Searching for Brands - at the IAB

Efficient Frontier was a proud sponsor of the IAB flagship “Search for Brands” event last week in London. Speakers were members of the IAB UK Search Council for the half day conference and the 70 person  delegation was buzzing with a mix of familiar faces and newbies. 

The quality of this year’s presentations reflects the fast moving pace of the search space. The event began with Jack Wallington, the IAB Chair of the Search Council, as he reflected on the reasons why search marketing is so amazing including: the rate of change; its importance to reaching and building brands online; and the overriding idea that search marketers are a genius combination of data analysts, behaviour experts and communicators.

The theme for the event, as the name suggests, focused around building a brand through search and, appropriately, Shuvo Saha, Industry Leader at Google presented on that very topic. After effectively pointing out the enourmous amount of searches daily on themes such as babycare and healthy eating, there is a clear opportunity for brands to reach their audience via search with the right message at the right time. Interestingly, research Google conducted with Kellogg’s breakfast cereal and Flora margarine proved that appearing top on the search engine results page not only helped shape brand perception but also increased the effectiveness of TV, print and radio campaigns.

Our own Client Services Director Jonathan Beeston wrapped up the day with what might have been a rather glum topic “Demystifying Data for Search Marketers” if it wasn’t for his comic interpretation and fascinating insight.  Beginning with the premise that if you “Torture numbers, they will confess to anything”, Jonathan covered the often debated topic of bidding on brand keywords. Presenting research conducted by Efficient Frontier, it was discovered for the sample brands that total clicks did not change by bidding on your brand (traffic diverts from SEO to PPC) but the conversion rate was a lot higher on PPC which meant more orders and overall revenue. In addition, Jonathan presented interesting data anlaysis on click path analysis between generic and brand keywords which is a topic that always gets tongues wagging. If you would like a copy of the Efficient Frontier presentation by Jonathan Beeston, please get in touch via twitter @efrontier.

While we all practiced our excellent communication skills over a Guinness or two in celebration of St Patrick’s day (thanks Jack!),  I can’t help but wonder why more advertisers aren’t involved in these terrific (and free) events.  Hope to see more of my London brethren at the next one.

Merinda Peppard
Global Marketing Manager

Comments

[SEO Los Angeles]

Sounds like you had a good time and learned a lot!