Calendars.com frees up its datebook to drive paid search ROI

Founded in 1999, Calendars.com brings together advanced internet technology with the world’s largest calendar inventory to create the web’s biggest calendar store. With over 6,000 different titles, no other site offers a greater selection of calendars.

Challenge
Calendars.com’s search engine marketing (SEM) team was seeking answers to questions such as “How do we know which keywords we should focus on? How much is too much to pay for a keyword? Which keywords generate the most valuable paid search traffic? How do we find valuable new keywords?”

Managing Calendars.com’s paid search program is a daunting task. Since the site features an extraordinary breadth of topics—from sports, to nature, to pets, to hobbies, to humor—the possibilities for keyword buys are practically endless. Like most online retailers, Calendars.com has limited resources and is highly motivated to allocate its marketers to high value activities. Prior to implementing IBM® Search Marketing, Calendars.com was spending at least 50 percent of its SEM management time in labor-intensive, error-prone activities:

• Assembling tracking codes in spreadsheets
• Integrating sales and costs in spreadsheets for each search engine

Calendars.com wanted to reduce the amount of unproductive time being spent and invest its resources in strategic activities that would drive maximum returns for the lowest possible cost.

Calendars.com is also challenged by the extreme seasonality of its business (85 percent of its business occurs between October and January). Certain keywords that pay off in the high season are too costly in the off season, so it is crucial that Calendars.com closely monitor trends and costs during the peak holiday season.

Solution
Calendars.com implemented IBM Search Marketing, which provides the SEM team with a single interface for monitoring keyword performance and managing paid search advertising across search engines. IBM Search Marketing includes a Tracking Code Generator, which automates the process of assembling tracking codes, checking tracking codes for errors, and uploading the keywords and tracking codes to the search engines. IBM Search Marketing also includes integrated performance reporting which automatically downloads keyword costs and matches them with the appropriate keyword sales to generate an accurate performance report. IBM Search Marketing’s performance reports are highly customizable, enabling marketers to define and report on custom metrics. Because there are so many specialty calendar niches, it is important to identify which keywords pay off and which do not.

Since IBM Search Marketing is integrated with IBM® Digital Analytics, Calendars.com was able to greatly simplify keyword discovery. Each week, Calendars.com examines IBM Coremetrics natural search and onsite search reports to identify popular keywords, and adds those keywords to its paid search campaigns.

Results
Calendars.com experienced an immediate payback in time savings. The 50 percent of time that had been spent in managing data in spreadsheets is now dedicated to high value activities that drive Return on Ad Spend (ROAS)—discovering new keywords, as well as testing and refining advertisement copy and landing pages. Further time savings were realized by implementing custom metrics in IBM Search Marketing that are crucial to Calendars.com’s business. “It used to take hours of preparation to produce the reports I needed,” said Calendar.com’s head of Online Marketing. “Now I open IBM Coremetrics, click in and immediately see how we are doing.”

Having rapid access to its custom metrics has allowed Calendars.com to manage its business more closely and to make decisions more quickly. Time savings has enabled Calendars.com to expand its keyword inventory by 47 percent, adding over 1,100 new keywords. The combination of benefits resulted in a 23 percent improvement in conversion rate within the first three months. Plus, Calendars.com’s customers are finding the products they want, which means they are happier shoppers who will return for next year’s calendars!

For more information
To learn more about IBM Coremetrics please contact your IBM marketing representative or IBM Business Partner, or visit the following website: ibm.com/software/marketing-solutions