So yesterday I covered the topic of what SEO is.  However, it has a counterpart that you may or may not be familiar with: SEM – Search Engine Marketing.  Now, to someone who doesn’t work with this stuff every day, you’re probably thinking there’s really no difference between the two.  Not so quick.  Search Engine Optimization is the method by which you help search engines index your site.  Search Engine Marketing is the paid inclusion of your site in their results pages.  You see those links that are set off from your normal results either in a colored or outlined box, or in another smaller column off to the side of the search engine?  See that little heading that says “Sponsored Links” or something of the sort?  Those are paid advertisements that are shown when people search for whatever it was you just searched for.  The people who market their websites by bidding on these keywords are called Search Engine Marketers.  They help businesses attract traffic to their websites by buying the traffic through keyword auctions.

Let’s take an example keyword phrase – “highest paying keywords”.  Now, go to Google and type in that phrase.  (You might even see this blog as one of the top entries.  We go back and forth between being in the top couple of listings and being pushed back to the second or third page.)  You probably see a couple of links on the right hand side under Sponsored Links right?  Now, change your search to “top paying keywords”.  Notice any difference in the number of links shown?  If so, that means that there’s more advertisers bidding on that space.  They want their ad shown instead of their competitors.  I’ll go more in depth as to how this bidding works another day.  For  now, you’ve at least gotten a taste of what the phrase SEM means.

         What Is SEM?