gregory, richard, latest stats about the search engines

Search in a RecessionA survey from SEMPO

Search in a RecessionA survey from SEMPO

Well, we are certainly “going through extremely uncertain times” as UK Chancellor Alistair Darling put it, but is digital and search fairing better than most? SEMPO have listened to the market and their members and have discovered whether search is experiencing a nibble, a great big bite or bucking the trend during “The Credit Crunch”.

Hundreds of responses to a simple survey

“Have you recently changed where you spend your marketing budgets in light of the changes in the economic climate?”

- unfortunately down in the majority of cases

76%

24%

Yes

No

“Are you considering raising expenditure in search activity because of the economic climate?”

- 69% of marketers leaving it neutral

25%

75%

Yes

No

“How reliant are you on intent driven marketing like Search for your wider marketing strategy?”

- 64% of marketers are reliant for a wider strategy success

29%

34%

34%

2%

Very

Quite

Not Very

Unreliant

“Are you aware of the benefits of synergizing your paid and natural search strategies?”

- A lot of education and things to learn about harmonious campaigns

29%

71%

Yes

No

“Has the richness of the search results and offerings from publishers changed your SEM approach?

- Half the world is changing, half isn’t

45%

55%Yes

No

“More use of shopping engines”

“More use of YouTube” (bloody sales guys pushing irrelevant)

“Increased affiliate use on performance deals”

“Testing mobile”

“Changes to content strategy”

“More use of widgets and social media”“Re-design web site”

“Expanded in-house teams”

“More video work”

“What would you consider to be the most cost effective form of marketing in a recession?

- Natural Search, Paid Search, but also…TV, Events, Print, email – 15% don’t know!

56%

15%

11%

5%

3%

2%

2%2%1%1% 1% 1%

SEO

PPC

Other

Social media

display

events

POS

affiliates

direct sales

TV

local targetted

email

“Natural Search as number one with 3 times as many responses as any other channel”

“One that I can turn off quickly”

“Don’t know”

“Anything I can measure”

“Do you use SEM for brand as well as direct response

- Could this be linked to the increasing richness of SERPS

38%

62%

Yes

No

“What are the main reasons for not spending more of your marketing budgets online? (obstacles)

The boss, the board, the CFO, lack of belief and balancing the mix

30%

27%

17%

15%

8%2%

management

Budget cuts

Performance issues

keeping a balance

Lack of Understanding

Contractual commitments

A culprit of company-wide cost cutting?

What our industry still needs to do…

•Increased focus on analytics•Further research into “holistic search”•Education for senior management – a UK issue?

Search in a RecessionA survey from SEMPO

http://www.sempo.org

Richard Gregory (SEMPO)Richard.Gregory@latitudegroup.com

+44 (0) 1925 420105Twitter:@smartrich

Paul Doleman (SEMPO)Paul.doleman@icrossing.co.uk+44 (0) 7718 585165Twitter:@pauldoleman

Want to help?