Search Engine Marketing

May/10

Yodle-Scam Or Incompetent?

by Chris under PPC, Search Engine Marketing

Yodle Scam… That’s what Google Suggest shows us when you first start typing Yodle into Google.

Scam is a strong word. I wouldn’t use it lightly. But apparently enough people type that into Google to cause their Google Suggest to displayYodle Scam.

I won’t theorize as to why that is such a popular search term, but I did want to share an interesting PPC result I found today.

I did a search for Denver garage door repair. The first paid result had ad text stating “High Quality Work in Southern Cali…”. What an interesting ad for Denver CO, I thought…

So I clicked it (sorry advertiser) and was taken to a company that clearly services Southern California, despite their ad showing in Denver CO to a searcher based in the NYC Metro area.

Denver is a city in California which this company probably services, but the folks who set up their PPC campaign clearly didn’t proprely set up geo-targeting. As a result, instead of showing the ad to just people in California or Denver CA it’s showing up anyone who types in Denver Garage Door Repair. Not good.

So who was responsible for the error? I scrolled to the bottom of the page and found my answer…

Yodle.

So is Yodle a scam? To say they are purposely defrauding their customers is a serious accusation. I wouldn’t say Yodle is a scam. I would just call them incompetent. This type of bad PPC management isn’t a rarity, hence the reason for such negativity and distrust when it comes to Yodle.

How much money that garage door company will waste on worthless clicks is anyones guess… It certainly won’t be known to the SMB because Yodle is not transparent about their costs per click. All the advertiser will know is that they blew through their budget and received X number of clicks. And just how valuable are those clicks? Is that local service business really going to get any business out of a searcher in Colorado?

Perhaps this is why the term Yodle Scam is in Google Suggest. Because SMB’s come to realize Yodle has wasted their money on a number of worthless clicks. Or maybe there are other reasons… What do you think?

PPC, Search Engine Marketing, SEM, Small Business 289 Comments more...

May/10

Manage Your Online Reputation

by Chris under Reputation Management, Search Engine Marketing

I recently saw an interesting request from a small business owner. He had received some bad publicity, and it was showing up in Google before his own business or personal info. He wanted help to push his bad stuff off the first page.

I give the business owner a B+ for understanding the importance of reputation management. All it takes is one bad review or article written about you to turn away potential customers.

Word of mouth is powerful, but it works both ways. Upset or wrong a customer and chances are pretty good they are going to tell someone they know about it. Chances are also pretty good, in this increasingly tech savvy culture, that the customer is going to go online and write about it on Facebook, Twitter, or other social media.

The cat is already out of the bag for the small business owner. His only recourse now is to either remedy the situation with the customer and try and get a follow up review, or go on a PR campaign to blitz the web with positive or neutral information to push down the negative.

So what’s the solution? Be proactive not reactive.

Engage your customers. Ask them to review you online. Make it easy for them to talk about you. Blogs, Google and Yahoo reviews, Yelp, Facebook, and more… Make sure your company is present in the most popular places your customer visits. Then, actively get your customers to talk about you. There are lots of ways, from online methods like email blasts and surveys, to off line methods like a simple thank you card with a note asking for a review.

Building up a steady supply of positive reviews will buffer you against the inevitable upset customer. Out of a dozens (hopefully hundreds) of reviews, one or two negative ones don’t seem so bad.

So start getting your customers to talk about you, otherwise the web will be filled with only negative remarks about you.

Reputation Management 202 Comments more...

Apr/10

If you build it, they will come. Unless they can’t find your website.

by Chris under Search Engine Marketing

Even if you were too young to see it, you’ve probably heard the famous line from Field of Dreams “If you build it, they will come”. Basically it’s a movie about Kevin Costner building a baseball field on his farm so that ghosts of a baseball team can come play. Yes, that’s a terrible one sentence synopsis of the movie (which isn’t a horror flick by the way), but it doesn’t matter. What does is the phrase and mentality that “If you build it, they will come”. All to often companies take the approach of “If I have a website, people are going to find it.” But unless you’re a well known brand like Apple or Nike, that just isn’t going to happen.

I met with the owner of a local rock climbing gym last month. It’s a family owned business, and has been relatively successful over the years thanks to the power of word of mouth advertising. But when the economy tanked, their revenue line started to trend downward. We met to talk about how Internet Marketing can reverse that downward trend. So I asked, “What kind of advertising do you currently do?”
“Oh, we don’t have an advertising budget…” I was told. I may have looked somewhat stunned, as he quickly followed up with “But we do put fliers in peoples mailboxes”.

Here is what went through my head, and which we spoke about. First, there was no tracking implemented to determine if the campaign was a success. No phone number set up specifically for the campaign, no “Promo Code”, not even the simple question “How did you find out about us” when employees answered the phone. Second, the mailer had no clear goal. Was it to push website traffic? Boost calls? Increase “stop ins”? No clear answer provided. And third, the target audience wasn’t defined. Parents looking for a place to host their kids birthday party think a lot different from a teenager looking to learn how to rock climb.

The rock climbing business does have a website, but it also suffers the same problems as their flier campaign; no tracking, no call to action, unclear of target audience. Further, the website has no clear purpose. It exists as a kind of online brochure. Basically, it was a If you build it they will come situation. But who is coming?

I set up Google Analytics to find out. The majority of traffic coming to the website is either from people typing the domain into their URL bar, or by typing the business name into Google. That’s like wanting to buy an iPod and going direct to Apple’s website, or typing Apple into Google. It’s fine for Apple because they have a prominent brand, everyone knows they sell iPods. But do you know the name of a rock climbing gym in NJ? Unfortunately for this business, a Google search isn’t showing them in the results page. Even if visitors are looking for the service the gym provides, they won’t find them. So the website may be built, but “they can’t come.”

So if you do have a website and aren’t doing any search engine marketing, just remember Field of Dreams. Just because you built it, it doesn’t mean they (your potential customers) can come. Know where they are going? Your competitor.

Search Engine Marketing, Small Business 257 Comments more...