Search Engine Marketing and Website Optimization

Southampton, PA, April 8, 2005 - One of the biggest challenges today's marketing executives face is learning to compete in the digital marketplace. One of the biggest mistakes many small business marketers make is failing to maximize the visibility of their company's website through search engine optimization. Those are observations made by David Katz, president of Dynamic Digital Advertising, an Internet marketing firm in the Philadelphia, Pennsylvania area.

It is estimated that 91% of consumers get information from the Internet when making a buying decision, and 85% of all visits to websites originate through search engines. "Do the math," said Katz. "If eight out of ten qualified potential buyers of your company's goods or services are being directed to potential suppliers by a search engine's results list, and your company's name doesn't show up on that list, you have a dangerous marketing problem!"

Business leaders are beginning to understand the value of corporate websites. Still only a small fraction of all websites are developed and optimized with methods that allow the search engines to find them. "It's a problem," said Katz, "because while companies play catch-up with technology, their lag time poses a real threat to their competitive edge and bottom line revenue."

If there is such probability for loss, why don't more companies optimize their websites? Katz said the answer is simple. "Most people don't even know their website can be optimized. They don't know they could rank higher in the search results because they don't understand how search engines work."

It is difficult for anyone to know exactly how the major search engines operate. They are very secretive about the precise algorithms they use to rank websites and the formulas appear to change regularly. What is commonly known is that search engines use automated programs called spiders to continuously "crawl" the World Wide Web and retrieve data from web pages. The data is analyzed and indexed based on various criteria like structure, content, link value and other encoded information. When a web searcher enters search words at a search engine site, those words are compared to the search engine's index. The best matches are returned in an order the search engine deems "best results."

Herein lies the problem with an un-optimized website. "Allowing a search engine to rank your website," said Katz, "hence ranking your company's ability to meet a searching consumer's need, with no calculated marketing offensive on your part, would be similar to opening a new store and allowing your competitors to advertise in front of it, totally obscuring the view of your store."

It sounds extreme, but Katz said he's not exaggerating. In the age of digital marketing, Katz believes corporate websites should be given top-level priority, no matter what size the company. Realistically, a well-designed and search engine optimized website can impact nearly every other area of a company's marketing strategy including corporate identity, lead generation, sales promotion, communications, and advertising. Conversely, those same strategies will be seriously negatively impacted if the search engines can't find the company's website, or if the website makes a bad impression or offers a poor user experience.

Some companies attempt to optimize their own websites, but Katz doesn't recommend taking on that task. "Optimization can be difficult and time consuming, and it's learned through years of successful trial and error," Katz said. "If the optimization isn't done properly, or not maintained properly, your website can lose its ranking or even be blackballed by Google. You're better off hiring a professional Search Engine Optimizer."

Of course, not all Search Engine Optimizers are created equal. But, a lot of information is available regarding SEOs, and there are guidelines to help you find a good one. Here is a list of questions Katz suggests you consider when choosing an SEO for your corporate website:

1. How does their own corporate website rank with the search engines?
2. How long have they been in business?
3. Can they provide client references and what do their clients say?
4. How do their clients' websites rank with the search engines?
5. Are they knowledgeable and experienced in search engine optimization?
6. Are they responsive to your questions and concerns?
7. Do they respond in a timely manner?
8. Do they qualify their recommendations with bona fide research?
9. Do their keyword suggestions really match words your potential customers would search?
10. How does their fee structure compare to other SEOs?
11. Do they make honest and reasonable promises?

Katz recommends you meet with several SEOs before you hire anyone. "There are thousands of companies who say they can optimize websites, maybe hundreds who really can," he said, "and just as many more that will charge exorbitant fees for minimal results." However, Katz said, when a company does find the right SEO, and their website has been successfully optimized, they've mastered one of the biggest challenges of marketing in the 21st century.

David Katz co-founded Dynamic Digital Advertising in 1994. It is a state-of-the-art digital design and production company. DDA’s list of services include: website design, development and hosting; search engine marketing and optimization; website content development and management; e-commerce and website tracking; digital and traditional photography; CD-ROM, DVD and video production; 3D modeling, animation and virtual reality; print, packaging and trade show graphics; strategic planning, corporate branding and e-marketing consulting. Dynamic Digital Advertising's in-house staff includes marketing specialists, designers, photographers, videographers, webmasters, programmers and 3D animators. For more information about Dynamic Digital Advertising and search engine optimization, go to www.zeroonezero.com.


CONTACT INFORMATION:
David Katz, President
Dynamic Digital Advertising, LLC
215-355-6442 fax 215-396-8779
http://www.zeroonezero.com