Create killer SEO, SEM, PPC and Landing Pages
SEO
SEO is an acronym for Search Engine Optimisation. It is the science of embedding essential information about a web page into the page itself. When SEO is done right, it can drive free prospective customers to your website over the long term. When it is not done right, it can have the opposite effect, making your website nearly impossible to be found. SEO is not to be confused with SEM which is explained below.
SEM
SEM (Search Engine Marketing) focuses on getting quick hits in the short term, for a predefined price. The ads you see on the right hand column of Google (click image for larger view) after you have searched for something, are all examples of SEM in action. All these listing are paid ads, also commonly referred to as ’paid search’. SEM is an excellent way to generate quick leads to your website or campaign page. But SEO and SEM are only half the story. Read on.
PPC
PPC (Pay Per Click) is the price an advertiser is willing to pay-per-click each time a web user clicks on their ad. The advertiser sets their own price for this, so in effect, they are bidding for the customers’ clicks. In an extremely competitive and lucrative market such as Financial Services, PPC rates can be set well beyond $5 per click. This means if their ad is clicked 1000 times, they will have to pay $5000. The scary thing is; this amount of clicks could easily occur in one hour in the right circumstances!
And it doesn’t end there. What if you’ve just racked up a $5000 bill for your company and you haven’t created the right ’landing page’ to convert some of that traffic back into sales for your company?
Don’t forget your Landing Page!
Before you even start with SEO, SEM and PPC, you should have a killer Landing Page. This is the page where you will send your prospective customers once you’ve done the steps above. If this has been done correctly, it should convert a good percentage of those thousands of clicks/prospects into paying customers. However, without a good Landing Page, any amount of money you care to throw at online marketing will surely be wasted. You might as well post Google a cheque now and save yourself some time – unless you’ve taken the time and effort (or engaged a professional) to get a great conversion strategy in place.
Summary
So as you can see, it pays to really know what you’re doing when it comes to SEO, SEM and PPC – or you could risk pouring thousands of dollars straight down the drain.
If you’d like to know more, Metaweb has proven strategies for generating more website sales. Happy marketing!
