Search Engine Optimisation (SEO) Blog

Search engine marketing versus search engine optimisation

admin — Tue, 09 Mar 2010 11:26:26 +0000

Marketing is an integral part of any business, not just today but since many decades. It is only in the last few years that Internet marketing became a major part of commerce, bringing up a new trend called e-commerce. The benefits and profits from advertising over the Internet were found so enormous and convenient that very soon most of the businesses, both old and new, started creating their own websites. And by the way the popularity of search engines increased it didn’t take much time for business owners to understand how beneficial it is to make use of this popularity. Thus, we saw the beginnings of marketing through search engines or, as we call it now, SEM.

And with the competition becoming tough, it became evident that it is not enough that the websites are found in the search engines, but that they must be found in the front pages of search engines. Consequently, we find the growth of the next trend, SEO or search engine optimisation.

The terms SEM and SEO are often swapped in daily conversation to mean either one of them. Even by the so-called “experts” in the field. However, a cursory glance at the definition of both is enough to realize that that is not the case. Let’s take a look at both.

Search Engine Marketing (SEM) includes all the techniques that make use of search engines to promote a website in the search engines. Its aim is to increase the traffic to the site. And for a business website, SEM is mainly to increase the profits.

Now, you might argue that this is what SEO also does. Well, you are right. SEO also tries to promote a website in the search engines through various ways. But here, all the techniques are direct efforts, commonly called organic techniques, like conducting thorough keyword research, creating genuine content, collecting quality backlinks, etc.

However, in the case of SEM any method of advertising online is a part of it. And SEO is one such component in SEM, the others being Pay per Click (PPC), paid inclusion, directory submission, etc. While SEM tries to find the website in the various search engines, SEO is mainly to bring it to the top positions in the front pages of search engines.

The aims of both are the same – to bring a website to the attention of the users and search engine. SEM concentrates on the former whereas SEO on the latter so that the former could see it. So, the point to remember here is that SEO is always great but an SEM that includes SEO is greater.

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Return on Investment (ROI) – A Definition

admin — Tue, 09 Mar 2010 11:20:17 +0000

Return on Investment (ROI) doesn’t have a big mystery behind it; it is, in fact, exactly what it sounds – the returns you get when you make an investment. In financial terms, it is the money that an investor gains in relation with the money that he/she has invested. It is normally measured in percentage. To take a simple example, if you invest a £100 in a company and you get a return of £5, you could say your ROI is 5%.

Known in some circles as “Rate of Return” (ROR) or just “Return”, ROI is not always measured in terms of money. There are many other ways of investment other than investing in a company. Also, you need to keep in mind that a return on investment is not always monetary. For example, if you are investing on a vehicle, its quality and trouble-free performance is the ROI you get.

ROI need not always be profitable. If a company has a loss of, say, £20 a day, your ROI would be -20%. Whether your return on investment is more or less depends on the company you have chosen to invest in. Therefore, it becomes important that you invest in company that’s reliable.

Another important factor regarding the ROI is term of investment. At any rate, investing a small amount for a longer period of time could be much safer than investing a larger amount for a shorter period. The advantage here is that the amount of investment would not be a heavy bulk and you would get the additional interest of the money you invest. Also, there might be companies that offer you a higher rate of interest but might not be trustworthy. It is always safer to go for an average company that offers lesser return in 20 years than a new hot company that offers higher return in 2 years.

It is natural that you might feel alarmed by all these details. However, these are no big reasons for fear. Any plan of investment is better followed by expert ROI analysts who would provide you suggestions on any kind of investment plans you have. With professional and expert advice you could be lucky to see your money getting multiplied again and again.

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Role of SEO in Internet Marketing

admin — Fri, 05 Mar 2010 12:14:02 +0000

Search engine optimisation, SEO as it is widely called, is now a globally known facet of online or Internet marketing. Any website owner, as soon as the website is created, would be trying to get it listed in the major search engines. And SEO, as you know, is the best aid for that. Many business owners just create the website, submit it in the search engine and then think that their job is done or, worse, forget to do anything more about it. Wrong. The real Internet marketing begins there.

In case of the online traffic to a website, quality is much more important than quantity. After all, you need 100 visitors who would convert to buyers rather than 1000 visitors who would just visit the site, hang around and leave without making a purchase. This is where SEO becomes relevant. Because it concentrates on a target audience who is searching for a particular product which is why they typed in the particular keyword that your website concentrates on in the first place.

The main advantage of search engine optimisation is that it brings benefits not just to your business but also to the users. By insisting on quality content and specific keywords SEO provides more information to the users who are searching for information. In fact, it multiplies that information by giving relevance to external links as well. Thus, if you sell wedding shoes you give information to the users on wedding gowns and wedding venues also through the related links that you have added in your site. Moreover, it can check the web designers from adding all those elements which would, though make the website attractive and captivating, only distract the readers from getting the details they were looking for.

SEO comprises the key areas that the website owners who do online marketing concentrate on. It creates a brand for your products, generates awareness of the website, increases traffic and converts the visitors to buyers. However, all of these only points to the fact that it should be an ongoing process. Constant updates and improvisations matter a lot to the optimisation of a website in the search engine. Be it a new website or an established one, SEO would never cease to be an important part of its marketing strategy.

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Organic SEO: A Definition

admin — Fri, 05 Mar 2010 11:55:57 +0000

There are various definitions attributed to “organic SEO”. It is usually taken to be the search results that occur naturally or organically when a user types out the keywords in the search engine. It is considered to be those results that are content-based and come on the left side of the search engine page. Normally, when people mention organic SEO, they refer to the unpaid and algorithm-based results in a particular search engine. The phrase carries a shade of natural, and therefore positive, way of achieving high ranking in the search engines as against the PPC, the way of bringing the site to the front page through payment of money, and other similar short cuts.

Organic SEO is time consuming, yes. But then it can be relied to bring long time results and good ranking. Which is why most of the web masters choose organic SEO than any other way of SEO like PPC though they are said to the site to the front page faster.

There are several advantages for the organic SEO for the companies as well as the users.

Organic SEO involves white hat techniques and will adhere to the guidelines of the search engines. This eventually is safer for the websites. Black hat techniques can ban the sites if not used wisely.
Search engines keep changing their algorithms once in a while. A company that is following organic SEO techniques has no reason to worry since its website is on top because of its high-quality content and not because of technical loopholes.
Organic method is always cost-effective. Even though techniques like Pay per Click can bring your website to the front very fast and create benefits for you initially, it will end up paying more. Whereas, organic method brings the site to the top slowly but steadily and without any loss of money.
Organic SEO companies normally provide frequent reports on the progress of their work. They will keep doing a constant keyword evaluation. In short, the website would be kept active always.
Organic search results tend to be more informative and rich in content than the artificial ones.
Websites that are found as a result of organic SEO will have more inbound links than artificial ones.

Majority of the users rely more on organic results than the sponsored links.

This white hat technique of SEO has travelled a long way beyond the milestone where it started. Now there are many factors that can be included in organic SEO like analytics, social networking, video, Instant messaging (IM), etc. The more versatile online marketing gets, the more variety is added in SEO too. One thing is certain – whether the white hat organic optimisation brings more results or not, which it most often does, it certainly keeps your website safe and active and free from getting penalised.

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Web Design Tips: How to create a website for the users and not for yourself?

admin — Mon, 01 Mar 2010 12:44:27 +0000

No website is created to be kept hidden from the viewers. The aim of any webmaster is to make the website viewable to as many users as possible. And for the same reason, it should be as user friendly and informative. A website has to be made not just interesting for a single reading but also make the users return again and again and recommend to friends. There are many factors that combine to make a website a favourite of the users. Let’s check out a few of them.

Meaningful content

First and foremost, the ubiquitous, omnipresent content! A website needs more than anything else excellent content that glues the readers to the site for a long time. However, it cannot be any content either. It should mean something, something worth the time of the reader who is reading it. It should impart the information the reader is looking for, and not just in a boring, mechanical way but should be presented in an interesting, curiosity-provoking way.

Avoiding unnecessary animations

Unless your website is about some online greeting cards or online games there is no use in adding flashy animations and images that can only distract and irritate a reader. Though you might think that inserting so much graphic might make the reader stick to the website, you couldn’t be more wrong. Imagine a fly jumping up and down in front of your eyes while reading newspaper! Similarly, there is the case of scrolling text and pop ups. Scrolling text can test the patience of the user since it appears in the speed that you set and not according to the preference of the user. And no user is ever going to think “another pop up? Wow!”

Easy navigation

Suppose you are browsing a website and you reach a page from which you have no idea how to reach back in the home page. And there is no link from the current page to the home page. What would be your next step? Obviously, to leave the site and never come back. Forget about recommending the site to others, you yourself would never return to it. So apply the same rule to your own website also. Provide navigation route that is easy to follow. Plan the distribution of the content carefully. Make it easy for users to find what they want. Try to avoid too many clicks to reach a page. Include a menu in all the pages.

Wise formatting

Provide some space between lines on every page. Unless you specify the space you want it is going to look cramped and crowded and therefore difficult to read. Similarly, make the font considerably large enough to read. Avoid ALL CAPS as much as possible. If you want to stress on some point you can use italics. If at all you use all caps make those words as brief as possible. Also, keep in mind that too many exclamation marks defeat the purpose. Use it not more than once or twice.

Fast loading

Suppose you want to check out a website. How long will you wait for it to load? At the most, a minute. So keep that in mind for your own site too. None of the users would wait for a website to load for a long time. Hence, make sure that your website loads fast and without any trouble. Make sure it works properly. Keep it updated always.

Wise linking

Sometimes website owners would provide links that would open in a new tab or new window. This is fine for external links, for it prevents the users from moving away from your site. But for internal links if each click opens up a new window or tab, it could be pretty irritating. Similarly, people expect links to be in blue font and underlined. Make sure you do either one if you don’t want to do both. Because, given in the same colour as the remaining text, links might not appear as links and might be missed. Also, explain what each link is all about in a few words at least instead of just providing it abruptly.

Easy accessibility

Last but not the least, provide your contact information on all the pages of the site instead of only the contact page. Visitors might not want to go back all the way to the home page and then find the contact page.

The tips to create a good, useful website definitely don’t end here. However, this could be a good start. All these steps themselves make a good website that is informative and helpful for the users. So, why the delay? Go ahead and create the website you had in your mind, the one that is visited by hundreds and thousands of visitors per day. Good luck!

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