April-May 2005

Vertical search will change the SEO game

Vertical search? Just when we got used to the idea of having local search (where you ask the search engine to look for, say, only printing companies located in a 5-mile radius), along comes this new idea for focusing your search by industry.

It could change the rules of the game.

You know that, with 95% of people online using them, you can't ignore search engines as part of your marketing efforts. But it can be very confusing. It may seem really expensive--or like it's just too much trouble. Totally legitimate reactions.

Spending for search marketing is now bigger, according to recent industry reports, than any other online ad spending--projected for 2005 at $4.1 billion--and plays a big part of the much-vaunted search engine optimization strategy. If you're like a lot of people, you get tired just reading all those terms, let alone having to do something about them.

So you might well ask: How much time/money do I REALLY have to invest in this stuff? The answer, unfortunately, isn't simple.

• Keyword prices are rising as marketers vie for positioning--which means you'll have to do more research and target more carefully, and therefore spend more.


• When 83% of marketers plan to increase spending on paid placement campaigns in 2005, it means competition continues to get fiercer.


• The good news is that the big search engines keep ramping up their investments to make search more effective: Google spent $319 million in 2004 and plans to invest more than $500 million in 2005.


• Hot verticals include retail, financial services, media and travel--which together equalled 79% of $2.6B spent on paid search in 2004.


• Hundreds of companies are being formed around vertical niches. Each company creates a site that searches only specific types of sites--say, only resumes of people with certain skills are collected from all available sources (such as Monster.com etc.)

The upshot for you, the user, is speed and simplicity--you won't have to wade through a lot of unrelated links to find what you need. It's search on steroids--you'll have ads that are more effective, clickthroughs that are more meaningful, and prices that are higher.

Big-budget companies will jump on these premium sites. And if vertical grows as powerful as it promises to be, we ought to see the price of general SEO coming down some. So take comfort, and massage your budget for some of this.
For small and medium businesses, a good way to work up a smart strategy is to first find out what your competitors are doing online.

Sincerely, Barbara

Some of what’s going on at ReallyGoodFreelanceWriter.com:

• Invited to author the Official Capitalist Cleveland weblog


• Quoted as blogging expert in nationwide outlets of Knight-Ridder and Gannett newspapers


• Hired to write university reference book materials on health and wellness
  Helping university market its EMBA program

Make the Most of Your Money - Q&A: Estate Tax - KEEP GOOD RECORDS

On April 13, Congress passed a bill that repeals the estate tax. While that sounds positive, surrounding factors may cause your heirs nightmares--unless you act now.
Under current law, the cost basis of your assets is adjusted to their value at the time of your death--which means there is no capital gains tax liability for or for your heirs if they liquidate these assets at your death. With the new law, your heirs will have to pay capital gains tax on these assets. (Did you honestly believe that Uncle Sam was truly eliminating a tax?)

Determining the cost basis depends exclusively on how well you keep accurate records. It will be hard enough to find confirmation statements for all of your stocks and bonds; imagine how tough it will be to determine how much capital you've put into businesses and real estate investments.

Start now. Make sure you have accurate records for all of your investments and other major assets that can grow in value.
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