This presentation on "mobile search engine marketing" was given at the Buzz City mobile marketing conference on September 15th 2010 in Cape Town, South Africa. The presenter was Liam Gibbs, head of SEO at Quirk eMarketing.
1. Mobile Search Engine MarketingLiam Gibbs – 13 September 2010 Credit: Stuck in Customs http://www.flickr.com/photos/stuckincustoms/
2. What we’re going to cover Introduction to search marketing The nature of mobile search Mobile search engine optimisation (SEO) Mobile paid search (PPC)
3. What is search and search marketing? Search is how people get to content online Search traffic generally accounts for the majority of traffic to a website Search marketing covers those activities designed to leverage the volume and unique qualities of search traffic Activities include SEO and PPC
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5. Why is search traffic important? Search traffic is qualified traffic Search traffic is cost effective (high ROI)
6. The Mobile Search Space Credit: gaspi *yg http://www.flickr.com/photos/gaspi/
19. Majority of mobile searches are navigational, rather than informational, in nature Mobile users often know what they are looking for, they just need to know where to find it.
20. And they tend to use shorter, more generic phrases to search
21. Nielsen reports that mobile users are highly “search dominant”. The use search to navigate even if they already know the site they want to get to.
22. This means that at the very least, you need to get the basics right around your brand queries
40. Higher ranking is much more important on mobile as there are few (if any!) listings above the fold
41. Inbound links are still important but less important than conventional search Engagement is key - videos, apps, social content and map listings (views, reviews, comments & likes)
42. Universal search is growing: don’t forget the non text verticals (image, video, product, news, etc.) Optimise all your digital assets to rank, and thus maximise your potential to get organic traffic.
43. Adwords on Mobile Credit: Caro Wallis http://www.flickr.com/photos/carowallis1/
44. Don’t just flick the mobile switch, a separate campaign should be set up for mobile users Use the same architecture and tweak over time
45. Start with a lower CPC than your desktop campaign and adjust up. Mobile is generally cheaper, but can be more risky.
49. Mobile ads are shorter than a normal text ad – only 18 characters width and only 1 description line, not 2 Use phone numbers in adverts – mobile users like to call!
51. Reduce expectations – users are less likely to purchase from a mobile device – so give them a reason to come back on desktop or share (tweet, SMS share, email to friend)
Find stuff online - Sounds obvious – but search is what people use to get around on the Internet (statistic here)Majority – most sites I see have more than 50% search traffic. Obviously that increases once you begin SEM activities Point is – your customers are using search, and u gotta be where your customers are!SEO and PPC – will clarify shortly
Quicker run throughScreenshot shows to two types of search results – organic (on the left) – paid (here on the right)Ses don’t take payment to feature in organic (their business success is based on this). So that’s great cos its free if you can get itHowever they DO take payment to feature on the right. That’s great, because if you don’t’ feature here, you can put money into the google slot machine to feature here.SEO – aims to have your digital assests appear on the leftPPC – aims to have your ads appear on the rightGoogle loves us to work here – claims to not know much about here Their business interest. But not neccesarily ours.
Qualified – because users tell search engines what they want. If you can feature when someone is asking for something just like what you offer – this is great positioning, and the user is much more likely to convert, because they have expressed intent.High ROI – paid search is performance based – organic traffic is free
Weren’t a lot of people on the mobile web a few years ago. As we all know - that’s changing rapidly.Just like with the regular web – as people go online, they start to search. Prolifically.
You can see that risingsmartphone use is driving this trend – although less so in South Africa.BUT ... (next slide)
So if you have products that are based around weekend consumption (think entertainment) – remember this.
Stats w/ pinch of saltCan focus on leader, plus all have broadly the same goal
Understanding this is the key to leveraging mobile search effectively
Not spending hours and hours, researching on a whim, seeing what they can find ... so more goal driven search behaviour
This has implications for the way people search, and the types of things they search forDont always have the time or inclination to mess around
BUT ... Here’s the catch
And this has implications for how you tap into mobile search traffic
So, this has implications for your keyword research – optimise for shorter phrases
Example of www.domain.com among top referring keywords for many sites
What do you notice? Paid ads, all you can see at first, and only two
Map results. This is known as local search.How does Google decide to show map results? A specific locality (in this case Cape Town) is indicated.Incredibly useful for searchers, and local businesses.Some results – Google Places pages – no website neededSome results – websites that specify locationNote reviews – will get to that in more detail later
Now we get the organic results. Interesting point to note here. As with many categories, where the search term is general (Cape Town Hotels), you find aggregator sites dominating.This is because the search engine determines that these kinds of sites are a better match for your query – site about hotels in cape town better than sites about specific hotels in cape town
Important to remember what SE’s goals are in general
Given goal driven, ‘on the move nature’ of mobile searchers, the users location becomes MORE important to Ses in determining what results to show you.This can be specified in the search query, or inferred from IP (version of Google you’re using)
Local listings are called up when a user specifies location (eg plumber cape town)Used to be Google local business centre or something, now “Google Places”
Very important. Content has always been key in SEO. Remember that Ses drive to bring the most relevant useful results to the searcher.Content that is not properly formatted for mobile, that doesn’t render nicely on the mobile device being used, is far less likely to be judged as useful and relevant in mobile search. So pay attention to content quality and formating – right for mobile consumption AND deviceCurrently Google actually “encodes / transcodes” some content – that is FORMATs it, for mobile consumption, due to lack of properly formatted options. You don’t want someone else deciding how you should look – or to be left out when good alternatives arrive.
URLs – search engines prefer URL structures that indicate clearly what the page and context is about. DESCRIPTIVE, KEYWORD RICH, STATIC.Crawlers cant crawl past login formsSitemaps NB for communicating where all of your pages are to crawlers. Mobile web still young, search engines are still in the phase of relying to a degree on user submitted maps of sites to crawl.Non compliant code on mobile can cause more problems than in a regular browser – basically you have less room to mess up, WIDE RANGE of devices, make sure you are accessible to ALL
The point is to help the search engines understand that you’re a mobile site, and therefore should be considered for mobile search resultsLocal modifiers in tags ?Yoursite.mobi – mobi.yoursite.com – yoursite.com/m
Our experience – client creates mobile site, but their existing .co.za site has more authority and history, ranking. So desktop site beats the mobile site in the SERPs.That means check if a visitor to your normal site is on a mobile device. If you detect that, redirect them to the mobile site.That way, it won’t matter that your normal site ranks better than your mobi one, the user still gets where you need them to go.Also, offer links between the two. If anyone falls through the cracks, they can still find the right experience via the link.
Remember the slide I showed you where all you could see were two PPC campaigns above the fold?So high ranking NB – paid and organic.
Traditional SEO, links are hugely important as signals of the popularity (and hence importance) of a site. In mobile, there is less of a linked up web of information. Other signals such as user location may be given more weight. But - we feel they are still taken into account in ranking, and shouldn’t be ignored in your SEO plan for mobile.Engagement is increasingly a more relevant signal than links. We know that where views, comments etc. can be determined (eg YouTube) they help ranking, as for reviews on pages that mention local businesses. Also need to consider social search as big volume engines, and Facebook definitely takes engagement with content into account for ranking – but there, engagement by your friends!
Search results used to be just 10 text links and descriptions. Now, include images, videos, news results etc. all mixed in = UNIVERSAL / BLENDED results.Optimise all to get max coverage in the SERPsUsers can also focus on a vertical, and have only image / video results etc. – SEARCH VERTICALSOptimise all to take advantage of what is effectively an extra search market
Easier to monitor results, track spend, deliver mobile specific messages
Wait to see if it performs before bidding up
Structure campaigns according to granular targets – location, phone typeResults can be monitored per region / channel – spend can be adjusted
Different channels – track and spend differently
Can make tracking difficult, unless its a click to call - which is a really cool development in PPC which is great for mobile.
Change up keyword usage if necessary for mobile
Or visit your actual location – use in store surveys to check effectiveness of campaigns, offer vouchers etc
User experience very NB due to limitations of devices.
Referring primarily to Apple’s app store – but Android app store downloads growing – and this could apply to any app store or apps in generalJanine: what is an app store .. How does it work, case studies
With this kind of volume – search is going to be a factorGrowth rate for application stores is incredible. Depending on what analyst report you read, mobile app stores could be either a $2 billion or $7 billion marketplace by the end of this year, or a $17.5 billion market by 2012.
Engagement is the name of the game – the more views, comments, likes and positive ratings – the higher your asset is likely to rank
Engagement is one thing, but we suspect that getting a lot of engagement in a short space of time, is a signal of relevance to ranking algorithms, and will help you achieve front page app store rankings. The more love the app gets, the higher it ranks and you get a snowball effect. Using social is great for this. But your app has to be good.