Search marketing certification in the West is well documented and supported by most search marketing organizations. However, in China the search marketing industry is still embryonic, so the need for a certification program to establish a skills level and professional competence is the first steps in promoting skills, knowledge and confidence for employers and clients.

In the past month SinoTech has validated through this certification program more than 100 people (outside the SinoTech group). The multi-choice exams are conducted online in Chinese and the exam is time limited to 30 minutes. This exam leads to a Chinese search marketing certification and the questions are specifically aimed at the search engines in China. You can read more about our certification program by visiting http://www.sinotechgroup.com.cn/certification/certification1.html

One question that we are often asked here at SinoTech Search is how much resource and spend the advertisers and brands should devote to Search Engine Optimization (SEO) versus Search Engine Marketing (SEM). However, it seems to be one of those questions that you never get a direct answer from most Search Marketing companies.

One of the first considerations when it comes to planning integrated campaigns is that of timing. The nature of SEM makes it a very agile compared to SEO, which can be particularly important when it comes to running reactive or tactical campaigns. Getting exposure against new keyword groups will always be quicker via SEM.

While SEM may be a faster way to get onto the results pages of the Search Engines, the results and insights gained from the campaigns can and should then be used to underpin longer-term SEO strategies. Analyze the ad copy and specific keywords that delivered results through your SEM and then use those insights to inform your SEO.

On a similar note, you can consider using SEM as a way for testing keywords, the copy and landing pages before you embark on a full scale SEO campaign. Use tools to ensure that you closely monitor how you compare against your competition and, where necessary, redress any negative balances with adjustments to your campaigns. For your top keywords, and particularly in aggressive industry sectors or at key times of the year, you may even choose to run your SEM campaigns as a loss-leader until your SEO has time to catch up.

A final point to consider is that SEM also exists in the space beyond the search and meta-search engines. You can select to run SEM ads on the content networks that will reach parts of the web that SEO can’t, further extending your online reach. Of course, when it comes to running contextual SEM campaigns, you need to start thinking about how your campaigns integrate with your broader product/company branding strategy. But that’s another topic for another post.

I was reading the blog post by Tim Ash on Search Engine Watch where he talks about the handbook produced by the Marketing Sherpa’s called “Landing Page Handbook”.

Tim’s post draws on the results from the handbook exploring the average conversion rates for different marketing tactics. The survey data was drawn from over 5000 active online marketers in a variety of settings.

In-house managed PPC Search - 3.84%
Outsourced managed PPC Search - 5.40%
Difference: 40%

In-house Natural Search Optimization - 2.62%
Outsourced Natural Search Optimization - 4.76%
Difference: 80%

What this suggests is when outsourcing SEO/SEM to a specialist agency, the conversion rates are much higher. Please note that statistics are always simply a gauge, the statistics did not breakdown the results by industry or company sizes, or other critical information. However, at a high level the data makes perfect sense, since agencies must perform better to justify their fees and keep their client’s loyalty and business.

Agencies that are specialists in a particular area see a wide cross-section of accounts and industries among their clients and should be able to do a better job. This post is not intended to criticize  in-house SEO/SEM teams but make the point that the Search marketing industry is moving very fast, and unless you have a whole organization focused on keeping up with the changes, it is very difficult to stay up on the latest developments.

Marketing activities are the engine of growth for a company. They are not administrative cost centers. Many companies mistakenly try to save a little money by running their programs in-house. They do not realize the real cost is in the lost opportunities that they can not capitalize on. If your in-house program is profitable, that is not enough - you must consider the scale of your program and always question how much money you might be leaving on the table. Giant conversion rate differences such as the above can be turned into strategic weapons that let you soundly trounce your competition.

So next time you consider the in-source / outsource decision, consider the opportunity costs as well as direct costs.

As the readers of this blog know, I work for SinoTech Search one of the leading Search Marketing firms in China and represents many Chinese and International companies in building keyword campaigns in Baidu, Google and Yahoo!. Therefore when I can across this article in Adweek Few Shops Practice Paid Search Skills, it was surprising to me that of the largest 56 US agencies assessed by Adweek, only five had sponsored links tied to their names on Google. The others did not have paid search links.

It’s very difficult to recommend certain things to our clients if we are not doing these things. I will be exploring the use of paid search within Chinese digital agencies in the coming weeks and will let the readers of this blog know if we are also like US agencies or we have a better appraication of SEM at the agency level.