Just in case anyone out there was having a crisis of faith, the Opinion Research Corporation has good news for you: search engines are still the preferred method for conducting product/service research. In a survey of 736 adults released yesterday (PDF), ORC found that not only do most people prefer to use search engines for product research, they also read “online customer feedback” heavily.

That THAT, totally skewed Pew findings!

61% of respondents said they read “online reviews, blogs and other sources of online customer feedback before purchasing a new product or service.” Even more impressive, 83% said that “online product evaluations and reviews had at least some level of influence on their purchasing decisions.” (But only 32% reported posting online feedback themselves. Lazies.)

And it’s not just individual goods and services that people are researching: 70% looked for information on a particular brand of goods and services.

The survey also looked at where in the “funnel” this research was occurring. Most of us in the industry expect it research and reading online opinions to come in fairly early or midway through the purchase process. That wasn’t exactly the case: 38% first consult online reviews when they began their shopping research, but 27% turn to the Internet after narrowing it down to 2-3 choices, and “another 21% are at the narrowing down stage to confirm that they are buying the right product or service” (Not totally sure what that one means…)

ORC makes a sort-of plug for SEO here, which I’ll reiterate: people are turning to search engines to research and buy the products and services that you offer. Are they finding you? (It’s been a while, but I still remember the elevator pitch!)

ORC also hit on another important area that businesses need to watch in these findings:

“Businesses today exist in an era in which it’s nearly impossible to escape the likelihood of being
evaluated…there’s nowhere to hide,” said Linda Shea, SVP and Global Managing Director of Customer Strategies for Opinion Research Corporation. “Companies must be extremely mindful of the power of proliferating online forums and their ability to shape consumer’s perceptions about brands. Even a single negative review, when posted in a very public forum, can have a significant impact on a prospective buyer’s decision to purchase.”

*cough*cough*reputation management*cough*
expert*cough*Andy*cough*cough*Trackur*cough*. (Whoa, sorry ’bout those allergies!)

Finally, the last little tidbit: the most researched product and service categories were:

• Travel/Recreation/Lesiure (82%)
• Electronic goods (80%)
• Household products/services (66%)
• Clothing (55%)
• Automotive (55%)
• Personal care (40%)
• Food (24%)

via

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Excerpted from:
Search Engines Preferred for Product Research

By Asif Anwar

When people realized the potential of email marketing, they thought that this is the future of internet marketing. Then came in Search Engine Marketing (SEM) with more liberal approach. As the social media evolved with Web 2.0, we are steadily seeing the shift of visitors from popular internet services like search engines and free email services to the newborn Online Social Media. We are seeing that the present of Internet Marketing is changing rapidly. So, why not the future?

The changes in the internet marketing will evolve around the technology. And marketers have to go where all the people are heading. To give a bit of hint, I’ve compiled some of my prophecies that are based on future of internet marketing.

Prophecy #1: Onsite Search Engine Optimization (SEO) will be History

Sorry for starting it this way. As an internet marketer, I am happy to promote the keyword Search Engine Optimization (SEO), as most of the people somehow got used to this term. But it’s a wrong word anyway. We the marketers don’t optimize search engines. Rather engineers in Google, Yahoo, and Microsoft does the exact thing.

As the search engines acquire more revenue, their pool of professionals is also drained with best brains. And it will just take some time to identify ways to evaluate each site irrespective of web development language used. But, they will eventually get rid of the need to optimize your site for the Search Engines.

Search Engines might also go for Visual Algorithm Update that will use snapshot image of the page to manipulate information like visible text, animation, and visible keyword density. With artificial intelligence using OCR technology to extract the texts, can eliminate a lot of tasks that are currently done for optimizing a site for search engines.

Prophecy #2: Searching will become more User-friendly

As the speed of internet rises, search engines will show more visible results. I would be happy to see Mouseover Zoom-up search results, for quick peek of the site I wish to open. It’s much like the Snapshot pop-in that Wordpress is using. That will make people go beyond the first Search Engine Result Page (SERP).

Moreover, the Search-As-You-Type will also be introduced with search suggestions. The search suggestion will also affect multilingual users, as they will be suggested English keywords for the same multilingual phrase. Well, that might be good for businesses for English speaking countries.

It may happen that searching will not be required at all in case of purchase. You just provide the query to Google, Yahoo, Live or any Search Engines; have a cup of coffee and you’ll have custom reports with prices on products you are seeking with background research highlighting positive and negative comments about the product.

Prophecy #3: More Personalized & Localized Results will Influence SEM

We are already experiencing localized search. However, the personal search has not yet been that very personal. Personalized search will provide more reputation for websites which can influence search engine performance based on more quality visits with low bounce rate. Websites will figure out new offline ways to create more personal affiliation with the site to influence personalized search.

Localized search will provide marketers with the ability to influence people on the move to purchase. That way, the localized search may also change if a consumer changes location.

Prophecy #4: Natural Language Reputation Algorithm will be a Great Factor

Misspelled keyword marketing has already started to vanish. Moreover, to fight duplicate content, spammers will use twisted garbage texts of the same content that have no meaning but with correct spelling. Search Engines will embed several artificial intelligence to identify natural language.

Sites with less grammatical errors and misspellings will get more Natural Language Reputation Rank. This in turn can add as another task for Search Engine Optimization (SEO).

Prophecy #5: Copying Themes will be punished by Near Duplicate Content Filter

Google has recently updated Duplicate Content Filter that punishes the use of duplicate contents in the internet. But, Search Engines will try it’s best to struggle with the remedies taken by webmasters or web marketers through their Near Duplicate Content Filter.

Varied contents with same theme will also be identified and punished by hidden results which you can see only by clicking “See more pages like this” beside the original theme. The explanation from search engine is, if two pages are saying the same thing, then why keep them all over the SERPs.

Prophecy #6: TrustRank will be Stronger than PageRank

Both Google and Yahoo are working on Trustrank. At current stage, it suggests using both automated algorithm and human editors to fight against spam. But, I believe that some other factors like low bounce rate, high visitors, age of the site, etc. will come under the automated portion of the TrustRank. Even email spamming reputation can also influence TrustRank. Sites will struggle to keep TrustRank high.

Prophecy #7: Online Social Media will kill Traffic from Search Engines

This is actually not a prophecy. We are seeing the result today. Facebook is growing rapidly with all the services it can find. In near future, you may never have to leave Facebook to get the services you want or worse (I’d say better) you can get paid services for free inside the walled garden. Then, the search engines will end up only as API among all other web services.

Prophecy #8: Handheld Devices will Rule Future Traffic

I said Handheld Devices, not mobile phones. I am not optimistic that mobile phone technology will last for 5 more years. As Bluetooth, WiFi, and WiMax evolves, each mobile phone operators will switch back to ISP (but wireless). Even Nokia is also trying to remove the mobile identity from their manufactured sets. They are calling N-Series sets as Multimedia Devices and E-Series sets as Communicators.

People are paying for the communicating with each other now through mobile phones. But in future, people will love to be spammed to talk free with their partners. They are always doing that for their favorite shows in television. Mobile-commerce will become more user friendly, making people buying more through mobile phones.

Social Media and Mobile platform will create a new hybrid means of communication that will be more secured and moreover it will be free. So, newsletter circulation will switch from emails to Online Social Medias.

Prophecy #9: Email will be the Least Used for Personal Communication

Email marketers have bad news. But, I guess they have got it already. Why use it as marketing media when people will not be using it? For personal use, people may not switch back to emails again. For instance, many of us regularly check Facebook & LinkedIn inbox which sometimes attracts more attention than the emails in mailbox.

But, I don’t see that email will die fast. Email services will evolve as much complex media of communication. I would like to see some sort of a CRM solution that automatically takes care of who to mail today. Email can turn out to be more of a Business-to-Business (B2B) communication tool.

Email may face another challenge is Email Toll for unsolicited emails aka spams. People may have to pay a small fee to get accepted for sending further mails. But then again, there will always be Toll-Free Email Address used by businesses.

Prophecy #10: Personal Power to Influence Purchase will Increase

With the evolution of Online Social Media, personal power to influence purchase will greatly increase. People with greater reputation will have greater trust rank and can influence purchase. Basically, they will be the next marketers. The punchline for my blog is “Philanthropists are the greatest marketers and vice versa”. I believe that will be true in future. Your effort to help the community can make you Authority of Reference to individuals for purchase. Authority site’s influence will reduce.

Even people with great reputation will be hired by companies for their marketing. Social Marketing will largely influence online purchase. Or each company will work for some sort of Social Cause.

Prophecy #11: Web-based Consumer Analytics will be Major Internet Marketing Process

Web Analytics and Consumer Analytics will be merged into a hybrid technique called Web-based Consumer Analytics. This may be the major online marketing process in future. Data Manipulators for specific industry will be another Marketing Position in future, who will help businesses identify high value customers. So, each marketer will know what you bought, what you might buy now, and what you will want to buy for next Christmas.

Web Analytics will evolve into Online Reputation Monitoring. And Search Engine Reputation Management (SERM) will thrive as the best strategy for online selling. Every business will use their own monitoring tool to identify potential need and businesses will have people finding it out.

Prophecy #12: Web Cluster and Widgets will mean Businesses for Small Companies

Web Cluster and Widgets will become more popular as small businesses may find niche marketing opportunities. The users of widgets or web clusters are not counted as visitors to the site. However, the large amount of use of them in external sites can increase more revenue for small businesses. However, to mask the reputation for push marketing, many marketers may mal-utilize it.

Prophecy #13: Future Internet Marketers will be Personal Helper

Personal help in purchase is currently a payable service. But in near future, marketers will play this role for free. If the marketers know that your son has brought many baby products for 3 months in a row and the birthday of your Granddaughter is in next week, then the marketers can approach you to remind what you can buy for your Granddaughter. This is just one example. But Philanthropy Model in Internet Marketing will rule the future.

This is an entry to Marketing Pilgrim’s 3rd Annual SEM Scholarship contest.

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13 Prophecies of Internet Marketing

According to Shoemoney, SEO has no future. I do not always agree with him, but in this case, he is dead right. Let me pull on my flame retardant suit before I explain why.

First, understand that the only reason SEO has ever worked is because search engines were not advanced enough to always show relevant information. I remember when I started selling online. At the time, I had only a few competitors in my industry and it was easy to beat them in the SEO game. It took only a few metatags and such, and within weeks, I was dominant.

That went on for years. Back in those days, a monkey could have dominated search engines rankings. We moved from metatags to inbound links with the right anchor text and continued our domination. How easy was it? I basically knew during that period how many inbound links we needed to achieve top three rankings, and the results were uncannily consistent.

Eventually, the search engines got smarter, and ended the concept of guaranteed SEO dominance. Some people are still in denial. I still have SEO snake oil salesmen calling me trying to sell me link trading services.

Here is why SEO as we know it is going to continue its death spiral. Search engines are too smart and they have a different agenda. They do not want to reward crummy companies that play SEO games–they want to give the top listings to the best companies. And they are quickly gaining access to the information they need to do exactly that. They will use traffic and buying stats to figure out who the top companies are.

Take my industry of health supplements. Do you think Google wants to reward the SEO contortions of unknown companies and affiliates with lots of free business? Of course not–they want to send their visitors to the top supplement sites in the industry.

Within a year or two, they will be good at it. I can predict what supplement companies will be showing on the first page of Google soon. They will be the companies that have strong brands and lots of business. If you are not in the top ten of your industry, you had better find a way to get there in a hurry if you want to be on the first page of Google.

Yes, this means that the rich will get richer and the poor will starve for SEO traffic. If you are not in the first category, you had better find a way to get there quick. The middle class is about to disappear.

In my last article, I wrote about the importance of branding on the conversion rate. If you want a long term SEO strategy, guess where your focus should be? Yes, your branding. Forget the typical SEO tricks; focus instead on building your brand to a position where Google WANTS you on the front page of results.

If you absolutely have to hire an SEO expert, hire one that understands this truth. I think, however, that you would be better served by largely forgetting about SEO and focusing instead on building your brand.

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Is SEO a Dying Industry?