by Laurie Sullivan, , Staff Writer @lauriesullivan, May 9, 2016
Aaron Levy, client strategy at Elite SEM, closed the MediaPost Search Insider Summit by talking about himself to demonstrate what type of search targeting persona not to use and the importance of getting beyond the keyword when it comes to targeting consumers through search.
Despite the fact that marketers are keen to create audience segments, they still bid for specific targets based on keywords, which he says does not make a whole lot of sense. Marketers segment branded and non-branded queries. People who the marketer’s familiar with vs. people who they are not, he said.
Marketers may end up with about 128 audience segments for every campaign to find the best that work, everything from brand with purchase intent, or navigational brands, to buying generic or research sub-brand. From those segments create a decision tree to determine the best. “Most accounts on my team end up with between six and nine sub segments for the biggest terms,” Levy said.
Make attribution decisions before starting the campaign. It will help to better segment campaigns. Think about the audiences, whether they are existing customers or dominate customers. Look at different performance segments and location, and whether or not it’s important to change the message.
While most marketers focus on bid modifiers, but bid modifiers don’t change the message or move money around, Levy said. He threw out an arbitrary rule for those who want to follow some sort of rule: If an element contributes more than 30% of volume, and more than 15 conversions per month.
He also shared four case studies and strategies — the first beginning with low-income consumers who come from mobile search more often than many think because they likely don’t have a laptop or desktop computer. Low-income consumers treat data like gold and many brands, although too many brands create apps with tons of features that probably don’t work on their phones, he said.
Levy also walks through ways to target reoccurring purchases, especially for holidays and special occasions. View the video here.
MediaPost.com: Search Marketing Daily
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