Search engine marketing: Reaching new customers via Google and the like
Search engine marketing, or the abbreviation SEM (English = Search Engine Advertising), stands for all efforts by advertisers and webmasters to attract more visitors to their own website via the search engine and, ideally, to direct users to the site who are very likely to convert to customers.
This means that search engine marketing is not only an important pillar in online marketing but also in the holistic view of marketing measures.
In this blog post, we would like to introduce you to the advantages and possibilities of search engine marketing and show you how you can use it profitably for your company. Here we go!
Advantages of professional search engine marketing
In contrast to classic advertising formats such as radio, print, or TV, which are largely push media, i.e., the advertising message is carried to the target group, search engine marketing differs blatantly here. At this point, we have a pull medium, because in the best case, the users of your site will find your specific search intention.
This has a decisive advantage:
a low level of diversification since the users of the search engine have a specific need that they want covered immediately. This need can be expressed in the need for information or in transactional intentions. Thus, search engine marketing can contribute significantly to new customer acquisition and guide interested users to your website.
In addition to the assignable intention of the user, measurability is also a crucial benefit of search engine marketing. Due to the measurability of web analysis software such as Google Analytics, advertisers have good opportunities to measure and evaluate the success of search engine optimization. This is particularly important for paid search engine ads because it allows you to quickly determine the ROAS (Return on Advertising Spent) and control budgets from a business perspective.
Search engine marketing: SEO vs. SEA
Professional search engine marketing rests on two pillars: search engine optimization (SEO = Search Engine Optimization), which takes care of optimizing organic search results, and search engine advertising (SEA = English Search Engine Advertising), which deals with the targeted placement of search engine ads for specific and defined keywords.
Although search engine optimization provides free traffic, it is not quite as simple an undertaking. Divided into three areas, the webmaster can expect up to 200 ranking factors, which are included in the allocation of ranking positions within the search engine. The on-page SEO area deals with the optimization of the factors on the page itself, such as the optimization of meta data, internal links, and the content.
The off-page SEO area, on the other hand, is aimed at external website signals. Websites receive “trust” through so-called backlinks, and if the search engine recognises good links from relevant pages, this usually has a very positive effect on the ranking positions.
The third area of search engine optimization includes technical SEO. In technical SEO, factors such as page speed, robot control, and crawlability are taken into account and optimized.
Search engine optimization can quickly become very extensive, and success does not appear immediately after optimization has taken place since the algorithm first has to recognise the change, index it, evaluate it, and then display it in the form of rankings. The efforts of the competition play a significant role in this.
The SEA area is comparatively just as complex. Various keyword options and the clustering of the ad accounts determine the profitability of the ad placement. Basically, there are two factors that determine the ranking position. The maximum click price and the quality factor, which we explain in detail in another blog post, In particular, the optimizations with regard to the quality factor quickly pay off because, with a high quality factor, one achieves better positions at lower click prices.
Search engine marketing: SEM agency or in-house
In order to build up well-founded know-how in the areas of SEA and SEO, expertise from various projects is required. Many companies underestimate this expertise, for example, when looking for personnel in the field of search engine marketing.
SEM agencies often have the necessary know-how, but there is usually a lack of reference to the products and services that can be built up through constant communication. In the case of small and medium-sized companies in particular, it makes sense to use agency services and thus build on their expertise. Mistakes can result in very high opportunity costs for companies in the long run.
Conclusion: search engine marketing is part of the marketing strategy.
From our point of view, search engine marketing belongs in every marketing mix. Today, the majority of potential customers are digital, and the Internet is the ideal communication platform.
However, the channel is not free; SEO is complex, and you need a sufficiently large budget for SEA campaigns. Even in isolation, search engine marketing will not have the desired effect, but the ROAS of the overall measures should be sustainably increased through the skillful use of various online marketing channels.
We would be happy to assist you as an online marketing agency with any questions you may have about the appropriate SEM strategy. Feel free to contact us!
