Google and search engine optimization are unavoidable for businesses today.

Companies that do not have an SEO strategy are losing market share by the day.

That being said, no company should ever put all of its marketing eggs in the Google basket. Just like any personal investment, a diversified approach to marketing will ensure that you have several lead flow channels as your Google rankings ebb and flow.

While conventional wisdom is that Google and the other search engines only track online activity, is this really true? Its turns out that many forms of traditional marketing filter back through the Internet and companies like Google are trying to measure and assess this activity, and find ways to incorporate all forms of marketing and branding signals into their ranking formula.

If you position your website as the hub of all of your marketing efforts, you can extract SEO value in some unexpected places.

Why Do Any Offline Marketing At All?

Even though the impact of online marketing cannot be denied, sometimes it can be overstated. According to Internet World Stats, 78% of the US population is online and 73% use Facebook at least once a month. This still leaves approximately 70 million people in the country who cannot be reached through online marketing modes.

The other fact worth pointing is that even though 87% of Americans are aware of Twitter, only 7% use it. This results in ample opportunities for advertisers to reach out to their potential customers through offline marketing channels.

According to a study from a few years, close to 40% of people who were searching for a particular brand on the web had taken the decision after having being influenced by an offline marketing mode. When asked what compelled them to go online to search for a particular company, brand, service, people answered as follows:

44% from TV ads

41% by word of mouth

35% from magazine and newspaper ads

23% from radio

13% from billboards

The marketers of the present day have a tendency to focus more on online marketing. Some of them are discount the fact that the best marketing campaigns work well when both offline and online methods are incorporated. For example, potential customers may check out their Facebook news feed in the middle of a TV show.

How Traditional Marketing Can Have An Impact On SEO

Google is definitely trying to associate offline marketing and branding with online search. The new Panda update as mentioned on Moz hints that the new algorithm determines the authority of your brand by dividing the number of incoming links to your website by the number of associated searches with your brand.

This indicates that when a user carries out a search using your brand name and clicks on your website, Google considers this as a “brand search”. In doing so, a link gets established between the keyword used and your domain. The number of such links, which are also known as “reference queries,” is used to modify the number of inbound links and implied links pointing to your website.

This is why if you have a huge number of incoming links with minimum brand searches, the value of the inbound links is diminished in order to find out your search ranking.

Discounting “Express Links”

According to a Google patent, they intend to diminish the value of express links associated to the same group of sites. “Express links” here include both follow and nofollow links. Instead, it will be emphasizing on incoming links from unique domains that are not associated to the site. Hence, hosting clone domains will take a backseat.

Google To Emphasize on Brand Mentions And Implied Links

This patent gives Google a technique to identify implied links through brand mentions. For instance, if you mention that you like a particular website but do not link to their domain, the site will never benefit from that.

With implied links, Google can find out that you mentioned that particular site and tie that into the site’s search ranking. Implied links give a clear picture of the authority of the brand when it comes to ranking.

How Are Brand Mentions And Implied Links Connected To Offline Branding?

A huge number of online searches are usually triggered by offline promotions. All these searches are nothing but implied links, which are the main factors on the basis of which your site gets ranked. In simpler terms, the traditional methods of promotion will be an important factor while ranking your site.

Google will certainly take into account the measurement of brand mentions as a potential ranking factor. Offline marketing channels like radio and TV will harness an improved opportunity for conversions than anything that can be achieved through digital platforms. Whenever a particular commercial is shown on TV, the viewer is instantly introduced to the brand as a result of which it has more chances of getting mentions and shares online.

Men’s clothing giant, Bonobos, found that customers who purchased at their online store after visiting their real outlets spent close to 75% more. Online insurance provider, Esurance, is another phenomenal example that shows offline customers how to find their website along with a detailed guide on what needs to be done once they arrive in their TV commercial. At the end of the promotion, which lasts for approximately 30 seconds, the brand pushes their domain and icon to the viewer to establish user retention besides top-of-mind awareness.

Final Thoughts

The present state of online marketing looks fragmented. You’ll find the traditional marketing guys handling offline marketing channels, such as TV and radio along with website techies and social media experts, who manage and create the digital half of the complete marketing campaign. Inbounding marketing experts, such as our own Kansas City inbound marketing team, are changing the way this game is played.

The problem that businesses regularly face is that these guys hardly work in a cohesive manner which allows companies to maximize their exposure, conversion and opportunities of sale.

In order for brands to blow up their traffic, search engine rankings and sales, online promotion has to be coordinated with strategic offline promotion methods. The overall value of a brand generated as a result of your online and offline efforts can definitely boost your current search engine optimization strategy.

On the other hand, if you don’t utilize your website with your offline marketing and advertising you will leave a ton of money on the table. Or worse – drive potential customer right into the hands of your competitors online, as they use AdWords and SEO to steal your marketing dollar right under you nose.

Want to improve your website rankings right now? Get an SEO score on your website with the free one-click SEO website report.