I had no idea how to do it. Naturally I Googled for a solution. I found a local consulting company who had the capability and negotiated a great deal. Client provided a wish list containing keywords that were highly competitive but just a couple weeks later, the site was listed top ranking under most of the keywords. But almost immediately we had to cut the contract - method used was far less than acceptable.
He had used a cheating page whereby all the keywords were present without making any sense. This is a method widely used in the old days but no longer acceptable by search engines today and even at the time, there was real risk of client's site being banned.
This was a turning point for me as it triggered my interest to evolve from web building into digital marketing.
Here are some fast facts on search:
- In March [2004], 1.8 million at-home Internet users - or 71% of active at-home Internet users in Hong Kong - visited a search engine site
- 55% of all online purchases originate from Search Engines as opposed to only 9% from banners
- Portals and search engines continue to be the most popular websites in APAC, with 6 out of the top 10 websites visited by internet users being search engines
- Search engine optimisation was the top method cited by Web site marketers to drive
The two types of Search Engine Marketing are PPC (Pay-Per-Click) and SEO (Organic Search Engine Optimization).
PPC gives you results in 1-2 days. It is far easier that SEO. You have the flexibility to turn on and off at any time with the ability to geo-
SEO takes longer to see effect - anywhere from 2 weeks to 4 months. It requires ongoing learning and experience and are more popular than sponsored ads. Though difficult to control flow of
Most companies are finding it difficult to implement SEO because of their web or department infrastructures won't allow frequent update; part of a requirement to keep site ranking at top level. This is changing though with more companies now moving to CMS platforms but some clients are still facing obstacles: creating, implementing content and link building requires expertise and is time consuming.
The best strategy is to start with PPC; identify your high value keywords and slowly shift them into web content development. This way you don't loose out on time and effort in developing site content that might or might not work in your favor of having high search engine ranking.
Remember both PPC and SEO require expertise so unless you have a dedicated
I will be interested to hear your thoughts - please feel free to comment!
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