What is SEM?

SEM is a digital marketing strategy that promotes websites by increasing their visibility in SERPs through paid advertising. Unlike SEO, which simply focuses on the organic searches, SEM employs tactics like PPC advertising to gain immediate visibility depending on the target.

 Key Components of SEM

1. Paid Search Ads: These are the ads that typically appear at the top and bottom of results pages for search engines and usually with a small “Ad” label next to them. They are generally triggered by specific keywords a user enters through search engines.

2. Pay-Per-Click: PPC is the most popular advertising model under SEM, wherein an advertiser pays a certain fee each time one clicks on their ad. Google Ads is the most popular PPC platform.

3. Ad Auction: Whenever a user makes a search query, there is an immediate auction in which it is determined which ads are to be shown in response to the user’s query, and in which order. Factors such as the user’s bid amount and ad quality are considered in this auction.

4. Keywords: Keywords are in fact the foundation of SEM. Every advertiser bids on the keywords relevant to his or her products; this is to ensure the ads they post will appear whenever somebody searches for those words.

5. Ad Copy: Eye-catching ad copy is needed to get more clicks. A good ad copy needs to be brief, informative, relevant to the keyword, and have a clear call-to-action clearly specified.

6. Landing Pages: This is the page the user is taken to after clicking on an ad. A strongly optimized landing page can enhance conversion rates multi-fold.

Why SEM is Crucial Today

It is estimated that there will be 6.54 billion internet users by 2025, making the online market a growing potential target market. In the year 2024 alone, the number of internet users in the United States is estimated to reach 323.56 million. Globally, 99,000-plus queries are entered into Google, which is the most dominant search engine, per second, currently giving an idea of how vast SEM outreach can be.

Search Behavior:

According to demandsage Organic searches drive 1000% more traffic than organic social.

– On average, a person views 8.79 pages on Google when he or she is searching.

– “Near Me” and “Where to buy” have increased 200 % in the last two years.

– 92.1 % of users use their smartphone to access the internet.

– More than 58 % of clients look for local businesses or companies using voice searches.

Google’s Control:

– Globally, Google also has captured 95.69 % of mobile search engines.

– Google holds 88.89% of the search engine market share in the United States.

– Chrome holds a 48.77% market share of browsers within the United States.

State of the Internet Use Worldwide:

– Internet users worldwide as of 2023 are 5.16 billion users, accounting for 64.5% of the global human population.

– China contains the largest unit of Internet users with 1.05 billion persons online.

– Internet users in the United States are at 305.37 million people.

Benefits of SEM

– Instant Visibility —Whereas SEO could take months into effect, SEM provides instant exposure on the search engines.

– Targeted Advertisements — SEM offers the ability to reach targeted keywords, demographics, locations, and times during the day in order to have the ad displayed in front of the right audience.

– Measurable Results — SEM platforms offer granular analytics; therefore, one can track down every impression, click, conversion, and, finally, ROI, which helps get better means of measurement and optimization of performance.

– Scalable: SEM is scalable up or down according to the budget and performance. Thus, it makes a round for each business, be it small or big.

Getting Started with SEM

1. Set Your Goals: Be sure about what you wish to gain from the SEM campaign. Common objectives could be an increase in site traffic, lead generation, sales enhancement, or just fame.

2. Choosing the Right platform: Google Ads will be preferable, but others like Bing Ads and Yahoo Ads may also prove efficient for a target audience.

3. Conducting Keyword Research: Identify the right keywords for your campaign with tools such as Google Keyword Planner, SEMrush, or Ahrefs. Identify keywords based on good volume and competition.

4. Ad creation : Write ad copy that is concise but believable, including target keywords and a healthy CTA. Test versions against one another to see which one does best.

5. Landing-page optimization: Make sure your landers are on point with your ads, that they load quickly, and consist of proper CTAs. An easy user journey will contribute to an increase in your conversion rate.

6. Decide Your Budget: Decide on an amount you would be willing to spend daily or monthly toward your campaign. It is advisable to start small and scale up when performance and ROAS seem right.

7. Monitor and Optimize: Keep a tab on how your campaigns are performing with the help of analytics tools, and make data-driven adjustments to bids, keywords, ad copy, and landing pages to drive better results.

Conclusion

Search engine marketing is one of the strongest resources in aiding businesses toward an immediate, targeted search engine result. It will arm you with the capability to design effective campaigns around your desired traffic, lead generation, or sales maximization, from grasping the fundamentals in keyword research to ad creation and optimization. SEM will be your go-to tool for executing measurable and scalable digital marketing. As the years go by and more and more users log online—with developing search behavior—the implications of mastering SEM will show to be imperative in staying at the forefront of an evolving digital marketing landscape.

The post Introduction to SEM: A Beginner’s Guide appeared first on SiteProNews.

This guide will cover the basics of Google Ads management, from setting up campaigns to optimizing them and analyzing performance metrics. In no time, you’ll be running effective campaigns that bring in more leads and convert customers into paying customers.

What is Google Ads Management?

Google Ads management is the process of creating, optimizing, and monitoring your Google Ads campaigns. It involves understanding how Google Ads works and using that knowledge to create successful campaigns that achieve your advertising goals.

To be successful at Google Ads, you need to understand how the auction system works and how to use keyword research to find the right keywords for your campaigns. You also need to know how to create effective ad copy and landing pages that convert visitors into customers. Additionally, you must be able to track your campaign’s performance and make necessary adjustments to optimize results.

If you’re new to Google Ads, there’s a lot to learn. But with the right resources and a little practice, you can get successful in Google Ads campaigns.

Process of Creating a Google Ads Campaign

Assuming you’re starting from scratch, the first step is to create a new campaign in Google Ads. To do this, log into your account and click on the “Campaigns” tab. Then, click on the “+ Campaign” button.

Once you’re on the “Create your first campaign” page, you’ll need to select what type of campaign you want to create. For most businesses, the “Search Network Only” option will be the best choice. However, if you sell products online, you may want to consider the “Shopping” campaign type.

After you’ve selected the campaign type, you’ll need to give your campaign a name. This can be anything you want, but it’s generally best to keep it short and descriptive. For example, if you’re creating a search campaign for your home cleaning business, you might name it “Home Cleaning Search Campaign.”

Once you’ve given your campaign a name, it’s time to start adding keywords. Keywords are the terms that people use when they’re searching for products or services like yours. To add keywords to your campaign, click on the “Keywords” tab and then click on the “+ Keywords” button.

On the “Add keywords” page, you’ll need to enter each keyword that you want to target. You can either enter them one at a time or upload a list of keywords from a file. If you’re not sure which keywords to target, Google offers

How Can a Company Benefit from Google Ads Management?

Google Ads is without a doubt one of the most successful platforms for online advertising. Google Ads management can help businesses create and manage their campaigns effectively so that they can achieve their desired results.

Here are some of the benefits that businesses can enjoy by working with an ad management company:

• Improved campaign performance: An experienced ad management company will be able to optimize your campaigns for better results. They will have the knowledge and expertise to know which keywords and ad copy are more likely to convert so that your campaigns can perform at their best.

• Increased ROI: With improved campaign performance comes increased ROI. A good Google Ads management company will be able to help you get a better return on investment by ensuring that your campaigns are as effective as possible.

• More time to focus on other aspects of your business: Letting a professional team handle your Google Ads campaign frees up your time so that you can focus on other aspects of running your business. This way, you can continue growing your business while someone else takes care of generating leads and sales through Google Ads.

How to Target Your Google Ads?

As a business owner, you know that advertising is essential to driving growth. But with so many options out there, it can be difficult to decide where to invest your marketing budget. Google Ads management is a powerful tool that can help you reach your target audience and grow your business. If you’re not strategic with Google ads, you could be wasting money on ads that don’t convert.

This guide shares some tips on how to target your Google Ads so that you can get the most out of your investment.

1. Define Your Target Audience

The first step in targeting your Google ads is to define your target audience. Who are you trying to reach with your ads? What are their needs and interests? When you have a clear picture of who you’re trying to reach, you can create ads that are more likely to resonate with them.

2. Use Keywords Strategically

One way to make sure your ads are reaching the right people is to use keywords strategically. When someone searches for a keyword that’s relevant to your business, your ad will appear in the search results. So if you want to reach people who are interested in what you offer, choose keywords that are closely related to what you do or sell.

3. Set up Targeted Campaigns

Another way to ensure your ads are reaching the right people is to set up targeted campaigns. With targeted campaigns, you can specify exactly to whom you want to show your ads.

Measuring the Success of Your Google Ads Campaign

Google Ads campaigns can be a great way to drive traffic to your website and generate leads or sales. But how do you know if your campaign is successful?

There are a few key metrics you can use to measure the success of your Google Ads campaign:

1. Click-through rate (CTR): This is the percentage of people who click on your ad after seeing it. People are interested in what you’re offering if your CTR is high.

2. Conversion rate: This is the percentage of people who take the desired action after clicking on your ad, such as making a purchase or signing up for a newsletter. A high conversion rate indicates that your advertisement is successful in convincing viewers to perform the intended action.

3. Cost per conversion: This is the amount you spend on your ad divided by the number of conversions (sales or leads). A low cost per conversion means that your campaign is efficient and generating leads or sales at a low cost.

4. Return on investment (ROI): This is the ratio of money made from your campaign to money spent on your campaign. A high ROI means that your campaign is generating a good return on investment.

Conclusion

The key takeaways for managing a successful Google Ads campaign include budgeting for your campaigns, monitoring your campaigns regularly, optimizing your campaigns for better results, and testing different campaign strategies. By following these tips, you can set your Google Ads campaigns up for success. You can hire a PPC agency to get the best results.

The post Google Ads Management: Creating a Successful Google Ads Campaign appeared first on SiteProNews.

That’s not it. 38 percent of online users in the US first read online reviews and then make a decision.

Data shows us that Google My Business (GMB) reviews matter, which is why you need to encourage your customers to leave reviews more often as a business. The better reviews you gather, the higher your rank on Google and the more traffic you’ll get. Eventually, it’ll lead to higher revenues and recurring leads.

If you want to learn more about GMB optimization services and how to use them to get more Google reviews, keep reading.

Why are Google My Business Reviews Important?

Google reviews are a game changer for businesses. They bring an abundance of benefits, including increased visibility and higher ranking, without spending any money.

Here are a few benefits of GMB reviews:

Increased Transparency

People value transparency, and Google reviews provide just that. Consumers are still a little skeptical about online shopping. Knowing other people have bought the same product and service as they’re seeking gives them peace of mind.

That’s why users tend to search for a business and read its reviews before purchasing anything from them. Research shows that positive reviews create trust, increase confidence, and persuade the consumer to take action.

Increased Online Visibility and Improved SEO

Google My Business reviews have an impact on search results. Google’s current algorithm goes over customer reviews and checks their posting frequency, quantity, and diversity.

A business with all three elements will have a higher chance of landing on the first page of local search results. This increases your chance of being discovered organically, especially if you use other SEO practices like GMB optimization, keyword use, and SEO content development.

When done right, Google reviews will show your business on the location map and display your content information, site, ratings, and reviews for the customers.

Allows You to Improve

Google reviews give you direct input on what customers think of your product and service. You get insights about your customer experience, where customers were happy and when they were not, and what products and services they’ve been opting for.

Monitoring this can tell you which areas need improvement and what you’re doing right.

Higher Conversion Rates

Consumers who see positive reviews about your business on Google are more likely to trust you. This will, in turn, give them the confidence to buy from you and leave a positive review themselves.

How to Get More Google My Business Reviews

Now that you know the importance of Google reviews, you may wonder how to increase them. Here’s what you can do:

Focus on Providing an Exceptional Customer Service

Need to compel your customers to leave a review? Make them love your product or service. If they’re blown away by the service you provide and see that their needs matter to you, they’ll become loyal customers who want to leave a positive review about their experience with your company.

Ask for a Review Directly

Want to increase your chances of getting a Google review from your customers? Ask them! Customers might not think of leaving one, so a reminder can encourage them to leave one. You can direct them to the review page by sending them a link.

You can also ask your employees to ask the customers for a review every time a purchase is made. However, make sure you aren’t too pushy.

Respond to Negative and Positive Reviews

Don’t ignore the negative reviews you get. When you respond to the positive and negative reviews you get, you’re showing the customers that their voice matters. It also builds a lasting customer relationship where they are encouraged to post more reviews because they know they won’t be ignored.

Leave Something Behind

It’s also a great marketing tactic to give your customer a little something to contact your business if they need to. With their product, leave a business or feedback card or a phone number to contact you. If you’re an online business, you can do this digitally.

Don’t Lose It at Bad Reviews

You won’t always get positive reviews. If your first reaction is to attack the customer, stop! Don’t come up with excuses; instead, tell them you’ll make things right.

When your customer can see that you read the reviews and work on them, they’re more likely to choose your business over the competitors.

Use CTAs to Encourage People

Sometimes customers just need a reminder to go write that review. For that, you can add Calls to Action (CTAs) in multiple places on your website or physical store. A simple “Like something? Leave a review!” will give them a nudge.

Let Them Know It’s Simple

Customers can be lazy. So, let them know it’s easy to leave a review and takes little to no time at all! You can ask them to leave a star rating and write a sentence or two about what they think of your product or service.

Try Email Marketing

Need more reviews? Try email marketing! Be straightforward. Ask them to write a review for you, and if they’re happy customers, they will be encouraged to do so. Since the process of writing a Google review is pretty simple, you’re very likely to get a response.

Use Social Media Platforms

Have a social media following? Don’t ignore them! Social media platforms are a great way to build a communicative relationship with your customers. You can include a link to the Google My Business reviews section and ask your followers to add in what they think of your business and the experience they’ve had with you.

The post The Easiest Way to Get More Google My Business Reviews appeared first on SiteProNews.

But, if done incorrectly, you can quickly spend a lot of your marketing dollars and have absolutely nothing to show for it.

This is why many attorneys and other local service business owners think PPC marketing doesn’t work. They’re simple not doing it correctly. To run a successful PPC campaign, you have to look at it from a comprehensive point of view. Not taking into consideration how other marketing channels work together (like your website, Google reviews, or your content and sales copy) can and will absolutely hinder the success of your PPC campaign.

It’s critical that you have a complete digital marketing strategy in place before you ever start sending paid traffic to your website.

What is Conversion Rate Optimization?

Getting potential customers and clients to your website is only half the battle. Once they’re there what action do you want them to take?

• Call your business
• Fill out a contact form
• Sign up for an email newsletter
• Download an ebook, etc.

In regard to internet marketing, conversion rate optimization (also called conversion optimization, lead conversion, or just CRO) is the process of increasing website leads and sales without having to spend more money on attracting additional web traffic.

How Conversion Rate Optimization Works

Conversion rate optimization actually shares many of its basic principles with direct response marketing (think mail, radio, TV, and print ad campaigns), which have been around for almost 100 years. Like direct response marketing, modern day conversion rate optimization utilizes human psychology, A/B split-testing, goal or conversion tracking, and audience testing to optimize your website.

Some test methods, such as split testing (also called A/B testing) enables you to monitor which headlines, images and content help to convert more of your website visitors into new customers and clients.

Importance of Tracking Goals and Conversions

Conversion tracking is the most important thing you need to do in order to increase your conversions, but it is the one thing that I see most often overlooked. You will never know how successful your marketing efforts are, or how to optimize your campaigns for more success unless you track conversions.

You can track your conversions by setting up “Goals” in Google Analytics. If you are an attorney or other type of local service business, the two most important conversions you want to track are phone calls and contact form submissions.

You can track “click to call” buttons and contact form submissions for free by integrating Google Tag Manager with Google Analytics. Or, if you want more precise data on your phone call conversions, you can integrate paid tools such as CallRail.

Additional Keys to a Positive ROI for Your PPC Campaigns

Use Keyword Targeted Landing Pages

A common mistake we see lawyers and other local service business owners make when running PPC campaigns is not having dedicated landing pages specifically for each of their ad groups. The more specific you can make your sales process using PPC ads, the better your results will be.

Separate Yourself from Your Competitors

Leverage your experience, reviews, awards, and results, to your advantage. Tell your prospect why they should choose you over the competitor down the street.

Target the Right Keywords

If your campaign is setup to run the broad match keyword “oral surgeon” for example, it can (and will) still show your ad when someone types a keyword even loosely related. When setup like this the keyword “dentist” alone could trigger your ad.

For this reason, broad match keywords almost always lead to lower conversion rates, so it’s best to avoid them. By setting all your keywords to either phrase match, or exact match, you’re telling Google to only show your ad when someone searches for that keyword specifically.

Conclusion

Gathering, analyzing, and testing visitor data is key to optimizing your website and landing pages, along with developing a complete digital marketing strategy. It’s amazing how many business websites there are that don’t employ even the most basic of CRO tactics. This opens the door to a huge opportunity for those that do.

The post The Importance of Conversion Rate Optimization in PPC Advertising appeared first on SiteProNews.

Every business, whether it is small or big, always wants a fully functioning website. It is the search engine that acts as a window to display your goods and services to the world and give your company a unique identity. But, what’s the point of having a website when you can’t reach your future clients?

Nothing, right?

This is where SEO gets into the picture.

With the help of SEO tactics (Search engine optimization), you can easily boost your website’s presence on the search engine and attract more leads. In simple words, SEO is one of the best methods to increase your website traffic from search engines like Google.

If you are a beginner in the digital marketing world, here are some reliable sources that will help you learn more about search engines and how they work.

The Best Sources to Learn About Search Engines

1. The Beginner’s Guide to SEO by Moz.com

This amazing guide by Moz.com is basically designed to explain all the major aspects of search engine optimization. This is one of the best sources that can help you learn a lot of things like finding the terms and keywords that can generate better traffic to your business website, building links, making your site SEO friendly, and giving it a unique value. This guide is divided into the following 8 chapters:

Chapter 1: SEO 101

Chapter 2: How Search Engines Work: Crawling, Indexing, and Ranking

Chapter 3: Keyword Research

Chapter 4: On-Page SEO

Chapter 5: Technical SEO

Chapter 6: Link Building & Establishing Authority

Chapter 7: Measuring & Tracking SEO Success

Chapter 8: SEO Glossary

You can go through this guide and learn more about the tactics of mastering search engines and SEO. After that, you can boost your website presence on the search engines and get better business results.

2. SEO Made Simple (A Complete Guide by Neil Patel)

If you find reading from the web a boring task, then this source is for you. “SEO Made Simple by Neil Patel,” is an amazing and interesting SEO guide. It covers videos, images, and screenshots that will help you get more familiar with search engine strategies and SEO basics. Here are a few things you can learn:

• Overview of SEO
• Difference between white hat & black hat
• Difference between on-page SEO & off-page SEO
• On-Page SEO
• Off-Page SEO

3. Web Savvy Marketing

Web Savvy marketing is a platform where you can learn to grow your web presence. Discover different marketing tools that can be helpful in brand building, driving traffic, and producing a tangible stream of revenue and ROI. The website delivers quality insights about simply utilizing search engine algorithms properly.

If you are a beginner and want to get more ideas about the fundamental concepts of SEO and how to implement them, the Web Savvy marketing website is an ideal platform for you. Not only will it help you gain better knowledge but also increase your website presence as well.

4. Search Engine Journal

A renowned website that can help you stay up-to-date with amazing articles written by well known SEO experts, social analytic tools, and paid search. There are many articles published daily on this website that can help you gain information about search engines, SEO tactics, and topics like:

• Digital Experience
• International Search
• Link Building
• Analytics
• Local Search
• Mobile Search
• Web Development

Knowing about all this can help you boost your business presence on search engines like Google, Yahoo, Bing, etc.

5. Google Webmaster Central Blog

This is an official Google blog that is really beneficial if you want to gather data about updates, indexing, crawling, and ranking. By referring to this source, you can learn about the new features that Google is going to roll out. It is a resource that you can’t overlook. Since Google is the biggest and the most popular search engine worldwide, what could be better than visiting its official website blog and knowing more about the search engine and SEO.

For more information, you can refer to Google’s search engine optimization starter guide that provides a step-by-step process to get a higher ranking on Google.

6. SEO Starter Guide by Google

Our sixth useful resource is a 32-page beginner’s guide in PDF format that covers the basics about search engines and SEO. Even though the guide is technical, it is worth reading. You will get to know more about:

• SEO Basics
• Improving Site Structure
• Optimizing Content
• Dealing with Crawlers
• SEO for Mobile Phones
• Promotions and Analysis

For a beginner running a start-up, this guide is useful in ranking a website in the search engine results and increasing traffic. The best thing is that this guide is from Google which is undoubtedly the best search engine. Stay updated about SEO strategies and how to maintain your website presence by referring to this guide.

7. QuickSprout

One of the most famous digital marketing entrepreneurs, Neil Patel, runs this website. 

It is a well-known forum aiming to educate and inform people who are new to SEO and not aware of the search engine algorithms. This website offers seminars and webinars to share information with thousands of people. Consider it one of the best sources for increasing your website’s online presence and becoming a better businessman. The seminar includes seven chapters where you will get to know about:

• Introduction to SEO
• Site speed and results
• New searching algorithm
• Advanced data analysis
• Keyword research
• Content building links
• Vertical searching

8. Yoast SEO Blog

This is a useful resource that will help you with technical SEO, WordPress SEO, and SEO content. Most travel bloggers and business people choose WordPress for their websites. The main focus of the Yoast blog is to enhance user knowledge on increasing their website search engine rankings as well as earnings. You can also learn more about things like why you should use synonyms and related keywords, what a landing page is and how it works, ways to improve your core web vitals, indexing, and much more.

9. Google’s Digital Marketing Course

This is different from the resources above. It is a kind of self-studying training pack that you need to complete at your convenience. When you take this digital marketing course, you learn about the tactics that you need to apply to become successful in the era of digital marketing. Refer to this course if you want to be successful and build a better online presence.

10. Ahrefs Blog

Finally, we come to the last but the most reliable resource, i.e., Ahrefs. It is a kind of data marketing website that focuses on the bigger picture. If you want to dive deep into SEO tactics and strategies, you can refer to the Ahrefs blog. You will learn how to create a viable link network that can help move your content up and down the SERPs. This website has a lot of informative articles for beginners, including topics like:

• How to increase website authority?
• Link building for beginners – Guide to get backlinks in 2020
• What are the keywords?
• How to make use of keywords in SEO?
• Content marketing types to grow your business

The list doesn’t end here. There is a lot more information at Ahrefs. 

Wrapping Up…

Search Engine Optimization is a crucial component of 21st-century marketing. Agree or not?

It is all about building a website presence on the search engines and gaining search traffic. The above resources will help you turn your average startup into a brand. This is only possible when you have a strong knowledge of search engine strategies and SEO concepts. For that, the reliable resources noted above can be of great help. Good luck!

The post 10 Reliable Sources to Learn About Search Engines appeared first on SiteProNews.

In this article, we’ve gathered ten great social media management tools that will help you do everything from scheduling to automatically sharing old content, creating social media images, evaluating results, and more.

Social Media Marketing Kitchener provides 10 best social media management tools that you can use in 2020:

1. Planable.io

One of the most useful aspects of Planable is the opportunity to see your social posts as if they were in the social feed.

This is useful if you want to drop posts across a number of different feeds and you need to configure them for each feed. You can drag and drop media files to your posts which helps you to prepare and build a visual calendar to see your campaigns clearly.

Features:

• The appeal of being able to see your posts as they appear in the feed can’t be underestimated.
• This feature helps to ensure that your visual content is first-rate by incorporating humor, gifs, etc. to your brand’s social media. 

2. Hootsuite

Hootsuite is one of the best social media management tools available for the production and management of business campaigns. Instead of manually handling all social media sites, you can just open Hootsuite and manage from a single dashboard.

You can use this social media app to schedule messages, monitor interactions, manage multiple profiles, and to perform many other social activities.

Features: 

• Has a limited free plan.
• You can schedule campaigns across various social media networks from a single dashboard.

3. Social Pilot

The Social Pilot suite has won a lot of fans with its simple and easy-to-use interface and competitive pricing.

It allows for bulk scheduling, content curation, and brand management.

Features: 

• The Social Pilot Calendar feature is a crowd-pleaser
• Smart reporting and good analytics
• You can quickly see how various accounts are doing and determine where to spend extra time focusing on customer interaction. 

4. SEMrush

We all know that SEMrush is a stellar forum to audit your SEO efforts.

In addition to tracking the performance of your content and finding the right keywords to use, you can also post, and manage your social media profiles, on the SEMrush app.

In their Social Media Toolkit, you can schedule messages, edit images, and import files from CSV files.

Features: 

• The SEMrush competitor research tools are extremely useful. You can find out which keywords they’re using and which digital marketing tactics work for them.

5. Buffer

Buffer is another handy tool that many pro-marketers use to share posts on a fixed timeline to get better results and to get more social traffic to their site.

You can add a particular time to share your content in just a few clicks. The free version only provides one social profile per network – you need the premium version to access multiple profiles.

Features: 

• It lets you upload images, articles, and videos with ease.
• You can organize content across various social networks from a single dashboard

6. Canva

Having well-designed graphics is a perfect way to boost your social media game. Registered marketers can use glamorous images for Pinterest and Instagram to produce better leads. When you need support with your image needs, Canva is the best social media resource you can use.

Canva is a great platform built to help you handle social media visuals. This tool gives you the ability to create a website without knowing anything about web design.

Features: 

• You can create great-looking content from your web browser 
• Thousands of exclusive graphic elements for the creation of beautiful images.

7. Sked Social

 It’s no secret that Facebook ads can build a reputation for your website and help you hit your target audience. So many advertisements on Facebook , however, have made them easy to ignore so marketers are now switching to sites like Instagram.

Sked Social allows you to:  

Features: 

• Modify photos for bulk sharing.
• Upload to multiple Instagram accounts through an easy-to-use interface.

8. Meet Edgar

Your social media channels will be full of content if you use Meet Edgar.

This interactive framework provides several different approaches to content development.

Features:

•  Meet Edgar has a smart composer that saves you precious time when creating content.

9. SharedCount

SharedCount is a free resource that lets you monitor the number of shares in a particular post on your website.

The key aim of using social media is to increase traffic and thus boost conversion. And, one of the easiest ways to know your campaign success rate is by testing the number of shares in your domain.

Features: 

• This tool is available free of charge and supports both Facebook and Twitter. Test the number of shares for bulk URLs.

10. Edgar

Edgar allows you to arrange information sharing. It does not add all content in a single queue. It assigns content to various categories and then applies publication time to each category. This lets you hit a market at a specific time.

Features: 

• Edgar optimizes post times by group, rather than using a single queue and reposts social media content to help you get more insight into your messages.

Bonus Tool: GoLogin

While GoLogin.com isn’t a full social media management tool with features like scheduling posts, it excels in managing multiple social media accounts.  With separate cloud profiles, you can safely log into various social media platforms without conflicts and maintain a distinct identity for each account. This makes GoLogin.com a valuable asset, particularly for social media agencies handling numerous client accounts.

The post 10 Best Social Media Management Tools to Improve Search Results in 2020 appeared first on SiteProNews.

In today’s world, having a strong digital presence is essential and your success is likely to depend on your ability to market your new business effectively online. But is this something you could do yourself, or is it the preserve of the professionals? Read on and make up your mind.

What is Digital Marketing?

In a nutshell, digital marketing comprises all the activities you undertake to promote your business in the online world. Your business’s home on the internet will be your website. As people visit your website, you’ll be introducing them to your business and what you offer, and hopefully converting them into clients.

However, no matter how good your website is, your potential customers need to know that it’s there and to be able to find it. This is where your digital marketing activities come in. These are likely to include Search Engine Marketing (SEM), Search Engine Optimization (SEO) and Social Media Marketing (SMM). The creation of your website, and the accompanying digital marketing activities, are all things which you can outsource to specialist agencies, or which you can do yourself.

Your Website

Designing a website doesn’t necessarily require any expertise in coding but rather the ability to write good content and illustrate it with strong images and other features. Lots of website builders exist, which are platforms enabling you to build your website without having to concern yourself with what actually makes it all work.

You might use Squarespace, Wix or WordPress, or a website builder provided by the company you’ve chosen to host your domain. Plenty of options are available. You can select one of the design templates provided by your website builder which means that the structure of your website is already laid out for you, together with things like the fonts and colours. You then provide the content in the form of text and images, and arrange things appropriately on each page. You can use your own photographs or utilise stock images available on the internet.

Search Engine Marketing (SEM)

Search Engine Marketing (SEM) is about presenting ads on Search Engine Results Pages (SERP’s). When someone types a search term into Google, or Bing, or whatever search engine they’re using, you will want your ad to appear when that search is relevant to your business. You are charged each time your ad is clicked and so SEM is also known as Pay Per Click Advertising (PPC).

When someone clicks on one of your ads, they are taken to a page on your website. This page is called a landing page and is not necessarily your home page. In fact, landing pages should be designed to match as closely as possible the search intent of the prospective client typing in (or speaking) the search query. It is the function of your landing page to captivate the person’s attention, persuade them that they should engage with your business, and show them how to do so.

The most popular SEM platform is Google Ads, following by Microsoft Advertising. Within these platforms you define everything to do with your SEM campaign, including the target demographic and geographical location, the keywords to be used to trigger your ads, and the prices you are willing to pay for your clicks. As an advertiser, your goal is to be amongst the top results presented on the SERPs. In order to achieve this you are competing against other businesses who also want to be in those positions.

Search Engine Optimization (SEO)

The results displayed on any SERP are determined by Google, or Microsoft, or whichever search engine you are using. Someone looking for a particular product or service may be presented with a number of ads, followed by a small map with several local businesses listed underneath, then some structured snippets, and then ten organic listings, which may be followed by more ads.

The goal of SEO is to achieve the highest possible position as one of the organic listings. A click on any of these listings is free of charge, but the challenge is to attain one of the top positions. The vast majority of searchers don’t look beyond the first page of search results and so this means that ideally you want to be one of the first ten results displayed.

Search Engine Optimization involves the activities you undertake in order that one or more of the pages of your website should achieve the highest possible position on the SERP. SEO involves both on-page and off-page techniques.

On-page techniques are about creating the best possible content on your website. This content should be engaging and compelling, both in the text copy, and in the images presented. It should clearly articulate what you need to communicate about your business and should captivate the reader so that they will want to reach out to you after visiting your site.

As a result of the increasing intelligence of the algorithms used by search engines, content written for the human reader will be equally well understood by the search algorithm. 

This means there is no need to manipulate the wording of your text copy to try to achieve a better outcome.

Off-page SEO is about the links you build between your website and other websites. Many of these will happen naturally as you list your business in search directories and create social profiles. The most powerful links back to your website are those coming from other sites which have a good reputation on the internet. The links from other sites to your website are known as backlinks and are an indicator to the search engines that your website is worth visiting.

Google looks for high levels of Expertise, Authoritativeness and Trustworthiness (E-A-T) in order to rank pages highly on its search engine results pages. It takes time to build the reputation of your brand and your website and this means that SEO requires a medium to long term strategy, requiring months or even years.

Social Media Marketing (SMM)

The third element of digital marketing is the use of social media. Multiple social media channels exist but the most useful are perhaps Facebook, Instagram, LinkedIn, Twitter and YouTube. You don’t need to use all of these and you might for example choose to focus on Facebook only. The starting point is then to create a page for your business on Facebook.

The general idea of social media marketing is that you post regular content which will be interesting and useful to your customers. The content needn’t be directly promotional as such but it should build your relationship and standing with your followers.

In order for social media marketing to be effective you do of course need to have followers. You can begin to build your following by leveraging off your personal contacts on Facebook. You can then grow your following further by emailing your customers following completion of jobs for them and asking them to like, follow or share your page.

PPC advertising is also available through social media, for example using Facebook Ads. Unlike Google Ads and Microsoft Advertising, these ads aren’t triggered by keyword searches but are presented based on demographics and geography.

This post has merely introduced a few of the building blocks of digital marketing. Undergirding each of the techniques described is the creation of content on the internet which relates to your business and your expertise. This is known as Content Marketing.

As you launch your business you’ll be presenting content through your website, your ads, your social media channels, and elsewhere. In the world in which we live today, content is truly king and the right content is what will draw customers to you and your business.

Success with your efforts!

The post DIY Digital Marketing appeared first on SiteProNews.

But which ones do you really need to understand and what do they all mean? The truth is that each set of three letters has a specific list of associated tasks that are vital for your success, and you’ll want to pay attention to them. Here’s what you need to know about the difference between SEO, SEM, and SMM.

What is Search Engine Optimization?

Search engine optimization (SEO) is essentially a set of best practices designed to help your website rank better on search engines such as Google or Bing—a critical factor in improving traffic and increasing overall conversions. A website’s particular rank is referred to as its SERP or search engine ranking position.

These steps include everything from using appropriate H1 through H4 tags when writing content to making sure to add alt tags on images and other various steps. We won’t go into all of them here. But, essentially, SEO is simply making sure you’re doing everything you can possibly do to cater to the requirements of search engine bots—i.e., software tools that come to your site on behalf of a particular search engine and decide where you should be placed in the search ranking.

Furthermore, there are also two key types of SEO to understand—on-page and off-page. On-page means the steps you actually take while on your website, such as adding new content or updating meta descriptions to include a particularly important keyword. Off-page refers to the actions you take off your website to help improve your search engine ranking. Examples include backlinking to your website on an article that’s posted on another related website.

In most cases, every digital marketer should pay attention to these steps and incorporate them throughout the entire website. These efforts are sometimes also referred to as organic traffic because the person searching the internet finds your website organically without clicking on a paid advertisement. The biggest downside to this marketing method? It can sometimes take a few weeks or months to increase SERP and see an improvement in traffic.

What is Search Engine Marketing?

Search engine marketing (SEM) is a process of driving traffic to your website through paid means, such as pay-per-click (PPC) advertising. Essentially, this is like jumping to the head of the line by paying a search engine like Google or Bing to show up at the top of the results page instead of waiting for your organic SEO efforts to take hold. In some cases, it can be wildly effective—but only if done right.

The most popular platform to use for SEM is Google AdWords. However, in recent years saturation of the market has caused advertising prices to skyrocket and made this method less desirable for those who are just starting out. These ads are also starting to become less trusted and acknowledged by those searching the internet for information on a particular topic, making your efforts less stellar than they once might have been for certain niches.

Instead, many digital marketing experts are turning their spend dollars to paid social media advertising. This is essentially a subset of SEM but involves the use of a specific social media platform to obtain views by a particular audience instead of trying to increase immediate ranking on a search engine.

What is Social Media Marketing?

Now that we’ve covered SEM, let’s take a look further into social media advertising. Social media marketing (SMM) is the process of utilizing social media channels to increase brand awareness and link building. In some cases, this can mean using paid marketing means, as we mentioned before, such as Facebook Ads.

Which platforms are considered part of SMM? While new ones are popping up all of the time, the most commonly used social media sites include:

• Facebook
• Instagram
• Twitter
• YouTube
• LinkedIn
• Snapchat
• Pinterest
• Houzz

SMM is only successful if you take a couple of key steps. First, you have to make sure you’re on the right platform to find your audience. For example, a clothing brand might not have any success on Houzz, but a custom kitchen remodeler would. Second, consistency is critical. Try to post on a weekly or another semi-regular basis to help stay relevant and keep your brand at top-of-mind awareness.

The main perks to SMM include building a brand culture, giving your target audience a place to learn about your offerings, and interacting directly with customers. Simply put, this type of marketing is a great way to consistently stay in touch with your audience without having to go to a lot of effort. Plus, just about everybody and their elected official are on some sort of social media site, so it can be an excellent way to gain a loyal audience.

Best of all? You can even improve organic traffic with social media marketing. If you’ve typed your business or brand name into Google lately, there’s a good chance your profile on Facebook or Twitter has probably come up in the list of results. And, if you’re doing things right, you’ve already linked your website through posts or your general profile. This is an example of off-page SEO and SMM working hand-in-hand.

Key Takeaways

Now, that’s a lot of terms to try to understand. The biggest takeaway from all of this is that these various digital marketing steps are all important. You cannot have a comprehensive marketing plan without SEO, SEM, and SMM. Each plays a vital role, and it is critical to your success to understand where they happen in terms of your particular website and goals. Incorporating them all into your online marketing efforts is essential to increasing SERP, traffic, and conversions. In some cases, this might require working with an outside provider or marketing firm to ensure your success.

The post The Difference Between SEO, SEM, and SMM appeared first on SiteProNews.

Three-fourths of people say paid search advertisements help them find the information they’re searching for online, according to a survey from Clutch. 

If people find your ads useful, your business can improve your brand awareness and earn high-quality site traffic. 

In fact, search ads can improve top-of-mind awareness by an average of 80%, according to a meta-study performed by Google and Ipsos MediaCT. 

Processing 3.5 billion queries every single day, Google is the go-to search engine. As the primary source of information for people online.  

Given its popularity, Google Ads is naturally where your business should direct search engine marketing (SEM) dollars. 

For retailers, though, it’s crucial to think about how to extend your SEM beyond just Google. 

Use this article to format your SEM strategy to target users across other major search engines and engage your target customers. 

Use Inbound Marketing Methodology for Your SEM

Most marketers say that inbound practice provided the highest quality leads for their sales teams.

With inbound, you’re focusing on consumers who are already looking for information related to your service or product, increasing the chances of conversions. 

Specifically, it allows your company to meet customers where they are – search engines, social media, etc. 

SEM helps improve the chances that people encounter your company on search by appearing at the top of search results pages. 

When they encounter your company first, people are more likely to develop trust for your brand. Web users consider the first several websites of the search engine results page (SERPs) as the most trustworthy businesses in their industry. 

It’s important that you keep this customer-centric inbound approach in mind to increase your chances of conversions on search.  

Keywords Are Critical

Keyword research is the core of any effective SEM efforts. 

Ranking first on a search engine results page (SERP) for a term or phrase results in a 40% organic click-through rate, more than double the effectiveness of ranking second (15%)  or third (9%).

When determining which keywords to target, consider: 

1. Relevant, high-intent keywords: The keywords you bid for should align with the terms people use to search for products you sell. 
2. Structured ad groups: Consider creating and bidding on groups of similar terms that can help you establish visibility for a range of phrases people would use to find your products. 
3. Negative keywords: Ensure that you don’t advertise for terms that are either irrelevant or won’t realistically lead to conversions for your company.  

Once you have determined the keywords you’ll focus on for your SEM strategy, you need to focus on how you’ll segment your ads across search engines. 

Adjust Your SEM Approach Based on Search Platform

Google is the most popular paid-per-click (PPC) advertising platform, which makes keyword searches particularly competitive.  

To distinguish your company from other retailers, expand your SEM efforts across multiple platforms

Although Google is the most used search engine, expanding your firm’s SEM strategy to include Bing, YouTube, or Amazon can help reach a wider audience. 

One reason a diversified strategy creates benefits is due to the different formats of each platform. 

Google, for example, has a horizontal display of shopping and product listings that make ranking above other retailers and organic results less important.

Still, companies targeting mobile audiences should maintain optimizing for top listing as a priority. Paid ads often display above the fold on a mobile interface, which essentially hides organic results. 

Amazon and Bing Help Reach Targeted Audiences

People’s preference for paid search ads relates to their intent. 

For example, people use Google to find answers to questions. Since text is generally the best method to achieve that, users who click on Google ads prefer text ads, according to Clutch’s survey. 

Amazon, on the other hand, gives access to products for purchase. As a retailer, you can be confident that people have more intent to purchase something than audiences of a Google search. 

Unsurprisingly, Clutch found that 50% of people engaging with Amazon ads favor shopping or product listings.

Bing, for its part, actually has a 34% higher click-through rate than Google Ads and tends to appeal to an older audience: 40% of its users are ages of 35 – 45, whereas Google users on average skew lower. 

If your target customers fall within the demographics of a less popular search engine, consider planning and dedicating some of your SEM strategy to those platforms. 

Retail Businesses Can Rely on SEM to Engage Target Customers

As consumers lives become increasingly online, retailers cannot afford to neglect a digital marketing strategy. Luckily, there are many ways to successfully engage SEM.  

By reviewing and targeting relevant keywords and structuring your SEM strategy according to which search engines your audience frequents, you can improve your marketing operations online for your retail brand.

The post How to Use SEM to Improve Your Retail Marketing appeared first on SiteProNews.

If you’re thinking of launching an SEO (Search Engine Optimization) campaign, it’s important to understand the basics so you know what to realistically expect when it comes to the results, and plan a strategy to set up your business for success.

Expectations

Almost every business wants to know the same thing – what’s my return on investment? Most believe if you rank well in Google, you will see the desired return. The success, of course, is completely dependent upon the keywords which you can rank for, the likelihood of getting there, and what the competition plans to do.

Ranking well in Google is very often the result of a conscious decision to compete in the arena of capitalism, and for anyone to guarantee they’ll win that battle is hubris. A certain appreciable quantity of humility goes a long way when determining whether SEO will be a principal driver of revenue for your business. Not only will you have to roll the dice on the SEO team you choose, you are also unable to predict what your competition will do. Staying humble gives you the opportunity to realistically assess your chances.

When SEO works, it can be a grand slam, and this possibility drives countless business owners and entrepreneurs to give it a serious try. Tracking revenue from SEO can be a challenge. However, we are becoming more sophisticated with options like CallRail, which allows us to track phone calls and where they’ve originated. Couple that with website form tracking, and we can paint a fairly accurate picture of ROI.

What Should You Do?

If you are thinking of starting an SEO campaign or pushing your SEO further, there are a few things you should be sure to do:

1. Install Google Analytics on your website to measure the visitors that are coming to the site, how long they stay, the pages they visit and whether or not they return. You also want to measure how many links you have through Google Webmaster Tools. You may have 10 or 10,000.

2. You then need to run a ranking report. Install software that allows you to add all the keywords that matter to your business and ensure you can also see the search volume (e.g. the number of people searching for each term).

Once you know where your website ranks, you’ll be better able to assess your situation and adjust your expectations. If you are on page two for keywords with great search volume, that’s excellent! If you are beyond position 100, you’ve got a long road ahead of you. Don’t be discouraged if your website isn’t where you thought it would be. Remember that SEO is about building a web asset and it can be a long process. If you are serious about your business and can plan at least a couple of years into the future, then chipping away at blogs, SEOing your website and creating media will slowly bring you closer to those coveted top spots.

What should your SEO program include?

At the time I write this, a good SEO program always includes the following elements:

1. Writing the meta titles and descriptions for every page of your website so they entice potential users to click. Meta titles are the blue links that appear in Google search results. The meta descriptions are the black text that appear beneath the blue links in those results.

2. Landing pages, if not already written, need to be created for every service your company provides. If you are a mechanic, there need to be landing pages on oil changes, fixing brakes, checking engine lights, replacing windshield wipers, tires, etc. When someone searches for those terms, your landing page will have the highest chance of ranking, and if the page is well made, it will do well in search results based on the amount of time users spend on the page, whether they click on other results, come back to the site and hundreds of other user metrics.

3. A strong SEO program also includes a consistent flow of new content, typically centered around a blog. Blog posts are shared on relevant social media channels including Facebook, Twitter and Google+. Depending on the business, content is also often shared on LinkedIn, Pinterest, YouTube and Instagram. In rare cases, Reddit and StumbleUpon are also good options. There are many more social media sites to choose from, but these cover the essentials.

4. “Link building” is a term many SEO consultants throw around to describe the bulk of the work that we do. Because it is ambiguous, many business owners simply don’t probe into what link building is — this is a mistake. How your SEO consultants link build is incredibly important, because it will make or break your program. If you or an SEO company goes about building links using so-called “black hat” methods (such as creating thousands of articles through randomizing text), you could be sandboxed from Google and lose years of hard work. On the other hand, should you or your SEO company create some viral images, you could reap 90% of your meteoric rise from one photo that was shared tens of thousands of times. Honest link building matters. Google wants to see content people genuinely like. It’s that simple.

Half of success in SEO is to manage expectations. If you are convinced that you can hire someone that will do SEO for you and that you’ll see positive ROI, but you don’t know where you currently rank, you have taken that cart and put it before the proverbial horse. Ignorance of SEO, unfortunately, places you in a position to be taken advantage of. SEO is known for being a gimmicky, unregulated industry filled with charlatans and incompetent salespeople, and for good reason. Do not fall victim to guarantees or allow yourself to remain ignorant of what a good SEO program looks like.

The post The Basics of Starting an SEO Campaign: Tips for Creating a Strategy for Success appeared first on SiteProNews.

A student of history, in 1959 John F. Kennedy picked up a botched English translation which has been the core of many inspirational business speeches since: “In the Chinese language, the word ‘crisis’ is composed of two characters, one representing danger and the other, opportunity.”

The first, wei, does mean danger, but the second, ji, while often mistranslated as opportunity, more literally means “the point where things happen or change.” The past six months has begun a period in search marketing in which Google’s swift changing of the known rules of natural language search and what Google shows in search results represents danger for every business not large enough to have a staff of marketers, writers, linguists and data scientists. AdWords, Google’s core business and source of revenue, rolled out a new AI-based tool to evaluate ads, and approve or disapprove them. Despite daily corrections by Google staff, the machine did not learn.

For example, we had an AdWords campaign we were managing for a national company which has a market which traditionally pauses over the holiday season. Combined with the normal delay of releasing the marketing budget for the new year, we restarted what had been an EXTREMELY cost-efficient campaign for all of 4Q17 in mid-January.

Suddenly, our ads were getting disapproved every day; our reps would review the ads, override the disapprovals and restart the ads. Next day, same thing. The client’s cost per click and cost per acquisition soared over 100%. Identical campaigns, very different results. 

Why? Google’s new machine learning rules determined that our ad language was “like language they would disapprove.” However, experienced AdWords managers approved them, over and over. We drew two conclusions: the AI programmers were clueless about the language of advertising, where we always make offers to attract clicks, and the machine learning algorithm they had put into place wasn’t learning from being corrected, day after day. RefreshWeb is a certified AdWords Agency Partner, so we have agency reps AND client reps to call. What does the average small business do when Google makes inexplicable, incomprehensible changes to the rules?

(Another conclusion is that Google has once again released a beta version to test on thousands of real, paying clients.) OK, if AI needs to see thousands of pictures of cats to successfully identify a cute kitten photo, can you imagine how many variants there are of headlines, ad copy and landing page copy they will have to re-evaluate before this new system works correctly?

There’s an interview excerpted in Rich Karlgaard’s column in a recent edition of Forbes, where George Gilder lights into Silicon Valley’s arrogance/ignorance of what real intelligence looks like.

Gilder: The advances in machine learning that Google trumpets and preens about really just advance in the speed of processing. The Google guys woke up with a Moore’s Law bonanza from the chip industry and imagined that they had invented it. When their Go-playing computer can play more Go games in a minute than the whole human race has played through all of history, that’s not a great advance in intelligence. It’s the same intelligence just accelerated to terahertz speeds. Yet this creates an illusion of super-intelligence, that machine learning can somehow gain consciousness and usurp humans.

Q: Again, the nerd IQ arrogance that artificial life will trump real life.

Gilder: In my book, there’s a chapter on the conference in Asilomar, that was financed by Elon Musk, and that I think was a kind of intellectual nervous breakdown. All the Google people were there to tell the world that the biggest threat to the survival of human beings was artificial intelligence, which they themselves were creating.

We’re big fans of technology, and we’re excited about new developments and the promises some of them hold. But we’re also on the front lines for our clients, working to get the best possible results for their web marketing dollars. That’s why our strategies evolve so quickly, as we learn about the latest changes. Clients may have shiny new responsive sites, but have they created responsive display ads for their paid search? They are happy to have a site that works on mobile devices, but do they know they may be penalized for not using AMP (Google’s Accelerated Mobile Pages project)? Do they realize their pages may lose rankings if they don’t load quickly enough? These are WAY under the radar for people running a business…but these unknown rules could be costing them revenue.

We’re available to help your team discover and prioritize the issues you need to address…obviously, you want to work on a few things at a time. As you work through this process of finding the things you need to change or fix, in the meantime we’d like to recommend you have us do a check-up on your site’s SEO performance. We\’ve just launched a new product, a $1000 SEO Wellness Check, with technical findings, competitive ranking reports and recommendations, which only takes a couple of weeks…and can measure the amount of prospect search traffic your site is missing.

If something we’ve mentioned about recent Google changes has struck a nerve, and you need to ask about what’s different this year, and what to do about it, we’d be happy to talk about your site and your marketing problems (or opportunities). Just call us at 512-637-5271, ext. 12

The post The Art of War with Google appeared first on SiteProNews.

Indeed these two marketing strategies seek to fulfill the same outcome, driving quality leads to your business, but that’s as far as the similarities go. Here are five major differences between the two so as to settle the SEM VS SEO debate once and for all. But first, what do these two acronyms mean? 

• SEM: Search Engine Marketing is an umbrella term used for all paid methods of driving traffic to your website.

• SEO: Search Engine Optimization mainly deals with improving your visibility on the internet by implementing strategies that make search engines deem your site or page as valuable enough to place in the top ranks of SERPs. This drives organic traffic, as opposed to paid traffic that comes through SEM.

Let’s take a closer look at these two powerful marketing strategies and see their major differences and how you can effectively use each one.

SEM VS SEO – Understanding the 5 Differences

Let’s go ahead and delve into the 5 differences between SEM and SEO. Understanding these differences will help you carry out an effective marketing strategy to get the right kind of traffic you need to your website.

1. SEO Needs a Website While SEM Doesn’t

When it comes to delineating SEM from SEO, one major factor that helps separate the two is the fact that SEO is heavily dependent on your website, while an SEM campaign doesn’t need a website for it to succeed (although a good website is highly recommended).

How does SEO work you ask? It’s simple really (theoretically) but a bit tricky if you don’t have the required knowledge or the time to put in. And that is why it’s advisable to outsource this part of your marketing to a reputable SEO agency that can help increase your visibility and conversions.

So how does SEO work? SEO involves optimizing many aspects of your website to increase its relevance and authority in the eyes of search engines. This is achieved by optimizing the two main pillars of SEO – On-Page SEO and Off-Page SEO.

On-page SEO deals with everything you can control on your website, hence the name “On-Page”. This involves many things that have to be expertly crafted, such as:

• Content

• Keywords

• Meta tags

• Internal and external links

• Rich snippets

• Optimizing for voice search

And many other factors that will make your website and its content stand out from the competition.

Off-Page SEO, on the other hand focuses on factors that are not on your website, like building backlinks and getting mentions and shares for your content. In a nutshell, Off-Page SEO is mainly about building relationships with other sites – another reason why you should outsource your SEO to those who already have established relationships and are experts at building new ones.

As for SEM, you can carry out a campaign even if you don’t have a proper website. That is, as long as you have somewhere to direct the traffic, say a landing page. Needless to say, it’s best you have a website. But unlike SEO, the quality, relevance, and authority of your website won’t affect your SEM campaign as this is affected more by your ad’s quality score and your bid. Whatever the case, once you pay, you will appear on the SERP pages.

2. SEM Gets Faster Results than SEO

One of the major disadvantages of SEO is that it is painstakingly slow when it comes to seeing tangible results. This is because creating amazing SEO optimized content, building quality links, and other factors out of your control that boost your SEO (like linkless backlinks) take time. And while you wait for the results, you can’t analyze your progress in real time. Ranking on Google is not automatic. It takes time. Even a tweak in your SEO strategy will take time to start showing results, as long as a month, although definite times are not known.

SEM, on the other hand, is a whole different game. The moment you set up your campaign and your analytics tools you can start measuring your progress immediately. And unlike SEO, a well-executed SEM campaign can start giving you positive results immediately because your placement on the SERPs is guaranteed.

This is why if you are a startup and looking to gain visibility (and sales) quickly, then SEM will be your immediate choice. But if you are looking to stay in the game long term, you must also include an SEO strategy.

3. SEO Gives You Longer Lasting Results than SEM

When people ask which of the two strategies to implement, they expect a clear-cut answer. Unfortunately, it’s not that simple. There are many factors to consider, and one of them is your long-term plans for your business, landing page, product page, or whatever you want to drive traffic to.

If you are looking for long-term, sustainable results, this is where SEO outshines SEM. When comparing SEM and SEO differences, this is one you can’t overlook, the fact that SEO gives you longer lasting results than SEM. In fact, SEO will keep giving you traffic for life as long as you don’t take down your website or violate an SEO principle and incur Google’s wrath (this is why you need an SEO professional taking care of SEO for you).

On the other hand, SEM will only give you results for as long as you keep paying for the opportunity to stay on the SERP’s top pages. Once you choose to end the campaign, the traffic stops coming. And because SEM is a bidding system, that place is not entirely guaranteed as anyone can outbid you at any time.

In short, SEO has the advantage over SEM in this area in that the work you put in once will keep giving you results, whereas with SEM, the moment you stop the campaign, the results also stop.

4. SEO has a Broader Target Audience Unlike SEM which is Ultra-Specific

One similarity between SEO and SEM is that both marketing strategies are about getting traffic. But even then, the kind of traffic is not entirely the same.

SEO targets anyone interested in the keyword you are ranking for. Whether they are still researching your product or services or ready to buy, SEO is a big net that you use to draw them in. This is why content produced for SEO purposes serves three main purposes:

• Brand awareness

• Product information

• Soft selling

In short, it caters to everyone at every stage of the buying journey.

SEM, on the other hand, is like a fishing pole, if we can continue using that analogy. Instead of drawing in everyone it can, SEM targets those who are ready to make a purchase. It has an ultra-specific target audience. Planning a SEM strategy requires that you be precise with all components of the strategy as you will only want to attract prospects who are ready to make a commitment, and as such, your content must push for a sell. The reason is very simple. Every click in an SEM campaign will cost you money, an average of $2 per click across the board.

To sum this section up, SEO is a net that draws in all types of people while SEM is a fishing pole that seeks to bring in ready buyers.

Sam Ovens is a great example. He’s a millionaire consultant (in both senses) whose target audience is people who want to escape the rat race for the good life. Sam used SEM to build his consulting company from scratch to what it is today – a massive company that has produced 24 millionaires, 450 6-figure earners, and a whole lot more success stories (like 3,000 people who have managed to quit their jobs and live their dreams).

5. SEO Costs Less to Implement Compared to SEM

When it comes to the differences between SEO and SEM, it’s important to note that there is a great difference in the cost of implementing the two strategies, with SEO being the cheaper to implement and run than SEM. Not only is SEO cheaper to implement than SEM, but it also has an edge over SEM in that it drives more traffic.

The reason for the disparity in the cost of SEM VS SEO is simple. SEO is free or organic traffic while SEM is paid traffic. Everyone who visits your website through a SEM campaign costs you something, whereas everyone who comes to your website through a SEO campaign costs you nothing – for life.

Jacob McMillen is a great example of a successful SEO campaign that cost nothing but brought in hundreds of thousands in business. By implementing an effective SEO strategy, he transitioned himself from a content mill slave to a successful marketing copywriter who is sought out by many big companies. Initially an unknown entity in his early days, he now ranks front-page for the key phrase website copywriter.

This, in many people’s eyes, is the major difference between SEM and SEO – the fact that SEO is a source of organic (free) traffic while SEM is paid traffic. This is why, for you to get a good ROI from your SEM campaign, you need to implement paid search best practices that will increase your chances of attracting the right traffic.

SEM and SEO – Two Sides of the Same Coin

When it comes to the SEM VS SEO debate, at the end of the day, they are as inseparable as the two sides of a coin. Though they have different methods of execution, they both serve the same purpose – giving you exposure and driving sales. And like the prongs of a fork, what one misses, the other is likely to get. But be sure not to go it alone as there are many landmines you can set off if you don’t them both properly. Let the experts take this digital marketing load off your shoulders while you do what you do best – running your business.

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But Facebook advertising is always evolving. New products, features, and strategies develop all the time. With that in mind, as an advertiser, it’s crucial to stay up-to-date on the exciting opportunities to market your product and brand on the biggest social platform in the world. In this article, I discuss five predictions on Facebook advertising you should know about to conquer 2018. 

Prediction #1: Personalized Subscription Products Will Gain More Attention

It’s no secret that shoppers like personalized experiences. It’s also no secret that they like personalized products delivered straight to their door with no fuss. Think Amazon Prime Wardrobe, meal-kit delivery service Blue Apron, and Dollar Shave Club, which all provide a customized subscription box service. These services allow users to easily purchase subscriptions with their mobile devices and indicate the frequency they’d like to receive their personalized boxes.

Millennials in particular are most likely to respond to ads promoting personalized subscription boxes. According to marketing analyst Emarketer, 25 percent of US Internet users who received a subscription box in April 2018 were in the 18 to 29 age range.

While the number of US users that received a subscription box was less than 10 percent, Emarketer also found that 9 in 10 US senior decision-makers believe personalization is crucially important to achieve business goals.

With users wanting personalized experiences in addition to the convenience of delivery, the number of subscription box purchases is going to ramp up. So it’s likely that Facebook ads promoting personalized subscription products will rise in popularity in 2018.

Prediction #2: Messenger Conversations Will Become a Necessity

Customers are on their mobile devices all the time. They’re usually streaming, browsing, using apps, or scrolling through their News Feeds. Or they’re using the Facebook Messenger app to engage in conversations with friends. 

Facebook has been encouraging businesses to use Messenger for building customer relationships. Whether it’s to address a complaint, confirm business hours, or answer questions related to the business or product, Messenger conversations are great for customer service experiences. Since customers carry their mobile devices wherever they go, they’re more receptive to seamless conversations to address their needs. And as more and more customers use mobile for their business needs, it’s predicted that Messenger will become a bigger resource for Facebook advertising in 2018.

Prediction #3: Influencers Will Become Integral to Marketing Strategies

If you don’t already work with an influencer for your brand, it’s highly recommended that you look into it. Influencers are the bridge between brand and customer. They have a special connection with their followers, so when they work with you to market your brand, their followers are more receptive to the message. We typically see them on Instagram and Snapchat, but influencers are also prominent on Facebook. 

A great number of influencers started on YouTube, expanding to other social media platforms like Facebook. They have been able to maintain a strong following wherever they go. Examples of major influencers with a significant number of Facebook page likes are El Rubius (6.9 million likes), Dude Perfect (18.7 million likes), and King Bach (9.4 million likes). Television celebrities like Will Smith (77.5 million likes) are also powerful influencers with a massive Facebook following.

Partnering with influencers for your Facebook advertising campaign is becoming more of a must as other advertisers invest more in influencer marketing. According to another Emarketer analysis, 70 percent of US agency and brand marketers indicated at the end of last year intent to increase their influencer marketing budgets in 2018. If other advertisers are doing it, in order to stay competitive, you need to find ways to include influencer marketing in your 2018 Facebook advertising strategy.

Prediction #4: More Facebook Ads Will Be in Video Format

Video ad formats are effectively engaging. They are more creative, informative, and compelling than static formats. According to Wordstream, 45 percent of users watch more than an hour of Facebook videos weekly. Eighty-seven percent of online marketers use video in their advertising strategies. Video ads are widely used because they work and deliver results. 

Users primarily watch video on their mobile devices. In fact, statistics show that more than half of video content is watched on mobile. Additionally, 92 percent of mobile viewers share videos they watch with other users. As emerging technologies continue to make the video-making experience more seamless and creative, video ads are expected to be predominant in 2018 Facebook advertising.

Prediction #5: All Facebook Ads Will Be More Transparent

Facebook’s recent efforts to improve user privacy on its platform in light of the Cambridge Analytica scandal include transparency. In recent months, the company has revealed updates and products that will make ads more transparent on Facebook. Political ads in particular will be clearly labeled as “Political Ad,” with “paid for by” information also included. The ultimate goal is to let users know exactly what they are looking at and to decrease the prominence of “fake news” and clickbait on social media. 

Now pages also need to go through a verification process in order to continue sharing posts. Facebook is doing this to ensure no fake accounts fall through the cracks. Also, making sure all pages offer only quality experiences is part of Facebook’s new goal for the platform. There will therefore be more steps you need to go through to make sure your page and Facebook ads comply with the platform’s transparency stipulations. 

As a result of this new focus on transparency, Facebook ads in 2018 and going forward will have a different feel to them. They will feel more honest and trustworthy. Yes, you will need to spend a little more time making sure your ads meet the necessary requirements according to Facebook’s terms. But the final result may drive more customers to your business because of authenticity. 

Conclusion

In this article, we covered five predictions on Facebook advertising for 2018:

• Personalized subscription products will gain more attention
• Messenger conversations will become a necessity
• Influencers will become integral to marketing strategies
• More Facebook ads will be in video format
• All Facebook ads will be more transparent

Facebook advertising is ever-changing, so none of these predictions are set in stone. But we can say for certain that the future is exciting, and 2018 has already given us a lot to look forward to.

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SEO vs. PPC

Many, including search engine optimization specialists approach SEO and PPC as separate entities. Even though these are different in many aspects, from an SEO point of view, it is best to think of them as two sides of the same coin. If you need a specific name for this coin, the name is ‘search.’

There are many ways that PPC and SEO complement one another and together prove to be a better search strategy. We will discuss seven different ways to plan close coordination between SEO and PPC to weave a winning strategy.

1. Enhanced visibility

The obvious benefit of pairing SEO with PPC efforts is the extended exposure your site gets in the SERPs (search engine results pages). Users tend to reduce their PPC efforts once they appear atop the search results. However, it is vital to remember that the top two to three results on many SERPs are simply PPC ads. To get a real return on investment, it is essential to be on top of both organic as well as premium search results. This gives users a feeling that you are an established and reputed player in the market.

2. Share the keyword data

Data rules everything in modern digital marketing strategies. So, by running PPC and organic campaigns simultaneously, you get double the data to analyze. With this, you can easily determine which PPC and organic keywords yield the higher conversion and make use of these analysis reports to optimize your online strategy further.

3. Tune your organic content strategy to the top PPC ads

Experts say that what works for PPC may often work well for SEO too. So, by understanding which PPC ads return the most number of conversions, you can get a good idea about what sort of titles tags, alt text, meta descriptions, and content works the best for you. By using PPC ads to test page elements, you can quickly learn what will work and what won’t to devise blueprint SEO strategy whereas organic testing will take a long time to give you such insights.

4. Integration of e-commerce feeds to AdWords

Google does some cool things to assist online e-commerce businesses. Now you can link specific pages such as product page or promotions page to PPC ads. Such ads will feature particular products with reviews or endorsements and will take users directly to the product page to prompt an instant purchase. This is an ideal way to give your e-commerce portal a special boost.

5. Using site search data

The major objective of PPC advertising is to identify which keywords your potential customer used to search and find products or services. By enabling site search on your website and analyzing the terms which are frequently used, one can get very valuable insights into the actual needs of your customers and derive their search habits from incorporating this learning into your online business strategy effectively.

6. Combating negative PR

Some occasional negative comments may arise about your company. This does happen and when it does, effectively combining PPC with SEO will help in damage control. The game is the same as we discussed above, increasing visibility. You can easily guide conversations if you gain control over PPC and SEO results on certain terms. You can find many examples online as to how companies use even negative search terms to ultimately work in their favor.

7. Visibility on social media

Social media is changing rapidly day in and out. In fact, one of the most notable changes is the opportunity for highly targeted advertising. Social platforms like Facebook, Instagram, LinkedIn and YouTube now offer targeted ads which you can use to reach a very specific group of people in your target audience. Using Facebook user profile info, you can, for example, precisely show your content to females between 20 to 25, living in Kansas City, and specifically interested in the latest fashion trends or sportswear. This may be a small group, but precise and apt for you. The data or leads you collect through such specific campaigns offer you the most appropriate conversion opportunities at the granular level.

Search engines are also expected to come up with more strategic benefits to businesses that are aiming at premium promotional campaigns, and this will further unveil the scope of linking PPC efforts more effectively with SEO efforts.

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