In the past year, I have been busy preaching to advertisers and agencies to look at search and display as complementary channels and analyze their performance in a holistic manner (disclaimer: Eyeblaster offers a product called Channel Connect for Search designed to help agencies and advertisers in this type of holistic cross channel analysis). I have been pushing the mantra that display is an upper funnel channel, while search is a lower funnel channel and together they should complement and assist each other in driving conversions. Therefore, I have been saying that comparing the two channels is wrong and that the right approach is to analyze the entire path to conversion while focusing on the synergy created by using both channels together. Well, I still strongly stand behind my mantra but recently I have seen several cases where path to conversion and cross channel synergy analysis was not feasible since there was no overlap between search and display (i.e. only few users were exposed to both display ads and search ads). The main reason for the low overlap was poor cross channel planning and execution prior to the campaign launch, which led to lack of synchronization between the search and display campaigns. This made me realize that in my recommendations I did not emphasize enough the critical phase of the campaign pre-launch. The pre-launch phase, which includes planning and execution, is the underlying basis for successful analysis at the end of the campaign (or at any other stage) and therefore it is critical to apply the holistic approach during this stage as well. But what does this actually mean?


Here’s a list of best practices that I recommend for holistic cross channel campaign planning and execution:


1. Campaign objectives synch – to drive the desired results, the search and display campaigns must share the same objective. Whether it is selling a product, building brand awareness or simply driving traffic to the site, it is critical that both search and display campaigns share the exact same objective. This is the single most import aspect of the synchronization between search and display.


2. Target audience synch – this goes without saying. The same audience should be targeted across search and display and that requires synching display targeting tactics with keyword bidding strategy. For example, if you target your display ads to a specific geographic area (e.g. a new compact car geo-targeted to NYC and SF metros) then make sure that you bid on search keywords which include relevant geo terms (e.g. name of car + “NYC” or “SF”).


3. Creative synch – it is critical to make sure that the creative messages are synched across search and display to communicate a cohesive message throughout the consumer’s path which will lead to a conversion at the end of it. For example, if the display creative highlights a certain feature in your product, make sure that you bid on the relevant search keywords for this feature and that the search ad copy will highlight the same product feature.


4. Campaign set up synch – from an execution perspective it is critical to properly synch the landing pages and conversion tags across the search and display campaigns. The display and search campaigns should use the same landing pages and conversion tags to allow tracking the entire path to conversion and de-duplication of conversions between search and display.


5. Campaign periods synch – finally, it is important to properly plan the search and display campaigns launch and end dates. This is particularly critical in cases when the conversion/purchase funnel is short so the search and display campaigns should overlap in their start and end date. In these cases, if one of the campaigns launches too late, there will be missed opportunities to drive consumers to conversion.


This is it for a start. I am sure that as you dive into the small details of the campaign planning and execution, you will find some additional best practices. If you have any, then please feel free to share.


 

Ronnie Lavi | Manager, Product Planning and Business Development