8 Powerful SEM Strategies You Need to Master

SEM Strategy #5 – Master PPC Optimization

PPC marketing is an excellent strategy for acquiring leads. However, PPC is a risky search engine marketing strategy if you don’t know where to start, as it might consume all your budget in no time.

Hence, as a beginner, it is very necessary to set a daily budget cap before you begin running your Google Ads campaigns.

Here are some of the best Google Ads tactics to use in your search engine ad campaigns:

Implement Remarketing Lists for Search Ads (RLSA)

Create a tailored ad account structure for each segment and implement RLSA to target users who have previously visited your website.

To add your remarketing list, go to Shared Library > Audiences, and then click the red +Remarketing List button:

Perform Device and Location Bid Adjustments

Analyze the performance of your ad campaign on different devices (desktop, mobile, tablet) and in different geographic regions or locations and adjust your bids accordingly.

Target Similar Audiences

Google Ads identifies users with characteristics similar to those of your existing customers or website visitors, enabling you to reach potential new customers who share common interests and behaviors.

Utilize In-market Audiences

Target users who are actively researching or showing purchase intent in a particular product or service category. This tactic allows you to focus your ads on users who are more likely to convert.

Utilize Dynamic Keyword Insertion (DKI)

Dynamically insert the search query into your ad copy. Here is an example of how Google changes the ad copy automatically in real time based on the user’s search query:

Improve Ad Quality Scores

Optimize your landing page copy to improve your ad quality score. Craft compelling and persuasive ad copy, use relevant keywords in your ad headlines and descriptions, and highlight unique selling points or benefits.

Create an Ad Schedule

Schedule your ads to appear during high-conversion periods, ensuring that your budget is allocated effectively. You can specify particular hours or days of the week when you want your ads to show.

Try Different Ad Extensions

Use a combination of ad extensions, such as sitelink extensions, call extensions, image extensions and structured snippets to increase ROAS (returns on ad spends). Here is an example of an image ad extension:

Dive Deeper: Google Ad Extensions: Everything You Need to Know

SEM Strategy #6 – Build Backlinks

Link building is another important search engine marketing tactic that should be a part of an effective SEO strategy. Links are one of the top ranking factors that Google and other search engines use to rank websites in organic search results.

One of the best methods to build links to your site is by using guest posting. With guest post link building, you find websites in your niche and approach them by sending an email asking to become a contributor. Once your application is approved, you submit content with a backlink to your website.

Apart from guest posting, there are several other genuine ways to create or earn backlinks to your website, such as:

Create High-Quality Content

Produce high-quality content that provides value, answers questions and addresses your audience’s needs. Your content should be original, informative, engaging and shareable. Excellent content will help bring audiences to your website, and they will naturally link to these pieces as a valuable resource.

Leverage Broken Link Building

Find broken links on relevant websites and offer your content as a replacement. Contact the website owner or webmaster, notify them about the broken link, and suggest your relevant content as an alternative.

You can easily find the number of broken links on any website using the Ahrefs broken link checker. Enter the domain, and this tool will show you a list of broken links:

Publish Influencer Interviews

Identify influencers in your niche and ask to interview them. Publish their interviews on your site, and it might generate valuable backlinks for your domain.

Share Your Content on Social Media Channels

Engage with your audience, participate in relevant discussions, and promote your content on social media to attract attention and potential backlinks.

Create Powerful Linkable Assets

Publish content or tools that naturally attract backlinks. Some examples are infographics, research studies, comprehensive guides or interactive tools. These assets are more likely to be shared and linked to by other websites.

SEM Strategy #7 – Optimize the On-Page Elements

Optimizing on-page elements is crucial for improving the performance and visibility of your website in search engine results.

Here are the top On-page SEO elements that you should optimize:

• Title and Description: Optimize your title and description by including relevant keywords and keeping it concise (around 60 characters for titles and 155 characters for descriptions). Meta tag optimizations help to improve click through rates and drive more traffic.

• Heading Tags: Use relevant heading tags to help users and search engines understand your content easily. You should use your primary keywords in headings and their LSI variants in subheadings.
• URL Structure: Create clean, descriptive URLs that include relevant keywords and are easy for users to read and remember.
• Images: Use descriptive file names and include relevant keywords in the alt tags to help search engines understand the image content.
• Content: Use your primary keyword in the opening para of your content and optimize your page with several instances of exact match keywords, their LSI variants, synonyms, and related keywords. Also, ensure your content is comprehensive and covers all the required information for the users.
• Internal Linking: Include internal links within your content to guide users to related pages on your website, improving navigation and SEO.
• Page Speed: Optimize your website performance by increasing page speed. For instance, you can use a content delivery network (CDN) to deliver static files faster to users around the world. You can check page speed using the Google Page Speed Insights tool, which lets you diagnose different performance issues.

• Website Responsiveness: Ensure your website is responsive and mobile-friendly to provide a seamless user experience across different devices.

SEM Strategy #8 – Practice A/B Testing

A/B testing is an excellent method to compare two or more variations of a webpage or element to determine the best version.

Before conducting A/B testing, you should define your test goals like, improving click-through rates, increasing conversions, reducing bounce rates, or any other key performance indicator (KPI) relevant to your website or business.

After you have determined your test element, develop multiple versions (at least two) of the element you want to test. Each version should have a distinct change, such as different wording, colors, sizes, or placement.

Divide your website traffic into different groups, ensuring that each group represents a statistically significant sample size. Launch your A/B test and let it run for a sufficient duration, and analyze the results based on predefined metrics.

Here is a pictorial representation of how A/B testing works:

After determining the winning variation, you can implement it on your website to generate more conversions than before.

Last Word on SEM Strategies that Work

Use the advanced strategies discussed in this article to run successful search engine marketing campaigns. By implementing these search engine promotion tactics, you will be able to expand the online presence of your brand, leading to more impressions, clicks, and conversions.

If you’re ready to grow your business, Single Grain’s SEM experts can help!👇

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