Bunk: Bidding on Trademarks a Waste
Aug 21, 2007 PPC Basics
I read an interesting post today written by Brad Waller at Revenews entitled “Billions Wasted on Trademark Bidding?” In the post, he writes about Brian Morrissey’s recent article posted on Adweek, stating that companies are wasting money on trademarked terms and branding. Most people that read my blog know it’s not as simple, but I like to prove some of my points through ridicule.
This post could also have been titled, “Billions Cash in on Trademark Bidding.” Why? For several reasons, not limited to the following:
- Gain exposure quickly until SEO rank catches up.
- Cut affiliates out of the revenue stream.
- Because it’s profitable, duh!
Let’s face it, we’ve all been at a point where we’ve had to pay catch-up in the SERPs to new keywords such as hot brand names, industry buzz words, or even popular long-tail combinations. But you needed your site optimized a month ago (some have claimed minimum one week) to really reap some serious rewards for unique keywords. What better way to get there quickly than by using pay-per-click? It’s by no means a stretch to extend that same logic to a brand or trademark you have recently launched into the market.
Affiliates are another reason why you may not be wasting money bidding on your own trademarks. Many of us are running affiliate marketing programs that compliment our revenue mix, but what if your affiliates are running the whole show? Suddenly your marketing to affiliates and at their beckon call, when you really should be cutting them out of the equation to increase profits. They’re already on Adwords, YSM, and adCenter, but your company has the power to offer discounts and promotions that they cannot. Your company should also have the financial leverage to take back a good portion of online revenue.
My third and final point is simple. In my experience, branding campaigns have the lowest CPC and highest ROAS than any other campaigns in existence. Your trademarks are protected from displaying in ad campaigns, therefore you have the edge in terms of quality score (in most cases). Your analytics tools should give you some idea of what your return on advertising spend is for PPC campaigns . If you haven’t tested it yourself, I urge you to discover for yourself the profitability to be realized from branding campaigns. Heck, you might even get a promotion for it!
Brad, thanks for writing on this from an affiliate standpoint, and Brian (if you’re reading this), don’t fret the small stuff - we all make mistakes.
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