Many of these direct response sources have great customer service and can easily start a campaign within weeks or even days. Additionally, they’re able to reach large online audiences — a brand advertiser’s primary goal.

Search engines and contextual networks provide positive ROI for many advertisers. Their beauty rests with their ability to track an advertising campaign’s performance and, even more exciting, actually drive real sales in real time, although not without exerting substantial work (successful ROI-based search and contextual campaigns typically require round the clock keyword optimization).

While such benefits are powerful — and readily apparent — for direct response marketers, brand advertisers have traditionally shied away from engaging such networks because their online work doesn’t typically involve an actionable result. In other words, they’re promoting a brand, not necessarily a product.

Brand advertisers, however, should think about including an action element to their online campaigns. One could, for example, encourage users to print a coupon, sign up for an offline event (sponsored by the brand), or subscribe to an e-mail list. Yes, brand advertisers are usually looking for more out of their online campaigns, and they tend to have very complex evaluation criteria, but small actions — and their corresponding results — could also contribute to the larger organizational goals.

Brand marketers are often looking to drive buzz and word-of-mouth marketing, two more intangible and unquantifiable goals. So why not start the buzz online as the top bidder on every major search engine for relevant keywords? Or be top in the rotation in your brand’s particular category in a contextual ad network? Such tactics lend themselves to quantifying results; one could, for example, measure traffic driven back to the site or to a desired page within the site.

Unlike their direct response counterparts, brand advertisers have — or should have — more stomach for new opportunities online and within search and ad networks. Below are two other creative ways to capitalize on search engines and ad networks — on a brand budget:

• Test user-generated content or new ad formats. This is a great idea for small-budget campaigns. You can quickly change directions if the content is not sticking.

• Real-time keyword targeting. If your product or service, for example, is mentioned or used by a celebrity, you can buy keyword combinations of your product and the celebrity.

I like to think of search engines and ROI networks as the low-hanging fruit of the online marketing industry. There is still an incredible amount of data that branding campaigns can gather — even without a specific action.

No, your efforts would yield more fruitful results by leveraging your existing keyword database among the countless search engines, networks, and other advertising applications that are often overlooked. (ADOTAS is a great resource for many of these online marketing options.)

In talking with search marketers — of all sizes — day in and day out, I’m often surprised to hear that at least half their time spent on SEM-related tasks — and in most cases, up to 75 percent of it — is monopolized by managing and optimizing their keyword list.

In our system, the average number of keywords per advertiser is nearly 2,000. Zango’s own keyword list approaches 5,000. Either way, that’s a hefty list and, more importantly, a hefty amount of work.

The question I often ask prospective SEM advertisers is: “If you spend that much time and effort — work! — on your keyword list, why limit its utility (and potential earning power) on just one or two search engines?” Just like you wouldn’t put all your retirement eggs in one investment basket, it’s wise to diversify your keyword currency.

Yes, there are legitimate concerns with lesser-known engines and other keyword advertising networks, like volume and traffic quality. Those same concerns, however, should be considered regardless of the media purchase, including those you currently buy.

Taking a step back, it can take months and months to achieve positive ROI, going back to the decision point of wanting to start an online marketing campaign. Once the decision has been made on where to buy, and the campaign(s) has started, the next step is optimization. Finding the perfect mix of target terms and adjusting their frequency and reach is both an art and a science. It’s painstaking, consuming work and I’m willing to bet there were nights you went to sleep thinking of new word combinations to test in the morning.

But you did it — you successfully identified your campaign’s top-performing keywords, or what I call the secret sauce. So now that you figured out the sauce, spread it around!

In 2007, make it a goal to try three new keyword media outlets. Happy New Year!