“Whatever the mind of man can conceive and believe, it can achieve.”

“Your big [tag]opportunity[/tag] may be right where you are now.”

“The battle is all over except the “shouting” when one knows what is wanted and has made up his mind to get it, whatever the price may be.”

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A few interesting statistics about [tag]ad recall[/tag] & the effectiveness of the ad medium:

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For those using [tag]Google Adwords[/tag] you may or may not know that just because you’re the highest bidder on certain [tag]keywords[/tag] you are not necessarily going to appear in the number one spot as you would if you were using [tag]MSN Adcenter[/tag] or [tag]Yahoo[/tag] [tag]PPC[/tag]. This is because Google determines your AdRank by taking into account not just your bids but the Click Thru Rate of your adverts aswell as other variables.

AdRank multiplies the predicted CTR against your MaxBid to determine position. However it doesn’t stop there, Google also applies an [tag]Ad Quality Score[/tag] which consists of various factors including historical [tag]keyword performance[/tag] across all advertisers, ad performance, relevance of the ad text / copy and other factors which Google have not released.

More recently Google has added the quality of your [tag]landing page[/tag] into the algorithim in determining your AdRank, meaning that you should always point your Google Adwords campaigns to the most relevant pages on your site. Remember Google prides itself on relevance so make everything you do relevant! It is also likely that Google will take into account your conversion tracking data when determining your AdRank. If your are converting visitors into buyers / signups etc your campaign will be considered ‘relevant’ and your AdRank will reflect this.

By testing & perfecting your Adwords campaigns you can often pay a fraction of the cost that your competitors are paying, whilst still out-ranking them!

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Thinking how you can increase the usability of your current website & inturn increase ROI ? Well as a starting point take a look some of the winning websites at the First UK UPA Awards held in November 2005.

The winners were as follows:

* Best Website for finding information (sponsored by Amberlight Partners)
GoogleLocal (GoogleMaps interface)

* Best Website for communication between users (sponsored by Prudential)
Flickr

* Best Website for online communication (sponsored by Foolproof)
JohnLewis.com

* Best software application (sponsored by Foviance)
Firefox

* Best consumer product (sponsored by Flow Interaction)
iPod clickwheel interface

* Best specialised / public technology (sponsored by Nomensa)
BA Self-ticketing machine

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John Lewis have been spending heavily in redesigning their web presence in order to increase web sales. They have won awards along with Yahoo & BBC.co.uk in the web usability stakes. ‘Web usability’ is the latest buzz especially here in the UK, many blue chips are now recruiting usability experts to overhaul their websites & carry out detailed web analysis in order to attain a higher EPV (earnings per visitor) Following todays report it seems to have paid off for John Lewis……

Source: Daily Mail

Internet sales leap for John Lewis

John Lewis today revealed a 25 per cent surge in profits – fuelled by a huge increase in internet sales.

The department store group, which also owns the Waitrose supermarket chain, said it had enjoyed an “excellent” half year.

Sales rose 11 per cent to hit £3billion for the first time in the first six months of the year, while pre-tax profits shot up 25 per cent to £97 million.

However, its biggest success was in online sales through its internet operation John Lewis Direct, which were 70 per cent higher than in 2005.

Chairman Sir Stuart Hampson said John Lewis Direct was now “a very major part of the business”, this year overtaking Peter Jones as the second biggest store in the group.

It now stands second in sales only to the flagship Oxford Street branch. The website sells about 20,000 of the most popular lines compared with 300,000 in a large John Lewis “physical’” store.

“It is the way many of our customers want to shop,” said Sir Stuart.

The success of John Lewis Direct reflects an accelerating High Street trend with all major retailers having to cope with a massive shift to cybershopping.

Some, such as Tesco – now launching its own non-food internet service – have adapted well while others, such as music chain HMV, have been badly damaged.

Another John Lewis online offshoot, the delivery business Ocado, also had a good first half with deliveries growing to 50,000 a week before the summer holidays.

Another big boost for the group – which is still owned by its partners – came from the World Cup, which triggered a rush of flat-screen TV sales. Sir Stuart said the trend had continued long after the tournament ended.

“People are turning increasingly to flat screens and then realising their second TV in the bedroom looks rather big and ugly by comparison so they come back to us and get another one,” he said.

Overall sales of electricals and home technology were up 27 per cent.

Other areas doing well included furniture (up 12 per cent) and men’s and women’s fashions (eight per cent higher).

In the South-East, the top performing branches were Peter Jones and Southampton (each with sales up more than 10 per cent) with Oxford Street – undergoing a major refurbishment – on five per cent.

At Waitrose sales were up more than five per cent, ahead of most other supermarket chains.

However, its profits barely rose because of big increases in its utility costs (up more than 80 per cent) and rent and rates (up 17 per cent).

Six new branches are due to open in the coming weeks at Eastbourne, Formby, Hexham, Lymington, Parkstone and Southampton.

Sir Stuart said the group’s strong growth, which has bucked the gloomy trends facing many other big retail names, continued into the second half of the year.

In the first week of September John Lewis sales were up 12 per cent on a year ago while Waitrose’s were up four per cent.

Waitrose was today named the “greenest supermarket” by the National Consumer Council.

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New [tag]EyeTracking[/tag] Study verifies the importance of page position and rank in both [tag]Organic[/tag] and [tag]PPC[/tag] search results for visibility and click through.

A joint eye tracking study conducted by search marketing firms Enquiro and Did-it and eye tracking firm Eyetools has shown that the vast majority of eye tracking activity during a search happens in a triangle at the top of the [tag]search results page[/tag] indicating that the areas of maximum interest create a “[tag]golden triangle[/tag].”

The first phase of the study was conducted with 50 people in Eyetools’ eye tracking lab in San Francisco, California and presented panel participants with 5 distinct scenarios that would require the use of a search engine. Google was used as the search engine in all of the instances.

Key Preliminary Findings of the Study included
The key location on Google for visibility as determined by the eye activity in the study is a triangle that extends from the top of the results over to the top of the first result, then down to a point on the left side at the bottom of the “[tag]above the fold[/tag]” visible results. This key area was looked at by 100 percent of the participants. In the study, this was referred to as the “Golden Triangle”. Generally, this area appears to include top sponsored, top organic results and Google’s alternative results, including shopping, news or local suggestions.

Visibility dropped quickly with [tag]organic rankings[/tag], starting at a high of 100% for the top listing, dropping to 85% at the bottom of the “above the fold” listings, and then dropping dramatically below the fold from 50% at the top to 20% at the bottom.

Organic Ranking Visibility
(shown in a percentage of participants looking at a listing in this location)

Rank 1 – 100%
Rank 2 – 100%
Rank 3 – 100%
Rank 4 – 85%
Rank 5 – 60%
Rank 6 – 50%
Rank 7 – 50%
Rank 8 – 30%
Rank 9 – 30%
Rank 10 – 20%

Eye scan and click through behavior changes dramatically as users moved “below the fold” to the section of results that required scrolling down. At the top of the page, the amount of eye movement declined rapidly through the top 4 or 5 results, and then at the bottom of the screen, tends to become more consistent through to the end of the page.

In searches where top sponsored results are returned in addition to right sponsored ads, the top ads received much higher visibility, being seen by 80 to 100% of participants, as opposed to 10 to 50% of participants who looked at the side sponsored ads.

On side sponsored ads, the top ranked results received much more in the way of both eye activity and click through. About 50% of participants looked at the top ad, compared to only 10% who looked at ads in the 6, 7 or 8th location on the page.

Side sponsored ad visibility
(shown in percentage of participants looking at an ad in this location)

1 – 50%
2 – 40%
3 – 30%
4 – 20%
5 – 10%
6 – 10%
7 – 10%
8 – 10%

There seems to be a “F” shaped scan pattern, where the eye tends to travel vertically along the far left side of the results looking for visual cues (relevant words, brands, etc) and then scanning to the right if something caught the participant’s attention.

These results come from an initial analysis of the results and were presented during sessions at the Search Engine Strategies conference in New York. While interesting, the study’s main findings are still to come and will required detailed analysis of individual behavior patterns.

Did It’s Kevin Lee said, “At this point, we weren’t too surprised at what we’ve seen in the study. We suspected much of this to be true prior to conducting it. However, there is tremendous value in confirming these suspicions, especially in a way that’s so visually compelling. It also proves that our methodology will hold up for phase 2 of the research. On the sponsored search side, data indicates that it is the clear branding and visibility advantage offered by gaining top positions, especially Google’s top sponsored links. Unfortunately, these aren’t always presented with a search. Google is a little fickle in this regard.”

Enquiro’s Gord Hotchkiss added, “We see a marked difference in how people say they search and what they actually do. Previous research had indicated that people were considered searchers and spent some time before choosing a link. The past few studies we’ve done, this one included, shows that there’s a huge importance placed on where the eyeballs end up on the page. Clicks happen pretty quickly. It just shows that search marketing is a real estate game. It’s all about location, location, location.”

Eyetools’ CTO Greg Edwards also commented, “Eyetracking is the enabling tool that fills in the gaps to understand why people click or don’t click — by quantifying what people consider before the decision to click or leave is made, companies can start to better anticipate and design to satisfy people’s needs. Applying this in the search results arena enables companies to better plan their marketing communication and increase conversions.”

This research is ongoing and the phase 1 results are highly encouraging. After further analysis is done, the results will be made available to the public through white papers. Further findings will be announced as they become available.

For more information about Eye Tracking or the study, contact Greg Edwards at contact@eyetools.com.

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Top news sites globally: Yahoo! News, CNN, MSNBC by ZDNet‘s ZDNet Research — comScore published its findings on top news sites among worldwide audience in June 2006.Top news sites worldwide Audience, 000ReachTotal Internet712,976N/AGeneral News319,964100%Yahoo! News76,24524%CNN30,41310%MSNBC28,5579%163.COM News28,4849%QQ.COM News26,1788%SINA News25,8108%AOL News23,9017%The New York Times13,0684%BBC UKFS News11,9494%TOM.COM News10,0163%Source: comScore

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