Back to school still heating up search engines

Are you keying in on the right search terms for back to school shopping? New data from Experian Hitwise sheds light on which back to school terms are hot this year, a big benefit for etailers because there is still time to tweak those campaigns through September.

by Kristina Knight

New data from Experian/Hitwise shows that several search engine keyword variations are driving traffic to retail hubs during this back to school shopping season. 'back to school' is the leading search keyword phrase, accounted for about 5.5% of search queries, but 'back to school supplies' and 'back to school clothes' are also hot keyword phrases, driving 1.07% and 1.04% of searches respectively.

Other hot back to school keywords include (for the four weeks ending 7/31/2010):

• Back to school activities
• Back to school sales
• Back to school bulletin boards
• Back to school ideas
• Back to school fashion

But common sense is telling you it's too late to capture back to school shoppers? Tell your common sense to quiet down, because, according to information from PointRoll, moms and dads will still be back to school shopping through September.

A recent report from PointRoll indicates that August actually has the lowest ad interaction rates (5%) for back to school shoppers, with July and September as the optimal months. For marketers, though, August is still a necessary advertising month. Consumers may not buy as much in August, but busy moms are still researching the best sales, products and apparel purchases for their kids before they hit the stores in September.

Meanwhile the National Retail Federation predicts that back to school shopping revenues will reach more than $55 billion this year, an increase of 11% over 2009 shopping numbers. About 66% of the spending will be by and for college students.

Tags: back to school, ecommerce, Hitwise, keyword advertising, National Retail Federation, online shopping, PointRoll