One of the main goals of inbound marketers is to get their website to show up, or rank, in online internet searches. There are a number of ways to achieve this with search engine optimization, content creations or with paid search such as Google AdWords. Recent marketing research has demonstrated why turning up in online searches is so important: a lot of people are using online searches to find information and research brands and products before they buy. Below are 20 statistics from recent marketing research. Each fact is interesting on its own but taken as a whole they make a compelling argument for optimizing your website for organic search and moving marketing dollars from traditional advertising models to inbound marketing and pay-per-click advertising.

1. In the last 4 years, the web has gone from 100 million websites to 250 million. source: Netcraft, Dec 2010 -TWEET THIS FACT  
    
2. 75.5% of the US population uses the internet. source: eMarketer, January 2011 -TWEET THIS FACT  
    
3. 82.6% of internet users use search. source: eMarketer, July 2011 -TWEET THIS FACT  
    
4. There are 191.4M search users. source: eMarketer, July 2011 -TWEET THIS FACT   
    
5. American millennials engage in over 14 different internet activities while those ages 65+ engage in mainly 7. source:  Generations Online, Pew Internet 2010 -TWEET THIS FACT  
    
6. In 2011, the average U.S. shopper consults 10.4 sources prior to purchase, twice as many as year ago. source Google/Shopper Sciences, Zero Moment of Truth Macro Study, U.S., Apr 2011 -TWEET THIS FACT  
    
7. Nearly 50% of US internet users will redeem an online coupon this year. source: eMarketer, May 2011 -TWEET THIS FACT  
    
8. There are 27M African-American Internet users. source: Google/GlobalHue/OTX, Five Truths of the Digital African American Consumer, Jun 2011 -TWEET THIS FACT  
    
9. 57% of people talk more online than they do in real life. source: Alex Trimpe via Ogilvy — February 21, 2011, ThinkQuarterly, Google -TWEET THIS FACT  
    
10. Search activity doubles after becoming a mom: U.S. moms conduct 21 searches per week (vs. 11 for non-moms). source: Four Truths About Moms and Search, U.S., Dec 2009 -TWEET THIS FACT  
     
11. 16% of the daily queries on Google have never been seen before. source: Google Internal Data 2011 -TWEET THIS FACT  
     
12. Online researching contributes to offline applications: 12% of all online researchers of deposit account information apply at a branch. source: Understanding Deposit Account Researchers Google/Compete, Aug 2010 -TWEET THIS FACT  
     
13. The average online research to offline purchase conversion rate for auto parts is 85%. source: Google, Automotive Aftermarket Study 2010, U.S., Nov 2010 -TWEET THIS FACT 
     
14. Search directly drove 25% of all online U.S. device purchases. source: Value of Search for Wireless Product Launches Study, Google/Compete, US, March 2010 -TWEET THIS FACT 
     
15. 62% of personal travelers use search engines as the number one source for travel information. source: Google/OTX, Traveler's Road to Decision 2010, U.S, Sept 2010 -TWEET THIS FACT 
     
16. 83% of beauty product consumers searched online as a direct result of seeing a magazine print ad. source: Role of the Online Channel in the Beauty Research Process -TWEET THIS FACT 
     
17. By 2012 internet video will account for over 50% of consumer internet traffic in the U.S. source: Cisco, Jun 2011 -TWEET THIS FACT 
     
18. In 2010, 58% of auto shoppers decided on a make and model in less than one month's time, versus just 34% a year ago. source: Automotive Shopping Behavior Study, Aug 2011 -TWEET THIS FACT 
     
19. The +1 button now appears over 5B times per day across over 1M sites across the web. source: Google Internal data, Jan 2012 -TWEET THIS FACT 
     
20. YouTube searches represent close to a third of total search activity for game titles. source: Google, Kinecting the Click, U.S., Sept 2011 -TWEET THIS FACT

When you consider the tremendous growth of online content and your website’s increasing competition you cannot ignore the importance of your website showing up in search results. Optimizing your website using inbound marketing techniques with keywords and content will improve your organic search results page rankings. This will take time but will result in long term benefits. The other option for taking advantage of online searches is to invest in a paid search such as Google AdWords. When done correctly the results will be immediate and can significantly improve your online conversions but paid search will not increase your long term organic search rankings. Whatever you decide to do it is important not to ignore the people online now who are looking for your business and services.

Photo Credit: Kakisky