Covario Rates Top 100 Multichannel Marketers on SEO Health
Covario Rates Top 100 Multichannel Marketers on SEO Health
Office Max Heads the Pack, Followed by Pro-Flowers and Office Depot
SAN DIEGO, April 19, 2010 — Covario, a leader in search and display advertising software and agency services for Forbes Global 2000 companies, has issued a white paper spotlighting SEO health scores for 100 of the nation’s leading multichannel marketers.
Now available, the white paper was timed to the launch of a new campaign from Covario that is focused on how global marketers can improve and accelerate their search engine marketing strategies, deployment and conversion results. Interestingly, three of the top five SEO performers are office supply retailers, with Office Max leading the way. The second through fifth spots went to ProFlowers, followed by Office Depot, Sears and 4 Imprint.
Using a 0-100 scale (with 100 being “excellent” and 0 being “poor”), Covario rated the companies’ websites for their overall SEO execution, which was further broken down into three sections: content usage, link strategy and technical construction. Covario considers “high” performers to be those scoring greater than 75. Only 12 of the 100 marketers studied exceeded that number for their overall score.
Office Max attained a winning overall score of 87, including perfect 100 scores in the linking health and technical health categories. Meanwhile, 73 companies fell into the “good” range with overall SEO health scores exceeding 60. Fifteen marketers rated poorly with 60 and below scores.
In addition to Office Max, ProFlowers and Sears leading their respective business categories, other SEO category leaders included Allied Electronics for technology providers, Omaha Steaks for retailer sites and REI for sports retailers.
According to the Forbes 2009 Ad Effectiveness Survey, chief marketing officers believe SEO is the No. 1 online tactic for driving customer acquisition, which is especially the case among advertisers spending more than $1 million a year online.
“This was unthinkable 2-3 years ago when most CMOs couldn’t spell S-E-O,” said the white paper’s author Craig Macdonald, Covario’s CMO and senior vice president, products. “The success of Google, Yahoo! and Bing in driving traffic to sites that drive actual new business is moving SEO into the forefront of large corporate marketing programs.”
The study was conducted in late 2009 using Covario’s Organic Search Insight, a technology used by more than 75 large advertisers to perform ongoing measurement and auditing of their websites. The full report is available on Covario’s website. It is being offered complimentary to marketers, along with additional information to help them improve their search marketing performance and start deploying proven best practices in a matter of days.
About Covario, Inc.
Covario, Inc. is the leader in SEM, SEO and display advertising software and services for the Forbes Global 2000. The company provides global organizations with robust interactive and marketing analytic solutions for paid search advertising, organic search engine optimization (SEO), and display advertising. Covario enables complex and distributed organizations to control brand integrity, ensure budget transparency and deliver quantifiable results across business units, distribution channels, geographies and languages. Headquartered in San Diego, Covario’s growing customer base includes some of the world’s best known brands in high-tech, manufacturing, retail, e-commerce, financial services, consumer electronics, media, entertainment, publishing and consumer packaged goods. For more information visit Covario.com or call 858.397.1500.