Marketing Science Blog

While surfing around LinkedIn.com the other day I ran into the following question from a member…

“What’s the synergy between search engine marketing and email marketing and can you provide examples of the synergy?”

Here are my thoughts on this…

Search marketing (as well as search engine optimization SEO) and email marketing are to an Internet marketer what the “one-two punch” combination is to a boxer. Left jab, then right cross. That’s a classic knockout combination. It’s your bread and butter if you’re a fighter. And it always produces greater results than the individual punches themselves.

Now, let’s put this in context with today’s web users, prospects and buyers… Nearly everyone turns to a search engine first to find what they are looking for Online. So, being found in search results, organically or by paid placement is arguably the most important element of Internet marketing. Search marketing is the left jab that sets up your right cross: email marketing.

Search marketing is also like a headline in a sales letter. If you don’t stop people dead in their tracks and get them to read more, the rest of the sales letter is meaningless, no matter how good it is. Without search, you would not be able to capture names and email addresses for marketing purposes (except if you advertise offline and drive traffic to your site). Search marketing is typically the starting point of a potential relationship between web marketer and prospect.

Enter Opt in Email Marketing…

The majority of times, your prospect has found your website and offer but is NOT ready to buy from you yet. She is not sure she can trust you, she just met you so to speak. Plus there are other offers and vendors to investigate. The web is big place with lots of choices. This is where email marketing comes in to create synergy with search…

People have more information and choices than ever. Unfortunately the more choices and information, the tougher it is to make a decision. More vendors, more information and more choices translate into more work for prospects. As a result many people get bogged down in “analysis paralysis”, procrastination or both. They are ruled by fear, uncertainty and distrust.

Because of all the information and choices available to Internet consumers, it is difficult to create lasting marketing relationships. There are so many vendors competing for mind and wallet share.

Search marketing does the heavy lifting of attracting qualified prospects to your sites and offers and creates potential relationships. Since a majority of people do not buy on the first exposure to an offer, it’s email marketing’s job to capture the name and email address and to break down barriers and inhibitions to buying over a time sequence.

Through email marketing you build solid relationships on trust, reciprocity (because you give something of value to them) and develop credibility as an expert in your field by providing good content on your website and in your email newsletter.

The success of the individual parts — search marketing and email marketing — can be attributed to the combination of these two forms of marketing. One without the other would produce poor results (an exception is offline advertising i.e. sending prospects to your home page or opt-in page directly from space or classified ads).

Also, synergy occurs when a web user is exposed to multiple instances of your brand, products, offers & websites.

For example, if a prospect keeps running into you online when they search on keywords related to your products/services and hears from you regularly through email marketing, credibility with that prospect is sure to increase because of the combined exposure.

Search marketing and email marketing are strongly dependent on one another for overall marketing success. Together they help you create relationships and online sales.

Of course your sales message has to be strong. But generally speaking any exposure in search results combined with email marketing is going to help your cause. It will help build trust and decrease buying resistance. This plus a good offer will produce solid online sales.

- Bob

Ok, so everybody and their brother is handing out marketing advice for 2008. I would like to provide my own list of things to recommend based on my own experiences as well as some of the things I’ve learned myself recently from my own research and from Alex Mandossian’s training.

#1 Marketing Strategy for 2008: Start a Blog and Post Regularly

A blog (web log) is a great way to add interesting and valuable content to your website without the usual formalities and pressures of writing, refining and publishing articles.

It’s just a lot easier to write when you’re being informal. You don’t have to creatively spit out paragraph after paragraph or obsess over grammar and style. After all, it’s YOUR blog. You write as little or as much as you want.

The marketing benefit of blogging is enormous. Search engines look favorably on blogs (over websites) because the content is usually updated regularly.

Some blogging tips… Try to update your blog at least every 2-3 days. Even better if you can update daily. The search engines will give preference to blogs that update frequently.

For great free blogging software, just click the WordPress link at the bottom of this page. Have your webmaster install it, configure it and you can start blogging right away!

#2 Marketing Strategy for 2008: SEO Search Engine Optimization

I am amazed at the large number of business websites which have poor (or no) search engine optimization. I believe part of this problem comes from the fact that many businesses have relied heavily on pay per click advertising as a quick fix to their search engine traffic woes.

As a result SEO gets passed over or a belief develops within the company that SEO is only for big companies with deep pockets. Nothing could be further from the truth. For a modest investment of say $75 -100 per page most small or medium businesses can enjoy a nice return on investment.

For example, I recently built a new website for one of my home care clients. I optimized it for mostly local search traffic using long tail keywords and many keywords which don’t even appear in the keyword inventories of search engines like Google, MSN and Yahoo.

This may seem somewhat contrarian to the normal keyword research a company or SEO consultant might recommend i.e. “only select and use keywords you find from the keyword tools of search engines”.

But my clients are benefiting from good traffic to their local businesses with these “invisible” keywords. In order to find these keywords you have to work closely with your clients and their prospects to figure out what’s most important to them and what’s “top of mind” when they do a search. Often times they use phrases which aren’t popular enough to be listed by the keyword tools. They add a town name or a city to a phrase for example. When taken collectively, all these invisible keywords can bring substantial traffic to a website.

If you do anything this year to improve your website traffic, have your site optimized and try to update your content regularly.

#3 Marketing Strategy for 2008: Video Content on Blogs and Websites

As most people have already figured out, video is “white hot” on the Internet right now. And there’s no end in sight. What’s especially great about this is the fact that search engines are currently giving priority to sites which contain video. Even more priority if you update with new video regularly.

In fact I believe this is NOT a fad, but web videos are here to stay. A lot like reality TV, video captures and commands people’s imagination and attention. It’s addictive. We are all voyeurs to some degree and video plays on this natural human characteristic.

Admittedly, I’ve been behind the web video curve, but no more. I went out and purchased a Flip Video camera that will create high resolution “how to” videos that I can place in my blogs and websites.

So my recommendation to anyone reading this post, is to just get started with video. You don’t need an expensive video camera, you can pick up a decent DVR (Digital Video Recorder) for as little as $100. Once you’ve done that, start creating some video tutorials or “how to” videos for your area of expertise.

Not only will these videos showcase your talents, they can create a “viral video effect” if you are providing something of real value and give people the opportunity to share the videos with friends at social bookmarking (like Digg, Stumble Upon) and networking sites (like FaceBook and MySpace) or by using a good TAF (Tell a Friend) script. If done correctly, the results could be a flood of new traffic coming to your site on a regular basis.

Part II in tomorrow’s post.

-Bob