Is Seo Digital Marketing

Is SEO Digital Marketing? Not really… but it is marketing. I’ve had my ups and downs with marketing over the years, trying to learn digital marketing, SEO marketing, social media marketing etc. Honestly, I’ve read hundreds of books on social media alone. But my question still stands…

Okay, to give you a proper answer to whether seo and digital marketing are synonymous, we need to undertsand what seo really mean. LET’S DIVE IN!

The Meaning Of SEO (Search Engine Optimization)

SEO is part of digital marketing, and it’s actually a set of tools and best practices that help websites reach higher search engine rankings. The goal of SEO is to increase the number of organic visits (not paid) from search engines like Google because organic traffic is a key source of visitors and potential customers. SEO strategy focuses on getting the page on selected keywords and phrases at the highest search position possible.

In order for the website to be properly optimized and to make the SEO strategy successful, On-page and Off-page optimization need to be taken care of. First of all, you need to do On-page optimization, edit and customize the web pages itself, both on the technical side and the content side. We recommend reading our post 8 Tips To Make Google Love Your Website.

On-Page Optimization

The On-page Optimizations focus is on:

Quality and genuine content,
Internal Links structure,
External Links structure,
Site performance,
Keyword Density,
Relevant Titles & Meta Descriptions,
Images optimization,
Canonical URL’s,
Structured page Roborts.txt and Sitemap.xml and Error pages 301/404

Off-Page Optimization

The Off-page optimization focus is on:

Social media presence (Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, etc.),
Blog posting, Articles, Guest post,
Backlinks Management (it is important that the backlinks look natural and are from trusted and well-rated websites)

Traditional Marketing Vs Digital Marketing

The first thing to do is to understand the difference between traditional and digital marketing.

Traditional marketing relies on tools and mediums like:

The newspaper,
Radio,
TV,
Magazines,
Billboards,
Direct mail
and any form of print

Digital marketing, on the other hand, is made up of tools like:

SEM (Search Engine Marketing),
SEO (Search Engine Optimization),
SMM (Social Media Marketing),
Content marketing like blogging, articles or video creation,
Email marketing,
Online PPC advertising (Pay-per-click),
Mobile Marketing (ads targeting mobile devices)
and Affiliate marketing.

Main Difference Between SEO And Digital Marketing

If we already know what SEO and Digital Marketing are, let’s find out what the difference between them is.

1SEO Is One Of The Tools Of Digital Marketing

The first major difference between SEO and Digital Marketing is that SEO is one of the tools used in Digital Marketing. And if you want to start marketing for your website, you should first start with SEO. A site that is properly optimized for search engines will provide a good foundation for all other marketing activities.

2 Free Organic Traffic = SEO Vs Digital Marketing = Paid Traffic

The second difference is how your website gets traffic. SEO tries to make the site appear on the highest positions in crawlers like Google for certain keywords. The higher the page is shown in the search engine results; the higher free organic traffic is, while Digital Marketing focuses mostly on paid traffic and uses PPC advertising (Google Ads or Facebook Ads) and other marketing tools dependent on the company’s budget.

3SEO Cost Vs Digital Marketing Cost

Another difference between SEO and Digital Marketing is in terms of finance. In this regard, let’s take a look at SEO first.

SEO Cost: If the website is properly optimized, it will start appearing in the top positions in search engine results, and of course, organic unpaid traffic will increase. The only other expense is having to pay an SEO Specialist on a monthly basis.

Digital Marketing Cost: However, digital marketing does not stop at paying for specialist services. The cost of digital marketing can reach as high as a few thousand a month. For example, if a website appears on the first page of Google, or if a company’s ad appears on Facebook, that’s all paid ads and the ad campaigns strongly relying on the company‘s budget. Once the company’s budget is fully depleted, advertising stops and the company loses online traffic and the benefits from being positioned on the first page of Google.

SEO and Digital Marketing are not synonymous. Although similar, they are not the same. SEO specialists focus on optimizing a site in order to get the highest rankings in search engine results (SERP) and thereby increase free organic traffic. Digital marketing specialists focus on enhancing overall online presentation and visibility for consumers using their corporate budgets, using various digital tools including paid advertising to achieve their marketing goals. So now you know the difference between SEO and Digital Marketing.

The Crucial Elements of SEO Marketing

Keywords

Long gone are the days when keywords were the only SEO technique that mattered, but that doesn’t mean they aren’t still crucial. The difference is that today, keywords must be well-researched, carefully chosen, and judiciously used in your content in order to be effective.

But what are keywords, exactly? Keywords are words and phrases that prospects use to find online content, and that brands can then use to connect with prospects who are looking for their products and services.

When undertaking the key steps of keyword research, it’s important to look for ones that have high search rates and low competition and to choose short-tail keywords (such as dog), long-tail keywords (such as terrier puppies for sale), and local keywords (such as puppies for sale in Boston) to work into your content. Along with a primary or seed keyword, you should also have secondary and tertiary keywords as they will still offer value to your business. Finally, use keywords to optimize all your titles, URLs, and other on-page SEO elements (more on that later…)

Content

Content is a vital part of SEO because it’s the vehicle you use to reach and engage audiences. Knowing your angle and crafting content that fits is essential.

For instance, if you owned a nursery and wanted to increase your visibility, you might publish a series of blogs about gardening, choosing the right species of plants, growing tips, and more. When a person who wanted to know about gardening went looking for that information, your blog would come up, and you’d be able to build a relationship with that prospect by providing valuable information. The idea is that when the time came for that prospect to buy a plant, for instance, you’d be the first nursery that came to mind.

Today’s content must be educational, but also interesting, relevant, and shareable. Content comes in a variety of forms, including:

Web page content
Videos
Blogs (it’s easy to start your own blog to practise!)
Infographics
Podcasts
Listicles
How-to guides
Whitepapers and e-books
Social media posts
Local Listings

Off-Page SEO

Off-page SEO involves external optimization practices that happen away from your site rather than on it.

The main technique used for off-page SEO is backlink building since quality backlinks to your site from external sites tell search engines that your site is valuable and high-quality which helps to build authority.

There are many tactics to backlink building, and some of the current best practices include guest blogging, creating lots of infographics that will be highly shared, and using influencer marketing in your content.

P.S. You can read a complete guide to on-page and off-page SEO to make sure you know the difference and make the most of both. In addition, some experts are beginning to refer to off-page SEO as “reputation building”

Local SEO

Local SEO is becoming increasingly important as more and more people use mobile devices for search. These days, 60% of all searches are performed on a mobile device , and nearly half of those searches have local intent.

So, let’s say you own a restaurant, then local SEO would ensure that when people in your area went looking for the best restaurants in town, they’ll come across your site.

Along with using local keywords, other local SEO best practices include claiming directory listings, creating location-specific pages for your site, and creating pages for your business (also called doorway pages) on Google My Business local directories and Google Maps.

Search Engine Marketing

Search Engine Marketing (SEM) refers to paid marketing efforts, and it includes things like native ads, Google AdWords, social media ads, pay-per-click (PPC), Google shopping ads, display ads, and more.

Although SEM isn’t always a major component of a comprehensive SEO strategy, it does have its place as it can help you reach new and highly targeted audiences. You can also make your SEO and SEM work together.

Examples of SEM advertising activities include:

Paid and targeted campaigns
Keyword based copy that specifically relates to your business or product
Performance indicators such as click-through-rates (CTR) and cost-per-click (CPC)

Understanding the Importance of SEO for Modern Businesses

Visibility and Rankings

One of the most important functions of SEO is increasing visibility, which means making it easier for prospects to find you when they search for something you have to offer. Visibility is directly related to your ranking.

The higher you rank on a search engine result page (SERP), the more likely prospects will see you and click through to your site, so it’s key to increase your organic page ranking. The more effective your SEO efforts, the higher your ranking and the better your visibility, which is especially important when you consider that a quarter of web users never click past the first SERP.

Web Traffic

Increased web traffic is one of the main goals of SEO, and you increase traffic when you increase visibility and rankings. Consider this for a moment: the #1 spot on a Google search gets nearly 32% of clicks and moving up just one spot in search results can increase CTR by an amazing 30.8%.

The golden grail for many marketers is the ‘Featured Snippet’ which is often referred to as position #0 as it appears above the first ranked URL. This is usually content that’s taken from a landing page on a blog that answers a question people are searching for and can give your organic click-through a huge boost.

So, if you want more people to find your website through a search engine, then you need to use SEO practices that will help you rank among the top five positions, and ideally number one.

Authority

Page Authority (PA) is increasingly important to search engines as it’s becoming more important to web users. Essentially, authority means that your website is trustworthy, high quality, relevant, and has something to offer.

Scores range from 1 to 100 and the higher your number, the more authority your site has. You can find your PA rating by using tools such as Moz and while it’s difficult to influence it, many SEO experts believe it’s to do with link profile – getting external links from credible and well visited sources.

Creating a Better Visitor Experience

Another reason SEO is critical is because all the time you put into generating great content and on-page SEO optimization improves the usability of your site. This creates a seamless and positive customer experience.

For instance, when you take steps to make your site responsive, it will make it usable for all your mobile visitors as well as people who visit from a laptop or desktop. Similarly, by increasing your page load speed, you’ll reduce your bounce rate and encourage visitors to spend longer on your site. Consumers expect a page to load as quickly as possible with a limit on loading to not creep past three seconds! T he longer the load time, the higher the bounce rate and the lower your conversions.

SEO is important because search engines aren’t perfect. If you don’t take steps to counter their failings, then your website will pay the price.

For example, if a site doesn’t have a proper link structure, then search engines may not crawl and index the site properly which can lower rankings. Coding errors can block search engines entirely, making it impossible for your site to rank, no matter how much time you put into other SEO efforts. Other common areas where search engines can run into problems include:

Duplicate pages
Forms
Images, flash, audio files, video, and other non-textual content
Language and Semantics

Conclusion

SEO, or Search Engine Optimization, is the process of getting website(s) to rank higher for keywords that are relevant to your business. A successful SEO campaign can target multiple keywords which results in an increase of traffic to your website leading to more conversions and ultimately more revenue.