Internet Marketing, simply stated, involves the generation of user traffic to your website. Internet Marketing is dominated by two primary areas and tactics: Search Engine Optimization and Search Engine Marketing.

Search Engine Optimization (SEO) describes the practice of structuring your website in such a way that Google and other search engines rank your pages at the top of appropriate searches. This is achieved by utilizing a series of tools and best practices to determine the best keywords to include in your website's code and content, and then ensuring these keywords are properly integrated into your website.

Activity generated via SEO is also called "organic traffic", as you are not directly paying for the traffic, you are simply constructing your web pages and content in the most optimal way.

Search Engine Marketing (SEM) describes the practice of paying directly for user traffic. A good example of SEM is Google's "Adwords" program, in which you establish a budget and requested search terms, and users are supplied with an "ad" that links to your website when they enter the appropriate search criteria. You only pay for the traffic you receive, but you pay for every single "click-through".

Although it can become expensive, SEM can be very effective if done properly and monitored on an ongoing basis. However, smart organizations ensure they execute SEO prior to SEM, as organic traffic can be more powerful and less expensive than SEM.

Additionally, creating a blog like this one can be another excellent online marketing technique that can be utilized. Blogs should typically focus on value-added information presented in a concise manner. Since search engines treat blogs more like news than marketing content, they can rank higher in search engine results than similar content posted to websites.

Al Polanec
Principal and Co-founder

Pittsburgh Website Design
Pittsburgh Internet Marketing