People say it all the time: “This advertising costs too much!” They practically go into cardiac arrest when they see how much the advertising for certain media in certain markets is going to cost them. It is pretty easy to get sticker shock when you see that a 60-second radio commercial on a popular Los Angeles station could cost you a thousand bucks – each. Or when you realize that radio spots on top stations in the San Francisco market cost as much as $2,500 – a MINUTE. Or when you realize that a newspaper ad in your city barely bigger than a Hershey bar will cost a couple thousands dollars. It’s easy to automatically think that’s a lot of money. Now here’s the important question for you, the advertiser: does the ad really cost too much?

So what’s the answer? The savvy advertiser will tell you that the cost of the ad is not the issue. What’s important is the return the ad will bring. If you were charged even as much as $40,000 for a 60-second radio commercial that generated enough sales to make you a profit of $50,000, then would the $40,000 be A LOT? The answer is NO! Of course not! You’d be a fool not to beg, borrow or steal the $40,000 so you could make the $50,000 profit! Try getting that kind of return in the stock market! How do you think that these big companies can afford to spend a two million for a 30-second TV commercial during the Super Bowl? They know that an enormous amount of people will see it – enough to make the return on investment a good deal.

The point is simple: you’ve got to figure out how much money an ad will make you before you draw a conclusion of whether or not it costs too much. So how do you do that? It’s actually pretty easy. Here’s a simple process for determining the Return on Investment, or ROI, of an ad. First, you’ve got to know how much profit you make on each sale. For instance, if you buy it for $50 and sell it for $100, your gross profit is $50. Second, figure out what your closing ratio is. If, on average, you close one sale for every four people who inquire, that’s a 25% closing ratio. If 9 out of 10 end up buying, then your closing ratio would be 90%. This is simple math. Third, figure out what your break even is. Do this by taking cost of the advertisement and divide it by the amount of gross profit per sale. Remember, we already figured out what your gross profit is a second ago. So how much do the ads cost? If the ads cost $1,000 and your average gross profit is $50, that means you’ve got to make 20 sales to make back the $1,000 – that’s your break even point – in this example, it’s 20 sales. Fourth and last, figure out the number of leads you need to generate from the ad if you are to break even. To do this, you’ve got to know your closing ratio, which we just figured out also. Let’s say it’s 25%, or in other words, you close one out of four people who inquire. So if you close 25%, and you need 20 sales to break even, that indicates that your $1,000 worth of advertising needs to generate 80 leads to break even.

Now I know that all sounds kind of complicated, but it’s actually pretty simple. We just calculated in the example that if the $1,000 ads can generate 80 leads you would break even. That’s a return on investment of 0. I’m not saying that your goal is to break even. I realize that you are in business to make a profit. But let’s start with breaking even; that’s the bare minimum you can accept when running an ad. At least you didn’t come up with a NEGATIVE return on investment! So let’s say your goal was to double your money. What would have to happen to your numbers? That’s right, you’d have to double your lead flow, or in this case, generate 160 leads instead of just 80. That means that if you generated 160 leads, you would generate a profit of $1,000 – again, on $1,000 spent. In other words, you’ve doubled your money. Your return on investment is 100%. That’s pretty easy to follow, isn’t it? By way of review, what we’re trying to do is calculate your return on investment for your advertising. Here are the four steps again. Think about your numbers in your business.

1. What’s your gross profit per average sale?

2. What’s your closing ratio?

3. What’s your break even – in terms of number of sales needed? How many leads does your ad need to generate for enough sales to break even?

4. What’s your return on investment on any given number of leads that you generate?

Now realize something important here. What we’ve just done in this exercise is figure out how many leads you need to generate to break even on the cost of the advertisement and then calculate the ROI for how ever many leads your ads end up generating. That’s a good piece of information to have, but now I want to take it a step further. Let’s figure out what’s known as the Lifetime Value of a Customer. What if your average customer brings you a $50 gross profit per sale like in the example we just went through? Is that the only time that customer will ever buy anything from you? How many times does that average customer come back in the course of a month or a year? If your average customer shops with you one time a month and makes you $50 gross profit every time, that customer is now worth $600 a year – in profit. And if you know that your average customer stays with you for 3 years, now that $50 a month client is worth a tidy $1,800. So now how much would you be willing to spend to accrue that client? What if those were your average numbers, $50 a month for 3 years. Then in the example earlier, remember where we broke even with 80 leads and just 20 sales? Now those 20 customers would be worth an astounding $36,000 over the next three years. And it only cost you a thousand dollars worth of advertising. Now your break even looks a lot better, doesn’t it! If you could accrue a $36,000 annuity every time you ran a thousand dollars’ worth of ads, you should mortgage your house and spend as much money as possible on advertising!

Now, a couple of words of advice when figuring your return on investment for advertising. Always estimate your numbers conservatively, or in other words, on the low side. Always figure on getting a lower number of leads than you’re hoping for and expecting. Always count on a lower closing ratio than you’re used to. If you calculate your numbers using conservative figures, then you’ll do fine if your results are actually lower than projections and in the event that you do as well as you had initially hoped, you’ll just make more money than you expected.

Let me give you a real life example to better illustrate ROI. There is a company that was promoting seminars where they would attempt to sell a service that cost $8,000. When they were starting to do advertising to promote these seminars, the question of how much budget should they afford came up. They wanted to start filling seminars with about a week after starting advertising, so they decided that fax broadcasting would be the best way for them to quickly get the message out about the seminars. Faxing can be done for as little as 7 cents per page in some major metropolitan areas, and even with the new laws around “opt-in” and “relationship” faxing it seemed the most effective method to get directly into businesses with a target for the seminar, so they came back and said they wanted to send out about 25,000 faxes a week for the 5 weeks they would be doing seminars. When asked how many sales were they planning on generating, they said because of a unique financing plan that allowed them to sell their package on a low monthly payment basis, they thought they could sell at least 100 packages in that 5 week time period.

Well, 100 packages is a lot and they were told that they would have to do at least 100,000 faxes a week for the 5-week period to get the number of leads required to sell that many packages. The man got his calculator out and did some quick math and realized that he had to spend $35,000! 7 cents times 100,000 faxes times 5 weeks! That number – $35,000 – sounded so huge it caught him off guard. His idea was to spend just under 2 grand a week or a total of less than $9,000. Big difference. That’s called “sticker shock.”

So what he did was figure out the ROI, according to the steps previously explained. Again, first figure out your gross profit per sale. His was about $3,250. Second, figure out the closing ratio. He expected this would be about 20%. So then, how many sales would he need to break even on a $35,000 advertising expenditure? Well, 35 thousand divided by $3,250 gross profit per sale is about 11 sales. Just 11 sales to break even. So if his closing ratio were just 10%, he’d have to generate about 110 leads to break even. 110 leads on 500,000 faxes? Statistically this is easily attainable even with poorly written materials. The last thing to do would be to figure out how many leads he’d have to get to reach his goal. His goal is 100 sales and his closing ratio is 10%. That means he’d have to generate about 1,000 leads. On 500,000 faxes sent out, that’s like a two-one-thousandths of a percent response. That is very reasonable. He’d generate a total gross profit on the deal of $325,000 and if you subtract the $35,000 advertising cost, that’s still a healthy gross profit. His attitude toward the $35,000 changed instantly.

Do you see how this analysis can work for you? Just run through your numbers and you’ll know how much money is a lot of money when it comes to advertising.  If you want to have me help you through this process, just send me and email or call for an appointment and I’ll be happy to help you.

Randy Martinsen

mymagency.com

Advertising on the Content Network vs. Search Network

In the last few years Google AdWords has gotten increasingly popular. One of the biggest reasons for this surge in popularity is the wide reach AdWords can help companies achieve. The extensive network of Google-related sites and the lack of a minimum ad spend makes it so that even companies with the most minimal ad budget can advertise online with AdWords and know that their ads can be seen by thousands overnight.

When setting up an ad campaign with Google AdWords one important decision that you will need to make is whether to advertise on the Content Network, the Search Network, or both. Google’s Content Network places ads on sites based on the content of the sites and how well it aligns with your ad. The Search Network places ads on Search Engines where potential customers are looking for information and products.

AdWords Learning Center

Content Network
When an advertiser utilizes the Content Network the ad he/she creates will be placed on sites that have similar themes to the keywords that are chosen for that ad. So for instance say you are using “gourmet coffee beans” as a keyword, using the Content Network your ad will be featured on coffee review sites, sites selling coffee makers, and perhaps coffeehouse blogs. With your ad on these related sites you can choose to pay each time that ad is clicked on, or each time it appears for someone to see. Content Network advertising is mostly used to create brand awareness. The thought behind this style of advertising is that when someone is searching for a coffeemaker and sees your ad they may or may not click on it, but due to the brand loyalty that can developed with a well structured ad, perhaps after they order their coffee maker they will need some coffee beans and go to your site.

Search Network
When an advertiser utilizes the Search Network the ad he/she creates will be placed on Google search engines and when a customer types in a keyword you are using your ad will be pulled up on the right-hand side or top area of the search results page. In the same example from above, when a potential customer goes on Google and types in “gourmet coffee beans” your ad can appear. Customers then click on the ad and are taken to your site where they can find the item or items they are seeking. With the Search Network you only pay each time you ad is clicked, not each time it appears. The benefit to this style of advertising is that you find the consumer at the very moment they intend to purchase “gourmet coffee beans.”

Criticisms
The question of advertising on the Content Network versus the Search Network is a divisive one.

Criticizers of the Content Network say that while it can reach more people the traffic it creates is not qualified in any way. Based on our coffee example, a click on your ad on the Content Network may be a person who, after searching for a coffee maker, is interested in seeing how much the coffee beans will run them if they buy the maker, thereby helping them make a decision on the coffee maker purchase. Or perhaps someone clicks on your ad after seeing that their local coffee house has started offering a new blend and wants to see if you have any customers who reviewed that product so they can decide if it is worth it to go down to the coffee shop and try it.  Additionally, if an internet user is trying to find song lyrics that contain the phrase “coffee beans” or a movie with “coffee” in the title or even a celebrity with the last name “Bean” your ad may appear even though it is of no use to the searcher. While Google offers the ability to filter out sites that you do not think are relevant on the content network, it can tend to get tedious and is a hassle for the more general keywords.

On the other hand, criticizers of the Search Network say that many times consumers go online to search engines to do a lot of research before buying and you could just be throwing your money away if you are paying every time someone comparison shops from site to site looking for low priced gourmet coffee beans.

Picking A Direction
Some advertisers split their budget between the Search Network and the Content Network, whereas others just stick to one approach. When deciding what is best for your business you should decide on the goals you hope to accomplish with your online advertising and then pick your approach from there. Keep in mind that if you try one approach and do not get the results you were hoping for, there is enough flexibility in the AdWords system to change your approach at any time.

More marketing help!

-Kate Pierce eCommerce Specialist

Do it right and you can convert more leads. Do it wrong and your customer gets the water torture.

Drip marketing is the rather inelegant term for a marketing campaign that relies on repeated contact, or “touches,” with a potential customer.

Unlike a leaky faucet, drip marketing is no accident. Successful drip marketing involves a carefully planned and thoughtfully targeted series of communications that will get your message across to customers and keep your company’s name in their minds. As prospects move through the early stages of the sell cycle, drip marketing helps ensure that those potential customers become your actual customers.

If you’re in sales you already know that prospects are not always ready to buy when you’re ready to sell.  Drip Marketing is a term used to describe an automated system that uses emails, newsletters, direct mail and postcards to continually drip out information to your list of prospects and customers.  Developing a strategy for keeping in contact on a continuing basis is what will cause a prospect to buy from you rather than from one of your competitors.

Let’s examine more closely how drip marketing can increase your sales:

1. Build a relationship– Sending out regular messages to your target market allows you to share information about your business and assures the prospect that your relationship with them will not end with the sale.

2. Presell your prospects – Educate them and help them do their research.  When they’re ready to make a purchase, who do you think they’re going to call?

3. Be persistent–Marketing experts recommend you have some sort of contact every 10-21 days to keep your name foremost in your prospects’ minds.   Think about what information you already have that you could divide up and send to your prospect list.   Brochures, white papers, manuals, FYI emails, etc.

4. Become the expert– Supplying your prospects with evidence that you know what you’re talking about will develop your image as an expert.   What have you accomplished that positions you as a leader in your industry?  Don’t be afraid to self-promote!

5. Be yourself–Studies have shown that prospects are more likely to make a purchase from someone they know and trust rather than a stranger who is selling a similar product.  Don’t be afraid to let your personality shine.  Let them see that you are a real person and that you care.

6. Mix it up– Prospects are bombarded with messages every day.  It’s hard to cut through all the clutter in order to get your message noticed.  Use a combination of email, postcards, direct mail, automated voice messaging, phone calls, Twitter, Facebook, etc.   You never know which of your messages will connect with which prospect.

7. Fix your follow-up failure– An automated marketing database will allow you to make sure that no one falls through the cracks.  Think of all the people you’ve met at networking events and trade shows.  What about referrals and your past customers?  If you’re like most salespeople, you have a pile of business cards on your desk with the intent to follow-up.  Unless you have an automated system, regular follow-up rarely happens and many sales are lost.

8. Target your audience– As you have probably discovered, your target market can be divided into various subsets. Using a database allows you to further segment your market and personalize your messages accordingly. Your prospects will become purchasers if they can relate to your sales message, which will be different for every segment of your target market.

9. Eliminate your slow sales times–Just as people are nearing the end of one marketing cycle and making purchases, new people will just begin receiving your information, thus continuing the cycle.  If you automate your marketing messages – such as via email auto responders or postcard campaigns – you will have a steady stream of sales.

10. Appreciate your current customers– Now that you have a customer base that has bought a product, you can use drip marketing to up-sell or cross-sell them to other products or services you offer.   Your current customers are a goldmine as they already know and trust you.

While planning a drip marketing campaign will take time, the effort is well worth the investment.  Once your automated system is set-up,  it will decrease the amount of time you spend in trying to manually follow-up with people and increase the amount of sales you can make each month.

Q:    “We do a lot of print advertising in magazines, but simply do not get very many leads.  Why is that?”

A:      “First off, the trend for customers seeking what you are buying is on the internet.  Also, your ads may not be created to take advantage of effective advertising design.  If your ad is not effective, not even a full page ad will work very well.  Also, “WHAT” are you saying?  Remember, its “WHAT” you say and “HOW” you say it that is way more important than “WHERE” you say it.

Q:    “We have never had a written, formal marketing plan and we always seem to do pretty well.”

A:    “Many businesses do “pretty well” during good economic times without a marketing plan.  But what about when the market slows down?  When the economy tanks, it tends to take with it those businesses that fly by the seat of their pants.  Remember that your marketing plan is the FOUNDATION to your house.  Those companies usually move in to the “Hope” strategy.  I “Hope” things get better.  I “Hope” business picks up.  The companies that have a formal written marketing plan don’t use the “Hope” strategy.  They “Know” where they are going and how to get there.  It’s proven that companies with a formal written marketing plan tend to have more even sales, are less prone to market gyrations, and are much more resilient to competition.  They also enjoy much more customer loyalty to their product!

Q:    “We have our own “In-House” marketing director… so why would we need Heavy Guerrilla?”

A:    “To make an honest assesment you have to ask yourself… how is your present situation working?  What are your goals?  If your goal to take your company from $5 million to $10 million in annual revenues over the next three years, then some pretty major changes should be in your plan.  We can work with your existing staff to shore up any pieces to your marketing plan that are not performing to meet your sales goals.  On the other hand, if making a major change is what is needed, Heavy Guerrilla can become your complete, end-to-end, outsourced marketing department.”

Q:    “We just need a website.  Can you guys do that?”

A:    “Technically yes we can.  But more importantly, how do you know you need a website?  Without a formal marketing plan and strategy, you probably don’t have a good idea as to what you need, and/or what you should even put on a new website.  We can work with you to not only generate a basic marketing plan and strategy, but to insure that your “Core Marketing Message” is presented properly on your website and that your website can be seen by potential customers.”

Q:    “There’s so much competition and chatter out there in the marketplace, how do we get noticed?”

A:    “This is where Heavy Guerrilla’s 25 years in successful marketing tactics comes in to play.  Your marketing plan should be a holistic, end-to-end solution that offers real solutions to your client’s problems.  One of our most hard-hitting, high-impact strategies is simply “DIFFERENTIATION”.  While this sounds simple, it actually takes a lot of real thinking to come up with ideas and products that your customers will feel that is different from your competition.  In this day and age, you MUST create a value proposition that makes your clients say:

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“I WOULD HAVE TO BE AN ABSOLUTE FOOL TO BUY FROM ANYONE ELSE, AT ANY PRICE!”

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Does your product or service make your customers say that?

Michael Bierut

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I was talking recently with a group of graphic designers. The subject was good work: not doing it, but how to get it accepted. Designers like to complain. We cast ourselves as embattled defenders of good taste and inventive ideas; arrayed against us are armies of insensitive clients, determined to thwart us, whose pigheadedness can only be defeated by dedication, cunning and guile.

We traded war stories for a while, but one seasoned designer in our midst was silent. We finally asked him what tricks he used to get good work done. “Well, I guess I’m lazy,” he said. “I just make sure all my clients are smart people with unique messages and good products. The rest is easy.”

The rest is easy. Looking back at the design work that led to Barack Obama’s historic victory in November 2008, I wonder if that was the trick. Although much has been made — rightly so — of the ingenious and adaptable “O” logo developed by Sol Sender’s team, Obama himself was his own best logo. Young, African-American, charismatic, change wasn’t just a message, it was the candidate’s very embodiment. When it was all said and done, Barack Obama was a smart guy with a unique message and a good product. And what designer wouldn’t wish for that in a client?

Selling change isn’t easy in a world that tends to prefer the comfort of the familiar. We all know what a revolution looks like: handmade signs, scrawled graffiti, the voice of the people. But Obama’s campaign was the opposite. Reportedly, the candidate resisted at first. “He did not initially like the campaign’s blue and white logo — intended to appear like a horizon, symbolizing hope and opportunity — saying he found it too polished and corporate,” reported the New York Times. But David Axelrod and his team prevailed. They must have known that the revolution, when it finally came, would have to be wrapped up in the most comprehensive corporate identity program the 21st century has yet seen. And it worked, as Designing Obama, the new book from Scott Thomas, Design Director of New Media for Obama for America, reveals.

Like every other graphic designer I know, I watched the live images of campaign rallies from Toledo to Topeka to Tallahassee with a growing feeling of awe. Obama’s oratorical skills were one thing. But the awe-inspiring part was the way all of the signs were faithfully, and beautifully, set in Hoefler and Frere-Jones’s typeface Gotham. “Trust me,” I told Newsweek back in February 2008. “I’ve done graphics for events — and I know what it takes to have rally after rally without someone saying, ‘Oh, we ran out of signs, let’s do a batch in Arial.’” But it isn’t just strict standards and constant police work that keeps an organization on brand. It’s the mutual desire for everyone to have every part of the effort look like The Real Thing. At the height of the campaign, my daughter asked me if I could design a flyer for a friend’s Obama benefit party at a little bar in Hoboken, New Jersey. We took the text and reset it in Gotham, downloaded the O logo, and put it together in minutes. “Wow,” my daughter said. “It looks like Obama’s actually going to be there!” Exactly.

The same thing was happening all over the country. In a world where access to digital media and social networks is becoming increasingly ubiquitous, Obama 08 became the first Open Source political campaign. Shepard Fairey’s “Hope” poster — an icon that’s destined, if you ask me, to occupy the 2008 slot of any historical timeline drawn up a hundred years from now — sits at the top of an astonishingly vast collection of posters, websites, buttons, You Tube videos, and even pumpkins, some generated by professionals, some by ordinary citizens, all of whom motivated by the urge to create a sense that their candidate was actually going to be there.

Political operatives will study this campaign and its design program for years, trying to unlock its secrets. Many will copy it. But few will capture its magic. It seems so simple, doesn’t it? A good logo, consistent typography, get everyone to join in. They’ll have all the ingredients in place except the hardest one: the client. You need a smart person with a unique message and a good product. Then, like the fellow said, the rest is easy.

Did you know that if you don’t have a clearly defined, written marketing plan… you are wasting money?

For the most part your business runs very well.  You attract clients and provide a product or service as promised.  What you may not know is that your business as well as any company must have a well defined, written marketing plan.  Without one, you are constantly searching for the “marketing gimmick of the month”.  This not only confuses your target market, but also wastes an enormous amount of money.  I see this approach every single day, but the good news is that your competition is probably utilizing this method also.  Now’s your chance to capitalize on their weakness.

Maybe it seems like too much work, but our experience tells us that your marketing plan (foundation) should be what drives everything you do going forward.
A company or new product launch without a marketing plan and associated strategy is like building a house with no foundation.  Sure, you could frame the wooden structure directly on dirt, but throughout the entire building process you will be constantly trying and guessing how to make everything level and square.  Build a strong, level foundation and the rest of the process is easy.

Marketing is very much the same way.  Almost 80% of all businesses do not have a marketing plan which is the solid, level foundation from which to build your business.  They know they need to generate customers, but yet they continually try different strategies, different advertising methods, public relations, etc. etc.  Each week they try something different, each week their marketing efforts have a different message.  Their advertising doesn’t follow tried and true graphic design layouts.  They have their brother-in-law’s kid slap together a web site.  Their web site looks like a 2nd grader put it together… their print ads looking nothing like their web site, their business cards or anything else they have.  Oh sure, they are spending lots of money but they are not getting results.  No consistency in look, message, or product offering.  Most importantly, they have no idea who their ideal client is, and/or what to say if they did know who it was.

The companies that DO have a marketing plan?  The companies that DO know who their “Ideal Client” is?  Well you know who those companies are.  They are the ones that typically “rule-the-roost”!  They are the companies that everyone wants to work for and many times have secured the “lions-share” of the market that you compete in.

Tell your advertising salesperson “Thanks, but no thanks”!

You as well as most companies are bombarded by advertising sales people… right?  Everything from promotional products like pens, key-fobs and calendars to yellow page ads, newspaper ads, and direct-mail.  Lately there is a new breed of salespeople promising you first page listings on Google, Yahoo, and BING.  Ask yourself, “If I do purchase advertising from one of these vendors, What am I going to say in the ad?”  Most likely, the ad salesperson will come up with some slick slogan, headline, or some ad copy they put together and rush it to press so they can get their commission.  What do they know about your business?  What is your target market?  What is your remarkable difference that will compel new customers to flock to your front door?  If any advertising salesperson doesn’t ask you up front, “Do you have a marketing plan & strategy?”, then they are probably only interested in making a commission.  Never put the “Cart Before the Horse”!  And never buy advertising without your road map, your foundation, your marketing plan.

Our fee typically pays for itself.

Heavy Guerrilla not only brings value to your entire company, we typically pay for our services in the first 12 months.  How you may ask?  We are one of the Northwest’s few true marketing and advertising agencies.  We get at the root of your marketing problems and work with you to generate real, foundational strategies that not only have longevity, but truly differentiate your company from the competition!  We’re not driven to sell you advertising just to make a commission, we’re driven by ROI.

While the underlying foundation of our strategies utilize long held, tried and true marketing methods, we also incorporate unconventional tactics to drive new sales, create excitement, and manage your entire marketing process.

Search Engine Optimization & Search Engine Marketing (SEO / SEM)

When people hear about online marketing, they often think of two of the more popular methods that a company can use to enhance its visibility on the Web: organic search engine optimization and pay-per-click advertising.  Organic search engine optimization campaigns offer several distinct advantages over pay-per-click advertising campaigns, as many recent studies have shown. What follows is a brief listing of some of the findings.

Propensity to Click

Study after study indicates people are less likely to click on paid search ads rather than on results from organic search engine optimization. For example, one study found that search users are up to six times more likely to click on the first few organic results than they are to choose any of the paid results, while an eye tracking study showed that 50 percent of users begin their search by scanning the top organic results. Other studies have shown that only 30 percent of search engine users click on paid listings, leaving an overwhelming 70 percent who are clicking the organic listings.  And a 2003 study found that 85 percent of searchers report clicking on paid links in less than 40 percent of all of their searches, and 78 percent of all respondents claim that they found the information they we searching for through sponsored links just 40 percent of the time.

Trust

Studies are beginning to indicate that the trust level for organic results is much higher than that of paid results, and that paid results are looked upon as a nuisance by some searchers. One study found that only 14 percent of searchers trust paid listings, and 29 percent report being “annoyed” by them.  Another study found that 66 percent of customers distrust paid ads.  Clearly, it’s not generally a good idea to upset potential customers before they even click on your link.

In an ideal world, you would use both SEO and Pay-Per-Click advertising strategically to maximize your site’s profile. However, budgetary constraints often make this impossible, and trying to do both on a limited budget or with minimal resources can result in neither campaign producing ideal results. In this case, it’s usually better to focus on one or the other. But which is best for you?

Pay-Per-Click Costs Rising

Pay-per-click costs are rising steadily. Between October 2004 and December 2005, average keyword prices rose from around $25 to just under $55.  And the cost of keywords can increase by as much as 100 percent during the holiday season.  These costs aren’t going unnoticed either; one study of problems experienced by U.S. companies found that 57 percent of respondents felt that their desired keywords were “too expensive,” while 51 percent expressed concern that they are overpaying for certain keywords.  On the other hand, when you outsource to an organic search engine optimization firm, your costs will likely remain more stable than the prices for pay-per-click advertising.

This document will also give you insight into our SEO / SEM strategies which have helped many websites to receive excellent rankings in organic search engines.  If at any point you have questions, please feel free to contact our SEO manager through email or IM mentioned below.

Contact:  Jerry Suhrstedt

Email:      jerrys@heavygu.com

About Us

We are a professionally managed, full-service, marketing and advertising agency located in Olympia, Washington.  One of our specialties is the field of Search Engine Optimization & Search Engine Marketing.  Our team is comprised of a national based team of 50 full time employees working on various SEO and SEM Projects serving right now more than 100 sites on the internet.

At Heavy Guerrilla we believe the most effective way of offering the some of the highest quality work in the search engine optimization industry is to keep up with the latest technological developments. We are a fluid and dynamic company that keeps abreast of current trends in order to remain one step ahead of the competition and to give our clients a continued reason to choose us to manage their Search Engine Optimization and Marketing. We learn from developing trends and assess their potential to help our customers.

SEO Process Flow

Below are the details of our SEO process & strategy:

On Page Optimization

• Before beginning SEO work, we measure how your site is currently performing. This phase helps us to understand strength and weakness of your site.
• Key phrase research and analysis – A Key Phrase is a combination of keywords that most appropriately define your product offerings and/or your area of operations. One of the most crucial steps in Search Engine Optimization is the process of Key Phrase Identification. We carry out a deep analysis of your products and offerings and then sort out the most appropriate key phrases. We consult with you and combine your ideas with current research in order to come up with a list of the most effective Key Phrases for your products. Then our SEO experts identify and finalize a set of target key phrases for your site’s search engine optimization.
• Target Pages – As with keywords, it is important to select the proper page within your site to be targeted for each keyword. After your approval of the suggested keywords, we analyze and find the most important pages of your site that we should target for optimizing for each keyword.
• Analytics Setup – Before making any changes in the website, we setup google analytics so that we can measure the results after completion of SEO work.
• Comparative Analysis – Competitors & Client Website – We don’t work without benchmarking. Our SEO experts analyze the top competitors of your site and compare it with all the aspects with your site. Here we check the various server related parameters like header status etc… along with the various website parameters like Number of indexed pages, Link Popularity, etc.
• Web Pages Analysis – Here we check all-important parameters of important pages of your website like site architecture & layout, Title tags, images, code to text ratio etc… This gives us the current standing of your site. We check all these figures throughout implementation of SEO and keep close watch on it.
• Meta tags & Header tags Optimization – After in-depth analysis of shortlisted keywords, results of comparative analysis & Web pages analysis we prepare the optimized title tag, description tag, keywords tag & header tags ( H1, H2 and H3) for all important pages of the site. A report is sent to you for confirmation.
• Content Creation (If Required) – “Content is the king” . Search engines like good and unique content in the website. Our copywriting team will analyze all important pages of your website to check if any page needs correction/addition/deletion in the text. If content changes are indicated, we will send you a report containing suggested changes.

SEO Implementation

After your approval of our above reports, we start implementing it on your website. It includes content optimization, title tag optimization, meta tags optimization, image optimization etc. If your website is static, we first implement it in dummy pages, send it to you, and after your approval we make the page live. If your site is dynamic, we make changes on the live site. It includes but is not limited to:

• Implementing Architectural changes if required
• Correcting the findings of comparative analysis
• Optimization of title tags, header tags, and other meta tags of important pages
• Optimizing internal linking structure
• Image optimization
• Content optimization according to finding of analysis
• Analysis & optimization of h1, h2, bold, a, table, alt etc.. tags as per meta tags optimization report
• Optimizing JavaScript and CSS codes
• Adjusting Code to Text Ratio as per the finding of analysis
• W3c Validation
• Off Page Optimization
• Off-page optimization (off-page SEO) are strategies for search engine optimization that are done off the pages of a website to maximize its performance in the search engines for target keywords related to the page content. It includes:
• One Way Inbound Links – In bound links are one of the most important factors that guide your ranking. The more inbound links, the better your chance of getting ranked. We build one way links to your site with other related websites.
• Directory Submission – Here we submit your site various directories available on the net. These are the good source of getting inbound links.
• Submission to Dmoz Directory – DMOZ is the most reputed human-edited directory on web. They have very strict criteria for inclusion. We optimize the title & description of your site especially for DMOZ & submit it manually.

Social Media Optimization

Social media optimization (SMO) is a set of methods for generating publicity through social media, online communities, and community websites like digg.com, del.ico.us etc… Primarily, SMO focus on driving traffic from sources other than search engines, though improved search ranking is also a benefit of successful SMO. It includes:

• Blog Setup – Search engine likes content and having a blog in the website is the best way to provide unique content to search engines. We set up a wordpress blog to your website and add articles written by our copywriters. This blog is also use for link baiting – an unique link building technique.
• Article Submissions to Directories – We create & optimize content rich articles of about 300 to 500 words & submit it to reputed article directories available on the net. These articles are submitted with 2-3 links to your website in the authors box. Article submissions not only give you one way links but also the visitors.
• Submission to Social Book Marking websites – Social bookmarking is one of the latest powerful SEO tools to promote your website. We submit your website to various high traffic community websites like digg.com, delicious.com, orkut.com etc. It not only helps in getting you better ranked in search engines, but also exposes your website to thousands of community members visiting these websites.
• Link Baiting – Link baiting means encouraging others to link to you. Legitimate linking brings you quality traffic. Here we create an unique blog post ( or you provide the content) related to your service or product and submit it to various bookmarking websites. It not only helps in getting you better ranked in search engines, but also exposes your blog posts to thousands of potential customers visiting these websites.
• Squidoo Lense creation & bookmarking. Squidoo.com is a reputed website where you can create your own page with link to your website (same as blog) called a lens (ex: http://www.squidoo.com/forex-currency-trading). This lens is then submitted to various high traffic social bookmarking websites. Squidoo lens’ helps to generate sales and huge traffic.

Suggested Service Details

• Number of targeted keywords 25 (15 Primary Keywords and 10 Secondary Keywords)
• Services: ON Page Optimization
• Keyword research and Analysis
• Doc type Analysis
• Optimization of title tags of all important pages
• Optimization of other meta tags (Description etc…)
• Optimization of header tags H1, H2, and H3
• Analysis of bold tag
• Optimizing JavaScript and CSS codes
• Optimization of non index able attributes like Frames
• Optimizing HTML Source Code
• Image optimization
• Hyperlink Optimization
• Optimizing internal linking structure (Navigation)
• Optimization of external Links
• Broken links analysis & correction
• W3c Validation ( for home page)*
• Creation & Optimization of HTML Site Map
• Creation, Optimization & Submission of Yahoo (TEXT) Site Map
• Creation, Optimization & Submission of Google (XML) Site Map
• Website architectural correction (if required)
• Content Optimization ( if required)
• Canonicalization error correction
• Blog Setup (Separately on WordPress.com)*
• Google Analytics Setup

OFF Page Optimization

• Link Building – 65 Nos.
• Directory Submissions ( including DMOZ.org) – 75 Nos.
• Search Engine Submissions – 100 Nos.
• Social Media Optimization
• Article Submission to Directories ( 3 FREE optimized articles) – 75 Nos.
• Submission to Social Book Marking websites – 75 Nos.
• Setting up Optimized BLOG(1 FREE blog post) * – 1 Nos.
• Link Baiting* – 75 Nos.
• Squidoo page creation (1 FREE lense with images) – 1 Nos.
• Squidoo Lense Submissions – 75 Nos.
• Comparative Analysis – Competitors & Client Website
• Google Page Rank
• Pages recognized by Search Engines (Google, Yahoo & BING)
• No. of Back links (Google & Yahoo)
• Header Status
• Code to Text Ratio
• W3C Validation
• Social Bookmarking Presence

* W3C validation depends upon your site structure. Validation will be done only if it is possible to do it without making major changes in the website structure.

*Canonicalization error correction is done in site hosted on LINUX server and your web host has provided you the access to .HTACCESS file.

*Blog installation will be done only if proper access to your site FTP and database is provided.

*Link Baiting is done with reference to Blog. Therefore Link Baiting service will be provided only if Blog is installed in your website.

Post SEO Monthly Maintenance

• Service Details
• Article Writing 1
• Link Building 25
• Directory Submissions 25
• Article Submission to directories 25
• Submission to Social Book Marking Websites 25
• Blog Posts 1
• Link Baiting 25
• Squidoo Lense Creation 1
• Squidoo Lense Submissions 25
• YouTube Video Creation & Submission 0
• Search Engine Ranking Report Weekly

When people hear about online marketing, they often think of two of the more popular methods that a company can use to enhance its visibility on the Web: organic search engine optimization and pay-per-click advertising.

In an ideal world, you would use both strategically to maximize your site’s profile. However, budgetary constraints often make this impossible, and trying to do both on a limited budget or with minimal resources can result in neither campaign producing ideal results. In this case, it’s usually better to focus on one or the other. But which is best for you?

Organic Search Engine Optimization

Organic search engine optimization campaigns offer several distinct advantages over pay-per-click advertising campaigns, as many recent studies have shown. What follows is a brief listing of some of the findings.

Propensity to Click

Study after study indicates people are less likely to click on paid search ads rather than on results from organic search engine optimization. For example, one study found that search users are up to six times more likely to click on the first few organic results than they are to choose any of the paid results[1], while an eye tracking study[2] showed that 50 percent of users begin their search by scanning the top organic results. Other studies have shown that only 30 percent of search engine users click on paid listings, leaving an overwhelming 70 percent who are clicking the organic listings.[3] And a 2003 study found that 85 percent of searchers report clicking on paid links in less than 40 percent of all of their searches, and 78 percent of all respondents claim that they found the information they we searching for through sponsored links just 40 percent of the time.[4]

Trust

Studies are beginning to indicate that the trust level for organic results is much higher than that of paid results, and that paid results are looked upon as a nuisance by some searchers. One study found that only 14 percent of searchers trust paid listings, and 29 percent report being “annoyed” by them.[5] Another study found that 66 percent of customers distrust paid ads.[6] Clearly, it’s not generally a good idea to upset potential customers before they even click on your link.

Value of Visitors

Organic search engine results tend to be seen as non-biased, and they therefore are able to provide visitors that are more valuable. The overall conversion rate, or the rate at which searchers take a desired action on a site, is 17 percent higher for unpaid search results than the rate for paid (4.2% vs. 3.6%).[7] Trends also have shown that more of the sales that result from search engines originated in organic search listings.[8]

Visitors Becoming More Aware of Pay-Per-Click as Advertising

As more and more people turn to the Internet for research and information, more searchers are becoming aware of paid results as a marketing tool. One study showed that not only are 38 percent of searchers aware of the distinction between paid and unpaid results, 54 percent are aware of the distinction on Google, which is widely recognized as the most popular search engine.[9]

Pay-Per-Click Costs Rising

Meanwhile, pay-per-click costs are rising steadily. Between October 2004 and December 2005, average keyword prices rose from around $25 to just under $55.[10] And the cost of keywords can increase by as much as 100 percent during the holiday season.[11] These costs aren’t going unnoticed either; one study of problems experienced by U.S. companies found that 57 percent of respondents felt that their desired keywords were “too expensive,” while 51 percent expressed concern that they are overpaying for certain keywords.[12] On the other hand, when you outsource to an organic search engine optimization firm, your costs will likely remain more stable than the prices for pay-per-click advertising.

Long Term Results

While a pay-per-click campaign may produce results more quickly than an organic search engine optimization campaign, organic search engine optimization campaigns can give you results that last. When the budget runs out for a pay-per-click campaign, or when your company decides that the pay-per-click campaign should be terminated, the results end as well. With organic search engine optimization, the optimized site content and other changes made to your site can have an impact on your search results until the next change in a search engine’s algorithm, or possibly even beyond.

Relevance

Users also have rated organic search engine results as more relevant than paid results. On Google, 72.3 percent felt that organic results were more relevant, while only 27.7 percent rated paid results as more relevant. Yahoo offered similar results, with 60.8 calling organic results relevant compared to only 39.2 percent for paid.[13]

Pay-Per-Click

While the above statistics may make organic search engine optimization seem the clear choice in all cases, in certain situations it actually can make more sense to do pay-per-click advertising. For those looking for fast results on a small budget, a pay-per-click campaign may be the answer.

Results

As previously stated, the results from pay-per-click advertising are immediate. On the other hand, an organic search engine optimization campaign may take up to three months or more for results to be apparent. In this case, pay-per-click is advantageous for those who are looking to promote an initiative that will go live in a short amount of time, or whose business is seasonal in nature and who only do promotion during certain months of the year.

Budget

Small businesses with extremely tight budgets may find that pay-per-click is a better investment than organic search engine optimization because a pay-per-click campaign will almost always cost less – good search engine optimization companies simply do not work for $100 per month. By limiting a campaign’s keyphrases to highly specific terms relevant to a company’s business, there will not be a large amount of traffic generated, but the traffic that is generated will be specific to the desired result. Plus, choosing such specific phrases can make them less expensive on a per click basis. Moreover, in niche markets with a high average dollar sale, where there’s not a great amount of search activity because the prospect pool is limited, it may not make sense to engage a quality organic search engine optimization firm at several thousand dollars per month when you can instead buy varying niche-specific keyphrases and generate traffic in that way.

Easier to Handle In-House

Non-complicated pay-per-click campaigns can be handled much more easily in-house than an organic search engine optimization campaign. Such campaigns generally involve business to business and high-end, service oriented companies, not those geared toward a large consumer base. Since organic search engine optimization requires a steep learning curve and since there are so many questionable tactics that can put a site at risk of penalization (the tactics that neophytes to search engine optimization are likely to use), it may make more sense to run a pay-per-click campaign. Since you are dealing directly with the engine, i.e., Yahoo Search Marketing and Google AdWords, you don’t need to pay a middleman, and these sites offer helpful tutorials on how to use pay-per-click marketing. Perhaps most importantly, the concept of pay-per-click is much easier to grasp and understand at the outset.

No Contracts

Most organic search engine optimization campaigns require a contract of a certain length because SEO companies know that meaningful results will rarely happen overnight. When dealing with an in-house pay-per-click campaign, obviously a contract is not an issue. But in general, even when you are dealing with an agency, you will not tend to need to sign a contract because the agency instead makes money on a percentage of the spend, although there may be a setup fee. Without a contract, you are free to reallocate marketing dollars elsewhere if you discover that the pay-per-click campaign is not providing the desired results.

Conclusion

Clearly, organic search engine optimization has some distinct advantages over pay-per-click advertising. However, there are undoubtedly certain situations and scenarios where pay-per-click advertising makes more sense fiscally and strategically. With a high enough budget, you would be able to have an effective organic search engine optimization campaign running in tandem with an effective pay-per-click campaign. But if you have to choose one, look into your unique situation before you decide.

Heavy Guerrilla Visual Communications Portfolio. While any well thought out business venture always starts with a business and marketing plan, they eventually delve in to marketing strategies that morph in to marketing tactics. Part of any great marketing plan includes visual communications to communicate the company or products marketing message.

Our portfolio of graphic design displays the end result of well planned visual imagery to communicate our clients’ goals to their target audience.