1. Keyword Research Tools (Adwords Keyword Tool and Keyword Discovery)
2. Track Rankings Tools (Webposition and SEO Book Tools)
3. Quick website information (SEOQuake)
4. Yahoo linkdomain search to find out competitor backlinks, also good link tools at SEOMOZ/linkscape
5. Patience

NetSearch Direct can tell you how many searches a keyword phrase gets and the percentage of clicks from the listings on the SERP, which equates to visitors.  From that, we provide an industry conversion percentage in order to estimate the leads possible — but no guarantees are given.

In order to produce a lead from your site, several variables must be optimized (site design, call to action, coupons, etc.).  NetSearch Direct provides our Internet marketing experience on all projects.  We can help your website convert more visitors into leads, but we cannot guarantee leads through just SEO.

Many people and SEO companies make the mistake in targeting the key phrases with the largest search volumes only without looking at conversions.  If you get 10,000 people to your site through 3 keywords but only convert 3 people through those keywords then that is not a very good conversion rate.  It is important to look for the keyword phrases that are going to convert visitors into sales.

Using key phrases that may drive high convertible visitors to your site each month is likely to be much better than targeting a highly competitive broad key phrase that is only vaguely related to your business, even if it does attract 10,000 searches each month.

Social Media Marketing has been coming on strong for some time now. This is a wonderful new area of the web. The struggle I have seen with many people is understanding its business impact. As marketers it is difficult to get your head around such a viral arena. On one hand SMM brings reach because it is so prolific. The number of pages and profiles coming online make the early days of the internet pale.

Reach Dilution

My first question is how to leverage this reach for marketers when on first glance it appears to expand the reach opportunities in advertising and at the same time dilute the effectiveness of advertising. On the other the target of SMM advertising, the relevance of the audience goes up exponentially.

Demographic Targeting

I like this revolution of adverting to the original onset of Search Marketing. At first it was an educational sale and a tough one at that. The impressions of Search Engine advertising are so small compared to the cost per thousand, CPM, model it is staggering. At the same time the value delivered by SEM and the return on investment make it one of the best media buys in the industry. This is because the SEM audience is predisposed to your product or offering by nature of the search terms entered into a search engine. SEM is no longer tenuous media, in fact it has joined the ranks of mainstream and any serious marketing is obligated to this space.

The Me Too! Effect

Will SMM make the same transition? The jury is still out on that one. The flood of rapid entrants into this media makes it appear so. These entrants may have learned that SEM is now mainstream and many marketers have missed the boat because of a wait and see position. So now these same marketers are flooding into the space espousing it’s virtues.

No Silver Bullet

The truth lies somewhere in between for SMM however. It is time consuming and and arduous endeavor. But if done correctly it can rival the best that Madison Avenue has to offer in results.

Stay tuned for SMM tips and how to make your SMM program a success.

Internet marketing, IM, is any activity to market or proment a service product or even a message. IM can be made up of various different subsegments.

Search Engine Optimization, SEO. Enabling a web site to properly indexed by search engines.

Search Engine Marketing, SEM, also known as Paid Search, Pay Per Click.

Web PR – Blog writing, posting, press releases.

These are all campaings. Most people understand SEO as a task, skill or project. It really is a campaing that needs it’s on budget goals, planning and proper execution.

NetSearch Direct, based in Richmond Virginia provide all of these services.