Chapter 1. Why Is Search Engine Advertising Important?

Web sites that lack search engine visibility are losing business. Second only to email, the most popular activity for U.S. Internet users is information search ‚ 67.3% of users perform searches, according to the U.S. Department of Commerce. And an estimated 40% of Internet users are using the web to make product or service purchases. With the popularity of online searching on the climb, eMarketer calls search engine marketing "almost a no-brainer" for companies. ^[1] Figure 1.1 shows the breakdown of the top five Internet activities among U.S. users.

^[1] The eMarketer charts and quotes as provided herein have been reprinted with permission.

Figure 1.1. Product/service information search and product/service purchases are among the top five most popular Internet activities.

These statistics suggest that if you want shoppers to buy from your web site, one way to do so is to make sure they can find you in the search engines.

With nearly all search engines moving to some form of a "pay-to-play" model, companies must proactively advertise on search engines. Sure, there are still a few spots to land a free link. But those opportunities of the "good ole days" are nearly extinct. Don't worry, search engines are generating profitable results for a lot of companies. Yours can be, or may already be, one of them.