WebTrends Ad Director, simplifying online marketing
Sep 2, 2008 Acquisio, Omniture, SES Tour, WebTrends
Not long ago WebTrends announced the release of their newly re-branded online marketing solution they now dub Ad Director. After talking with representatives at Search Engine Strategies San Jose, it’s a bit of a departure from the intricately granular management platform Omniture Search Center provides, but might be a welcome change for SEMs looking for a more high-level strategic solution.
According to WebTrends, billions of dollars are wasted each year on online advertising budgets improperly managed through manual or poorly performing automated processes. WebTrends Ad Director hopes to remedy that problem by offering both tracking tools and management resources to their subscribers.
What does that mean? WebTrends Ad Director is almost like having an agency in a box.
This approach differs substantially from industry-leader Omniture, as WebTrends aims for that group of search marketers that don’t necessarily want to waste time on delving deeper into statistics and management options. In fact, the strategy is very similar to one used by my fellow Canadians (or should I say Canadiens?) at Acquisio.
To be fair to Omniture (if I don’t, I’ll get phone calls), Search Center does have a bevvy of tools available to automate several unique processes and manage groups of keywords, but due to certain limitations that I won’t detail here, you can’t say that it’s a simplistic ‘high-level’ solution. Setting up and understanding those bid management tools and actually gaining ROAS from using them can be a significant investment in human capital.
Back to WebTrends Ad Director…
The company is employing a strategic, versus tactical, approach to analytics and online marketing management. Rather than scrutinizing the return on ad spend (ROAS) for various individual keywords, WebTrends Ad Director groups various keywords and tries to achieve the greatest possible ROAS for that given group. There are still big winners and big losers in that group, but the overall effect is a much higher ROAS.
Ultimately, it all comes down to your workload and preference as an SEM. Do you prefer the nitty-gritty granularity of Omniture Search Center or (gasp) manual processes? Or do you prefer to take a higher-level strategic approach to online marketing management?
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