Search Engine Marketing and Online Advertising

“Internet marketing” is a broad term that includes search engine marketing (SEM), online advertising, ecommerce and email marketing. Search engine marketing, a Fergusson & Associates specialty, is discussed below. Online advertising, another specialty, is a lot like buying magazine or newspaper space, only the purchases are made on websites, often through a network buy. 

Many businesses already have an ecommerce or email marketing effort, but we can often help to make those efforts more effective with a new creative approach, such as copy or a redesign.

Whether you are a financial services firm, or a small business, you should know that at Fergusson & Associates we are focused on solving your marketing problem, not on trying to sell you on one or another Internet marketing solution. We will recommend a solution that fits your particular problem.

Search Engine Optimization and Search Advertising

For example, search engine marketing includes two main fields of expertise – search engine optimization (SEO) and search advertising. 

Search engine optimization is the process of editing a web site to make its code and content more visible to the search engine robots that catalog and index sites. 

Search advertising is a branch of direct response marketing that is adapted to the Web. Search advertising is also called pay-per-click advertising (PPC), or cost-per-click (CPC) advertising, because the advertiser pays the search engine each time a web searcher clicks on a search ad.

Many sites can benefit from SEO, but not every marketer needs search advertising.  We will recommend the most cost-effective solution for you, and, if there is more than one possible solution to a problem, we’ll present you with clear alternatives so that you can make an informed decision

Another thing to remember about Fergusson & Associates is that we see tend to see Internet marketing as first and foremost an exercise in direct marketing, and, to a lesser extent, branding. That means that we talk with you as one marketer to another, one businessperson to another, without a lot of technology or verbiage getting in the way.

Our business model keeps our interests in line with yours

Many online marketing firms get compensated on an agency model, that is, as a percentage of advertising dollars. At Fergusson & Associates, we think your needs are best served if we bill by the hour.

For one thing, you don’t have to worry about us pushing a particular advertising budget in order to expand our bottom line. In our view, a consulting, by-the-hour compensation model keeps our interests aligned with yours.

Moreover, we understand that many of our clients will want us to design and roll out an online campaign for them while they develop the capability to run their own in-house online marketing effort. 

If this is your plan, you should know that we support your goals, and would like to help you develop your online marketing department with staff selection, training and skill transfer. Our goal is to help you succeed with Internet marketing, and we believe that if we help you succeed, your referrals will help us succeed as well.