Independent Search Engine & Directory Network (ISEDN) - Breaking News!
By: Martin Lemieux
Watch out for a shift in the pay-per-click (PPC) industry, happening right
now! This shift is finally going to give smaller search engines and
directories the ability to tap into the PPC market, currently monopolized
by the big guns online (Google, Yahoo & MSN). They will attain this lofty
goal by banding together and delivering paid ad placements on a mass
community scale for a fraction of the cost.
More and more advertisers are going to want to advertise through the ISEDN
because of the sheer amount of exposure that they will be able to receive
through all the search engines and directories partnered together through
this network.
I was able to be the first to interview Mel Strocen, CEO of Jayde Online,
Inc., the parent company of ExactSeek.com.
The Independent Search Engine & Directory Network (ISEDN) was an outgrowth
of ExactSeek's commitment to bring affordable and effective search
advertising to the web community. Although ExactSeek was successful in
partnering with a number of search engines and directories, it became
apparent that popularization of a new pay-for-inclusion program would be
better served by an active and independent association of search engines
and directories than by a single engine.
Here are some excerpts from that interview:
Martin: "When was the ISEDN formed? ( http://www.isedn.org )"
Mel: "The organization was officially founded in June of this year,
although the idea for a network of this kind was being discussed for
several months previous to that. The ISEDN website, however, is only a few
days old."
Martin: "How many members does the ISEDN network have right now?"
Mel: "47 members at the moment, but the network has been acquiring new
members at a rate of 3 - 5 per week."
Martin: "What kind of market reach can the network deliver?"
Mel: "It really depends on how big the network becomes. Some search engine
and directory members have reported 10,000,000+ searches/month but, given
the rapid growth of the ISEDN and the fact that it's only a few weeks old,
we really haven't had the opportunity to determine the total number of
search impressions the network can deliver. We expect to receive specific
numbers from the members in the coming weeks which will enable us to
provide a more accurate picture of the network's search reach. My best
guesstimate right now is that pay-for-inclusion listings are displayed
approximately 120 million times per month. Of course, that figure will
grow as the ISEDN grows."
Martin: "Why should advertisers choose the ISEDN network over Google or
Yahoo?"
Mel: "The most obvious reason is cost. An advertiser buying a 3 or 12
month listing is looking at a cost of $3 - $4 a month. I'm not aware of
any other engine that can match what the ISEDN offers in terms of value or
exposure. Where else can you buy targeted keyword terms for less than $5 a
month and get top 10 exposure for your site listings across 45+ search
engines and directories?"
Martin: "You're right, that is amazing!"
Martin: "Because of the sheer distribution size this could potentially
have, what preventive measures are being implemented for click fraud?"
Mel: "In the ISEDN advertising model there is no incentive for click fraud
to occur. You pay a one time fee for your selected keyword term and that's
it. Competitors or bots could click on your ad repeatedly and it wouldn't
cost you a penny more. With the monetary motive for click fraud removed,
it's unlikely to be a problem."
Martin: "What does the future hold for the ISEDN?"
Mel: "It's a little early for me to speculate on how the ISEDN might
evolve. ExactSeek is just one member. Future plans will depend on member
participation and input in the coming months. What I would like to see is
for the ISEDN to become a counter weight to the gradual monopolization of
search on the Web by engines such as Google, Yahoo! and MSN. I would also
like to see the ISEDN contribute in other areas related to search such as
search relevance and possibly the support of open source search software.
In the long term, I believe the Web and searchers in general will be
better served by diversity than by monopoly."
Martin: "Are members going to decide the future of the network?
Mel: "The short answer is yes, they will. To function effectively, the
ISEDN will in time need to implement some kind of governing structure that
determines the organization's future course. What that structure is and
how the ISEDN evolves will depend on input from the members. Initially,
direction and objectives will most likely be determined by majority
concensus.
We've just added a private member discussion forum to the ISEDN website
which will allow members to voice their views on issues such as the
network's direction, objectives, online advertising, governing structure,
network promotion and other topics of relevance to the membership.
Martin: "So will any of the discussions from the network forum be opened
up to the public?"
Mel: "Eventually, yes. Assuming public interest, we'll setup discussion
forums that allow webmasters and/or siteowners to ask questions and
provide feedback to individual ISEDN members or to the membership as a
whole. If we go this route and, I expect we will, it should help to
improve communication between searchers and search providers. It should
also help raise general public awareness of the many excellent directories
and search engines on the Web that currently are under the radar."
Martin: "So how does the advertising portion work?"
Mel: "Every ISEDN member is provided with an XML feed to implement within
their search results or directory listings. The feed can be modified by
the individual members so that pay-for-inclusion listings are displayed in
a way that matches their site look and feel, but regardless of how the
listings are displayed, advertisers are guaranteed top 10 exposure across
the entire ISEDN network. Premium placement of this kind is made possible
by the fact that we limit the number of times any one keyword term can be
purchased and because all paid listings are rotated in the SERPs (search
engine result pages) on each individual engine and directory.
Surveys have consistently shown that few searchers look at more than 30
search results for any given search query. The ISEDN advertising model
takes this into account and limits the sale of any keyword term to 30. If
a keyword term has been sold less than 10 times, the paid listing almost
always appears on the first page of search results (depends on how many
listings an ISEDN member displays per page) although not always in the
same position. If a keyword term has been sold more than 10 times then
paid listings begin to rotate between the SERPs. On sold out keyword
terms, the worst case scenario for an advertiser would be that his listing
would appear on the first page of results roughly once of every 3 searches
on his keyword term. This is somewhat offset, however, by the fact that
the system supports broad keyword matching as well as exact keyword
matching.
Martin: "With this first come, first serve program - Are you worried that
bigger companies will buy out all the keywords available?"
Mel: "Not really. There are literally millions of keyword term
combinations available. As the more obvious terms are bought out, it might
require more creative thinking on the part of advertisers to come up with
good searchable terms, but other than that, I don't anticipate a problem.
Based on current trends, many buyers either forget to renew their keywords
or simply let their listings expire. The end result is that thousands of
keyword terms will be rolling over on a continual basis. In the event that
the program becomes so wildly popular that keyword availability does
become a problem, we may have to look at changing the parameters of the
system to accomodate demand, but that's unlikely in the forseeable
future."
THIS IS AN ADVERTISER'S DREAM!
Anytime a PPC or paid inclusion ad can get distributed through an entire
network of competitors, it has the potential to be very powerful and
deliver a lot of quality results. Personally, I would much prefer to
advertise within 100 websites rather than just one. The power of
advertising is in the numbers!
This couldn't have come at a better time. The SEO industry is crying for
quality PPC alternatives. Google's recent battle with click fraud has left
many advertisers world wide wondering if they should really keep their
entire internet advertising budget within one basket.
Increase Your ROI Through Smaller Programs Online:
More and more, Smartads is recommending paid advertising in smaller, more
tightly knit search engines and directories to our clients. ROI (Return on
investment) is very important to the adverising industry, and we have
found that advertising in smaller ventures rather than the bigger gorillas
online, brings better results.
The reason for this is simple:
* - Less competition
* - Greater targeted audience
* - More local opportunities
* - More exposure for your money
In the old days, creating smaller, more targeted PPC campaigns used to be
a lot of work for the marketing professional to research and maintain. The
ISEDN has made that job a lot easier for us to maintain on a larger scale.
Why would spend hours trying to find smaller directories and other
programs, when you can find them under one umbrella?
To check out this internet advertising shift for yourself, go here:
http://www.isedn.org
About The Author:
Martin Lemieux is the president of the Smartads Advertising Network.
Smartads helps all sorts of companies world wide to grow their business
offline and online. Visit Today!
International: http://www.smartads.info
Canada: http://www.smartads.ca
Copyright © 2005 Smartads Advertising Network - Reprints Accepted. Author
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