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Whitevector's latest research focus report explains how 'Top Buzzwords' can maximise your search engine marketing and optimisation...

Search engine marketing and optimisation has definitely found its way into the modern marketing toolbox. Even though the concept has been around for a while now, it is still expected to grow in the future. A study by Guava and Econsultancy shows that in 2009 over half of the British firms (55%) said that they expected to invest more money on search engine optimisation, whereas only 31% said that their SEO budget will stay the same compared to the previous year. Thus, as more and more companies gain ground in the field, more sophisticated and effective means must be found in order to gain online visibility.

Online discussion analysis provides a unique means to improve search engine marketing keywords as well as to optimise web sites to ensure their appearance in natural searches. The idea behind the analysis is to look for the most relevant and case specific words that people use in their online discussions regarding the studied topic. Whitevector calls the analysis method 'Top Buzzwords'.

The Top Buzzwords analysis is useful in many ways. In most cases the first implication from the analysis is to include new themes that have prompted discussion among consumers. This is especially important as most of the market research studies investigate only topics that are known to be relevant - it is rare to find something new that is not triggered by the analyst. The same applies to search engine marketing: the result will naturally be different if the keyword sets come from the audience itself instead of the marketer.

There are also other benefits from picking up the keywords directly from online discussions. Firstly, the words come from consumers' actual discussions so they represent those topics people consider important. Consequently, they might use those words also in their online searches.

Another implication from the analysis is to uncover what we might call 'under-the-radar-signals' from the market. For example, Top Buzzwords could reflect consumers' growing interest in new industry trends. Or if the buzzwords indicate for example a degree of poor customer service, the company should look closer into what has caused such comments, and act accordingly.

The main idea behind the analysis is to define which specific words of relevance to the project should be included. If you start with too large a sample, you might end up with too many common words that do not really tell you anything about the studied industry or brand. Therefore, the aim is to look only for the most relevant words. At the same time, it is necessary to exclude the rarest words so that the results won't be biased towards the views of a few 'hardcore' contributors.

Example analysis - Thomas Cook

In these example charts, we've looked into the most relevant keywords in regards to the travel agency Thomas Cook and one of its travel destinations, the Canary Islands. The content is from UK based social media sources in January 2010.

By analysing the word sets, a marketer can compare them to their SEM keywords but they also might see something interesting regarding their business in general. Whitevector's Chat Reports service enables the marketer to drill down to those discussions that include the most relevant buzzwords and to see, how consumers actually use those words.

Chart 1. Top Buzzwords for Thomas Cook, January 2010. Source: Whitevector

Chart 2. Top Buzzwords for the Canary Islands, January 2010. Source: Whitevector