Spun Digital - Finding customers online

Search engine optimisation is deemed essential at a large proportion of businesses.

According to a new survey by Practical eCommerce, SEO has become a top marketing medium amongst professionals working in the online retail sector.

The search engine marketing expert claims that 95 per cent of the companies it surveyed believe SEO is important to the success of their business.

Meanwhile, just one per cent of firms said SEO was not important to their overall business strategy.

Practical eCommerce's new study also showed that 82.8 per cent of firms believe their website has been designed to take advantage of the latest developments in search engine optimisation. Just 11 per cent said their website design was not geared towards search engine marketing and a further 6.3 per cent said they did not know.

But what is more interesting is the gaps that are prevalent in businesses' SEO knowledge - highlighting the distinct advantage that can be gained from hiring in a specialist search engine marketing company.

Some 40.6 per cent of respondents said that they "completely" understand the multi-faceted world of SEO. But more than half (54.7 per cent) said they only understand search engine optimisation "somewhat" and almost five per cent claimed to have no understanding of search engine marketing whatsoever.

The lack of thorough search engine optimisation understanding among businesses - which can be overcome by appointing a dedicated SEO company - was also highlighted in a recent study by search engine marketing news provider Genius, which showed that many companies are not using SEO to its full potential.