Where to start first, SEO or SEM?

For a new business it can be a tough choice, should I bite the bullet and invest in SEO for my new site? Or should I try the safe route and spend the money on an SEM campaign? Where margins could suffer being lost in the mist of endless competition?

If you truly are starting a new business and do not have a lot to gamble, the SEM option may be your better choice. You can start to feed your profits by simply turning volume saving money for the SEO investment. I know how this sounds; the SEO guy is suggesting SEM! But if you are in a highly competitive field its going to take a lot of money to move the new site.

A few reasons why it can be such a tough process:

1). Google looks at the age of the domain, a new domain could spell trouble. You would need to build credibility towards the new domain. Rand Fishkin wrote a great article today about this exact subject.

2). Do you have enough real unique content to stand apart? Maybe not, you may just be taking the same data bits from the other sites that are out there. Not a great user experience and Google can see this.

3). You may have invested in the wrong technology, many new online sites get sold this amazing web design with a huge back log of technical problems. It could cost hundreds of hours repairing it. That’s why it’s so important to check the rankings of the other clients. If they don’t rank, something is wrong!

On the other hand if you can get the press coverage and have a unique offering you might just be able to take the risk. To asses the situation go to the search engines, check out the competition. See how long they have been in the business and most importantly figure out how many are competing with you. It’s important to realize that competition is not just the sales guys. It’s also the other sites out there, the ones that you may consider pointless, specs, news etc.

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Direct Link to offer

Sessions I wouldn’t miss at this Pubcon Las Vegas

Tuesday November 14th

If you are an in-house SEO guy I wouldn’t miss the In-House Optimization forum at 10:15am

Link Development and Linking Optimization can be interesting if the panelists don’t tare your site apart and expose your evil linking strategies at 11:35am

Corporate Mega Site SEO Management, this one sounds interesting. I won’t miss it, strange that my site is larger than all of them put together and I not on the panel, maybe next Pubcon. 2:45PM

Wednesday November 15th

International and Euro Optimization at 10:15am sounds great, if you have sites in multiple countries you really need to be a part of this.

Site Structure and Crawlability at 11:35 sounds good, if you have a large site I would definitely be here.

Thursday November 16th

Ecommerce Site Optimization at 10:15am This should be interesting I am speaking in this session. Prepare some tough questions for me!

Above all you must go to the Interactive Site Reviews at 1:30, this session is great! Matt gave me some great advice in Boston!



I will spread as much as I can about the parties as soon as I have the list.

SES San Jose – Day 1

Ok, I admit it. I didn’t even go to the first day’s sessions but I spent the day with a few very talented SEO’s. It was quite refreshing to sit down with some bright people for a change who actually have some clue how search engines work.

Normally I sit at the sessions and hear the constant I am so and so, and I am the best SEO out there. These people are useless, most people wouldn’t hire them in a million years and the ones that do are desperate. As a friend of mine would say, “They couldn’t even close a door” let alone a deal.

Later I wound up at the ASK party, this one was insane. The drinks where flowing and the bar tenders where breathing fire with everclear, which both the everclear and the lighting drinks on fire are illegal in California. I thought one of the bartenders was drunk; he kept dropping the bottles when he threw them up in the air.

Unfortunatly my schedule once again has made it almost impossible to get to the SES today, so I will be attending the Google Dance. I will finally attend the conference on Wednesday.

When are you spending too much for PPC?

Your initial signs of over spending can easily be quantified. If you are receiving more than +/-50% of your traffic from PPC, then you need to look at SEO. There is no excuse for spending 100’s of thousands of dollars and completely ignoring natural search. This happens more often that you know, most people just give up.

On the other hand you will have firms who spend $200-500k a month in PPC and think that a 150k SEO campaign is expensive. Imagine a public company telling their board that an investment of $150k is too expensive; when they can save over $1M a year. Think about it carefully before you blow the idea off. On the other hand just randomly choosing a SEO firm on a whim is dangerous. Investigate the firms; many of these firms have a lousy track record.

Check for the following when speaking with firms:

1) What is the customer service to client ratio? Many firms claim to have thousands of clients and a handful of employees to handle it.
2) Do they trash other competitors? Focus on the skills, not on the bashing. Most SEO’s are extremely arrogant, and think they are the best thing since the web was started. You will find these people become a hard ache after time.
3) Offers Guarantees? Forget about it, read the fine print. You might get 10% of your money back.
4) Research them! Ignore the gossip from jealous competitors, check with real clients!
5) Check out your rep! Many SEO firms employ fresh off the boat people with an extremely low salary, thus attrition can be high. If your rep isn’t happy at work, then you will not be happy with the work, or there a lack of.


I have heard of some SEO firms’ exec staff throwing furniture in a fit of rage for loosing deals. Childish antics signal instability. I will refrain from mentioning who it was.

Get them to send someone onsite! Learn from them, this is not brain surgery. The more you know, the higher the success rate will be.