What is Search Engine Optimisation (SEO)?

Search engine optimisation is a process that aims to promote a web site’s position towards the top of the search engines’ results page (SERP) aiming to increase the relevant web site’s traffic.

“Organic SEO” or “Natural Search”

Sometimes search engine optimisation is also referred to as “Organic SEO” or “Natural Search” which means that the process refers to those listings that are offered by search engines without having the need to pay for the advertising.

For example, if you are using the Pay-Per-Click SEO services of products such as Google Adwords, Yahoo Search Marketing or Microsoft adCenter, you are not using Organic SEO or Natural Search.

Why is search marketing important?

Search marketing is a term that is used to describe the use of both Organic SEO as well as the Pay-Per-Click SEO (PPC SEO).

In recent years search marketers have realised that the effort put into organic search engine optimisation pays off in terms of getting a higher page “quality score” for bidding on PPC. This means that if your website is optimised for a particular keyword and you are also running a PPC campaign for the same keyword, your costs for PPC bids are lower.

In addition to this, from the prospects point of view, if they see a website in the organic search results as well as in the paid search results, their confidence in clicking on that link increases compared to just seeing one of the two results.

Be on the first three pages of search results

With the increasing numbers of online users, for private and business purposes marketers realise that it is important to get their websites on the first three pages of search results in order to be noticed by their prospects.

Some studies even suggest that 68% of search engine users click on the results on the first page only, hence if your business is not found for the right keyword on the first page of a search engine the chances of success for your search marketing campaign are very low.

Over 70% of households have access to the Internet

For example, in the UK over 70% of households have access to the Internet and nearly 97% of businesses have an Internet connection in 2010.

When online, the use of email and search engines are the top two most frequent activities thus if marketers can get their products to prospects in this way they are reaching out to a vast majority of online users.

“SEO is therefore one of the most cost effective ways of improving a site’s ranking in search engines and a good way to drive targeted traffic to your site.”

SEO is sufficient – why Search and Social Media Marketing?

Search & Social Media Marketing goes beyond SEO, it is a process that aims to maximize a web site’s position towards the top of the search engine results page (SERPs) for relevant search terms, using organic search, pay-per-click (PPC) and social media which facilitates the increase in meeting the pre-defined web site specific objectives.

There are a number of different objectives that a website could be measured against, the two most common ones are conversion goals and brand awareness goals:

Conversion goals for different websites could be

• increased lead generation,
• online sales,
• downloads etc.

Brand awareness goals could include

• the number of visitors,
• time spent on site,
• bounce rate etc.

The underlying assumption on the Search and Social Media Marketing course is that a website is a business tool that is used to increase return on capital employed. Also, Search and Social Media Marketing includes the use of organic SEO, PPC and Social Media.

Would you like to learn more about SEO?

Here are a couple of pages which can help with your understanding of search engine optimisation:

• SEO Courses
• SEO Training
• SEO Tutorial

---