning to do it, please do so soon. Your vote (and participation) is important.

The timetable for elections is as follows:

Nominations for being on the committee must be in by March 31st, 2005. Members can nominate individuals they would like to see on the committee or, of course, nominate themselves.

By April 18th candidates and their biographies plus balloting details will be published online.

On May 2nd the ballot will be closed. The vote will be by single transferable vote administered by the Electoral Reform Society who will give the results by May 9th. At the same time as the 8 committee members are announced a further ballot paper for the positions of President and Vice-President will be published from those committee members willing to go forward for these positions. This vote will be completed by 20th May and will be on a “first past the post” voting system with the person with the most votes becoming President and the runner-up Vice President.

The results will be announced at the meeting we plan to have at Search Engine Strategies in London at the beginning of June.

Prior to that meeting we will be:

• Ensuring the website has the latest developments published!
• Officially registering our trade association with the relevant authorities.
• Getting quotations for hiring a professional (part-time initially) Director General familiar with the administration of trade associations for the new Committee to consider.
• Continue discussions (which have already commenced) with the British Standards Institute (BSI) on defining professional standards which will be internationally recognised, to be applied to our industry subject to membership approval. The BSI have already provisionally agreed to attend our first meeting to get feedback from members on how (and if) we should proceed with defining standards.
• Start development of the SMA-UK website to include information for both members and non-members on search marketing related resources and statistics relevant to the UK search marketing community and those interested in using the medium of search marketing. We would like to form a sub-group to assist in content development and, if you would be interested, then please join SMA-UK and help the development.
• Ammon is also working on developing training and we will be announcing further working groups in different areas on the SMA-UK website which you may find of some interest. Similarly, if you would like to see concentration in a specific areas (affiliate marketing and PPC are areas that spring to mind) then members are able to put these ideas forward.

At last, our Association is being formed. Over the past few months SMA organisations modelled on our UK format have started development in Europe, North America, Latin America, Japan and Australasia!

We hope that we can continue to lead the way in showing how a truly representative organisation can benefit its members and the buying public who are now considering search marketing as an ever more important media buy.

With that over, I can formally start bowing out as Acting President. I look forward to handing over to someone the members have chosen, democratically, and sitting comfortably at the back of the room ­ out of the 'hot seat'!

Kind regards
Barry Lloyd

Acting President
SMA-UK
www.sma-uk.org

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Top 10 Search Engines for 2004

According to Nielsen//NetRatings, here are the top 10 search destinations (US, home and work) 12 months later in December 2004:

Brand or Channel Unique Audience (000) Active Reach (%)
Google 67,123 44.85
Yahoo! Search 47,917 32.02
MSN Search 37,684 25.18
AOL Search 25,447 17.00
Ask Jeeves 11,674 7.80
Information.com 11,513 7.69
Overture 5,726 3.83
Netscape Search 4,587 3.06
InfoSpace Web Search 4,280 2.86
Microsoft Search 4,273 2.86

If Yahoo News and Google News were classified as search destinations, a list of the top 10 search engines in December 2004 would have looked like this:

Brand or Channel Unique Audience (000) Active Reach (%)
Google 67,123 44.85
Yahoo! Search 47,917 32.02
MSN Search 37,684 25.18
AOL Search 25,447 17.00
Yahoo News 21,337 14.26
Ask Jeeves 11,674 7.80
Information.com 11,513 7.69
Google News 6,431 4.30
Overture 5,726 3.83
Netscape Search 4,587 3.06

Popular Valentine's Day Searches

According to The Lycos 50, Valentine's Day searches increased 172 percent last week. Pay particular attention to No. 9. It looks like gifts for him made the list, but gifts for her did not.

Top Valentine's Day Searches

• 1. Valentine's Day animated e-cards


• 2. Valentine Lingerie


• 3. V-Day Clip art


• 4. Valentine's Day Flowers


• 5. Valentine Star


• 6. Valentine Chocolate


• 7. Valentine Day Gift Basket


• 8. Valentine's Day Wear


• 9. Valentine gifts for him


• 10. Valentine's Day Greetings

Online Advertising and Internet Marketing for under $100

Is setting up a profitable means of advertising possible for $100 or under? In the following post, we'll tell you hos to do it and succeed on your shoe-string marketing budget. And a great way to do it is to start right here, at our advertising-marketing targeted blog.

Useful Budget Online Marketing Methods and Strategies

• PrWeb allows you to setup, optimize and distribute your very own custom press releases for a nominal $80. This allows you to be a "featured release" as well as have your release distributed to various media outlets like eMediaWire, Yahoo News, Google News and any site that may subscribe to PrWeb's RSS feeds.


• Blog Marketing: You can either buy media placement on a topic specific blog that relates to your business or setup your own blog, creating a network for potential leads. Just don't buy ads on blogs about pink flowers if you are selling pipe-fitting supplies. Relevancy?


• Monthly Newsletters


• Viral Marketing


• White Papers


• Sweepstakes and Contests