SEM - Research Measures Success

SEM - Research Measures Success

Search engine marketing success comes from good research. By applying research to understand your competition and target audience, your optimization efforts will succeed.

Remember when homework from school often required some research on your part to complete? It is much the same scenario for search engine marketing: you need to apply yourself by researching in order to understand your competition and target audience. Your visitors need to relate to you and understand your message and what you want them to do.

Know Your Industry

You must spend time understanding the industry you are trying to make a profit from. If you sell widgets, know everything you can about widgets: where they come from, how they are typically sold, why people need them, etc. You can learn a great deal from your competitors. Research using industry communications such as online magazines, forums, newsletters and blogs. Read articles written by industry leaders and keep up on the latest news about your industry. The more you know, the better your basis for building an authoritative website.

What's Your Point?

Ok, so you've got this product you want to sell online. What are you saying to your audience? Make sure you write in a clear, concise way so your message does not get lost in the process. Just because everyone in your company understands your message doesn't mean the visitors to your site will. Have a few test scenarios set up; ask a few objective readers what they understand from your website and see just how much your message is getting across. You'd be surprised that what may be obvious to you is not necessarily obvious to your website visitors. If you are having trouble creating a clear message for your website, consider hiring a copywriter to convey what you want to say.

Know Your Target Audience

Who buys your product and why? Who needs the information you have on your website? Who would you like to have visit your

website that isn't already there? Who is visiting you? Are they professionals who understand your technical terms or visitors of varying levels who all need the same information from you? What do you offer that a certain market would want from you? Take the time to get a good look at what is out there and how your competitors are presenting their information to online visitors. Use your log statistics reports to track who comes to your website. Get familiar with the keyword terms they are using in the search engines to find you. Research the domains that most visit you. Find out why visitors are clicking away from certain pages before going deeper into the content of your website. Is it a lack of information? Too many choices to click on? Is the language used or instructions given easy to understand? Don't give your visitors a reason to leave before they understand your message.

Know Your Competition

Take a good look at your top competition and see what they are offering online. Even looking at websites that are not direct competitors may give you an idea of what to offer your visitors. Think of it this way: someone put effort into creating those websites. Visit your competitor's website. Search in the major search engines for your most important keyword phrases and see if your competitors show up in the top thirty search engine results. Learn what you can and see if what they are doing is something you should be doing. It's always good to know if your competitors are using SEO, Paid Inclusion, PPC, Link Building and other means to rank well.

Make Your Website Accessible

There's nothing worse than muddling through a website looking for what you want and clicking so much you finally give up. Use easy navigation, make sure your information or products are easily accessible to your visitors. Create written text that is easily understood in order to get your message across readily. Give your visitors plenty of written information. There's no such thing as "too much text" when it comes to search engine robots "understanding" your web pages. What's good for the visitor is often good for the search engine robots.

Do The Work

Research is the cornerstone to your success. The more you know about your subject, the better you will be able to inform your visitors. By informing your visitors you build trust and interest in learning more about your website. Do the math - get searching!

Daria Goetsch is the founder and Search Engine Marketing Consultant for Search Innovation Marketing, a Search Engine Marketing company serving small businesses. She has specialized in Search Engine Optimization since 1998, including three years as the Search Engine Specialist for O'Reilly Media, Inc., a technical book publishing company.

Copyright © 2002-2005 Search Innovation Marketing. http://www.searchinnovation.com All Rights Reserved.

Permission to reprint this article is granted if the article is reproduced in its entirety, without editing, including the bio information. Please include a hyperlink to http://www.searchinnovation.com when using this article in newsletters or online.

---

Can Google Really Deliver Country Specific Searching?

This is a serious matter, can Google really deliver top... Read More

Soliciting Search Engines

As your guide operator through the web, search engines are... Read More

The Great Search Engine War, Where Content is King

When search engines first appeared, they were simple affairs consisting... Read More

What Constitutes a Complete and Effective SEO Campaign?

Unfortunately, not many Search Engine Optimization companies know what this... Read More

New Site and Sandbox: How to Get Rid of It

You have put lot of sweat in making your site.... Read More

Selecting The Title Of Your Link Exchanges

I want to touch base with selecting the title of... Read More

The SEO Gurus poem

Am I alone as I survey that vast wilderness outside,Sat... Read More

Keywords Finalization Methodology

To arrive at the set of keywords that:Describe business correctly... Read More

Search Engine Optimization for Dummies

Lets face it. Search Engines rule the World Wide Web... Read More

Is a High Search Engine Ranking Important for YOU?

In the process of designing a website for clients the... Read More

The Smart Way To Get Listed On Google!

So you want to get listed on Google? And you... Read More

One Way Link Building Secures Long Term Ranking Results

One-way link building is a great way to improve your... Read More

Press Release + PRWeb = Top Google Rank... True or False?

I've always been a big time press release aficionado.And up... Read More

An Introduction to Google Sitemaps

... and why I 'm dying to get finally in... Read More

Writing SEO Copy ? 8 Steps to Success

We all know that the lion's share of web traffic... Read More

Googles Trap, DMOZs Nap, And Yahoo!s Crap

On November 16th, 2003, Google commenced an update (the Florida... Read More

9 Ways to Keep Google Happy

A recent Google patent application has the SEO community buzzing.... Read More

SEO Expert Explains on how to Restore a Website and Remove Sandbox Effect from Your Website

The sandbox effect or (site getting banned on google) has... Read More

Agressive Linking Strategies Help To Get Your Site Noticed

A good link building strategy has become an essential part... Read More

How Search Engines Connect Sellers and Buyers

Maggie knows how to find what she wants. She lets... Read More

10 Ways to Tackle Keyword Research and Selection

You need to be extremely careful with keyword research so... Read More

SEO Expert Guide - Keyword Analysis (part 3/10)

If you imagine that building an optimized site is like... Read More

How To See What Pages Of Your Site Google Has In Its Index

There is a lag time between the indexing or updating... Read More

Your Search Engine Optimization Strategy: Make Love, Not War

When it comes to search engine optimization strategy, there are... Read More

Search Engines Are Going to Love You for This

What's the most potent free traffic source on the web?***... Read More

Without Conversion Rates You Don’t Know If You’re Mickey Mouse Or Mickey Mantle

I couldn’t agree more with the headline of this article... Read More

Twelve Steps to Higher Search Engine Placement

Recent studies suggest that more than 80% of new visitors... Read More

SEO, the Simplified Version

Lets get things straight. SEO is a very competitive market.... Read More

1 Simple SEO Strategy To Get More Visitors To Your Site From Google

Did you know that you can dramatically increase the number... Read More

SEO and the Outsourcing of Inbound Link Building

Search Engine Optimization nowadays has a lot to do with... Read More

Search Engine Copywriting: Focus on One Topic

Perhaps the simplest of all the lessons I have learned... Read More

A Classified Way To Drive Business To Your Web Site

There are more than 105 million of them in the... Read More

Optimizing Online Catalog Copy for the Search Engines

It only makes sense. You have an e-commerce catalog site.... Read More