This article is part three of a multi-post series on SearchFuel discussing tips to a successful search marketing program through integration of your search and media agencies. Click here to access previous articles in this series: Let’s All Play in the Sandbox Together and Share for Success or Share to Exceed.

When building your sand castle or your campaign, integral to your success is communication.  In our last post we touched upon the first step in a successful campaign – planning. Working hand in hand with planning is communication. One does not effectively exist without the other.

A foreman has to communicate with the vendors on building materials and permits. He has to work with his crew to make sure the castle is stable and up to code.  Elect a foreman to keep the conversations (and the project) flowing. In this day and age, so many agencies can do it all. The threat of competing agencies learning too many of your processes only to pitch a more streamlined plan to the client to add to their business is high on many minds.  Avoid this problem by working as a cohesive team to stay ahead of the competition and deliver a successful product to the client

Keep the conversation going…too often a hard stop occurs when the rest of the team is waiting on one portion, or when calls and emails start going unanswered.  When one of the team starts missing the regularly scheduled meeting or will not respond, it is up to the foreman to get to the bottom of the problem.  Do they have other clients/projects that are taking up more time than expected?  Are they not getting the necessary response from one of their vendors, thus holding up their ability to respond? Whatever the reason, getting to the bottom of it quickly, through communication, will allow you to solve the issue and continue building.

Discuss timelines and deadlines.  Manage the team’s expectations.  If we know the production and approval for television ads take the longest to plan, start there and plot according to each team’s different needs.  Make the overall timelines readily available to all team members with access to updates so everyone knows when there are hang-ups and what may fall behind due to it.

Ongoing communication is the only way to successfully complete the project.

Communicating is talking, exchanging information and ideas, notifying, corresponding – or any other means of relaying a message from one person to another.  The point is to share with your team. Without this intercourse among the team our moat may leak, our walls will crumble and the campaigns will not succeed.

We have a great team to build the castle, let’s have open communication amongst the builders…Time to get a blueprint.  Stay tuned for our next post after the holidays about the mud and rocks of it all – budgeting.

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In the current economic climate, it’s easy to feel more like Scrooge than Santa’s Little Helper. The fact that the time period between Thanksgiving and Christmas is five days shorter than last year doesn’t help either. It feels like Christmas snuck up on us this year and now we’re left scrambling to get everything done. (Actually, that’s kind of how it feels every year so I’ve been relying heavily on that “5 days less” tidbit to justify my procrastination.)

However, even in the midst of our less-than-stellar economy and the feeling that there’s no time to buy the gifts we might not want to spend the money on in the first place, there’s a silver lining to be seen without ever leaving the house – the aggressively slashed prices and deals that can be found online.

According to marketing research company comScore, sales in the four-day period from Black Friday through Cyber Monday saw a 13% increase versus the same time period in 2007. So far, overall online holiday sales have remained consistent with last year’s sales despite consumers’ desires to cut down on holiday spending. In a comScore survey conducted the weekend before Thanksgiving to gauge consumers’ attitudes towards holiday shopping this year, 39% of respondents stated they planned to use the Internet to help cut costs.

So, what are advertisers doing to capitalize on the attention from these shoppers to boost online sales? After doing some surfing, it seems the popular online promotions include free shipping offers and other special online-only discounts. But are advertisers this holiday season bringing these offers to the consumer with search marketing or are they waiting for the consumer to discover their fabulous offers on their website?

To see which advertisers were more likely to end up under the Christmas tree, I assumed the mind of an ordinary consumer doing some broad searches to jump start ideas for a gift list. At the time of this post, Victoria’s Secret, who’s pretty good at aggressive holiday marketing, was offering free 2-day delivery on orders meeting a certain minimum. However, when I searched for “pajamas” and “lingerie,” neither paid ad that showed up had any mention of this offer, nor any other holiday special. (Inexplicably, they didn’t have an ad show up at all for the search “women’s underwear.”)

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A dreary, rain filled Sunday afternoon practically begs you to take the opportunity to spend a lazy few hours online shopping and surfin’ the net from the safety of your sofa. A fan of Almanac, I commenced with “on this day,” then “word of the day,” followed by “birthday of the day.” I grew bored quickly and even considered getting up to load the dishwasher, when I decided to surf the future!

I started with Google and MSN and the keyword phrase “on this day 2030.” The results were natural on both engines displaying content from “Earth day 2030” and an interesting article from “Forum for the Future” with regards to climate change:

“It’s New Year’s Day, 2030. Hungover, you stumble across to the fridge and yank it open. You grab the purple nutrition bar you’ve been saving, slump down on the sofa and call up the movie channel. Just a couple of minutes viewing proves it’s another propaganda film, featuring the valiant efforts of the ‘global volunteers’ in Antarctica who are helping to run the refugee settlements. But viewing is interrupted quickly by your Monitor, which announces that you left the fridge door open and are wasting too much energy. The broadcast is closed down and you’re docked several credits for the climate violation.”

Yahoo displayed a listing from Zappos shoes on the Hip 2030 toddler/youth lace up boots! That was confusing – would I even know a toddler to purchase lace-up boots in the year 2030?

Back to Google to search images, maps, news and shopping “on this day 2030.”   A “green” theme was quickly emerging – price of oil and how to find the Worldwatch Institute on Google Maps.

Google Shopping provided the opportunity for consumerism with a book named: 2030: A Day in the Life of Tomorrow’s Kids.

“Global events and new technology change how we live from moment to moment. So, what will our world be like in twenty years? Come take a look as futurists Amy Zuckerman and James Daly examine what a kid’s daily life might be like in the year 2030. Inspired and informed by trends and scientific and technological research, “2030″ is not only a peek at some cool future gadgets (talking dog collars, cars that drive themselves), but also a thoughtful examination of how our lives might be impacted as we adjust to environmental change.”

Why are there not more advertisers paying for future marketing opportunities? If content is being written and researched with regards to 22 years from now, surely I am not the only surfer searching on the future? I might just add that book to my shopping cart today and get prepared for tomorrow…

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So I hear that the economy is a little slow right now, but have no fear search is the recession proof industry!  Not sure if I buy the hype on that one.  Search may be recession resistant, but I think it is far from recession proof.  We feel the strains that clients are putting on their media budgets, just maybe not as much as the traditional media channels are at this time.  Search can provide a more direct link to what consumers are looking for, intention marketing, and then provide analytic substance to back-up the results of our campaigns.  However, that is a topic for someone else besides HR to get into.

Here is the topic the HR guy wants to touch on…..retention.  Well at least the idea of retention, because it is like the proverbial iceberg – there is a lot more lurking underneath than just what you see on the surface.  Retention is a good practice for any time in any economy, but in an economy like this it’s even more important.  I just heard that there were 181,000 jobs cut in November alone.  I don’t care what industry you’re in, that is a lot of companies laying people off.  Even in “recession-proof” search people are concerned about organizational stability and definitely their own job stability.  Isn’t that just human nature, to be safe and wanted?  Abraham Maslow said in his hierarchy of needs that you need to have your basic needs met before you can move up the pyramid, and definitely before you get to self-actualization.

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*Note: This article also appeared in MediaPost’s Search Insider on December 12, 2008. Must register/log in (free) to access.
During the 2008 election, President-Elect Barack Obama and Senator John McCain had successful strategies that included ground-breaking use of online media in a presidential campaign to reach voters and convey their platforms.

Arguably, the popularity of online forums and maximizing the opportunity for consumer engagement through online presence allowed the candidates to be in two places at one time – live, in-market shaking hands while also available 24/7 online — without collapsing from exhaustion on the campaign trail.

So what should we take away from the use of search and social media in the 2008 presidential election? To help answer that question, I’ve harvested the insights from a keynote panel at MediaPost’s Search Insider Summit in Park City, Utah that discussed the two candidates’ online tactics.

Search marketing is a valuable branding tool. Don’t underestimate the power of search marketing in building and maintaining your brand. Organic results bring your genuine content to the forefront of the search engine results page (SERP). Those results increase with social media outreach, with consumer-driven content giving you third-party endorsement. Through paid search, you own your message and can adapt it properly — and frequently – to speak directly with your audience when they raise their hand about subjects related to your brand. If McCain and Obama could do it on a topic like politics, you can, too.

Search serves as a powerful channel for lead generation and direct response.  During early campaign efforts, the Obama camp used paid search for list-building and donor acquisition. Later, in general election campaigning, paid search played a role in voter mobilization and driving voter registration. The 2008 presidential election reinforces the valuable role search marketing can play in lead generation or direct response, whether you’re looking to build your CRM program or drive your audience to a specific call to action.

Always optimize your campaign to better connect with your audience. According to panelist Emily Williams, interactive account executive at MSHC and member of the Obama campaign’s interactive marketing team, the economic crisis didn’t shift the team’s strategy, but there was increased attention paid to “issue” terms. The analysts also focused on the impact of successful paid search strategies that favored the competition versus going against the competition. The reality is, your strategy is built early on, but like a growing plant, should never be left without water or pruning. The nature of business, consumer preference, consumer-driven media and the news media can shift what’s important at any time. By keeping your audience in mind every day of your search program, you’ll continue to be relevant and reap the benefits of your optimization.

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