Cheapflights.co.uk Tops Natural Search Results in Greenlight Search Study

LONDON -

- Greenlight Releases First Integrated Research

LONDON, October 26 /PRNewswire/ –

Greenlight, the UK’s leading independent search marketing agency, has launched a new format for its industry sector reports. Each quarterly study will consist of paid search as well as natural search analysis, to offer a fully integrated report. The first of these focuses on the flight sector and covers Q2 2009.

This latest research is based on more than 77 million searches that took place in Q2 2009 for flight-related terms, including both generic and destination-led keywords. This data was then used to rank the most visible brands on page 1 of Google’s natural search results.

According to Greenlight’s report, the most visible websites in natural search results during May 2009 are cheapflights.co.uk, skyscanner.net and travelsupermarket.com, reaching 92%, 64% and 48% of the searching audience, respectively. Whilst aggregators dominate the top five spots, direct providers feature in the top ten, with ryanair.com coming in at position 6 with 31% visibility.

EasyJet.com comes top of the table when analysing generic keywords, with ryanair.com and British airways.com also making an appearance in the top 10. Cheapflights.co.uk takes pole position when looking specifically at domestic, short haul and long haul destination keywords.

The paid search section of the report determines an advertiser’s share of voice based on how often they appear on Google, which ad position they are bidding for and the search volume generated for the keywords they bid on. The ranking represents visibility across the top 120 keywords in June 2009.

EasyJet.com has the greatest share of voice in paid search reaching 14%, achieved largely by easyJet’s effective bidding on high volume terms in the generic and short haul space. In the paid search league table, two of the top five advertisers are direct providers (easyJet and bmibaby), whilst all the top five websites in natural search are aggregators.

Greenlight currently produces quarterly research reports on flight, online gaming and hotel sectors. They also cover a broad cross section of industries including insurance, mortgages & loans, credit cards, car hire and online dating, amongst others.

The complete flights market sector report ( www.greenlightsearch.com/sectorreports/) is available at: www.greenlightsearch.com/newsletters/june09/sectorreport.html

Notes to editors

Greenlight is an award winning, specialist search engine marketing (www.greenlightsearch.com/) agency providing targeted and accountable natural and paid search (www.greenlightsearch.com/ppc/) solutions. The agency has helped numerous companies to succeed in search marketing over the years by improving its clients’ positioning and website visibility in the top search engines, and driving traffic to their websites.

Greenlight provides a full range of search marketing services from offices in London and New York, including search engine optimisation, pay per click management, link building, consultancy and SEM training.

Clients include FTSE, NASDAQ and NYSE listed companies as well as charitable organisations and government bodies. Greenlight works with SMEs, global brands and top interactive agencies across vertical markets as diverse as publishing, financial services, retail, travel, hospitality, property and entertainment.

www.greenlightsearch.com

Additional Information

Other sector reports include the Greenlight Marketing hotel market sector report (www.msnbc.msn.com/id/33448964) .

Greenlight search marketing ( econsultancy.com/press-releases/4390-greenlight-scoops-idm-award-for-b est-use-of-search-engine-marketing) scoops IDM award for Best Use of Search Engine Marketing

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Greenlight Search (www.crunchbase.com/company/greenlight-search) on Crunchbase

Founder and CEO of Greenlight, Warren Cowan ( www.linkedin.com/in/warrencowan) on Linkedin

Source: Greenlight

Contact details: Beatriz Bailey at Greenlight, T: +44(0)20-3326-6233