Frequently Asked Questions
What is Internet Marketing?
What is Search Engine Marketing?
What is Search Engine Optimization?
What is Search Engine Positioning?
What is Search Engine Submission?
What is the difference between search engines and directories?
What are the different types of search engines?
Why is Search Engine Marketing important?
How can Search Engine Marketing improve my business?
How can I implement a Search Engine Marketing strategy for my company?
What is Internet Marketing?
Internet Marketing consists of strategies and techniques applied on the Internet to support a company's overall online marketing objectives. The goal is often driving targeted traffic to a website and features on the website to create a desired call to action. Internet Marketing techniques use Search Engine Marketing devices as well as newsgroup and mailing list postings, banner advertising, online promotions, online image development, email strategies and other interactive features.
What is Search Engine Marketing?
The fundamental component of Search Engine Marketing is Search Engine Optimization, but this marketing system also includes other techniques involving aspects of website design and structure. Search Engine Marketing is the overall process, important elements of which include the preliminary assessments and website submissions to Pay-per-Click search engines and significant directories. Of course, the long term maintenance of these programs is also part of Search Engine Marketing, the ultimate goal of which is to drive traffic to your website by optimization, increasing Link Popularity, and improving Search Engine Positioning.
What is Search Engine Optimization?
Search Engine Optimization is the process of promoting and marketing websites and business online to achieve better Search Engine Rankings for relevant, targeted keyword phrases. It refers to optimizing the coding and content of a website for both search engines and visitors in order to attain higher rankings than competing websites. Search Engine Optimization will increase qualified traffic and generate customer enquiries that ultimately convert to sales.
Research shows that most search engine users do not look past the first two or three pages of results returned by a search engine. Research also shows that around 85 percent of Internet consumers use search engines and directories to look for products, services, and information. Given such a high degree of consumer use and acceptance of search engine results, Search Engine Optimization is the most cost efficient and rewarding means of generating qualified site traffic and activity.
What is Search Engine Positioning?
Effective Search Engine Positioning results in a specific website or page ranking highly on Search Engine Results Pages. These results pages are a list of links pertaining to a specific user submitted search term. Search Engine Positioning is only relevant for search engines with "crawler" technology like Live Search and Google. In contrast, business directories like Yahoo! only list the website (rather than individual pages) and do not "crawl" or "spider" for additional links or content.
The process of Search Engine Submissions, Search Engine Crawling, and Search Engine Positioning is complex. Variables that affect positioning include: website coding, content, internal and external links, keywords, keyword competitors, and the algorithms used by different search engines
What is Search Engine Submission?
Search Engine Submission refers to the act of getting your website listed on search engines. Another term for this is Search Engine Registration. This is usually done by entering your page information on a particular search engine's submission page.
Simply submitting a website listing does not mean that it will necessarily rank higher for particular keywords. It only means that the search engine knows the pages exist. A useful analogy is one of a lottery; having a ticket does not guarantee a win, but without a ticket there is no chance of winning.
What is the difference between search engines and directories?
Search engines use software programs (algorithms) to index web pages, often called robots or spiders. They are programmed to constantly "crawl" the Web in search of new or updated pages. They will go from one to another until they have visited nearly every website on the Internet. Every search engine employs different criteria to determine if your website should be indexed and how well it should be ranked. The most popular search engines today are Google, Yahoo!, and MSN.
Internet directories do not use software programs. They are compiled by humans who organize websites by subject into categories. If you submit your company's website to an Internet directory, it will be visited by real people who can decide whether to include it or not. The most popular directories are Yahoo! and Open Directory Project. If a potential customer uses a search engine site, the query generally must match the words on your web page. If they use a directory site, the query generally must match the words in the description of your website in the directory. Some directories require a fee for placement.
There is certainly a link between search engines and directories. If your website is listed in Internet directories, then it can also have a higher ranking on search engines; for example Google prefers websites that are listed in the Open Directory Project. A listing in all important Internet directories will have a very positive effect on your website. If you want best results for your website, you should make sure that it is listed in all relevant Internet directories. If your website is listed in industry specific and regional directories, then it can gain a higher link popularity score which can improve your rankings on other search engines. In addition, directories bring more targeted traffic to your website.
What are the different types of Search Engines?
Search engines work on several different principles, frequently changing how they operate and where they get their information. Most search engines today use a combination of different methods to obtain results.
- Directories: Human editors actually view your site to decide if and where it will be included in their directory. They use the actual website and not individual pages for the listings. Meta tags and other code are of no importance to directory submission though a description and category suggestion must be provided. Listing may be difficult due to the large amount of submissions that these directories receive. Unique and high quality content is the best way to assure placement. Unlike "crawler" engines, making changes your web pages has no effect on directories. Popular directories include Yahoo! and Open Directory Project.
- Robot/Crawler Engines: These applications use site code and content to pull up individual web pages for their listings. The results are generally topical and determined by the presence of specific keywords. Major search engines these days are "crawler" based (E.g. Google, Alta Vista) which means that they "crawl" or "spider" the web pages and index them in their databases accordingly. When a user types in a search term the search engine will return the most relevant results based on the information they have stored. These results are most frequently described as Natural Listings.
- Pay-per-Click Services: Here subscribing website owners bid a certain amount to reserve given keywords. You then pay this amount each time your listing is clicked on by a viewer using a Pay-per-Click service to look up those keywords. This is a highly effective but potentially costly solution. Google Adwords and Yahoo/Overture are two examples of this.
- Meta Engines: These are not true search engines, in that they compile results from other search engines and merge them into one list of results. These services (E.g. Metacrawler) were originally unpopular amongst the regular search engines, as they often made use of their bandwidth without paying for it. These days, search engines make deals with Meta search companies in order to have them include their engine on the list of sources. This is partly because of direct payment, but also because the search engine companies use Meta search inclusion as an argument in support for their paid inclusion services.
- Hybrid & Mixed Results Engines: Some search engines also display mixed results (E.g. AOL, Netscape) from both "crawled" and directory sites. These search engines may not always produce results that are as relevant as crawler based engines due to the fact that they also add paid submissions. Paid submission options are now available on several search engines.
- Private Engines: Many corporate and educational sites hold vast amounts of information in their databases. They often charge one time or subscription fees for users to gain access (E.g. Proquest).
Why is Search Engine Marketing important?
There are now an estimated 430 million people online in the world; double the number of people online just a year earlier according to popular surveys. The online population is growing at an astronomical rate, at the moment doubling every 12 - 14 months; and there is still room for growth in the online community. The number of people online represents only about 7 percent of the total world population.
With so many people looking for stuff online, mostly through the search engines, it just makes sense to have your website listed. People who use search engines are looking for something specific. If they are looking for online gaming for instance, then they probably intend to play. They are pre-qualified visitors. They know what they want, are looking specifically for a place to get it, but just haven't found the right vendor.
With Search Engine Marketing, you can target these pre-qualified visitors with a potential conversion rate of 20 to 30 percent. This estimated conversion rate from search engine traffic is significantly higher than banner advertisements, bulk unsolicited email messages, and other methods. The cost of implementing a successful Search Engine Marketing strategy is much less than conventional advertising methods.
How can Search Engine Marketing improve my business?
Search Engine Marketing can help in a number of ways:
- It helps direct high quality traffic to your website
- It helps you generate revenue from your website
- It helps you to measure the profitability of your website
- It helps reinforce brand values
- It helps reduce overall marketing costs
- It helps acquire qualified leads
- It helps increase client membership
- It helps information to reach clients
- It helps increase exposure of your products and services
With regard to branding, a recent study by The Dieringer Research Group reported that 40 percent of Internet users in the U.S. changed their opinions of brands due to information gathered online. This not only reinforces the importance of ensuring you get maximum quality traffic to your website, but that once visitors are there, they are informed of and believe in the products and services you offer.
It's hard to understand why so many companies invest significant time and money building a website, yet do not even consider how to get people there. Many firms are successful at driving current customers to their site, but are not using the Web to generate new business. This is a huge missed opportunity, and these companies are often amazed when they learn how many Internet queries are conducted every day by people looking for exactly what they offer. Yet companies of all types and sizes are successfully using Search Engine Marketing to improve their overall marketing ROI.
How can I implement a Search Engine Marketing strategy for my company?
Contact Anduro Marketing, a professional Search Engine Marketing firm, to help your company establish a successful Search Engine Marketing strategy.
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