Keywords For Ad Buyers: Pay Up
E-Tailers also are researching how visitors navigate their sites and are working to better convert them into long-term customers. One way: customizing the e-tailer's ``landing page'' -- where the searcher is first directed -- to a specific keyword. That makes it easier for a customer to get the info she wants and more likely that she will buy.

Nonconverting Keywords and the Search Continuum
Searchers who ultimately purchased a product online conducted some 13 searches before ever making the purchase. This means that for every single converting search term, there were 12 prior nonconverting searches -- searches that today, most PPC search advertisers would never consider bidding on due to poor post-click conversion performance. The implication is nonconverting terms have a greater value than search marketers currently ascribe to them.

Keyword Price Dip Reveals Seasonal and Industry-Specific Volatility
Keyword prices dropped an average of 3 percent in January after the end of the 2004 holiday shopping season, but prices in certain vertical categories fluctuated even more dramatically. That's according to search engine marketing (SEM) firm Fathom Online's study of keyword pricing in nine industries.