Over the last 10 years, search has become the user interface for the Internet. Before the era of the search engine began, online users were in charge of remembering URLs and domains, and shopping and research was strictly limited to malls and big-box retailers. Things have dramatically changed since then. In 2013, Google alone hosted almost six billion queries per day.

While it’s easy to see the impact of search on a large scale, day-to-day searches and questions flooding in from around the world prove its massive reach. Search is how people — no matter their corner of the globe — access the world and learn new things. Children as young as four years old know how to take advantage of search engines, as do their much older grandparents. No matter the intent, billions of people flock to prominent search engines everyday, doing research and making purchasing decisions across industries. 

With all these searches occurring daily, businesses around the world have a tremendous opportunity for exposure. If businesses are trying to sell a product or service, there’s no better way to reach their target market. Research shows that organic search is the largest driver of traffic across all major industries – driving on average 51% of website traffic, and 40% of website revenue. The potential is there to see major success from search — but brands have to know how to use it.

While this massive opportunity is ripe for the taking, search engines are complex and nuanced areas to explore. And, search is not a one size fits all approach. Search engine results pages (SERP) vary dramatically from mobile to desktop. BrightEdge research has shown a 62% variance in the results from Google desktop vs. mobile device. The only way to truly make the most of search’s massive potential is to find an advanced search technology to assist them. It’s no secret that search content and keywords can be optimized for success — but without a reliable partner, how can marketers know what works and what doesn’t? That’s just the beginning. Throw in the endless amounts of data streaming in from searches, keywords and consumer behavior, spanning rich-media content, and across different device types, and locations, and companies will undoubtedly need insight from a search engine technology to help them analyze this massive data-set and take action.

And let’s not pretend that only a few companies are tapping into the power of search. Understanding the competitive landscape — what competitors are doing, how they’re doing it and where they’re seeing success — is crucial to gaining the advantage. With all the different possibilities for success that search offers, making a solid and sincere investment in technology will help brands manage and win the market.

Seven years ago, BrightEdge realized the need to make organic search a predictable marketing channel. To help businesses realize their true potential, BrightEdge built a sophisticated solution to help marketers move the needle on search. Powered by the DataCube, BrightEdge technology supports helps over 8,500 brands understand search engine-fueled data and maximize the value of their content efforts. With a relentless commitment to innovation, and over 81 product releases, BrightEdge has dozens of features, including Blended Rank, Mobile SEO, and Content Optimizer to bridge the gap between SEO and content efforts, BrightEdge’s suite of advanced technology can help brands take their search and content strategy to new heights.

Google has made secure search the universal default, meaning site analytics no longer provide user search query data to correlate keywords with site visits, revenue, and conversions. As a result, marketers need to shift to a content-centric approach and manage page performance. While taking a content-centric approach is the path forward, we realize many brands have invested heavily in a keyword-centric strategy. As a transition to content-centric marketing, brands can leverage Estimated Keyword Reporting, a “triangulation" method, whereby a brand can take into account a keyword's search volume, rank, and the click through rate (CTR) to estimate how much organic traffic a keyword is driving.

What powers Estimated Keyword Reporting is accurate click curves, which requires insight into keyword data that is no longer available in site analytics. Fortunately, BrightEdge foresaw the market shift and months before the change to 100% secure search, performed analysis across our 8,400 brand clients and web traffic for more than 5 billion web pages, to look at how mobile, tablet, and desktop traffic drives conversions. This comprehensive research was based on exact match keywords with no change in rank or ranked page over the course of one month. This research translated into BrightEdge Customizable Click Curves providing a baseline CTR between desktop, mobile, and tablet.


So what is a customizable click curve? A click curve allows brands to apply a custom formula or custom calculation to their business that estimates the actual search traffic based on search volume and keyword ranking.

Mobile & Tablet Click Curve Analysis

US smartphone adoption grew by 30% in 2012 and continues to increase, yet most brands are left estimating traffic and forecasting with outmoded inaccurate desktop-only click curves. With BrightEdge’s proprietary smartphone, tablet, and desktop customizable click curves, brands benefit from understanding how CTR varies across devices. BrightEdge mobile research finds that the top 3 SERP results capture 62% of clicks as compared to 44% on desktop devices.

Customizable Click Curves Power Estimated Keyword Reports

Search marketers that currently manage content performance with a keyword-centric strategy require continuity in their business metrics including traffic, conversions, and revenue as these metrics are necessary to understand the overall health of a program, identify high value keywords that drive revenue, and to justify future investments. BrightEdge has leveraged our best in class rank data, along with our best in class customizable click curves to create Estimated Keyword Reporting.

Estimated Keyword Reporting - includes estimated traffic and estimated revenue reports, enabling brands to:

• Measure traffic and revenue - understand what efforts drive revenue and focus on these opportunities, measure traffic at the keyword or keyword group level
• Comprehensive dashboard reporting - align your team with in-depth reports which illustrate the state of your program

Customizable Click Curves Extend Across BrightEdge S3

• Share of Voice – BrightEdge’s patented Share of Voice allows brands to gain a true understanding of how content performs across all device types vs your competition. Within Share of Voice users can select desktop, tablet, smartphone, or your own custom click curves for an accurate view of Share of Voice across devices.
• Dashboard Reporting – BrightEdge customizable dashboard charts provides instant visibility into an organization’s overall content health and detailed analysis of initiatives with scheduled email delivery. Leverage customizable click curves across our flexible dashboard charts.