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HELP! I need some search engine marketing?

I had an email from some SEM company saying my websites Adwords™ was no good? I had a telephone call from a so called SEM company saying my websites Adwords™ results didn’t show up for anything. A company told me that they could get me to the top of Adwords™? Help I need to know what I should be doing with my Internet marketing? We get these questions and many more all the time, what you should ask yourself is, if they say you don’t list on Adwords™ for what you do then how did they find you, do they really know what you sell, do they know what your marketing campaign is all about, well the answer is probably no because it is highly unlikely they will know what your budget is, how many people visit your site and how many people convert into customers, so how can any company make that statement without the full facts.

What’s SEM and do I really need it? Search Engine Marketing or SEM for short is the process of Internet Marketing that promotes a website by increasing it’s visibility in the search engine results and which has a proven return on investment (ROI).
The method of SEM includes the process of search engine optimisation (SEO), Pay per click and paid inclusion, if you have not read our SEO pages then please do before reading the rest of this page as you will get a better understanding of what SEM is all about.
There are quite a few SEM companies out their who provide a useful and very good service to website owners however there are also many poor companies who have given the industry a bad name through their aggressive tactics or don't really know what their doing and as such drive useless traffic to your site and in the process cost you a fortune on your Adwords™ charges.
So I hear you ask yourself “do I really need SEM”, well right now you are reading this page and you probably found us on the front page of Google™, Windows Live™, MSN™ or even maybe Yahoo™ so if you have some spare money and since you have taken the time and trouble to research into SEM then the answer is probably Yes.

SEM emails and telephone calls

When any company emails you or telephones you out of the blue about your Adwords™ campaign then alarm bells should start ringing as these are spam emails or cold calls and as such they have probably not looked at your website in any great detail and have probably not taken the time to understand what you do or how you do it, after all these people are normally telesales and as such their job is to call as many people as possible.
Any SEM company that is any good would need to first work out whether they understand what you do and what you sell, they would also need to know how much you spend on your Adwords™, how many visitors to your site you get from your ad’s, what paid keywords are used and most importantly how many of these people converted into customers.
Without this basic information to hand how can these companies say they can improve your Adwords™ campaign?
Don’t forget the chances are they found you by clicking on one of your ad’s in the first place, so while their on the phone thank them for that extra click they just cost you.

Can I check myself if my Adwords™ campaign is any good?

Yes you can, one of the most basic tests to see if your current company is any good is to type the word free before one of your main keywords and see if you list in the Adwords™ section.
Here’s an example “free labels” without the quotes, now depending on your budget and how many clicks you have had you made need to search a few times to make sure as you may not be listing on every search due to your budget.
The best keyword to use is one you list on the front page for in the Adwords™ section. Once you’ve picked a main keyword then put the word “free” in front of it and check a few times
Why? I here you ask, well it’s the first thing we do because if someone is typing the word “free” into the search box then they don’t want to pay for what their looking for, however you just paid for them clicking on your ad only for them to find out you don’t give it away for free so they then leave your site and click on someone else’s website, these clicks would be better used to bring in quality customers who might actually buy something from you.
There are exceptions to this rule as you might actually give some thing away for free in the hope they will return to buy something else or to upgrade to a better item or product, this is where a specialist SEM company would be needed who know what their doing to filter out the word “free” from everything else expect those special items or what is often referred to as lost leaders.
So if your listing with the word free yet you don’t give any thing away free then its time to change companies.
There are many other examples like this where people are clicking on your ads for products or services you don’t provide please see our menu on the left for more information on other tests or you can fill in our SEM keyword report request and we will do one for you free of charge.

Do I have to include SEO with SEM?

Well if you want your Internet marketing campaign to return the maximum results then yes you do.
Another reason for this is that Google™ will score your landing pages, these are the pages which a customer first sees after they have clicked on one of your ads.
If the page content is poor or is not related to the keywords used then Google™ will assume the page is unrelated and you will list lower in the Adwords™ results meaning to get higher up you will have to pay a lot more per click then you need to, this in the industry is referred to as the “Google slap”.
Why? I hear you say, because we are back to the unethical SEO and SEM companies and people out their who just spammed Googles Adword results with rubbish and spam sites causing the overall user experience to fall, If you think a while back how many ads did you click on that just returned rubbish or spam sites, well Google™ took a stand on this and by the looks of it has won since results from Awords is again back to being the best in the industry.
So at the end of the day if your pages are poor or not related then you will pay a lot more than needed hence why you should choose an SEM company very wisely.

Make sure you know where your money is going.

Insist on full and detailed reports for the activity of your website along with conversions and goals achieved.
Don’t take thier word for it make sure they install Google Analytics™ to which you have full access to, this way you will know the real position and benefit of your campaigns and not the word or report from the SEM company itself, because if you are using an unethical company then they could put in anything they like in their own reports.
Another tip is to pay Adwords™ directly and not to the SEM company for the clicks as again it’s the only way to make sure where your money is going.

Get legally protected with a money back guarantee

To cover yourself you should always get a contract with an unconditional money back guarantee.
This will be different to an SEO money back guarantee because most of the money should be going towards pay per click and as such is not refundable, however you should insist on a refund of the campaign management fee or fee’s which a company is charging you for maintaining your keywords and other related work if you are not happy with the service they are providing.
There are some tests to see if your current company is any good, please see our menu on the left hand side or you can fill in our SEM keyword report request and we will do one for you free of charge.

Remember that you or your company are solely reasonable for any actions taken by an SEM company you hire and as such it’s your site that gets removed and its your business that will suffer should it not comply with the terms of any pay per click service.

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