Thursday, February 6, 2014

What is SEO, SEM, and SMM?

by Victor J. McCoy
3V Design Media.com


The Internet has opened doors for many businesses to market their services on a larger scale quicker, and in some cases at lower cost. This is due to the ability of companies to develop effective SEO campaigns along with Search Engine Marketing (SEM) and Social Media Marketing (SMM). However, some of these terms are new to some business owners and we thought we would help to define a few of them.

SEM (Search Engine Marketing) describes the tactics associated with researching, submitting and positioning a Website within search engines to achieve maximum exposure of your Web site. SEM does include SEO but is not limited to that process. It includes paid listings and other search-engine related services and functions that will increase exposure and traffic to your Web site.


SMM (Social Media Marketing) is the new buzzword that is used to describe a myriad of Web-based platforms, applications and technologies that enable you to socially interact with one-another via the Web or Web 2.0 as these services are normally labeled. They include Facebook, YouTube, Del.icio.us, Twitter, Digg, blogs and other sites that have content largely contributed based on user participation — that is, sites that organize and deliver user-generated content (UGC).

SEO ( Search Engine Optimization) is the process of improving the volume or quality of traffic to a web site from search engines via "natural" ("organic" or "algorithmic") search results. The goal of SEO is to have your website appear earlier in the search results list for your product or service. When visits to your website increase the opportunity to increase sales of your product or service should also increase.

Warning.There are many companies that present themselves as professional SEO companies, promising results.Then, there are some that will make no guarantees but produce great results in helping your company rankings improve on the Internet. But, the key to directing traffic to your website to increase sales is also directly related to your offline marketing strategy as well as your online SEO strategy. A combination of both can produce great results - preferably desired results. Never approach SEO without clearly defining what you can reasonably expect as a return on your efforts. You must understand what "your" objective is as it relates to your entire business. Do not get caught up in someones aggressive sales pitch concerning SEO services. Do your homework and study the different strategies that are being used like link building.

First. Research how search engines work, what keywords or topics people are looking for as well as the actual words relevant to your industry that are being searched.


Third. Make sure your website has been submitted to all of your local and regional directories.


Fourth. Know that content is king. You need good content that specifically address what people want to know, and what they are searching for online. Articles on Dolphins when you sell residential swimming pools may be irrelevant to your product or service, thus not helping drive potential customers to your website.



3 comments:

Singapore Web Design said...

You have discussed everything very clearly. SEO and SEM both are very necessary to rank any website higher in search results. Thanks for sharing.

Unknown said...

Hii..

Very interesting post. I really enjoyed to read your post. It is very helpful for me. In this you discus every point in very good manner. Thanks for sharing such a nice information.

Unknown said...

Hii..

Very interesting post. I really enjoyed to read your post. It is very helpful for me. In this you discus every point in very good manner. Thanks for sharing such a nice information.