Marketers use of Search Engines and Analytics

How often do you open your browser and head to a search engine to find information or images about something that interests you? And to what search engine would you generally head to first? There have been countless occasions where I have jumped onto my iPhone or Laptop and automatically head straight to google as my source of search engine. Like me, many others use Google as their primary search engine, with clear dominance over their competition. A companies choice of search engine (for many this would be Google) and presence is crucial in determining the success of their Search Engine Marketing campaigns (SEM). So what is SEM? Simply it is a digital marketing strategy used to increase the visibility of a website in search engine results pages (Optimizely, 2019). There are two key SEM techniques; Search Engine Optimisation (SEO) and Pay Per Click (PPC). SEO refers to the process of optimising your website to get placed higher in the organic search result listing of search engines. Over 64% of website traffic comes from the organic listings, as searchers’ eyes are drawn to these results first. However, it is not a process that happens overnight, and companies need to understand it is an ongoing process and requires technical expertise. PPC is a situation where search engines like Google offer businesses the opportunity to pay for premium advertising spaces at the top and sides of their search results (WebCentral, 2019). It could be said that it is almost impossible to achieve success as a business if they do not implement SEM strategies into their operations.

It is remarkable how dominant Google is when it comes to market share amongst its competitors. As of April 2019, Google owned 92.42% of market share, with Bing coming a very distant second with 2.61% (Statcounter, 2019). I think it’s very obvious why companies would choose to implement SEM strategies through Google as opposed to its competitors. To fully understand SEO, companies should understand the key phrase analysis, which in basic terms is determining what their customers are searching. This includes factors like comparison/quality of the phrase, adjectives, intended use, product type, vendor, location and action request (Google, 2019). Companies need to consider how many competitors would be attempting a similar strategy, so their key word analysis needs to be thoroughly done to ensure maximum results. All in attempt to be that first page when customers search particular things, amongst the billions of other results that could potentially pop up. Moreover, the Black hat vs white hat theory explains the different forms of SEO approaches. The black hat approach refers to techniques and strategies used to get higher search rankings, and breaking search engine rules, whilst the white hat strategy refers to the use of techniques and strategies that target a human audience opposed to a search engine (Unamo, 2019). The black hat approach contains hidden content including; comment tags, small font/white text on white background. Also includes Meta keyword stuffing, doorway pages and link farming. In contrast the white hat technique includes; quality content, appropriate use of titles and meta data, keyword research, use keywords across all elements of your pages and quality inbound links (Valentino, 2019). Which approach do you think would be more beneficial generally speaking?

To determine whether your e-marketing strategies require improvement, companies use marketing analytics. This involves reviewing traffic volume, referrals, clickstreams, online research data, customer satisfaction surveys, leads and sales. The impact marketing analytics can have on a business are that firms attain favourable and sustainable performance outcomes and if competition is high, and consumer preferences are rapidly changing, analytics become even more important (Germann, 2013).

What search engine do you choose to use? Do you think it is more beneficial for a business to attempt the PPC strategy? Let me know your thoughts below. Thank you, for reading this weeks blog.