• by Gord Hotchkiss , Featured Contributor, May 9, 2007

Roger Barnette (SearchIgnite), Lindsay Rinehart (Avenue A/Razorfish), Maura Lewis (DoubleClick Performics), Chrysi Pilalithes (MIVA) and John Rodkin take on the question of brand and search this morning. Lindsay shares some compelling brand lift metrics for Chase credit cards..with 60 to 70% lift in recall (aided and unaided) and some equally impressive numbers for brand affinity. One of the things that both Maura and Chrysi talk about is the increasing important of branded search terms. One of the challenges is trying to track value of the more generic term searches. We know they're important, but it's very difficult to measure the value of these searches. Maura talks about making sure that you maintain multiple channels of traffic, as they found a 41% increase in conversions when traffic came through different channels. Roger Barnette talked about competition amongst corporate divisions for brand terms, so you're not artificially inflating your click costs through internal competition. He also stressed the importance of roping in affiliates so you don't fight them on the SERP. Yahoo's Panama has been good news for brand advertisers, with 30% drops in costs per click.