• by Laurie Sullivan  @lauriesullivan, March 12, 2009

SearchIgnite is introducing a tool that integrates search engine optimization rankings and performance data with pay-per-click search results.

It will help marketers quantify investments spent on SEO and PPC campaigns by giving them graphs and charts to track consumer actions on both paid and organic search.

Both organic and paid search optimization teams typically live in unconnected silos, according to Roger Barnette, SearchIgnite president. "Having information from both campaigns lets marketers see how they complement each other," he said.

The integration of both SEO and paid search data into SearchIgnite's platform tool is not just convenient, it aims to help marketers make more informed budget allocations and develop smarter marketing strategies.

Although Google, Microsoft and Yahoo don't provide reporting data for a company's SEO position in search engine rankings, they do give information on paid rankings for a variety of keywords. There's no easy API to tie-in both types of campaign data. While third-party technologies often supply the data separately, Barnette couldn't recall another platform that reports organic and paid rankings side-by-side.

The integration with SearchIgnite's 3.0 tool augments reporting and optimization capabilities, from bid optimization tools, to forecast modeling and detailed reports.

SearchIgnite recently conducted a study for a financial services company to quantify the impact on a marketer's conversions, revenue and spend when paid search is run alongside top-ranked natural search results. Results show clicks from SEO campaigns rose 17% on days when paid search ads ran, garnering more "free" clicks simply by running paid search ads alongside search query results.

Total conversions and revenue on both paid and natural terms increased on days when paid search ads ran, too. Revenue increases more than compensated for the cost of the paid advertising. For every $1 spent on paid search for the brand terms tested, incremental return in revenue was 900% higher than when no paid advertisements were running, the company said.

With the integration of SEO into SearchIgnite's platform, marketers looking to invest time, money or resources in improving their SEO results can quantify the impact that SEO has on their overall revenue. Barnette said this tool is one in a series of enhancements that SearchIgnite will release to give marketers this year in an effort to give search marketers a complete view of campaigns.