If you’ve worked on large brand SEM campaigns, you’ve likely had discussions as to what, exactly, to do with branded SEM traffic. Do you spend money on clicks that you might have garnered without ads, or do you stomach the cost, albeit floor-level CPCs if you’re screaming “official site”, to ensure maximum traffic?

Of course, I’m assuming that everyone running SEM campaigns for well known brands is looking at their search traffic like this. Maybe I shouldn’t. Many brands see a 10x higher CTR and conversion rate, pushing CPCs and CPA to the floor. The trick there, is knowing what your business goals are; maximize volume at an acceptable overall ROI, or maximize net profit, possibly with a volume floor for business purposes. That’ll depend on exactly what your metrics show you, again assuming that you’ve properly segmented and used negatives. More recently, Performance Max campaigns gobble-up branded SEM traffic with no options to avoid it. So, we’ve got that going for us, which is nice.

What about landing pages? I’ve found dramatically different conversion rates testing brand traffic to a homepage and a paid ad landing page. While non-brand traffic clearly preferred the landing page(s) that we constantly tested and optimized, branded SEM clicks preferred the homepage by a wide margin. I usually lump branded SEM traffic in with organic & direct website traffic; people who know you and have come to you need one path to conversion, while people who aren’t likely to know you, who’s attention you just grabbed while they were online doing something else, they need a different funnel.

If you’re using affiliate networks, policing SEM for your own brand is a must. Affiliate CPA arrangements are pretty securely priced, but not if someone’s poaching your branded SEM traffic and sending it your way as their own.