Written by Fernando Maciá
Search engine optimization, despite being a new tool, is based on some of the marketing laws most commonly used to explain the success or failure of companies’ marketing strategies: the immutable laws of marketing.
The 22 immutable laws of marketing are the fruit of 25 years of experience of consultants Al Ries and Jack Trout, where they describe the successes and failures of the marketing strategies of several companies.
Search engine optimization moves on a game board very similar to the experiences that gave rise to some of these famous laws of marketing. Obtaining a greater flow of visitor traffic through the first places in search engines is as identical as the marketing actions that companies carry out to enter the consumer’s mind as the number one product.
Below we discuss how some of these laws apply in the world of search engine marketing:
The Law of Leadership: “It is better to be first than to be the best”.
This law states that it is much easier to get into someone’s mind by being first than to try to convince someone that you have a better product than the one that came first.
In the case of search engine optimization, it is useless to have the best web page or the best product if its ranking in the main search engines is not among the first 30 results.
Recently, a study was conducted to test the “click attraction power” in the first position of search engines through the analysis of the click frequency in each of these first positions of the SERP (search engine results page).
This study consisted of two tests: in the first test, a group of people were presented with a page of search engine results for a certain word and a click response of 42% of people on the first result (SERP A) and only 8% in the second result (SERP B).
In the second stage of the experiment, the same group of people was presented with the same page of results as in the previous stage, but SERP A was replaced by SERP B, i.e. the result that had previously been in second place was now placed first and vice versa. In the end it was obtained that 32% of people clicked again on the first SERP while 12% only clicked on the second SERP.
In this way it was demonstrated that, regardless of the quality of the page presented in the search engine results page, users will always click on the first SERP to a much greater degree than on the rest of the results.
The Law of Category: “If you can’t be first in a category, create a new one in which you can be first”.
This law tells us that when we want to launch a new product, the first question we should ask ourselves is: What can I be first? or in which category is this new product “the first”?
In the case of search engine positioning, there are markets that are tremendously saturated by competition and obtaining the first position in search engines can be an almost impossible goal.
For example, competing for the first place for the phrase “hotels in Madrid” is almost a lost war because it is surely the macro target of all competing companies. However, if we opt for a keyword that is less competitive but still reflects our target audience such as “luxury hotels in Madrid” the first position is just around the corner.
A first position on “luxury hotels in Madrid” will logically bring us less traffic than “hotels in madrid”, but if our hotel is a 5 star hotel, we will surely prefer visitors arriving by the more complex phrase than by the more common phrase. Remember that in the end what you need are visits that convert into customers.
Studies show that 50% of searches are done through a single combination of words. This makes us rethink the definition of our initial list of keywords. You just have to be monitoring the combination of words that best fits your offer and choose to enter that niche market.
The Law of Division: “Over time, a category will divide to become two or more categories”.
This law indicates that categories evolve over time towards greater segmentation. Knowing this, we must anticipate and try to be the leaders in some of these new categories.
In the field of search engine optimization, the search criteria used by users have been evolving. A very clear example is related to the number of keywords used. Several studies indicate that a couple of years ago the average number of words used in a search phrase was approximately 1. As of today, that average is already at 2 words and growing. Phrases such as “subsidies” are no longer used” to make way for phrases such as “subsidies for companies”, “subsidies for the self-employed”, or “subsidies for SMEs”.
We must also be aware of the changing trends in the market in order to choose the categories where we want to be leaders. For example, the Spanish Mediterranean real estate market has gone from searching with the phrase “front line beach apartments” to “front line golf apartments”.
Choosing the keywords with which we want to be leaders in search engines is the most important decision in a search engine marketing campaign. We do not have a crystal ball to predict the future, but we can know the market segments where the competition is not strong. That’s where we have to push and try to be the first. By complying with this premise, we will be in accordance with the main immutable laws of marketing that in theory assure us that we are not on the wrong path.
