Back in April, the SEMPO 2011 state of search marketing report came out. While this is a paid report, some of the relevant findings have been summarized on various sites. What this means for our clients is as follows:

• Market size growth in the North American market is a healthy 16% which makes it a hypergrowth area. Nom nom nom.

SEO, PPC, Social Media, Mobile Trends

• More is being spent on SEO, but fewer companies. This makes sense as SEO is not for everyone, but when it works, it usually is effective to do follow-on investments
• PPC is the same story, fewer people buy ads, those who do are buying more, on average.
• Social media budgets will be increased and more people are participating in social media. (Expect social media price inflation as a result). Facebook, Twitter, YouTube and LinkedIn are the top social media sites.
• Mobile is seeing a lot of growth and interest, as well as localization/location-based search and advertising. Foursquare on the rise.

Challenges for Social Media

• Measuring ROI
• Integration of analytics