An interesting study has been released by RevTrax. The study was conducted over a two year period and found that paid search had a significant impact on in-store sales. The summary, which you can download here, highlights some cool stats:

• The average click on a paid search ad generated approximately $15 of in-store revenue, with some
  merchants seeing as much as $28 of in-store revenue.
• Approximately 9% of clicks on a paid search ad generated an in-store sale, with some merchants seeing up
  to 26% of clicks on a paid search ad generating an in-store sale.
• Many merchants reported that 40-50% of customers acquired via the study were new

To conduct the study, RevTrax used the following process:

• a paid search advertisement was displayed to a consumer;
• the paid search ad led the consumer to a printable or mobile landing page displaying a coupon with a
  unique barcode; and
• the consumer redeemed the coupon inside a brick & mortar store.

Utilizing its unique barcode or promo code technology, each coupon was tracked back to the search activity that
drove engagement. RevTrax also utilized a variety of proprietary coupon security features to ensure clean
measurement of data only from the paid search channel.

Another interesting bit of info that’s not in the summary, but can be found on Search Engine Land is that, in the words of RevTrax COO Seth Sarelson:

As for PC vs Mobile, we’re working on a later study that will address these results, but most of what we’re looking at here is printable coupons from a PC.

Before I found this tidbit, I was ready to assert mobile as the primary driver of the results. After all, with the proliferation of smartphones and tablets, it would seem to be a  logical conclusion.

I look forward to the follow-up study.

@MarkPalony

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Large and complex paid search programs have the same problems as their smaller, less complex relatives, but the grander scale makes those problems more difficult to solve. This edition of the Industrial Strength column on Search Engine Land offers a few tips on how to manage the issues and how to add incremental improvements to a mature PPC campaign. We’re talking ad groups, tools and the ever-present issue of bid optimization.

There are several ways to optimize your keyword bids, but they are not all equal. You’ll find a summary of them on the OptiMine website here and a more expansive look in our whitepaper, Achieving the Gold Standard in Paid-Search Bid Optimization.

Regardless of how you’re optimizing today, do so with an eye on the future making sure to track your conversions at the most granular level possible: the individual keyword. Even if you don’t use it today, having the data available will make for a smoother transition if you need it in the future.

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If you want a great summary of auto-bidding technology used for paid search bid optimization read this article (plug warning: the interviewee is Rob Cooley, OptiMine’s CTO).

The Q&A comes from Josh Dreller and his In The Trenches column found in search engine land. Josh is a true expert in the industry who “gets” why auto-bid technology is necessary for paid search, but also understands the danger in the set-it-and-forget-it mentality that often accompanies its implementation.

In the interview, Josh gets Rob to break a difficult problem into its component parts and describe how they are put together in a way that benefits paid search advertisers. If you’re not sure what to look for in auto-bid technology, this primer will give you enough information to begin asking the right questions.

In it Rob talks about the four approaches auto-bid technologies use to optimize paid search bids: Global Keyword-Level, Local Keyword-Level, Global Cluster-Level, Rules-Based. You’ll also get a quick look at models vs. rules, keyword vs. clusters and global vs. local optimization.

If you’re managing large paid search campaigns automating the bidding process will drive efficiency, but the right auto-bidder will also drive performance improvements. Others may have been stopped short of finding the Holy Grail, but it does exist.

Read the interview and you’ll know what I mean.

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The Holidays are fast approaching – we’ve already had frost here in Minnesota – and that means a dramatic increase in retail spending; online and in-store.

The big question is, are you ready to claim y0ur unfair share of the Holiday market?

Ready or not, search engine land, weighed in yesterday with 5 tips you can use to prepare your paid search for the inevitable. The post includes pointers for budgeting and mobile strategy, but the most intriguing is the section on taking an holistic approach.

An increasing number of people are using desktop and mobile searches in a quest to buy locally. Amazon isn’t going away anytime soon, but SEL makes the point that you had better begin making the online-to-offline connection with your customers or you might just lose them.

You can read the entire article here. Don’t just read it. Print it and post it through the end of the year.

Then, this same time next year, you can take it out, dust it off. Consider it your first holiday decoration of the season.

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That’s a different story.

Cameron Johnsson (@CameronJohnsson), with the help of some data from emarketer, recently addressed the issue on Search Engine Land and the bottom line, while interesting, is not particularly surprising. Google, Yahoo and Microsoft occupy the top three spots in paid search, while display advertising shows Facebook, Yahoo and Google in the top positions.

Johnsson’s post uses two emarketer charts to illustrate market shares from 2009-1012 (projected of course). According to projections, by 2012 the paid search and display markets will look something like this:

• Paid search: Google will own it to the tune of 77.7% of net revenue. Microsoft will be at 10% and Yahoo 6.5%
• Facebook will have a slight lead in display: 19.4% to Yahoo’s 12.5% and Google’s 12.4%

Google’s lead in paid search is virtually insurmountable, leaving the others to fight over the crumbs. But display, with its relatively even distribution of market share, poses a tremendous growth opportunity. A look at the chart, however, reveals that only Facebook and Google have increased their shares since 2009. Yahoo, on the other hand, has seen their share erode from a market-leading 15.8% in 2009 to 13.1% in 2011.

The battle lines have been drawn and the combatants on the field fighting for web dominance are Facebook and Google.  A winner may not be determined for some time, but Google’s paid-search filled pockets will serve them well, as will the newly-minted Google+.

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