Empathizing Of The Uk Users

Published Date: 02 Nov 2017

Abstract

The present study approaches the empathizing of the UK users’ behavior with respect to internet when considered in presence of SEM (Search Engine Marketing) and related activities, Conceiving the present dynamic role of online and connected consumer who use internet and Web 2.0 tools like Social and Media Blogs. An online form survey, reaching up to 108 respondents actively using social network sites like "Face book", analyzed the respondents’ social, demographic and general characteristics, their online behavior, and their level of conflict with SEM activities. It also discovered the most democratic and the most often used internet tools. The review findings were mostly consistent with same kind of studies conducted in different regions of United Kingdom and Europe .the review of gathered data enabled to find relevant kinships between variables and equating answers through age, gender, and hours fagged on the internet. The results will give all internet marketers a degree of perceptivity into their direct users, and will allow them to make strategies to provide for the targeted segments effectively. Also, this study will give a vital point of cite for future research related to internet marketing, which will be useful believing the current trends and development of particular marketing activity.

INTRODUCTION

The topic of this explore, "Examination of UK Online Consumers’ sensing and Attitudes towards Marketing governed by Search Engine in context of Web 2.0" .Firstly, we need to understand what is Search Engine Marketing and is essential for contextualization of project. Carrera (2009) and Chaffey et al. (2009) have defined Search Engine Marketing as an action that affects promoting firms with the help of online search engines, to meet marketing targets by providing relevant content to users’ and search results, thus motivating to click on particular link.

As for Search Engine Marketing Park and Kim (2008) have defined it as most measurable, strategic and governable way to build a dynamic and mutually good consumer to consumer and also consumer to marketer communications about a certain service, product or company. It is acknowledged in field of marketing that the knowledge owned by customers, their prediction of relative conduct, and meeting expectations which is important and is a key to success.

As a result, internet marketers need to understand characteristics of users and internet habits of users in order to effectively find and reach target segments (Carrera, 2009; Chaffey et al., 2009). From position of consumer marketing, study of internet users’ and their decision making process should be based upon users’ characteristics and relative online behavior.

This study aims to critically find how UK online consumers comprehend and act in front of Search Engine Marketing (SEM) and other activities, and main objectives are as follows:

To realize impact of internet on existing modern day marketing.

To look into the current circumstance of the Web 2.0 consumer, and its role on web

To realize the modern day internet Consumers conduct towards marketing

To look into key concepts related to Internet Marketing, poring specifically on SEM (Search Engine Marketing).

To examine the ways UK consumers comprehend SEM activities, and evaluate mental attitude towards SEM activities.

To suggest testimonials for further study or schemes in internet marketing context

During the procedure of secondary search, there are several key questions , which forms the foundation of form elaboration:

To what extent trust issues are a concern when analyzing activities for internet marketing and their effectiveness?

How do consumer performs searches using search engine pages and what is considered more important during the search?

Why internet users choose massively the organic results retrieved from a search engine page, instead of frequented links?

What incites internet users in forward marketing emails to their friends and other users?

How far consumers engage in company blogs and various social network pages?

How do users interact with blogs and various social network pages?

1.1 The impact of the Internet on consumer Marketing

Analyzing the internet with regards to consumer marketing is important to understand .A simple question which arises is: What factors affect Internet consumer marketing?

According to Chaffey et al. (2009) internet has enhanced marketing as first website made in 90’s was (http://info.cern.ch/) (CERN, 2008), and now, there are more than one billion users using internet regularly and the manner companies sell products or services and way consumers react has changed emphatically. Peterson et al. (1999) honor this idea, debating that World Wide Web owned maximum potential for marketing. Drawing Success in business mostly depends upon technological knowledge and further gives competitive edge and remains continuous process.

There are many authors who conceive that Internet play an important major impact on Marketing mix 4 P’s: in Product Mix, digital brought different services and products (e.g. software) and further added new features to already existing ones (Carrera, 2009).

Avlonitis and Karayanni (2000) admit to the fact that internet helped the discovery of user needs, cut across and product testing; In Price Mix, Carrera (2009) expresses that there is significant reduction in costs is seen, which developed firms selling products or services at a very low price, with the use of web sites for e.g. a low-cost airlines.

Nevertheless, the customization of services and products allows companies to appoint premium price, as they abide by with buyer’s tastes and is studied in detail by (Chaffey et al., 2009); For the Place, products and services like home banking has facilitated the interaction and reduced costs in comparison to other distribution channels. Besides, the ability to continue information related to clients is much more effective than traditional transfers, dealing the Promotion, with regards to digital context and advertising adapts directly to the needs of consumers, as it collects information related to these for e.g. detection of IP address and profile of buyer for suggestions (Carrera, 2009). Furthermore, the promotion of a service /product is now also built by C2C basis, which is very difficult to control and there are different ways to manage (Mangold and Fauls, 2009), and will be analyzed later in project.

All these elements have changed the manner consumers behave with companies, thus bringing a wider choice from all the different suppliers, and are a means to selecting and purchasing of items has turned out to be easier and faster. But for long customers are engaged and confident of this new way of marketing.

1.2 Web 2.0

A paper was published by Microsoft (2007), stating that web 2.0 is changing the internet into a powerful and authoritative medium, changing the way how society believes and behaves or reacts. The report confirms that especially social networking process is gathering people from different communities, and acting as a medium for personal reflection. This is consistent and is in accordance with Fu et al. (2007), and is said that use of collaborative technologies leads to an extraordinarily fast growing community which is virtual, here people pass by and share their information. These authors have agreed on the fact that World Wide Web is moving towards social web, and users have an important role in all the aspects of business and remains to be the main focus in this study.

Consumers have embraced role of an important agent, who can express themselves using new tools, like wikis blogs or social networks (Carrera, 2009). In similar manner, Cheung and Lee (2009) contend that web has moved from being mere medium of information into a medium of content creation and further sharing. Chaffey et al. (2009) further gives arguments that the widespread acceptation of high speed broadband and world-wide media experiences are more and more used to absorb consumers with each other and also with companies.

More and more people discuss online and interact with products and brand campaigns, in a manner of "viral effect". These authors are in line with Carrera’s definition, which suggests that by addition of Web 2.0 it enhances in promoting interaction and user yielded content using virtual community and participation of social network, content ratings and widgets and tagging. However, it remains to be seen is how users are willing to absorb the internet marketing campaigns and further motivates user to share the latter.

1.3 Online Consumers’ behaviour towards e-Marketing

Online users mostly don’t have physical comfort provided by offline stores and a communication which is face to face. This concept is related to security problems and stories of fraud and internet commerce (Chaffey et al., 2009). As a result, consumers look for evidence of trust on a website, which may include brand familiarity or site appearance and quality of content, site may have official recognition and other recommendations given by users. Ha (2004) completes this discussion, by excusing that consumers have grown more internet savvy, they now insist on interacting with firms they trust. Various other trust factors are also added like privacy (risk of giving personal information), security related with payment risks, navigation like fulfilling access to various kind of information and related to order fulfillment (Bart et al., 2005; Ha, 2004).

However, there are consumers who buy only on company websites: but also have other online sources, is important to purchase choice. Following the research conducted by AOL UK (2006), about 77% of all the respondents’ accord that if they read a negative review about a product on internet related, it would make them think about their purchase, 42% assumed that they had to switch and move towards a different brand. One of the most important sources for online information is the search engines, which is followed closely by websites of famous brands, price comparison websites and reviews/opinions available on internet, are written by experts, customer reviews on websites. One of the important factors is that these online sources for information reduce time spent in comparing product quality which is to be done before purchase, this is a common aspect related to offline context (Huang et al., 2009). As a result, it is important to carry on here that the trust factors has an important role related to consumers perceptions towards online marketing, also consumers need to reach for different sources related to information of products they want to buy.

1.4 Attitudes of Online Consumers’ Towards e-Marketing

Breitenbach and Van Doren (1998) studied five distinguished kind of internet users, which are accorded by different academics to continue valid currently (Chaffey et al., 2009):

organized information seekers: Those who want to get information for product or leisure, services information, that generally are not brought online

Unorganized information seekers: They are referred as "surfers", and such users want to browse and change web sites using links, looks for interesting or different things and are more expected to click on ads or banner

Organized buyers: Such users are usually get online to purchase something specific. Websites which compare various products have an important role in this case.

Bargain hunters: Users who want to get offers and promotions, so as to vindicate their

investment in shopping.

Entertainment seekers – Such users look for complete online entertainment in various contests like puzzles ,quizzes, or games for multi-player, and lik to interact with various animated features available on web site

Recently, a study from EConsultancy (2004) found a similar classification for online consumer behavior, stating it does not involve behaviors which are applied to various people on the basis of product or occasion; different individuals may react or behave differently. The report found the "Tracker" and the "Explorer" concept. But it needs to be explored in detail, and is the kind of consumer who don’t have any buying intention, and is exposed to internet marketing action (like Search Engine Marketing), which may result in a conversion.

1.5 Attitudes towards search engines

To conduct product or service explores, consumers mostly use search engines. These are powerful consumer tools which retrieve relevant information related to products or services. Consumers can perform quick searches which are online by simply issuing queries built up of search products or services (Kumar and Lang, 2007). However, it is very important to note that not all consumers are searching for particular products; consumers mainly want to know for information on search engines. In reality, as Smith (2009) states, Yahoo and Google’s (world’s most used search engine) objective is to retrieve relevant information related to the words queried. More so, information websites forever rank higher in comparison to profit-driven sites, continuing here an important dispute for Search Engine Marketing.

To understand this consumer search engine conduct, iProspect a Search marketing company in (2006) carried out a research on the way consumers use search engines. The major findings were that 62% of users only look only at first page of results and ignore the rest. Aula and Rodden (2009) accomplished this finding, by demonstrating that users assess search results very quickly and most of the times make unconscious decisions, centering mainly on first two results for a particular search as shown in (Figure 1). iProspect also expresses that when consumers do not get what they were looking for, about 41% change their search term and 82% complicate their search with other complementary words.

As for prestige, it was ascertained that about 36% consider that the firms enrolled at the top of search are best brands in market. The final feeling was that comparing with sponsored area, which is between 60% and 80% and click on natural or organic listings of search page. It remains to be searched why users mostly like organic links, and reasons behind not flicking on sponsored links.

Figure 1: Heat map drawn for user’s scan performed on Google search

1.6 Attitudes towards Emails

Following a analysis by Habeas (2008), irrespective of email and other internet threat concerns, users are still and will continue to be dependent on email, irrespective of their relationships with business organization or from each one other through web 2.0 applications. The study has revealed that nearly 69% of total users expressed concern related to email fraud scams, and many of them do not know how can they distinguish between possibly dangerous and emails that are trustable. It also showed that majority prefer firms that offer choices and content of emails.

Mintel (2008) added up users that trust emails which come from similar companies who provide relevant information with least effort. In a seminar conducted by dotMailer (2009), it was mentioned that even though the current circumstance of web 2.0 era in which consumers have the power, still email is gateway to consumers’. Users today have digital lives where every single user owns an email account (or may be more than one).However, what actuates users to send marketing emails is a key point in our research. According to Lin et al. (2006), users may have stronger intention for forwarding certain email if it provides them positive emotions and gives relevant information, or mails are greater in length, or may include some interesting multimedia. On the flip side, Phelps et al. (2004) differentiated between infrequent transmitters and Viral geniuses: the first ones choose rigorously which emails are important and then decide to forward them, and send them to their mailing list; while Viral Mavens are patronize senders who feel helpful ,excited, or satisfied as they forward emails to persons who they think will wish the message. In other perspective, a report presented by Mintel (2008) indicates that nearly half of all the responders open emails that have special offers if mails come from individual they know, and lie in the age group of 25-44 years.

1.7 Attitudes of User towards Social Media

The visual aspect of web-based societal media has helped the communication among one person and hundreds or thousands of other users, for the airing of products by companies. This consumer to consumer position has gained awful power amidst the business world, also provided new opportunity for firms to communicate intimately with their consumers and discussed in detail by (Sinha, 2008). However, due to its irrepressible nature, the challenge for firms lies on the power to shape consumers’ treatments in order to mould them with company’s goals (Mangold and Faulds, 2009). These sources described five different social mass medium platforms: communicating using (micro-blogs blogs, and other social networks), Collaboration (Social Bookmarking ,Wikis, and Opinion Sites), Multimedia (Audio Sharing Sites ,Photo and Video), Opinion Sites (sites for Product Review and sites for Question & Answers), and Entertainment sites (Games and Virtual communities).

Research done by iProspect (2007) ascertained that various social media sites are called by quarter of internet users; and very few execute searches in sites for firms or brands; about 34%

of users of such sites have been shaped to purchase a wares through them; majority still don’t have such habit to add user produced content; and that younger is the user, the more apt will he visit and absorb proactively with societal media sites. Ramos (2009) amended these findings in his study by showing how users use social media to arrive at buying decisions: it was chanced that the majority (69%) are just "Spectators" and read and check user generated content; about 37% are "Critics" who contribute with their comments; and remaining 29% are "Collectors" who use social technology as a means collect information.

The main result of the study was that more than the social media application which influences their buying pattern; it is online peers’ beliefs. As a result the main issues which remain to be researched are how consumers engage and commend company blogs, pages, micro-blog and other social network pages.

2Literature Review

Most searches on a major Search Engine such as Google will call up two types of search results: Paid search and Organic search (also known as Pay-Per-Click). Organic search results on Google appear on the left of the page, whilst Paid search results appear on the right. The basic difference between these types of results is simple. Paid search results are those for which an advertiser has paid Google – the prominent position is secured by a financial transaction. Organic search results have not been paid for – a prominent position is assigned by Google based on a complex set of algorithms that determines how relevant the website is to the search term used.

Both Organic and Paid search have their advantages, and which is appropriate to use and depends on the nature of the campaign in question. To explain, let’s look at each in more depth.

Search Engines such as Google assess a website according to a wide range of factors and assign it rankings for relevant key phrases. In the case of Google, this assessment takes in more than 200 different metrics, among them such things as keywords, number of quality in-bound links from third-party websites and portals, coding, information architecture and usability. Securing high rankings is essential for Organic search to be successful, and websites engage in ongoing Search Engine Optimization campaigns to do so. Each results page on Google shows 10 Organic search results, and more than 75% of Internet users move on after the second page of results. So to be truly effective, Search Engine Optimization needs to secure listings in the top 20 results for targeted key phrases. This can take some time, typically 6 months, but with proper maintenance it is possible to keep high Organic rankings in the long term.

Paid search listings, such as Google AdWords, are accomplished by "bidding" (paying) for specific key phrases related to your product or service. High rankings are achieved immediately, but are only retained for as long as you keep paying for them. The exact position of Paid search listings depends on a range of factors, including the price paid and the quality score assigned by the Search Engine to the landing page or website. Advertisers pay only in case an Internet user clicks their paid link.

According to Jupiter Research, four out five clicks from a search results page come from Organic search results. This is a clear indication of how much more seriously Internet users regard Organic search. So does this mean that Organic search is always the best method to use? Actually, no, it doesn’t. In the long-term, Organic search yields the most cost-effective results, but there are specific circumstances in which Paid search is more appropriate.

Paid search can provide you with an immediate boost in pre-qualified website traffic, leads and online sales. As Paid search advertisements appear straight away, results can be seen within days, even within hours, of the start of a campaign. This makes Paid search extremely useful for tactical campaigns, or for promotional campaigns involving time-sensitive or seasonal offers which need immediate exposure.

The other major time when Paid search is the best option is during the early stages of Search Engine Optimization. As a typical SEO campaign takes 6 months to "ramp up", Paid search is a effective way of getting fast results and also good return on investment whilst waiting for higher Organic search listings to be gained. In the short-term, paid search is often the best option.

The major disadvantage of Paid search is cost. In the long-term, paid search is significantly more costly than Organic search, with cost running into hundreds or even thousands of dollars each day, particularly for the most valuable key phrases. And cost is increasing. Google’s reinforcement of "Quality Score" has raised costs for non-targeted key phrase buys that get a "Poor" quality score. This has had a serious effect on the cost of Google AdWords, in particular for affiliate sites. With various strategies for optimization you can lower your costs for Paid search, but over the long term organic Search Engine Optimization gives a higher return on your marketing dollar.

2.1 How Paid Search and Natural Search Bring New Sales to Your Company

Paid search marketing is a strategy whereby you develop a list of "keywords" which are relevant to the products and/or services your business offers. Actually, the best keywords and not a single words at all, but rather phrases that describe your business. Relevancy is absolutely critical when building this list of keywords. With your list of relevant keywords you must then choose an online search advertiser who will display your advertisements when users perform searches using one or more of the keywords in your list. The three main search advertisers are Google, Yahoo!, and MSN (Microsoft). Each of these advertisers offer an advertising program referred to as a Pay-Per-Click, or PPC.

A PPC advertising program works like this: You take each one of the keywords in your list and find out what the current "bid price" is for those keywords with the online advertiser you've selected. Let's say that you're using Google's Adwords PPC program for your online advertising and one of your keywords is "portable blue widgets". A research tool in Adwords will tell you, among other things, how many searches were performed last month using the keyword "portable blue widgets". The tool will also tell you what you would have to "bid" on this keyword to insure that your Google advertisement (which you'll write later on) will appear on the all-important first page of a search result for that keyword.

Suppose the current bid price for "portable blue widgets" is, say, $1.00. Your bid should be something greater than $1.00 to make sure your ad shows up on the first page of a search result consistently. So, you bid $1.15 to start. You then write a few small text ads promoting your business which include a link to a relevant page on your website.

Once you've written your ads and bid on your keywords the fun begins! Google rotates your ads on their system and within minutes of launching your PPC campaign your ads start to appear for searches relevant to your keywords. Up to this point you haven't paid Google a thin dime – not even for opening an Adwords account. However, the moment someone uses one of the keywords, your Google ad, and further clicks on the ad taking directly to your website and thus pay Google the amount for that visit. What you pay is your bid price for the keyword that was used to land that visitor on your website. If your bid is $1.15 then Google charged your account for the amount of money.

Using a paid search program like Google's Adwords PPC program offers you a way to get your advertisement on first page of Google search result for a particular keyword almost instantly. Plus, you only pay for click-thru's to your website. If you've written your ad properly, this click-thru will represent qualified prospects. This may all sound pretty easy – but it's actually very complex. In fact, we believe it is so technical that it does NOT encourage clients to get started using a PPC strategy for one very important reason: PPC campaigns can drain your bank account faster than the U.S. Congress can spend a billion dollars!.On the contrary, a professionally managed PPC campaign is able to generate more business for a company that cannot be dreamed of with any form of advertising. That is a fact. Our own company has seen a dramatic rise in leads and new business as a direct result of using PPC to market our services.

2.2 Disadvantages of Paid Search Marketing

• Requires a quite a technical expertise for mastering and using effectively. Users must thoroughly understand the concepts involved with valid keyword research, ad writing, ad testing, target marketing, and more.

2.3 Benefits of Paid Search Marketing:

• Immediate first page search result ranking for relevant keywords.

• Highly-track able results for each keyword and each ad.

• Offers fast, reliable testing of headlines, keywords, product interest, and more.

• Offers method to control costs of advertisement on a daily basis.

• Offers ability to conduct geographic target marketing (geo-targeting).

• Offers ability to select which online ad mediums (search, content, mobile, etc.) for ads to appear.

Natural (Organic) search marketing is different from paid search marketing in that you do not pay an online search company such as Google whenever someone clicks-thru to your website from a search result page. Your website earns its ranking "naturally", or "organically", as a result of bearing highly valuable content on website itself.

Is it easy to get a systematically high search ranking by natural means? No, and it is getting harder all the time as the number of online competitors increases. Does it deserve the time, money, and resources to accomplish a high natural search ranking? Well, it depends on how badly your company wants to stay in business. After all, online marketing is probably how your competitors are finding (and keeping) their new business. Finally, surveys have shown that a natural search ranking converts visitors to paying customers about 30% more frequently than paid search.

2.4 Disadvantages of Organic Search Marketing

• Requires a high degree of technical expertise to master and use effectively. Businesses must continually add valuable, original, relevant, and compelling content to the site to achieve and maintain a high organic search ranking.

• Achieving a high organic search ranking is not immediate. Results from executing an effective organic search marketing campaign require a minimum of 4-6 months on average before they are realized.

• Less of a direct connection between resources invested in organic search marketing and results realized.

2.5 Benefits of Organic Search Marketing:

• Achieves a higher conversion rate on average.

• A high organic search ranking is not reliant on competitive keyword bidding. Organic ranking is more stable and predictable over a longer period of time (assuming the site is kept current with fresh content).

2.6 Is Natural Search Marketing Better Than Paid Search Marketing?

Many times our clients ask us "Can we stop paying Google once our site achieves a high organic search ranking?" There is a debate going on about this among online marketers, but we look at this issue purely from the standpoint of onscreen real estate.

The onscreen "real estate" on a Google search results page is limited to only 23 possible listings both paid and organic. The more places you can get listed the more likely your competitor will be relegated to the next (and far less important) page of a search result. If you’re listing is seen in both Sponsored areas of results page also in organic listings and as a result you are viewed with greater authority by consumers and other online searchers ("Geez! This company is listed everywhere – they must be really good!")

Conclusion

Search marketing is more and more becoming a popular way for businesses for marketing their products and services in a highly cost-effective manner – especially compared to most other forms of traditional advertising. Each type of search marketing strategy, whether paid or organic, it plays an important role in overall online marketing strategy followed for products. To summarize, both Organic and Paid search have their uses. Organic search is the best long-term option to yield the maximum Return on Investment – the costs are lower, the click-through rates are higher, and positions are retained for longer. But Paid search is the best option in the short term – you only pay for the clicks you receive and results are immediate. As with most things in marketing, it is getting the right mix of elements that is important, which means Organic search as the basis of a marketing strategy, backed up by Paid search for key and time-sensitive initiatives.