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The Online Buying Lifecycle (video)

Marketing, social media, advertising

Andy Black

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Andy Black

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TedM

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well, i appreciate the vid...so i guess by buying terms you mean 4+ word long tails and "buy", "for sale" "online" + [search term]
 

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well, i appreciate the vid...so i guess by buying terms you mean 4+ word long tails and "buy", "for sale" "online" + [search term]

A buying keyword doesn't have to be 4+ word long tails, or include "buy", "for sale", or "online".

The name of my friend's B&B in the Champagne, France is called Les Molyneux. Someone searching with that search term is very close to booking a room with her.
 

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A buying keyword doesn't have to be 4+ word long tails, or include "buy", "for sale", or "online".

i doubt she'd need to do an adwords campaign for her brand-named b&b. if someone is already searching for it, it'd come up #1.
 
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Andy Black

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^^^ Always bid on your brand name. This prevents people hijacking your traffic, and allows you to monitor search volumes over time (which gives you a clue as to how well your branding efforts are doing).

It also allows you to amend and split-test your ad copy, and landing page.

Branded searches cost peanuts since you should be getting 40-60% CTR.

This was going to be my next post.
 

RogueInnovation

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I've been circulating around the idea that you should target existing demand first.
I think there are definate exceptions, such as when your brand requires you to create demand and reward that attitude.

Lazy mans chips:
"You feeling lazy at your computer? Why not munch on some chips! We are the greasiest but also the lazy mans solution"

You are attatching yourself to stigma by being THAT direct. So you ASSUME another market demand that is close to the original and target that.

You always need to push the boundary of existing demand a bit anyways
"You ate healthy all week? If you are going to reward yourself with a quick indulgence, try our new grease free chips!"

So, even though you might be a chip company, you don't just rush to existing demand (at least on paper)
You satisfy original demand deftly, and you advertise the boundary pushing idea.


Coke does this with, diet and all those variants, which affects their brand to be more forward thinking, but they have coke there as a fallback for when change doesn't take.


How you target existing demand should be elastic as it will not always be open to diet versions nor classic versions.
You have to assess the optimal strategy and get something that works.


So when targetting existing demand, I think we can also do diligence on how it will impact existing perception.
The problem for most, is they are so afraid of stigma, that they avoid demand completely!!! When just doing diligence on the perceptual effect would have sufficed.



Apple didn't have existing demand for ipods. No one was like "I need an mp3 player", we mostly thought "damn mp3 players are clunky bs".
They zipped way past the existing demand and said "what if it worked?".

Their brand success then drove existing demand towards new technology. Iphone was a success and so brand advocates wanted ever more tech, ipad.


Essentially by driving past existing demand they drove demand through their brand.
So there is great benefit in faith, as it can create a large runway for innovation and make your business snowball by meeting increased demand in excellent ways.
 
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TedM

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This prevents people hijacking your traffic, and allows you to monitor search volumes over time (which gives you a clue as to how well your branding efforts are doing).

right now, i have no traffic to hijack! your second point is a really good one. really really strong insight.

but, getting back to kw's. after having talked with @SebYK , (who was guided by.... :) ), i was thinking of making 1 campaign for exact match search terms - using the classic kind of buy words + long tails + my brand name [now], and trying to optimize adgroups / ads to maximize my quality score.

And then, to have a more general campaign, with very rough groups of lots of other terms, and monitor CTR and see if there are words to move over to the exact match campaign and negative kw's to use.

and, hope for the best...
 
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Andy Black

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^^^^ OK. Remember it's not really about what match type you use, but what search terms you will be eligible for.

Exact match [london hotels], is actually less useful if your hotel is in Kings Cross, than modified broad match keyword +hotels +kings +cross.

My third point is also important. If you have a paid search ad above your organic listing, you get to change ad copy and landing page copy to focus on conversion rates.... rather than trying to get the page ranked.

Also, having an ad and an organic listing supposedly improves CTR... so that it is more than the sum of the parts.
 

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Iwokeup

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Thanks for the great video, Andy
 
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Weaponize

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"It's easier to sit at the bottom of the hill and catch the people that are already looking to buy"

@Andy Black really a great statement when put in the context of your video. Thanks for making it and sharing it!
 

Kingmaker

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Great video! Really spoke to me since I recently lost money targeting people "browsing" and "researching" in a vain attempt to get higher CTR, which I got, but it was useless because it barely brought any sales.

I did get a bunch of e-mail subscribers, so will try to move those people to buyers over a period of time.
 
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Weaponize

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Always bid on your brand name. This prevents people hijacking your traffic, and allows you to monitor search volumes over time (which gives you a clue as to how well your branding efforts are doing).

That statement, especially the highlighted part, really is gold. Thanks for sharing that @Andy Black I hadn't thought of it like that!
 

Andy Black

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^^^ Always bid on your brand name. This prevents people hijacking your traffic, and allows you to monitor search volumes over time (which gives you a clue as to how well your branding efforts are doing).

It also allows you to amend and split-test your ad copy, and landing page.

Branded searches cost peanuts since you should be getting 40-60% CTR.

This was going to be my next post.

Here's that post:
 
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Monnies

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Andy mentioned this thread in our conversation.
It gave me some good insights, summarized:
- 4 kinds of people are determined, the people on the wrong side of the hill are the hardest to get to buy from you.
- Therefore start at the good side of the hill, the people who already decided to buy, the low hanging fruit. Get their search terms.
- Then create more buyers by providing information, and, important, have a listing for that. In that way you can shift people towards the good side of the hill.
 
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CoreyinMN

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^^^ Always bid on your brand name. This prevents people hijacking your traffic, and allows you to monitor search volumes over time (which gives you a clue as to how well your branding efforts are doing).

It also allows you to amend and split-test your ad copy, and landing page.

Branded searches cost peanuts since you should be getting 40-60% CTR.

This was going to be my next post.

You have no idea how many times I have read the opposite. Marketers out there would recommend you to pick a brand name so to be able to steal traffic from another already well-established brand with a similar name. I guess they are hunting for misspellings but clearly, it would not work if we are talking about the bigger more known brands like Apple or Amazon.

Now I can see the fact that bidding for terms for them will get much more expensive because they did not build a brand around a novel name. Not only that. The bigger brand will keep most of the authority and recognition and it becomes an uphill battle. I think the only time when it would be advantageous to pick a similar name to a well-established brand would be when starting a company in some microniche or vertical that has nothing to do with the bigger brand. Something that people can find using different non-branded key terms and then they remember the name because is similar to the brand they already know.

Something a lot of businesses in different verticals seem to use is "Premier". Screenshot
 
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