Summer Search Trends
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BY P.J. Fusco
June 21, 2006

Inthe northern hemisphere, the longest day of the year is on or near June21, when the sun is farthest north. Conversely, June 21 is also theshortest night of the year. If SEM (define) trends couldattain such a regular, predictable schedule, we might be onto something.

Duringthis summer of search, let‘s take a moment to observe online marketingtrends that are ready to break through the darkness and hit mainstreamstatus, like the first glints of sunlight that disperse the dark night.

Local Search

Some say local search is the glimmering hot spot on the horizon of PPC (define) advertising. BorrellAssociates reports local businesses will more than double their paid search to $987 million this year, up from $418 million in 2005.

Yet the Interactive Advertising Bureau (IAB) recently announcedthat Q1 2006 online advertising revenues reached a record $3.9 billion-- marking a 38 percent increase from the first three months of2005.

Ifthe numbers and forecasts are accurate, local search accounted forabout $246 million in online advertising during the first three monthsof the year. This equates to local search accounting for 6 percent ofQ1 online ad revenues.

Doesthis translate into local search being a hot spot of online marketing?Perhaps local search is more like a mirage sparkling in the distance,easy to focus on but elusive all the same.

Localsearch behavior is evolving, but this nascent search trend is actuallygrowing faster than general Web search. Yet if local search is going tolure more advertisers to the well, then right here, right now,technologies must improve, specifically technologies behind the devicesthat delivermobile search results.

Mobile Search

The Pew Research Center recently released a surveyshowing Americans are becoming increasingly dependent on their mobilephones. The result is more and more people use online mobile services.Forexample:

• 52 percent of adults keep their cell phones turned on all day, every day.
  
  
• 30 percent of adults want to browse the Web from their cell phones.
  
  
• 47 percent say that mobile maps and driving directions are must haves on the next phone they buy.

Reportslike this prompted portal powerhouse AOL to add several new features toits mobile search service. AOL‘s Surf the Web service allows users totype in keywords and navigate to a Web page that‘s automaticallyrendered and reformatted to fit the device.

AOL also enhanced local search and mapping services for GIS (define)-enabled devices. Users simply select a "locate me" function that binds them to CityGuide, Moviefone, and MapQuest results.

Marrylocal mapping to mobile searching, and it‘s a day at the beach -- solong as you keep your batteries charged. For now, mobile search remainsa kludge of poorly matched components and on-the-spot online marketingaspirations. But mobile search won‘t always be this way. Mobile searchrepresents one of the best ways to reach out and touch someone at thepoint of a buying decision.

Pay Per Call

Perhapsmobile and local search can combine to create a groundswell of onlineSEM activity. A real connection is being made right now between searchand pay per call, particularly for online advertisers wary of clickfraud.

According to a reportby The Kelsey Group, the U.S. pay-per-call advertising market couldswell to $4 billion by 2009. This year, the pay-per-call market isexpected to account for $60 million.

Thoughpay per call is widely thought to be a powerful local marketing channelin the making, privacy concerns and pricing models remain points ofcontention, which is probably why Google continues to dabble in thespace.

Meanwhile,Verizon SuperPages provides pay-per-call ad distribution in MSN LocalLive, SuperPages.com, About.com, and WhitePages.com. Ingenio currentlyprovides distribution on AOL, among others, and YellowPages.com pickedup distribution into Yahoo Local.

Acertain duality remains. Clicks can be generated and responded aroundthe clock unlike calls, which are generally reserved to regularbusiness hours. But callers, rather than clickers, are generally muchfurther along in their decision-making process. That puts a premium onpay-per-callpricing.

Withdayparting functionality in place, more and more businesses areembracing pay-per-call online marketing solutions. If every law firm,travel agency, or Realtor in America decides pay per call is the online marketing model of choice, we‘ll have our first summer blockbuster in themaking.

In Summary

Hello? Hello? Is any one out there?

Yes,we‘re here. But the mobile phone just died, and we‘ve lost our way on alocally remote, unplottable course. We‘ve switched to landlines to makethe most of our pay-per-call strategy, but prospects have startedcomplaining about busy signals and hold times.

Shortcomingsaside, online advertisers and search marketers are all trying to figureout how to best leverage some of the potentially hottest search trendsthat will burn brightly this summer. Shouldn‘t local search, mobilesearch, and a pay-per-call strategy be part of your SEM mix?