SEM Revealed

March 23, 2011 by admin
Filed under SEO Business

SEM is the solution for all on-line promotions. Therefore we must address this issue. It’s not rocket science that businesses should be on the web. It’s not enough just to be online though. If nobody can find you, you might just as well not be there!

Let’s compare it to a new store opening up… A lot of money has gone into setting it up. They open for business… And see where they are – in the middle of nowhere, down some side-alley. And no-one has given any thought to advertising their location. Is anyone likely to buy from them? This is exactly the scenario for 99% of ALL commercial websites in existence.

The World Wide Web has caused a paradigm shift in marketing. Around the time of the millennium, it was thought that having a website was everything. Vast amounts of money were spent on all singing/dancing web sites. This trend was cheerfully encouraged by on-line design companies, who relished the business! But just the existence of the site didn’t bring in the customers. They’d thought that simply having a site on the web meant customers could see them. In fact, this wasn’t the case at all.

A traditional approach to marketing breaks down on the web. Off-line marketing people would suggest your website is like a sales brochure. Consequently they’ll recommend the time-honoured promotional methods of newspaper advertising and the media. Really just assuming websites need the same treatment as everything else! First they make a nice looking catalog. Then they utilize various marketing methods to get people to look at the catalogue. Yet in the web economy, this approach is way off the mark!

This process only utilizes the web as viewing gallery, which is quite wrong. It allows us to search and research – to discuss ideas and interact with others. It’s completely interactive, bringing massive choice to billions of people. We can find the sites we’re looking for because Google, Bing and Yahoo etc. have formulated huge site directories to simplify the task. Can you imagine trying to find something in Yellow Pages if there wasn’t an order and an index? We’d be forever frustrated and disappointed.

Search Engines have sorted all this. But in doing so, they’ve radically changed the face of marketing forever. Because now, if you want to be found in the vast sea that is the internet, you have to be indexed in the Search Engines. Even that isn’t enough though. Statistics reveal that almost no-one looks ‘below the fold’ on the 1st page.

But Search Engines are interested in making money – so to overcome high rating difficulties, paid advertising was introduced. You Pay Per Click, so you’re only charged for your ad when someone clicks on it. How refreshing was that? Because now you didn’t have to spend anything until an interested person looked at your web page. Advertising in this way requires well informed judgment, but if handled properly it can be very worthwhile.

Unfortunately, PPC advertising has now become literally swamped with adverts in most fields. New online marketers have forced up the price per click, largely through over-the-top bidding. So it’s often the case now that many are priced out of the market. In particular, where a sale requires a large number of clicks. Consequently we’re seeing a renewed interest in SEO. This means websites are optimised in ways that naturally push them up the search pages.

Have a go at this – Go to Google or Bing RIGHT NOW and type in a few product or service keywords. Can you see your website on the 1st three pages? It’s very doubtful. So you might as well not be there at all! If it is there, would clients really use those keywords?

You could be relatively happy with PPC. But are you professionally managing your campaign? What kind of returns are you getting? Do you measure the quality of each campaign and draw up accurate statistics? Without testing and measuring, you can’t be sure what works best. There will always be an element of guesswork (and consequently less than perfect results) without accurate stats.

Both in Britain and around the world, statistics show that commercial advertising and selling is experiencing a seismic shift towards the internet. It’s no longer an option. Embrace the web economy, and maximize its potential.

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