SpyFu's list of daily budgets of top Search Engine Marketing spenders

[LJVF]

Not sure how credible this list is, but the numbers are staggering.

The usual suspects are on the list, proflowers, ftd, 1800, etc... but who is "blossom florists"?

 

[theRKF]

We've had a few threads about Spyfu:
Spying on your competitors' keywords
SpyFu
Interesting site keywordspy.com

It's generally found to be only moderately reliable at best.

 

[LJVF]

Ryan, I did notice that the listed ppc budgets seem to be more close to accurate now. They were way out of whack last year.

 

[hcflorist]

I'm actually surprised that the flower peddler budgets were that low. This just reinforces my long-stated belief that local flower shops can and should butt heads with these giants in THEIR LOCAL MARKETS and take those local markets away from them.

The numbers by themselves might be impressive to some. But when spread over a per capita or per square mile basis of the area they cover, they aren't so impressive. Local florists should get over being impressed and start figuring out that they can and should successfullly butt heads against these guys in their local markets and take their local markets away from them. It's affordable and can be done in many markets for much less than a lot of florists are paying these guys every month for the privilege of helping them (the big guys) compete against themselves and all local florists by filling for them.

 

[LJVF]

I'm actually surprised that the flower peddler budgets were that low. This just reinforces my long-stated belief that local flower shops can and should butt heads with these giants in THEIR LOCAL MARKETS and take those local markets away from them.

The numbers by themselves might be impressive to some. But when spread over a per capita or per square mile basis of the area they cover, they aren't so impressive. Local florists should get over being impressed and start figuring out that they can and should successfullly butt heads against these guys in their local markets and take their local markets away from them. It's affordable and can be done in many markets for much less than a lot of florists are paying these guys every month for the privilege of helping them (the big guys) compete against themselves and all local florists by filling for them.

The problem I see it is that along with their big budgets probably comes a significant adscore, which in turns grants them a much better ppc click rate than the average joe could command.

I've been competing in adwords from almost the very beginning and have come to realize that it is becoming more and more difficult to compete with the big boys for any of the top slots in important keywords. Now, I'm in a big city where the competition is fierce, perhaps in a smaller market, the rates are more affordable. But...florists in a smaller market probably do well in the organic listings, in which they need to take a hard look at whether jumping into the ppc game is right for them.

IMO, if a florist is going to go down the ws free road, rather than putting this ws service money into ppc as you suggested, I believe it might be wiser to put this same money into developing brand recognition.

 

[Bigted]

$22,000 a day for flowershopping.com? Who knew that guy was raking in that much money using those "well-documented tactics".

 

[CHR]

Just remember, we florists pay a big chunk of that $22K/day tab in the form of commissions and rebates. Same with the other OGs.

I agree with both hcflorist and Darrell. Focus on Local keywords and don't waste money on terms unlikely to convert. Small town florists should have have a lower cost per click and can take advantage of having a map shortcut under their listing if they can land in the top 2-3.

Larger operations do have an advantage in scale (better adscores), as Darrell mentioned, but don't let that keep you from taking a look at AdWords opportunities.

 

[bloomz]

But even better than adwords is some good old organic seo.

Lots more people click in the natural listings.

 

[theRKF]

The problem I see it is that along with their big budgets probably comes a significant adscore, which in turns grants them a much better ppc click rate than the average joe could command.

IMO, if a florist is going to go down the ws free road, rather than putting this ws service money into ppc as you suggested, I believe it might be wiser to put this same money into developing brand recognition.

Not entirely true - size doesn't equal quality score. For example, a small campaign I was running for Martin's at Valentine's day was well under $1 for key V-day terms and generic terms from the 12th to 14th.

It's the quality of the ads, primarily, that drives quality score and therefore price.

But even better than adwords is some good old organic seo.

Lots more people click in the natural listings.

True - depending on the type of query it's anywhere from 12% - 20% click the PPC ads.

Don't overlook the fact that a short PPC campaign can help you determine effective keywords to target for SEO in the longterm.

 

[goldfish]

Generic keywords with city name, like "florist (city) (state)", are difficult to compete and, in my opinion, unnecessary if your shop already ranks high in organic search.

More specific names work much better. For example, "peace lilies" with negative keywords like "-care" can be had with less than $1 in most towns with a good CTR.

Also it's worth experimenting with both Google and Yahoo. For certain keywords, Yahoo gives me a much better score than Google, leading to a higher ranking with better CTR.