At the same time, companies are now starting to allocate a set budget for SEM efforts. No longer are businesses pulling money from other marketing channels to cover their SEM expenses. Search engine marketing is now an integral part of any marketing campaign.
- Direct sales has moved to the first spot as the primary objective of corporate search engine advertisers. Last year, 62 percent of advertisers said their primary objective was to increase brand awareness. Lead generation still holds number three spot.
- SEO is still the top form of search engine marketing. In fact SEO has grown in importance, from 80 percent last year to 83 percent this year, with PPC in second place.
Of course, these results should not come as a surprise to anyone who has been following the SEM industry for the past year or so. Big companies are discovering the profit-making potential of the SEM field and are actively getting into the game. Although many of them are newcomers, these corporations are effectively sidelining the small businesses, which have been dominating the industry since its creation. ![[]](http://www.searchmarketingstandard.com/wp-content/themes/sms/images/entry-end.gif)
No surprises, but as a search engine marketing company I love to see the positive results… and the info being published. Educating the C level execs is very important at this stage of the game.