My Search Marketing New Year’s Resolutions, 2011 Edition

Looking through some old material the other night, I came across a column I wrote in 2009 about my Search Marketing New Year’s Resolutions. Not surprisingly, like many New Year’s resolutions, some of them didn’t get accomplished. But enough of the world has changed since I inked that column two years ago that I thought it made sense to update it a la 2011. Here we go!

Resolution #1: Integrating SEO & Social Media Marketing (SMM) Strategies

Everyone’s doing it, or at least claiming they are. SEO and SMM teams working hand-in-hand, harmonizing messaging across Facebook, Twitter and the like, resonating with a singular voice, engaging users in a conversation that seamlessly unfolds on search results pages and social graphs across the Internet.

Easier for small sites and companies to accomplish, not so much for large, matrixed organizations with some of the worlds largest web properties. No problem, we already have ‘like’ and ‘tweet’ buttons all over the site, not to mention eighteen facebook pages and about a dozen or two twitter feeds.

We should be able to get our hands around this in a matter of weeks – I’ll just start a Center of Excellence, include all the key players in search and social media around the company, and disseminate standards and best practices to all the stakeholders. Should be a snap, no?

Resolution #2: Move Away From Last-Ad Attribution & Use A Real Attribution Management Solution

This is the year. I mean it. I’m going to do it. But last-ad attribution was so easy to sell into the organization and for people to understand, and I really dread having to translate all that mathy goodness into Plain English for a bunch of high-level managers who probably don’t give a hoot which attribution method I use as long as I continue to increase my contribution to the bottom line.

Besides, as a paid search guy, don’t I have the most (budget) to lose by leaving the warmth and comfort of last-ad? Maybe not, the experts are now saying. Maybe not…so how hard can it be? Negotiate a contract, liberally sprinkle some third-party javascript tags around my site, warehouse a bunch of data, run some spiffy predictive algorithms and away we go, right?

Resolution #3: I Will Devote More Time To My adCenter Account

Now that the Microsoft transition is complete in the US, all my search traffic from Yahoo! and Bing is coming in through my adCenter accounts. Thing is, adCenter works quite a bit differently than Yahoo! Search Marketing (YSM) did.

I’m seeing traffic levels and CPCs change on my existing keywords, and I’m definitely seeing a different keyword mix driving my traffic than I did with YSM. I need to double check my international settings, expand my keyword list, restructure my accounts, write new creative, re-bid everything to match new CPCs and conversion rates, lift my budget caps…I better get started now!

Resolution #4: I Will SEO My WordPress Blog

This is getting embarrassing. I mean it’s like the cobbler’s children having no shoes over there. Some posts are tagged, some aren’t. None are categorized. And to be honest, I’m having a hard time with the basics – for example, writing titles that are both SEO-friendly and don’t make you puke in your mouth when you look at them.

Yes indeed, it’s time to hunker down, put the headphones on, and sharpen my WordPress ninja skills so I can take advantage of all the SEO-friendliness the popular blogging platform offers. I think I’m still using the default (Kubrik) header with no add-ons except my own domain name. Disgraceful, truly disgraceful…

Resolution #5: Utilize All Features & Extensions Within Search Advertising Platforms

One of the nice things about the evolution of search marketing is that it isn’t just search marketing anymore. Display advertising, retargeting, click-to-call, landing page testing and automated bidding are just a few of the myriad new features now offered to the search marketer, direct from the search engines.

I need to make a prioritized list of features right away, write up a testing schedule, integrate it with all my other priorities, evaluate results, roll out successful strategies across my entire programs – I could spend all year on this one.

Well, it looks like I have my work cut out for me this year, so I better get to it. See you next month.