At some point, you’ll also want to grow your search engine marketing channel. Studies have shown that organic listings are chosen first by 70% of people viewing search results. That means you can sharply increase your search engine traffic by appearing in organic results on first page of Google and Yahoo.

Measurement

It’s important to measure how much business is being generated (ROI) by marketing dollars you are spending on your search engine marketing strategy.

Do rising bid prices scare you away from search engine marketing? They shouldn't if you know which of your ads are winning customers and which are not. Measurement can tell you that and skilled split testing and maximize conversion rate. Split testing is a key value-add provided by professional Search Engine Optimization Professionals.

Persistence

Search engine campaigns are easy to set up and for that reason easy to neglect. You must monitor your campaigns regularly because search engines often introduce new features that can help you market your on-line business. If you neglect your campaign, even for a short while, you might find that you've dropped out of sight. An ongoing relationship with Search Engine Optimization Professionals can reduce this risk.

Curiosity

Don‘t be afraid to “tinker” with creative part of your search engine marketing strategy. Sometimes a small word or text change can double or even triple your click-through rate or conversion rate.

Try it, just to see what happens. It won't ruin your budget and might just put you at top of your game.

In conclusion, Internet is most cost effective marketing opportunity ever. By mastering these five fundamental elements to search engine marketing you can be among top performing websites in your industry.

Now with these facts in mind I’m confident you can clearly see what a top 10-search engine ranking can mean for your bottom line. Although it does leave a question unanswered in my mind, what has a higher ROI… organic search engine optimization or paid search?

According to SEMPO’s key analysis, U.S. & Canadian SEM Industry Size Estimate by tactic in 2004, organic SEO accounted for 12% of market share or $492,057,200 while Paid Placement accounted for $3,341,878,176 or 81.8%.

Interestingly, 9 out of 10 respondents are actively engaged in organic SEM marketing programs accounting for 89% of respondent advertisers. This trend can be contributed to average cost of popular keywords continuing to escalate.

If escalation continues to rise it could make paid search engine advertising exponentially cost prohibitive for all but largest advertisers… 900lb gorillas!

Simply put, ROI is outpacing inflation: SEMPO’s key analysis indicates advertisers could afford to pay on average 33% more for their keywords and remain profitable, while they say prices have gone up 26% on average in last 12 months. That’s leaves a 7% advertising margin to maintain current profits for 2005!

SEMPO’s data also noted that advertisers will get smarter about managing their paid placement programs before they cut back on spending.

This is also consistent with a report released by Nielsen/NetRatings indicating that growing demand for search engine advertising is outstripping supply of currently available advertising space.

These findings seem to indicate inventory of keywords is approaching a critical demand problem however; most advertisers felt they still have some degree of price flexibility in their paid placement programs before they will reach threshold of diminishing returns.

Is there any wonder why organic search engine positioning has gained popularity for online marketers in 2004? Could it be higher (ROI) return on investments?

SEMPO also cites that 43% of advertiser respondents have shifted their budgets away from other marketing programs for Organic SEO.

So what does it all mean? Let numbers speak for themselves.

Organic SEO is undeniably gaining favor over lower ROI paid advertising. This is evidenced by virtue of fact that paid advertising is becoming less profitable.

Although paid advertising will continue to hold a large portion of market share, as paid advertising returns diminish and keyword costs soar my early 2005 forecast is for materialization of a progressive organic SEO market trend to facilitate need for advertising space.