People never stopped searching. There’s always the quest for the new. But in the marketing world, not much has changed. In the past 3,000 years, there are two targeting methods that were proved to be effective.

Asking the Question

Whenever people ask direct questions, those who have themed responses have higher chances of finding their customers. Relevant subjects on specific information give people the variety of options that they can choose from. Marketers just have to have the appropriate answers to the  customers’ search.

The key to search marketing is the ability to infer the intent of the people targeted. Web marketers at least need to have an idea of what these people are actually asking for.

Search is endless. Answers are unlimited. They always will be. Only our search “engine” technology and our power to look for information change. For example, if a company needs marketing services, The Northern Office offers it an array of services like online marketing, social media, content development, etc. So it is just having the right answers related to the direct concern of the customers.

Building bridges

From ancient pictographs to daily broadsheets to radio stations to tabletops – the concept of channels is forever. However, the way people use channels changed over time. In the pursuit of finding customers, marketers have countless options when it comes to choosing which channels to use for campaigns. Campaign just means executing a plan with an objective, a themed message which can be done in series, thru a single or multiple channels.

These channels are locations where in some way customers meet and gather. They serve as bridges for messages to reach and connect to people. Channels, in the online marketing world, are venues where users can access the internet and internet based tools, entertainment, or services. For example, facebook is a channel because a large number of people are users of facebook. In the same way that newspaper is a channel since a significant amount of people read it.

After understanding the basic categories of marketing, we now categorize them into two versions: organic and paid.

Categorizing the basics

Organic search happens when a user types a question by using a keyword, into a search engine’s box and submits it. It is also commonly known as the free search. While paid search is when advertisers pay search engines to get rankings in sponsored SERPs.

Important terms to remember:

Keyword = key phrase, search term, query
SERP(s) = Search Engine Results Page(s)
SEO = Search Engine Optimization
Rank = ranking : describes how you position in the SERPs a specific page appears in association to a particular keyword searched
Organic prominence : when a keywords attains a high organic ranking

Examples of organic search results may come from Google’s unsponsored results, Facebook’s internal search engine or Youtube’s free search results.  Since page ranking in organic SERPs is free, the competition can be pretty tight, especially for frequently-used keywords. Currently, the major search engines (Google, Yahoo, Bing) made SERPs personalized based on its users.  In order for companies and individuals to catch up, they should know how to establish their authority on the internet. This is done through search engine optimization. SEO is an important skill for web marketers since you drive traffic to your sites for free.

The catch: There are a lot of SEO spammers proliferating the web. So be careful when doing SEO. Click here to get assistance (hyperlink)

Below is a simple diagram to illustrate how online marketing is done in what category.

The internet, no matter how fast it may grow, is just one of the many groups of channels where customers can be targeted using search and contextual methods, which may be free (organic) and sponsored (paid). Times may change but the ABCs of marketing techniques won’t.

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