By Harry Mackin

Search engine optimization (SEO) and search engine marketing (SEM) are different forms of digital marketing that require distinct skill sets and approaches, but one is not complete without the other. 

Utilized correctly, SEO and SEM complement each other, allowing a marketing team to balance short-term and long-term gains to achieve their goals more effectively than they could using only one or the other.

Read on to learn how both SEO and SEM work, and why they serve as complementary cornerstones in an effective digital marketing strategy.

What’s the difference between SEO and SEM strategy?

Search engine optimization (SEO)

Search engine optimization is the practice of continuously updating web pages to ensure they rank as well as possible for search engine result pages (SERPS) related to the keywords they’re targeting. 

SEO refers to all activities focused on enhancing a page’s organic SERP ranking. Unlike SEM, SEO practices don’t involve explicitly paying search engines to appear in SERPs. Instead, this discipline is about creating and optimizing high-quality content that aligns with user intent to rank near the top of searches for important keywords and queries.

All on-page website optimizations you implement to improve a page’s SERP ranking could be considered part of your SEO strategy. These include keyword research and implementation, content optimization, link building, user experience improvement, and more.

Search engine marketing (SEM)

Search engine marketing is sometimes used as an all-encompassing term for search-related marketing activities (including SEO), but often refers specifically to paid search engine advertising. Where SEO aims to rank on SERPs organically by providing best-answer content, SEM initiatives involve using paid advertisements to increase SERP visibility for a predetermined set of highly valuable keywords. SEM ads can appear in the “sponsored” section at the top or bottom of a SERP, or in an additional designated space to the side of the results. 

Though SEM involves direct paid advertising, it still requires considerable strategic planning and maintenance. Most search engines use a bid-based pay per click (PPC) model to determine which paid advertisements appear per SERP. These auctions occur whenever a SERP is called up by a user; winners are determined not only by the amount bid by each advertiser, but also by the quality, relevance, historical click-through rate, and more.

SEO and SEM differences in practice

The primary difference is that SEM refers to appearing in SERPs by paying to place advertisements in them, while SEO refers to everything you do to appear in SERPs without explicitly paying search engines to be there. 

This distinction means SEO and SEM are typically used for two different but interrelated purposes. SEO is considered the long-term play for rankings. By steadily building authority and following SEO best practices, sites can improve their SERP rankings and, therefore, their brand’s …read more

Source:: Top Rank Blog

Author: Aaron