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Search Engine Marketing - A Primer For The Busy Executive

Written by: Rich Gaasenbeek

Article Overview: One of the hottest topics in marketing today is Search Engine Marketing or SEM for short. What is SEM and why is it so hot? The purpose of this post is to give the busy SMB owner a quick high level guide to the key things he/she needs to understand about SEM.

Search Engine Marketing - A Primer For The Busy Executive

One of the hottest topics in marketing today is Search Engine Marketing or SEM for short. What is SEM and why is it so hot? The purpose of this post is to give the busy SMB owner a quick high level guide to the key things he/she needs to understand about SEM.

So what is SEM? Think of SEM as a two-step dance. Step #1 is all about getting found by the people who are searching online for the products or services that you sell. Step #2 is all about converting those people who have found you online into prospects or customers.

Step #1 – Getting Found

So many companies spend their marketing budgets searching for customers – or worse – trying to CREATE customers (think evangelism). It’s a bit like searching for the proverbial needle in a haystack.

SEM turns this problem on its head. At any point in time, SOMEBODY is out there looking to buy what you’re selling! It may be one out 10 or one out of 100, but they’re out there!

And guess where they’re searching? On the Web of course! (Google didn’t morph into a verb – “to google, googling” – by accident!) Over 85% of people now start their search for something – anything – on the Web regardless of whether it’s B2B or B2C, product or service, global or local.

Effective SEM ensures that those people FIND YOU – and ideally find you first – without you actually having to do a whole lot (other than a pretty modest investment SEM of course).


Step #2 – Converting Visitors Into Prospects and/or Customers

Now that you’ve got people visiting your Website because they found you first in their online search, what do you do with them? Sell to them of course!

Sounds trite, but 90% of SMB Websites actually fail to do this. They provide lots and lots of information on the company, its history, the 344 products it sells, the founders childhood development, etc., BUT they don’t make it easy to contact them (think toll-free phone number in big font on the homepage), and they don’t make the “easy sale”.

In our next post, we’ll look more closely at the “easy sale” and why it’s such an integral part of the SEM equation.

Related Articles
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  Search Engine Optimization
  Most Effective Search Engine Marketing
  How To Increase Your ROI By 900% With Search Engine Optimization
  Why optimise your website?

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Related Forum Posts
What Do You Want To Be Taught? - Hi, My name is Jeff Foster, I will be moderating this new section. I want to get your opinion on topics you would like to discuss & be taught on. I see a great need for small business owners to learn how to perform basic Search Engine Marketing (SEM) which would include the basics about Search Engine Optimization (SEO). What do you want to be taught on? Jeff
Re: Let’s talk about the ways of marketing your products, servic - I agree with some of the others who responded it depends on what your selling... but to answer your questions here are some of the methods I use. Forum Marketing Yahoo Answers (I need to use more of) SEO (Search Engine Optimization) Bum Marketing or Article marketing P-P-C (Pay Per Click) Marketing Online Directories Hope this helps.
Re: Search Engine Marketing - Optimization For Local Businesses - Nice information about SEM / Search Engine Marketing... It's very help me to know benefits if using SEM for local business.. Thanks for sharing this information..
Re: Search Engine Optimization - If you are interested to get more information about Search Engine Optimization you can visit Search Engine Watch site gives you a great way to keep up with what’s going on in the search engine world. This site provides a ton of information about a very wide range of subjects related not only to search engine optimization, but also the flip side of the coin; subjects related to searching online.
Website SEO Marketing Consultant from India - Hi all, I am search engine marketing consultant, and has worked on seo marketing of several online websites. In case you need any help or facing any issue related to SEO/SEM, you can post your query. I have 4 yeards of experience in following :- a ) Search Engine Optimization/Marketing b) PPC Promotion c) Website Development too;)


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