Google caused a stir in the Internet a couple weeks ago. Google announced that they would encrypt the search sessions of users signed into Google accounts (also called SSL or secure socket layer encryption.) Why would Google do this? That’s a great question. This question is creating heated Is Google Good Or Evil debates all around the web (read my colleague Brian Chiou’s Google Good Or Evil article for his take).

What does SSL Encryption really mean?

SSL encryption means search queries and search results are private. Search results are only visible and accessible to the individual user on the other end of the computer (or phone)…well, AND to Google of course.

Did search engine optimization get harder?

Yes, since search engine optimizers lost the ability to identify keywords searched for a large portion of web traffic. SSL encryption means Internet marketing analysts can’t tie a keyword searched to a goal (or conversion) on a website for users signed into their Google Account.

Were we spoiled with free access to such valuable information in the past?

Google’s decision to limit analysis comes as a blow. SSL encryption isn’t Google’s first paradigm shift and won’t be their last. But why would Google cloak something we are used to knowing? Something we used to help clients optimize content for search marketing?

Google says in their official blog that they want to “make search more secure”:

As search becomes an increasingly customized experience, we recognize the growing importance of protecting the personalized search results we deliver. As a result, we’re enhancing our default search experience for signed-in users.

Is Google really concerned about our privacy? I just looked up my house in Google Earth. There is my car sitting in the driveway. I could zoom and see me sitting on the couch watching TV. Security? Really?

Google says they will continue to pass across secure socket layer data for those using Google’s advertising platforms. SSL encryption only affects organic (non-paid) search results. The lesson here: Pay the price and Google will giftwrap keywords, tie a bow around them and drop them in your lap.

Not convinced money is at the bottom of Google’s SSL encryption?

SSL kills retargeting, the practice of showing ads related to recently visited sites. Retargeting works for old advertising reasons. Retargeting works because repetition works. Retargeting works because customers think serendipity when a massive, intelligent, invisible hand sends subliminal messages and influences free will. Leaving aside the used car salesman feel to retargeting for another post, Google killed retargeting because of how this marketing tactic impacts search. Retargeting reduces search volume. Reduce search volume and Google’s PPC money takes a hit. Money–not security–is at the bottom of Google’s SSL encryption change.

Does Google have something else up their sleeve?

The answer to that question is always YES. Are they prepping us for a paid tool that will allow access to this valuable data? Is Google pushing us to pay for data to improve their $10 billion revenue (from last quarter alone)? Answer: YES.

Or is Google responding to a security backlash? An “adbusters-like” attack on retargeting? Is Google taking steps to improve their privacy policy to benefit the end user? Like most things Google, the answers to all of these questions and many more is always YES. Personally I will believe in the divine Goodness of the “do no evil” company when my house isn’t so easily accessible from any cell phone, iPad or computer on earth.

So, where do we go from here?

As Internet Marketing Specialists, SSL encryption means we have our work cut out for us. We need to be creative in how we collect, analyze and report with our new search engine marketing (SEM) reality. Our Internet marketing world is challenged once again. But who isn’t up for a good challenge?

We say bring it on, Google. We’ll adapt. We’ll figure out ways to help clients understand your new SSL world as we’ve figured out all the other new worlds you’ve created. You’ll make us better Internet Marketers because of it. So thank you Google. I knew I loved you for a reason.

It was my first big test. Having created a crude territory management system on a very expensive and not very powerful PC purchased with a loan from Marine Midland bank I’d been promoted to do something similar across the world of M&M’s. Holding one after another variable constant I watched the regression of the now dependant variables such as sales, profit per shelf facing or distribution point. Nothing made sense. I was lost in the data.

I’d been selected to be an M&M’s taste tester and trust me this sounds much more fun than it actually is since sitting in a room for hours eating and then spitting out the new Twix turned out to be painful. Coming back to my noisy desk in M&M/Mars large open national office, no one has an office at Mars, Incorporated, I decided to introduce taste panel data into my analysis.

I was young, stupid and oblivious to the dangers of mixing church and state. Introducing and then regressing the taste panel the conclusion was clear. Royals wasn’t very good, or more accurately a little Royals went a long way. I was asked to determine why 16 ounces of Royales were sitting on shelves. Our sales force was the biggest buyer of Royales. When the product hit its freshness date we would issue a credit and destroy the product so consumers didn’t eat stale Royales.

Consumers weren’t eating Royales because a few after dinner was great, a 16-ounce bag was death by mint M&M’s. Creating a five-page report I called a meeting (first mistake). Expecting applause, accolades and a big biscuit I finished my report, looked up (this is well before computer aided presentations) to see angry, cold silence. No one spoke for what seemed an eternity. Sometimes you know instantly you’ve been a fool despite your ability to predict it before hand and this was one of those moments.

The two most senior managers left the room without a word. Alone with my boss and mentors Charlie Purdy and Wolfgang Pfeiffer I learned of my faux pas. You didn’t tell senior Mars Brand Managers their products were so significantly flawed. It simply wasn’t done. Charlie and Wolfgang would help me understand the ropes well enough to climb them instead of hang myself over the next few years. The future couldn’t be turned back even by uber-powerful, freshly minted Wharton MBA Brand Managers.

Royales died an unmerciful death and some tough conversations took place well above my pay grade. I’d just experienced my first example of an important internet marketing rule (even though there wasn’t a Internet then) – the math always wins. Will share more contemporary examples of why the math always wins soon. In the meantime, if you have any Royales please throw them out as they are well past their freshness date .

Martin

—
Martin.Smith(at)Atlanticbt(dot)com
Director of Marketing

Bounce Rate

Your bounce rate is simply when a visitor enters your site and does not go to any other page on your site. This data can help you identify certain pages that need improvement. For example, if you have 10 service pages on your site and 3 out of the 10 have an extremely high bounce rate compared to the rest, it may mean that you need to add/change content, replace images, or add an offer/call to action. If your bounce rate is not design related, it may be that you are driving the wrong type of traffic to the site. Organically, if you are optimizing your site for the wrong keywords/phrases you could be driving irrelevant traffic to your site. On the paid side of things, if you are bidding on the wrong keywords or that the keywords are too broad you may have to bid on more targeted keywords.

Time On Site

The time on site indicator is very closely related to bounce rate. It is one of the best ways to see how engaged your visitors are on your site. If you notice that visitors are leaving within 30 seconds, you may not have content that is not compelling enough for a user to stay. Usually if your time on site is low, you will notice a higher bounce rate. Like bounce rate, if you drive the wrong type of traffic to the site you may have a low bounce rate.

Unique Visitors

Depending on the type of site you have, you may want to know how many new visitors you have compared to returning visitors. If you are managing a content-based site like a blog, forum, or wiki, you may want to take notice of visitors who return to your site. However, if you are a business trying to gain market share in your industry you may want to see what percentage of new users are visiting the site.

Top Keywords

It is always important to see what top keywords people are using to find your site. Your keyword list can help you see what keywords you are organically showing up for in the search results. Along with top keywords, pay close attention to each keyword as it correlates with time on site. You will notice that certain keywords/phrases will bring you higher time on site, lower bounce rates, and higher conversion rates.

Top Content

Extremely important for e-commerce sites, monitoring your most visited pages can help generate more revenue. Analyzing to see what products people are looking for can help you determine which products to market and promote more. For blogs and content focused sites, seeing which articles or blog posts are most popular can help you figure out which content you should highlight on your site or re-purpose on other content sharing sites.

Goal Conversions

Ultimately your site conversions are what generates leads and sales. When monitoring conversion data you want to look at it from a few angles. From one side, you want to see where your conversions are coming from. Are they coming from Google? A site you are marketing on? Paid search? An email marketing campaign? From another side, you want to see what keywords people used to convert. You may see trends in certain keywords that convert better than others. Another angle to look at is geo-location. Are more people converting within your city? State? Country?

Checkout Process

When a user is ready to buy, the last thing you want to do is put up a road block and make it difficult to checkout. The hard part is getting them to buy, checking out should be a walk in the park.  Keep the buying cycle as easy as possible by keeping the steps to a minimum.

Checkout Process Quick Tips:

• Give multiple payments options
• Do not require the user to sign-in to purchase
• Do not try to add additional fees at the end of the purchase
• Give access to return policies, contact information, shipping tracking #s, privacy policies, support
• Only require information that is necessary to complete the purchase
• Send a confirmation email after purchase
  

One of the most important aspects of the checkout process is to track the abandonment rate using an analytics program like Google Analytics.  If your checkout process is flawed it will not matter what the user has done prior to checking out, they will not buy.  If you have multiple steps in the checkout process, make sure you setup your analytics to track every step.  If you have 3 steps in your process, there may be a reason why 65% of users are abandoning their cart at step 2.  Try an A/B or multivariate test to see if you can increase the percentage of checkout completions.

Timely Offers/Incentives

You would be surprised how far an offer as simple as “Free Shipping” can go.  Even if you are not giving a discount on the product itself, you can give the impression to the user that they are getting a great deal!

Timely offers can act as a great reason to speed up the buyers decision.  If you are offering a special 3 day sale, with 20% off everything in the store a user will feel the sense of urgency to purchase before the sale ends.

Cheaptickets.com does a great job of creating a sense of urgency in their buying cycle.  When you go to purchase a plane ticket, they will show “3 Seats Left” at that discounted price.  This will help the user want to buy sooner than later, to take advantage of the lower rates.

Seasonal Product Offerings

Take advantage of users searching for seasonal products, by tailoring your messaging for that holiday.

For Example:

1. Christmas: Circuit City, 12/25 — Merry Christmas! Find Santa-sized savings on TVs, cameras, GPS & more
2. Halloween: Dell, 10/27 — Un-Boolievable Savings – Up to $345 off Select Systems
3. Mothers Day: Lands’ End, 4/19 — Mother’s Day is May 11 – consider us “landsend.mom”
4. Easter: Finish Line, 3/21 — The Easter Bunny Wears Chucks—-Do You?

Seasonal Products Quick Tips:

• Bundle similar seasonal products
• Tailor the offer to a specific gender/demographic (mom, dad, children)
• Offering FREE gift wrapping
• Offer a customized message
• Offer customized engraving
• Guarantee delivery before the date of the holiday
• Have multiple timely promotions that end the day before the holiday
• Give extra savings after the holiday has past

<< Guide To E-Commerce: Part II

Google now incorporates local business listings on two levels: local-based searches and broad-based searches. Because of these new methods it is extremely important to have a complete and detailed local business profile.  Similar to Google’s algorithm for ranking websites in the organic SERPs, there are a number of local search ranking factors that contribute to ranking well in the local business results.

There use to be no easy way to know how much traffic you gain from your local business listing, until now!  Google has just integrated basic analytics reporting within your local business center.  Not only can you see the basic data like impressions, you can also see key actions people take on your local listing.

Your local business profile has become much more relevant than ever before. We highlight 3 key benefits that make a world of difference.

1. Google has defined a local business listing action as someone clicking for more info on the following: Maps, requesting driving directions, and clicking through to your website.

2. You can easily see what keywords and phrases people are searching to find your local listing.

3. Google has added the ability to track people who have requested driving directions from your local business listing.  For brick-and-mortar stores, this could help you identify how far people are willing to drive to get to your location.  In turn, if you are doing PPC advertising you can try to geo-target those locations.

I’m sure that this is only a sign of things to come to better enhance the tracking capabilities for your local business listings.  You may want to leverage this data by adding new content (videos, images, logos, business description) to your listing to see if it helps increase impressions, clicks, driving direction requests, etc.

Sign up and verify your local business listing in Google, Yahoo, and MSN.  You may also want to check out quick tips for local SEO, for some helpful guidelines on how to help your website rank higher for localized searches.