The different methods of search engine marketing

Search engine marketing is an umbrella term that describes a particular niche of internet marketing activity. Ultimately all of the different methods described under the term have one goal – to promote a website by increasing its visibility in Search Engine Results Pages (SERPS).

There are a variety of different methods used in search engine marketing though. These range from arguably conventional advertising arrangements to more complex methods that exist exclusively on search engine platforms; here are the two types of search engine marketing that form the backbone of the industry:

SEARCH ENGINE OPTIMISATION

This is one of the most effective ways of search engine marketing because if its done well, its practically invisible outside of your websites prime position in SERPs. Search engines deliver results based upon the keywords that users enter in their search query, returning the websites that their algorithms judge to be the most relevant to that specific query.

SEO is the strategy whereby the volume or quality of traffic to a website is improved by making sure that the site appears higher in SERPs. The idea is that by targeting keywords specific to the websites target audience, the likelihood of reaching a relevant user is much greater.

Search engine optimization differs from other forms of search engine marketing in that it is a form of ‘natural’ promotion – of making a site feature better in the ‘organic’, unpaid portions of SERPs. There are many different tactics used in SEO but ultimately it is based around the strategic manipulation of links, page content, meta information, site design and search engine policy to target certain keywords and certain search engine users.

PAY PER CLICK

The other side of the search engine marketing coin is PPC – Pay Per Click advertising. This type of advertising model, where advertisers only pay the host if their ad is clicked, is used across the internet but has some significant differences with Search. On search engines, advertisers typically bid on keyword phrases that will likely be used by their target audiences; PPC adverts on content sites are normally charged on a fixed price per click rather than via a bidding system.

PPC adverts typically appear in a separate area of the SERPs than organic results, to reassure users that results are being delivered to them via relevance rather than advertising budget. The three largest networks in search are, perhaps logically, the three largest search engine operators: Yahoo Search Engine Marketing, Microsoft AdCenter and Google AdWords. Each has different benefits to advertisers and fiercely competes to lead the way in Paid Search advertising.