Right about that!  Paid Search Analytics aren’t cheap, and I’ve looked at what’s involved in merging Paid and Organic Search Analytics – a lot of work, not very scalable and processor intensive, along with time intensive.    At the end of the process, you’d want an actionable list of keywords that you can cut spend on, or increase spend on – along with new keywords to bring into the campaign and one’s to just drop.

I got to think about that based on at new Study: Huge Potential SEM Spend Untapped by Jupiter Research and Marin Software; I expect Marin Software to want to prove that Paid Search Analytics is something you should do, because that’s what they specialize in.  Still – what if they’re right?

They are right – but I suspect this in not a decision any one would “lightly make” to invest in a Paid Analytics solution – and hopefully, one that integrates Organic in the mix.  Here’s more from the Jupiter/Marin study:

“..The study, called “Large-scale Paid Search: Challenges and Opportunities,” surveyed 103 agencies and advertisers spending at least $50,000 per month in paid search:

• 53 percent of respondents were spending between $50,000 –$250,000 per month
• 30 percent spent between $250,000 –$1 million
• 17 percent spent over $1 million per month on search marketing

The survey, are “still” being managed with Excel:

I’ve come up with a methodology  – but it’s just difficult, not easy to scale, and at the end of the day, untested.   Without getting into the specifics – your friends would beL

• Google Webmaster Tools (each domain would need to be verified
• Ranking Manager 6
• Your Paid Search Data, either in house produced or the spreadsheets from the agency

The extra 22% left on the table that is not being spent – it’s mostly due a lack of awareness – but I think, leaving out Organic is leaving even more on the table, and I haven’t seen anyone except Covario having a solution that attempts to balance paid and organic.

Yes, we all know there’s a lot of Paid Ad Cannibalization of Organic Search results – but how much, down to the keyword level?    We’ll see.

Anyway, one additional thing one could do – and this is not tied to the Jupiter Marin study – is use Compete’s Search Analytics to figure out how much each competitor’s traffic is based on Paid Spend.    I did that with Monster.com, Careerbuilder.com, Indeed.com, Craigslist.org, Dice.com, just to get an idea in the Job Search sector, how much of each site’s traffic is from Paid Search Traffic

Monster.com