Other Industries Teach Us

I have always used other industry data to help lead us in dominating in the real estate and mortgage industry which comprises most of our client websites. By looking at other markets we can take inferences that lead us to understand new opportunities and solidify hunches.

A new study conducted by Compete Inc. for Yahoo Search Marketing concluded that consumers reached with search are attractive for financial services companies since they are both wealthy and of strong credit quality.

Now, this isn't exactly your direct client, but they share some similarity for sure. The finance industry is pretty closely related to real estate sales, and especially Mortgage Brokering.

"A third of people who are searching on brand terms are looking to establish a new relationship or expand their existing relationship" with financial service providers, said Mike Bailey, managing director of financial services at Compete, Boston.

The study found that 31% of all searchers online are looking for loans.

Now what I find interesting is that however, 80 % of the prospects researching a bank are competitor's customers. 

"From a search marketer's perspective, when I establish a portfolio of terms to put a listing on, I want to make sure I have coverage across general terms, specific terms and brand terms to reach all of the consumers investigating the products that I'm marketing," said Justin Merickel, director of the finance category at Yahoo Search Marketing, Sunnyvale, CA.

This is exactly the approach that we at Spider Juice Technologies use to capture more brand and lead generation for our Realtor and Mortgage clients.

Another interesting phenomenon is that Credit card prospects find it more convenient to apply online -- 83 % via the Web, 5 % through the bank branch and the rest by telephone.

But of those consumers who research their checking, savings and loan options online, one-third to one-half of those who open accounts do so at in-person channels. For example, 56 percent of checking account openings resulting from search were consummated at a branch versus 43 percent online. For savings accounts it was 38 percent in a branch, 60 percent online and the rest on the phone. For loans, the branch's share was 36 percent, the Internet's 42 percent and the phone's 22 percent.

This follows one of our Search Marketing Truths: "People research online and buy offline" . This is why I have argued over and over again that your website must serve one master, that is to capture online searchers names and personal information. All the branding and loyalty building is done after the capture.

Thanks to DMNews.com for much of the information for this post.