As explained in my last article, search engines can tell you a lot about your customers. Specifically, I shared a few tools that enable marketers to identify buyer needs, emerging market trends, and competitive threats.

Today, I’ll cover another (free) tool that can help you understand your customers’ entire search process, and the best ways to capitalize on this data to improve marketing results.

Expand your keyword focus

One of the most common mistakes B2B search marketers make is researching only those keywords that are directly related to their company. A tremendous amount of time and energy goes into analyzing keywords associated with their brand, products and services.

Perhaps it is not intuitive to think beyond your own keywords. But, marketers should really be asking, “What else are my customers looking for, and how can I address their broader set of needs?”

Understanding the relationship between searches related to your company and all the other things your prospects look for – can provide some valuable marketing clues.

The search funnel

One of my favorite tools, the search funnel, is part of Microsoft AdCenter Labs. This type of tool shows what people searched for either immediately before (incoming) or after (outgoing) a specific query.

Here is what the Microsoft Search Funnel interface looks like:

Search funnel data

Let’s take a look at some search funnel data related to Verizon, a company regularly listed as one of the largest B2B advertisers.

By running a series of search funnel queries for outgoing searches, you can see that the most common search made immediate after a query for “verizon” is a search for “verizonwireless”. This makes sense. People start with the brand name, and then move to a search for the service.

Perhaps more insightful is the data for a search oerformed after “verizonwireless”. Amazingly, four out of five of the most popular next searches are for a competitive service. This type of data really verifies that prospects do indeed use search engines for product comparison purposes.

How can a marketer capitalize on this? Think about how to best meet peoples’ needs as they move through their search process. What about promoting a wireless service comparison chart in your PPC ads and on your landing page? This clearly seems to be what most Verizon wireless prospects are looking for. This type of marketing message anticipates prospects’ needs and will likely boost response and ultimately, conversion rate.

Another example

Let’s review some search funnel data for the popular small business accounting software, Quickbooks.

By looking at outgoing search data, you can see that people who search for “quickbooks” are also interested in these four things:

1. Learning about the parent company (Intuit)
2. Understanding the differences between various Intuit products (Quicken, QuickBooks, Quick Books Pro)
3. Finding where to purchase the product (Staples, Office Depot, Office Max)
4. Comparing Quickbooks to competitive software (Peachtree)

How could a marketer capitalize on this? My first thought is that the PPC ads and corresponding landing page for the keyword “quickbooks” should include items like: a table that allows people to quickly compare features and functions of various Intuit products, a competitive comparison chart, a retailer locator function, and a link to information on Intuit.

Capitalize on the search process

Searching is (usually) a process. This is especially true for B2B companies and firms with long, complex sales cycles.

Search funnel data can be used to anticipate needs, provide truly helpful information, and associate your brand with prospects’ needs as they move through the process.

Marketers must strive to learn more about how their customers search. In addition to keywords directly related to your company… what are your prospects looking for?

Forget about your SEO investment. Disregard your PPC budget. B2B marketers should be asking themselves, “Am I getting all I can from search engines... for free?” Consider this: searching is the second most popular online activity today — second only to email. In fact, comScore (August 2009) estimates that Google alone handles 304 million searches a day. Given this large volume of activity, search engines can tell you a lot about your customers.

Today, I’ll discuss several easy-to-use tools that provide meaningful insights into your customers’ needs, emerging market trends, and competitive market threats.

Market research at a price you can afford!

Web analytics tools provide insight into the people who have already found your website. Alternatively, search engines can tell you about the entire online population. In fact, this collective set of data can be viewed as a gigantic, publicly available research study; your very own focus group. And all at no charge!

Every year, marketers spend millions of dollars on research in order to determine how customers think; what they are looking for; and how people view a company relative to the competition. I propose that many of these insights can be gleaned from (free) search data.

Customer needs and terminology

One of the most interesting things you can learn from search engines is how people actually think about (and search for) your products and services. A very simple but effective tool is Google Trends. Marketers are able to analyze relative search volume, for multiple queries, in various locations, over time.

So, for example, a B2B network provider might want to determine the specific language used most often when prospects search. Perhaps the marketing department is focused on messages related to “high speed internet” but the sales force suspects that more people think in terms of “broadband services”.

A simple query in Google Trends will quickly indicate exactly what people are looking for. This chart shows relative US search volume for these two queries over the past 12 months. It also indicates major news events (the letters in the boxes) that might influence general interest and search volume.

We can quickly see that significantly more people are looking for information related to “broadband” than high speed internet. This knowledge can help marketers craft meaningful messages and run campaigns that are better aligned with customer needs and terminology.

The analysis can be further expanded upon by using numerous, free, keyword research tools. For example, the Google Search-based Keyword Toolallows a marketer to enter a relevant website URL or a target keyword and receive many more related search phrases.

Entering “business broadband” returns these additional search queries (and more) with relative estimated monthly search volume:

This data reflects how customers think and specifically what they are looking for. Marketers can utilize this information to better align marketing messages (both online and off) with customer terminology.

New market trends

Search tools can also be used to identify market trends and competitive threats. For instance, let’s analyze search queries related to the business networking service, Linked In. Take a look at search volume for “linked in” in the US from 2004 to 2009:

Virtually unheard of in 2004, and with only minimal interest in ‘05 and ‘06, the popularity of Linked In has skyrocketed since 2007. Any company even remotely associated with the business-networking industry should (at a minimum) be aware of, and hopefully capitalizing on, this phenomenon.

This example shows how search engines can provide early clues to changing behavior. Marketers must ask themselves how to best capitalize on this knowledge. What does the enormous popularity of Linked In mean to your business? How could you be using this service with respect to your marketing efforts, sales contacts, suppliers, partners and current customers?

Competitive threats

Lastly, search data provides insights into current and emerging competitive threats. Let’s compare the relative interest in various small business accounting packages. We’ll look at US search volume over several years for queries such as: Peachtree, QuickBooks, and Microsoft Dynamics.

At a glance, we can see that the QuickBooks and Peachtree brands have a similar level of search activity (with QuickBooks being slightly more popular). Microsoft Dynamics is significantly less popular and really didn’t become a competitive factor until mid-2005.

I recommend that B2B marketers use monitoring tools (a very simple option is Google Alerts) to keep track of news events related to current and potential competitors and periodically compare search volume to determine growing or waning market interest.

This type of analysis can be conducted on competitive company names as well as competing product and service brands. Search data can be analyzed for a specific city, metro area, state, country, or globally. Trends can be viewed across many years or behavior can be analyzed on an annual basis.

Mine the gold

Search tools provide insights into actual, real-time online behavior. B2B marketers who capitalize on this gold mine of knowledge can better align marketing messages with specific customer needs — thus, increasing response rate and improving overall marketing results.

What you can learn from the hundreds of millions of searches that take place each day?

It’s amazing how few companies can tell you what an online lead is really worth. I’ve found that most marketers embrace the lower is better philosophy. But, is a low-cost lead generation strategy always the best choice?

I contend that there is an optimal lead cost for every company. Establishing the right cost-per-lead model involves testing the market relationship between volume and cost… and ultimately must be driven by ROI.

Continually reducing cost-per-lead

Many B2B search marketing programs are designed to drive prospects to online contact or registrations forms. A common way to manage these campaigns is to drive cost/registration lower and lower, over time. Of course, one must ask: what is happening to volume with this strategy? How many potential registrations are being left on the table?

The cost/volume relationship

Undoubtedly, there is a relationship between lead cost and lead volume, but typically it is not linear. Let’s use a B2B pay-per-click (PPC) campaign as an example.

If 50 leads per month cost $2,500 ($50/lead) twice as many leads will not necessarily cost $5,000 (still $50/lead). It is common for lead cost to increase as investment increases. Why? With a very small budget you can milk all possible efficiencies out of a PPC campaign. As spend grows, budgets and bids are increased and a wider keyword net is cast. All of this will likely generate more leads but at a higher overall, average cost/lead.

The marketing efficiency curve

Each marketer must test this “PPC efficiency curve”, understanding the volume/cost relationship for their particular market. As campaigns are being optimized, data is been gathered, and marketers must analyze their options.

For example, would you rather have 100 leads per month at an average cost of $50/lead, or 150 leads per month at an average cost of $80? True: $80 is more expensive than $50 — but, depending on factors such as lead-to-sale ratio and the average profit margin associated with a sale, an eighty dollar lead might be the best choice. In fact, a savvy marketer might be willing to spend much more per lead, based on ROI.

Finding the optimal lead cost

Marketers who expend the time, energy and effort required to estimate the value of an online lead have a big advantage over their competition when navigating the marketing efficiency curve. Instead of focusing solely on driving cost/lead down, these savvy marketers focus on maximizing lead volume at an acceptable (profitable) cost/lead.

Where is the sweet spot for your company? I urge B2B marketers to test the market and find the optimal balance between lead volume and lead cost, based on ROI.

Much has been written about B2B search marketing programs designed for lead generation and customer acquisition purposes. For lead gen efforts, success metrics typically focus on volume of leads, cost per lead, and quality of lead. Many B2B marketers are starting to question this simplistic approach and are no longer willing to ignore the opportunity costs associated with not showing up in relevant search results, even if a listing doesn’t immediately produce an inquiry, lead or customer.

The value of search visibility

When a highly-qualified prospect proactively searches for information that is absolutely relevant to your product or service and your firm is nowhere to be found on the results page, how does this ultimately impact bottom line business results? No doubt about it, the value of search visibility can be very hard to determine.

Although difficult to measure, I believe that search visibility must not be ignored. Unfortunately, this is exactly what most B2B search marketers are doing today: focusing exclusively on lead generation and customer acquisition metrics at the expense of all other search marketing benefits.

I have recently been involved in several online lead gen campaigns that left marketing executives feeling short-changed. Even with stellar results around inquiries, contacts and leads, marketers started to question this myopic approach and begin wondering about additional potential benefits (and costs) associated with their search marketing efforts.

Cornerstone keywords

As search marketers know all too well, executives often conduct test searches and branded vanity searches just to see how their firm stacks-up relative to the competition. Often, these leaders are perplexed by the results they see and wonder why their firm isn’t showing up in a top position (organic or paid) for the most obvious, popular keywords in their industry. Shouldn’t these words be the cornerstone of any sound search marketing program?

But, experienced search marketers realize that the most popular, obvious keywords also tend to be the most expensive and don’t necessarily convert the best. Therefore, search marketers who are managing lead gen efforts, are usually not focusing on the most obvious words and phrases.

Rather, they focus their firm’s investment on the phrases that generate the highest volume of registrations, leads, or customers at an acceptable cost. Bottom line: lead gen programs are not focused on visibility, branding or market positioning.

Think beyond leads and customers

Perhaps it’s time for a new paradigm.

I find that it is always worthwhile to ask executives their opinion regarding the top 2-5 most important search phrases for their company. You may be surprised by their responses! Yet, B2B marketers should realize that these phrases are what executives view as important, and these are the words they will be watching and searching for.

So, even if you’re running a lead gen-oriented program, it is important to have some dialogue around this and make a business discussion about the importance of being visible for these search queries — regardless of lead generation or customer acquisition results.

Broaden your success metrics

I suggest that in addition to the standard lead and customer goals, B2B marketers also determine visibility, market positioning, response, and engagement metrics.

For example, visibility and branding goals should be set for only the most important words and phrases. Success metrics include: organic visibility score, average organic position, number of ad impressions, average ad position, and advertising market share.

Competitive positioning goals are very similar, but would measure your firm’s visibility relative to a few select competitors.

Market response goals primarily measure the percentage of viewers who click on organic or paid listings. Key metrics include click-through-rate (CTR), cost-per-click, and number of visitors.

Website engagement goals focus on what happens after the click. Metrics could be average time-on-site, number of pages viewed, visits to a specific page, and use of an online feature or function.

Tell the whole story

Most marketers agree that all of the above events or actions are valuable, but that this value is difficult to estimate. My suggestion is, at a minimum, take the value of a lead or a customer, and assign a very small portion of that value to each impression, each click (visitor), and each desired website interaction.

Marketers should report these secondary success metrics in addition to the lead gen and customer acquisition data you are already focused on.

The cost of NOT showing up

Most B2B marketing executives would be appalled at the suggestion that they skip their industry’s biggest trade show or stop advertising in the most popular trade publication, even though the value of these efforts can be hard to measure. Yet, they don’t manage their search marketing programs based on the same type of overarching, integrated marketing strategy.

B2B search marketers must ask themselves is search visibility really just icing on the cake or is there a more significant opportunity cost associated with not showing up?

The goal of many B2B search marketing programs is to generate online inquiries and leads. Search engine optimization (SEO) and pay-per-click (PPC) programs are designed to find highly-qualified prospects and drive them to targeted landing pages where people register to receive valuable information or complete contact forms. Below I share five simple yet effective tips to improve landing pages and registration forms – two critical elements of any lead gen program.

Offer choices and bundle assets When it comes to searching people are looking for different things and value various types of information. Preferences may be based on the person’s business role, personal knowledge, or where they are in the research and buying process.

For instance, some prospects are interested in market trends and industry research. Some prefer educational webinars, whitepapers or podcasts. While others are looking for video presentations or flash demos.

I’ve previously written about the importance of offering choices. This allows marketers to appeal to more prospects. I also recommend combining multiple assets into a valuable reference kit. Then, promote this compilation of resources via your ad copy and landing pages.

Show and tell. I’ve learned that people like to see what they are getting before they go through the effort to get it. It’s true: a picture is worth a thousand words. B2B search marketers should take a page from the product marketing play book. Make it tangible. Include a screenshot from the software download, a picture of the whitepaper cover & table of contents, or a short clip from the video demo.

Additionally, write a great description. Tell people (exactly) what is being offered. Download white paper is not specific or compelling! Prospects are trying to determine if your registration form is worth the effort. Give them a “sneak preview” of what’s to come, and describe the benefits associated with the asset. Answer their primary question,What’s in it for me?

For example, a compelling description for a whitepaper might be: see how CompanyXYZ automated call center workflow and improved effectiveness by 25% in 6 weeks.

Play the name game It seems obvious, but many marketers don’t think to test what they call these downloadable assets. Could the same piece of information be titled Product Tour, Virtual Tour, or Product Demo? Probably. Give it a test. I’ve seen radical changes in download rates… simply by changing a name.

Keep it short and sweet. I can’t say it enough. The #1 mistake most B2B marketers make is not testing simplified registration and contact forms. I urge you to test all aspects of these forms, including the number of fields, the order of the questions, optional vs required items, and the location of the form on the page.

In my opinion, the purpose of a registration form should be to engage prospects and start a dialogue. Sure, you want the inquiries to be reasonably qualified, but let your lead nurturing and management process do the heavy lifting. Online forms should not be used to replace the entire sales qualification process.

Testing proves that there is a direct correlation between length and complexity of a form and the abandon rate. The more information you require, the more people will bail.

Also, some pieces of information are more sensitive than others. First name, last name, email and zip code are pretty common and non-intrusive. However, conversion rate drops off substantially when you require phone number.

Build trust Remember, visitors don’t know your company as well as you do. Customer testimonials, industry awards and client case studies are all great ways to build credibility.

I also recommend providing a link to your privacy policy — right next to your registration form. Although rarely clicked on, a privacy policy increases visitors’ trust, making prospects more willing to share personal information.

Iterative testing is the key B2B search marketers must engage in an ongoing, iterative testing process designed to continually improve landing pages and registrations forms. The market data collected will allow your business to determine an acceptable balance between lead volume and the degree of qualification associated with each registration.

Take a good hard look at your landing pages and forms. Try to do this through the eyes of a new potential prospect.

Would you click SUBMIT?

Patricia Hursh is president and founder of SmartSearch Marketing, a Boulder, Colorado-based search engine marketing agency. You can reach Patricia at patricia@smartsearchmarketing.com. The Strictly Business column appears Wednesdays at Search Engine Land.

Many B2B marketers are frustrated by their inability to reach executive-level decision makers. Recent research indicates they needn’t look further than the internet. Let’s explore how marketers can utilize search engines to easily and cost-effectively reach executives online.

The B2B marketing challenge

When Forrester asked B2B Marketers about their top marketing challenges, the #1 issue identified (in the 2006 B2B Marketing Effectiveness Survey) was difficulty reaching decision makers… identified by 54% of those surveyed.

For firms selling expensive, high-consideration products and services, such as enterprise software solutions, marketers need to reach and influence C-level executives as part of a long, interactive sales process.

Trusted sources of information

A study just released by Forbes.com and Gartner focuses on C-level executive behavior. The research concludes that the Internet continues to be the most influential and important source of business information for C-level executives around the world. (Much to the disappointment of the newspaper industry!).

Highlights from the research include:

• 67% of C-level executives say the Internet is their most important source of business information.

• Senior executives research competitors and industry trends online daily.

Executives’ use of search engines

Several years ago Forbes published a more detailed study entitled A Day in the Life of CEOs Online. The survey looked at Web usage of CEOs and senior-level managers at large companies (with a thousand or more employees).

The report indicates strong C-level usage of search engines, as supported by the following facts:

• 54 percent conduct online researches

• 34 percent say they go to the Web first to find information on a product or service
• 86 percent use search engines

This propensity for online research seems to apply to executives at small and medium-sized companies as well. According to a study by Bredin Business Information, when asked where they are most likely to start looking for information to manage or grow their business, 48% of SMB executives identified search engines as their starting point (results are based on an online survey of 338 business executives at companies with 500 or less employees).

Focus on Google

No doubt about it: the internet, and specifically search engines, play a critical role in executives’ decision making process.

B2B marketers should also know that business searchers prefer Google even more than the general public. A study by Enquiro in September of 2007 indicates that a whopping 72% of business searchers identified Google as their search engine of choice.

Understand how executives search

So what does all this mean for B2B marketers? How can you capitalize on executives’ online behaviors?

First, understand how executives search. Do some search query (keyword) analysis. In general, executives are interested in broad, strategic topics, and tend to focus on information such as industry research, market trends, competitive insights, new capabilities, and future predictions.

Second, B2B marketers must make sure that your company is (A) visible when these types of searches are conducted, and (B) that your message is relevant. Does your search listing—paid or organic—include strategic information and a compelling call to action that would appeal to an executive?

Pay particular attention to Google and also investigate any industry-specific search engines, directories, or portals that your target audience would likely use.

Align your messages with executives’ needs

Make sure your PPC ads, organic listings, and landing pages clearly position your firm as a strategic partner. Provide downloadable assets such as industry research reports, market trend analyses, and strategic competitive assessments. In other words, don’t present executives with a “free shipping” message!

The data is in. Executives are online. Executives are searching. Are you capitalizing on this behavior?

B2B marketers: Utilize search marketing to proactively position your firm as executives’ strategic partner of choice.

Much time and energy has been devoted to improving PPC campaigns and SEO programs for B2B websites. The basic premise of advertising and optimization is to improve visibility and response, i.e., get that click! But, I’ve noticed recently that many marketers are focusing their initial marketing efforts not on getting more clicks, but rather on improving what happens after the click. Now, to be fair, improving landing pages to maximize conversion is nothing new.

But, what I find interesting is that many marketers are now investing in conversion improvement before they are willing to spend any money at all on PPC or SEO. In other words, they want to improve website effectiveness before they start to increase visitor volume. Seems kind of logical, doesn’t it—fix the leaky bucket before you turn on the faucet!

The volume game

Make no mistake, I still work with plenty of B2B marketers who are fixated on increasing their search advertising budgets, and see this as the only way to generate significantly more leads and customers. They are squarely focused on playing the volume game.

This approach might work well for companies with unlimited funds, but these days most of us need to wring more and more efficiency out of a stagnant or shrinking marketing budget. If you’re faced with this challenge, “conversion improvement” is your new best friend.

Diminishing returns

Take managing a PPC campaign, for example. At the beginning of the optimization process, significant improvements can be made, and made quickly, by rigorously testing keywords, match types, ad distribution, targeting, bids, budgets, and ad copy.

Many marketers utilize campaign management tools to help them automate and accelerate this process. But typically, after many months of rigorous testing, the rate of improvement inevitably slows and marketers reach a point of diminishing returns.

Limitless improvements

Improving website conversion, on the other hand, is a nearly limitless endeavor. I’ve worked on projects where we have engaged in ongoing landing page optimization for months and even years, actively testing headlines, images, graphics, fonts, calls-to-action, core messages, downloadable assets, names, descriptions, and all aspects of registration forms.

Also, search marketers can become more and more precise in their marketing efforts over time, as they create sites and pages specifically tailored to individual products and specific target audiences.

Marketers are always amazed at the impact of doubling conversion rate: twice the leads at half the price… and with the exact same marketing budget. Not bad.

Work your program from both sides

I encourage B2B marketers to work their search marketing programs from both sides: pre-click and post-click. Only by improving the entire customer experience—from the first search to the click to the website experience and ultimately the desired action—can you maximize your search marketing ROI.

B2B marketers must consider the best way to prioritize their initial efforts. In my opinion, the shift from volume to efficacy makes a lot of sense.

Many B2B search marketing programs are designed to generate online registrations, inquiries, and leads. Typically, something of value (such as a white paper, product demo, or presentation) is offered in exchange for personal contact information. Today I’ll offer three tips to enhance the value of these downloadable assets and generate more online registrations.

Leveraging the asset and the form

The two main components of the online registration process are: (1) What is being offered, and (2) How one receives it. In other words, the downloadable asset, and the registration form.

The basic premise is that valuable information is provided in exchange for personal contact information. In order for this to work, there must be an equitable exchange between the marketer and the prospect. This is why registration forms for very basic information must be kept short and simple, while registration forms for highly valuable, customized information can be a bit longer and more complicated.

You’ll find details here on the benefits of testing registration forms.

Improving downloadable assets

Obviously, the asset being offered plays a critical role in this process. Yet, ironically, most marketers don’t focus on analyzing and improving the way they present white papers, webinars, demos and presentations.

Today I’d like to share three proven methods to increase the value of your assets and generate more online registrations:

• Bundle information
• Offer multiple media formats
• Test names and descriptions

Bundle information. B2B marketers should consider bundling multiple assets into a comprehensive “kit.” For example, by combining a white paper with an archived webinar, with a product demo or case study, you create a larger asset of much higher perceived value than any one of these individual items. Often times this type of combined download is called a Success Kit, or a Resource Guide, or an Information Pack. The asset can then be promoted in PPC ads and on landing pages with copy such as Register once for immediate access to multiple resources.

Offer multiple media formats. B2B marketers should give website visitors a choice. Offer assets that allow people to read, or listen, or watch. Many companies already have information presented as video clips, audio files, and, of course, written documents.

For example, on your landing page, you could offer:

• Video clip of executive keynote at an industry event

• Podcast of a recent radio interview or presentation
• Webcast of an archived webinar
• Product demo created in flash
• Documents such as white papers, case studies, and instruction sheets.

That said, don’t get too carried away! Research indicates that, when given the choice, business buyers still prefer simple, straightforward information. Here’s more data on business buyers’ preferences.

Test names and descriptions

This one is so simple…yet very few marketers actively do this. What you label the asset is extremely important. Simply by changing the name of an asset you can significantly improve response rate.

For example, the same piece of information can be labeled Product Tour, or Video Demo, or Virtual Tour. Test all of these names, and determine what your target audience responds best to.

Secondly, how you describe the asset is equally important. The description should entice the prospect to download the information by providing specific, concise benefit statements. For example, here is an effective description for a case study download: Learn how company ABC increased the efficiency of their sales system by implementing common practices and a global data model across 10 locations in nine month.

Simple steps drive significant improvements

Are you so busy selecting keywords, writing ad copy, and designing/optimizing landing pages that you’ve neglected one of the most basic elements of a successful B2B search program?

Spend some time analyzing the information, assets and resources you offer prospects. Compare your assets to your competitors. Ask yourself, “Is this information unique, compelling, and truly valuable?” I urge you to test all aspects of downloadable assets: what you call the resource, how you present the information, and how you describe the value to be received.

I have found that registration rates can be significantly improved simply by making the information so compelling that prospects just can’t refuse!

Patricia Hursh is president and founder of SmartSearch Marketing, a Boulder, Colorado-based search engine marketing agency. You can reach Patricia at patricia@smartsearchmarketing.com. The Strictly Business column appears Wednesdays at Search Engine Land.

Should marketers avoid paying for prospects who are early in the buying process and not ready to submit personal information or be contacted by a sales person? Should these “tire kickers” be avoided so that marketers can focus their attention on generating more valuable, sales-ready leads? While this approach may seem logical at first, I believe it is short-sighted and ultimately leaves a lot of money on the table.

Early-buying-phase searchers

One of the biggest challenges I’ve experienced working with B2B marketers is overcoming their belief that if a searcher doesn’t immediately register, sign-up, download, or complete a Contact Us form, then the prospect is not valuable and not worth the effort or the price of the click.

Actually, nothing could be further from the truth. I believe there is huge value in utilizing search marketing to reach prospects early and frequently throughout the entire buying cycle – including the very first stages. Getting in front of prospects early allows you to cost-effectively support your brand, generate a larger volume of high-quality leads, and improve overall marketing ROI.

Understand how business buyers use search engines

According to recent research from Forrester and Enquiro’s 2007 B2B Survey, business buyers use search engines most frequently at the beginning of the buying process, during the awareness and research phases. Buyers actually use search engines less frequently when they are ready to negotiate and purchase a high-consideration product or service.

My colleague Jon Miller also supports this premise and recently wrote about buyers using search engines early in the process and long before they are ready to engage with a sales person.

Align your search programs with buyer behavior

Instead of being frustrated by this fact or ignoring the realities of buyer behavior, B2B marketers should embrace this process and proactively align their marketing programs with the various phases of the buying cycle.

For example, let’s look at a search advertising campaign for a company selling database software.

Early-Phase Campaign A successful pay-per-click (PPC) search ad campaign designed to reach early-phase prospects would have the following attributes:

• Keywords include general, broad search phrases such as database application software and database software information.
• Ad copy appeals to researchers and fact finders and might include statements such as database market trends or database application tips and advice.
• Landing pages provide general market information and calls-to-action such as download market trend report or review database application options.

Late-Phase Campaign In contrast, a late-phase search campaign would look like this.

• Keywords are much more specific and include many long-tail phrases, such as web based medical databases.
• Ad copy may focus on specific features, product comparisons, and buying tips. For example, Compare database application features or Find the right application for you.
• Landing pages offer information and downloadable assets that address specific buying needs, such as Download product and pricing options. View software comparison chart. Request a custom quote, or, yes… Contact Us.

Manage multiple types of programs

To reach the largest number of qualified prospects, marketers must manage multiple types of programs designed to proactively reach prospects at various phases of the buying process.

Understanding this requirement is critical to search marketing success, because the brutal reality is that not everyone who finds your site is a sales-ready lead. Remember, not all conversions are qualified inquiries and not all inquires are qualified leads. A lead scoring and nurturing program is required to fully capitalize on search-generated inquires and to convert web inquiries into bonafide sales leads.

Track prospects’ behavior over time

How can you determine if first time clickers later become inquiries, leads, and customers? Marketers should track first-time visitors, and their subsequent visits, and their online actions over time. Segment your web analytics data as needed, but at least identify and separate all visitors, search visitors, and paid search visitors. The idea is to understand prospects’ behavior before they become a conversion or a lead.

You will see that over time, a percentage of first time clickers who do not take any desired action (i.e., tire kickers) return to your website and sign-up for email information, download a white paper, or register for a webinar. And eventually, some will request to be contacted by a sales representative, becoming leads and ultimately customers.

Embrace the buying process

Remember, business buyers go through a process that involves search engines, especially at the beginning. Very few searchers become qualified sales leads on their first visit. More often, the process takes time and requires multiple searches and visits before a meaningful sales interaction can take place.

Embrace the fact that prospects use search engines early and frequently, and are in control of their own buying process. Get your brand in front of these prospects. Proactively penetrate the market segments you want to pursue. Differentiate yourself from the competition.

Strive to track prospects after the first click and before the conversion event. Measure repeat visits and website actions over time. I think you’ll find that tire kickers are a lot more valuable than you originally thought!

Patricia Hursh is president and founder of SmartSearch Marketing, a Boulder, Colorado-based search engine marketing agency. You can reach Patricia at patricia@smartsearchmarketing.com. The Strictly Business column appears Wednesdays at Search Engine Land.

B2B search advertisers must confront an annoying paradox. For most advertisers the billable event is the click. Yet for most B2B advertisers success depends not on clicks, but rather on conversions: the percentage of visitors who take the desired online action, such as downloading a white paper or registering for a webinar. B2B marketers must weigh the pros and cons of focusing on response rate versus conversions.

Quantity of clicks vs quality of conversions

Many search marketers run their campaigns to maximize the volume of prospects driven to a website. The idea is, load more prospects into the top of the funnel, and more sales will be generated at the bottom.

B2B marketers don’t necessarily think this way. For many of us, it’s not so much about the quantity of clickers as it is the quality of converters.

B2B clicks are more expensive than B2C

B2B search advertisers pay, on average, a bit less than $3.00 per click ($2.77 on Google, according to Marketing Sherpa’s 2006 Benchmark Report). This is more than twice the average cost for a consumer product click ($1.36).

$3.00 might not seem unreasonable, but some B2B firms advertise in highly-competitive sectors where click costs are in the $15 to $40 range! At this price, it’s important to convert as many visitors as possible into action takers.

Using ad copy to pre-qualify clickers

When faced with a limited pool of potential buyers, and when each click comes at a significant cost, B2B search advertisers must do everything they can to pre-qualify clickers to reduce the number of clicks coming from searchers who will simply not complete the conversion process.

Ad copy is a powerful tool that can help you accomplish this pre-qualification step. This may seem challenging, but even within the limits of ninety-five characters, advertisers can send strong signals about who should and should not click on an ad.

Reducing response rate

Unlike B2C ads, where generally it’s the more the merrier, any B2B search ads are actually designed to reduce response rate. For example, I work with a company in the IT Outsourcing sector. Here are two ads we recently tested.

Ad #1

IT Outsourcing Service
Reduce costs. Improve reliability.
IT Outsourcing Resource Kit.

Ad #2

IT Outsourcing Provider
Serving firms with 20 – 300 users.
IT Outsourcing Resource Kit.

Ad #1 is fairly general and focuses on user benefits and a call to action. Ad #2 specifically describes the target audience.

The first ad had a 5.6% click-through-rate (CTR). Ad #2 was much lower at 3.1%.

The Quality Score trade-off

The second ad, with the reduced CTR, will receive a lower quality score than Ad #1 (all other things considered equal), resulting in lower ad position for the money.

Why would a marketer purposely lower CTR, and thus impair the Quality Score? The answer lies in conversion rate and cost/conversion. Our client discovered (through an online survey) that many people who clicked on Ad #1 were too small to qualify for their service (companies with fewer than 20 users). Not surprisingly, clickers from these smaller companies never converted into qualified prospects or leads. For this reason, the generic ad had a much lower conversion rate than the pre-qualifying ad.

Based on this, the IT Outsourcing company decided to test multiple versions of only the pre-qualifying ad copy—thus lowering CTR and Quality Score—but ultimately improving conversion rate and cost/conversion.

The balancing act

Current Quality Score algorithms, based partially on CTR, penalize B2B marketers who use ad copy to pre-qualify clickers. B2B marketers must evaluate the pros and cons of maximizing response rate versus maximizing conversions.

If your campaign is focused primarily on lead generation (versus brand building or market positioning), or if clicks are especially expensive in your category, or if you are trying to reach a very specific, fairly small niche audience, I recommend using ad copy to pre-qualify clickers—even at the expense of lower CTR and Quality Score.

All this might change in the future of course, if ad networks move toward cost-per-action models (as many predict). But, for now, I advocate the “Don’t Click Here” method for most B2B search advertisers.