Alastair Thompson talks to Jon Ostler of “The Performance Network”
The online advertising industry continues to mature with the launch of NZ’s first “performance-based” advertising network. The Performance Network (TPN), soft-launched in March this year by First Rate founder Jon Ostler, was, he says, “in response to demands by advertisers and publishers for new advertising options”.
First Rate has become a Google Gadget Ad developer to pioneer the development of gadget ads in New Zealand. First Rate is a direct response, online marketing agency that provides online strategy, search engine marketing (SEM), search engine optimisation (SEO), email marketing and performance-based online advertising and tracking services direct to a range of clients across Australasia, including ING, Yellow Pages, APN, Rabo Plus and Roses Only. First Rate has offices in Auckland and Sydney.
“Do you know what your competition is doing and if it’s working?”
Identify and analyse your online competition then devise strategies and tactics to out-manoeuvre them. Learn from their successes and failures and put into place a cost effective strategy that will be assured of success. Understand your industry online and be sure that your business plans will work online.
“The right site content is essential for site stickiness, conversion and search engine traffic “The findings of the site business strategy, competitor analysis and market research will drive new site content production. Information based pages will be added to the site presenting high demand information to the search engines and users.
What Is Search Engine Optimisation?
Search engine optimisation is the technical process to make your website content and purpose as apparent as possible to search engines. Search engines attempt to present users with the most relevant websites and website pages possible for any search that a user enters. So the search engine optimisation process is about ensuring your site ranks highly for relevant and popular search phrases.
“55% of all online purchases originate from Search Engines as opposed to only 9% from banners”
Site content needs to be presented to search engines in a very specific but subtle way in order to achieve top rankings for popular search phrases. The technical process of adjusting a site’s content and html is called search engine optimisation. For the rankings to be achieved, a good online reputation is required. For traffic to be generated the correct phrases must be targeted. To achieve the maximum business benefit, the site’s usability and business strategy must be well planned and executed.
Search Engine Advertising is the placement of small text advertisements on search engines. Google Adwords and Overture Pay-for-Performance Search are the two most well known players. On Google the text ads appear at the top of the results and on the right hand side under the heading ‘Sponsored Links’. Overture syndicates its ads to other search engines like Yahoo where they appear at the top of the page and are under the heading ‘Sponsor Results’.