SEO -SEM Do you get it?

[famousartguy]

My question goes out to all of those who are well versed in SEO and SEM.
How comfortable are you with each of these and do you use a standard process for "working the system" or do you have to adapt very often to new strategies and tools?

[BigAlReturns]

SEO I'd say I'm pretty comfortable with. I'd use a reasonably standard process for on-site SEO, rewriting URLs, optimising titles etc, this doesn't vary a lot between sites. When it comes to link building, then there are so many ways of doing this, what I'd use on a particular site would really depend on the site itself.
SEM I've not got much experience with, so can't really comment.

[Dezynincodr]

I am a novice at both of these but I am learning SEO as much as I can since I know it can yeild big results for little $$$ once you are in a top spot. I have also tried PPC but spent more than I gained so I decided to call it quits.

[famousartguy]

Originally Posted by Dezynincodr

I am a novice at both of these but I am learning SEO as much as I can since I know it can yeild big results for little $$$ once you are in a top spot. I have also tried PPC but spent more than I gained so I decided to call it quits.

Same here. Does anyone know of a leading source for SEO? One big question I have is does everyone just use Google ( I know some that use yahoo, cause yahoo is seeking a larger $$ in the PPC biz and has some good deals.),but how do we determine exactly what Google looks for or doesn't? how do we determine the trends of SEO?

[BigAlReturns]

Originally Posted by famousartguy

but how do we determine exactly what Google looks for or doesn't? how do we determine the trends of SEO?

There's no way anyone (outside of Google) can know exactly what criteria they use to rank sites, so it comes down to experience and common sense. Experience includes your own sites, and what you read on blogs/forums. Reading several of these will let you build up an opinion of how much you believe what they say, as well as giving you a wider understanding of the subject.
Common sense is also key - the technique I use is to "think like a search engine." If you ask yourself a question, such as is technique x better than technique y, then think to yourself, if I was a search engine, would I find sites with x to be more relevant than sites with y?
Finally, we have some knowledgeable members on this very forum, so any questions you have, go ahead and ask them in the SEO forum. The SEO FAQ is a work in progress, but have a read of that as well, as it aims to answer some of the more common queries.

[ryanhellyer]

To follow on from BigAlReturns comments, SEO is a black art. No one really knows exactly what the best way to 'work' the search engines is. Even those who work at Google won't know what is best for Yahoo, just their own search engine. And if someone did know - they probably wouldn't tell us!

BigAlReturns advice on 'thinking like a search engine' is spot on too. I often hear people ranting about finding ways to trick the search engines, but the people I hear suggesting these types of things the most, are those who only have piddly small websites. The ones with huge sites always recommend concentrating on writing clean accessible code and building up external links. The search engine designers are constantly working to develop algorithms which can detect and penalise sites trying to manipulate their results accordingly.

Above all, the best thing to get traffic via search engines, is to concentrate on developing quality content. If you have quality content, backlinks will occur naturally and the corresponding increase in traffic will just happen.

Having said all that, I'm no expert on SEO and haven't had much luck getting traffic from them

[famousartguy]

Very nice post guys--thank you. Really!

[BigAlReturns]

Originally Posted by ryanhellyer

Above all, the best thing to get traffic via search engines, is to concentrate on developing quality content. If you have quality content, backlinks will occur naturally and the corresponding increase in traffic will just happen.

This is the one piece of SEO advice that if you follow, will guarantee to improve your rankings. When it comes to search engines, content is, and will for the forseeable future remain, king!

[shakir]

No Experiance in SEM. BUT Seo is the very interesting part and will get money for the effect. me working on link building site optimizing etc there is many SEO method .. m enjoying and earning

[breddg]

Hey,

SEO & SEM both are important for drive a traffic.

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