AdWords Campaign Strategy

This week, our group started to work on our GOMC strategy. Our client is the American College of Chest Physicians (CHEST), publisher of the CHESTJournal, which is the global leader in advancing best patient outcomes through innovative chest medicine education, clinical research, and team-based care. The organization provides educational, leadership, and networking opportunities to its membership.

The AdWords account will consist of five campaigns targeted nationally in order to expand the organization’s customer base and reach the niche market looking for board review courses in the areas of pediatric pulmonology, pulmonology, and critical care. In order to have a very concentrated campaign, ads will solely run on Google’s Search Network. 5 campaigns are planned according to different product, and will direct users to different webpages. 

The 5 products are:

1. CHEST Pediatric Pulmonary Board Review

2. CHEST Critical Care Medicine Board Review

3. CHEST Pulmonary Medicine Board Review

4. CHEST ABIM Critical Care Medicine and Pulmonary Disease SEP Models

5. CHEST Board Review Courses 2014 

Also, we set the negative keywords to narrow down our search area and exclude some customers that we aren’t interested in reaching. The bidding strategy will be based on obtaining an average position of 2.5 by bidding $0.15 to $0.20 higher than the first page bid estimate. The Traffic Estimator will be used to evaluate projected cost-per-click (CPC) and amount of clicks for new keywords. Keywords that generate high impressions, with corresponding click-through rates (CTRs) lower than .90% will be dropped. To optimize the Return on Ad Spend, all campaigns will start with a smaller budget in the beginning, and will be increased each week.

We’re excited to launch the campaigns and assist the organization in meeting their strategic goals, and learn more about AdWords. And, of course, win the 2014 Google Online Marketing Challenge!

Adventures in AdWords: GOMC Group Blog Post

As we embark on our Google Online Marketing Challenge project, we wanted to give a brief overview of the organization we have selected, as well as highlight three Adword features we felt were noteworthy and important additions to a marketer’s toolkit.

American College of Chest Physicians (CHEST) is the organization we have selected for our GOMC team. The organization is a professional medical society and offers membership, leadership, as well as several educational opportunities to pulmonary, critical care, and sleep medicine clinicians. We have worked with the organization and determined that their annual board review courses are a good fit. The courses prepare physicians for taking their board certification exams, and also offer a boot camp-like opportunity for other clinicians who are not required to take board examinations.

Now, on to Adwords! Adwords is a familiar concept, but there is more to the tool than simply paying for advertising. Lets check out three important features helping to connect individuals with products and organizations.

· Ad Rank Formula. How does Google decide which company’s advertisement will show up first when a customer uses it’s keywords in his / her search? We had assumed like many others that money was the deciding factor. But Google actually uses a formula to determine the ranking order of competing ads. This New Ad Rank Formula is has three components, the Max Bid, Quality Score and the expected impact from your ad extensions and formats. Ad Rank plays a huge role in determining the prominence of the ads on a search results page and the cost-per-click.

· RLSA or Remarketing Lists for Search Ads. An other important feature is RLSA or Remarketing Lists for Search Ads, which lets companies customize it’s search ads campaign for people who have previously visited it’s site and tailor bids/ads to these visitors when they're searching on Google. When people leave a site without buying anything, remarketing lists for search ads helps the company reconnect with these potential customers as they continue using Google Search. Companies can set your bids, create ads, or select keywords, keeping in mind that these customers have previously visited your website.  Adding code to every page of companies’ website allows the code will be added to the user’s cookie and they will be on the remarketing lists.  Companies can reach them when they search on Google or other websites, which display Google advertisements.

· Enhanced Sitelinks. Finally new Enhanced Sitelinks provide advertisers with far greater control over the appearance of their ads. For example, companies can now schedule its sitelinks to talk about lunch specials at lunch time, or dinner specials in the evening. (Genius!) Moreover, it can designate sitelinks as being mobile preferred, thus providing an opportunity to present ads that are more relevant to the user context (i.e. where, what time, and from what device did the search originate from). Best of all, it can all be done within a single campaign now.

We’re looking forward to putting these tools to use to promote the CHEST Board Review courses with Adwords this quarter.

Social vs. Search

As someone who works in social media day in and day out, it tends to be all I think about.  So, a distraction in SEO this week has been interesting and got me thinking. . . is social killing search and SEO? 

We all know that video killed the radio star.

Here are three common scenarios for finding something great on the Internet. How does user-generated social content stack up to search engine results?

The case of the SUV, car seat and really tall husband.

Social media allows you to receive personalized search results from people who actually know you, your preferences and specific taste. When researching a car, you know you can find specs online about the make and model, but what about a specific question like, “hey, who has a Traverse? Will my rear facing Britax carseat fit behind the driver’s seat?  I need to know if my 6’1” husband will have any leg room left after the seat is installed!”

The question is specific, combines two brands, and the personal characteristics of the buyer. Your social network might know that you have a really picky husband who just won’t be happy with the remaining legroom. They might also know that they shouldn’t suggest you get a minivan instead (remember what happened last time some suggested it?!). Google doesn’t know that. 

[Image: weknowmemes.com]

Point? Social media.

Best Greek restaurant in Chicago?

Throwing this search term into a Google search yields a lot of results. Most of them link to sites like Yelp or Urbanspoon, sites that rely on user-generated content to populate the site. These sites offer the good (“Saganaki? The best!”), the bad (“Bathrooms were the worst I’ve seen.”), and the ugly (“The waiter didn’t wash his hands before he left the bathroom.”).

All powered by social media. But assembled by search.

Point? I’ll call it a draw.

Back to basics.

Need a phone number? Or perhaps the address of the drycleaner? In most situations, a quick Google search beats asking your Twitter network that is likely strewn across the globe.

Point: Search

More to the story?

But, I think there is a lot of grey area, as well. Think about the popular site, Pinterest. It is a collection of images assembled by users. But, there is very little social interaction (other than the simple act of following those who you know), but the social media platform has just about perfected the visual search world.

Consumers are increasingly looking for authentic results- real reviews from friends, expert third party reviews of vehicles, and the review section of Amazon. A Forrester Research study found just that. Real content and real reviews rank highest.

[CHART: Marketingcharts.com]

So, it begs the question, should we just be putting more resources towards networking with our influencers? More partnerships with mommy bloggers who will sing the praises of our products? 

I’d say the jury is still out, but the world of search looks very different with the advent of user-generated content on Facebook, Yelp and countless other social media platforms.

Week 1 Musings

I feel like I learned a ton of new information this week via the videos and reading presented for Marketing 595: Internet and Interactive Marketing. I've heard essentially every term presented, but never analyzed and dissected in such great detail. It was definitely interesting and set the tone for the quarter!

I think a few things really resonated with me:

There is nothing new under the sun. In some shape or form it has been done before. Including social media. From the telegraph to cassette tapes, these mediums have, at some point in history, acted as social media. I think viewing social media through this lens is important. Popular media has a tendency to villanize social media, but it truly is just a medium for the same human interaction that has been occurring since the cave man. 

I loved the FUN REACT assessment of social media. So much of the content rang true. In my experience, social media really is a great tool for facilitation. In my work, we use this approach on a daily basis. I am regularly sharing and presenting research our audience is interested in, but might not have an opportunity to seek out due to time constraints. So, much of the content is presented and our audience comments and interacts. We may follow up with additional resources or links, but in the end, we have provided a space for like-minded individuals to gather and discuss. 

Al Gore didn't invent the Internet. No, really, he didn’t. I thoroughly enjoyed the high level overview of the advent of the Internet and the World Wide Web. I found the lack of profit gained by Tim Berners-Lee as the inventor of the World Wide Web to be really fascinating. A tool so many of us use on a daily basis brought the inventor very little fame or wealth- a stark contrast to the Mark Zuckerbergs of the world.

Just for fun, Al Gore and his internet "proclamation."