Search Engine Optimisation (SEO)
We believe SEO is a "must-have" part of the online marketing mix. This is reflected in the wider marketplace as brands are increasingly investing in this area. A recent survey of over 400 UK organisations (including 54 retailers) showed that 97% of them are engaging in some form of SEO activity this year (2009), a 2% increase on 2008. Of those, half are spending at least £10k p.a. on SEO and a fifth is spending at least £50k annually . Investment levels in SEO average at 15% of the online marketing budget. Anecdotal evidence suggests that a well-indexed, established retailer can expect 35% to 40% of its traffic to come from natural listings in search engines.
E-Consultancy UK Search Marketing Benchmark Report April 2009. Sample of over 400 respondents
Why use SEO?
Your customers can find you when they are actively looking for you, or a product you sell. This ensures brand visibility online and a seamless customer experience from the outset
Being top of the natural listings in search engine results pages improves:
- Traffic Levels
- Brand Awareness
- Brand Recall
- Purchase Intent
- Conversion to sale
SEO requires relatively low upfront and ongoing investment compared to other online media.
Good site optimization achieves breadth of visibility across a wide variety of relevant search terms - from brand specific and product to more generic keywords and phrases.
As a result, traffic coming through to your site from the natural listings in a search engine offers the highest return on investment of all the available online acquisition media.
Onsite: Optimising your site content, keywords, text, meta descriptions and design so the site appears high up on search engine results pages
Offsite: Developing campaigns and content that encourages other sites to link to yours, thereby increasing the visibility of your site in listings behind search engine results pages
