In an effort to increase individual privacy, Google is encrypting all keywords used by their search engine users. What does this new change mean for online marketing?
By encrypting all searches, businesses will no longer be able to see what keywords were used to direct traffic to their site.
In a recent article by Marc Purtell, these changes “greatly affect how search marketing campaigns are built, executed, and optimized.” Without keywords, online marketing must focus on other methods, like page-level performance data, to create and evaluate strategies. Since Google Analytics already tracks page-level data, marketers will have to identify “which pages are performing well from a traffic and engagement basis (bounce rate, time on page, conversion) and the keywords the page ranks for” to get an idea of how well keywords perform.
Some other methods to use for overcoming the encrypted searches are:
- Using Branded Pay-Per-Click Campaigns
- Internal Search Data
(For more details, view the full article)
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