July 09, 2008 | Wednesday

Search for a new battle of the brands

TOM GRIFFITHS examines the potential impact changes to Google’s pay model, which lets companies ‘hijack’ searches for rivals, have on retail firms in the UK’s insurance sector.

ON MAY 5, Google rocked the UK online advertising world by altering its pay strategy to allow companies, for the first time, to bid on their rivals’ previously protected trademark terms.

With 85% of all searches on Google including a brand element, and new research from Global Reviews, the customer experience benchmarking firm, showing that customers prefer to research insurance online rather than through any other channel, this seismic shift has created one of the largest battles for online presence the insurance marketplace has ever seen.

So will this affect you? Well, I am afraid to say the answer is “yes”. Your closest rival, be it Norwich Union, Endsleigh or Churchill, now has the ability to bid for your brand terms and, if successful, diverting potential clients to their site - potential customers who were intent on finding you. Fortunately, however, the flip-side of this is that the change to Google’s policy presents an opportunity for you to bid on your competitors’ brand terms as well, increasing your visibility and decreasing theirs.

With opportunities on both sides of the fence, as you can imagine, the impact of this change has already been severe - for some, worse than others. Somewhat unsurprisingly, so far it has been well-known brands which have suffered the most. This is because before the change came into effect they had strong brand protection, which meant nobody else could use their trademark terms, rendering them worthless. After the change came in, however, a flood of bids from rival companies dramatically raised the cost per click (CPC) of the trademark terms and vast sums had to be paid to buy them back.

So what should you do? Ultimately, the answer is simple - you should balance your spend on generic search terms in order to allocate more budget for the rising costs of trademark terms. For example, as an insurance company, it may be wise to spend less on the search term “car insurance” in order to free up spend for brand terms. Furthermore, in the personal lines arena, the change enables the aggregators to encroach on the premium protected territory.

The clever move is, therefore, to act quickly. If you organise your funds before your competitors, you will free up more money to buy your own terms back and out-bid your competitors on theirs. Our research has already indicated a 120% increase in CPCs for trademarked brand terms and we are predicting a rise to 400% in the not too distant future.

While securing your brand terms is an essential start to adjusting to the changes of Google’s policy, it is just a start. As the policy change affects the search marketing strategies of all online insurers throughout the UK, it will in turn affect new product launches as companies are no longer guaranteed to own their new brand search terms. This will significantly affect the way your customers shop, so your search engine marketing team needs constantly to be watching your competitors’ every move.

In addition to Google’s policy change, the next few months will also see Google dip its toe into the already muddied waters of financial comparison via its new “merchant search” offering (see a preview at http://www.latitudegroup.com) and Google’s toe is a big one.

Having recently tested this price comparison offering in the secured loans market, the company will soon offer a comparison service across all markets, providing details of companies and services relevant to the user’s particular search.

As this new function is located at the top of the sponsored links box - so where the consumer’s eye would naturally start looking for relevant content and the all-important call to action - the merchant search is well-placed to grab the user early on in their search. It is likely that a number of users will see the merchant search option and decide to review the remainder of the search results, thus giving your brand the opportunity to enter their consciousness and “disrupt” their search. However, the likelihood that they will then come back to the merchant search is great as it provides a quick, easy and obvious way of continuing the user’s search.

Brand visibility

So what does this mean to the average insurance company? You need to increase your brand visibility and focus more than ever on user engagement at the earliest possible stage of the user journey - the search. This means finding the right balance between appearing in the paid listings and the natural listings. This will be key to attracting the right traffic to your site - appearing for generic terms such as “travel insurance” will get you volume and focusing on the niche search terms - “young driver cheap car insurance Vauxhall Corsa” - will ensure that the traffic you do receive is as far along the buying cycle as possible.

Appearing as frequently as possible with a particularly relevant offer will reinforce your position at the forefront of the user’s mind and, although all users would claim to be completely focused on the product/ service/brand they are searching for, there is always an opportunity to attract attention. This is a form of advertising after all. The key to effective search marketing is therefore relevance; having something compelling to say to the consumer once they see your website or brand in the search engine listings.

Having a key differentiator which appeals to your core demographic - be it price, additional benefits or level of service - is essential to creating a “need”. Once you have created the need, you must ensure that your website is capable of answering it effectively and quickly as this the only way you are going to be able to convert the search into a sale.

Search marketing is not a spectator sport - you need to be proactive in winning the click - and to understand how to do this, you must understand the user. The typical consumer, when running a search, has an expected outcome in mind. Their actions are intent-based and they are actively “searching”. However, knowing that the user can be at various different stages of their journey when searching is how you define the best strategy to win that click.

Generic searches

Ultimately, consumers can conduct generic searches and “browse” the results, they can conduct branded searches and more actively search through the results, or they can be directed ... by you. Through brand visibility - appearing at the right time for the right search term - and effective, relevant content, you can direct the user to your site while allowing them to feel in control - the perfect sale.

Tom Griffiths is a specialist in the insurance sector at Latitude, the search marketing agency.

Insurance Day, 9th July 2008