“Black Friday,” the day after Thanksgiving, is the biggest shopping day of the year for U.S. brick-and-mortar retailers. But, for each Monday after Black Friday, consumer searches spike up on the internet and online retail websites enjoy their highest traffic and associated sales of the year. Search engine use is directly impacting businesses during this period, and companies which haven’t optimized their internet presence stand to lose out on some of the sales they could be getting if consumers could find them. This is true for online businesses as well as for brick-and-mortar stores.

While savvy companies planned for this season all the way back in the summer, and already have their internet storefronts in order, it’s not too late to do a few more things to insure a business can squeeze out more from gift shoppers on the “Cyber Mondays” following Black Friday.

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See Related Stories In Search Engines: Shopping Search Engines, Search Marketing: Shopping Search Marketing

Most search marketers focus their efforts on organic search optimization or sponsored search listings. But there’s another channel that offers unique opportunities to reach additional viewers and potentially drive conversions that might otherwise never be realized.

On Thursday, May 10, I’ll be presenting the webcast Successful Feed-Based Search Marketing: Shopping Engines, Paid Inclusion & More through our sister site, Search Marketing Now. In this webcast, I’ll describe the multiple types of feeds that can be used to extend a search marketing campaign, and will talk about some of the benefits they provide, including broad reach, the ability to get search-unfriendly websites included in search engine indexes and more.

I’d like to extend a personal invitation to all search marketers to attend this event. The webcast is at 1pm Eastern time, and registration is free. Here are links to more information and the registration form. I hope you’ll be able to join us!

See Related Stories In SEM Industry: Conferences, Search Marketing: Shopping Search Marketing

Marchex and its TrafficLeader subsidiary have published the 2007 Search Marketing Insights for Retailers, a 19 page whitepaper that offers strategies for online merchants to improve search visibility in the major shopping search engines. There’s also some interesting data about traffic to each of these services, and a useful table that compares the data feed requirements for each service. The whitepaper is free, but you’ll need to provide your name and email address to get to the download page.

See Related Stories In Search Engines: Shopping Search Engines, Search Marketing: Shopping Search Marketing, Stats: Popularity