Digital Marketing Trends 2020

Digital Marketing Trends 2020 – ©Webacom Media Corporation

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Happy New Year, we wish you a happy and successful 2020! This year is still very similar to our suggestions for 2019, the world is still “having a conversation” online and that is growing even stronger today.

We run several paid Google/Bing Ad campaigns and the data is showing long tail keyword strings in the form of questions are popular. Out of several types of demographics we work with “law” had the highest quantity of questions, with “family law” related queries the highest. The second was plastic surgery, many patients have a multitude of questions prior to booking consultations.

Start tracking your own data through Google Analytics and paid campaigns and watch the keywords that triggered the Ads. Then use that data to help with organic traffic. Once you see patterns create landing pages to answer those questions. Use Schema Markup if your familiar with it as it helps more using structured data.

Think about common questions like How to…and What is…and similar. Go to Google search box and start typing a subject and you’ll see all the auto-suggestions, this is yet another way to match what people are really typing online. Add pages like a Blog and keep feeding your website and social media channels with educational information. This is a tried and tested way to increase traffic and it’s been working a long time.

Google Local Services

We are of mixed opinion on this reasonably new service from Google. In Canada, there are very few categories as in the trades that can use them. Where we live there are only four categories as shown below. The US has many more.

• Plumbers
• Electricians
• HVAC
• Locksmith

It’s easier to show a screenshot to demonstrate how it works. I used Google and typed “plumbers long beach”, here is the result.

That’s Google Local Services right on top showing three Google Guaranteed listings on top. Then Google Ads show followed by Google My Business (Maps) and finally organic results.

The good news is you only “pay per phone call” once all is set up versus pay per click. In this case, you don’t even need to give your website when setting it up as it’s not needed.

The bad news is Google goes through a very long process of qualifications and you need to have your insurance papers, liability, certificates, history, owners and much more all prepared ahead of time. Once Google accepts you, you get that Google Guarantee for up to 2K in claims for the customer. Google steps right in and mitigates any issue, so this is not good for your listing should you have any claims against you, as Google is the gatekeeper.

More bad news, as in the example of Long Beach, there are many more Google Guaranteed companies not showing on the first results when you click “more” the list expands.

We are still undecided on just how positive this is, we feel Google is taking too much of the upper search results while leaving organic deeply driven to the bottom. Three paid elements before you get to organic is quite frankly pissing off the industry that has supported Google throughout their history.

Now with Google controlling claims and insurance and even mitigating is a deep concern. Business owners are being forced into paid Ads as they have no choice.

Bing has not yet entered this realm to our knowledge. We use Bing in combination with Google Ads, however, Google still rules the roost. Bing was initially less than Google, now it’s very similar in pricing. The real personal service and support from Bing are far better than Google, but any issues with Google are resolved quickly.

We still love Google as it has brought the most business to our customers and ourselves, we hope they continue to respect those that made them so wealthy and keep organic results in reach.