Does search engine optimization matter when you are doing a viral marketing or teaser ad campaign? Absolutely! One Degree and the “Uncle Yaris” TV ads give us a textbook example. Because I wrote about yaris.ca a few days ago, we’re getting a ton of search traffic right now on the terms Uncle Yaris and Yaris.ca.

I find it truly ironic that I wrote “they’re from Toyota as a simple Google search will tell you” and now that page itself is the top result:

Google will redirect you to the site if you search on yaris.ca, but Yahoo shows this:

<lost due to link decay>

And MSN puts One Degree at the top of an Uncle Yaris search as well:

<lost due to link decay>

My quick review of the search results didn’t reveal yaris.ca as a result for any of the searches now driving traffic to us.

Lesson learned? Teaser campaigns will generate LOTS of search activity. If you haven’t optimized your site so that the search engines can find you, your curious customers won’t either. Any SEO experts out there want to chime in with a few suggestions on what Toyota should have done with yaris.ca — other than hire you?

And to Toyota? Thanks for running a TV teaser campaign for One Degree! We’re lovin’ the traffic!

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Originally published at www.onedegree.ca on September 29, 2005.