Today, I ran into Google's new savings-account comparison chart for the first time (see notes 1, 2 and screenshot below, link). The search giant now offers separate pages with financial product comparisons for mortgages, credit cards, CDs, checking, and savings accounts. And the comparison matrices are at times positioned prominently on searches potentially reducing traffic to top advertisers and to organic results as well (see screenshot below).

Savings account search results
Let's look at an example search today for "savings accounts." The results include a blue-chip lineup of paid advertisers. Following is a list of the top 10 paid results compared to their position on the Google comparison page (note 3):

1. American Express (#1)
2. ING Direct (#7)
3. US Bank (#24, 30, 32, 33)
4. BECU (local advertiser)
5. Citibank (#19, 25, 26 )
6. Capital One (#10, 15, 31)
7. Navy Federal CU
8. TD Ameritrade
9. Zions Bank (#4, 5, 22, 23, 27)
10. Discover Bank (#2, 11)

Analysis
I still don't understand why Google would risk antagonizing its financial advertisers by drawing traffic away from their ads and into the Google-powered comparison matrix. The company says its focus is on the user experience. So I guess they believe that long-term this approach will generate more traffic, more searches and ultimately more revenue, possibly from commissions for actual accounts generated, rather than just pay-per-click.

But in its current beta stage, there are some odd results. How would you feel if you are US Bank, bidding high enough to be number three on the search results page, but not shown until page three of the savings-account comparison page? Worse, three top-10 advertisers, BECU, Navy Federal CU, and TD Ameritrade aren't even listed on the savings comparison page.

Which brings up a bigger question. How does Google determine which FIs are listed? The savings-product comparison indexes only 17 banks, of which five aren't even playing the rate game at this point with rates of 0.25% or less (note 4). Furthermore, there's not a single credit union and just one smaller bank (Bank of Internet) listed. 

I understand this is just a trial balloon from Google and that product comparisons could make it easier for users to find the best rate. But right now it's unfair to any financial institution not in the chosen 17, and it doesn't allow users to easily choose from criteria other than rate, monthly fee, and whether a branch is nearby.

It also looks like the system could be gamed. What's to prevent one of these banks from launching ten, or 20 or 30 different savings accounts, all with temporary teaser rates, to soak up more space in the matrix?

Sure, Google will eventually build algorithms to prevent that, but that will take time. Meanwhile, it's an odd transition time for the search engine and its financial advertisers. But if you rely at all on Google to deliver new customers, you better pay close attention to developments with its product-comparison pages.

Google search for "savings accounts" (12 Jan. 2011, 4:00 PM Pacific, Seattle IP address)

Google's "savings" comparison page

Offer details page for American Express High-Yield Savings

---------------------------------

Notes:
1. According to MyBankTracker.com, Google started running the deposit-account comparisons in late December 2010 in the U.S. market.
2. We wrote about Google's credit card comparison matrix in November.
3. Google's savings-account matrix listed a total of 44 results, from 17 unique banks, displayed 10 per page
4. 14 of the 44 results, almost one-third of the matrix, were accounts paying 10 basis points or less.

Today, when searching Google for "credit cards," a small Comparison ad appeared on the top of the results page, above the individual paid spots (see first screenshot below; note 1). The title was "Credit Card Offers" and clicking on it delivered me to the following URL: google.com/comparisonads/uscredit (see second screenshot).

Google had previously disclosed United Kingdom tests for credit card and mortgage comparison ads, but this is the first I'd heard of them in the United States (note 2). The comparison page had 101 credit card offers that could be searched based on certain card attributes such as "no annual fee" and/or by the user's self-evaluation of their credit quality.

Clicking on one of the offers delivered a page that summarized the salient points, but according to the fine print at the bottom of the page, Google isn't currently being paid for these credit card ads. However, there was a source code in the URL that delivered me to the U.S. Bank application, so Google may be banking referral fees for completed applications.

If this practice becomes widespread, card issuers will need to adjust their Google search buy and figure out how to gain better exposure on the comparison-results page. Right now, APR (interest rate) is the default sort mechanism.

1. Google search for "credit cards" brings up comparison ad (10 Nov. 10)

2. Credit card comparison page includes sort and search options

3. The offer page provides detailed price info
Note: Clicking on the "application form" button takes users to the issuer's site to complete the application

3a. Fine print at bottom of the page

----------------------------------------------

Notes:
1. Searching from a Seattle IP address on 10 Nov. 2010 at about 5:00 PM Pacific Time via Firefox 3.6 on WinXP.
2. Apparently a few others have seen them; for example, Search Engine Journal reported on the practice in an October post (here).

With growing debit card usage, and few rewards programs with meaningful payment bonuses (note 1), the market seems right for a focused debit-card-rewards provider.

But the market has not evolved as fast as many thought. Capital One threw in the towel on its decoupled debit rewards program. Finovate alum (video here) Tempo Payments is refocusing on affinity-branded cards, which often have a reward component paid for by the affinity partner.

But a new entrant, PerkStreet Financial (powered by The Bancorp Bank) may have the right answer: reward levels on par with credit-card programs, 1% of spending value, 4x the average debit card program (note 1). The company emphasizes rewards paid via free coffee (nice tie-in to the name), music downloads (going after the youth market), or gift cards from name-brand retailers (adds retail interest to the account). See the first screenshot.

But with lower interchange, and no monthly fee (note 2), how can a bank afford such high rewards?

• No branches
• Rewards paid out on retail stored-value cards which are provided to the bank by retailers at prices less than face value
• $30 overdraft charges (but it's OPT-IN optional)

$50 new-account bonus: If you navigate directly to the website, there is no new account bonus (see screenshot 2). But if you use Google, it's hard to miss PerkStreet's ad (screenshot 3) or the affiliate deals. Going to the site through those options earns you a $50 bonus (screenshot 4), and in the case of the Google ad, an additional $50 qualified satisfaction guarantee (screenshot 5). 

1. PerkStreet perks page (link; 2 Dec 2009)

2. Standard homepage with no offer, emphasizing free

3. Google search for "PerkStreet Financial" (2 Dec 2009, 5:30 PM Pacific from Seattle IP address)

4. PerkStreet homepage accessed via affiliate (Doughroller link)
$50 bonus with $25 opening deposit and three months of activity

5. Landing page offer (link, 2 Dec 2009)
$50 bonus now with direct deposit, and $50 more if not satisfied within eight months.
To qualify as not satisfied, you must have set up direct deposit within 60 days of account opening, made 10 or more debit transactions per month for six straight months, and have closed your account within eight months of opening.

Notes:
1. According to the fine print disclosures on PerkStreet's homepage, 17% of debit cards provide rewards with an average value of 0.23% of spending (source cited: BAI/Hitachi 2008 Study of Consumer Payment Preferences).
2. The account has a monthly fee ($4.50) only if there is no activity.

Thanks to information in LendingTree's lawsuit (embedded below) against its rate-engine provider, Mortech (see note 1), which was picked up by the NY Times, then echoed across the Internet, Google appears to be looking at providing loan rate comparison/aggregation directly in its search results. The service appears to have been beta-tested in the UK more than a year ago (screenshots here).

It's no surprise Google would make this move. It's long worked on ways to help online shoppers compare products and services. For example, a search today on "air conditioner" displays the usual targeted text ads on the top and right, but also shows various "shopping results" in the middle of the page (see screenshot below). There are even catalogue-like thumbnails in the right-hand column, something I'd not noticed before.

Financial services, with heavy search volumes, are an obvious area for expansion by the search giant.

The LendingTree lawsuit says the service may launch within the next 30 days. Google says only that it is "currently working on a small ad unit test that will run against a limited number of mortgage-related search queries in the U.S."

What it means to NetBankers: The service, if successful, could help users streamline their rate-research process by eliminating a visit to a loan-comparison site. But it's not likely to have a material impact on banks, credit unions and other mortgage lenders. There will just be more advertising dollars ending up in Google's pocket at the expense of other financial lead-gen sites such as BankRate.com, Interest.com and LendingTree, of course.

LendingTree complaint

Search results for "air conditioner" (27 Aug 2009, 3 PM Pacific, from Seattle IP address)

Note:
1. LendingTree claims that Mortech, an info provider to LendingTree, would be in violation of its contract if it provided similar technology to Google. See LendingTree's press release on the matter.

Someone's getting creative on Chase's search-engine marketing team. Look at the ad they placed on the RSS feed of a recent Payments News article (see first screenshot below, note 1). Using Google AdSense, the bank cleverly placed an ad against a story about Wells Fargo's same-day bill pay service.

Chase probably figures consumers reading about same-day payment capabilities might also have experienced problems with overdrafts in the past. But, I'm not sure why Chase used a call-to-action aimed at driving prospects to a branch:

Wamu Overdraft Forgiveness 
Help Take Control of your Finances. Find a Chase Branch Near You Today! (emphasis added)

Prospects that clicked through on the first ad landed on a microsite with a large branch finder at the bottom. This is a good microsite, although it doesn't directly mention taking control of your finances (see second screenshot).

Over at the main Google site, Chase used a pitch that seemed more likely to induce clicks (see third screenshot): 

Welcome to Chase
Chase Checking Alerts Help You Avoid Fees. Learn More Today!

These search ads were not displayed in searches today, so perhaps they were pulled after performing poorly.

Lesson: There's a lot of attention in the press these days about overdraft fees (see NY Times editorial today). If you have good tools to avoid them, especially mobile alerts, it might be an effective way to attract new customers.

And even though these particular ads may not have worked, it demonstrates that Chase is being creative in its search engine marketing efforts. The only way you can find what works in your market is by continuous trials (note 2).

Google ad on Payments News RSS feed (29 July 2009)

Chase landing page from ad shown above (link, 29 July 2009)

Google AdWords ad for "Wamu overdraft forgiveness" (29 July, 12 PM Pacific, from Seattle IP address)

Notes:
1. Viewed in a soon-to-be-defunct NewsGator reader.
2. For more info on search engine marketing, see Online Banking Report: Searching for Customers 3.0 (March 2008).

I don't know if Wells Fargo has saturated the entire Seattle market, or just the radio station I listen to, but I've heard its ad for a web-based retirement tool a dozen times in the past week or so.

I like the radio spot. It takes a complicated subject and creates interest by asking, "What is your RSI score?" Then, sending listeners to the Web to take the bank's Retire Secure Index test. It's interactive, it's timely and it makes good use of a multi-media approach. 

And Wells Fargo uses search engine marketing masterfully to ensure that interested prospects find their way to the bank's retirement landing page. The bank has purchased Google AdWords for various retirement terms (see first screenshot below) and created a unique landing page (second screenshot) and URL <wellsfargo.retiresecureindex.com> that has quickly moved to the top of the organic search results (see note 1).

Retirement tool
The tool itself is good. It's not easy to make a retirement savings worksheet compelling, but the bank does about as good a job as you can expect. After a 60-second intro by the friendly virtual spokeswomen (see second screenshot), the user completes a short form that takes about two minutes. The on-screen spokesperson talks you through it, but I tuned her out since it's relatively straightforward stuff (note 2). 

After a few seconds of calculation, and a clever drum roll, Wells delivers an RSI number (see third screenshot), which is the number of years you can maintain your desired income level after retiring. It's a good way to present the results, focusing on the positive. Users can go back and change the inputs or go into advanced mode to add home equity, business equity and/or part-time employment.

At the end, users are encouraged to contact the bank through a branch or toll-free telephone number to talk to an investment rep. There is also a link to open an IRA online. All in all, it's a good effort to engage users with a difficult topic.

Overall scores:

• Radio advertising: A+
• Search engine marketing: A
• Retirement tool: B+
  Provide an option to continue without the virtual spokesperson (see note 3)

1. Google results for "wells fargo retire secure" (10 March 2008, noon)

 2. Wells Fargo Retire Secure Index Landing page

3. Call to action

Notes:
1. For more information on search engine marketing for financial institutions, see our latest Online Banking Report (here). 

2. The audio can be turned off, but the spokesperson cannot be made to sit down or go away (see note 3).

3. The first option on the original landing page is to choose "dial-up" or "high speed" versions of the tool. The dial-up version does away with the audio/video track and just presents the static form.

We just finished the latest from our Online Banking Report, entitled Searching for Customers 3.0 (see note 1). The report takes a fresh look at search engine marketing for financial institutions including local search, financial keyword selection, how to leverage social media such as blogs to improve your organic results, and more.

It's 36 pages long with 11,000 words and 28 tables. The report includes overall search marketing trends and metrics. We also dive deep into the most popular financial search terms and to help you uncover new ideas for your own search marketing tactics.

Online Banking Report subscribers may download the report here. All other may purchase it for US$245 (single user) here. The abstract is available here.

Note:

1. The "3.0" in the report title means it's the third time we've covered this subject during the 13-year history of Online Banking Report. We also looked at search in April 2003 (OBR 95) and June 2001 (OBR 69) when Google AdWords was just getting rolling.

Even before the big game Sunday, E*Trade was showcasing its SuperBowl ads on YouTube. Six hours before kickoff this ad (inset) was displayed next to search results for "etrade," "banking" and other terms (note 1). The "trading baby" video had been watched just a few hundred times when I saw it yesterday; this morning, it has had more than 90,000 viewings.

The YouTube ad contains three links:

1. Clicking on the arrow launches the funny "baby trading" video embedded on that page
2. Clicking on the "Press to Watch" takes you to the E*Trade page on YouTube <youtube.com/etrade> where you can watch a series of commercials (screenshot below)
3. Clicking on "See all the E*Trade videos" takes you to this landing page at E*Trade's website (see screenshot below)

Later in the day on Sunday, E*Trade also added a link to the videos from its homepage (screenshot below).

The Commercials
E*Trade ran two ads within a few minutes of each other early in the second half. "Trading baby," shown above, uses an adult voiceover to discuss how easy it is to trade online. The second ad, "banking baby" (embedded below), showcases the company's high-yield savings account. This has to be the first, and probably last, time a savings account product received SuperBowl advertising exposure. It has 107,000 views in less than 24 hours.

Both ads ended on an upbeat note, saying that E*Trade was opening a thousand accounts per day, a great message against the backdrop of negative publicity the company received a few months ago with its subprime problems.

Screenshots:

E*Trade Ad Next to YouTube Search Results (3 Feb 2007)

E*Trade YouTube Landing Page <youtube.com/etrade>

E*Trade Advertising Landing Page <etrade.com>

E*Trade Homepage (4 Feb 2007)

E*Trade Google Ad (4 Feb 2007)

 Note:

1. Searches conducted from Seattle IP address: YouTube Sunday, Feb. 3, 9AM Pacific, Google Monday Feb. 4 at 10 AM 

When researching my earlier post, 10 Ways for Banks to Leverage Apple iPhone Hysteria, I happened to search for "iphone loans" at Google (see results below). Not really expecting to find anything, I was shocked to see the first result pointing me to a recent loan listing at Prosper (see inset, full listing here).

Unless this is a stealth PR ploy from Apple (doubtful), the enterprising NY waitress who posted this Prosper loan request, is riding the iPhone wave to nail down decent terms on a $1,000 loan, which she says will be used to buy the phone.

Julestar01, who by the way has a great future in marketing ahead of her, used the eye-catching graphic above along with the killer title, iMoney for the iPhone. After being highly recommended by the leader of her Prosper Apple User Group, including his/her first bid for the full grand at 13.20%, the loan is now fully funded at 12.55% with more than seven days remaining. It has already attracting 20 bidders causing the rate to fall 20 basis points even as I wrote this post. I'm sure there will be many copy-cat requests after the success of this one.  

It does provide another way for a bank to leverage the iPhone hype: jump in and fund this loan, then you can say you are the first bank to make an iPhone loan.

Another fascinating observation, and the real reason for this post: Prosper, not Apple, or AT&T, or even Citibank, has the number one organic link on Google for "iPhone loans" at absolutely zero cost. That's the first-mover advantage at work.

Page 1 Google search results for "iphone loans"
(10:00 AM PDT, 7 June, 2007, from Seattle IP)  

Citibank has the top spot this morning if you Google "checking accounts" from a Seattle IP address (see below). Wachovia and US Bank are the lucky recipients of the free advertising that goes with being in the top-two organic results. Two smaller institutions purchased well-placed ads with Alaska USA Federal Credit Union landing in the number four spot on the right-side column (#7 overall) and Viking Bank at #5 on the right (#8 overall).

Citibank's landing page emphasizes the rate on its savings account, with a passing mention of EZ Checking (see screenshot below). The landing page is gorgeous, but is it missing the point by soft-pedaling what the searcher was looking for? Only Citi and its analytics team knows for sure. My guess is that it does pretty well since the bank's been using this basic design for more than a year now (see previous coverage here).   

I don't know how I missed this yesterday. The Bank Deals blog, which routinely gets this stuff first, was the first to note that ING Direct's much-discussed new paperless checking account is now visible on its website (see below). The full launch follows a 4-month invitation-only period (see our previous coverage here).

However, the account is not currently running on the homepage, which tonight was rotating through three product offers:

• 4.5% Orange Savings
• 6.0% Orange Mortgage
• Orange retirement accounts: Traditional and Roth IRAs  

ING Direct, along with Everbank, are currently running ads on Google for "electric orange" and "electric orange ING Direct" (see inset). The landing page, shown below, includes a Jane Kim Wall Street Journal clipping.  Interestingly, the ING Direct landing page still says you must first open a savings account to qualify for the checking account. The Website carries no such restriction.   

We'll have more info on the account as we run it through its paces.

ING Direct product page

ING Direct landing page from Google AdWords ad

Today, The Wall Street Journal looks at Yahoo's latest efforts in mobile search where it holds a substantial lead over its online nemesis Google. According to figures from Telephia, Yahoo has a 7% penetration of U.S. mobile subscribers vs. 3% for Google. In addition, MSN has a 4% penetration and AOL 3% (see article here).

Yahoo will be encouraging users to download a search application to their phones, see  <mobile.yahoo.com/search>. Advertising revenues will be shared with wireless carriers. Mobile search results are more "managed" than website results in attempt to better display a single answer to the search so phone users can avoid surfing to other websites for answers.

Why is this important for online banking? Most consumers, especially the 35-and-older crowd, will get their first taste of a mobile phone app through search. Once users begin to to get comfortable with Googling or Yahooing from their mobile, it won't be long before other ecommerce apps become popular, and mobile banking will be at the front of the next wave.

And early mobile banking users are likely to share one key attribute that sets them apart from online banking users, a willingness to pay fees for service. Most mobile applications such as sports scores, mapping services, or games currently carry small monthly fees. Whether or not banks choose to charge directly for mobile banking is yet to be seen, but we believe there is an excellent potential for profitable fees from at least a portion of the mobile user base (see previous post here).

Remote deposit capture is one of the most significant new technologies to hit online business banking since, well, online banking. According to Celent, 60 of the largest 100 banks, including 20 of the top 25, now offer it. In addition, hundreds of smaller community banks now offer it.

So why can't I find it through Google? (see note 1)

For two years I've been coveting the service and waiting for my bank to offer it to small businesses such as ours. I'm still waiting.

Today, I happened to see it mentioned on the homepage of a local community bank here, First Mutual Bank (see screenshot below).

Not wanting the hassle of moving my account relationship, especially to a bank on the other side of Lake Washington (a major traffic hassle), I tried a little Googling to see what other banks in the area might have it. 

It fails to show up in the organic results, and only two banks, Wells Fargo and Main Street Bank <mstreetbank.com> are advertising on "remote deposit capture" and the shorter "remote deposits." Main Street Bank is located out of state and Wells Fargo, while just up the street from my office, appears to target its remote capture to larger businesses. I'd be willing to pay $20 to $30 a month for it, but I'm guessing that's not even close to the Wells Fargo commercial customer price.   

Action items (see note 2)

1. If you offer remote deposit capture, make sure you have a dedicated page touting the features and benefits.
2. On the dedicated page, make sure you use the term "remote deposit capture" in addition to any cute name you've branded it with. That will help users find it on search results.
3. Market it through Google and other search engines. At this point, it doesn't appear that there's much competition for ads, meaning your cost per click should be low.
4. Create a landing page that captures leads for your business banking officers. Check out Wells Fargo's approach at https://www.wellsfargo.com/com/boc_campaign
   (see screenshot below)

Notes:

1. I am searching from a Seattle IP address. In other markets, there may be financial institutions using Google to market remote deposit services.
2. We will post an additional article on remote deposit marketing later today

<Updated 12/1/06 with more details>

Two new entrants in the so-called high-yield savings market launched this week:

• E*Trade Bank <etradebank.com>: Its new 5.05% Complete Savings Account was advertised in the Wall Street Journal today and took next-to-top honors in Google search results for "best savings accounts" (see end note 1, screenshot below).
• iGoBanking <igobanking.com>: The new online brand from Flushing Financial launched Monday with a 5.3% rate on an online savings account (see end note 2, screenshot below).

iGoBanking (click to enlarge)

As previously reported, Flushing Financial launched its entry into the online savings market. The 5.3% APY no-minimum account ranks as the fourth highest in the nation according to the Bank Deals blog (see list here). The rate leader continues to be E-Loan's at 5.5% (see our coverage here).

However, iGo can claim the highest no-minimum rate in the nation since E-Loan and the others require at least $5,000 to qualify for the higher rate.   

The bank will focus on deposits, CDs, and savings in 2007 and may expand to home equity and mortgage lending in the future.

Analysis
The website is attractive and relatively well designed. The online application is hosted by CashEdge (see related post here). Unfortunately, the outsourced application fails to maintain the look and feel of the main website and may cause a few applicants to second guess their decision to sign up (click here for a more thorough analysis of its application design). 

E*Trade Bank (click to enlarge)

E*Trade's Complete Savings account builds on the direct bank's lineup of award-winning products (see previous coverage here). The bank flat-out understands the market and the medium.

The landing page for the new savings offering is brilliantly laid out with Google-like simplicity using just 25 words of copy (other than the table and the below-the-fold fine print). Notice how they show specific competitive prices, including high-yield market leader ING Direct. But what most consumers will remember from the chart is the "6X national average" rate.

Finally, the "Open an Account in Minutes" and "Free, one-click transfers to and from any institution" address user concerns on both those issues. And the small padlock with E*Trade's protection guarantee helps users understand security issues.

End notes:

1. Search conducted at noon PST, Nov. 29 from Seattle IP address (see screenshot below).
2. Source: American Banker, 29 Nov. 2006 (article here)

Google search results for "best savings account"

At 8:30 AM today, we heard an unusual advertisement on classic rock radio for the Bank of America Alaska Airlines affinity card.

It wasn't the ad itself that was so spectacular, although it's not every day that you hear credit cards being pitched on radio. And it wasn't the offer that made the ad stand out, although 20,000 bonus miles is a pretty good perk.

What made it memorable was the call to action, "visit myalaskacard.com." They didn't even bother to throw an 800 number into the spot.

It's hard to say whether a radio spot will prove cost effective, but using a memorable URL should help. It's far easier to remember than a telephone number, and prospective applicants can be immediately greeted with an effective sales pitch reinforcing the product benefits and bonus offer.

Analysis
However, once again BofA stumbles with its search engine support (see previous article). Searching on Google for "my Alaska card" brings up a single ad for a Web-based portal site, CreditStep.com (click on inset for closeup).

In fact, we tested every variation of "my" + "alaska" + "airlines" + "credit" + "card" and BofA was nowhere to be seen UNLESS we dropped "my" from the search query. Interestingly, Chase was an aggressive advertiser on several of the search terms offering a competing airline card with 15,000 bonus miles. BofA showed up as an advertiser only when we dropped the "my" from the search query.

The lack of advertising against "my alaska card" is especially damaging because the first few organic search results do not link to BofA or Alaska Airlines. Also, if you type a similar URL, such as www.alaskacard.com or www.alaskaairlinescard.com you either end up at a generic link site or an error page. At this point, potential prospects will either apply at the wrong place or give up on the search. 

If you correctly input the exact URL, you end up at the following landing page. It's OK, but should reinforce the impressive benefits of applying now, a free ticket right away and a $50 companion ticket every year on renewal (see screenshot below).

Action Items
Here's what you should do to ensure better search-engine support for your offline advertising:

1. Advertise at search engines on likely search terms that would be used by consumers responding to your advertising
2. Create a memorable URL that is not easily mistyped
3. Register or purchase domains similar to the advertised URL (including common misspellings), or pay the owner to refer traffic to your landing page
4. Design a landing page that boldly supports the benefits in your advertising and includes a prominent "Apply" button

If you thought it was tough competing with the direct banks and their 5% savings products, now you have a legitimate company advertising rates of 8% or more. Of course, this is no FDIC-insured product; it's the interest rate paid to lenders at Prosper's person-to-person loan marketplace.

The person-to-person lender was bidding aggressively today at Google on both "high yield savings" and "online banking." The ads typically made the fourth position in the right-hand column, putting them "above the fold" (see inset).

The company is testing three different ads, all focused on rate levels substantially higher than the 5% to 5.5% advertised by the competition. Prosper is testing a straight up "8%" ad, an "8% to 12%" ad, and an "8% to 29%" one (see below). 

The ads lead to one of two landing pages. Here's the slick one that looks more "bankerish": 

Or the more "Web 2.0" version that no one will confuse with a bank ad. There is even a small eBay logo visible in the screenshot (used by one of the participants seeking to bankroll an eBay store), a smart touch for a company that is positioning itself as "the eBay of lending." 

All-in-all, it's a good effort put forth by Prosper, which can only succeed if it attracts enough money into the marketplace. 

For more information on Prosper, Zopa, and the entire person-to-person market, see Online Banking Report #127.

When Bank of America launches a new product, you might as well try to ride on their coattails rather than fight it. One obscure loan-referral website is doing just that.

Bank of America's product-du-jour, at least in our Seattle market (UPDATE 10 Jan 2007: Confirmed as a market test in this article here), is a unique no-fee mortgage that comes with a built-in "refi" option. The refi feature allows users to lower their underlying mortgage annually if rates drop. It's a product that makes a ton of sense for today's savvy mortgage holders, who know when to hold 'em and also when to fold 'em into lower-rate loans.

The bank has been blitzing the market with branch, Web (see End Notes), and radio advertising for the product. Today's mid-day radio spot included a URL in the call to action, <bankofamerica.com/nofeemortgage>. Typing that URL directly into the browser leads to the correct Bank of America landing page (see screenshot in End Notes).

However, for a good portion of listeners that navigate with Google, typing "bank of america no fee mortgage" brought search results that did NOT include the bank as an advertiser although they were the second organic result listed (see screenshot below).

Google search results for "bank of america no fee mortgage"

Surprisingly, the top advertiser, YourQuoteOnline, was running an ad that was rather deceptive (see screenshot above). It fooled me into thinking it was a BofA ad.

A similar search for "Bank of America mortgage no fee" did bring up the bank's Google ad (see below), although it linked to a "$2,000 savings" landing page (see End Notes) instead of the no-fee promotional page. Evidently, Bank of America has not properly coded their search-word criteria to include the more obvious search term or to send searchers to the current no-fee campaign page. The bank is leaving money on the table by allowing some of the traffic generated by its advertising to be funneled off to other companies.

Google search results for "bank of america mortgage no fee"

End Notes (click continuation link for footnotes)

Banner advertising at About.com's banking blog <bank.about.com>

Landing page for direct navigation to <bankofamerica.com/nofeemortgage>

Landing page from bank's Google ad on "bank of america mortgage no fee"

The privacy furor that erupted August 6 over the 20-million Web queries posted by AOL has distracted from the useful information contained in the database. While AOL removed it a week ago, numerous search-engine researchers had already downloaded the file and have reposted it with front-ends for research purposes.

SEO Sleuth <seosleuth.com> has posted the top-2000 search terms from the AOL sample. Click the continuation link below to see a list of all banking terms that made the top 2000 list. Here's the first 10 with their overall rank among all search terms:

40. bank of america
86. bankofamerica
114. fidelity
159. bankofamerica.com
170. paypal
174. www.bankofamerica.com
202. free credit report
215. american express
259. wachovia
264. wells fargo

What's striking about the AOL search data is the overwhelming preference to search on brand names rather than product categories. Also, that Bank of America has an extraordinary share of mind with searchers, with its various forms accounting for four of the top six most-searched financial services terms.

--JB

Rank/Search Term/Number of Searches/% of Searches that Ended in a Click (to ANY website)
Note: Click on the search term for a list of the websites visited after entering this search term

Are you tracking the search marketing efforts of your competitors? If not, you should be. If you are, consider using KeyCompete <keycompete.com>, a $199/yr tool that identifies keywords used by your competition and the competition for your keywords.

Enter a URL and the Web-based service returns a list of keywords used by that company in its search engine marketing efforts. You can also do the opposite, enter a keyword or phrase, and see who's using it in their marketing efforts. Results are seen instantly on screen and can be downloaded into an Excel file.

It's a simple way to uncover new keyword opportunities. For example, we looked at Key Bank's current keyword buying (click on inset for details). The majority of their marketing is for boat loans and student loans. But without the KeyCompete tool we'd never know that the bank is advertising its K-12 private school tuition program, AchieverLoan, under obscure search terms such as "Massachusetts preparatory school" and "Addison private school" (see screenshot below).

Cost
The basic plan, which costs just $199/year, includes a personalized watchlist for URLs or keywords to make competitive monitoring that much easier. For an extra, undisclosed fee, the KeyCompete will provide more detailed reporting on your competition including:

• approximate clicks per competitor's keyword
• approximate cost per competitor's keyword
• estimated overall keyword marketing expense

Overall, some good information to have in your back pocket for next year's budget request.

--JB

Everyone wants free checking. So it's no surprise to see Wachovia the top bidder on the term at Google (click on screenshot right). The bank also managed to snag the top organic listing (directly below the paid ads), a coup for its search-engine-optimization consultant.

As much as Internet users love a good deal, they are skeptical when they see "free," especially when a company is spending money to advertise on the term. Wachovia wisely meets the skepticism head-on with a landing page entitled (click on inset for closeup):

Free checking. No catch.

The page also includes six bullet points, three of which relate to online banking. And there are two "Apply Now" buttons, at the bottom of the bank and the upper right.

Analysis
While this landing page won't win any Webbys, it's fundamentally sound. The first three bullet points meet the likely customer objections by affirming that there is no minimum balance, no monthly fee, and no direct deposit requirement.

Clicking on the Apply Now button leads to a page explaining the process and what's needed to apply. Unfortunately, the user is forced through three screens of disclosures, the last one a record-setting 69-screen monster before the application begins. With such a tedious first phase, the bank is losing most of its prospects before they've even entered so much as an email address.

To avoid massive application abandonment, you must get customers engaged in the application before the trip down disclosure lane. Wachovia also stumbles by offering too much product choice. The customer that started at Google looking for free checking is forced to choose from 12 checking account options on that same 69-screen testament to the power of a large bank's compliance department.

Grades:
A for search-engine marketing
B for landing page design
C- for application design

--JB

We've been poking around on the search engines to see what banks are doing to attract new customers moving into their area. In a search today for "Seattle banks," we were impressed to see a local community bank, Viking Bank, with the top spot on Google AdWords (upper right in inset). Viking was the only area bank with a paid listing. The other seven listings making the first page of Google results were from various information aggregators, such as MapQuest, or lead generators such as 100BestLenders.com.

However, clicking on the ad sent us to one of the worst landing pages we've ever seen. For some reason, the bank is paying big money to drop Google searchers onto its log-in page, which has not a single benefit listed. In fact, the item that draws the most attention, especially since it loads first, is a warning about a service problem for Mac users (click on screenshot below for a closeup). To make matters worse, the Viking Bank logo isn't even clickable, so prospective customers have to search the navigation to find a way off the log-in page.

Analysis
Viking Bank's search-engine buy is smart. You want to be seen when users search on "yourcity" and "banks." But you must spend some time to build a landing page that quickly communicates user benefits (see NetBanker April 5).

--JB

The online loan-referral market must still be healthy. How else can you explain how an unknown company, providing not a single clue as to whom might run it, can afford to be within the top-three advertisers on Google searches today for "refinance" and "home equity."

These search terms, each used millions of times each month (NetBanker Sep. 20, 2005), currently have three ads across the top of the Google search results. In both cases, previously unknown referral agent, LoanTrust.org, is a top sponsor. For "home equity," it's in the company of two well-known brands, Ditech and LendingTree (click on inset for a closeup). 

Clicking through the LoanTrust ad drops users onto a professional looking site that name-drops ING, Geico, and Equifax to build credibility (click on screenshot right for a closeup). But anyone peeking under the covers should be concerned about where their personal information will end up. For example, the short About Us section includes this grammar-challenged sentence:

LoanTrust, is dedicated to operating in an ethical conduct in all its activities.

Also, many of the "services" offered simply dump users into other websites, earning LoanTrust commissions on the traffic.

Analysis
We have nothing against this company: they are probably a well-meaning outfit cutting corners on copy editing (we've been guilty ourselves). The point is: why are they able to snag a top-spot on Google? Shouldn't large, established lenders be able to squeeze better returns from the $100 CPM keyword buys on Google?

Apparently, the answer is no. And that's because the big players often don't execute well on their landing pages. Rather than give rate searchers what they want, access to multiple rate quotes to ensure a fair price, large financial institutions tend to dump surfers right into their loan application and expect their brand image to win the day. It's usually not that easy.

Read more in OBR 124 and 126, Online Lending v5.0.

--JB

Google just staked its first claim in financial services, opening Google Finance <finance.google.com> today. It comes as no surprise that the search giant would look to grab a share of the considerable traffic to consumer finance sites (see chart below).

Naturally, the Google effort is well designed and fast. The site uses interactive, Flash-based price charts, news feeds from Google news, and company and officer information from a number of sources. The site allows users to set up a personalized portfolio, and it links to blog postings and even to postings from Google's moderated forums (click on inset below for a closeup).

The only surprise is the lack of advertising. Not only are there no banners or postage-stamp ads, but also no buried "sponsored links" to be found. We don't expect it to stay advertising free, but for now, it's a good place to refer customers to check stock quotes, track target companies, or set up an online portfolio.

Consumer finance traffic
Unique visitors in Feb. 2006
  Yahoo Finance>>>12 million
  MSN Money>>>11 million
  CNNMoney>>>8.5 million
  AOL Money & Finance>>>8.3 million
  WSJ/MarketWatch>>>8.3 million
  Forbes>>>6.7 million
  Reuters>>>6.6 million
  Entrepreneur>>>5.5 million
  ConsumerInfo.com>>>4.0 million
  BankRate.com>>>3.5 million

Source: Nielsen/NetRatings, 3/06

-JB

In thousands of searches using Google and other search engines, I've succeeded in stumping them a few times, receiving no results on my search expression.

However, today I saw something I'd never witnessed before. A Google search for "VantageScore," the new joint credit score from Experian, TransUnion, and Equifax (NetBanker March 14) returned the following (click on the inset for a closeup):

• Zero mentions of the term
• Two ads placed against a search term that returned zero documents (click on inset for closeup).

But I guess it had to happen: savvy credit report marketers are moving faster than Google's spider to lay claim to a new term.

--JB

Since the dawn of the online credit bureau era (1997/1998), online credit report marketing has been dominated by the specialists: Experian, Equifax, TransUnion, ConsumerInfo.com (now owned by Experian), Fair Isaac, Intersections, and others.

Now, financial institutions are becoming more involved. For example, Citibank's AdWords spot pitching its Credit Monitoring Service showed up fourth overall (and second in the right-hand column) in a search today for "credit report monitoring" on Google (click on inset right for a closer view). With 84 advertisers vying for space on the first page or two of results, that's expensive real estate.

Citi's $9.95/mo service (after one free month) is powered by Intersections <intersections.com> and includes info from all three credit bureaus, daily alerts based on Equifax info, $20,000 in identity theft insurance, and other benefits (see screenshot below for a full listing).

Another surprise advertiser in the category is Wal-Mart whose ad appears in the sixth position along the right side of the search results (see inset above). The retail giant's $7.46/mo service is co-branded with TransUnion's TrueCredit (click here for screenshot).

Analysis
We are big fans of credit report monitoring, having personally used it for more than a decade. And while the service does deliver significant value, we think the single $9.95/mo price point is too high for the mass market. Granted, ten bucks is better than the $14.95/mo charged by TransUnion's TrueCredit for a similar service (see inset for an email received today). But the $120/yr is simply too much for information that can be extracted relatively easily by consumers themselves.

Better would be a multi-tiered offering: Regular/Gold/Platinum that starts at under $5/mo and peaks at $9.95/mo for an individual, $14.95/mo for a family. That way, more customers would receive the benefits of proactive monitoring while the truly paranoid could use the pricier options for added peace of mind.

Another puzzling aspect of Citi's service: it's impossible to find it through the home page. It not only lacks its own link in the product menus, but also comes up blank in searching on "credit report monitoring" or even "credit reports." You shouldn't have to use Google to find such an important service, especially at a bank that's spent tens of millions promoting itself as a safe haven against identity theft.

For more information on credit-report monitoring, see Online Banking Report #83/84. For more on pricing, see OBR #109.

--JB

The Wall Street Journal's Ruth Simon writes today about how lenders are using the rise in short-term mortgage rates to convince borrowers to swap their adjustable-rate mortgage (ARM) for a fixed-rate one. She told how CitiMortgage, Wells Fargo, and others are targeting borrowers through direct mail, statement inserts, and telemarketing campaigns.

To see if these tactics had spilled over to the online world, we tried a few Google searches to see who was advertising "ARM to fixed-rate conversions." The only highly targeted ad was by DiTech, <ditech.com> the online lending unit of GMAC.

Under our search, "trade ARM for fixed mortgage," their AdWords promotion used the headline, "Dump Your Adjustable & Get a Fixed Rate Loan from Ditech.com" (click on screenshot above for a closer look), exactly what we were looking for. Unfortunately, DiTech has not created a landing page that speaks to this niche. We were dumped on their busy homepage (click on screenshot below for a closer look) and left to our own devices to figure out how to accomplish this intricate task.

Analysis
It's simple to see what went wrong here:

   Great search engine marketing
+ horrible website execution
= wasted $$$$$

The old advertising cliche about the fastest way to kill a bad product is with great advertising is doubly true with search engine marketing. Great search engine marketing increases click-throughs, driving costs through the roof, while poor website execution pulls conversions down, making the whole effort appear terribly cost ineffective.

So before launching any clever search engine campaigns, make sure you are able to cash in on the traffic.

--JB

As we searched Google today for debit card info, we noticed E*Trade on top of the paid search results with an AdWords listing entitled Platinum Visa Debit Card (it was the first "banner" on the top of the search results).

Interestingly, clicking on the link takes you not to a single-product pitch for a debit card, but to the broker's E*Trade Complete product which combines brokerage, banking, and lending into a single offering (click on inset for landing page screenshot).

Note: The graphic image appearing in the middle of E*Trade's landing page features a check, debit card, and security token overlaid on a screenshot of its online banking area.

Analysis
Showcasing its Complete product on debit card searches shows good mastery of search engine marketing by E*Trade. The online giant figures the type of person searching on debit cards will be intrigued by the total control promised by the package account. The out-of-scale security token also adds a reassuring touch to the image (see inset). 

-- JB

In reviewing common banking, credit and insurance search terms today (August 2005) vs. two years ago (April 2003), there has been phenomenal growth in searchs on specialty loan terms, such as (number of searches on Overture each month):

home equity loan -- up 21-fold from 82,000 searches to 1.7 million searches in August
home equity credit line -- up more than 80-fold, from less than 15,000 to 1.2 million
auto loan -- up 10-fold, from 100,000 to 1.1 million
student loan -- up 12-fold, form 110,000 to 1.3 million
credit card cash back -- up more than 50-fold, from less than 15,000 to 730,000
mortgage refinancing -- up more than 38-fold, from less than 15,000 to 570,000
payday loan -- up 7-fold, from 79,000 to 560,000

In comparison, some of the more generic terms have shown much smaller gains:

mortgage -- doubled to 1.2 million from 640,000
debt consolidation -- tripled to 700,000 from 250,000
mortgage calculator -- up 10% to 630,000 from 560,000

Another big mover: online banking, up 16-fold, from 31,000 to 500,000

Click on the thumbnail above to see all 50 top search terms or download the Word file here: Download banking_search_terms.doc

You can use Overture's keyword selection tool yourself at this link.

--JB

Comparison shopping has been in the news lately. General consumer sites, Shopping.com and Shopzilla (formerly BizRate), and financial services specialist LowerMyBills.com, were purchased this year for a combined total of $1.5 billion (source WSJ, 9/14/05). And of course, Google entered the fray last year with its Froogle service.

• Experian bought LowerMyBills for $330 million
• Ebay bought Shopping.com for $620 million
• E.W. Scripps bought Shopzilla for $525 million

Consumers like the shopping comparisons, with 60% of Internet users having used one according to Jupiter Research. The popularity, and merger activity, will attract more entrants such as Become.com, each looking for a new angle.

One new twist is to add value through shopping guarantees. BuySafe recently launched an online marketplace <www.buysafeshopping.com> where users can choose from 1.5 million products covered by the $25,000 BuySafe guarantee. Merchants pay for the protection with a 1% transaction fee.

One area that has seen relatively little activity considering its popularity with online users is financial services. For one thing, financial services, especially loan products are more difficult to compare, because the credit quality of the applicant determines which products are appropriate.

We expect more financial comparison sites to join the ranks of BankRate.com, FISN.com, Banx.com and others. The mainstream shopping comparison sites will also add financial services to their coverage. Already Shopping.com, PriceGrabber.com and others have mortgage comparison services (click on inset for closeup). We'll look at these service in more detail next month in Online Banking Report.

For price leaders, these sites have the potential to be wonderful sources of qualified leads. But if you are a premium-priced provider, you'll have to work that much harder to keep your share.

--JB

Contributed by Mike Bailey, Compete, Inc.

Every day millions of consumers use the internet to search for new deposit accounts, loans, and credit cards. As a financial marketer you understand connecting to the growing online demand for financial products and services is a competitive necessity.

But what is the most effective way to understand and even predict how a potential customer thinks and behaves online? What search strategies will be most effective to allow you to tap into an online community of potential customers?

To find the answers, Yahoo! Search Marketing sponsored a study, conducted by Compete, Inc., a predictive analytics firm specializing in the financial services industry. The results provide some surprising insights that can dramatically influence your success in attracting and retaining customers.

First let’s look at two of the search “myths” we uncovered:

Myth #1 – People searching for credit online are not good prospects

The first thing we discovered is that consumers who use search to research deposit, loan and credit card products are affluent, have great credit and have a higher likelihood of applying for the products they have searched for than consumers who use other channels for their research. With 49% having an average annual income of more than $60,000, these prospects are 67% more likely to start an application than a typical online shopper and loan searchers are 59% more likely to apply.

Myth #2 – Brand names are not relevant in search marketing because those searching for specific banking institutions must already be customers there

As it turns out, searchers who type in a specific retail bank name are not just looking to log in to their existing accounts. A full 30% are potential new customers researching new accounts. And of those 30%, about 80% are looking for an alternative financial institution. So in search marketing, your brand and the terms associated with it provide three opportunities:

1. Service your own customers
2. Acquire new customers looking for specific services
3. Access competitors’ customers

Most financial institutions have worked hard and spent marketing dollars to build a brand with positive and credible attributes. The good news, as our study shows, is that consumers looking for deposit and loan services hold brands in high regard. Consumers searching for particular brands make more than two-thirds of the search-generated deposit applications in a typical month. And a hefty 80% of credit card shoppers start their online searches with brand names, including the highly advertised brand names that you would expect, as well as partner and affinity cards, such as “air miles card.”

So how do you achieve better results with your online marketing? We recommend three strategies:

1. Establish a balanced portfolio of terms. We have seen that deposit and loan searchers balance the types of terms they use. Credit card searchers, on the other hand, are inclined to research brand-related terms, including partner cards and affinity relationships. As a marketer you will need to adjust your portfolio of keywords and terms to make sure you have as broad access as possible to all potential customers.
2. Leverage brand terms to attract deposit customers. Consumers who look online for major retail bank brands are most interested in deposits and cards and least interested in loans. Create copy that reflects this insight and tailor your incentives toward what your customers want.
3. Measure and reflect offline conversions in search marketing ROI calculations. Without measurement how will you know how effective your efforts are and how to make adjustments? At least 50% of conversion volume occurs offline at a branch or call center, but the bank, product or service was researched online first – so tie your offline transactions to search.

Online search is a powerful consumer tool allowing people to easily find the information they need to make decisions about banking and financial products. As a marketer, make sure to do the research and analysis so you can create the most effective multi-channel and measurable marketing programs.

Mike Bailey is Managing Director of the Financial Services Practice at Compete, Inc., headquartered in Boston

Disappointed in your conversion rates on prospects attracted to your site via search (paid or natural)? Compete and Yahoo Search Marketing (formerly Overture) released results of new research at the recent Net.Finance conference.

The study looked at a pool of 75,700 searchers who conducted 250,000 financial information searches. Of that total, just 5,640, or 7.5%, ended up submitting an application for a financial product. Since they are often looking at more than one provider, your "expected" share would be less than 7.5%.

So if you are closing 5% or more of your visitors, you are hitting it out of the park. Even a 3 or 4% close rate is exceptional. On the other hand, if you are closing 2% or less, your creative and/or offer may be lacking.

--JB

Now that Google has begun identifying search engine users by their IP addresses, advertising via Google has become a whole lot more lucrative for community banks and credit unions.

Financial institutions now have the ability to target their keyword ads via city, state, or MSA.

See OBR 95 for a full report on search engine marketing.

Overture

Overture, the IdeaLab venture that pioneered the pay-per-click auction process originally under the name GoTo.com, also reaches a significant number of Internet users: 80% of the total according to the company. The majority of the volume is through MSN, AOL, Yahoo, and others that display its paid listings for a cut of the revenue. Overture.com itself attracts 6 million unique search users each month.

Overture PPC ads displayed on Yahoo.

Overture’s 100,000 advertisers have their listings displayed at Overture.com before any non-paying websites. Some banking terms have more than 200 paid listings. However on partner sites, such as Yahoo (screenshot above), only the top three or four advertisers are displayed on each page, leading to intense bidding for top slots.

For example, in early May the top four bidders for “home equity loan(s)”¹ were all paying about $4/click. Converting one of every 100 visitors would result in an acquisition cost of $400/loan.

Other financial services terms had even higher bids, especially anything to do with debt or credit. For example, the top four bidders for “debt management” were willing to pay more than $9/click (Table 5, right).

More targeted search terms such as “home equity loan(s) Seattle” had much lower bids, in this case just an average of $0.11 per click for the top-four spots.  However, geographic targeting doesn’t always result in lower CPCs. In the case of “mortgages yourstate” average costs for the top-4 bidders were 15% higher than for the unmodified “mortgage”.  

¹On Overture, but not Google, singular and plural versions are covered by a single bid, e.g., mortgage and mortgages return the same search results.

Table 1

10 Most Expensive Financial Keywords

average pay-per-click cost on Overture, May 2003

Source: Overture, 5/29/03

Yahoo, MSN, AOL

Advertising placed through Google and Overture will get you placed on AOL, Yahoo, and MSN. However, all major search engines except Overture limit the number of paid ads to eight or fewer per page of search results.

Table 2

PPC Listings Displayed at Major Search Engines

includes pay-per-click sponsors only

Source: Online Banking Report, 5/03

*Not all keywords display Overture paid ads.

LookSmart

With Google’s rise to the top of the search engine sweepstakes (see Table 2, below), old-fashioned pure search, as opposed to the bloated “portal” strategy, is very much back in style. Even Yahoo’s latest multimillion-dollar advertising campaign focuses on straight-forward search.

Of importance to advertisers, especially smaller ones, is the ease at which one can reach search engine users through so-called pay-per-click (PPC) keyword advertising. For as little as a few dollars per week, any legitimate business* can post a small, text-based listing within the search results. Google and Overture are the key players with their ads displayed on their own sites and at Yahoo, MSN, AOL, Earthlink, and other search engines (see Table 2, below). 

Here’s how it works. Instead of displaying a banner to everyone that searches on “mortgages” for instance, you can target only those customers in your community by sponsoring the search phrase “mortgages yourcommunity.” You might pay a buck or two for each prospect that comes to your website, but they likely will be high-quality prospects. If you convert 2% to a sale, acquisition cost would be in the $100 to $200 range. For more information on searching for mortgage prospects, refer to the case study on pages 11-15.

Search Term Selection

They key to making search-engine marketing pay off is the selection of cost-effective keywords. Choose too broad a term, e.g., “mortgage” (637,000 searches on Overture in April), and your advertising costs go through the roof. Too narrow of a search expression, e.g., “mortgages for dummies” (285 searches on Overture last month) will deliver negligible volume.

The second criterion for a positive ROI is bidding the appropriate amount for each keyword. Bidding on popular keywords can reach levels that are difficult to justify. For example, if you are a mortgage broker in Atlanta, you might want to advertise on “mortgages Georgia” which logged 2,600 Overture searches last month. Unfortunately, you’d need to bid more than $3 per click to get in the number-three slot. However, if you chose “mortgages Atlanta” (830 Overture searches), you’d pay less than half, $1.40 per click, for a top-three slot. Assuming equal conversion rates, your acquisition cost per loan would be less than half for the “Atlanta” search, although loan volume would be only one-third that of the “Georgia” search.

*The major search engines maintain varying levels of editorial control over the advertising content and relevancy. For example, a soft drink manufacturer cannot buy space on “online banking” at Overture or Google. Nor can a bank advertise on “cola.” In addition, Google has sometimes not allowed ads on certain trademarked terms, such as Amazon.com. But it appears to be loosening that restriction; most trademarked terms we tested recently displayed sponsored ads.

Table 1

Top Search Engines Ranked by Unique Search Users (U.S.)

  Source: 2003 search traffic, ComScore, 5/03; search engine sources, SearchEngineWatch.com, 5/03; 2001 Web traffic from PCDataOnline, 3/14/01

Table 2

Banking and Credit Keyword Selection Tool

choose a word from one or more column to create relevant search expressions*

Source: Online Banking Report, 5/03

Table 3

Top Banking and Credit Search Terms

banking, loan, and insurance phrases with 15,000 or more searches on Overture’s network, April 2003

Source: Overture, 5/29/03 (1) includes singular and plural forms of the keyword as well as common misspellings, e.g., “mortgage” also includes “mortgages” and “morgage”; (2) searches on Overture during the month of April, 2003; (3) Calculated by adding $0.01 to the previous bid before averaging; (4) assumes 3% clickthrough; (5) assumes 2% conversion

Target community niches through search engine pay-per-click

Now that your website can close the sale, the challenge is to increase the flow of qualified prospects. The first step is to use metatags and other techniques to makes sure the search engines find you when users type in specific criteria such as the “banks in Peoria.” See our report entitled Searching for Prospects (OBR 69) for a complete overview of search engine optimization techniques.

But as the Web gets more crowded, you need to do more than that to attract new loan- and bank-account prospects. With more than 300 million searches conducted each day worldwide (Table 1 below), the best place to find new customers online is still the search engine results page.

Table 1

Worldwide Daily Searches on Major Search Engines

millions

Source: Online Banking Report estimates +/- 20% based on the following info:
(1) WordTracker.com estimate of 320 million total daily searches in April multiplied by column 3;
(2) StatMarket HitBox tally of search engine referrals at sites they track, 4/03; (3) Nielson NetRatings estimate of U.S. home and work unique visitors, 1/03; (4) includes Teoma.com; (5) included with parent

It used to be that it was cost prohibitive for all but the biggest banks to
run banners on search engines. Today, with the advent of small pay-per-click (PPC) display ads (ð pp. 8-10), the economics of search-engine advertising are much different. It no longer requires a six-figure advertising budget. Self-service account management has done away with minimums and can be very cost effective, so long as you target the right keywords
(ð Table 4, p. 4). Bottom line: a community bank or credit union can target searchers in its own market for just a few hundred dollars per month.

Besides the three E’s: email, education and entertainment, the primary use of the Web is searching for information on a product, company, purchase, etc. But new users, and experienced ones as well, can become exasperated by the prospect of finding the proverbial virtual needle in the Web haystack.

You could offer newcomers guided links to the major search engines. Your guidance should include a few words of advice so users can minimize the time spent in fruitless searches. Separate guides could be posted for business users, intermediate users, and newcomers.

But don’t try to do this yourself. With search engines changing practically every day, your advice will quickly become outdated. Enlist your Webmaster-in-Residence or an outside Web consultant to keep this area up to date.

What are you looking for? Each search engine uses confidential and proprietary algorithms to rank sites, but a few common denominators seem to matter in most cases:

•  Page Name: The actual name of the page; for instance <banking.html> should help with searches for banking.
•  Page Title: The words that appear in the blue Title area of the browser window.
•  Page Text: Frequency of certain words and how close to the top of the page these words appear.
•  META Tags: Keywords, site or page descriptions, and other information useful for search engine robots. META tags are located in the HEAD section of the page and can only be seen by viewing the HTML source code.

Infoseek results from “California” & “bank” search.

To see this in action let’s perform a search and study our results. Go to Infoseek www.infoseek.com and search on California bank. As you can see in the screenshot above, there are 1,977,853 pages with one or both of these keywords. And, drum roll please, the site that rises to the top of the 2 million pile is The California Bank Reference Guide www.findley-reports.com/fr2b.html Also, note the Wells Fargo banner running above the results. Wells is sponsoring the word “bank” on Infoseek.

Looking at The California Bank Reference Guide Web site, we see three methods it’s employed to increase its ranking:

1. The page title is “California Bank Reference Guide.”

The number one “California bank” site on Infoseek.

2. The first two words that appear in the text of this page are California bank.

3. Select View Source in your browser and you will see the META tags near the top of the source code. Notice the words bank and California are listed in the Keywords. Also notice that the site hasn’t attempted to “spam” the search engines with too many occurrences of the word bank or California. The search engines fight keyword spam by ignoring it, or worse dropping the site to the back of the pack.

My discussion here only scratches the surface of this ever-evolving topic. If you wish to learn more check out these sites:

Alan Martin is Webmaster for Online Banking Report and President of NetBranch, a bank Web site consulting and design company based in Atlanta, GA. Prior to founding NetBranch, Mr. Martin was Webmaster at Security First Network Bank. Contact him at alan@netbranch.com  or (770)736-5956.

Search engines are used by 87% of Web users looking for information. And every month the search sites get better at helping users zero in on the desired information. But they are still pretty weak when searching on broad categories such as “loans” or “credit.” There are just too many uses of such terms on the 50 million pages catalogued. All the more reason to consider a banner ad. If you search on “credit cards” and receive 514,000 possible sites, you may not visit a single one. But that 5.9% teaser ad might just draw a quick mouse click.

Search engines provide a unique advertising opportunity, one that doesn’t have a counterpart in other mediums. The ability to “sponsor” keywords or a group of words creates a whole new category of target marketing. (Sponsors pay to display their ad banner each time the keyword is used in a search.)

Financial services companies have been advertising on search engines since the beginning. But as you can see from the chart above, there are still plenty of keywords for sale. We checked the 13 loan terms above on four major search engines, plus Yahoo (which is a directory not a true search engine). Of the 65 possible advertising buys (13 words times 5 Web sites), only 27 (42%) were being used by a financial services company.

The table above shows how many Web sites were listed in the results of each search. Multiple words were enclosed in parenthesis, but not all search engines recognize this convention. So comparisons of the results from one site to the next are more challenging.

The table also lists the financial services companies sponsoring each search term. Sponsorships can change from one minute to the next, so this table represents just one particular slice in time.

We were surprised that many of the search terms were not sponsored. All five sites had a sponsor for “mortgage,” but only Yahoo and AltaVista had a sponsor for “refinance.” Even more surprising, “home equity loan” had just one sponsor, John Hancock on InfoSeek. Below you can see which sites were most popular with financial advertisers