Strategy

As a strictly online company that offers a strictly online service, employing a comprehensive search marketing campaign was a no brainer for Vongo®. However, as the ubiquity of pay per click increased, Vongo realized they must up the creative and sophisticated antes to ensure a competitive advantage. Vongo decided to fatten the pot with demo targeting, a new and unique technique exclusively offered by MSN. Demo targeting is the optimization of bidding strategies based on searcher demographics. This newly-offered PPC technique compares the entered keyword against the searcher’s age, gender and geographic location. Another tactic gaining popularity analyzes the day of week and time of day in which the user searched. The latter two statistics comprise a unique PPC strategy referred to as day/time parting.

Currently, MSN is the only engine to offer demo targeting on pure search results, while all the leading engines allow for day/time parting. MSN determines user demographics from initial account registration information. To utilize either demo targeting or day/time parting strategies, bid boosts are required in addition to the base bid. Demo targeting requires a thorough understanding of one’s target audience; without this knowledge, search marketers can waste a large amount of the advertising budget.  Due to the newness of these strategies, Vongo could not be entirely confident in the effectiveness of demo targeting and day/time parting; yet, the nature of search engine marketing allows for a great deal of experimentation.

MSN adCenter reveals the age group and gender of Vongo visitors. These details are determined from account information provided by users during initial MSN registration. Significant discrepancies in the number of male and female visitors inspired the gender targeting experiments.

The ultimate success metric determined for Vongo’s PPC campaign was an increase in initial downloads and trial subscriptions, due to increased exposure on search engines. To gain this escalated exposure, we needed to secure the number one spot during optimal time periods. The required bid boosts for day/time parting made a larger cost per click inevitable; however, we endeavored to maximize the click through and conversion rates and, subsequently, lower the cost per download.