aimClear Search Marketing Blog

Deeply rooted in the same keyword research that advises SEM, nestles the discussion of classic query types and user intent. This conversation has bubbled under the online marketing industry for nearly a decade,  continuously evolving in both sophistication and scope.  The reason is obvious. Leveraging search terms common to consumers is only half the battle-  now more than ever it is crucial to understand nodes of user intent before you shove transactional content at merely walk-by traffic.

While this fascinating conversation can be traced back nearly a decade, the concept really gained traction in 2006 with the boom of social media and a new emphasis on the human behind the keywords. Now we’re talking about ascribing intent to “social segments.” Read the rest of this entry »

There has been much written surrounding classic query types. In review, conventional wisdom dictates that there are basically three kinds:

• Informational - suggests the searcher is on the broad quest for knowledge about a topic of interest (medical symptoms, film trivia, tips on housebreaking puppies, etc.).

• Navigational - indicates the searcher is on the hunt for a specific website, usually dedicated to a specific brand (a search for Pepsi usually means the searcher’s destination is Pepsi.com).

• Transactional - connotes the searcher is ready to make a purchase online (typically formatted like so: “buy [product keyword] online”]).

However, things are not always that cut and dry. In these days of four and five word searches, there are subtle shades of intent that aren’t always obvious to the marketer.  For PPC jockeys, spending cold cash to separate out live customers can be a crucial matter of budget.  Let’s take a look at four ways to identify and leverage some subtle intent words out there to help you focus time and money on PPC keywords that should stand a decent better of converting. Read the rest of this entry »

SEO’s cut their teeth in the keyword research process. The first few months of an SEO’s development is often spent in the “saltmines” researching and testing nearly endless variations of words and phrases in Keyword Discovery, Wordtracker and Google’s keyword tool. Are users searching for “trash cans” or “trash bins”? Read the rest of this entry »

These days predictive utilities like Trellian, WordTracker and AdWords are only half the keyword research story. State of the art processes combine these standard search predict tools’ output with “what we already know,” by mashing in site-specific datasets at the keyword level.

Additional keyword data might include statistics culled from organic analytics (KW traffic, conversion, behavior criteria), PPC history (CPC, CTR, conversion, etc…) and SEOmoz’s Linkscape (SEO competitiveness-predict).

We all know it’s theoretically useful to “advise” the keyword selection process by aggregating datasets. Very few SEMs actually pull it off. This article will guide you through the process of using spreadsheets to pilot advanced techniques, for API automation later. Read the rest of this entry »

While classic keyword research counts phrase permutations users search for, Buzz Pocket Mining measures the individual and community-wide social graph. The good news is, incredibly powerful BPM tools are totally free!

“Social graph” simply means categorizing definable pockets of members’ participatory chatter as folks interact, share content, make friends and live lives together. Often expressed by a tag cloud, Buzz Pockets are how we index topical interests, as expressed by users. Read the rest of this entry »

Day two of SES Chicago had me ducking for cover, as razor sharp tips and tools came flying at me from the “Advanced Keyword Research” session of the PPC track.  This session, moderated by, Ron Jones, Search Engine Watch Expert & President/CEO, Symetri Internet Marketing was about demystifying keyword research.  Read the rest of this entry »

Since social sites are congregation points for hundreds of millions of users, finding out what they’re thinking en masse lends useful stemming (creative discovery of synonyms) insight to traditional keyword research.

Hot topics define each community, each with idiosyncratic tools to measure chatter patterns and reveal content which has gone hot by consensus. This provides tremendous insight into the marketplace to support various marketing objectives. Read the rest of this entry »

Overseeing local and mobile search marketing efforts can be daunting. Numerous providers offer ever-increasing abilities to target eyeballs by demographic criteria. How much should be budgeted to the greatest benefit?

What should we do first? Who are the players? This session explored the “tactical demands of running a successful local/mobile search marketing campaign.”

Chris Sherman, Executive Editor, Search Engine Land , moderated and led off the discussion. Chris gave us the good news first, that “local and mobile campaigns have a lot in common with traditional search marketing. However, local mobile is much more fragmented with dozens or hundreds of factors to keep track of.” Read the rest of this entry »

There has been a revolution of keyword research tools over time. The first introduction to keyword research for most of us was years ago with the free overture keyword tool, which was the basis for many an early PPC campaign. Overture became Yahoo and provided insight into Yahoo’s keyword “inventory.” it was revolutionary.

Now with more advanced tools like Trellian Keyword Discovery, and WordTracker we have access to databases of differing sizes, quality, focus, skew and insight. aimClear suscribes to several regionl, global, and specialized keyword databases (through their APIs) which we aggregate in a proprietary tool. However WordTracker offers a free keyword research tool with useful functionality to the public. If you’re willing to do a little screen scraping, data can be harvested to provide insight into the keyword universe. Read the rest of this entry »

If you pay attention to seminar speakers (and anecdotal chatter) it’s quite obvious that many advertising agencies are grappling with (and feeling threatened by) the ubiquitous evolution of search marketing.  The new Internet marketing is about a constant stream of recurrent content published on SEO savvy platforms. The days of set it and forget it static pages are over…gone the way of meta keywords, and other antiquated SEO attributes.

Making the situation more confusing for agencies is the reality that advertising agency clients have heard about search marketing, they know they need it, and they ask agencies directly about it. This puts (formally full service) agencies in an awkward position including but not limited to the possibility of missed revenue opportunities. Agencies in our area seem to give their clients the stock answer: “we don’t offer those services and recommend working with a firm that specializes in SEM.”

This post begins a series of articles aimed squarely at advertising and PR agencies with the intent of demystifying the SEM process.

Old Information is Cheaper
This is especially true in second and third tier markets where engaging an “SEM firm” often means paying too much for second or third tier misinformation or web 1.0 advice (in a web 2.0 world). Unfortunately the current environment of great demand and fast profit for SEM wanna-be-companies breeds “SEM firms” that are actually last-generation website building shops. Hiring a design/build firm to market a website costs less in the short tem and you get what you pay for-less traffic and sales over time.

Read the rest of this entry »