It’s probably no surprise to anyone working as a search marketer, but the industry is chugging along at double-digit growth rates, even as budgets for other forms of marketing and advertising continue to be slashed. According to SEMPO’s sixth annual State of Search Engine Marketing Report, the North American search engine marketing industry will grow 14% this year from $14.6 billion in 2009 to $16.6 billion by the end of 2010.
The report, based on a global online survey of nearly 1,500 client-side marketers and agency respondents, also found that measuring the return on investment (ROI) is the biggest challenge facing marketers this year in all three key search tactics covered in the survey—search engine optimization, paid search and social media marketing.
Another unsurprising finding: Google dominates. 97% of companies responding to the survey said they advertise on Google, with 71% paying to advertise on the Google search network, and 56% distributing ads via the Google content network. By contrast, 50% use Yahoo! Search, and 44% use Bing, compared to 54% who said they used Microsoft Live (MSN) search in 2009.
Many search marketers have experienced keyword inflation on Google. 56% of advertisers and 62% of agencies said that Google keywords have become more expensive over the last year, but these increases appear to be mostly limited to Google, with only 32% reporting higher costs on Yahoo and 29% on Bing.
Another key trend relates to the impact of personalized search results, with 31% reporting that personalization is having a “highly significant” impact on search marketing efforts, with a further 44% calling it a “significant” trend.
Let’s get social
Despite all the attention social media is getting, social media marketing budgets are still virtually insignificant compared to those for search engine optimization and paid search. 73% of companies had a budget of less than $25,000 for social media marketing in 2009, including 23% who said their budget for Facebook, Twitter and other social media darlings was zero.
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