NONE: Re: ONLINE-ADS>> International Search Engines
Re: ONLINE-ADS>> International Search Engines
Bill Hunt (whunt_at_globalpromote.com)
Fri, 10 Apr 1998 09:31:50 -0700
Jerad,
I'll try to help point by point. The whole international aspect of the net
is still in its infancy and there are only a few that really understand how
it works. It is a completely underutilized area of business in the net.
During Web Advertising 98 in NYC, a number of the big sites indicated that
35% of their traffic was from overseas domains. That is over 1/3!
Ironically, very few are even capitalizing on that opportunity.
>We've had good luck buying keyword banners on the search engines, and we'd
>like to target specific foreign countries.
You should be able to do that now on the same search engines. Although
many have not realized it yet,
but the should be able to target IP location. For example, if a visitor
comes from .de (Germany) they would see an ad in German not English.
Companies that have used this tactic have realized from 5% to 35% click
through rates. The main reason it works is that overseas visitors are
conditioned to see things in English on these sites and when they see the
banner in their own language it does a few things:
1. It is surprising and it "entices" them to click to follow language they
understand.
2. In many cases people do not know that a banner is a banner. They
believe it is somehow related to the site. However, when it has "click
here" in the local language or some other "easily understood" call to
action, it tends to get clicked more.
>Does anyone have any experience with the international search engines such
as Yahoo! Japan, Excite >France, etc.? I've contacted Yahoo! and Excite,
and they said that their foreign versions either don't sell >keywords or
the keywords I want don't receive enough traffic to sell on the foreign
searches.
We have extensive experience with buying ads around the world. Both of
those sites sell keywords. We have bought keywords a few times in Yahoo!
Japan. The problem is you should buy the "local language word" if it is
more commonly used.
Banner advertising is still young and crude by todays standards in most
countries. Most sites do not have stats let alone verification. In many
cases you must communicate with them in their language or their rep that
can speak English. Many cases, especially Japan, you must wire the money,
in Yen, to them in advance of the ads running. And we think we have too
many banner sizes here, there are even more odd sizes overseas.
>Does anyone have information on how useful the foreign versions of search
engines are for
>marketing purposes?
They can be very useful if done correctly. You obviously understand the
power of keywords. Other languages use their version of the word that is
why it may not show up in the list that the US rep has. You can also buy a
category like travel if you have a hotel site for Hawaii. We have had some
successful campaigns when we had good "localized" creative, local keywords,
and a good message on the destination page.
>Are they a waste of time if you already have banners on the main search
engine?
No, especially if the banners on the US sites are in English only or have
copy that may not be clear to non-English speaking visitors. And yes, they
often visit search engines. They may speak English well or not at all but
that may be the only place to get that information. However, they do not
understand the innuendos or other unique message we tend to put in our
creative. You can maximize this by using the IP location model that
delivers the local language ad.
Other comments:
If you want to test international buys, a good practice is to use the
International versions of the US search engines. Sometimes you can deal
directly with the US in others you cannot.
It is important to understand that often overseas search engines are more
expensive because they do not have competition, exchange rates and VAT taxes.
It goes without saying that you need to deliver the right information after
they click. A classic blunder was a large amusement part that bought home
page Yahoo! Japan and ran contest ads for a free trip to the US. When they
clicked the add it dumped them on the home page in English. There was no
information on registering either in English of Japanese.
It is often better to test that market and keyword traffic by listing the
site in the overseas search engines. This will give you an idea of those
searching and following the link to your site by monitoring your logs.
LinkExchange International has banner buys that allow you to place o local
language member sites. For more information please visit their site at
http://www.linkexchange.com/international.html
If you want further discussion about this and other international Internet
issues I recommend you subscribe to the Global Promote Discussion list.
This discussion list focuses on using the net to reach international
markets. FAQ, Information, and archives are at
http://www.globalpromote.com/list.html you can subscribe by sending a
message to: mailto:join-Global_Promote_at_gs4.revnet.com
I hope this topic continues since it is one of the fastest growing areas of
the net!
Best regards,
Bill
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William Hunt - Senior Strategiest - Global Promote
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Phone: 1.626.457.8064 Fax: 1.626.457.9244
Multilingual Target Marketing & Search Engine Listing
"Announce your site to the world ... in their language"
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