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1  Search engine marketing (SEM)

Search engines

 are a primary way of finding information about a company and its prod-

ucts (as explained in Chapter 2). We all now naturally turn to a search engine when we are 

seeking a new product, service of entertainment. The main options include Google, Bing 

or a regional search engine popular in one country such as Baidu in China, Naver in South 

Korea or Yandex in Russia. It follows that if an organisation is not prominent in the search 

engines, then many potential sales could be lost since otherwise, a company is dependent 

on the strength of its brand and offline communications to drive visitors to the website.

Consequently, Chaffey and Smith (2011) stress the importance of timing for  traffic- 

 building. They say:

Some e-marketers may consider traffic building to be a continuous process, but others 

may view it as a specific campaign, perhaps to launch a site or a major enhancement.