Get New Customers, Increase Sales with Search Engine Marketing

Search engine marketing is about making your website work harder to attract new customers and increase sales to existing ones.

Used correctly, search engine marketing can prove far more cost-effective than traditional media like press, radio and TV.

For an increasing number of businesses, these media are no longer the first choice, given the increasing power of the internet as the chosen way to source product information, compare prices and in many cases, buy.

Search engine marketing is one of the efficient ways to:

• Get new customers and turn lookers into buyers
• Get repeat business from existing customers
• Encourage existing customers to buy more often
• Encourage existing customers to spend more

Given that 89% of Australians and Australian small-to-medium businesses are on-line (Sensis E-Business Report, July 2008) and the ever-increasing numbers of both to research products and services online with view to buying, search engine marketing is clearly the way to go.

What is search engine marketing?

It is the process of actively marketing your website on search engines (like Google and Yahoo), led by search engine optimisation (SEO) and pay-per-click advertisng (PPC).

By instantly reaching nationwide and global demographics, search engine marketing offers the following key advantages:

1. Extreme leverage

Search engine marketing can reach millions of prospective customers instantly and with relative ease. It connects potential buyers directly with your company, making it a highly effective form of marketing.

2. Precise targeting

There are many different media through which you can reach potential customers. They offer high or low levels of targeting and active or passive user participation. But even the most specifically targeted publications and broadcast media cannot pinpoint the right prospects for you as efficiently as search engines.

The very word 'search' provides a vital clue. Prospective buyers search for information, prices and offers on the internet feeling it gives them more immediate, more relevant, more up-to-date information than available elsewhere.


3. Cost effectiveness

Search engine marketing saves money on printing, postage and distribution while enabling you, as a marketer, to better demonstrate the value your products offer and how they provide your customers with a better return on their investment — something especially important in the current challenging economic climate.

You can use the internet at costs usually far lower than those charged by print or broadcast media, Yellow Pages, e-mail and direct mail.

4. Measurable results

Search engine marketing campaigns can provide extensive data on the responses being achieved, allowing a high level of analysis to support and develop the campaign.

By analysing search engine position reports, site statistics, visitor conversion rates and other key indicators you can quickly see what works for you and what doesn't.

How SEO works:

SEO may take longer than PPC to be ranked high on organic search listings — your site has to earn its place rather than achieve added prominence by paying for it.

Organic listings are those in which websites earn their high rankings by their searcher-relevant content and site engineering without other methods like PPC.

Organic listings have the benefit of third party validation in the minds of people searching the web and are thus seen as more creditable. This is especially helpful for businesses which are not yet household names.

The practice of SEO also means that the website will be optimised for the user experience as well. Optimisation of the site can let the visitor know:

• That the site has what they are looking for
• Whether navigating to what they are searching for is fast and simple
• That they can trust your offering enough to make a purchase or at least leave their contact details so you can start a dialogue leading to a sale

Top search engine rankings work for your business 24/7 giving your site non-stop exposure.

By delivering content that is relevant and easily accessed by your prospects and customers, your brand identity becomes stronger, increasing the potential for more sales and bigger spends.

Increasing search engine presence with PPC advertising

This is a paid form of getting your website prominently placed on a search engine.

In Google, for instance, PPC listings are placed above the main (organic) listing and in the right hand margin. 

Advertisers pay each time a user clicks through to their website or landing page.  Ad position is usually determined by how much you pay for the searched keyword or phrase. Advertisers bid on relevant keywords and phrases to secure optimum ad positioning.

Benefits of PPC marketing:

• Provides an immediate increase in qualified visitors, leads and sales giving you fast results within just hours or days
• Is ideal for short-term advertising campaigns and can be measured precisely
• Is flexible, allowing for advertising copy changes, keywords and phrases to be edited, activated or paused
• Ensures that only subject or industry relevant ads are shown when a search query has been made
• Guarantees your search engine presence
• Ensures you pay only for qualified traffic, not just page impressions
• Marketing or advertising using PPC is cost-effective and has a high level of transparency
• Sponsored campaigns are created to fit your industry sector
• Sponsored links and PPC are an accurately targeted form of lead generation
• Correct use of high quality content (especially in your landing page) increases your return on investment.

SEO vs PPC

The golden rule in marketing is that you should constantly strive for maximum results and ROI for your budget.

In other words, if your marketing is making you a profit — even if it's a small profit — it's worth it. By this model, PPC is worth doing but, overall, it can eat into margins.

Taking Google as an example, you only pay when a visitor clicks to see your site and you can set a daily (scaleable and flexible) budget to cap your expenditure. Other search engines may have different rules and contracts so be sure to clarify what you agree to.

Bottom line:

Implementing natural SEO will significantly increase your visibility and margins over the long term.

Adding PPC techniques will gain measurable, immediate increases in traffic but you need to be sure the added expenditure (which can mount up quickly) is suitable for your product or service.

You also need to be sure your enquiry follow-up is up to the mark to maximise conversion of enquiries into sales.

Your best results, of course, will come from the optimum use of SEO and PPC.

Let's talk

We look forward to discussing your search engine marketing requirements, having partnered with search engine marketing specialists to ensure your website not only earns its keep but significantly increases your enquiries and sales.