In our last blog we talked about SEO (Search Engine Optimization) and today we are going to cover SEM (Search Engine Marketing) and Google. SEM is essentially the process of gaining traffic and visibility from search engines through paid advertising and unpaid advertising in Google, Yahoo, Bing, Facebook, LinkedIn and other social media applications and on-line websites and blogs.
First and foremost, you need to make sure that your business and/or company is part of the Google family! So be sure to set up your Google accounts as there are several different platforms from Google, so the more user-friendly you are with these tools the more savvy you will be with SEM.
At the #GA Summit a new set of API’s (Application Programmable Interface) were announced to help large companies and their web developers and IT Departments better manage their metrics. These upgrades allow users to seamlessly integrate their software with Google Services such as Google Analytics, Google Adwords and YouTube. As many large corporations have unique demands, manage several websites and have many users. The new API’s will streamline configuring the reports from Google Analytics and cut the amount of time spent reviewing and compiling all of this information so that IT Departments and Marketing can spend more time analyzing the factual insights.
Google Platforms:
Google +: If you are not using Google Plus properly this will affect your ranking with Google and ultimately your SEO or Search Engine Optimization. So make sure you have an account and are updating your account with newsworthy content! Google Plus content helps you with your page rank, and your information stays around for a long time!
Google Analytics: If you are looking to boost sales, improve your mobile app and increase the number of visitors to your website, Facebook followers, Twitter followers, you need to be using Google Analytics and you need to be reviewing this on a regular basis.
Google Tag Management: Just recently, Google has added a new feature called Google Tag Management , which was launched at the #GASummit last week Link to summit . The theme this year was ACCESS, EMPOWER, ACT with numbers and metrics. VP Engineering Paul Mure and Product Management Director Babak Pahlavan talked to the masses about what is coming down the pipeline for Google Analytics. So it was not surprising that Google launched Google Tag Manager. As Tagging is vital to your Search Engine Marketing and performance. Google Tag Manager will help you manage your metrics through Google Analytics and your conversion rates. You can click here to hear the live stream from the #GASummit.
Google AdWords & ADVERTISING: How Google AdWords work is that you set up an account and pay based on a cost-per click. You can also set the payment parameters base on a daily budget that you and your client are both comfortable with. The best part about Google Adwords is that there is no minimum and you are not locked into a contract. You are only charged when someone clicks on your ad to go directly to your website. Again essential for Search Engine Marketing.
YouTube: Again if you are looking for more opportunities for your SEO and SEM make sure you are up-loading content on YouTube. Control your story, start a conversation and keep your audience growing with YouTube and be sure to use YouTube analytics!