Search Engine Marketing (or SEM) includes optimizing your site, submitting your site to directories, getting your site indexed by search engines, managing pay-per-click campaigns, writing and distributing optimized press releases and articles, using blogs and RSS, marketing via an affiliate program, and much more.
Sometimes people get the “optimization” of their site confused with the “submission” of their site to the various engines and directories. They say, “our designers offered us that before and it didn’t work — nobody can find us still.”
If it were that easy, we wouldn’t be here
Optimizing your site is the first and most important step to starting a successful search engine marketing campaign. An optimized site addresses the same elements as a search engine spider would. In other words, it has the content, code, links, and other factors that help improve search engine ranking.
Plan a Campaign
Regardless of the size and scope, a solid search engine marketing plan can help drive your business. The fact is that people use the Web as a first step before making a purchase — from reading reviews of a book or movie to figuring out the best lawn mower to buy, to choosing a veterinarian or a vacation destination before making a purchase.
This is good news for businesses of any size because it is an affordable way to help increase site traffic, which translates into paying customers. Part of a good campaign is taking advantage of all the low-cost ways of advertising online (and even offline). The cost of good Web site optimization alone is usually well worth it in the long run.
A good search engine marketing campaign does not have to be an expensive endeavor — and it starts with having the right content in a site designed with search engine marketing in mind.
