In a weak economy, consumers are looking for deals. There are many websites dedicated to providing coupon and discount codes to frugal shoppers, but did you know Microsoft Live Search jumped on the discount bandwagon earlier this year with the Microsoft Live Search cashback program?
The initial purpose of the Microsoft Live Search cashback program was to boost Microsoft’s position in the online search market as well as to make some extra money for Microsoft. While it’s unknown if Microsoft has reached either of those goals, new data released by Microsoft does show that the Microsoft Live Search cashback program certainly helps advertisers give their brands a boost at a time when consumers want to save money and retail sales are down industry-wide.
According to The Register, eBay has increased its paid search ROI by 50% using the Microsoft Live Search cashback program and ShoeMall.com has seen an increase of 6-times its previous ROI. Microsoft Live Search claims that 4.5 million consumers use Microsoft Live Search to conduct over 68 million product or brand searches each month. That’s a lot of targeted exposure for an ad!
Microsoft also claims (via their own study with comScore in 2008) that, “Live Search referred almost 12% of all U.S. commercial online transactions and about 13% of all U.S. online spending among key retail categories in the second quarter.”
No one knows how accurate that claim is since Microsoft spearheaded the comScore research, but cashback search does seem like a viable brand marketing option that can easily be incorporated into a brand marketing plan. What do you think?
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Susan Gunelius is the author of 10 marketing, social media, branding, copywriting, and technology books, and she is President & CEO of KeySplash Creative, Inc., a marketing communications company. She also owns Women on Business, an award-wining blog for business women. She is a featured columnist for Entrepreneur.com and Forbes.com, and her marketing-related articles have appeared on websites such as MSNBC.com, BusinessWeek.com, TodayShow.com, and more.
She has over 20 years of experience in the marketing field having spent the first decade of her career directing marketing programs for some of the largest companies in the world, including divisions of AT&T and HSBC. Today, her clients include large and small companies around the world and household brands like Citigroup, Cox Communications, Intuit, and more. Susan is frequently interviewed about marketing and branding by television, radio, print, and online media organizations, and she speaks about these topics at events around the world. You can connect with her on Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, or Google+.
