SEMPO SEO Survey Sure is Superb!

There’s some very very interesting stats available for anyone who cares to look over even the sample SEMPO/EConsultancy “State of Search Survey” available here. As one of the SEO firms that participated we got same late yesterday and it’s truly ‘chock full’ of various numbers that both confirm — and deny — our own SEO practice business.

This Survey was a global one with over 1500 client-side marketers and advertisers and SEO firms taking part from over 60+ countries around the globe. As well as paid search and SEO, this report also looks at Social Media too as part of an online firms marketing mix and that’s where some of the surprises come from too, eh!

First of all, one of the most stunning stats is this — that in 2009, the total SEO marketing dollar volume was $14.6 billion dollars — and it’s projected that in 2010 that will grow by 14% this year to top $16.6 billion! That’s evidence right there, in our minds, that marketers have truly decided that this downturn in the economy is either over or waning big time, as an increase of 14% means that more and more firms are now thinking that “hey, SEO will get us more traffic and then conversions and increase our online revenue stream” — and that’s good news for anyone on the client-side of marketing, eh!

And there’s more too!

Of the companies that are re-allocating their marketing budgets, around half or 49% are moving it from print advertising into SEO! Good news!

More than a third or 36% are shifting money from direct mail inot SEO! More good news!

And almost a quarter or 23% are moving away from conferences and exhibitions and trade shows into SEO too! Even better in our opinion having worked all of same for many clients over the past few decades!

SEO strategies then are making their mark in boardrooms across the globe we feel and that’s all good news for us SEO types, eh!

And LOCAL trends? The Survey clearly shows that the increased importance of LOCAL search is prevalent with over 85% of agency respondents reporting this as a new significant marketing tactic!

And on average, companies expect to spend about 43% more in SEO in 2010 than they did in 2009…while only 9% expected to spend less (note which also includes all PPC campaigns as well).

Social Media budgets are still modest, it’s reported, when compared to SEO and PPC budgets; where about three quarters or 73% had a budget of less than $25k for social media marketing in 2009, but around a third of same say they will maintain their current social media budgets at the same size but a whopping 59% say their budgets will increase! Again more good news.

Of course, there are tons and tons of other findings within this Survey report and we’ve not the space here to even effectively cover the Executive Summary, which in itself is stunning.

The full Survey is available of course, for a fee…but there is the opportunity to join the EConsultancy group as a member and get that report among dozens of others too. The Survey Sample report that has some of these stats available free, is found via a PDF link on the page holding the Survey notice and summary itself at the link above or here too.

I’d recommend that if you want to know what is happening in 2010 for SEO, that you at a minimum, go and get that Summary Survey report and read it religiously….it’s got some interesting stats to see and some projections in various areas that can help you for your own SEO strategies…now that’s smart SEO, eh!