Thursday, September 27, 2012

Keyword Targeting and the Chaff


Time for a good old fashioned blog post.  You know, the kind that is more knee jerk than it is carefully thought out.  Reactionary you might say.  The kind of one that could very well end up as a rant and that I may well regret when I wake up at 4am thinking about it.

It’s been a very busy, but in the main actually quite fun, day managing a client announcement that they are retiring a brand and merging the business attached to it into another brand.  Due to the timing, legal requirements and sensitivities of the announcement we were left having to implement some of the digital layers at relatively short notice, including some keyword targeting.  Which has unexpectedly helped sort the wheat from the publishing partners chaff.  

Credit where credit is due first.  nzherald, MSN and AdHub – all provided excellent account and technical service, fine tuning the campaign on the fly with me to have it running to order within two hours of letting them know it was happening.  Installing in me a sense that I’m working with true partners that care about helping us achieve our clients goals.

But then there was the chaff.  Despite some good account service, another main news portal and a main email portal were nothing short of technically hopeless.  For the love of Jesus, all I was asking for was either some effective keyword targeting, or them tagging the relevant stories to then serve my ads into them.  This is basic, 2007 stuff.  The kind of options these sites and their trafficking teams should be well and truly on top of.  I guess this is an old fashioned bad product story – confidence seriously eroded from bad experience.  One of them even suggested that their wasn’t enough money in it for them.  Okay, fair enough, your business prerogative.  But maybe your eyes need testing?  It seems you’re a bit short sighted maybe.  Can you read the letters in the middle of the chart?

And, as an aside, what an interesting study of the value of brand today has been.  While the services that the retired brand have been offering to customers will not change (only the colour of the buildings and bank statements, with all the staff remaiing the same) I’ve seen a steady stream of comments on web sites of people declaring their undying love for the retired brand and a determination to move to another supplyer.  Ah yes, irrational consumer choices based on brand loyalty, the ad industry loves you for them.  Anyway, time to get in my 3ltr, 4WD Subaru Outback and take the perfectly well sealed road home.

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