Fairfax Digital Signs Up For Next Generation of SEM Software From e-Channel

July 11, 2008; 06:01 AM

E-Channel, a premium Australian search engine marketing (SEM) company has announced an agreement with Fairfax Digital to supply its DynamicCreative software to manage search engine marketing campaigns across the publishers classified's websites - Domain, Drive and MyCareer.

The contract follows an extensive trial of the software which saw the publisher's cost-per-click ratio reduced by 30 per cent in the first 12 months.

DynamicCreative, a search engine marketing platform created by e-Channel, has been designed specifically to meet the criteria established by search engines such as Google and Yahoo! that favours the relevance of ad content above the advertising cost values.

According to Frank Grasso, CEO and founder of e-Channel, while bid management software is still widely used in the market, there have been moves by the dominant search engines to ensure more relevant search results to improve the experience of web users. This has redefined the requirements for successful Search Engine Marketing (SEM).

"Bid management software is quickly becoming old technology that manages the cost per click of a campaign. The reality is that Google does not reward how much an advertiser is willing to pay - they reward relevance. e-Channel's DynamicCreative software is the first SEM software to market that can assist companies to reach their online audiences in keeping with these requirements."

As a result of using the DynamicCreative platform, Fairfax Digital has been able to create roughly 300,000 highly customised unique ads and expand their campaign from 20,000 key words to approximately one million keywords.

"Our search engine marketing is now far more effective as a result of significantly expanding our reach. We have crafted highly targeted ads that have resulted in a reduction of our cost per click and cost per acquisition," said Graham Perry, Managing Director, Classifieds for Fairfax Digital.

Version 2 of DynamicCreative launched in early June of 2008 and offers large organisations the ability to efficiently manage their SEM campaigns.

"DynamicCreative is now even more robust and is ideal for clients who have comprehensive or complex websites. Traditionally large, dynamic campaigns have been cumbersome and time consuming to administer and this software automates that process and ensures that they are managed efficiently," said Grasso.

The software also includes advanced reporting capabilities to ensure that clients have visibility over all aspects of their campaigns and can regularly update and adjust them to ensure that they are reaping maximum value.

e-Channel has experienced significant growth since its inception in 1999 and has doubled revenues over the last nine months . The agency is currently handling over $15 million in advertising across Google and Yahoo has grown its sales team by 100 per cent in the same period.

"Our reputation for providing highly effective search engine marketing campaigns and unique software to maximise results for our clients is well known. We have a quality offering, and our expansion reflects this acknowledgment from the market," said Grasso.