There was a time when placing ads in the Yellow Pages and the local newspaper was the preferred marketing strategy of American businesses. That time has passed. Today, since most consumers surf the Web on a daily basis, it is crucial for businesses to enhance their Internet presence to reach their target audience. Based in Lake Mary, Search Engine Techs was formed to help businesses of all sizes accomplish that goal.
Search Engine Techs debuted earlier this year when Dan Kinchen, who owned One Step Solutions (an Internet marketing firm), and John Todero, who founded DyVERSE Marketing Group (a brand development and web design agency) decided to merge. Kinchen, who has extensive experience in Internet marketing, oversees the company’s day-to-day operations while Todero specializes in pay-per-click management and new business development. Their newest partner, Claudia Espejo, manages client relations.
Internet marketing is a broad subject. Search Engine Techs specializes in search engine optimization (SEO), reputation management and pay-per-click advertising campaigns. The company helps its clients improve its positioning on the Web via major search engines like Google, Yahoo!, Bing and ASK.com.
“The Internet, and not the Yellow Pages, is where consumers flock when looking for a product or service of interest,” Kinchen said. “Search engine marketing has emerged as one the most effective and efficient forms of advertising in this age of new media.
“In addition, search engines allow for the most precise tracking of Return on Investment (ROI) through web analytic technologies,” Kinchen added. “Traditional forms of push marketing such as advertising through newspapers, radio, and television are becoming less and less productive. In addition, it is extremely difficult to track the results. This is a main reason why a growing number of businesses are allocating their marketing dollars to avenues like SEO and pay-per-click advertising.”
Simply put, SEO allows businesses to show up higher on search engines. For example, without SEO, a company’s web site might be buried on a search engine page that is never seen (such as page 20 on Google, for example). Most Internet visitors only look at the first two pages of results on a search engine, thus the reason why SEO is vital so that companies’ web sites are highly visible when people conduct searches on Google, Yahoo!, Bing and ASK.com.
Some businesses rely solely upon SEO, Todero says, while others combine SEO and pay-per-click advertising, or start with pay-per-click advertising alone. Pay-per-click advertising allows businesses to instantly generate leads via search engines since their ads are listed in the search engine results.
Reputation management is a growing sector of Search Engine Techs’ business. It involves monitoring the Internet to ensure that harmful statements online written about a company or an individual are removed. There are many cases where hostile customers, disgruntled employees and ruthless competitors try to harm the respective company’s reputation by blogging or posting derogatory statements online about the company or specific individuals who work there. This can adversely impact the company’s business, recruiting and customer retention efforts, and the company's public image.
“We decided to merge our companies and form Search Engine Techs to specialize in niches (SEO, pay-per-click advertising and reputation management) that are rapidly growing,” Todero said. “Since decision makers and leaders at companies all of sizes are becoming more Web savvy, they are recognizing that importance of committing a higher percentage of their marketing budget to attract and retain customers on the Internet.”
Though SEO is becoming more prevalent, many people are still unfamiliar with the inner-workings of the process. Kinchen serves as an educator and an expert source about the subject and gives several presentations about SEO on a monthly basis. Each month, he holds an SEO Lunch, where he offers his advice for free at Gargi’s Lakeside Italian Restaurant near downtown Orlando.
Kinchen and Todero are helping spearhead a movement to bolster Orlando's technology community and working to increase the numbers of creative technology professionals in Central Florida, which they believe will in turn attract more technology companies. Todero, for example, is the co-founder of CoLab Orlando, which is located on the sixth floor of the Angebilt Building on Orange Ave. in downtown Orlando and gives independent creative professionals shared office space to work and collaborate.
As the Internet continues to evolve, a greater number of businesses will recognize the importance of building a strong online presence, Kinchen and Todero believe. This will make companies like Search Engine Techs invaluable and lead to significant expansion in the Internet marketing industry.
“There will be a time in the near future when it is commonplace for a company to devote all of its marketing dollars to tools such as SEO and pay-per-click advertising,” Kinchen said. “By positioning ourselves as a respected company in this field, we are poised for tremendous growth.”
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