One of Bob Dylan’s most famously quoted lyrics is, “For the times they are a-changin’” Never has that been more prevalent than in the world of internet marketing. Just a few years ago getting number one rankings on Google was relatively easy. We as internet marketing specialists can only look back at those times and think of the good old days of “low hanging fruit”. When Google started in 1998 the company indexed 26 million pages of content, by 2000 that number had reached 1 billion pages of content. As of 2008 there were well over 1 Trillion pages of indexed content on Google! That’s a lot of information to keep track of; more importantly a lot more competition for those marketing online.

With all of these additional pages, Google as well as other search engines, are constantly updating their algorithms to make searches more relevant and targeted to the user. Social search outlets as well as  semantic web software (improvements in the working relationship between computer and man) are some of the new trends with search engines and search marketing companies alike.

THE ERA OF SMART SEARCH ENGINES

Microsoft recently unveiled the new search engine Bing which works as a “decision search engine”. New features of Bing include video and image preview within the search results, local information that is personalized in the organic rankings (traffic, business listings, maps, reviews etc…) and instant answers. For example, current information will be displayed first in the organic listings for sports scores, finance, airline flight status’, celebrity news, new products/services and many other search terms. Bing, in essence, is making search results based more upon geotracking, recent search history, account/profile settings and currently published articles. Believe it or not Google keeps track a lot of what you search for. Other search engines like Yahoo, as well as industry specific vertical search engines are quickly adopting these new methods of indexing.  Internet marketing just got more complicated!

So what does this revolution in search engine indexing mean for businesses looking to get number one rankings? It means that a website can no longer solely focus on proper keyword text optimization. The term ‘Digital Asset Optimization’ has been thrown around some in the past years as a term to describe the practice of taking all of a company’s digital assets and promoting them through relevant marketing channels in addition to developing appropriate keyword and linking strategies. Digital Assets refers to various types of interactive media (video, image, audio, blog, podcast, ebook, webinar, RSS feed, news/pr, product/service, social media and networking sites). As of a few years ago only a few innovative search engine marketing firms adopted the use of Digital Asset Optimization, but in today’s economy more and more search marketing firms are jumping on board to stay ahead of the curve.

BROADENING SEARCH ENGINE OPTIMIZATION STRATEGIES

According to a Marketing Experiments Inc. estimate, in the future 90% of B2B buying communication will be through video. Tools are already on the market for consumers to create professional looking videos with ease. Today’s consumer wants to be entertained while quickly absorbing information to make smarter purchase decisions. It is up to us as SEO and SEM marketers to incorporate search engine optimization strategy into interactive media. The same rules do not apply to interactive media as they do with traditional SEO or SEM. A common rule of thumb in search marketing is to create and publish a lot of content. Creating a lot of quality rich content will not only gain a prospects trust but also look first-rate in the eyes of search engine spiders. Marketing online is not simply about creating content but building an online presence that extends to hundreds or thousands places on the web. Your content should be considered a brand extension of your company.

No matter what trends may come and go one thing will always remain constant: Content is King. The internet is no longer a digital storefront for an organization but rather a venue for a company to engage and interact with its customers. SEO Marketers need to be aware of the challenges of creating, branding, promoting and optimizing new forms of rich interactive content for their clients. For those search engine marketing agencies willing to take SEO and SEM to the next level the long-term rewards will be numerous.

Yours in Selling,

Paul J. Plvan
Principal
http://www.mercuryleads.com

The Future of Search Engine Optimization is a post from: Lead Generation Strategies: No Longer A One-Hit Wonder!

In today’s tough business environment it is increasingly important to do 2 things very well as you execute your demand generation process:

• Have a well executed multi-channel communications strategy
• Create a closed loop lead generation process that includes a planned lead nurturing process

As a B2B lead generation and sales lead company we see these 2 items most often missed or just overlooked by Marketing Executives working on lead generation strategies. As you can see below independent research companies have validated that this is a major mistake. Consider these facts:

• Closed loop lead management process including database segmentation, lead qualification, lead scoring, and lead nurturing leads to 50% pipeline growth.
• Well-executed multi-channel marketing campaigns generate a sales lift ranging from 7-34%.
• Companies that develop nurturing programs increase their average order value by 47%.
• An estimated 70-90% of all leads generated by marketing are never followed up by sales.

This is indeed sobering information for Marketing Executives and their lead generation campaigns. These tactical elements are generally considered the most vital part of any lead generation process, and we have realized even higher lift than this in client lead generation and demand generation processes so the payoff is obviously worth the effort.

Discipline is the operative word and a great deal of it is required. Whether implementing these processes in-house or using an external vendor your job just may depend on accomplishing these aspects of your sales lead generation program. You have to look at this through the eyes of your target prospect. The C-Suite is more and more involved in key purchasing decisions of the organization. They also have the least amount of time. Therefore your communications, and messaging for demand generation has to be expertly coordinated in order to gain top of mind awareness for your product or service. To use a Mercury Leads analogy you have to “fish where the fish are”, the CEO, CTO, or CFO can be found in the most remote estuaries.

The statistics listed above are common sense but with a little discipline your company can prosper when other organizations and competitors are stagnant. I’ve attached a link to a document we’ve compiled over the past several years something we call “Lead Generation Facts of Life“. By taking your campaigns to the next level and exercising common sense and discipline your lead generation strategies will enjoy a substantial increase in overall performance. For other helpful white papers please visit our website and of course we welcome your comments.

Yours in Selling,

Paul J. Plvan
Principal
http://www.mercuryleads.com

C-Suite Demand Generation is a post from: Lead Generation Strategies: No Longer A One-Hit Wonder!