Paid Search (PPC) & Natural Search (SEO) Co-optimization Strategies

In-House SEO And PPC: What You Can Learn From Each Other, Optimally
Speaker: Warren Lee, SEO Manager, Adobe
Tweet @ SEOCUBED (#smx #33D)

© 2012 Adobe Systems Incorporated. All Rights Reserved. Adobe Confidential.

In-House SEO And PPC: What You Can Learn From Each Other

DON’T PUT A LINE IN THE SAND BETWEEN PAID SEARCH & SEO
© 2012 Adobe Systems Incorporated. All Rights Reserved. Adobe Confidential. 2

Global Search Alignment

§  The Adobe Search Team is responsible for managing and optimizing the Search
Experience across the 3 pillars of Search:

Paid Search SEO

Site Search
*2013 Team Focus:
Maximizing the
3-pillar integration


A holistic search strategy that considers the buying cycle



A paid search strategy that considers targeting buyers across the buyers journey

•  Each tier has its own unique KPI’s
•  Types of keywords for each tier will vary by industry
•  Messaging should align to the tier



Keywords

Web design

Learn more, free trial
Messaging


Keywords

Adobe Dreamweaver

Buy now, Upgrade
Messaging


Keywords
TIP
Adobe Dreamweaver ALIGN MESSGING
TO
Buy now, Upgrade PURCHASE INTENT
Messaging


SEO PAID SEARCH

PAID SEARCH + SEO

How to make the best use of your SERP ‘shelf space’.


SERP example

THE SERP PRESENTS SEVERAL STRATEGIC OPTIONS ACROSS PAID AND NATURAL SEARCH


How can Adobe best allocate its
paid search budget while leveraging
its organic search rankings?


Cannibalization vs. Synergy

§  Cannibalization §  Synergy
§  Paid ads take away revenue, visits, trials, §  Presence of paid ads results in a lift
orders, etc., that would have otherwise in organic (visits, trials, orders,
gone to SEO revenue, etc.)

$600 $400

$350
$500
$300
$400 $250 $200
$180
$300 Paid $200 Paid
$500 Organic $150 Organic
$200
$100
$250 $150
$100 $50 $100

$0 $0
Running Only Running Paid + Running Only Running Paid +
Organic Organic Organic Organic

*not actual Adobe data *not actual Adobe data


Both Cannibalization & Synergy

$350
$300
$250
$200 $180

$150 Paid
Organic
$100 $200
$50 $120

$0
Running Only Running Paid +
Organic Organic
*not actual Adobe data


Test Objectives

§  Explore the relationship between paid and organic search
§  Cannibalistic, synergistic, or combination of both? To what degree?
§  Quantify impact of paid ads on organic performance
§  Track, monitor, and analyze across all key metrics
§  Derive actionable results

§  Glean insight into how paid and organic should focus their optimization eﬀorts
so as to provide the greatest return on investment
§  Analyze trends
§  Provide recommendations for future testing


Case Study 1

§  Objective
§  Test the relationship between paid ads & organic listings. Are there synergies? Is
there cannibalization occurring?
§  Strategy
§  Test a group of pre-selected keywords, splitting them into 2 equal groups (based on
historical performance, rank, etc).
§  Scope
§  5 weeks
§  70 keywords
§  Hypothesis
§  Organic listing ads running solo will have higher traﬃc and more trials and revenue
yet Paid ads drive more incremental value


Test Results - Test Resulted in Paid Search Incremental Value

Revenue Trials
$100,000
3000

$80,000
2500

2000

$60,000

Paid
1500
Paid

$40,000
Organic
Organic

1000

$20,000
500

$0
0

Running
only
Organic
Running
Paid
+
Organic
Running
only
Organic
Running
Paid
+
Organic

Clicks/ Trials Orders Units Revenue Net Revenue Conv% Conversions
Visits

Percentage +61% +72% +71% +77% +94% +80% +7% +72%
Change

Across the board running paid + organic resulted in more volume at a higher
conversion rate producing more incremental revenue and a higher AOV


Case Study 2

§  Objective: Increase trial downloads
§  Strategy: Change CTA in Organic page meta descriptions to reflect “Free Trial
Download”
§  Scope:
§  3 pages updated
§  Test ran 3 weeks

§  Hypothesis: Increased trials from these pages and (hopefully) no eﬀect on Paid
performance


Test Results – Organic Trials

Test and control page visits
5000
4500
4000
32%
3500
3000
5%
2500
2000
1500
1000
500
0
Historical Test Historical Test
Acrobat Test Pages Acrobat Control We also saw a lift in Conversion Rate
Test and control page trials Page
Name
Week
Conv%

400
Acrobat
Pro
Historical
9.83%

350
300 45%
Test
9.93%

250
200 Convert
PDF
Historical
1.83%

150
8%
Test
2.22%

100
50 Edit
PDF
Historical
3.72%

0
Historical Test Historical Test
Test
5.11%

Acrobat Test Pages Acrobat Control

Case Study 3

§  Objective: Determine impact of using top paid ad copy including promotional
offer in SEO meta data for new Creative Cloud product.
§  Strategy: Change CTA in Organic page meta descriptions to reflect “40% off
discount”
§  Hypothesis: We will expect synergy between paid and natural performance,
and and increase in visits and orders. Paid CPC may increase and paid ROI may
decrease.

Awareness

Consideration Meta descriptions targeted at different points in the purchase funnel

Purchase


Scope / Methodology

NORTH AMERICA
u  Test Start Date: July 10, 2012
u  Test End Date: August 14, 2012

Japan
u  Test Start Date: July 20, 2012
u  Test End Date: August 16, 2012

u  Meta descriptions were changed at the same time every week
u  Tracked hourly till they appear on Google
u  Normalized to a 7-day week


SOLVE FOR KEYWORD UNKNOWN

( KW Unavailable / (Total Entry Page Visits – KW Unavailable) + 1 ) * KW

FOR EXAMPLE:

Total visits to a certain page – 100
KW unavailable – 40
KW1 – 30
KW2 – 20
KW3 – 10

To get the adjusted number for KW1:

( 40 / (100-40) + 1 ) * 30 = ( (40/60) + 1 )*30 = 1.67 * 30 = 50

For KW2: 1.67 * 20 = KW2 adjusted 33.3 (33 rounded)

For KW3: 1.67 * 10 = KW3 adjusted 16.7 (17 rounded)

Total of the 3 adjusted numbers = 50+33+17 = 100

Test Group across all Metrics
UNITS VISITS
120 60000

100 50000

80 40000

60 30000

40 20000

20 10000

0
Baseline Promo Normal 0
Baseline Promo Normal

REVENUE ORDERS
120 120

100 100

80 80

60 60

40 40

20 20

0 0
Baseline Promo Normal Baseline Promo Normal


Control Group across all metrics

UNITS REVENUE
60 14000

50 12000

10000
40
8000
30
6000
20 4000

10 2000

0 0
Baseline Promo Normal Baseline Promo Normal

VISITS ORDERS
50000
60
45000
40000 50
35000
40
30000
25000 30
20000
20
15000
10000 10
5000
0
0 Baseline Promo Normal
Baseline Promo Normal


Clearly the results were surprising!


Thank you


Thank you!

QUESTIONS?

FEEL FREE TO FOLLOW UP WITH QUESTIONS.

TWITTER: @ SEOCUBED


RESOURCES

THE BUYING CYCLE:

http://support.google.com/adwords/certification/bin/answer.py?hl=en-AU&answer=19450

GOOGLE STUDY (2011):

http://googleresearch.blogspot.com/2011/07/studies-show-search-ads-drive-89.html

http://static.googleusercontent.com/external_content/untrusted_dlcp/research.google.com/
en/us/pubs/archive/37161.pdf

GOOGLE STUDY (2012):

http://googleresearch.blogspot.com/2012/03/impact-of-organic-ranking-on-ad-click.html

ADDITIONAL LINKS:

http://support.google.com/adwords/certification/bin/answer.py?hl=en-AU&answer=19450


APPENDIX


Google Study


Google Study

GOOGLE SAYS PAID SEARCH IS
INCREMENTAL.
BUT…
§  81% of Displayed Search Ads Had No
Associated Organic Result
§  More than half of data was holiday
data
§  Only looked at clicks, not conversions
or other KPIs
§  Made no distinction between brand
ad and non-brand ads


Google Study

GOOGLE SAYS PAID SEARCH IS
INCREMENTAL.
BUT…
§  81% of Displayed Search Ads Had No
Associated Organic Result
§  More than half of data was holiday
data
§  Only looked at clicks, not conversions
or other KPIs
§  Made no distinction between brand
ad and non-brand ads

<- SO TEST FOR YOUR SELF!!


Paid Search (PPC) & Natural Search (SEO) Co-optimization Strategies

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