Search Engines Double Conversion Rates of Other Acquisition Sources
According to a “first-of-its-kind” study from digital marketing firm WebSideStory, search engines have more than twice the ecommerce conversion rate of other traffic acquisition sources, proving further why marketers have paid so much attention to the online channel over the past few years, according to a first-of-its kind study from
During the last three months of 2005, the search engine conversion rate at B2C ecommerce web sites was 2.30 percent, more than twice the conversion rate of other acquisition sources (0.96 percent), which include banner ads, affiliate marketing links, shopping search engines and other referring links according to the WebSideStory Index, However, search engines, including both paid and organic listings, still trailed direct navigation conversion rates (4.23 percent), including bookmarks, by nearly double,
according to the index.
In a press statement, WebSideStory’s senior digital marketing consultant Ali Behnam observes, “For several years now, search engine marketing and optimization has dominated online marketing, and this data shows why: it’s far more effective at converting visitors into buyers than most other acquisition sources taken as a whole. Still, he adds, “this data also shows, the best conversion rate still comes from good old fashioned branding and customer loyalty, where visitors either bookmark your site or type your URL directly into the address bar.”
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Reader Comments.
This is welcome validation for what has long been a magic number in our industry…2 in 100.
We’ve tracked conversion and lead capture from search engine referrals for about 6 years for dozens of plastic surgeon websites around the US. Across the nation and over time we keep seeing that 2 in 100 pop-up as the average metric for lead capture.
It’s not clear from this brief what they are measuring as a conversion, and whether this report dealt exclusively with retail or if service conversions were also included…but the coincidence is welcome validation…or maybe, just a coincidence.
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