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Effects of the FIFA World Cup in the SEM industry

by Tug Agency | 04.06.2010
Millions of people around the world are anxiously awaiting June 11th when the ball will roll in South Africa, not only the FIFA World Cup generates tons of interest around football fans (hence pubs and betting sites) but also many other industries will enjoy the collateral effects of this giant sports event.  If you are into search marketing you should have done by now the homework, as any SEO efforts should have started at least a couple of months ago and your PPC campaigns should be ready for launch if they are not live yet.

But how the FIFA World Cup affects the Internet world?  Well, let’s see the below Google insights graphic which depicts the behaviour of two major sporting events, in red Wimbledon which annually presents peaks of traffic when the Tennis Grand Slam is celebrated, and in blue the World Cup with a massive peak in June 2006, which is expected to happen once again this year -notice that traffic has already started to climb up.

The FIFA World Cup Google Insights for Search

Now how marketers can take advantage in different verticals?  Well, if you are in the phone industry, I am sure you should have thought about ‘cheap South Africa phone call rates’ or text updates of latest scores. If you are into gossip, the main subject will be the WAGs. In retail, national team t-shirts and kits are already on demand. And even if you are a local business you should have updated your Foursquare, Facebook and Twitter accounts with the offerings for this June for the #worldcup.  There is still time to run the extra-mile but all the efforts will pay off!