This Friday, Marc and I are going to be presenting the very broad topic of “Internet Marketing” to some of the smartest business people in Idaho. In preparation for that presentation I am creating slides (I will upload them later so you can take a peak) and deciding how to approach such a huge undertaking — we only have an hour. So far the basic outline looks something like this:

1. Industry Trends
2. Top Ten Internet Marketing Mistakes (this is a lot of fun)
3. The Proven Process for Continuous Improvement
4. Overview of a Few Select Online Marketing Tools
5. Resources for Learning to Use the Tools

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Paid search is a useful tool for supporting almost any online strategy. In some cases it will be the primary tool for driving sales through a website, however, it usually is not. Before you start your AdWords campaigns (some of these concepts apply to other search marketing platforms as well), know what you are trying to achieve.

You can use up all of your resources getting optimal click-throughs and not increase conversions one bit. If you are marketing a new product to a highly targeted market that may be an acceptable strategy — perhaps you will want to optimize your campaign for traffic. If you are in a well-developed market your ad spend will be better allocated by optimizing for conversions. By the way, this decision will affect everything from keyword selection to landing page content.

In practice, most businesses want to create campaigns that increase traffic and specific conversions. However, to simplify the presentation I am going to ignore that and treat them as completely separate. (more…)

I am relieved to be done with the very constrictive set of posts giving a waterfront view of website optimization. Now, we can get into the good stuff. What is the good stuff you might ask.

Well, my first stab at the good stuff is with regard to “getting a new website.” I am anxiously anticipating the upcoming posts by an acquaintance of mine at our local grassroots marketing firm. Turns out Sam Swenson, the Blueline web guy, is writing some great stuff about pricing new websites. It is fun and very insightful to get a developer’s view on the industry.

The part that is not surprising, but still frustrating is his absolutely correct answer to the question, “how much should a new website cost?” The answer we all expect and hate — It DEPENDS. Oh, those web developers are just trying to get as much as they can from us right? Wrong. It really does depend. Sam is going into a fair amount of detail about why it depends, and giving you a bit of an idea of what to expect when you go looking.

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Well, here is the last piece of my website optimization positioning posts. If you feel like all of the posts were kind of squishy and non-specific, you’re right. Over time all of the ideas touched on will be developed in more detail, so I guess I am saying be patient.

Now, regarding database development. I know less about the actual implementation of this piece than any of the others, but to really get an optimized website and Internet marketing effort you need to touch this topic. Here is why — even the most expensive web analytics solutions cannot provide all of the information you will need to make data-driven decisions. A few months ago I was at a wonderful conference put on by Web Trends (one of the web analytics pioneers), and one speaker talked extensively on the 360 Degree view of the customers (here’s what my traveling companion at WestSlope Design had to say about it). Simply put, the speaker acknowledged that in order to get the 360 Degree view they will need to tap into your CRM, E-Commerce, Phone Records, Survey Results, etc.

Not every website optimization effort requires all of that, but alternate sources of data can provide you with valuable information. Ultimately, getting all of your analytics package data and other data sources in a central location and then dissecting it and analyzing it will require some serious database work.

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Well, we are winding down on our “lay of the land” topics and then we can start getting into the real fun stuff. Today’s topic is Data Analysis. This can be a really nerdy (not to be confused with geeky) topic. Let me just touch lightly on a few of the high points that you should be aware of, whether you are doing your own website optimization or have a consultant doing it for you.

Perhaps the most important point here is that if you are going to analyze data, you need sufficient amounts of data. What is sufficient? Well, it depends on your tolerance for error. More data will generally lead to more accurate decisions. In your college statistics classes the minimum sample size is 30, or something like that. In the real world 30 is very deficient. 100’s are good, 1000’s are better, and 10’s of 1000’s are great. Now that I have scared small businesses into thinking their web data is useless let me share a brief story.

I have a good friend that is a data analysis expert. He did some work for a local company regarding their media placement. He ran an online survey and within a few days had 200 results (not optimal). He did his regression analysis, and massaged the numbers in SPSS and concluded that the primary market for the client’s service was working moms and that they should advertise on three specific radio stations.

The advertising/marketing agency working for his client was quite upset because they had already determined that stay-at-home moms were the primary market. When a “discussion” ensued the ad agency argued that 200 responses was not a sufficient sample size and that because the survey was web based it was likely biased. My friend simply responded that a base of 200 customers is certainly more reliable than 4 “marketing guys” sitting around the table pulling ideas out of thin air.

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We will be posting more about paid search marketing, so I will keep this fairly brief and high-level (again, just giving an overview of the website optimization space). 

Paid search, strictly speaking, is simply paying to have text advertisements appear on search results pages.  Now, not surprisingly, there is a lot more to it than that.  For example, the major search engines have extensive “content networks,” which means your ad can show up on websites.  And, you can create image ads and video ads in addition to the classic text ads.  The key, regardless of how sophisticated you want to get with your paid campaigns, is to keep your message consistent and relevant.

Website optimization has to extend to the ads your marketing and design team puts out because if they are saying one thing and the website is saying another you could have a serious image problem.  Additionally, the search engines reward consistent themes from keywords, through ads, and on to your website.  A well structured paid search campaign will have lower cost-per-click and higher conversion rates.  Typically, with any website optimization effort you will need to extend beyond the website and look at the message in your ads and on referring sites.

You will be able to track the success of message alignment via your web analytics solution.  A measurement of single-page accesses will start to give you a feel (although it is not a perfect measurement) of the effects.  Also, the data you collect from your paid search efforts will give you a little glimpse at the “why” people visit your site, as opposed to just knowing that they do. 

Here is what I mean:  The keywords your visitors search for represent questions, or needs, they have.  You can test key terms with paid search that will give you insight to their questions, which you will not get via organic search.  Also, you will get a better feel for search volumes by looking at paid search impressions.  See, now you are starting to understand your web visitors a little better.

My philosophy is that paid search marketing, even if you are not interested in the pure advertising part of it, is a relatively inexpensive way to conduct some market research.  In terms of website optimization, the critical role of paid search marketing can totally ignore the advertising function, if it makes sense to do so.

Today I setup the Question and Answers page instead of writing a post. Visit it, ask a question, and get an answer.

There is a difference between search engine optimization and web site optimization. Sometimes they even conflict. For example, a page with optimal keyword density for search findability may be very clunky and annoying for your website visitors.  In many cases, getting more traffic with lower conversion rates may not be a good strategy (sometimes it is).

Now, those of you who know something about SEO are probably cringing at “keyword density,” considering it is a minor factor, but it is a factor and every little bit helps.

The technical structure of your site is the minimum bar for search optimization. In other words, if it doesn’t meet certain standards then it will automatically decrease your rankings. For example, if you have a Flash Introduction page for your web site and you have not done anything to “help” the search engines through that page it could be the only page that gets indexed. And, worse than that, there is no crawlable content on the page! The ill effects go beyond just search though, the page may not be compliant with the Americans with Disabilities Act, and you may not be creating the “user experience” you thought you were. This is not to say you shouldn’t have the fancy flash intro page; just be careful how you do it.

One other example where SEO and web optimization will intersect (or diverge) is the messaging of your campaigns. It is very important that you treat your targeted web searches as questions. If you want to rank high on Swiss Bank Accounts because it gets searched more frequently than Idaho Bank Accounts you can create keyword targeted content and for the sake of argument, lets say you do rank well. That is a fantastic SEO achievement, but will do little for website optimization.  Website optimization is for people not for search engines.

A good website optimization effort will keep things in balance. You need high search rankings, you need fancy web programming, you need a functional web site, you need a pretty web page, and web site optimization is focused on getting all of those elements in the right amounts.

Marketing, as it relates to web optimization, is Valitics’ area of expertise. That being said, Marc and I could write a book on the subject, however, I will keep this blog post short. There will certainly be plenty more to come in future posts.

The primary point I want to address in this broad overview we are walking through is that your message has to be consistent from the initial “touch” to the customer satisfaction follow-up. This principle embodies many of the elements discussed in the other disciplines related to website optimization. Here is an example:

Let’s say you meet a potential client at a leads group. They immediately get an impression of you from your conversation, they have expectations. One of two things will happen when they visit the website on your perfectly designed business card — it will either validate their expectations or it will not. A general measure of that will be your entrance page bounce rate (not super scientific, just a question of did the visitor find what they were looking for). I am not claiming that it is a perfect measure, but coupled with additional measures can give you some insight to your “wow factor” as Marc likes to call it.

The same process will occur if visitors come from your paid search campaigns, organic search results, or referring websites. Make sure your message is consistent whenever possible, and you will see increased results from your web marketing efforts. One point to consider is that you need to know your value proposition prior to creating ads and web pages.

I suppose the connection between website optimization and usability is fairly straightforward, so I won’t bore you. However, there are a few points that need touched.

If we think of usability as the ease with which visitors to a website can accomplish the purpose they came for then it becomes a very critical piece of website optimization. Really, usability and site optimization are both focused on reducing friction for potential customers.

Not surprisingly, web analytics can play a significant role in identifying friction points on your website. If you want to optimize your own web site, are a usability consultant/expert, or just want some great analytics information I highly recommend that you get familiar with the Future Now’s practice of “persuasion architecture.” Persuasion architecture is a fantastic approach to website optimization and it encompasses the basics of usability. And, to my absolute enjoyment, it embraces web analytics as well!

Last point about usability, don’t mistakenly think you are an expert just because you surf the web. The principles of usability go beyond just designing simple navigation structures. During your web site optimization efforts you will want to watch the clickstream data closely, ask your visitors about their website experiences, and test like crazy to identify usability breakdowns in your system. If you think your site may have a problem, or you are in doubt about your ability to identify usability problems, get with a usability expert.

BTW, PinPoint Performance a web and software usability firm based in the Boise,ID area will give you a free consultation. That’s right, its free, so I am not trying to sell you anything, just making connections.