1. Creating experiences for people with specific needs, in the moment

Savvy brands will deliver hyper-relevant experiences by leveraging data to (1) understand & (2) cater to people with pressing needs:

Instant Gratification

• Provide people exactly what they need, when they need it
• Contextually relevant personal communications with clear value (for example a location-based offer at the right time)

Use predictive analytics to personalise advertisements

• Extract information from customer data and use it to predict needs (for example through CRM integration)
• Leverage data to deliver custom experiences

 

        2. Engaging searchers based on context, as they move beyond simple search language

“Search marketing” now includes social, video, CSEs, native, TV, wearables, apps, maps, review sites, “things,” and cars—often without having said or typed. 

Keywords have always been the best way to determine intent.  But, as we move beyond keywords, intent can still be derived from context:

Audience buying
Engage based on contextual inputs like time, device, geography , demographic, interests, behaviour & prior brand interaction—even if a keyword wasn’t used.

Expanded reach
Today, we can reach well beyond the traditional search engine results pages.

       3. Embracing the power of curation to foster ongoing relationships with consumers

Through curation, many brands have developed ongoing relationships with their customers, resulting in more sales:

People-powered content
- Leverage customer data—reviews, likes, clicks, conversions—to create curated landing page/content experiences.

Curated spaces
- Seamlessly entwine your content into already curated spaces such as Pinterest Promoted Pins, and Yahoo! Native Ads.

Influencer partnerships
- Partner with bloggers and other influencers who curate products for their audiences.

Search is a form of digital marketing that involves the promotion of digital brand assets (websites, videos etc.) by increasing their visibility in search engine results pages (SERPs), e-retailers and brand websites. Search marketing is about connecting searchers looking for information with the most relevant information available online. It encompasses both organic (SEO) and paid search (PPC).

The keywords used in search campaigns can be brand terms to ensure visibility and brand awareness as well as campaign specific terms related to the launch of a new product or brand event that consumers may be searching for.

SEO stands for Search Engine Optimisation, the process of improving the visibility of a website or owned asset on organic SERPs, by incorporating search engine friendly elements into a website.

In organic search, Google determines rankings through its algorithm, based on around 250 factors, that included upwards of 500 changes last year. Only Google has access to the algorithm but we do know some of the key factors that lead to higher rankings on the SERPs:

• Creating unique and useful content
• Ensuring titles are optimised
• Making content relevant to the search term
• High quality links to other sites.

A website audit should be the first thing carried out to assess what needs to be addressed. A site needs to be friendly to search engines for successful indexation. Ensuring indexation by search engines takes place is always the first step in an SEO strategy, because if content cannot be seen by search engines, it will never appear in search results.

The title tag element is critical to both user experience and search engine optimisation. This is because it will be judged by users as the very first thing they see in the search results pages to determine whether a page will be useful to them or not. It will also be used by search engines to determine what the page is about.

Google comes down hard on websites with spammy links, so it is crucial to link to reputable websites. In the past, Google has penalised websites with poor practices - resulting in lowered search rankings and sometimes even being completely de-indexed. It is therefore important to keep up with changes in Google’s algorithm when they are announced and adhere to best practices in SEO.

Every website must be optimised so consumers are given a good experience on their mobiles and are therefore more likely to convert (for example by making a purchase). Performics predicts that by the end of this year, mobile search volume will outpace that of desktop and Google is continuing the trend of trying to push brands to focus on mobile. On 21 April 2015, Google expanded "mobile-friendliness" as an organic ranking signal, which (according to Google) will have a "significant impact on search results". Making it easy for people to discover relevant content, optimised for their devices, is now critical to driving results and Performics is closely monitoring the effects of these recent changes. You can check if your website is mobile-friendly on Google Developers.

Content marketing has become an increasingly important part of an effective SEO strategy and quality content can drive partnerships, which in turn delivers increased visibility, ranking and consumer engagement. Google is designed to give the user the best content for the particular search term they’re looking for, so the most efficient, cost effective and natural way to rank for desired search terms is to own the best content on the web for that particular search term. Consumers want useful content and visitors will spend longer on your website if you provide content that they want to read. Good content also helps increase traffic and encourages people to share your site via their own sites, social media and social bookmarking sites.

PR, brand mentions and existing links should also be optimised to drive brand equity and bring traffic to your website. Infographics and visual content display data in a visually compelling way in order to tell a story through an image. They can be very popular as a form of content marketing, and are easily shareable.