SEM 101
Search Engine Marketing Defined
Learn definitions and understand realistic expectations from SEM and PPC
What is SEM?
Search Engine Marketing (SEM) has two definitions:
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SEM, is a form of Internet marketing that seeks to promote websites by increasing their visibility in Search Engine Result Pages (SERPs). According to the Search Engine Marketing Professional Organization, SEM methods include: search engine optimization (or SEO), paid placement, contextual advertising, and paid inclusion.
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SEM deals specifically with pay-per-click advertising. The New York Times defined SEM as the practice of buying paid search listings. Therefore, SEM has become synonymous with and is used interchangeably with “PPC” or pay per click advertising on Google, Yahoo!, Bing and other search engines and content sites, including Facebook. (It’s not “paper click” folks. No one knows what that is.)
Site design, usability and customer relationship management tools found on the site are critical to SEM's success, and content development is more critical than you can imagine.
However, in this SEM 101 section, we’ll focus our definitions of SEM on the pay-per-click model of online advertising and explain the bigger picture SEO and design aspects in SEO 101.
Search Engine Marketing + Pay Per Click Advertising =
- Brief paid text ads on SERPs
- Ads that are delivered against search results for keywords and phrases that you bid on for premium ad positioning
- Ads are traditionally text-only, but also includes display ads
- Text ads are limited to a fixed number of total characters
- Ads are mostly posted on the right sidebar of a SERP
- Can include thousands of keywords in campaigns
- Free split testing of ad copy
- Total control over targeting and budget
- Totally measurable, focus on the conversion behavior
- You pay only for the Cost Per Click, market controlled rates
- Key metrics and baselines:
- Click-Through-Rate (CTR): The number of clicks divided by the number of impressions (actual viewed ads). Can be calculated across entire campaigns, by group, by ad, by keyword, and more.
- Campaign Average = 0.05% CTR
- Good Campaign Average = above 1.5%
- CTR per AdGroup or Keyword can range upward to 25% or more
- Cost-Per-Click (CPC)
- Average/common range: $1 - $6 cost per click
- Depends upon the industry and competitive volume
- Some industries can range as high as $20 CPC
- Average/common range: $1 - $6 cost per click
- Conversions
- The number of completed desired tasks per person
- Examples: sales, downloads, lead generation forms, engaging live chat tools, resume submissions, email subscriptions, etc.
- Click-Through-Rate (CTR): The number of clicks divided by the number of impressions (actual viewed ads). Can be calculated across entire campaigns, by group, by ad, by keyword, and more.
Anatomy of a Search Engine Results Page
Monthly Search Volume
"Realtors" - 11,000,000
"Dentist" - 11,000,000
"Used car" - 13,600,000
"General Contractor" - 2,200,000
"Solar power" - 1,000,000
"Car insurance" - 9,000,000
"Auto repair" - 4,000,000
"Construction company" - 500,000
"Things to do" - 5,000,000
"Janitorial" - 823,000
"Ford Mustang" - 9,000,000
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