Can throwing big bucks at search engine marketing smooth over a corporate crisis? BP thinks so. A quick “oil spill” search puts the embattled oil giant’s tailored messages above organic search results on Google, Bing and Yahoo.

BP’s PR strategy for the bad press is no shocker. One study showed that nearly 30 percent of people will click a sponsored link before genuine search results.

Google’s AdWords program lets companies purchase sponsored links that appear above normal search results depending on the company’s budget.

Terms that also trigger BP’s response website include “oil spill claims,” “oil spill disaster” and “oil spill cleanup.” BP may be paying $10,000 daily to stay at the top of search results, according to ABC News.

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Promotions and contests can stimulate short-term sales. They’re also a powerful tool for educating consumers about a brand, even the stuff that doesn’t seem so sexy on the surface, and gathering valuable information. A recent web promotion Ideopia created for Reliance Medical Products presented an entertaining quiz that educated prospects about the benefits of dealing with an American Manufacturer. In addition to driving engagement on an important brand value, visitors were required to answer questions before entering the quiz. Just the kind of stuff that you might use for customizing email… who knows? Let us know if you would like a tour of this project.

Doesn’t that make you feel special when email spammers use your first name? We think it’s a stupid trick, and it’s delusional if you think it’s a substitute for dynamic email marketing.

Real dynamic content is much different, and much more powerful. Based on user preferences or segmentation, contents are tailored to individual interests. This increases click- thrus and conversions, and overall ROI of your campaign.

Engage your audience through more relevant content.

To get started with email marketing you’ll need an emailer who can handle dynamic content, separate content for each segment you wish to target, and a segmented list.

1. Define the most advantageous segmentation for your business. For example, a professional oven manufacturer might capture e.g. the names and titles of restaurant owners and head chefs, and type of restaurant (Italian, French, Haggis).
2. Invite your existing subscribers to express their preferences on a web page; and explain what’s in it for them, e.g. they’ll receive a recipe that’s perfect for their restaurant every month.
3. Create a newsletter format and design that contains core content pertinent to your entire audience, e.g. trade shows you’re attending and company news. And allow a space for dynamic content.
4. Create a specialized chunk of content for each of your markets, and space for it to be dynamically inserted in your newsletter.
5. Continually prod subscribers to update their preferences. For example, would you like to see a recipe just for your restaurant every month?
6. Track analytics to improve the content for each segment.

By now, it’s probably been pounded into your head that social media content is important for optimizing your company’s rank on search results. Google, Bing and other search engines now incorporate  social media participation as an important factor in their alogrithms. But, have you seen this effect in action?

The screen capture shows Google results for the term “Ideopia.” Note that 8 out of 10 results are from social media – Linkedin, Twitter, Facebook. And these results are being incorporated fast, e.g. the Twitter post on phobias was posted just 28 minutes ago. Food for thought!

A new feature Googled up for mobile phone users allows them to click on a phone number in a search ad and dial it automatically. Yeeeeeha! You can leave one hand on the wheel and order double pepperoni! But wait, this innovation might be cool for your business, too. It’s easy to setup by plugging a phone number into your Google Adwords Account Google Adwords account by plugging in a phone number. Click and Dial is also sensitive to geography, so the user always gets the number for the nearest location. Clicks on phone numbers are billed at the same rate as clicks on phoneless search ads. Our advice? Jump on it!

Sucking up to search engines, aka search engine optimization, is widely considered the best strategy for driving clicks from search. Most users, especially savvier ones, just put more stock in it. Depending on what shape your site is in, driving search rankings to page one of search results can be a long-term and expensive undertaking. But you need short-term results now, now, now! Your best option is probably a carefully crafted Adwords campaign, or a similar channel on other search engines. You’ll still pay, but if your campaign is optimized properly you should realize an acceptable ROI. The answer is different for every industry. The best solution is blended. A properly optimized site will not only rank higher in search, but it will lower the cost of search campaigns by increasing the relevance of your landing pages.

Yelp is a website that features user-generated reviews of businesses. Yes, you should be scared! According to Comscore, Yelp is growing at a rate of 80% annually, while its main competitor, CitySearch appears to be flat lining. Yelp is especially competitive with mobile accessibility and popularity. So take a few minutes to see if your business is already listed on Yelp, and make sure the information is accurate. If your profile is missing, the process for creating one is fast and smooth. With the growing popularity of Yelp, it would be smart to monitor reviews of your business for attacks on your reputation. Negative reviews are one thing, but hatchet jobs by former employees or competitors are quite another.

Of the many factors that determine the success of an email campaign, the time of day and day of week campaigns are deployed is the most often ignored. New research from Pivotal Veracity may just change your timing. It shows, for example, that the elapsed time from when messages are first sent and first seen has expanded from 23.2 hours in January 2009 to 25.9 hours in August 2009. This is critical if your email campaign is time sensitive.

Target an Episode

Pivotal Veracity also identifies 2 daily episodes especially pertinent to B2B mailings targeting office bound workers. The first period in the morning, from 7:30 to 9 a.m. is the most extended time people use to cope with their email. Later in the day, from 2 to 3 p.m., workers attend to their emails in shorter bursts. While mornings are popular, PV suggests that your customers may view your email as welcome relief later in the day.

The ideal time of deployment is a moving target. As soon as a day or time becomes “popular,” it’s time to move your campaign away from the onslaught of email competing for your customer’s attention.

The rebirth of web ads was a hot subject at the Internet Summit we attended in Raleigh. Until fairly recently, eye tracking studies and low click thru rates seemed to show that web ads and banners were largely ignored. New attribution studies that measure how different web advertising elements work together show display ads having a powerful impact, including up to a 60% lift in clickthrough rate on search results followed by a 35% increase in conversions.

Several studies show these click-thru rates improving 30 to 50% based on prior exposure to a web ad. The biggest challenge identified by the Internet Summit attendees is to improve ad creative, which most described as miserable, to engage consumers and drive an even higher lift on click-thru rates. Okay, we can do that!

Keywords are the words or phrases that visitors use to find your site via search. Most web analytics programs track keywords and how many visitors each drive to your site.

Here’s what you can learn. Say that you’re in the candy business and your top keywords are “jaw breakers,” “salt water taffy,” and “Carbolicious Carmel Corn.” Great, you sell those products. But what if 30% of your company’s income derives from selling “candy gift baskets,” and that term ranks at the bottom of your keyword list? This is an example of an opportunity missed, and a website that’s out-of-step with its core business. To get the rest of the picture use Google’s keyword tool to find out the frequency of search on key terms. This will help you determine if your business is jiving with reality. For example, if  “mimeograph” machine is one of your top keywords, but it’s very low in popularity as a search term…uhhh…you may want to consider a new core business. Keywords can speak volumes about the state of your site and business, so dig in soon!