Search popular destination for wealthy consumers

Wealthy consumers are increasingly turning to the Internet to find the goods and services they need, but some marketers are still missing out. That is because they may be advertising in the wrong places. According to a recent report from The Luxury Institute, wealthy consumers are likely to turn to search engines first when looking for a product.

by Kristina Knight

According to the report, search is now only slightly behind the recommendations of friends and family members for wealthy consumers. This is defined as households with annual income over $150,000. About 64% of wealthy consumers first turn to company/product websites while 57% turn to friends and family. Nearly 40% of consumers are now turning to search engines for product information.

News from Hitwise indicates that Google may be the best bet for luxury marketers. The search giant accounted for nearly 70% of search queries in June.

This doesn’t mean that Google is the only search engine for luxury marketers. As advertisers know, putting all of your marketing eggs - or keywords in this case - in one basket is a mistake. Spreading the wealth of search keywords across several search engines will increase the ROI of campaigns and catch the eye of more consumers.

“Luxury [marketers] are quickly awakening to the power of gateways like Google to drive consumers to their sites,” said Milton Pedraza, CEO of the Luxury Institute. “Now is the time to get processes in place to measure the efficacy of various search optimization strategies.”