Why & how to craft a post-SEO acquisition strategy

Merchants have long relied on search engine marketing to acquire new customers — and for good reason. Search engines are the leading way consumers find new Web sites, and for merchants, optimizing eCommerce sites to rank high in “natural” (unpaid) search results has been a cost-effective way to gain visibility for their brands.

But a growing number of signs indicate that SEO’s dominance as an acquisition strategy may be nearing an end — forcing merchants to diversify their activities. Among the factors contributing to this change:

• Consumers discover new sites from a widening array of sources. Search continues to dominate, with 54% of consumers saying they use search engines to find new Web sites — but that’s down from 61% in 2010, according to technology researcher Forrester. Moreover, new sources are growing in importance, most notably social media sites, which are now second in popularity as a discovery tool.

• Amazon has overtaken Google as a shopping research tool. With its vast repository of products and customer reviews, Amazon.com represents more than a purchasing destination for consumers. from 2009 to 2011, according to Forrester, while Google slipped by 45%.

• Recent algorithm changes make it harder to earn a page 1 ranking. As we’ve discussed previously, the algorithm that determines the content of natural search results on Google has changed over the past couple of years to favor , but sites whose content has attracted inbound links from other reputable domains. While small- to medium-sized merchants are increasingly produciing high-quality content, establishing inbound links is a resource-intensive process that ultimately remains outside their control — making it harder to compete with larger brands for attention and visibility. To further up the ante, over time Google has changed the format of its search results display to include fewer natural links. On mobile devices, where screen real estate is at even more of a premium, the problem is especially acute. Such changes are probably one reason why paid search has skyrocketed in popularity as a means for finding new web sites, growing 125% from 2011 to 2012, according to Forrester’s survey. But paid search can be an expensive proposition, and therefore just as difficult to dominate as natural search listings.

Of course, these trends have yet to converge to displace search as the leading tool for site discovery, and merchants shouldn’t abandon their SEO efforts. But they should begin to experiment with new ways of attaining visibility, with a view to being well-positioned to adapt to whatever the landscape holds in the future. Strategies to consider include:

• Marketplace selling. Use a product or brand name as a search term, and the first page is likely to be dominated by links to online mega-mass-merchants: Amazon, eBay, Rakuten (formerly Buy.com), and so on. Rather than try to battle their way to the top of these listings, merchants might do well to adopt an “if you can’t beat ‘em, join ‘em” mentality and take advantage of the marketplace selling opportunities these sites offer. Of course, successful marketplace selling is complex enough to warrant its own blog post (watch for it!), but the payoff can be twofold: not only can merchants win sales from new buyers, but they can “own” the marketplace link to their brand’s products from high within natural search listings. By selling on Amazon’s marketplace, beauty brand Perricone MD in effect nabs the top two natural search results for one of its product collections and, coupled with its paid search ad, dominates the top of page-one results.

• Email 2.0. In Forrester’s study, consumers rated email from companies or brands as a top source for finding Web sites; in fact, from 2011 to 2012 email’s growth in popularity was second only to paid search, at 73%. So while merchants tend to think of email as strictly a retention tactic, they should also incorporate ways to attract new customers, such as this Valentine’s Day promotion from The Gap, which offered an enticing discount for subscribers with a one-use-only code, and then awarded a slightly smaller discount to friends who received the forwarded message. Those recipients not only had the opportunity for instant savings, but saw how being a subscriber enabled access to still better deals.

• Smart social media. Not only is social media now the second-most-popular means of finding sites for consumers, but search professionals predict that social media mentions are growing in importance when it comes to natural search rankings. In 2011, page-level social media mentions were thought to make up 7.22% of the search algorithm, compared with 5.30% in 2009, according to SEOMoz’s most recent survey of ranking factors; the majority of SEO experts polled for the survey said social media signals would grow to be a top ranking factor in the future. So while merchants have struggled to attribute direct revenue to social efforts, social media contributes to overall brand visibility and is therefore worth a thoughtful approach. Merchants should:

  • Enable social sharing and endorsement of products on every network. A brand’s products can still be shared and promoted by individual users on social media sites even if the merchant doesn’t maintain an official presence there. Add Google+ “+1” and Pinterest “Pin It!” functionality to product pages on the main eCommerce site alongside links for Facebook and Twitter sharing.

  • Interlink social outposts and the eCommerce site. Be sure to give your sites maximum linking exposure by cross-promoting wherever possible.

  • Seek endorsements and mentions from authorities. With inbound links, the authority of the link source counts – so merchants should attempt to attract attention from highly relevant sources.

    • Cultivate relationships with reputable industry bloggers; send them press releases and new products likely to be of interest.

    • Seek out topic-relevant Twitter accounts that have already attracted plenty of followers encourage them to follow the brand.

    • On Facebook, “like” related pages with credibility, such as industry organizations, cultural institutions and media outlets, and invite “likes” in return. Cosmetics manufacturer Stila has “liked” fashion publications such as Allure, which “likes” Stila in return, thereby elevating the brand’s social visibility.

What means aside from SEO does your brand employ to achieve visibility with new customers?