SEM is synonymous with pay-per-click advertising, so SEM is now generally called pay-per-click advertising, which is search engine bidding. In fact, many people often confuse SEM and SEO, thinking they are the same thing or simply don’t know the relationship between the two. Today, we will take you to understand the real meaning of SEM and SEO and the difference between the two.
1. What is SEM
SEM means Search Engine Marketing in English and Search Engine Marketing in Chinese. SEM has been used to collectively refer to and cover the entire SEO, natural search engine optimization and paid advertising optimization. In online promotion, we use various methods to increase exposure, hoping to make our website ranking appear on the search engine result page. This increases the visibility of our website, brands, products and services.
With the passage of time, we have now classified SEM separately as paid search marketing optimization, so the SEM we are talking about now usually refers to search engine bidding, and the ranking obtained by buying advertisements can be collectively referred to as SEM.
2. what is SEO
SEO means Search Engine Optimization in English. It means an optimization method to improve website keywords to get higher ranking in search results by catering to search engine algorithms. Since most of the traffic and clicks are in the first few positions of the search results, the higher the ranking, the higher the exposure, the higher the clicks, the higher the traffic, and the more opportunities for conversion. Therefore, SEO It's the way most websites do online marketing.
According to the sharing of SEO, SEO is to gain the trust of search engines through the content produced by the website, optimizing the website structure, building external links, etc., so that the website ranking can appear on the homepage. Especially for popular keywords, SEO can greatly save advertising costs compared to running paid ads, so this is also the biggest difference between SEO and SEM.
3. What is the difference between SEM(Search Engine Marketing) and SEO(Search Engine Optimization)
SEM usually refers to online marketing activities, so SEO is also a part of SEM in a broad sense. The following are some common online marketing activities, which can be collectively referred to as SEM:
1. Paid search advertising
2. PPC (pay-per-click) pay-per-click advertising
3. cost per click
4. cost per thousand impressions
SEO refers to search engine optimization, so the goal of SEO is to obtain rankings in natural search results. There are many places to optimize this ranking, from website architecture, website content, external chain publishing, website speed, and user experience. .. and so on need to be optimized, so that your website ranking can be improved, and "the process of optimizing a website to get a better ranking is called SEO".
4. Comparison between SEM and SEO Natural ranking;
1. SEM needs to be clicked and paid immediately; SEO will not incur additional costs no matter how many times it is clicked;
2. SEM can get ranking immediately after paying; SEO requires long-term optimization to obtain natural ranking;
3. SEM generally refers to all online marketing activities; SEO refers to the ranking optimization of "natural search results";
4. Popular keywords will cost a lot of money through SEM; they do not need to be ranked through SEO optimization;
Both SEM and SEO are for exposure, traffic, and conversion, so neither SEM nor SEO is good or bad. Under normal circumstances, most companies will implement SEM and SEO simultaneously, and use both types of marketing at the same time. The strategy can ensure that in the short-term (SEM) and long-term (SEO) strategies, the market can be favored for a long time, thereby maintaining the competitiveness of enterprises and products.
Conclusion:
Whether it is SEM or SEO, we all need to find suitable keywords for delivery or optimization. We recommend using SEO tools to help you analyze more suitable keywords, which is an important first step. For the short term, the best way for you to see results is to use SEM to gain the benefits of short-term advertising. For the long term, you must continue to optimize SEO, so as to reduce your marketing costs and improve website traffic.