Growth of search engine marketing rises above recessionary market

There's not much good news floating around the world of advertising and marketing at the moment. Bad economic news is piling up worldwide, marketing budgets are under severe pressure and most forms of online and offline advertising are suffering stagnant or even negative growth.

The one big exception to the general down trend is search engine marketing (SEM). Call it what you will - SEM, paid search, Pay Per Click (PPC) - but this particular form of online advertising appears to be just about recession-proof. Google's ongoing growth in such a down market is just one example of how SEM keeps growing at a faster pace than nearly any other form of marketing.

It is expected that paid search will grow at a compound annual growth rate of 13% a year up to 2013, even in a world where print, broadcast and other offline media are stagnating or declining.

So what is it exactly that seems to make SEM recession-proof? It is the fact that it is accountable, measurable and delivers good results for a relatively low investment. SEM does what marketers need a marketing medium to do in a down economy: it generates better returns on the smaller budgets organisations have to work with.

The power of declared intent

The power of SEM lies in the fact that a search user declares intent by telling the advertiser exactly what he or she is looking for, and search engines provide the results to the user. By contrast, most other forms of advertising push a message to audiences who may or may not be interested in them.

The fact that advertisers place their messages in an environment that is relevant to the user mean that SEM is a powerful tool for branding as well as achieving customer acquisitions and conversions. SEM allows one to directly address people who are seeking out products or services just like the ones your company sells.

SEM is cost-effective and efficient. Because you are getting the right message across to the right people and at the right time, there is far less wastage than there is in most other forms of advertising. A company is not spending money talking to people who probably will never buy what it's selling anyway.

Another benefit of SEM lies in its flexibility. One could easily set up a branding campaign that will see a longer tail of keywords and the possible use of the content network. Your focus will be on achieving critical mass or reach in a cost-effective manner. By contrast, a sales-driven campaign will be more targeted with a strong ROI focus.

As long as you keep linking your results to your online objectives, you can monitor how well your search budget is performing and optimise your campaign to ensure the best possible results.

If you want to generate leads, you can measure the amount and quality of those leads. With the right tools, you will have the ability to track, manage and evaluate your campaign, right down to a keyword level, to understand what is working for you and what isn't.

Worldwide trend towards search

Around the world, marketers are buying into search. Research conducted by Forrester in Asia Pacific, North America and Europe shows that 85% of marketers are using, piloting or planning to pilot search marketing programmes this year.

South African marketers, too, are beginning to understand the value of search and are catching up with their international counterparts. They realise that Internet penetration in the country might be relatively low, but the medium reaches a highly lucrative and valuable audience.

Search marketing should be a cornerstone of any marketing strategy. Any company that isn't visible when users are looking for their services or products online is throwing away opportunities to capture new sales and customers.