British IAB And DMA Lead Way In Search Marketing Best Practices

The U.K.'s Interactive Advertising Bureau (IAB) has announced a joint initiative with the U.K.'s Direct Marketing Association (DMA) to develop best practices for search marketing.

Neither organization is affiliated with its American namesake, and representatives from the U.S. IAB said that they were unaware of similar joint initiatives stateside.

Together the two British trade organizations have more than 1,250 industry members--including companies like Saatchi & Saatchi Interactive, Google and TACODA UK--and it's the first time that they have collaborated to address search.

The initiative, aimed solely at search engine marketing companies, identifies four key criteria for compliance: companies must have been publicly traded for six months, have at least two dedicated search marketing employees, have search engine optimization training as accredited by Google or Microsoft, and be a member of either IAB UK, IAB Europe, DMA, Search Engine Marketing Professionals Organization or the Association of Business to Business Agencies.

Accreditation from other search engines and more in-depth guidelines are slated to come before the end of the year. Firms that adhere to the charter can declare their compliance with an IAB 'best practice icon' on either their Web sites or other company literature. The DMA is looking at a similar awareness marker.

The IAB reports that search marketing currently garners 58% of all online ad spend in the U.K. (which eMarketer forecasts will top $5 billion this year), but while its share is set to grow, there have been no clearly identifiable industry standards.

"Paid-for search has grown at an incredible rate over the past five years, and could well become a 10% [advertising] medium in its own right by the end of the decade," said Guy Phillipson, IAB chief executive. "This charter represents an important first step in the establishment of search marketing best practice in the UK."

"Clients and suppliers are very keen to establish some ground rules for search," said Robert Dirskovski, head of interactive media, DMA. "In the U.K., direct marketing is by and large a self-regulated industry. But we've had many of our members calling for a set of commercial rules when it comes to PPC."

Dirskovski added that the best practices push wasn't created in response to search marketing abuse or misappropriation, but that the industry is currently grappling with questions about sponsor disclosures, information retention and audience education.

"From a consumer perspective, we need to make it clear that some searches are paid," said Dirskovski. "Not everyone is aware when they use a search engine, that a company may have paid for some of the selections they receive in the response."

The IAB search council is working with the DMA to come up with two follow-up sections for the charter that detail working with affiliate marketers and the issue of trademarked keywords.

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