View the PDF

Sipera’s Search Marketing Situation

Targeting a highly technical audience of enterprises and service providers, Sipera Systems, Inc., recognizes that all its potential customers spend much of their time online. The leader for pure security in VoIP, mobile, and multimedia communications, Sipera provides leading-edge security products to enterprises rolling out VoIP and service providers deploying UMA and IMS networks.

“Online is the first place people look for solutions in virtually any industry today,” says Brendan Ziolo, Director of Marketing for Sipera. “Search marketing is important for all companies, and it was definitely important for ours. If we’re not doing search marketing, we’re missing a massive market opportunity. It’s crucial for us to appear where our potential customers are searching.”

In the initial research phase for a VoIP security product, Ziolo says Sipera’s potential customers start with a search engine like Google™. “Think of what you do when you’re looking for something. You go straight to Google. You don’t go to trade shows; you don’t go to webinars. You use search. That’s why this has to be a top priority.”

When Sipera relaunched its Web site in March 2006 to establish branding and messaging, the site did not appear on the first page of search engine results, so potential customers did not see it. The company recognized that its investment in the site would be lost if potential customers could not find it. Sipera needed to quickly develop a cost-effective search engine optimization (SEO) program that would increase the company’s visibility to the online market for the sake of brand awareness and a pay per click (PPC) ad campaign for lead generation and amplified visibility.

Search Warrant’s SEO and PPC Solution

As a small company, Sipera had to decide between conducting search marketing in house and outsourcing to an agency. Sipera outsourced to Search Warrant Online Marketing for two important reasons. First, Sipera lacked the dedicated resources required to deploy and maintain an effective SEO and PPC campaign. Second, search marketing is a niche market requiring a specialized skill set. Ziolo chose to outsource to an agency with the necessary niche expertise.

Working with Search Warrant, the Sipera team identified keywords that met three criteria: words they learned the majority of their audience would search for; words that had value to Sipera; and words that Sipera could realistically hope to win based on the level of online competition. The selection process needed to be particularly rigorous considering the relatively small number of pages on the Sipera Web site.

With the short list of targeted keywords confirmed, Search Warrant marketers created keyword-based Google ads and landing pages to point to offers such as white papers and demos for lead generation. For search visibility, they updated the Sipera Web site, enriching the HTML and focusing content on the chosen keywords without altering the meaning. The Search Warrant professionals also helped to develop additional Web content to further improve the search rankings for particular keywords.

“Search Warrant took our existing content and repositioned it for SEO,” explains Ziolo. “We just review keywords and discuss priority, and Search Warrant takes it from there. The process works really well.”

As Sipera’s Web content becomes increasingly search-friendly, the two firms are looking at how to use linking and public relations activities to take Sipera’s search marketing program to the next level of performance.

Measurable Results and ROI

The measurable results of Sipera’s Search Warrant process prove that it works. Before Sipera began its SEO campaign, only a few of its Web pages ranked on the first page of Google for the targeted keywords. Within half a year this number climbed to 47 page-one rankings, including 15 listings that continue to appear in the coveted first position on page one. Considering that 60% of all traffic clicks through on one of the first three search results, these top ranks represent the program’s greatest success to date.

As a result of its increased search visibility, Sipera has experienced increased interest in its products. More traffic to the site results in more sales leads attracted by online offers such as white papers and demos. Additionally, with the pay-per-click ads on search engines such as Google, search leads and costs can be tracked by the number of clicks an ad receives and the number of lead-generation forms that are subsequently completed.

Compared to other marketing activities, search marketing is intrinsically measurable from start to finish. Sipera and Search Warrant can easily monitor the performance measures of the program. For example, Sipera can confirm that it enjoys conversion rates that are four times higher than the 3-4% industry averages reported for 2006 by MarketingSherpa. Ziolo can also affirm that the cost per lead for PPC is lower than for its other online marketing techniques such as webinars and is much cheaper than offline efforts such as trade shows.

“This is definitely a successful marketing campaign. We’ve got lots of leads, the cost per lead is low, and with prompt follow-up, these leads are turning into sales meetings. Search marketing is working as well as our other marketing activities or better,” says Ziolo.

Not only is Sipera winning in terms of ROI, but the company is also winning in its field. On search engine results pages, Sipera appears in better positions and more often than its competitors. “SEO gives us an important competitive advantage,” says Ziolo. “ If someone’s looking for a solution, and they come across our site first, that’s good news for us.”

Sipera’s engagement with Search Warrant is ongoing: as it achieves success in each new keyword area, Search Warrant begins optimizing others to maintain Sipera’s winning search results.

“Search Warrant was absolutely the right move for us,” says Ziolo. “We’re getting great results, the people are easy to work with, and the process is simple. That’s exactly what you’re looking for when you’re outsourcing. The results speak for themselves.”

Get the PDF