8 Amazing Digital Marketing Stats from SMX East

In October, the Jacob Javits Convention Center in Manhattan was filled to the brim as the annual search engine marketing conference and expo, SMX East, was held in New York City. More than 1,500 of the industry’s marketing leaders, influencers, and enthusiasts from all over the United States graced the event.

During the 3-day assembly, interesting statistics were revealed which include:

  1. 50% of search queries are 4 words or longer

Casie Gillette of KO Marketing revealed that long tail keywords (search queries with at least 3 words) have been the recent focus of search strategies. Oftentimes, marketers only think about keyword optimization, but missing out on what their customers are really looking for.

Gillette shares a thought provoking insight: the problem lies in marketers that are not communicating with their support teams. She explains that the “support team is the direct line to your customers, they field the questions that aren’t on your website.” To address this problem, she suggests that it is worth asking your support team to write down frequently asked questions from the customers that they’re in contact with. Base your long tail keyword strategies from these feedback.

  1. Poor landing pages will make you lose 97% of leads

Yes, you’re reading it right. 97%! You would think that with the different channels easily available for consumers today, only 3% (at least in the US) is captured because of leaky landing pages. But what’s a leaky landing page? According to Larry Kim of Wordstream, it’s an ad that encourage website visit. Instead of this, integrate click-to-call features that will allow the lead to go straight to you and not your landing page.

Kim adds that this is hugely beneficial to businesses because phone calls are 3 times more effective than browsing on your landing page.

  1. Click-to-call commerce will reach $1 trillion in 2015 and double by 2019

This statistic support Kim’s claim above. BIA/Kelsey, a research and advisory company focused on local advertising and marketing, expects 162 billion phone calls from mobile to businesses. Meanwhile, Marchex’s findings predict that click-to-calls will bring it $2 trillion to businesses by 2019.

The takeaway here is to ensure that search campaigns are pushing phone calls and document it properly to understand the value it brings to the business.

  1. Seeing your Ads on mobile is 2X harder

WordStream’s PPC Community Manager Erin Sagin revealed that it is harder to convert a mobile visitor, but there is a way to remedy this: bid up on mobile. But if you’re having drawbacks because of finances, Sagin suggests to just focus on high purchase intent keywords such as long-tailed specific queries, purchase-type keywords like “buy,” and “discount” and emergency keywords.

Save lower-intent keywords for desktop as it will more likely to gain profitable visibility there.

  1. More than 86% of time on your phone is spent within an app

This fascinating statistic revealed by Bitly’s Product Manager Samantha Yeh will tell you that it’s high time to invest in apps. She also shared that apps will drive $5.6 billion revenue this year alone.

To address this revelation, allocate a part of your resources in creating an app to increase retention rate and customer loyalty.

  1. 72% of consumers who did local search visited a store within 5 miles

There’s nothing surprising about this number, but this is an important consideration to do local advertising. If you have a physical store, advertising in geo-targeted radius in Google will help shoppers find your store easily before visiting.

  1. 51% of people want location-based coupons when searching

Aaron Levi of Elite SEM shared a client’s case study wherein they introduced mobile coupons for in-store purchases. The client saw a 9916% lift in incremental mobile revenue.

With this data, you might want to incorporate in-store deals (if you have a physical store) to spur visits and conversions at your shop.

  1. 43% of consumers do research in the store

Consumers are informed more than ever so make sure that they can access information on-the-go. If you’re in retail, it’s better to have at least 50 reviews in aggregator sites because it shows up in your ads. This could prevent a consumer from purchasing from a competitor.

Surprised with the statistics? We were too, but at least now, we have a realistic view of consumer insights that will guide our future marketing campaigns. What’s the most amazing insights you learned from SMX East and how will it shape your campaigns? Do share and who knows, we might have something up our sleeves for you.


Resources:
incitrio.com | ultimatebanners.co | searchengineland.com