Web Search Results

“Ummmm, I don’t think so, let me google that.”

These are the familiar words of the modern skeptic, followed by typing key words in an online search engine. Have you ever wondered how the order of website results are ranked? There is organic ranking that occurs based on keywords and interaction with the website called SEO (Search Engine Optimization). Businesses can also invest in SEM (Search Engine Marketing) where they pay for their website to appear at the top of the results.

What you see in the image above are the search results for the keyword “Insurance”. You may have  noted that it says “Ad” next to the website. This is an Example of SEM, these companies are paying for these results to show. The advantage of this method is that it gets your content seen quickly with relative ease in comparison to SEO. Visibility is the goal in both SEO and SEM. Do you click on paid advertisements or do you forgo them for results that show up due to their own merit? Additionally, SEM results are easy come easy go, once the funding stops the website will lose ranking.

Here we see SEO results, these companies likely have a long term SEO strategy that has optimized them to show at the top of the search. Due to SEO Strategy cultivating genuine website traffic and interaction it is also sustainable, and is much slower to build but is equally slower to drop in ranking. It also creates better consumer sentiment based on earning that ranking instead of paying for it. How do you generate this organic traffic though if your website isn’t as visible on the first page of search results? This is where SEO can be tricky and potentially frustrating. A slow burn, although creating sustainability long term, is problematic in the short term. It also takes a level of expertise to engineer SEO and then carry out the strategy. It can also be costly if the business owner needs to commission someone to do this for them.

Why chose just one method? It appears that implementing both SEM and SEO could stabilize Search Engine ranking in the short term and long term needs of attracting website traffic. A firm would need to consider their budget, opportunity cost and expertise as well as projected ROI (return on investment) to build and monitor their strategies. An example of opportunity cost, for those who are unfamiliar with the concept, would be an Auto Repair Shop owner/ operator who is also performing repairs. He is an expert at auto repair, but has no experience with SEO? Is his time best spent learning a new skill to drive website visibility or repairing cars to bring in revenue? Would it cost the business less to hire an SEO expert or for the Mechanic to take the time to learn it himself and then manage the content creation to carry it out?

Resource:

Sun, Dylan (June 13, 2018) Equinet Academy, SEO or SEM? – Examples, Differences, Pros & Cons (Comparison Table) https://www.equinetacademy.com/seo-vs-sem/