Purchase-Related Searching Takes Place Before Transaction and Generic Search Terms Dominate Purchase-Related Searching Takes Place Before Transaction and Generic Search Terms Dominate
Monday, 13 March 2006
DoubleClick Inc., a provider of marketing solutions for ad agencies, marketers, and Web publishers, has unveiled a new study, “Search Before the Purchase,” in conjunction with comScore and DoubleClick’s search marketing division, Performics, to demonstrate how consumers use search engines in the process of making purchases online.
The study, which analyses pre-purchase search activity across four categories (Apparel, Computer Hardware, Sports & Fitness and Travel), showed that roughly half of all online shoppers conducted related research at a search engine before making an online purchase.
It also found that most searchers complete their purchase-related search activity weeks in advance of the purchase transaction. While it is widely accepted that searches that lead directly to a purchase are often brand-related search queries, the study shows that brand names of online retailers were in the minority of all the purchase-related searches made during their shopping research.
Buyers Conduct Many Related Searches Prior to Purchase.
Overall, the study found that approximately one out of every two online purchases is preceded by research on a search engine. In the case of the travel segment, nearly three out of four travel buyers consulted search engines before making a purchase.
The number of searches prior to purchase varies by category - buyers on fitness/sports sites conducted 2.5 relevant searches in the 12 weeks preceding a purchase; apparel buyers made 4.7 relevant searches; computer hardware buyers, 4.9, and travel buyers averaged 6 relevant searches in the 12 weeks before their transaction.
Many Buyers Complete Relevant Search Activity in Advance of Purchase.
Although many marketers evaluate the success of search marketing programs based only on clicks that lead to a purchase in the same session or perhaps within a few days, most buyers complete their purchase-related search engine research two or more weeks before they make a purchase online.
For example, in the travel category, 54.7 percent of buyers' final searches occurred at least two weeks before the purchase event; 21.5 percent searched one week or more before purchase and only 23.8 percent bought during the same session.
Buyers clearly favor generic terms early in the buying cycle – for example, “running shoes,” as opposed to a merchant brand. Brand-specific searches accounted for only 18.1 percent to 28.5 percent of all searches those buyers conducted, depending on the respective purchase categories.
Further, the study showed that a small minority of all the searches (4 percent or less for each category) were for "Brand + Item Searches"; that is, compound phrases that included a merchant's brands plus another term. Though the volume of searches on these Brand + Item terms is low, they do drive a comparatively high proportion of clicks per search, relative to Brand and Generic searches: for Apparel sites, only 1 percent of searches but 3.7 percent of clicks.
Branded Terms Dominate Search Activity Closer To The Purchase
While the majority of search activity across the full twelve weeks is generic, brand searches and clicks become more prominent close to the purchase, peaking in “same session” search activity (searches and clicks conducted in the same session as the purchase). For example, in the case of apparel buyers, 10 percent of all clicks occurred in the same session as the purchase, and 89 percent of these clicks included a merchant's brand (brand only or brand + item).
Buyers in other categories followed similar though less extreme patterns: 9 percent and 54 percent for computer hardware, respectively, 9 percent and 49 percent for travel and 11 percent and 57 percent for sport & fitness. However, buyers converting from a branded search can mask the value of the prior generic searches in direct ROI analyses. This study shows that the generic terms that dominate related searches also lead to purchases and may provide an opportunity for marketers to influence consumers.
“The findings of this milestone study suggest to marketers that there is an opportunity to attract and engage searchers throughout the buying cycle, and not only with their own branded keywords,” said Stuart Larkins, vice president of partner dervices, Performics, a division of DoubleClick. “Marketers should track search click-throughs for weeks prior to the purchase session to fully account for the longitudinal impact of generic keywords in search. Generic keywords provide greater reach for marketers and contribute to the overall lift in a search program.”
Methodology
Using its proprietary panel of 1.5 million U.S. Internet users, comScore Networks identified people who made a purchase at one of 30 web sites in four vertical industries (Travel, Apparel, Computer Hardware or Sports/Fitness) in the month of September, 2004. Merchants were selected for a high volume of traffic and a homogenous set of products for sale. The population of the survey included people (“buyers”) who made a purchase at a target site.
The survey tracked search activity - both searches and clicks - of the buyers for 12 weeks preceding the purchase (July - September 2004). Both searches and clicks include all relevant search activity of the buyers and is not limited to activity related to the 30 merchants in the four categories.