New Research From Conductor Shows Gifts.com Tops Valentine's Day Online Searches

NEW YORK, NY--(Marketwire - Feb 13, 2012) - Conductor, the leader in Search Engine Optimization (SEO) technology, today announced the findings of its research report that examined online search behavior and keywords for Valentine's Day 2012. Gifts.com was the overall winner, earning 60 percent share of search or appearing in the top-five search results for six out of 10 non-geographic gift-related keywords.

Consumers naturally turn to the Web to gather ideas and/or purchase gifts and activities for their special someone on Valentine's Day. According to a recent consumer insights study from Google, Valentine's Day searches have increased 35 percent year-over-year with an expected $210 billion on the line for Web-influenced sales in 2012. Conductor sought out to identify the top Valentine's Search Engine Results Page (SERP) winners, segmenting keywords into two categories: gifts and activities. Throughout the month of January 2012, Conductor analyzed more than 1,700 high-volume geographically and non-geographic specific keywords using its leading SEO platform, Searchlight™, to determine domains that appeared most frequently for Valentine's Day queries.

"It's widely understood and confirmed by recent studies that Valentine revenues go to jewelry, dining out and flowers," said Nathan Safran, Senior Research Analyst at Conductor and author of the study. "But for this study, we wanted to examine the differences between local (geo) and non-geo (no location specific) results when further segmented into the categories of 'gifts' and 'activities.' The results showed 'geo' queries were less competitive, leaving a relatively open field in the geographic Valentine's Day landscape for retailers to better leverage in 2013."

A summary of Conductor's key findings follow below. Share of search is calculated by examining the percentage of keywords in which the domain appears in the top-five search position.

• Non-Geographic Keywords: Gifts
  SERP Winner: Gifts.com at 60 percent share of search, followed by RedEnvelope.com at only 37 percent
• Geographic Keywords: Gifts
  SERP Winner: Yelp.com at 15 percent share of search, followed by datehookup.com at 11 percent and mingle2.com at 10 percent
• Non-Geographic Keywords: Activities
  SERP Winner: About.com at 25 percent share of search, followed closely by OpenTable.com with 23 percent
• Geographic Keywords: Activities
  SERP Winner: Yelp.com at 34 percent share of search, near even with Gayot.com at 33 percent

Unlike other verticals analyzed by Conductor -- most recently consumer electronics, toys, clothing, beauty and jewelry in the holiday study -- Valentine's Day did not see the persistent dominance of SERPs by a handful of retailers. Excluding Gifts.com, no domain appeared in the top five search positions more than 37 percent of the time, even less when considering only geographic searches. The Conductor report concludes retailers would be well-served to understand the individual regional markets in which they operate and perform careful keyword searches to better capture their share of Valentine's Day search in the future.

To view the complete report and all rankings in each category, go to: conductor.com/valentinestudy

About Conductor
Conductor is the undisputed leader in SEO technology, empowering enterprise marketers to manage and improve their SEO efforts and deliver provable ROI. The company created the first and most widely adopted enterprise SaaS SEO technology solution, Conductor Searchlight™, which helps marketers scale natural search, monitor competitive market share and boost revenue. Conductor recently launched the SEO Cloud™, which makes it possible to blend SEO data and workflow across any other form of web marketing. Companies such as FedEx, Siemens, Toys"R"Us, Autodesk and GE rely on the company's technology platform and team of experts to continually measure and improve their natural search traffic and revenue.

Based in Manhattan, Conductor was recently voted as one of Crain's Best Places to Work in New York for the second year running and was named as the 13th fastest growing software company in Inc. Magazine's latest rankings. Visit Conductor at www.conductor.com or on Twitter @conductor.