MerchantCircle Survey Says Search is the Most Important Marketing Channel For Small Businesses

I was not surprised at all when I came across this statistic. A new “merchant confidence survey” from  MerchantCircle/Reply.com, among 2,500 US small businesses, finds that search engine optimization (SEO) is the marketing channel they would choose if they could choose only one. 


The question asked was: “If you had to put all your marketing time and budget into only one channel, what would it be?” Search Marketing (SEO + SEM) jointly got 43% of responses. Interestingly SMBs are giving up on traditional media advertising as their most important marketing channel. Note that the question was not asked to determine which is the best performing channel, but which channel to keep if you had to pick only one. If the question was about performance, I would say SEO and SEM would be at 70-80%, if not higher. 


Great analysis from Search Engine Land:
http://searchengineland.com/seo-single-most-important-marketing-channel-for-smbs-survey-103944?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=feed-main

Source, MerchantCycle Blog:
http://blog.merchantcircle.com/2011/12/merchant-survey-group-deals-and-pay-per.html

 


 

About Matthew Capala

MATTHEW CAPALA is a global inbound marketer, search strategist, author and speaker. By day, Matthew is the Head of Search at Profero, a global digital ad agency. He is also Adjunct Professor at NYU, where he teaches a graduate course on search engine marketing. By night, he is an Internet addict decoding insider PPC and SEO strategies via SearchDecoder.com and broadcasting tips via @SearchDecoder.

16 Responses to MerchantCircle Survey Says Search is the Most Important Marketing Channel For Small Businesses

  1. agrobuah December 23, 2011 at 7:50 pm #

    Guidelines are very meaningful. thank you

  2. Marg February 29, 2012 at 3:07 am #

    I could see why. Running SEM and SEO Philippines campaigns generate fast, lasting, effective results at cheaper costs. Just goes to show that merchants are getting smarter!

  3. Anna March 1, 2012 at 3:24 am #

    I would have answered the same, too. I had stuck to dental SEO marketing tactics since day one, and I’m happy with the results. Still, I think a combination of all these avenues would work well, too.

  4. Marco Phillipstein March 8, 2012 at 3:17 am #

    This comment has been removed by the author.

  5. Marco Phillipstein March 8, 2012 at 3:20 am #

    This just shows how important SEO is for small businesses. It is a very effective way in branding your business and reaching out to your consumers.

    seo norwich

  6. Martin Rolloff March 22, 2012 at 6:31 am #

    Social media channel is a good way of increasing a company’s trustworthiness and goodwill which will definitely give the said company and increased and better branding. When companies are able to have conversations with their customers, the result is going to be a great amount of credibility.

    local seo

  7. George Smith March 30, 2012 at 3:23 am #

    I couldn’t agree with you more. SEM and SEO has become very important for small businesses. Businesses who have used these kinds of marketing strategy had a surprising increase in their ROI.

    experiential marketing

  8. Kyle Simone March 30, 2012 at 3:40 am #

    Being a Los Angeles SEO specialist, I could say that the Internet has paved the way for small business owners to succeed in this industry.

  9. Matthew Capala April 4, 2012 at 3:35 pm #

    Thanks for all the comments. Why do you think paid search (SEM) scored relatively low compared to traditional media or even social. PPC, if managed correctly, will always outperform other channels when it comes to ROI. I think small businesses have a long way to go to master the most ROI-effective paid media channel: SEM.

  10. Perth web design April 10, 2012 at 6:02 am #

    Search engine optimization is something that’s really important especially when almost everybody does their searching via the internet. Thanks.

  11. SEO Australia April 10, 2012 at 8:43 am #

    Apart from SEO, I begun learning about web development. If you excel on both skill, you have the power to beat search engine’s algorithm.

  12. andyyy April 17, 2012 at 3:11 am #

    Search engine is the main thing online. You first use the search engine before you go to other websites. It is one thing that you cannot live without in the internet. This is a good feedback for seo reseller companies. It is a sign that more people are relying on search engine optimization.

  13. jessie bobsy April 25, 2012 at 2:05 am #

    I couldn’t agree with you more that Search is the most important marketing channel for small businesses. The іnvеѕtmеnt in SEO ѕervісe іs аlwауs bеnеfіcial and wоuld reap gоod rеsults оn іnvestmеnt. SEO cоmраnies works so thаt you аre benefіtеd through thеіr mеthоdѕ аnd tесhniques.

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  14. Debra Mennins April 25, 2012 at 9:13 am #

    It goes without saying that search can account for a large percentage of traffic, but there are still qualifiers to add to that fact. Since bounce rate effectively neutralizes the effectivity of search traffic., other factors like layout, design, and content also need to be invested. My friend who works with a dental web design company makes sure that search traffic stays longer with better designs.

  15. Darby McClintock July 27, 2012 at 7:20 pm #

    I agree with you all! That’s why we in the internet marketing company Brisbane always ensure that we are up to date in terms of what the current Google algorithm requires to stay current.

  16. John Wodden December 3, 2012 at 6:42 am #

    I have to say that the information here was the most complete that I found anywhere. I am definitely bookmarking this to come back and read later.

    Web Survey Tool

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