SEO (Search Engine Optimisation) has always been one of the biggest buzzwords on the internet. Recently, SEM (Search Engine Marketing) has been banged around too. What I aim to do here is to discuss what the differences between SEO and SEM actually are. What I say here should not be taken as correct - I’m really thinking aloud here and inviting discussion.

Let’s start with what wikipedia has to say on the two terms:

Wikipedia on SEO:

Search engine optimization (SEO) is a subset of search engine marketing, and deals with improving the number and/or quality of visitors to a web site from “natural” (aka “organic” or “algorithmic” search engine) listings.

And on SEM:

Search engine marketing, or SEM, is a set of marketing methods to increase the visibility of a website in search engine results pages (SERPs).

Now that we have a basic (and maybe not too helpful) insight into the two phrases, I aim to think aloud once more and delve into what the two terms mean for the keen internet marketer.

As a front end designer, which do I do?

Now it’s hard to put people into roles here as there are a vast array of different ways that studio’s around the world operate. But here, the front end designer is responsible for graphics, HTML and CSS on a website. In the real world, the front end designer may take on more or less responsibility for internet marketing and his/her role may be more ‘fuzzy.’

You probably do SEO. You have certain goals to aim for in natural search engine listings and have knowledge of the desired keywords/phrases that the site you are building must rank well for. The site is built with search engines in mind - you’ve followed many of the recognised ‘rules’ when it comes to titles, headers, internal links and copy.

What you’ve achieved here is SEO. The completed website is search engine friendly and has the best chance of doing well in natural listings. You’ve made a ‘Search Engine Ready’ website.

As an internet marketer, which do I do?

Here, the internet marketer takes control after the launch of the site. Again, in the real world more interaction between the two people (if in fact they are two different people) will most likely occur.

Chances are, you do SEM. You’re happy that the completed website is ready for you to do your work with. You’ve now got a good set of raw materials to work with.

You go about tasks such as attracting links, ePR, filling in directory listings, attracting reviews, advertised and anything else that could encourage traffic to the website or help with the ranking of the website in a search engine.

So what you’re doing here is SEM. Once given a search engine ready website, you’ve done all things within your power/budget to improve traffic to the site. And that’s the important bit - traffic.

Conclusion

SEO gets a website ready for its journey into SEM. SEM takes a nicely coded website and utilises the internet to attract traffic. That’s the important word. You might say that SEO is about just ranking whilst SEM encompasses ranking and traffic all bundled into one.

As I said, this is thinking aloud. SEM and SEO is a huge topic and I hope that this is a good introduction. I’d love to hear what you think about this subject and how define these terms at your workplace.

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