PJ Lighthouse

Search engine optimization (SEO) and search engine marketing (SEM) are two of the most powerful and profitable things you can do for your online business. As Google celebrates its twelfth birthday there are more Internet shoppers than ever, with more choices than ever. So let’s take a few minutes to see how you can beat the competition and dominate Google.

This article has three parts; Stats, Spying and Shortcuts. Each part can be used individually or grouped to provide quicker results. The following information is what the SEO and SEM experts know and gives you the inside scoop on the tools they use.

Part 1; Search Engine Stats: This will give you the latest intel on search engines. This is to help you make informed decisions on how to spend your SEO time and where to spend your SEM money (search engine marketing, which includes pay per click advertising.)

A.) Google gets nearly half of all US searches performed on the Internet so you can bet that’s at the top of our SEO to do líst. Here are the exact numbers as provided by the “comScore for searchenginewatch.com” survey:

42.7% - Google
28.0% - Yahoo!
13.2% - MSN
7.60% - AOL
5.90% - ASK
2.60% - All Others Combined

B.) Now that we know how much the search engines are used let’s get some inside information to help us plan SEO and SEM strategies. According to the UK based company Neutralize.com, users of Google versus those of MSN are just about polar opposites when it comes to natural versus paid search listings. Here’s what their research found:

Google: 72.3% of searchers prefer clicking on the natural listings that SEO helps you get. Only 27.7% prefer using the paid links you might use as part of your SEM plan.

MSN: Only 28.8% of searchers go for the natural listings while 71.2% rely on paid links. This is almost the exact opposite of how Google users work.

That is amazíng information to have! You know right away that your time and effort is better spent on SEO for Google while putting your pay per click dollars into MSN is probably your best bet.

Technorati Tags: SEO, Search Engine Optimization, Blog Traffic, Web Marketing, Free Traffic, Internet Marketing, Google, SEM, search engine marketing